Read More
Wow! I’m back after an amazing 2 weeks in New Mexico with one of the most amazing men I’ve ever had the honor to meet, Martin Prechtel.
Every 6 months, I get to go off the grid and drop deep into the magic that unfolds in his school, Bolad’s Kitchen.
And while I’ve continually felt that the mysteries and rich tapestries of indigenous origins that Martin weaves together with us is an absolutely lovely layer that expands and magnifies my work in the world, I was really amazed to see how much overlap there was in our last session together.
One of the biggest pieces that we focused on this past time was approach. What does that mean exactly?
Check out this week’s inspiration here to get the scoop.
From my perspective, everything comes down to relationship. How we relate to ourselves, our loved ones, the elements that keep us alive, and the Holy.
And I’ve found that as I refine how I relate to myself and the Holy, the effects tend to echo out and impacts all other relationships in my life.
In the beginning of all relationships and all interactions, there is the time in which we approach with a desire. What desire we hold in our hearts, and how we make that connection is the foundation for how that relationship and that interaction will unfold.
If someone comes to me with a sense of entitlement, I’m not very likely to open up my treasure trove of wisdom and kindness for them. If someone comes to me with flowery words to stroke my ego and a self-serving agenda, I’m likely to smile, grit my teeth, and say “no thank you.” If, however, someone comes to me with an open heart and a recognition that connection is a gift, not a right, and demonstrates in some way that they really see me and my offerings with respect and gratitude, then I am likely to flood them with all I’ve got to give.
I don’t think the Holy is any different. Constant requests for help, forgetting to say thank you, forgetting to say please, or forgetting altogether that to be in communion with Divine Source is the ultimate offering are great ways to get a not so generous response from the elements we are invoking to help us with our limited ways as human beings.
There is no way I could or would attempt to teach the methods of approach that Martin so graciously unfolds for us, but I can share with you what it has looked like in my life.
I’ve mentioned this before, recently, but emptying out first, before barging in on any sort of connection with someone is key. To approach anyone we honor, it’s a good idea to empty out of our own desires, needs, stories and projections so we can be present and listen.
Tuning in, listening, allowing resonance to happen is next. Starting to simply be aware of who this “other” is we want to engage with.
Then we want to ask “do I have your permission to take part in your experience?” WIth the Holy, I’ve never gotten a “no,” but I do feel the difference between plopping down on my meditation cushion at my altar with a busy mind and an agenda, instead of consciously entering into that space with the recognition that the Divine is there, more potent than any king or queen, and my internal and external noise and static impact the way in which I connect in. I’ve found that the Divine has infinite patience and compassion, but my experience is enhanced when I take a moment of conscious attunement to respectfully approach the deeper realms of awareness.
I’ve had the same experience with sacred instruments, like my didjeridoo. if I just pick it up and try to start to play, it is awkward and feels clumsy, but if I pick him up as I would a delicate and precious sentient being, take a moment to say “hello,” and just be with him, then start to breathe into him, and then slowly allow my attuned breath and energetic flow to move through, the sounds are elegant, beautiful and beyond my personal abilities because i have honored the magnificence of this magical being, rather than treating him like an object that is at my beck and call.
As one final note, I’ll add a quote from a dear brother, Jeff Wright, who is the backbone of Medicine Path Native American Church. He says “How do we keep something sacred? We treat it in a good way.” And for me, the way of approach is the first, and key step to starting a relationship that immediately invokes the Holy and invites a deeper experience than is possible when we forget to ask permission.
Well, I hope that landed well with you. I continue to forget, then remember, then forget again, and then remember again on deeper and deeper levels. It takes practice, but it’s oh so worth it!
Give it a shot and tell me what your experience is. Do you notice a difference between interactions as usual and taking a moment to follow the steps I’ve offered above? Leave your comments in the comments section below.
Until next week, may the Goddess be with you.
xo & <3
When I look at some of the biggest pearls of wisdom that I’ve learned in my relationship with the Divine Feminine, my baby steps into the shamanic realms, and learning indigenous traditions and teachings from different cultures, there’s one particular nugget that not only intersects all of these, it stands out as, probably, the number one practice that HEALS ALL SUFFERING, and UNLOCKS MANIFESTATION MAGIC. Want to know what it is?
Check out this quickie for this week’s Heads UP for Thriving Outside the Box.
Giving Thanks is at the heart of love. It is the key element of Spiritual Composting, which turns all suffering into limitless joy. It is at the core of all healing.
As a key to unlocking manifestation magic, it tells the mind and body, especially those old stuck parts, that whatever it is we were longing for, well, it’s already here, and letting the whole mind*body*spirit resonate with that new reality is the fastest way of calling in what we want. (I’ll get more into that in future messages, and have touched on it already. It’s a BIG topic to dive into).
Gratitude is, if there really is such a thing, the cure-all. It is a simple and easy way of practicing loving kindness. It’s hard to turn a hard heart to a show of gratitude.
Imagine being able to be grateful for someone’s mistreatment of you. The wounding would dissolve into love, and the “mistreator” has no option but to be stunned and melted by the graciousness (at worst, it creates such an unpleasant discord because there’s no place for the intended harm to land, that the “mistreator” will excuse him/herself from the situation).
Gratitude is one of my greatest weapons, along with love. Actually, I think Gratitude is the weapon and love is the ammunition. Regardless of the metaphor, the two together are unstoppable, truly.
Just give it a try.
Here’s a simple practice to turn everything around:
First thing in the morning, take 5 minutes to simply list all the things you are grateful for. You can say them out loud, or write them down and carry them with you as a reminder.
Here’s another practice:
1) Put reminders ALL OVER THE PLACE (in your calendar, alerts on your phone, stick-it notes . . .) “What are you grateful for now?”
2) Simply allow that mantra to reside in your mind and heart: “What am I grateful for now?”
3) Don’t react or respond to anything in a challenging situation until you’ve found at least 1 thing (not something unrelated, but something directly involved with the challenge) to be grateful for.
One last pearl about gratitude: The more time you give yourself to feel grateful, the more, you will notice, there is to be grateful for.
I believe that all the Elements and Guides who are here to help us need to be acknowledged and fed in some way, and gratitude is one of the foods that pretty much all of them like. And the more I feed them, the more they want to help me out. I’m not kidding. I can almost not get an offering of thanks out there before it is reciprocated in multiple ways.
So, that’s it for today’s transmission. I hope it serves you well.
Do YOU have a Gratitude Practice? If so, what is it? If not, try one of these and tell me what happens in the comments section below! I love to hear from you <3
We’re getting to the end of the hot and sultry days of Summer.
And as I’ve been in the playful and very activated energy of it all, I had an invitation from Spirit come to me. It was to take a moment to be silent and to be receptive.
Summertime (especially here in the Bay Area) is full of big plans, events, parties and expression. It’s a time for fireworks and celebration, and it can be easy to forget to practice one of the most important (and frequently least honored) elements of truly getting what we want. What is that element? Check out my latest video for the answer, and some ways to put it into practice.
This beautiful poem just came in to my life today, and speaks beautifully to what I just shared:
Praying
It doesn’t have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch
a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn’t
a contest but the doorway
into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak
~Mary Oliver
So, I’m keeping it simple.
Enjoy, and please comment below on how still & silent receptivity serve your journey.
If you want more in-depth insights, invitations and offers from me, sign up for my weekly inspirations and they’ll get delivered along with the vlogs to your in-box.
