Stop putting limitations on your life

There is this sneaky game we play with the Universe called manifesting. And believe it or not, like it or not, you are a powerful manifestor! Everything you believe, think, say and do is manifesting something in your life. Are you paying attention to what you are creating?

If your life is filled with things you don't like or don't want, it's time to pay attention. Because that means you are inadvertently creating things that work against you rather than for you. You will know this is true for you if it feels like no matter what you do, you just can't get a break. Things just don't seem to go your way.

It's an easy trap to fall into because we don't do it consciously. So it feels like it just happens. But this is untrue. We know from science that what we think becomes our reality. And we can change reality by changing our thoughts.

When we change our thoughts, we change our focus. When we change our focus, we change what we feed with our energy. When we change what we feed with our energy, we change what we create. Sound simple?

It really is simple...but it's not so easy to do because so much of our lives are run on "auto pilot." We have billions of thoughts stashed in our sub- and un- conscious minds that drive our thoughts, words and actions without us ever knowing it. All we see are their consequences. And not all of them are pleasant.

COST VS. INVESTMENT

Here is a simple example of imposing limitation in your life. It's something I hear often: "How much does it cost?" "I can't afford that." "I don't have the money." "I'm broke." etc.

First of all, there is a big difference between a cost and an investment. Calling something a cost when there is a huge return for you personally is wrong. I do not see an investment in something that serves you in amazing ways as a cost and neither should you; it is a gain! An investment in your wholeness, happiness and fulfillment, in something that serves your life in  powerful and positive ways is always a gain.

THE INFINITE ABUNDANCE OF THE UNIVERSE

Second, it is limiting. As soon as you say things like It costs too much or I can't afford that or I don't have the money, you set limits to your level of abundance. You are acting as though there is a limit when there is not. This Universe is infinitely abundant. There is no scarcity here and no one is excluded from the abundance available. But you must stop putting limitations on your connection to it; and that starts at the level of your thoughts and words. Otherwise, all you will continue to see reflected back to you in reality is the lack and scarcity held in your thoughts, words and actions.

BUILDING PROSPERITY

Third, this is not to say you should be careless or thoughtless with your resources. No, quite the opposite. Of course it is important to hold high awareness around how you use the resources you have. But it serves best to put as much focus on building your resources as you do on not being careless with the ones you have. To build your prosperity, you must open to receive more than you can imagine and from sources you can't imagine. Otherwise, the picture will never change. Opening to the infinite possibilities of the Universe is what creates true resourcefulness.

MONEY AS ENERGY

Fourth, what is really happening when you invest in yourself? Money is nothing more than energy. And beyond that, it is a symbol of love. When clients sign up for my After A Breakup BOOTCAMP, for instance, they exchange their money for my guidance to help them reclaim their happiness and wholeness. They show themselves love by investing money in themselves, and I show them love with my guidance. So money becomes an exchange of love energy for their empowerment. 

ASK AND THE UNIVERSE ANSWERS

Fifth, this exchange of love energy is very important and here is why. It gives the Universe a clear message of what you want. When you exchange money (love energy) for something that serves your highest good, you tell the Universe, Yes! This is what I want! There is no guessing, no hesitation, no confusion; you've put your focus on it and your energy into it so the Universe goes, Ah, that is what she wants! And then it conspires with you to make it happen to your empowerment. But if you go into a dance of I can't afford that, it's too much, I don't have it, I can't... the Universe goes, Hmmm, does she really want it? Maybe not. And nothing aligns to help you get it.

SYNERGY OF A GROUP

Sixth, the energy that flows between two or more people working toward a goal is powerful! It's the old spiritual teaching, when two or more are gathered in my name. There is a synergistic flow that happens, like an upward spiraling of the energy that amplifies and elevates the experience for everyone. And having a mentor or guide on your side helps you reach your goal more easily and successfully. In the case of my BOOTCAMP, for example, I become your personal trainer to inspire you when you feel frustrated, encourage you when you want to give up, guide you when you don't know how, steady you when you wobble, and get you back on track should you stumble.

So all this is to say again, pay attention to what you are creating in your life. Stop imposing limiting beliefs! And get help if you feel unable to create what you want. Because it is there for you; you just have to learn how to access and connect with it.

How to Make 2018 an Amazing Year for Yourself (and the rest of us!)

