FINDING YOUR TRUTH

Becoming Someone Else

“When we can’t stop thinking about our problems, our mind and life merge. We become lost in the illusion of the dream.

We could call this a ‘rut,’ but it goes much deeper than that. Along with our actions, our attitudes and feelings become repetitive. And we form the habit of being ourselves.

To change our lives, we must fundamentally change the ways we think, act, and feel. Because how we think, feel, and behave is – in essence – our personality. And our personality creates our personal reality. So, to create a new personal reality – a new life – we must create a new personality. We must become someone else.”

Dr Joe Dispenza – OFFICIAL NEWS & FAN PAGE

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Had I not just been reviewing all of my old hypnosis and NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) notes from a decade ago, I might have glossed over this older Dr. Joe quote. BUT… since I was still processing the listed techniques and information from the old notes review, I paused to consider how “We become lost in the illusion of the dream.”

Seriously, we ALL do it. We may not recognize it as such, but we ALL have our delusions—some of us just have more than most or at least put more energy into maintaining the delusion over our less-desirable reality. In fact, some of us hold our ‘delusions’ up as sacred, unassailable standards because we are unable to see them as they really are: They become how we want LIFE to be—not how it actually is. And that’s where we get into trouble.

The entire point of hypnosis/NLP is to help people to change their pattern of troublesome behavior that is creating problems in their life between their delusions and realities. Or as Dr. Joe describes it: “To change our lives, we must fundamentally change the ways we think, act, and feel.”

But to do that—to make those changes, we have to recognize what isn’t working well with what we are currently thinking, acting and feeling.

Now that awakening process to how we really see the world around us is not a ten-minute fix by any means. It is a lengthy endeavor of first better understanding how you ‘perceive’ the world around you—how you ‘interpret’ and then ‘react to’ what you see, hear, and feel while interacting with all aspects of your world view; and then it involves setting a determined intention ‘to change’ those basic perceptions/reactions by shifting your thinking about what is happening to you at any time.

Piece of cake, right?

Well that’s where hypnosis and NLP come into play. They help you reframe, reconsider, refocus, and restart what is actually happening in your life—all without using the framework or context of your original delusion.

Since I’m not a board-certified therapist (certified hypnotherapist, yes, but therapist, no), I can’t claim to officially help people in that respect, but at the same time I can at least help inform them about the convoluted workings of our minds when we try to make some sense of our world, but we keep failing to do so because we are stuck in the old habits of perception/interpretation. If you keep inputting the same things in the same ways, you just keep getting the same output.

We have trained ourselves from childhood onwards to recognize certain patterns of causation/reaction when we deal with others or deal with the world at large; and then we naturally fall back into our same old habits of perception/interpretation of what is happening in how we deal with what we are experiencing at the time. The past can certainly inform the future but without shifting our view of the past, our NOW becomes just as tainted and unreliable as usual. Without change of some sort the future looks just like the past.

Meaning: We often see what we want to see. We believe what we want to believe. And we feel how we feel, no matter what our rational mind tells us is for our betterment or our detriment. The real trick of hypnosis or NLP is to help shift that erroneous seeing, thinking, feeling to something that better serves our welfare and our inner peace.

And feeling a deep sense of inner peace is a long-sought-after goal by many. Discovering who we really are as thinking, feeling people is an exploration into the depths of our souls; and that trek can be rife with obstacles and unexpected detours until we allow ourselves to fully open up to our vast potential as compassionate human beings. That obstacle path is one I am most familiar with and can easily talk about.

“To change our lives, we must fundamentally change the ways we think, act, and feel. Because how we think, feel, and behave is – in essence – our personality. And our personality creates our personal reality. So, to create a new personal reality – a new life – we must create a new personality. We must become someone else.”

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When your life isn’t working for you as is, ‘To become someone else’ and be willing to change your habitual behaviors, are choices we all have to make. But to do that, you first have to figure out what you really want from life, and then determine how you go about finding it.

