TRUST AND LET GO

Eventually life takes on a rather unusual magical quality. Everything seems unreal and dreamlike. You get the sense that nothing is quite as solid, real, and unchangeable as you once believed. It's disorienting and even frightening at first. Nausea and other physical manifestations of fear are common while you get a sense of your bearings in this new way of being. It will pass. And soon this magical world will become as real to you as the old one. Soon you will know that it is the same world you were living in all along. The only real difference being that now you can see. Now you know. Now you have arrived. ~Dorothy Mendoza Row





I've given birth at home 6 times. As I am quite familiar with the process, I often liken the birth of anything new to that of childbirth. There is a phase of labor called "transition" that occurs immediately prior to the time when the woman is able to begin pushing her baby through the birth canal and out into the world. It is at this time when she often appears to completely lose control. And there is a very good reason for that. At this point, the child is suspended between worlds. He is no longer in the place from which he is emerging, but neither is he here on earth. And the mother is right there with him. Nothing is solid, nothing is known. Though she feels enormous pressure inside of her, she cannot push her baby out. She is forced to completely let go, to trust her body and the Universe to move herself and her child to where they need to go. The more she trusts, the faster the process, and she feels tremendous relief when she is finally able to DO SOMETHING, to actively take part in helping the baby to be born. A more solid and familiar reality returns, a place where action produces results.

It is the same for anyone, man or woman, who is birthing anything new into their lives. First, there is conception, an idea joined with desire. Then there is pregnancy, the time when that idea is growing steadily into a form that can live and breathe in the world. When that idea is ready to be born, labor is gentle at first, increasing in intensity as the reality of its emergence draws near. And like a woman in labor, that idea reaches a point of transition between thought and manifestation that is so intense, one is tempted to give it all up and run away in a state of complete terror. Nothing is familiar in this place. And one questions the wisdom of such a daring adventure. There is only one thing to do at this point: TRUST AND LET GO.









"Once you learn to let go, things just start to happen."
~Erin Haptas









I was first inspired to give birth at home by a woman in her 80's who told me that she had been blessed with the painless childbirth of her only son. She had been attempting to conceive for nearly a decade in the days before fertility clinics. She had all but completely given up when she found herself pregnant. She believed it was her overwhelming joy at being granted this miracle that allowed her to give birth without pain or fear. For me, that explained everything. While none of my births were completely without pain, I can say with absolute certainty that the more I was able to embrace trust and joy, the less fear and pain I experienced, and the more able I was to completely let go and let nature take its course.

The more you resist the power of your own being, the more pain you experience, and the more difficult it is to move forward. So now I know that whenever I am feeling frightened by a world that seems unfamiliar and out of control, the answer is not to resist this feeling, but to surrender to it. That being done, I soon find myself once again on solid ground, able to move forward on my own power, with results that are as miraculous, or nearly so, as that of a perfect, newborn child.

Life is Good!!! :)

"To awaken within the dream is our purpose now. When we are awake within the dream, the ego-created earth-drama comes to an end and a more benign and wonderous dream arises." ~ Eckhart Tolle

Today, I'm awake. I know I'm awake because I feel good. I know that life is good. I know that all is well. I know that everything happens for my benefit, and I seek to claim that benefit, even when that is a very challenging task to undertake.

Sometimes, I fall asleep. When this happens, the world becomes a solid and inescapable prison. Life appears to be working against me. And feeling good seems like an unattainable dream.








But I never fall asleep for very long anymore. And this sort of sleep is never very deep for me. There is always a part of me remembering that life is a great, strange dream. I remember that life is coming FROM me, not AT me, and I adjust my thoughts accordingly. Happiness soon follows. Always.













Life is indeed a gentle, merry dream.

Believe that this is true!

Because -

Our attitude toward life determines life's attitude towards us. ~Earl Nightingale

Life is what YOU MAKE IT!!! And so clearly it follows that:








Have a benign, wonderous, happy, gentle, merry day of awakening, my fellow travellers.

LIFE IS GOOD! :)

LOVE is ALWAYS the ANSWER

Complaining about anything holds you in the place of refusing to receive the things you've been asking for. ~Abraham-Hicks

I recently found myself in the position of having to deal with a very confused and angry person, full of complaints about everything in life, including me. The first thing I do in a difficult situation is remind myself to open my heart, instead of the very human response of closing it up in a state defensiveness. Doing this, I realized that this person was full of fear. And that, had the circumstances of my early life been the same, I would likely be experiencing the same terror and mistrust of the very Source that gives me life as well. Knowing this, compassion and forgiveness soon follow.

Next, I remind myself that absolutely everything happens for my benefit, and I ask Source/God what that benefit might be. The primary gift of this challenge was to see the direct result of my own whining and complaining in times past. Yes, everything you do really does come right back to you. And so, my resolve to turn my own life into a NO WHINING ZONE was most definitely fortified.

Finally, I turn to my Higher Self/God/Source and ask how I can help this person that is feeling so much pain. And this was the answer: LOVE.

Love is always the answer. It's so simple, it's easy to overlook. And it's difficult to stand strong in love, when you are being attacked by hate. But knowing what I do, it is no longer possible to believe that there can ever be another option. We are all sending our actions out into the world on a cosmic boomerang. Reacting to hate with more hate keeps us in an endless and inescapable loop of misery.

And so, I do my best to love, even when it seems impossible to accomplish. I love, even when it appears to have no positive effect. I love when love is not immediately returned, knowing that it eventually will be. I get better at it all the time. And the results improve accordingly, increasingly filling my life with bliss, and freedom, and of course- LOVE.