Listen to your heart. What does it tell you?

Are you happy inside? Loving the life you have? So full that you overflow with joy? Living low-stress day to day?

If your answer is "Yes," congratulations! You are on a powerful path of keeping your courage high and your heart open. And by doing so, you serve the vibration of the planet in a positive way. Thank you!

And if your answer is "No," why not? What stops you? So many things can. Is it depression? Scarcity? Fear? Doubt? I can promise you that whatever it is lies deep within your psyche; you may not even know it's there. Because if you did, why wouldn't you change it?

I don't know anyone who wants to live out their lives in depression, scarcity, fear, doubt, or whatever else plagues them. But something stops them from taking steps to change their lives and break free of their pain. Usually, at the root of being stuck is fear. 

I speak to many people who are on a path of evolution right now. There seems to be a massive awakening taking place, meaning that many people are gaining a deep understanding of their place in this reality, and they feel inspired to elevate the vibration we share. These folks are ready to do whatever it takes to change their experiences from painful to powerful because they recognize the value of themselves and their lives. And they recognize that by raising their personal frequency, they participate in raising the frequency of the entire planet, which benefits everyone. This is BIG! 

I also talk to many people who are stuck in a low frequency, a low vibration. Rather than choosing to uplift and evolve their lives, they are stuck in stories of depression, scarcity, fear, doubt, or whatever else their mind concocts. When I speak to these folks, they are angry, closed, resistive, and in attack mode. Who wouldn't be? 

Believing we live in a Universe that diminishes us puts us on a hampster wheel of feeling defensive, forcing us to live in a constant mode of "fight, flight, freeze, or join." We either attack, leave, numb, or find others to commiserate with, none of which serves us in breaking free of our pain. And it certainly does nothing to elevate the Planetary frequency we all share.

The deal is - we get more of what we focus on, meaning that what we give our attention to, we feed our energy to and it grows in our lives. It doesn't matter if we want it or not, or if it's positive or negative. It's what our attention is on and our energy is feeding, so it grows. The Universe doesn't sense dualities like positive or negative, want or don't want. It senses what we are feeding with our attention and energy, and assumes we want more of that.

If our attention and energy are focused on everything we don't like or want, our life sucks because we get trapped in a low frequency. We spin in useless patterns that consume our energy. We never seem to get what we want. And we certainly can't catch a break or get ahead. Instead, we seem to get more and more of what we don't want. 

Stuck in this low frequency, we can spend our entire lives feeling miserable and looking for our next persecutor, because of course we believe there is one. There is always someone to blame for our pain either instead of or in addition to ourselves. Or we turn someone into our hero who doesn't need to be. Or we judge and torment others to try and feel better ourselves. 

But mostly, we default into a pattern of neglecting or rejecting our true selves, and we end up miserable and suffering inside. Which then shows outside in the content of our lives.

The more stuck we feel, the more stuck we get, until pretty soon we don't know any other way to be except stuck. And we can't imagine being anything else. Even when we encounter people who broke free,  who offer us something different or model for us a higher vibration, we ignore the offer or excuse away their happiness as luck or privilege or even pillage...something unavailable to us for whatever our reasons.

Pity. It doesn't have to be that way. We can raise our frequency and shift our vibration to transform the content of our lives. It really is quite simple. But we imagine it is going to be too difficult or painful or terrible or impossible, so many of us don't even try. Ever. 

We convince ourselves that we are special but not in a good way; in a way that says we cannot have what we want for whatever our reasons. And we believe that happiness is out of our reach. So we spend our time dragging down everyone else's frequency to match ours instead of lifting ours up to match theirs.

Notice that I described the transformation process as simple rather than easy. It is simple; it is not necessarily easy. But I guarantee it is easier than spending your entire life in misery! And a heck of a lot less scary than we imagine it might be. The process of transforming our lives comes down to making a commitment to ourselves to do so, mustering the courage to face the unknown, and then taking a step at a time through whatever we encounter until we reach the other side. Simple, right? But not necessarily easy.

So how do we jump off that hampster wheel of low frequency? To answer that question, we must understand how we get stuck on it in the first place.

For one, we each develop an unconscious - or hidden - inner guidance system during childhood that we never notice. Like a secret GPS that directs our thoughts and choices. But this hidden guidance system tends to be based on information that is faulty and misleading. Following it, we end up where we never meant to go, feeling alone, hurt, and confused, having little idea what happened or how we got there.