Until next week,
May the Magic be with you!
xo & <3
Happy 13! Yes, it’s been 13 weeks (that’s a whole season’s worth!) since I started my journey with you, offering inspirations for a life outside the box, filled with magic, topped with limitless joy.
To celebrate, I wanted to present you with a little riddle. What do Oscar the Grouch, The Goddess, and the Number 13 have in common?
Check out my latest video to see what the heck I’m talking about:
13 is the element that comes from the Void. It is all possibility that emerges from the darkness of the Great Unknown. It is the Great Mystery inasmuch as we can possibly grasp such a thing while still in human form, perceiving through human mental constructs.
We often fear and judge it. Yes, even me. Yes, even you. We think it is trash. We think it is “other.” What it is really? Something unknown with the potential to expand the universe towards even greater life.
It is out of our control. It is beyond our comprehension. It is scary, and it keeps life happening. It breaks the mold, rocks the boat, never even got inside the box, and laughs at convention. It’s dirty and sweaty, scraped up and invites us to step way outside our comfort zones (and if we’re lucky enough, She kicks us off our beaten path to see the tiny miracle emerging beyond our sight).
I suspect you might be drawn to this frequency or you wouldn’t be reading my newsletters. While they are focused on bringing in the light, they fully embrace the full spectrum of the human experience, and 13 is my special H’Om girl.
Since Oscar is so in love with trash, and in ancient times, the Goddess Temples housed the “trash” (since she is the transforming element that returns life to the lifeless), he’s a secret cheerleader for the Goddess. GO OSCAR!
Goddess of Trash Challenge:
She invites you to do a couple of things.
#1 – Open your mind and heart to something or someone who currently brings up contraction inside. Find an opportunity to praise, rather than judge.
#2 – Make yourself available for this potent frequency to operate in your life. That means creating space in your schedule, your heart and your mind, and ASKING for The Goddess to move through you. It won’t be comfortable, but it will offer something new, unexpected and very lifey.
#3 – Leave me a comment about your experience in the comments section.
A BRIEF DISCLOSURE:
I share this and all other insights through the lens of being a priestess ordained into 13 different archetypes of the Divine Feminine, and as an initiate into a Mayan tradition of shamanism. I have a unique perspective to share. This is my own picture, inspired by my work with Martin Prechtel in Bolad’s Kitchen, my work with the 13 Moon Mystery School, my education and life experiences, and as a channel for the Divine living a life on the edge of magic, beyond the mundane. I want to honor my teachers and their influence in my work and also acknowledge that I am in no way able to teach you what they would; nor can I promote my opinions as endorsed by these teachers. I take full responsibility for what I say. For more information about the big influences in my life, click on the links provided.
ARE YOU READY TO TAKE IT FURTHER?
JOIN ME for my in-person circle!
I am accepting applications for the Living Wisdom School NOW, which starts up October 12th 2013. Space is VERY LIMITED and there is a screening process to make sure our group is cohesive.
Can’t make it to the live circles?
TAKE PART in my Journeys of WISE teleclass!
We meet for 75 minutes weekly and calls are recorded and provided as our gift to you for your listening convenience.
It’s been so great to celebrate our 13 weeks together! Here’s to the next 13!
xo & <3
Hey SupterSTAR!
Tell me if you’ve had this experience before:
You push through some old pattern. Years of old conditioning have come to the surface and you’ve taken the risk and done the hard work to move through into a new reality for yourself and just when you’re about to celebrate, you start to feel anxious. You get triggered. And it feels like everything just might all apart. It seems like often, after a great break-through, there’s a whiplash effect that can bring it all down.
Sound familiar? You’re not alone!
Check out my latest video (6 min) that give the 2 signs of success that most of us mistake for sure signs of failure.
Well, I hope that is helpful!
And tell me about what YOU experience after a breakthrough, and if it was challenging, what got you through the aftermath of vulnerability that comes from a big break-through? Leave your comments below.
And if you liked this week’s inspiration, don’t keep it all to yourself! Spread the love! Tell your friends and post it on your favorite social media sites.
Thanks & until next week, may you Re-Member the Divine within YOU!
xo & <3
I have sat down several times, wondering how to share this week’s inspiration with you. Usually I have a clear idea that is just chomping at the bit to be liberated into the written word, but today (which makes perfect sense if you read on), the experience I want to share is so intense, I’m not sure how it will unfold. The message is waiting to be revealed and requiring that I simply sit down, without any sort of agenda, and allow Spirit to guide my fingers.
What I am about to share is immensely sacred and intimate and my prayer is that it holds the inspiration and guidance for you that it has offered in my life.
A year ago, during a rare, but nonetheless challenging time, I fell into a day full of self-doubt. I was having a crisis of faith, QUESTIONING EVERYTHING that I’ve built my life on. Finally, after feeling stuck and overwhelmed for hours, I got my butt out of the house to go for a walk. No more than 5 minutes down the very busy trail by my house, I came across a fox skull (totally random and so out of the blue). I put tobacco down and prayed with it, asking if this was something for me (I’m really learning that it’s good NOT to take anything that is not truly mine, as all things hold medicine and the wrong medicine is, well, just wrong). The overwhelming message I got was that the skull was there as a reminder from Spirit that, no matter what happens to my faith, I am always seen and held.
Fast forward to just a few weeks ago. Fox has continued to appear, more and more frequently. Showing up to visit the new sweat lodge that the Native American Church has built at our home, and remind me that, despite my sometimes lack of ability to see the big picture, the big picture does not fail to see me.
Last week, I was on that trail again, and a fox jumped out of the tree in front of me and took off around the bend. I was in total doubt, telling mysel I had made it up. It must have been a raccoon. No fox would be so obvious in the middle of the day. And just as I was convincing myself I had not actually seen him, I rounded the bend, and there he was, standing and looking at me over his shoulder. It was obvious he was there, waiting for me to really see him. I gasped as we made eye contact. I looked at him and really took it in. I said “Wow, thank you, beauty!” and then he disappeared as quick as lightning.
The next night, I went to my weekly Chanupa prayer circle and one of my prayers was to really deepen with and understand Fox Medicine. A few short days later, I went out on the same trail. Before I left, I stopped in at the Crone Altar (the latest archetype we danced with in the Living Wisdom School). The Crone had melted open the raw chocolate I’d offered her, and she told me to bring sweetgrass for my walk. I found a golf ball with the number 13 hand-written on it (a very magical symbol of death, transformation and change). I perked up my senses and thought “This is a nature oracle! Pay attention to what else you find that is unusual. It will be guidance for the road ahead.”
Within minutes, I rounded the bend and there he was again, but this time, the fox was dead. I instantly started to cry. The first flash that hit me was a recognition of him being my kin. My brother. The next flash was deep grief for the death of this beautiful being. The next sense that hit me was immense gratitude as it was unmistakable that he had come to offer up the medicine that I had just prayed for.
Spirit had guided me to bring a braid of sweetgrass with me that day, and so I knelt down by his beautiful body, prayed with the offering, and asked what I was to do with this experience. As I placed the sweetgrass and my hand on his heart, I got the message that I was to take him home and let Spirit guide me as to how to care for him in a good way.
I did a tobacco blessing on him, lit sage and the sweetgrass, and then brought his perfect, lifeless body home with me, in my arms, like a baby. All I could feel was a swirling of different emotions: sensing this being as my brother, grief and gratitude.