Or as this blog often claims, you have to make the effort of “Finding Your Truth” to make full sense of your existence here, because if you don’t know your TRUTH, you just keep wallowing in your delusion of it.

Riding the Fox

“And, when we grow up

we must never forget

that hidden, down deep

within us

is our forever inner child

resting, silently

forever waiting

forever hoping

that one day

we shall, remember it.”
Athey Thompson
Seb McKinnon Art, “The Moon’s Daughter”

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Kaleidoscopic Reflections

When you think back now on the many different phases of your life, do you ever feel like you are staring one-eyed through an optical tube like a kaleidoscope that shifts the images into mirrored shapes and colors as you turn the shaft one way or the other? Turn it one way and you see one reflected thing, then turn it the opposite way and you see something completely different reflected in the tube.

That is what happens over time as we view our personal life. We see it one way for a time; then age and experience shifts our view and we can see something completely different when we reassess it.

Year-end reflections can also do that to you—can change how you comprehend how the past year may have actually affected you. An experience or event that may have seemed to affect you one way when it first occurred may seem quite different after the dust has settled on it and you have the time to look back from afar.

I recommend doing year-end reflections, which are much easier to do if you have kept a journal of daily incidences and revelations to review. But even if you haven’t kept such a log, taking the time to reconsider what all has occurred in your life over the last year and assessing how that has shifted your life in one direction or another, is a good practice to adopt both in terms of your mental/emotional health as well as assessing the clarity of your life’s direction so you can then ‘course correct’ if you need to do so for the new year ahead.

If you aren’t familiar with year-end assessments and you don’t have a log of daily events or experiences to draw from, you can start by asking yourself a few basic questions and then logging your honest answers to them, such as:

Are you happy overall with your current life?
How could you improve your life situation or how could you bring more joy into your life?
What changes would you have to make in your life to have a brighter, more hopeful outlook? Be specific.
How has the past years events, activities, or interactions shown you what works well for you and what doesn’t work so well?
Are there certain people who are important to you? Name them. Why are they important? What needs do they fill for you? (family connection, lover, confidant, coach, socializing partner, spiritual advisor….)
How could those relationships improve? Or is it time for a new relationship?
Or is it actually time to start thinking less about them and more about you? One-sided personal relationships are not very satisfying. And truly becoming more familiar with all aspects of yourself can help you determine WHY your life seems to look one way or the other in that shifting kaleidoscopic tube.
Are you content with your current LIFE direction? Have you personally set career or education goals to achieve, and what is the status of them? Are your social interactions fulfilling you, or are you fairly isolated and feeling alone?
Do you desire more social contact with others or are those current interactions not satisfying your needs? Do you feel that something is still lacking in your life even when you are with other people?
How can you bring a sense of excitement and joy back to your life? Are there new adventures you might try or new places you might explore? Are there cooking classes, or exercise classes, or places to go and explore that might help shift your outlook from your current ‘really bored’ to more anticipatory?
Or how can you better appreciate where you presently are and what you are currently doing in your life? Are you maximizing your locale and your natural resources? Are you taking advantage of all opportunities provided to you?
Are you actively or passively living your life? Can you become more active and more aware of what all is happening around you daily? Maybe you are missing something in your current setting. Familiarity has its drawbacks. When we are very familiar with our settings and interactions we often slip into auto-function mode, and then tune out all other stimuli happening around us. So take a day and stay alert to everything NOT so familiar, and see what you can discover about life occurring all around you that you might normally miss.

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How we view our lives is always subjective, and our attitude toward LIFE in general can have a major effect on what happens to us both large and small. So spend a little more time getting to better know yourself first, to determine how you want your life to continue forward from here on out.

That initial assessment time might make the difference in how bright and colorful your LIFE kaleidoscope will appear when you turn the viewing tube many years from now.

Moving Though It

“We are not meant to stay wounded. We are supposed to move through our tragedies and challenges and to help each other move through the many painful episodes of our lives. By remaining stuck in the power of our wounds, we block our own transformation.