For another, if we don't value ourselves enough, we will most likely not be willing to invest in ourselves to change our frequency. Because we won't feel we are worth it. I have clients who come to me feeling broken, unlovable, alone, and afraid but they won't invest in themselves to transform their lives because they don't feel they are worth whatever it takes to do so. It is so very sad to me that they cannot feel their inherent worth and value. It breaks my heart, every time. 

Even more sad is that many people are willing to invest more into external things like A/C units, cars, or their looks than they are willing to invest in themselves - their inner Selves. They get caught in traps of unworthiness, or they develop a distorted notion of what self-worth actually is, so they prioritize everything but themselves. 

Don't get me wrong; we have responsibilities to tend to in our lives. I'm not talking about blowing off our necessities. I'm talking about what we prioritize in our lives. We all have access to the abundance of this Universe; there is no question about that. Everything we need is available to us, but we have to be open to receiving it in order for it to enter our lives. 

If we are internally, energetically closed down by unworthiness or self-pity or anger or doubt or fear or any number of other low frequencies, there is no room for the abundance of the Universe to enter our lives. At its core, this is about our sense of self-worth and value, yet it is entangled with scarcity and lack, abundance and prosperity. But I will reserve that topic for another blog!

Lastly, changing our lives is a process that takes commitment. There is not a pill to fix it. Or a book. Or an event. Or a person.  Ultimately it is up to ourselves. We must love ourselves enough to seek the support we need to update our faulty inner guidance system and grow. It is not a fleeting experience; it is a journey. 

Generally, we start the journey by feeling uncomfortable with something in our lives. And our inner struggle begins. Maybe we get sick. Or have an accident. Or someone we love dies. Or our job sucks or we lose it altogether. Or our partnership ends. Or we discover a betrayal. Or we finally acknowledge that we are unhappy.

When the pressure builds enough and we decide we can't live this way any longer, something shifts. It's as if we break open from the inside out and burst to the surface, gasping for air. We know we will drown if we don't change something. 

Why does it take us so long? Why do we suffer so long in the struggle? Because without an anchor, change is too hard to hold onto in the context of the familiar, unless or until it reaches critical mass. With critical mass, we feel we have no choice: change something or continue to be miserable until we die. Then we feel lost and confused, thrust out of our familiar comfort zone into the wild unknown.

It's easier for us to stay in our comfort zone - even if it's not all that comfortable - because at least it's familiar. We know how to do our lives the way they are. But we don't know how to do something different. So we don't invest enough of our energy into making something different happen because we are not sure how, or what it will look like. The unknown is a scary thing for many people.

The tricky part is that until we invest at least 51% of our energy into making something different happen, it won't happen. Well it might, but when energies are left unattended, things tend to change in ways we don't want. Think of it this way: if we have 50% of our energy invested in staying the same and 50% of our energy invested in changing, what do you think will happen? Nothing. Nothing significant will happen because it's a toss-up and it's more comfortable for us to stay in what we know, even if it's not exactly what we want.

All it takes to break free of this low-frequency trap is to invest at least as much energy in our selves as we do in everything else. Because until we do, nothing significant will change in our lives or in the world we share. And in order to do that, we must value, respect, and love ourselves. This is not selfishness; this is self-awareness. This is how we evolve.

Every challenge in our lives is an opportunity to grow and evolve. Challenges cause tension inside of us. That tension is our invitation to do something different, to change something. Without it, we would not grow; because why bother if there is nothing disturbing or upsetting us...enough?

We change because we either have what we don't want, or we don't have what we want. And eventually, if the tension increases enough, we get fed up with it. Or we change because we reach a threshold of discomfort we can't tolerate any longer within ourselves from something outside of ourselves. Or we change because we don't have a choice. Or we change because we encounter a crisis.

Changing is not the enemy here! We are our own worst enemy by not valuing and loving ourselves enough to take a stand for ourselves. Or by tolerating what we don't deserve. Or by rejecting the possibilities that are awaiting us. Or by not honoring our truth. 

Well I say no more! If there was ever a time to become self-aware, this is it. I say it is time to take that stand for yourself, to stop tolerating the shit-show you find yourself in, to stop rejecting the amazing things that await you in the field of infinite possibility, and to honor your truth. Because you are worth it!