I reached out to the medicine man who guides our Medicine Path Native American Church ceremonies that are such a huge part of my life, and other members of our community for some support in how to really honor this almost unbelievable medicine gift.
What landed for me was that I was to take his skin. Something I’ve never done and felt not just a little intimidated to do. But with prayer, and the support and presence of a dear sister, Ayden, I became intensely intimate with this beautiful creature. With many prayers, offerings, and empty presence, I did my best to honor my brother and to fully receive his sacrifice in a way that could serve my path and beyond.
Since I first laid eyes on him, I have felt shifted. There has been so much that has opened up for me in my heart, my vision, my mind and my body. Some of it is still floating around on the etheric plane, but some of it is landing, and because this offering is so powerful, I want to share it with you since I feel that we are all, in some way, on the same journey together, and there is wisdom that can serve us all here.
LESSONS FROM FOX:
1) You are always seen by the Divine, even if you can’t see Him/Her.
2) The deep recognition that happens at the heart-knowing level, holds within it the wisdom of death. Everything and everyone we “recognize” or take in as a part of our journey will some day not be there. Embrace them anyway. Let the breaking open of the heart be an allowance for what is – the gift and the inevitable loss. Don’t miss out on potent medicine, gifts and lessons in an attempt to avoid the pain of loss.
3) Grief is inherent in every deep connection, and when we can be present with the FULL experience, it creates beauty, feeds the Holy, and gives us medicine unavailable from the mundane world that tends to filter out the parts of the human experience that are messy.
4) Being fully available to receive what the Divine has to offer us (and honor it) is more fulfilling and enriching than any social status or efforts at “progress” could yield.
I feel, unquestionably and fully seen by my Creator. There is no amount of money, or material/social acquisition that could compare. These experiences are not found on-line, and seldom at the mall or other landscapes of human cleverness. They exist in the in-between spaces we forget about. The moments that our busy schedules tend to push out.
For me, these potent communications, hit-on-the-head-with-a-frying-pan sort of answers to prayers, are the most valuable experience I could have. They let me know I am remembered and snarl at self-doubt, keeping it at bay.
As I complete, I have these questions for you:
Where are you hiding from the Holy (through busy-ness and lack of presence)? What parts of you are afraid to be vulnerable and seen by the Unknown? I want to hear from you! Let me know your answers to these questions, AND, have you had a magical connection with a guide from the animal or plant kingdoms? How did it show up, and how did it impact your life?
Please leave your comments here, and . . .
stay tuned for next week’s Head’s Up for inviting more of the Divine into your Life and Thriving Outside the Box!
I just want to say that I have been feeling the deep sense of outrage that has rippled through our community as the result of a continually failing “justice” system. We have so many people in jail and prison and there’s so much inconsistency in how punishments are handed down, and, truthfully, it feels like an immensely antiquated system that is creating more harm. As the veils thin and more and more humans are choosing community, connection, love, sustainability, balance, and health instead of control, ownership, us vs. them, it seems obvious that the prison system is lagging far behind in the whole train of human conscious evolution.
And the truth is, many of us feel upset, but then we don’t really know what to do with it. How can we take real action to make our world a better place? It can be easier to just try to tune it out.
And that’s the same for when we have regret in our lives. Events we wish we could have done differently, but now are stuck in the place of being aware of the damage, but feeling hopeless and powerless to do anything about it. Is there a solution? Yes, in fact, there is.
Instead of feeling overwhelmed, I wanted to share a potent tool I’ve used many times for myself, and have shared it with pretty much every client and many of the groups I teach and speak to. It has brought about miraculous results in my life and the lives of many others, and I think it is really important to share this tool so that each one of us can do our part in making the planet a place of healing and loving relationships rather than disconnection, separation and contention.
The tool is a Huna Hawai’i’an practice called Ho’o Pono Pono. There are books and probably workshops you can take on this experience, and I am no expert at it, but I have used it many times and can truly say it has played an immense role in healing some circumstances that I felt were hopeless. (Not just my own experience, but for others as well.)
I invite you to check out this video where I share the 4 basic steps and go into the details of how I have integrated them into my practice for maximum potency.
Again, the 4 steps are:
1) Apologize
2) Ask for forgiveness
3) Say “I love you”
4) Say “Thank you” for the healing
There are SO MANY WAYS that this practice can be used and integrated into other practices so that it really serves you. I had one friend tell me she used it to get a call back on a job she really wanted, but felt the hiring manager’s assistant had blown her off. I have used it to heal crunchy relationships that have not been available for live and in-person healing. Again, I’ve always experienced potent and positive results and so I highly recommend it for ANYTHING that you are experiencing that feels outside of your control and painful.
I want to put out a personal prayer for our personal healing in old unresolved upsets and a complete transformation of how we deal with criminals. I believe that focusing on restoration, healing and going to the heart of why the crimes were committed in the first place is where true justice lies. It may not be easy or pretty, but I believe it holds the keys to a healthier planet. Fortunately there are amazing pioneers who are growing this concept in the world through Restorative Justice, which is a practice that focuses on bringing healing to victims and perpetrators of crimes rather than punishment, which frequently leaves the victims and their needs largely unconsidered, and offers no real help to those who broke the law so that they can make a better choice for themselves in the future. There are really potent parallels here between regret we hold inside ourselves and the injustices that exist out there, and I believe that when we start to shift from within, it ripples out and becomes a reflection in our external world as well. Don’t ever underestimate the necessity and potency of you doing what you can to heal your life. Every single person choosing to live with more love and peace in their hearts makes a huge difference in the world. That means that you hold in your hands the most powerful tool for a healing planet. Are you ready to use it?
Please let me know how you are using this practice in your life and how it is impacting your relationships in the comments section below.
Here is a resource for more information on Restorative Justice I highly recommend:
Sending a prayer for deep healing for ALL who have been harmed, and all who have caused harm. May there be liberation from the suffering and a coming together in loving kindness.
Until next week, all blessings.
As I have started to feel my energy return and seeing the light at the end of the long tunnel of loss I have been walking through, I’ve taken the time to feel into the many responses I have received from clients, friends and my community.
I keep hearing so many stories about the intense heaviness of loss, and that some of us are able to really connect with the sweetness, the sacredness and the beauty that is available inside each passage, transition and loss. And some of us can get swallowed up in the grief and feel consumed by sadness and an inability to move on. And as I’ve listened to the stories and felt into what has helped me to feel so held and blessed during this potent and challenging time of grieving is one key that, I think could help us all to shift from living in the past with regrets and remorse, to celebrating our lives and moving out of the darkness and into the bright side of life.
I shared a little bit of what I discovered here in this week’s video and I invite you to check it out.
Being able to be fully present with what is happening, to listen, to really be fully available, to surrender to what’s going on, rather than trying to fight the loss, ignore it, push it away or otherwise tune out from the pain gives us the ability to show up for these powerful, life-altering experiences in a way that keeps us out of the dark shadows of regret. Regret seems to be a prison we put ourselves in that traps us in the past, and the only key to releasing ourselves is to be fully present (and to find forgiveness for how we’ve dealt with the difficult times in our lives).
The truth is, we don’t live in a culture that tells us how to deal with death, so truly, just getting through it with one’s sanity is something to be proud of.