We overlook the greater gifts inherent in our wounds – the strength to overcome them and the wisdom that we are meant to receive through them. Wounds are the means through which we enter the hearts of other people. They are meant to teach us to become compassionate and wise.” ~Caroline Myss

Art • “Favorite Kind of Saturday” by Olga Erokhina @wanderings

(Found on The Soul Journey with Sarah Moussa )

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You know this time of year is often hard on some folks who might be missing loved ones and feeling very alone in their grief; or maybe they are feeling lonely in general or confused at what little they actually ARE or ARE NOT feeling about the holiday season or about their closer friends; or perhaps they are even confused about their own lives and where they seem to be in their living process—confused about the direction of their lives—unsure of where they presently are and where they are going in the future.

Basically I just wanted to say: It’s okay to feel that way.

It’s okay to feel exactly whatever you are feeling. You are being honest about it. Pain is real—physical or emotional/mental.

Sometimes we feel what we feel without the need for a rational explanation. It just is. So it’s okay to feel whatever you are currently feeling, but if you linger in that feeling for days or weeks (or longer), that’s when you get into trouble. That funky feeling becomes a mind-state that is harder to shift out of.

Now about the quote above: I’ve been a Caroline Myss fan for decades, and if you’ve ever heard her videos or audios, you know immediately she is a no-nonsense “Get yourself together!” kind of teacher who does not tolerate slackers or whiners. I like that about her in general. She is to the point, crisp, and sometimes a bit brutal in her assessment of how we should view our lives. A student expressing victimization or openly feeling sorry for him/herself will not remain long in her class. She just won’t put up with it.

But the thing is that in her sharper critique of how to better handle your life challenges, she knows how to shift your perspective out of that funk you are presently immersed in. She knows how to broaden your view on WHY you are here and WHAT you are meant to do with your precious life WHILE here in this life experience.

Therefore to her (and to many, including myself) she views our wounds not as curses or tar-pits in which our feet are hopelessly stuck, but as educational ‘opportunities’ to maximize learning more about ourselves through the experience and learning more about LIFE in general.

In other words, yes, you may feel like the world is swallowing you whole right now BUT if you can stop for a moment and see what this emotion/situation/experience is really showing you about your own resiliency or about your determination to climb out of the tar-pit, or about your flat-out refusal to be beaten down into the dirt by the hardships you are currently experiencing, THEN you can see the VALUE of this particular ‘testing ground’ that your higher spirit has evidently placed you in at the moment. Through enduring the inescapable difficulties facing you, you may be discovering aspects of yourself that you had not previously realized. You are a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for being. You truly are tougher than the challenge and capable of surviving the nastiest of the nasty, if you just keep going and don’t quit until you are through it. You got this!

“We are not meant to stay wounded. We are supposed to move through our tragedies and challenges and to help each other move through the many painful episodes of our lives. By remaining stuck in the power of our wounds, we block our own transformation.

We overlook the greater gifts inherent in our wounds – the strength to overcome them and the wisdom that we are meant to receive through them. Wounds are the means through which we enter the hearts of other people. They are meant to teach us to become compassionate and wise.”

***

For all of us, LIFE is one big challenge. Find a way to meet your challenge and move through it. You’ll learn to better trust yourself during the process.

And that is the biggest reward you could ever receive for your unceasing efforts: Learning you have the capability to handle anything that life throws at you. Because you do.

Gifts

‘Gifts’ are one of those malleable concepts that may take time for us to personally realize because sometimes they may seem more like curses.

At first our natural talents or proclivities may seem intrusive to us or even unwanted, or perhaps on a positive side they seem mystical or surreal in a sense, but not a sense that others welcomed when we were near them. So we learned to keep quiet about those ‘gifts’ so as not to draw undesired attention or insults and attacks from people in our lives.