2018 is the year, Baby. In ancient Numerology, it is a number 11 - the highest, most evolved frequency. It is about awakening, and about a perfectly powerful balance of masculine and feminine energies. According to the Chinese calendar, it is also the year of the Earth Dog, promising to be productive and tiring yet refreshing and regenerating at the same time. 

Get ready...Get set...GO! Go! for your self and Go! for all the rest of us! Change your life. Raise your frequency. And do your part in elevating this reality to a higher vibration. You can do it! We all can do it! Because we are all worth it and so is this reality we share. One step, one day, one change at a time. Before you know it, you will wonder why on Earth you waited so long...

Blessings to you, my friend.

FOR MORE INFORMATION about this, watch this and other videos at: http://bit.ly/2iIhq41

[NOTE: If you are a woman struggling to recover from a breakup or divorce, consider joining my women's only, closed Facebook Group, After A Breakup: Going From Heartache To Happy. This group offers support, guidance, new perspectives, and wisdom; and gives you and your experience a place to be held and heard.]

Solar Eclipse: More Sacred Opportunity Than Spectacle

This may or may not be news to you, but there is so much hype about the upcoming Solar Eclipse of August 21, 2017, that I feel compelled to share about it on a deeper level, for your consideration.

It came to my attention that the upcoming Total Eclipse of the Sun is not a “spectacle,” as it is being treated in typical Western fashion, but a sacred and powerful event. For instance, certain Native tribes share that this Eclipse is an intimate and rare encounter between the Sun, Moon, and Earth, a connection to be respected rather than “stared at.” They add, in fact, that it is "rude" to stare at it. The word that comes to mind for me is “disrespectful.” 

From a Shamanic perspective, the Total Eclipse of the Sun is a powerful and significant event, providing an opportunity for heightened awareness and positive change. Out of the light from which we are born, into the shadow of this ego-oriented reality, and back to the light of our true nature we die - a Solar Eclipse symbolizes the sacred journey of our lives.

  
Here are some other reasons why the Solar Eclipse is not only a significant opportunity, but a sacred event:

From an energetic standpoint, the Total Eclipse of the Sun signifies change, or a disruption of the norm. For instance, it is not "normal" for the Sun's light to be blocked, or to glimpse twinkling stars during the daytime, or for the Planet Earth to be cast into full shadow. The symbology of these things is intriguing.

The Total Eclipse of the Sun flips the reality of what is on its head. It is a turning over of the status quo. It rocks the energetic boat of our lives, offering a significant opportunity to reboot outdated, hurtful patterning.

This Eclipse invites us to explore the multitude of changes within ourselves, our lives, and our world that feel like a “disruption of past norms.” How do we respond to them in a way that maintains our integrity and fosters harmony or even evolution? This is the challenge; it matters not whether we feel aligned with the changes or disruptions we face. And there are many right now.

How we choose to address the changes is significant: it is the point of our personal power in terms of what we manifest in this reality. Through our choices, we can either make substantive healing and peace possible, or we can feed the wounding and chaos - within ourselves, our lives, and our world.

Just as the Earth will be cast into shadow, we, too are thrown into the shadow of our beings, our lives, and of what we have created in the world, even if only through our ignorance, apathy, or by our default membership in the Human Race. We are all responsible, since we are all energetically inseparable. 

This event invites us to look deeply inward to search out the shadow aspects of our being that we generally deny - those parts of ourselves we reject; those parts we are ashamed of and choose to keep under cover; those parts of ourselves that in some way contribute to our personal and global suffering. By bringing them into the light (of our awareness), we claim the opportunity for change, allowing us to make a different choice - to release and move beyond them to something greater for ourselves and our world, rather than continuing to hide them in the shadows of denial, fear, apathy, ignorance, or rejection.

Something powerful this way comes…

2017 - The Year of the Ten Fire Rooster

 2017: The Year of the Fire Rooster

 

About now, you may be brushing the dust from your clothes, grateful to have made it through the crazy Fire Monkey antics of 2016 relatively unscathed. For many personally, and for all of us nationally, we went through one of the wildest roller coaster rides of our lives this past year. Standing firmly in the new year, we can release a big sigh. But it ain't over yet, folks...