But it is so important to recognize that when we see that a loss is imminent: in a relationship, a job, our physical capacity, or saying good-bye to a loved one . . . that being present with every phase allows us to respond in ways that can really serve a graceful flow that creates gentleness during this challenging time. This allows us, as we look back at the process, to say “I wouldn’t have done it any differently,” and I think that this is the absolute biggest gift we can give to ourselves. It allows us to move forward, heal, strengthen, grow and fully participate in what life is offering us on the next leg of our journey.
And if you’ve had a loss that you find yourself stuck in, full of regrets, there’s still an opportunity to heal and let those regrets become helpful guides and allies. It requires compassion and forgiveness, and it requires finally having all the feelings that were avoided. It can be something that is overwhelming, and so I invite you to get help with this process. From a friend, from a professional. There is absolutely no need to stay stuck in the past and to let regret eat away at your happiness and keep you from fully living the immense gift that life is waiting to offer you RIGHT NOW.
So please, don’t waste one minute more. There is no honor, reward or benefit in letting regret run your life. It’s time to let those feelings go, cut the anchor of the past and allow yourself to be fully engaged with what life has placed in front of you to experience in this moment . . . and this moment . . . and this one.
May you feel fully supported and nourished on your journey and please don’t ever hesitate to reach out. I’m here to help you thrive and live a life free from regrets.
Please tell me what your experience is with regret. How have you kept yourself free from regrets, or how have regrets shown up in your life? Share below in the comments section.
And thanks for stopping by! I look forward to deepening with you.
Until next week, all blessings.
HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!
Today I want to be brief with the words and offer up for you a musical journey. A mixed tape, if you will, from the Goddess. It’s a journey through loss. May it see you through into the light at the end of the tunnel and to your personal freedom and take you on a journey through loss that might support your graceful transition from emptiness into what lies on the other side of this passage.
Severance
Ganesh Invocation
Chant of the Paladin
Namaste
Monk With Bell
Dissonance
Fortune Presents Gifts not According to the Book
Sarve Shaam
Morning Song
Meeting In The Aisle
Dawa The Cradlesong
Prabhujee
Refuge & Sevenfold Offering
Thank You For Hearing Me
Starálfur
How dow music impact your life? Do you use it to support you in troubled times? What is your favorite music when you’re sad? Angry? Ready to pop? PLEASE SHARE IN THE COMMENT SECTION BELOW!
Once again, thanks for tuning in, and until next week, blessings on your journey!
xo & <3
As I have been walking, eyes wide open, through the grief process, I had a really powerful “Ah-ha” moment I’d like to share with you. I hope it helps ANYONE WHO SUFFERS FROM DEPRESSION. I know that it has helped me. I am going to get really vulnerable here and share some really personal information. It’s difficult to be so raw and open, but I think it’s important and can be a big help to others who are going through the grieving process. Check out my video where I explain how it might be possible to be joyful and depressed at the same time.
I don’t feel like being on the phone, on my computer, don’t want to do “work,” meaning the busy stuff. I feel resistant to so many things that I usually instinctively do without so much as a second thought. Eating healthy, exercise, yoga . . . they’ve all been a big challenge. Thank godness (sic) I haven’t had any resistance to my prayer and meditation practices. In fact, that’s kind of the only thing I really feel like doing lately.
For a little while I resisted it and tried to push myself to keep things moving forward as usual. Then I realized that this is a time to be restful and gentle with myself, so I excused that internal “go get ’em” voice that was starting to cause feelings of guilt and labeling myself as lazy. I allowed myself to simply honor being more slow and less productive. And then, in a conversation I had with a friend this week, it came. The “Ah-ha” moment. I realized that depression is not actually a bad thing. I think it is an undeniable invitation to really honor the time we are in. To be more inward, more quiet, to let our emotional flow happen and not try to keep up social engagements and pretend that it’s “business as usual.”
At times of great loss, the Universe is saying “It’s time to be empty, still and fallow.” It’s a time of releasing, letting go, surrendering, and allowing the slate to be wiped clean, and then from the emptiness to allow what is next to emerge. It’s not a time to try to be productive. The only thing wrong with depression, in my opinion, is that most of us don’t live in communities or cultures where we can allow ourselves to fully allow the hollowing out time to happen. We’re expected to keep working and taking care of all of our responsibilities as usual. Maybe, if we’re lucky, we get 1 or 2 days off of work or we have some awesome family or friends who help us out here and there. Most of us, however, have to just keep on keepin’ on, and that’s when depression is a problem. We are not honoring this HUGE ceremony that’s taking place in our lives and our hearts and minds and bodies are wracked with stress trying to walk in two different directions at once.
So, my suggestion is to simply do what you can. Don’t beat up on yourself if, while going through a loss, you’re not at the top of your game! Ask for help if you can. Rest more. And instead of fighting off or labeling depression as your enemy, see it as your friend who’s trying to support you in fully honoring the potent loss you’ve gone through. If it’s been over 6 months, then it is a really great idea to reach out for support. I’d be incredibly honored if you chose to connect with me, but whatever your wisdom guides you to, get help so you don’t have to work so hard for your health.
Again, my heart goes out to all of my relations who are in the grieving process.
Next week I’m going to treat you with a Soundtrack from the Goddess. Until then, blessings on your journey!
As you may know, I have been in a deep process of letting go. There have been several deaths and lots of loss and grieving in my life, and while it has been incredibly challenging and requiring presence, gentleness, and LOTS OF REST, it’s also been a potent teacher and guide.
I’ve found that this interstitial space, this in-between place that is empty IS THE GREAT MYSTERY, from which all possibility arises. Even though it can bring up all sorts of fears around “not having,” being lonely, and survival, it is an immense opportunity to allow ourselves to start something new that is a quantum leap beyond what we thought possible for ourselves. How do we do that? Watch my video for some insights into the potent time.
I believe that we have these huge clearings because the Universe is preparing us for something really big, and so I try to really stay present with each step, honoring it, showing up the best I can, going easy on myself, and preparing to receive.
I’ve been letting go of lots, and plan on continuing that until this in-between time feels complete.
What are you letting go of? How does it feel to do a big clearing? What pearls of wisdom or hidden treasure are you uncovering as you allow the old to leave and make way for the new?
PLEASE LEAVE YOUR COMMENTS HERE! I LOVE to hear from YOU!
Until next week, All blessings!
xo & <3
As my journey continues to walk me through more loss, I’ve felt myself like a dreamy shell, emptied out, raw, vulnerable and transparent.
As I’ve gone into this experience, deeply and slowly, I’ve realized that I have been blessed with some insights that have made this process an immense blessing, full of graciousness, and I wanted to share it with you so that, in your times of loss, you can fully receive all that is here for you.
Watch my video where I share why being empty after a loss can be a good thing.
I’ve recognized, as I’ve witnessed this death and loss, that the emptiness is a great gift and something I don’t often allow myself to drop into. I empty out during meditations, but when the universe wipes the slate clean, it is a clearing that we wouldn’t ever choose for ourselves and yet this powerful time is ripe with so many opportunities to allow something new and even more fully aligned with our highest good.
The biggest key is to make sure not to hurry and fill up that space with the quickest and easiest distraction/filler we can find. To truly honor what has passed and to really make sure that we are letting this clearing away be of service in our lives, it’s essential to hold that empty space in reserve for something that is truly worthy of that space. Is TV or getting lost in on-line distractions what we want to take the space of a relationship?