Those odd sensory phenomenon that may seem so magical to us in our solitude, may draw strange reactions from parents and friends, forcing us to keep quiet about our ‘natural gifts’—until we run across others who relish their own ‘natural gifts’ and can better help us accept our own.

I’ve taught Usui REIKI for a couple decades now, and the biggest ice-breaker turning point in class participation comes early on—just as soon as I tell the class that “REIKI may enhance or awaken your hidden psychic abilities.”

Then BOOM! Backs straighten in the chairs, hands shoot up or voices instantly start declaring personal stories of psychic experiences. And when I had previously asked each one WHY they were attending the class with not a one saying “to enhance my psychic abilities,” I NOW hear that this new revelation gave them instant recognition of WHY they felt they needed to take the class besides the obvious energy-healing aspect. Perhaps they didn’t know exactly why this class was so important to them prior to my saying what I did, but NOW they definitely knew why they were really there. Fascinating.

Once that “your psychic gifts may be enhanced or revealed” revelation is made, everyone starts jabbering with each other—instantly freed from self-doubt or the fear of being judged.

For me it is both funny and enjoyable to witness the entire class suddenly relate together and gel, so I always make the statement early on in the class to help everyone to simply relax with each other—that’s when they all realize that ‘you’ve just found your new peer group.’

Why I’m writing this now is because I noticed this morning that James Van Praagh posted this message below, and I got the nudge that maybe I should share it here for others to run across—folks like the students in my previous REIKI classes who may be feeling uncertain or burdened by their own ‘natural gifts’ that keep intruding into their daily lives with no explanation for why it is occurring.

For me as a child, I was always intuitive and empathic (could feel things) but I was not so much psychically gifted to see or hear things; however with others in my REIKI group of friends, many of them had those psychic gifts (seeing and hearing) as children and their parents tried to discourage them or told them to “shut up about that,” so for you who are parents or for folks who once had parents with similar viewpoints, I just want you to know that the world is finally acknowledging your natural abilities, and they aren’t really ‘bad things’ after all.

It just helps to know you aren’t alone in your situations, and that even our gifts need to be refined and honed to use them well; and to not allow them to adversely control us. It’s one thing to be more psychically receptive—an open frequency channel to receive input from others; but without establishing controls or limits to our psychic receptivity, too much undesired input can lead to something resembling schizophrenia.

Van Praagh is a well-known psychic and offers training in honing your abilities.

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“Helping Your Sensitive Child Thrive

How old were you when you first became aware of your psychic or mediumistic abilities? You might have heard voices, had an imaginary friend only you could see, or sensed the presence of relatives who had passed on years earlier. Perhaps you had strong feelings about places and people that you couldn’t explain. If you were a child when this happened, chances are you didn’t know exactly what was going on! Hopefully, you had a supportive, sensitive adult to help you navigate these experiences. If so, you probably grew up to be someone who embraced their gifts and followed their intuition. If not, you might have found yourself scared or in denial about your spirit connection. A parent, teacher, family member, or friend can make all the difference in the world when it comes to nurturing a highly sensitive, spiritually gifted child. James Van Praagh

Read: https://vanpraagh.com/helping-your-sensitive-child-thrive/ “

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Defining the Self

The previous post was on the “SELF as Master,” meaning that in this context the SELF here was referring to the God-force SELF—the ALLness—the Everything.

But even the ‘ego-self’ that most of us struggle to control, is a bit more diverse than saying it means ‘pure ego’ which also has its own range of implications. There is a certain negative connotation associated with the term “ego,” and yet without any ego—or any sense of self—we can easily become manipulated manikins to whoever pulls our strings.

I was once trying to describe self-realization and self-actualization concepts to a clinical psychologist friend where I said the self-realization goal was to eliminate our personal egos, and she replied that this was very strange because she often spent hours trying to help her more subservient clients to develop a stronger sense of their own ego—to stand up for themselves—to better protect themselves from aggressive controlling partners. So from her viewpoint a certain amount of personal EGO is necessary to survive in the world.