2017 may not bring much relief, though it is sure to harbor more change. In numerology, 2017 amounts to a number 10 or a 1 (the energy of 1 magnified by 0). This number is associated with new changes and also with the potential for peace, harmony, unity, and vitality. The number 10 also relates to manifestation and the potential to create a wise balance among seemingly opposing principles such as masculine/feminine, creation/destruction, good/evil, etc. resulting in a powerful wholeness...all feel-good possibilities.

With so much going for us, how can we go wrong? Because even though the foundational energies of this year offer an opportunity to evolve to a higher vibration, we must claim it. The number 10 also comes with a dark side that is ruthless, competitive, unemotional, domineering, stubborn, independent, and eccentric. If we play out these qualities instead, we are sure to suffer.

Now let's add in another piece of the 2017 puzzle: January 28th marked the start of the Chinese New Year - the year of the Fire Rooster. The energy of Fire Roosters is generally cocky, dominant, overly self-assured, resourceful, hard-working, bullying, boastful, vain, courageous, outspoken, blunt, egotistical...sound familiar? 

Interestingly, our country's new leadership personifies this energetic like never before. Barely a month in and there have already been authoritarian rumblings from Washington that smack of an "I don't give a damn about protocol" approach to governance. We would be wise to pay close attention to where things go from here, as our nation moves ever so tentatively through this historic period.

Such a 10 Fire Rooster-esque profile is ripe for big, huge things to happen, but we cannot say of what nature. Perhaps this energetic is exactly what we need to catapult us forward into evolutionary greatness as some believe. Or perhaps this energy will tear us down in brutal ways as others believe. The potential is ripe for either to occur. And most people stand with firm conviction on one side of that belief or the other. 

 But I will say this: If you give a rat's ass about things like compassion, integrity, unity, stewardship, diversity, or equality, you best pay attention. The dark side of 10 Fire Rooster energy is not interested in such things. Nope; they are interested in only one thing: getting their way. They like their way, and they tend to disregard the rights and opinions of others to get it. That's the tricky deal with the dark side of 10 Fire Rooster energy; its nature is divisive rather than unifying.

Two verbs to ditch not only this month but this entire year are apathy and complacency. Just pitch them right out of your world because a 10 Fire Rooster energy demands the opposite - a centered, clear, assured, solid stance with deliberate and right action. Right action? Who can say what that is? 

In a nation more strongly divided into two distinct camps than we've seen for generations, with each group determined to stand up for what they believe is right...all wallowing in the cocky energy of the 10 Fire Rooster...there is potential for things to get rather ugly this year.  

Standing up for what you believe in is fine; necessary even. Just be careful not to stoop to the immature bully-antics that the cocky 10 Fire Rooster may bring to the ring. If you do, you just may find yourself on the receiving end of a mighty ass-whipping. Knee-jerk reactions do not serve the individual or our current evolution as Human Beings. Neither does being overly optimistic, overly pessimistic, or plain old apathetic. Clear, conscientious conviction with decisive, aligned action is what is called for.

Aligned action can be as simple as holding an undying faith in the inherent goodness of Humankind. Goodness is in each one of us somewhere; even those we may view as our enemies. Goodness is everywhere, actually. Just take a quick look around. People everywhere are standing up for goodness in all kinds of ways, big and small, publicly and privately, because they believe. They believe in the importance and power of things like compassion, integrity, unity, stewardship, diversity, and equality. And they believe in the importance and power of basic Human goodness.

But you won't feel a connection to that goodness if you don't do anything to cultivate it in yourself. One simple way to do so: meditate. Even 3 minutes a day of meditation can achieve this. Meditation is also a powerful way to stay out of knee-jerk reactions so you don't add to the messiness of the Fire Rooster energies at play in the world, or find yourself on the receiving end of an ass-whipping. Plus, as a bonus, every time you meditate, you shift one vibrational thread in the energetic matrix of our world toward the light and love and goodness of the Universe...and every little bit helps.

Try something basic like the universal Sanskrit syllable of Om (believed to be the basic sound of the world, containing all other sounds), or Ra Ma Da Sa Sa Se So Hung (another Sanskrit Mantra that invites unity of heart).

Or you can simply meditate on your breath, knowing it is connected to all other breaths. Or on the goodness beating in your own Human heart, knowing it is connected to the goodness in all other hearts.