With the blank slate in front of you, what new art do you choose to make of your life? Pay attention, because the universe never takes away without offering something to fill it up. It may take some time, but it is always worth the wait.
How have you chosen to deal with losses in your life? Have you had the opportunity to turn a loss into something that has made more beauty in the world? Please share your insights and experiences in the comment section below.
And, if you like what you’ve seen and read here, sign up for my weekly inspirations, they’ll get these gifts delivered directly to your inbox for free and you’ll get extra insights and tips that I don’t share anywhere else.
Oh, and please tell your friends. If you like this content and you like your friends, then share the goods!
To all of you who are grieving a loss, great or small, my heart and prayers are with you.
Much love and all blessings,
Have you been experiencing intense loss and change too? It seems like there has been so many powerful life transitions right now and my heart is feeling really full of all that this process brings: grief, beauty and grace.
This past month has been full of death, loss, and a call to grieve on a level I haven’t experienced in several years, yet I’ve felt the most blessed I can recall in many years as well. It may seem contradictory to be face-to-face with what could easily be seen and labeled as a tragedy, and yet feel so much peace and grace, and it seemed really important to share this experience with you from this raw place I’m in so that it may serve you in your times of great loss. This week’s video is all about what I’ve learned about death and finding grace and peace inside of the loss.
Have you been experiencing powerful changes? I’d love to hear how you are navigating loss in your life, and if you have any wisdom you’d like to share, please leave a comment below!
And if you like what you’ve seen and read and you’re not on my mailing list, feel free to sign up. It’s completely free of charge and hassels and you’ll get my weekly inspirations delivered directly to your inbox along with other special personal shares you won’t find anyplace else.
Until next week, blessings on your journey!
xo & <3
Hey all you wild at heart thrivers, have you been getting bombarded by all sorts of messages about awakening your Divine Purpose? (Some of them were from me, it’s true : / ). I certainly have, and recently, I took a moment to think about it and thought,
“What is the big deal, anyway?”
Well, I took a moment to think about it and then share a little bit about why knowing and living in your Divine Purpose is such a great idea. I also share some insights into this whole Divine Purpose deal that might make it a little less painfully woo-woo sounding and a little more understandable and approachable.
Check it out here
And please tell me about your insights and experiences with uncovering and manifesting your Divine Purpose in the comments section.
Don’t forget to check out the other treasures I’ve left here for you. My Living Wisdom School and the Journeys of WISE are here to fully support you in the mystical and practical ways available to us in making our soul’s calling a reality in this lifetime. Go ahead, check it out, and drop me a line! I’d love to hear from you!
Until next week, may you remember the Divine within you.
xo & <3
Hey friends!
Did you know that I wrote an oracle? It’s true! It’s maybe another side of me you haven’t yet seen and I’m so excited to share all of me with you under one umbrella – here at my new epad!
As the result of asking for a dream for the collective in 2008, I was guided to decipher the archetypal wisdom held within the Alice in Wonderland Adventures and it became a wildly popular website and newsletter with over 10,000 hits each month. Despite the fun I was having, I felt really stretched in too many directions and it seemed wise to gather all my offerings together here at my new epad for all of my friends, family and fans to enjoy in one convenient location.
It’s all me whether it’s silly or sacred, from the Divine or the Land of Wonder. And as an authentic human helping my earth tribe to THRIVE outside the box, it seemed important to give you ALL I’ve got. So, without further adieu, here’s my first video blog from down inside the rabbit hole. Here we meet the White Rabbit and discover what he has to teach us about time, and passage into the realms of the subconscious mind.
Enjoy!
Oh, and PLEASE take a moment to share any experiences you’ve had where time stood still or flew by OR any journeys you’ve taken with the White Rabbit!
I really want to hear from you!
So leave your stories down below in the comment section!
Thanks and big hugs with tea and jam from the kitchen of the White Queen. She’s a bit of a mess, but she makes a killer crumpet!
xo & <3
Hey beauties! I have a question for you. Have you ever thought about what the Holy eats?
It’s something that’s only come into my consciousness over the past few years and continues to become a more and more profound question.
Several years ago, I had the opportunity to learn, directly from one of my sacred altars, that an altar is actually a mouth of God:dess/Creator. It’s a place where we receive Divine wisdom and inspiration. It is also something that needs to be fed.
Check out my latest video where I explain why you’d want to and how you can feed the Holy through keeping a sacred altar.
Want MORE depth? Soon you can access chapters to my new book: “Sexual Bliss Through Good Housekeeping: The extraordinary woman’s guide to a better EVERYTHING” where I’ll dive deeper into making and keeping a sacred altar, co-creation with the Divine and other practices for making more magic (so much that it squeezes out the mundane).
Like what you see? Don’t keep it to yourself! Share it with your friends! And if you REALLY like what you see, sign up for my weekly inspirations. You’ll get my vlogs mailed directly to your inbox and you’ll get special treats and offers you won’t find anywhere else.\
DO YOU have a sacred altar? How do you work with it? Have you ever experienced it as something that speaks to you and something that needs to be fed? PLEASE SHARE YOUR EXPERIENCES BELOW in the comment section. I’d love to hear from you!
Until next week, remember the Divine within you.
xo & <3
Woohoo, Wonderbeings! I’m so excited to say that my new website is officially up and ready to receive all the SuperSt*rs like you who are saying “YES” to live JOYFULLY outside the box!
My personal mission is to help more and more of us who are choosing (or more accurately, really feel there is no choice about it) to live outside the comfort zone, far beyond the mainstream and at the edge of the Mystery, to walk the fringe with unlimited JOY! I’ve found some secrets (mostly the hard way), and instead of standing by smugly and watching my cohort scraping and bruising through the same mistakes I made, I want to share what I’ve learned with you so we can get on the magic carpet ride together and en-joy!
So, to celebrate, I’m going to share with you a powerful download I recently got on how to birth our Divine Purpose, so you can feel the love too. Check out my video blog here, where I give up the goods (there are adorable baby kitties too – I know, it’s a cheap shot, but I couldn’t say no to them).
Make sure to check out the new e-pad. The other pages of this site have other offerings you may like. The shag rug is still all fluffy and welcoming and I’ve got some appetizers you’ll love (sign up for my weekly inspirations and they’ll come directly to your inbox and you’ll get magical bits & bobs you won’t find anywhere else).
xo & <3
I am so excited to be posting my VERY FIRST VIDEO BLOG EVER!
Yeah!
I wasn’t expecting to dive in quite yet. This new website (which I’m annoyingly excited about) has just a few little bits and bobs I’m attending to so that it’s super fun and inspiring to engage with. But I couldn’t help myself. This transmission came through about grief and I just had to share it. It felt too important to wait. If you stick with me to the end of this transmission you’ll get:
1) Some great insights about how we humans turn grief into MORE grief even when we don’t want to and, even more importantly . . .
2) HOW TO STOP DOING THAT!
Below I’ll include 7 great ways to let go of grief so it doesn’t get passed on AND HERE’S THE KICKER- it’ll feel really good doing it.
And so, without further adieu, here’s what I learned about Grief and how to heal ourselves, our ancestral wounds, and feed the Holy with it. Sound too good to be true? Watch this video above and then read on, I’ll explain.