And when I talk about ‘self-realization’ I’m referring to GOD-force SELF—making it more like the all-capped “SELF-realization” where the focus is on realizing that we are the Master SELF incarnate in this life experience, and that we are still, and always will be, connected to the Great ALLness no matter what we do or where we go.

But when Maslow for instance talks about ‘self-actualization’, he is referring to your truly maximizing who you are as a human being capable of releasing your untapped creative and intuitive greatness. Some examples:

—The Dictionary on Self-Actualization: “the realization or fulfillment of one’s talents and potentialities, especially considered as a drive or need present in everyone.”

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—“What is self actualization in Maslow hierarchy of needs?

Self–actualization refers to the need for personal growth and development throughout one’s life. It is the highest level of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, which was developed by psychologist Abraham Maslow. Once you are self–actualized, you’ve met your full potential as an individual.” (www.simplypsychology.org/self-actualization.html)

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So to fully comprehend WHO you are and WHY you feel significant to this existence, it helps to consider the personal ‘ego-self’ in relation to the ‘Great-SELF’—the God-force SELF; or self-actualization in relation to SELF-realization—i.e., self/SELF.

And whereas for many of us, the goal is to tamp down our personal egos and be less self-focused (which often means we are demanding that our needs be placed above all other’s needs); our existence here in a physical body requires that we protect and utilize our human body to explore this life experience, therefore personal ego was intended to help us do that. In that respect, ego is not such a bad thing as it is necessary for basic survival.

What it all comes down to is the classic conundrum of “Where do I end and you begin?”

That’s a hard question to answer, because for me personally I’m not sure there is an actual ending per se for any of us.

Maybe our problem is that while we are here in the Earth-plane, we have such a restricted perspective of what ‘the end’ means to the physical body; whereas in the higher planes of energy existence there is NO end or ending, only multiple variations on a ceaseless theme whose purpose is increasing conscious awareness.

This so reminds me of the old Isaac Asimov short story on discovering the Creator of the Universe: “The Last Question.”

If you haven’t read it, I won’t spoil it for you.

Self as Master

“God, Guru and the Self are identical. A spiritually-minded person thinks that God is all pervading and takes God for their Guru. Later, God brings them in contact with a personal Guru and the person recognizes them as all in all. Lastly the same person is made by the grace of the master to feel that their Self is the reality and nothing else. Thus they find that the Self is the master…”

~ Ramana Maharshi

Mystic Path to Cosmic Consciousness

All the voluminous possible subjects to contemplate and I ran across this Ramana Maharshi quote that struck a chord in me.

I’ve read numerous books from many diverse spiritual masters in India and think this ‘self/Self’ concept is one of the most important for western minds to truly comprehend, and yet one of the harder concepts for us to digest.

In essence we must consider how does the small ‘self’—meaning our egos, relate to the large ‘Self’—the ALLness—GOD—the Great Everything?

Most spiritual seekers spend a lifetime questing for closer association to GOD only to eventually realize that GOD was always present within him/her—never outside the person—never an external goal or a destination or a longed-for connection. We are already connected and always have been connected to God because we are tangential extensions of that ALLness all interacting with other tangential extensions of that same ALLness.

We are like fingers and toes of the Great Everything all wriggling about trying to recognize our relationship to the vastness of all possibility. And as finger and toe extensions of the ALL, we have the ability to create the world around us as we choose to envision it because Godforce energy flows through us to do so.

Depending on our upbringing, most of us in the west were taught that God was this paternalistic, omniscient, all powerful force that ruled our lives—but that God was separate from us and we had to behave appropriately to please God for our lives to flow beneficially in all ways. Meaning: God was NOT us; and we were NOT God. That was blasphemy to think that we and God were one and the same.

So many people went in search of a spiritual teacher—a guru of some sort, to guide them in becoming closer to God and to learn how best to communicate with that all-powerful Master of our existence. As Ramana Maharshi mentions, they felt that God first put them on the path to finding that particular teacher so then they must follow that guru with religious devotion because the guru knew the true path to God.