So it appears, my friends, that 2017 will be a year of big change and action. Let's make it right action based on unity rather than segregation, equality rather than inequity, and compassion rather than ego...all of which start within each and every one of us Human Beings, and all of which are nurtured through meditation. Such a simple action makes a powerful difference. This month's energy tip: start meditating regularly.

Til next time... Namaste'

Crazy Cloud of Crap

We are now technically into the third week of September and...

Wait a minute...how did we get to September...NINE months into 2016...already??

Don't get me wrong; I will be uber-happy to move beyond this crazy-ass, Nine Fire Monkey year (See my blog from February). But seriously, how did we get through 3/4 of this year already...? It feels like we just celebrated the new year. 

Anyway, moving on...

This month, the heat of Summer is beginning to (subtly) recede as we round the corner toward Autumn. But wow, are things boiling hot! The election hype, the Olympic hype, the violence hype...It's all spinning around us like a tornado, creating a crazy cloud of crap we have to navigate our way through.

Don't delude yourself into thinking you are not impacted by these things. We live in a single, unified field of energy, as all the fish in the ocean do. Waves of energy in the form of vibrations and impulses gently nudge or harshly slam into us, just as they would if we lived in the ocean.

So not one of us is insulated from anything that happens on this planet (or beyond, if you want to go there). What happens, even if on the other side of the globe, impacts us, though we may or may not be consciously aware of it.

How do I know this? Because quantum physics has finally proven it to be so. When stimulated, particles of matter respond to each other, even when separated by thousands and thousands of miles across the globe. We - you, me and everything else here - are particles of matter, constantly responding to the experiences of those around us.

"So what?" you may ask. "What does this mean?"

It means if you find yourself feeling tired, sluggish, overwhelmed, blah, uneasy, perhaps even exhausted or depleted, irritable, angry or ill, your body system is likely struggling beneath the crazy cloud of crap I mentioned earlier. There is no way to escape it...

Well, that is not exactly true. There are things you can do to shield yourself from the influences of these more dense energy vibrations. But they take practice and to practice them, you have to learn them first. Then, you have to do them regularly. The more you do them, the better they work for you.

Some of these things are simple; some are more complex, coming to us from the indigenous, deeply connected cultures of the world. And they work. Really well.

Managing the impact of the crazy cloud of crap on you is twofold. First, take steps to minimize your contact with it. Second, take steps to minimize its impact on your body system.

Here are some things to stop doing to minimize your contact with it:

• Stop bombarding your system. Unplug from screen technology (TV, internet, phone, etc.) as much as possible. If you choose to engage with them, be very specific about why you do and with whom you connect. Don't drown yourself in other people's rhetoric, spin, drama, opinions, and emotional energies. These things penetrate your personal energy field and pollute it with gunk, leaving you feeling low, sluggish and off-balance both physically and emotionally. If anything significant happens, you will hear about it anyway.

• Stop taking things personally. Every single person on this planet has an opinion about what is going on, including you and me. Whether people's opinions are right or wrong, true or not, is irrelevant; they are just people's opinions and people have a right to them. Arguing, rationalizing, explaining - these are all antics of the ego and probably will not change someone else's opinion. Your energy and passion are better spent elsewhere. So let others be, without taking their opinions on as a personal affront.

• Stop neglecting yourself. Your body needs to be energetically nurtured just as it needs to be physically nurtured. When you get "slimed" by crazy clouds of crap, your energy body needs a good cleaning to restore its vibrancy and re-balance its functioning. The better it functions, the less vulnerable you are to the impact of such clouds, and the better you feel.

Here are some things to start doing to minimize its impact on your body system:

• Start spending more time doing things that inspire your senses, like playing, creating, dancing, singing, visiting with others (face to face, not via a screen), or anything else that awakens you (hiking, biking, spending time outdoors, listening to favorite music, cooking, meditating, road tripping, doing yoga, bubble baths, writing, napping, snuggling, etc.). 

• Start trusting in something larger than yourself. Trust that there is more to what is happening than you can possibly comprehend. The tapestry of Life reaches far beyond our full comprehension, so find something bigger than yourself to entrust its design to. Trust that the Divine Source of all things always works with us and never against us, even in the midst of a crazy cloud of crap.