So, I decided to NOT TAKE IT PERSONALLY, but that actually opened the door for the real, deep, archetypal and ancestral grief to show up. And at first I didn’t want to have that grief handed to me, but when I saw this woman’s spirit handing me her grief, I realized I didn’t have a choice. Well, truthfully, what I realized is that I actually had several choices, but the ONLY ONE that felt right was the one that was going to be the most painful for me at first.
THE OPTIONS:
What we tend to do with grief: a) send it inward and cause disease and/or depression inside of us, b) pass it forward to the first person who accidentally stumbles across our path and steps on our toes, or c) ricochet it back to the source we think we got it from. ALL of these choices magnify the harm, feed it, and make it to grow. The only option that actually heals and prevents the spread of more harm is to be willing to d) process (or metabolize as my teacher, Martin Prechtel, so beautifully puts it) the pain through our body, our mind and our spirit so that it becomes food for the Holy instead of fuel for more pain.
How do we metabolize grief?
GREAT QUESTION! One we don’t tend to address in any way in our modern “civilized” culture. We tend to justify and condone the anesthetization of the grief: TV, depressive fatigue/sleep, food, alcohol . . . Ironically, even at this amazing class on Restorative Justice, I didn’t hear any talk about the grief that’s brought up and responsible ways for releasing it so it doesn’t generate more of the same (maybe, just maybe, this is why I was gifted with this missile launch, so I could have this deeper “ah-ha” moment and help to raise awareness about it). We aren’t taught how to do it, or that it is even important to do it in the first place.
Here is what I do to process the pain so it not only doesn’t cause harm, it actually turns into something(s) beautiful:
1) I cry – a good hard cry, especially in front of an altar, holding a medicine bundle, or out in nature with your bare feet touching the earth and your heart pressed up against a big old mossy tree is the best, but any way it comes out. Just allowing the grief to flow authentically is what matters.
2) I tone – a nice deep sigh, a moan, sounds that resonate from the belly and the heart that vibrate out feel SOOO DELICIOUS. I like to morph the grief toning into chants or, if it feels appropriate, into ridiculous sounds and pulling silly faces that help me to laugh at myself and what I have chosen to get caught up in.
3) I move – it used to be, and sometimes still is, that really intense exercise that gets my heart-rate up, sweat pouring and body feeling its strength was what I needed. Now, I find that dance (at home, Ecstatic Dance, Sweat Your Prayers, Barefoot Boogies, Dance Jams . . .) are my most helpful practices for letting the grief out of my body. I also really need Yoga to release stuck energies, and bring myself back into alignment after getting “bent all out of joint.”
4) I talk – it is so helpful to share what’s happened, but IT’S PARAMOUNT to share with someone who knows how to hold that experience with me. Someone who won’t magnify it, turn it into drama, or try to fix me or my “problem.” Someone who WILL simply hear me, understand my process as a sacred witness and love me no matter what, is ideal. If I don’t have access to that, I write about it, or literally talk to an imaginary person so I can get it out of my system but not launched as an angry attack at anyone.
5) I feel – it is the most difficult piece, but it’s the key to the real healing and it creates immense insights and SUPERPOWERS that only reveal themselves when I allow myself to feel everything. I think it is necessary that we really feel, deeply, all of what is being grieved on all sides. It’s painful, but it has so many gifts inside of it and once you experience it a few times, you start to really like feeling the whole spectrum of the human experience. If I hadn’t chosen to just sit with the grief as it metabolized, I wouldn’t have seen and learned so much. It was completely worth every tear I shed to have this greater capacity to be compassionate and to be less likely to cause future harm to myself or others. And there’s something really nourishing & satisfying about being totally real.
6) I pray – this one is key in my daily life. I pray for help in letting it go, and insight on how to turn my pain and grief into beauty that feeds the Holy. I’m always guided in a direction that dazzles and delights me with its richness and deeper connection to joy.
7) I transform – through the art and alchemy of spiritual composting, I’ve learned that when I strip away the projections and story-lines wrapped up in any negative feeling, what I’m left with is just pure energy which I can then use to fuel my body, mind & spirit through the metabolization process. It turns the GRrrrr! into (deep breath in and a long sigh out) Aahhh!
If you try all this stuff and still find yourself wanting to make an all out assault on someone or something, consider testing out my Love Bomb. It’ll work wonders and you’ll still love yourself in the morning ; )
So, that’s pretty much it.
I know it isn’t popular to choose to metabolize grief. Few people will recognize the hard work you are doing. Few people are going to come up and say “Hey, I’m really glad you processed your pain in a helpful way and didn’t crap all over me today.” BUT, if EVERYONE chose to metabolize the grief that they were holding, we’d have an immediate mass shift in consciousness that might just blow our minds into permanent joy. It’s one of those things that is almost invisible, and yet it is what this conscious evolution thing is all about.
Yes, my friends, THIS IS THE HOKEY POKEY.
It’s painful, it’s real, and it’s the most beautiful thing in the world. Are YOU ready for the stealth superhero ride?
GOOD! Stay tuned, I’m still putting the pieces together and not even officially opened up shop yet, but soon, yes very soon we’ll be riding the magic carpet together.
Now, as promised, here are the resources I was given for Restorative Justice:
Restorative Justice for Oakland Youth: www.rjoyoakland.org
Community Works: www.communityworks.org/
Restorative Justice Training Institute (Rita Alfred): rjtica.org
Insight Prison Project: www.InsightPrisonProject.org
National Council for Crime and Delinquency: www.nccdglobal.org/what-we-do/restorative-justice-project/current-projects
These resources were taken from handouts offered at the California Institute of Integral Studies Public Programs Course: The Emerging Field of Restorative Justice, taught by Fania Davis & Sonya Shah
xo & <3
When I look at the rich and diverse ways that I have worked with people, and the rich and diverse group of people I have worked with, it might seem difficult to really wrap my head around the question “what do you do?” But when I lay everything out and look for the common thread, what I find is that the practice of loving my pain is at the core of my personal healing practice and the work I do with everyone: from the child welfare service I did for years, to the support I offered women faced with cancer diagnoses, to men and women struggling with co-dependent relationships, to healing from heartache, to physical and medical challenges. Pain that was physical, pain that was mental, pain that was emotional and spiritual suffering as well.
When it comes right down to it, we are here in our bodies. Regardless of our beliefs about why or what happens after the body goes, we are conscious beings inside physical bodies and the reality of that physical existence includes pain.
Most pain, I have found, comes from separation. Otherness, abandonment, neglect, distance, there are lots of different levels of separation and lots of different ways it manifests, but when we feel disconnected from self, others, the body, Source, we feel pain. Ironically, pain frequently inspires us to want to pull away and distance ourselves from the discomfort, which leads to more separation and more pain.
My work, which I’ve found to be surprisingly powerful, effective, gentle and fast (sometimes verging on the miraculous), focuses on shifting the consciousness . . . doing a u-turn, and going right into that pain as fully and as deeply as possible. I’ve found that connecting with this difficult part of the self is the most powerful and long-term way of transforming that pain into something better. Usually, in fact, it can become the most celebrated part of the self.
This practice started when I was 11 years old, dealing with intense menstrual cycle cramps (which I had at the very early age of 10). I was a part of a program for “gifted students,” and had learned a sort of self-hypnosis technique that was the seed of my guided imagery practice. It was called a “fantasy trip,” and included consciously relaxing each part of the body and then going into a beautiful fantasy world I made up with my imagination. When I started having cramps that felt beyond my ability to cope, I would do the fantasy trips, but sometimes found that this did not take me out of my pain. I didn’t realize it at the time, but the solutions I sought would be the foundation of the work I now so effectively do not only for myself but with countless others to help them.