But eventually the seeker realizes that the guru is not the actual Master to follow so devotedly for their spiritual enlightenment, but that Guru is only the guide showing the seeker HOW to connect directly to God for herself because THAT is the ‘key knowledge’ currently lacking in her life: How to directly connect into the Great Everything and feel that overwhelming Oneness with the ALL.

Once the personal connection to ALLness is reestablished, then the seeker realizes that the ‘Master’ is not the Guru in some human form, but Spirit itself is the Master and is the true ‘Godforce connection’ that she was always capable of achieving for herself, but that she had mistakenly failed to recognize it as such and had failed to cultivate her personal Godforce connection to fruition.

“God, Guru and the Self are identical. A spiritually-minded person thinks that God is all pervading and takes God for their Guru. Later, God brings them in contact with a personal Guru and the person recognizes them as all in all. Lastly the same person is made by the grace of the master to feel that their Self is the reality and nothing else. Thus they find that the Self is the master…”

“…Thus they find that the Self is the master…” means it isn’t the ‘ego-self’ he’s referring to with that statement—it is the ALLness Self that flows through us at all times—our own Godforce connection; and that WE (each of us) have the ability to use that Godforce to create the world we choose and the life we want, because we are simply fingers and toes expressing the Great Everything in whatever we do.

We are the Creator’s creations creating the world around us in our own personal images with every choice that we make because “God, Guru, and Self are identical…,” and we are all of them—as appendages of the Greatness allowing the Godforce to flow effortlessly through our lives.

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Our Ordinary Lives

“We all have encounters with the sacred; we just have to cultivate the eye that can perceive them. We have to see what’s already here, interwoven with what we claim is human and mundane. We have to take inventory of the magic that conspires to love us in and through our ordinary lives.”

~ Meggan Watterson at www.earthschoolharmony.com

We are living in such a strange time. It defies explanation really; and for certain it defies logic because little is logical about our ongoing collective world-wide, as well as internal, conflicts for many years.

For the most part you can choose to view your own life and our aggregate lives in ways that can either sooth you or infuriate you depending on your personal preference. Hostilities everywhere are easily fanned by resentments, grievances, and anger; while peaceful mind-states, though still possible, are much harder to maintain.

If anything I think our combined collective consciousness has been dulled into apathy by the constant acrimony and perpetual divisive turmoil we see daily–everywhere, and it tends to lean toward whomever rants the loudest at any given time. But ranting in general is not the path to peaceful coexistence—it’s just the opposite. Ranting is very “ME” focused, rather than “US” focused, discounting the opinions of others as of little consequence to the loudest vocalizations from the attention seeker.

So through all of this vociferous consternation and social mayhem it becomes harder for each of us to maintain a calm inner awareness of how miraculous and amazing our lives actually are, especially when they are so rife with problems.

The TRUTH is that we actually live EXTRAODINARY lives even in their ordinariness, because LIFE itself is a miracle. But it often takes an intentional focus to see it, meaning: You have to stop and acknowledge the miraculous aspects of your life. (Don’t agree? Hold your breath for ten minutes, and when they bring you back from the dead, maybe you could reconsider that opinion.)

“… We have to see what’s already here, interwoven with what we claim is human and mundane. We have to take inventory of the magic that conspires to love us in and through our ordinary lives.”

And during our daily struggles we search for greater meaning throughout most of our existence, asking those familiar questions—why am I here—what am I to do—is my life important in some way to the greater good—what is my TRUE PURPOSE for being here at this time?

But the answers to all of those questions are as illusive and confusing as are the answers to why the world around us is the combative way that it is.

Perhaps our personal view of ‘the world’ that we all share is based only on how we choose to perceive it—how we choose to make use of it—how we choose to accept our actions and the actions of others as allowable or not to the fabric of our collective existence.