• Start soaking in a hot bath with lots of Epsom salts. This is my favorite way of cleansing the body's energy field of slime. Emerge feeling more vibrant and radiant.

If you find yourself suffering from the crazy cloud of crap spinning around us, give me a call. I've got lots of tools in my toolbox for just this sort of thing.

A Brick in Disguise

You know those moments when you look around and feel grateful for your life. You have had them; we all have. People around you are struggling through big changes and yet your life seems tranquil and happy. You smile inside.

The thing is, it is just a matter of time before that tranquility and happiness you feel disappear into the abyss of change in your own life. Change always comes. It is the one constant. It cannot be avoided. It is the nature of the force that creates life. That force is fluid, not static. Things do not stay the same for long.

I had one of those moments recently, driving along in my tranquil, happy life when BAM! Change happened. What I imagined would be another nice experience on my long trail of "happy" turned out to be a brick in disguise. Not a dinky, reality check brick, but a huge, smack you hard on the head kind of brick; a send you reeling, give you a nasty concussion kind of brick. 

And when I awoke from my concussion, I realized it wasn't just one brick that hit me, but a whole truck load of them. Change happened. Life as I knew it will never be the same. I'm not completely surprised, given the energies of this Nine Fire Monkey year (see my Feb. 16th post). It all fits.

After years of building a deeply spiritual, more authentic relationship with myself and my life, much of it disintegrated before my eyes in a single moment of reaction. How can this be happening? I wondered, I've worked so hard. But it was happening; it did happen. Change happened. It always does.

Sometimes change feels good; great, even. But the brick that hit me did not. It was merely disguised as something good; great, even. And I trusted it. I fell for its disguise. I walked right into its path and practically asked it to smack me. 

It can be hard to recover from a smack like that. I find myself struggling to understand it, asking the useless "Why?" questions. I will not find any answers; not now. It is too soon. The bricks and I are still rolling through the dirt, kicking up dust. Answers won't come until the dust settles, if they come at all. 

In the meantime, I find a bit of comfort in two things I believe: 

1) that everything happens for a reason, and 

2) that the Divine Source from which we come always works with us and never against us. 

These two beliefs are my lifeline of hope; my breadcrumbs back to a tranquil, happy life. We hear the first - that everything happens for a reason - often during difficult times, but do we really know what it means? 

The way I understand it is this: Everything happens for a reason, and the reason is so a higher purpose or good can be realized. We have the opportunity to evolve as Human Beings and perhaps even as Souls while we are here. The experiences we have in life provide those opportunities, if we take them. Despite how they feel to us, every experience is an opportunity for a higher purpose, a higher good, to be realized. And even as I grow through the comfortable experiences, I seem to grow more through the uncomfortable ones.

Just because an experience feels uncomfortable does not mean it is moving us in the wrong direction. Quite the contrary. We tend to get complacent in our comfort. Forgetting is easy when we are comfortable. We might even get smug about it.

But when we are uncomfortable, we tend to wake up and pay attention. We examine what is happening more closely; we want to ease the discomfort. We come back into ourselves and our lives more fully. We reconnect with our sense of humanity and compassion. 

If we are willing to embrace the discomfort, we return to a state of humility, surrender and openness to that which is greater than ourselves. We ultimately find the illumination of our own Being. This is a good thing...and worth every bit of the discomfort.

It is easier to find the willingness when I remember the Divine Source always works with us and never against us. Believing this allows me to rest into the notion that we are held and guided by something much greater than ourselves. We are never truly alone, for the loving, Divine Source always has our back, gently nudging us (or giving us a powerful smack in the head) toward the evolution of our Soul. 

You can believe whatever you want. This is just what I believe, recognizing that it is not only our triumphs but our struggles that pave the road, brick by brick, to our most evolved Self. It is my mission to grow as much as I can while here because I haven't resolved the issue of life, death or reincarnation for myself. I would rather take full advantage than realize later that I missed a precious opportunity because I was too arrogant to consider it. 

In the end, the bricks in disguise that smack us upside the head aren't such a bad thing, although they are uncomfortable. They may be exactly what we need to catapult us into a higher level of Being. We have to deal with them one way or another. I choose the high road. I choose to embrace the discomfort and use it as a gateway to the illumination of my Being. 

Anyway, my tranquil, happy life will return soon enough because one thing is for certain: change happens.