I started going right into the pain and asking it what it needed. It would usually tell me, and then I could take care of it and feel better.
This practice became much more conscious and more refined as I got older and studied Buddhist Insight Meditation and other methods of visualization and pain management. It is a natural part of my personal practice, so much so that it is almost automatic for myself. And it is the foundation of what I do with my clients who have found emotional, mental, spiritual and physical relief from pain, suffering and all sorts of stress.
I have been blessed with good health and a body that does not frequently experience a lot of pain, and so I had not, for a while, been challenged to really test the limits of my ability to turn into pain that is really powerful . . . not for a very long time, that is. But recently, I was given the opportunity to test the whole practice of moving into pain.
I was riding my bicycle down a winding narrow road when I came upon an injured squirrel. I slowed down and wanted to possibly stop to see if I could help it. As I got closer, the squirrel was alarmed and bolted towards me, then in a panic bolted the other direction. In a few split seconds in response to all of this, I rode my bike to the very edge of the road (which was at the edge of a little drop off that went down into a drainage ditch about 15 feet down). WIthout any warning, the asphalt and dirt gave way under my tire and in a flash, I was headed down the steep slope with my bike.
As I tumbled, I could hear myself saying “Oh, this isn’t good,” but I relaxed and allowed myself to seek the softest solution for each contact with the ground. When I finally came to a stop, I chose to just lay there. Not try to jump up, which is very common for people in an accident. I laid there and just breathed. My first response was to just breathe and come into my breath. As I did this I felt a panic and throbbing in my left hand and my left knee where I’d taken the worst impact. I was out of my body and couldn’t really feel anything but a throb that was filled with fear and trauma. As I tried to figure out what to do, I realized that I needed to take my own advice and bring my full attention to my pain. For just a brief moment, the fear said “No way! That’s going to hurt! You may have broken your hand and badly injured your knee. This is too messed up to handle. Just distract yourself until someone comes to help you,” but I knew that I was probably the best help I could have, so I allowed my breath to carry my consciousness to the pain that was screaming for help. I started to feel my hand and then my knee and they were in acute pain. I kept an even and deep breath and just focused on the intense pain that was shouting at me from my body. I started to do Reiki, and gently held my left hand with my right hand, and just laid there and started to open up my heart and call in as much love as possible. I started to notice that the sun was shining and I could feel it on my face. I took a moment to remove my bike helmet (thank goodness for it!) and allowed myself to get as comfortable as possible. I then just continued to lay there, breathing into the pain and sending it as much love as possible. Adding to it, the sweet warmth of the sun. Then I noticed I could hear the birds singing and I took that into my breath and felt a sense of joy in my heart. I realized that, no matter what the reality was of my injuries, I was alive and able to appreciate the birds singing and the sun on my face and so I got a big smile on my face and sent that smile into the pain too.
I then realized that the poor squirrel was up there on the road suffering too, so I started to send some of my Reiki to it, and as I brought my consciousness outside of myself, I realized there was a man walking down the road towards me. I continued to just lay there and love myself as much as possible and he walked by, looked at me, smiled and continued on. He had no idea that I had just taken a nasty spill on my bike or that I was laying there, not because I wanted a nice little break half-way down the steep hill for a little sun-bathing, but because I was injured. I got an even bigger smile and reassured myself that if I appeared to be perfectly happy and natural laying there, then I was probably going to be alright.
I gave myself plenty of time to fully return all of my consciousness to my body. After a little while (time definitely dissolved into the experience) instead of the panicked, distant throbbing, I felt the very real pain of my injuries, which told me that I had fully re-entered my body and could move safely. Gently, slowly, and cautiously, I sat up and looked at my body. I looked at my hand, which was swollen. My left knee had a huge goose egg on it. I gently moved my fingers on my left hand. They were sore and stiff, but they moved without excruciating pain, so I knew I wasn’t going to need a doctor for that. I gently bent my knee and it seemed to be alright too. I continued the Reiki until it felt like time to get up and go home. I gingerly ambled up the steep slope. My bike had, luckily, stayed at the top of the road (only now it was upside down and somehow facing the opposite direction I was biking), so I picked it up, made sure it was rideable and then looked for the squirrel. He had run off the road and was hiding in a bush close by. I knew he was way to frightened for me to approach and offer help, so I said a prayer for his well-being and got on my bike and road home.
I did all the good things to assist my body. I put ice on my swollen parts, took an epsom salt bath, gave myself Rescue Remedy flower essences, and rest. I was really amazed to find that I could walk normally, without pain. My hand was quickly fully functional (well, lifting heavy things took a while), and the most amazing thing was that I had almost no bruising, and very little aches in the following days.
Now, in my days as a child welfare worker, I actually studied injuries and how they progress (for forensics evidence), and so I was certain I was going to have some SHINERS! But there wasn’t anything that was very visible without being pointed out. I did have some obvious road rash, but the injuries appeared to be incredibly mild; not at all in synch with the big hits my body took and the initial pain I was feeling. The craziest thing is that I bruise easily. I can have a deep dark indigo bruise that I don’t even remember because I just didn’t feel it happen. There is no logical reason why I was able to go dancing just 2 days later, do yoga (with postures that put me on my knees) and just go on as though nothing had happened. There’s no logical reason why I have almost no bruising almost a week after this accident. And yet, it’s true. I am almost completely healed from something I thought I might need to get help for.
I am so grateful I had this opportunity to test myself and really take this practice to a deep and undeniable place.
I know it seems absolutely counter-intuitive, but going into the pain and giving it as much love as possible, in my experience, has only ever brought powerful, and sometimes miraculous healing. Whether it’s physical, emotional, mental, or spiritual.
Read MoreI’ve been incredibly blessed with the opportunity to live in the Bay Area and connect with some really amazing holistic/spiritually centered women’s entrepreneurial communities, such as The Goddess Collective (Montclair, CA), and FEMtalks (Berkeley, CA). These communities are really supporting women in nurturing their Divine Feminine nature AND embracing success as entrepreneurs, which has been so life altering for me! It’s helped me to let go of old paradigms about being successful, making an abundant living, AND offering my gifts to the world in a way that reflects my spirituality and deep sense of devotion and service. It’s also been incredibly inspiring to find myself continually surrounded by other amazing women who also want to serve in big ways, from the heart.
I have noticed an interesting practice that, I feel, can be a growing edge for us all to explore as entrepreneurial women. We are still frequently putting our main focus on financial success. Not only financial success, but fast financial success. THIS IS NOT A BAD THING! I do not want to suggest that making one’s way to a 6 figure income within a year of starting one’s business is wrong or anything but absolutely inspiring. I would ALSO like to suggest that there may be wisdom in looking deeper at the path to success and honor the many ways we measure it, and the many ways we get there.
Making it to 6 figures quickly feels like a very yang-based experience. Again, nothing at all wrong with it, but more masculine. I would LOVE to see us look more deeply at the DIFFERENT paths our successful women entrepreneurs are taking. I would LOVE to hear more about valuing the path of staying centered in loving self-care WHILE growing one’s business. I would LOVE to hear stories of women who chose to focus on joy while gaining more and more success in their work. It very well may be that these are the experiences of the women who shot quickly to success, but that isn’t at all mentioned, and I feel like the lack of acknowledgment is reinforcing a pressure or value in that more masculine push for quick success.