Simply put: We all see the world around us as we choose to see it, and we interact with that world based on our limited, self-focused perception. We may get so caught up in our biased views that sometimes we fail to notice how miraculous the simplicity of LIFE actually is; and when you can stop and intentionally tune in to the sacredness of the world around you, you can shift your limited perceptions to a higher vantage point from which to reassess your life.

As the above image shows, there is peace and continuity in the snowy egret’s patient waiting for a meal to swim near as the day either dawns or ends; and this visual metaphor that we have witnessed daily in different ways, beams a simple unstated acknowledgement of LIFE’s general purpose for all beings to ‘survive and thrive’ day by day, no matter the species, no matter the circumstance.

And despite all the fury and rancor that bombards us daily, the world we share remains as ‘the world’ always was and still is—a potential treasure trove for maximizing our own growth and creativity—a fine-art gallery with free admission for nature’s magnificent beauty and ecological harmony—and an on-going opportunity for us to learn compassion and sharing with others while better understanding our own role in LIFE’s current evolution where all species peacefully co-exist here during our limited lifetimes.

So really, there is nothing ORDINARY about our lives or about LIFE in general, is there?

“We all have encounters with the sacred; we just have to cultivate the eye that can perceive them. We have to see what’s already here, interwoven with what we claim is human and mundane. We have to take inventory of the magic that conspires to love us in and through our ordinary lives.”

***

Be Soft

“Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.” Kurt Vonnegut

I started to say that I don’t think I’ve ever been accused of ‘being soft,’ but I think I recently have been by someone close to me who thought I wasn’t being hard enough on a repair technician that I was dealing with at the time. There are ways of accomplishing a goal without belittling and demeaning or even threatening the person with whom you are engaging. That I do believe.

In fact I think if you recognize and appeal to a person’s humanity, and can inspire their desire to assist you rather than trying to intimidate them into doing so, you will receive greater rewards sooner than if you had harassed and harangued them. I personally am more likely to respond to that approach.

Seriously, in today’s world right now why does everyone, especially in the news media’s focus, have to be so mean and hateful? I don’t understand that aspect of our shared experience.

In a world full of TAKERS why can’t there be more GIVERS instead?

If you had more GIVERS in the current world, there would be less need to be a TAKER, wouldn’t there? If there were more gentleness expressed everywhere by everyone, wouldn’t there be less anger and meanness?

I was listening to Margaret Hoover’s “Firing Line” early this morning and she had Adam Grant as her guest: “Adam Grant is an organizational psychologist and bestselling author who studies how people find motivation and meaning, and what it takes to lead more generous and creative lives.” (wiki)

Grant was talking about the binary choices we face in today’s world (‘my way or the highway’ thinking) and how hard it is to carry on family or group conversations now because we are all so entrenched in our own opinions and mindsets that we have no tolerance to listen to others who disagree with us. We immediately go into ‘attack mode’ to slander the other person’s character, family, and associations.

He said something I found interesting: He said really listen to someone who disagrees with you, and ask them why they think what they do, what evidence they can provide to substantiate that feeling and thought (just listen—don’t try to counter their argument); then ask them if there is any evidence to the contrary that would sway that belief they are espousing.

Meaning that if you can help them determine whether what they are saying is ‘evidence and fact based’ or simply an ‘act of faith’ in who is saying it, then you can help them to define if that ‘belief’—that ‘faith’ that they maintain—is more like a religion than a legal issue, because you can believe what you want to believe about most anything, but that doesn’t make it factual. Would FACTS per se if they became aware of them, ever help them to change that current belief that they hold?

Important here: Just ask them that—don’t provide the actual evidence yourself contrary to their opinion. Just leave it in the air for them to consider. And respect their right to disagree with you. Then see if they start paying more attention to the details of what they currently believe about the issue.

You know TRUTH seems hard to come by in today’s world. And simply calling something TRUTH doesn’t make it so; nor does rallying behind a flag and shouting “FREEDOM to the People” make it a call for justice and equity as much as it may be a cry for anarchy and chaos disguised in patriotic fervor masking a group’s ulterior motives.