Love is the Answer

"Be Impeccable With Your Word. Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love." ~Don Miguel Ruiz





This painting by Robert Donaghey is called "Winged Heart". I find it to be a beautiful illustration of the way to create positive, loving movement in the world. A positive, loving heart has magical wings made of mystical radiance. And as it touches lightly the hearts of others, blossoming miracles are its bounty.

Today this painting made me think about the power of words. While it is true that our primary methods of communication are non-verbal, words are the next step in the process of turning imagination (where all manifestations originate) into reality (on Earth as it is in Heaven). That fortunate bit of lag time between thought and manifestation gives us time to readjust any misaligned, out-of-control thoughts before they create havoc in our outer circumstances. But once those thoughts are put into the written or spoken word, they have entered your physical reality, and they become much more difficult to correct.

This being so, it follows that there is great worth in setting your intent on becoming "Impeccable With Your Word". I find that if I try to do this with my mind, the effects are limited. So instead, I set my intent on opening my heart, and speaking from there. An open heart is automatically in touch with the hearts of others. When you can feel in your heart the feelings of others, you know the truth of your oneness, and using "the power of your word in the direction of truth and love" becomes effortless.

Well, it's not quite effortless for me yet, but I thoroughly enjoy being an eternal work-in-progress. I love my life, and I love that it will never get old because there will always be another great height to aspire to.

For today, I am pleased that I have this opportunity right now to be "impeccable with my word" in telling you what my heart is saying right now: "Psst...Love is the answer. Pass it on!"

Surrender

Eckhart Tolle's
Present Moment Reminder: "It is not by resisting or running away from,
but by that deep act of surrender that the divine is realized. And that
amazingly does not take time. Surrender can only be now."

I am often asked how I've managed to maintain my fitness and flexibility after having 6 children. It's a strange question if you think about it. And the answer is in the question itself. In other words, my answer is that I don't question it. I don't say to myself what other people seem to be saying: You have six kids. Why aren't you stiff and out of shape?

I usually skip the more detailed explanation, which involves pointing out that they have some preconceived ideas in their belief system that are somewhat limited. Generally, I keep it simple. I tell them it's all about keeping a good attitude. Everyone can relate to that on some level, because if you pay attention to life for even one clear moment, you'll see that it's true.

One woman in a fitness class that I was taking decided to be more insistent in her questions about my level of flexibility. I said something about how flexibility of mind can translate into flexibility of body. And she gave me an eye-rolling look of disbelief that said: I know this is California, but spare me the hippie philosophy. What she said out loud was: No really, how do you do it?

And this was my answer: Most people think that stretching is about forcing your way through the tight spots, from the outside in. But it's not. It's about allowing your body to release the tension that you are holding within it. The point of release comes from deep within you, and works its way through to the outer layers of your body.

Pushing against resistance creates more resistance. Allowing its release creates freedom of movement.

I think she was sorry she asked.

I was reminded of this when I read the above Eckhart Tolle quote, because you create more freedom of movement in your life the same way you do it with your body. Both involve a "deep act of surrender". If there is something in your life that has been stubbornly resistant to change, the answer can never involve more resistance. Instead, allow it to be, and you will find yourself moving through that block as if it were never really there at all.

LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE !!!!

Life is on your side. That's a really good thing to know. It's a really good thing to remember. It's absolutely amazing to hold as a dominant thought in your mind. To accept that absolutely everything Life brings is a gift for your benefit and highest good, is to accept Paradise as a state of mind.

I mean, this is for me - all of it, Everything, this whole world, and everything and everyone in it, and all the worlds beyond it! All of it is here for my pleasure, and I have the free will to do with it as I please. Wow. I'm awed.

And I'm humbled. To know the great power that I possess is to know great responsibility. Every thought I think is contributing to the creation of not only my reality, but to the experience of all others within their own realities, because we are all interconnected. We are in fact, all ONE.

Just a hint of such awesome responsibility can be enough to short-circuit the mind and throw it into a sleep-state of denial, separation, and powerlessness. I like to look at the many ways this manifests as being nothing more than symptoms of a minor and temporary dis-ease of the mind.
And everyday it gets easier for me to remember that there is only one cure: LOVE.

LIFE is a GIFT of PARADISE for your PLEASURE. Yeah, really. It is.

So there's nothing left to do but to LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE !!!!

NOW is the Time of Awakening

NOW is the time of Awakening.

I used to think that there was always someplace else I needed to get to. Nothing was ever quite good enough for me. I was always needing something more, more, and then more again.

And then I woke up. And I didn't even know I was sleeping. Ha! Go figure.

My life is perfect exactly the way it is. And on top of that, it keeps getting better everyday. That's a far cry from what I was taught to believe in the old sleeping reality. Back then, I believed myself to be no better than 2nd rate in any given area.

So I stopped rating myself. And I stopped thinking that the opinions of others should matter to me at all. And then my mind started to really quiet down. There were no longer dozens of different voices offering their expert opinion on what I should be doing with my life. Oh sure, they still float through. But it's the quietest voice that I hear most clearly now. That still, small voice that can only be heard deep within me, although its Source can found all around me, Everywhere.

There's no place I need to get to these days. There are places I would like to go. There are places that the still, small voice whispers to me that I will go. But it's NOW that holds my attention. Because it's NOW that's perfect. It's NOW when the Source of Everything can be found Everywhere.

NOW is the time of Awakening.