Words are just words. Actions can be for the betterment of others or for the detriment of them.

But gentleness in attitude and frequently expressed compassion toward others both go a long way toward making this world a better place to live in and to grow.

***

“Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.”

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Trauma Survivors All

As have many before me, I’ve been through personal trauma so I would never minimize anyone’s trauma experience. But when I saw this graphic, I reacted strongly to it—especially the “…We’ve had to fight for our ability to think clearly and know who we are….”

For me that is SO true. I think a ‘survivor’ of any horrendous experience is one who simply refuses to give in, give up, or quit trying to recover one’s own being from whatever nasty situation that so adversely affected them. And I don’t DO ‘victim’—never have—never will. We are SURVIVORS—ALL of us. That’s the only way to make it through this LIFE.

Examples of trauma situations are too many to list—but believe me you know the aftereffects of TRAUMA when they strike you. Your entire world view shifts from being the confident person that you once were before the adverse incident or situation, to the shell-shocked, struggling ‘wisp of who you once were’ afterwards. And it takes a lot of time and effort to intentionally solidify into your true self again.

Plus if you are a stubborn little mule like ‘moi,’ you’ll want to face down the fears and nasty emotional/psychological residues all by yourself, because ‘Hey, it’s fine—I’m fine—everything is fine!’ don’t you know. Except you actually aren’t FINE—not even close. So take my hard-earned advice here and get some real help coming to grips with what all was and likely still is happening to you, because the hidden, lingering aftereffects are still the most devastating to your daily life, and especially to your relationships.

See, that’s the part of “Trauma survivors crave honesty and authenticity….” that you have to learn to acknowledge and respect about yourself now. You really are NOT the same person that you once were—you will never be that naïve and gullible again—that open and trusting of others—or even that arrogant and oblivious to other people’s/being’s reach and power (Yep, that’s me); because it’s just not possible that you will let yourself be so vulnerable to any others ever again; which either makes you hesitant and nervous around others or it possibly makes you defensive and suspicious toward them—simply to better protect yourself in the now from encountering a similar nasty past experience.

I get it. I really do.

Totally and completely—I get it. I question everything and everyone around me now. I always look for motives and dive deeply beyond surface appearances in search of that illusive TRUTH thread to any situation or encounter.

I DO crave “honesty and authenticity” in any of my relationships, including friendships; and because I’ve had to fight so hard to recover my thinking abilities, I will never take anyone or anything at face value again, and never will I automatically believe whatever I’m being told by ANYONE, especially since as an energy worker I can FEEL the energies that they are projecting along with the meaningless words that slide so easily from their lips. You can’t fool a ‘human lie detector’ (an energy empath) who can literally FEEL your emitted vibes.

So in truth as the graphic above states, I am NOT “…willing to engage with those who do not honor that” —who do not honor ME as a valued person.

And that is exactly how I feel about dealing with other people now. Show me who you really are by your actions and mannerisms—don’t tell me of your sterling character and numerous accomplishments because they mean nothing to me. Self-proclamations are merely your ego’s hubris surfacing which does the opposite of your intention. If you brag on yourself, I trust you less, not more.

I value silence. I value humility. I value witnessing your actions with and your reactions to others who come in contact with you—especially your reactions to animals. You can’t fool animals, as they read and react to people’s energies better than most humans do.

So if you want to book a visit to MY personal island, you better have a valid TRUST passport and proof of authenticity as a ‘caring human being’ before even thinking about approaching MY shores.

You know, …just sayin’.

When Words Fail

What He Said

Alberto Villoldo

“We now know that whatever you vibrate, you create and attract to yourself. So, you work on healing yourself in order to create peace around you. You become peace. If there is conflict living within you, you cannot live in a world of peace. The world mirrors back to you perfectly the condition of your love and of your intent. And if the world you are living in is not a world that is at peace and at joy and at grace, then you have to find peace, joy, and grace within you.” – Alberto Villoldo, PhD.