As I learn about how to grow my business, I have been moving at a pace that feels good to my heart, my body, and my soul. As I learn new techniques for writing “hot copy,” creating an irresistible “opt-in page,” and making well-received offers, it has felt really important to sit with all of these perspectives and feel into which ones are a genuine reflection of my work in the world. It has felt necessary, as a conscious emissary of the Divine Feminine in business, to really feel into how to use what I am learning in a way that is a genuine reflection of me.
The Dalia Lama said that the Western woman would be the one who helps us awaken our consciousness and it’s not just learning how to be successful and bringing our gifts out there. I think it is HOW we become successful. The path is all we have, and I would love to explore with my communities how we dance with success in a way that nourishes and supports us.
Here are some of the practices I am currently engaging in to help me stay centered in my Divine Feminine nature:
*Every piece of advice I receive about how to grow my business, I allow myself to sit with it. To feel how my body responds to it. If there is resistance, I ask if the resistance is based on a fear of success or if it is some wisdom that is arising. I allow myself to trust anything my heart and womb tell me, regardless of what someone else tells me I should do.
*I feel into the energy inside a new business practice and feel whether it is a match in frequency with what I am doing or not. (For example, one really great speaker suggested not to ever do anything you can pay someone else a minimum wage to do, BUT I feel so nourished and joyful making my own food. I also feel a deep connection with clearing my personal temple space and I could pay someone minimum wage for this, but it wouldn’t feel as nourishing or supportive as me giving myself the time to take care of myself in this way).
*I try to recognize that JOY is my continual goal and can be accessed NOW. Making a ridiculous amount of money doing what I love is a really great goal which I feel worthy of and hold as a goal, but it is absolutely secondary to the constant goal of joyfulness. If something feels heavy but will bring me money, I ask myself if it is really in service to my life’s path to say yes to it.
*I remind myself that making money is only one way of marking success. My health, my relationships, my sense of peace, spaciousness in my schedule and feeling centered are the most important elements of my life and if they are all reflecting abundance, then I feel I have succeeded. These are also the more feminine gifts to the world, and I feel it is incredibly important to continue to look at these parts of our lives and value them at least as much as we do making money. What is the money for, anyway?
*I try to notice what my motivations are behind making money: Am I trying to keep up with someone else’s success (comparison)? Do I base my self-worth in it? Am I tricking myself into thinking I’ll finally feel “worthy,” “valuable,” “acceptable” if I’m making a certain amount of money? Even something as subtle as thinking that once I make money all my problems will be solved can be a maze that can be difficult to find an exit from.
So, I wanted to share my 2 cents. I really believe that we have the power to manifest a new way of being in the world and while money is a wonderful, desirable tool, I would like to invite all of us to recognize its limitations and not let it overshadow the other elements of our lives that give us joy and make life worth living.
HOW DO YOU navigate success in a way that assures self-care and honoring all parts of your Divine Feminine nature?
Read MoreWhen I was 13 years old, my mom’s sister, Sharon, someone who was vibrant, full of child-like enthusiasm for life, and someone I delighted being around, was murdered by her husband. He then committed suicide soon afterward and it was such a shock to my system I couldn’t even understand what had happened for quite a while. As I have experienced my relationships with men, I have come to realize that there was a fixed, almost frozen stuck, part of myself that had crystallized around the idea that men want to harm women, that it is just an innate experience. I hadn’t consciously thought it, but that shock I had so many years ago was never fully grieved.
It is common, in the midst of serious trauma and tragedy, for us to work at quickly picking up the pieces and moving on as though we are fine and nothing has happened, and in doing so, I think we end up holding on to hardened, petrified grief in our psyches and our physical bodies and on subconscious levels, it informs us and influences what we draw in and manifest for ourselves. I recently did yet another ceremony to release my uncle from the perpetrator role, and consciously asked for a release of that stuck part of myself that has held onto this idea that men will always harm women in some way or another, and have found that I am releasing that old story from my body. It is coming out in tears, and finally grieving what hit me so many years ago, and I am seeing how my beliefs (as they pass out of my mind and allow a more expanded way of seeing) had kept me in a repeat pattern of calling in (or at least perceiving) destructive behavior from men.
I see how easy it is to only see one small piece of the whole when looking from inside the hole of an old wound, and how much more liberating it is for me and the relationships in my life, to allow something bigger and love-filled to show up.
Whether we believe the “other” deserves a pardon or not, WE DESERVE A BREAK from being held down by the labels of victim, wounded, broken, and we have to let go of the whole story all together if we want to be free from this heavy mantle.
In the prison of judgment, both inmate & prison guard are behind bars. Forgiveness is the key to liberate yourself. Are you ready?
I remember a long time ago, having a bunch of chaos going on in my life. My boyfriend at the time just had no ability to stay centered and hold space for me. After one particularly frustrating evening, I found myself driving home early after a big eruption. I didn’t want anything but to just relax and enjoy and he just couldn’t be there for me. So, there I was, diving home and I started feeling sorry for myself. It was an old self-pity story I’d run before. “Every time I need something, my partner just can’t/won’t show up for me! I’m always left taking care of myself!” And, fortunately, right in the middle of that old programmed response, I caught myself. Thank goddess, I caught myself . . . I thought “Wait, I’m always left taking care of myself . . . I’M AWESOME AT THAT! I do a fantastic job of showing up! I know how to be compassionate, loving, supportive . . . I’m going home to take care of myself and that’s not a booby prize, that’s the freakin’ jackpot!” So, when I got home, I acted like I was my ultimate boyfriend. I lovingly drew a bath for myself, put in some nice epsom salts, lavender oil, lit candles, turned on some music, and that started a whole new concept for me. I started spending time imagining, “If I was a man who was in relationship with me, how would I want me to show up?” I started recognizing that I had a lot of great things to offer, and I started offering them . . . to me. It was so nice! I quit expecting it from my boyfriend (very soon after he was my ex-boyfriend), and quit putting all my unrequited and unappreciated acts of generosity outside of myself and started offering it with great enthusiasm to myself. It has continued to nourish me through break-ups and other hard times. It has also helped me to, much more easily, detect when a potential partner just doesn’t/can’t show up the way I want. Then I get to make a decision of whether that is important or not. If it’s important, I can ask for it, and if I don’t receive it, I know I can offer it to myself. I can also make a much more empowered decision about who I enter into a committed relationship with. It certainly isn’t based on unspoken expectations or co-dependent needs anymore. Being my own best lover has liberated me from needy relationships, but most of all, it’s given me a new best friend . . . ME. During this month of LOVE, I encourage you, whether you’re in a relationship or not, to start giving yourself time and space to court yourself. Imagine your ideal and then make your dreams come true! You might learn some really amazing things about yourself. And then, when those yummy gestures show up from someone else, you’ll be even more appreciative. Happy Valentine’s Day! May you be surrounded by LOVE!
Read MoreIs it possible that failure might just be an important foundation of success? I sure as heck hope so because I have a lot of failure “bricks” with which to build the foundation of my life, career and relationships.
I’d like to share with you a little about this fascinating concept (one that might seem counter-intuitive) and how it has served me.
It was just a couple of days before Thanksgiving. I’d been spending months wrestling with my Sagittarian nature, trying to hone down my niche, concretize my offerings, and create a website that would be simple, effective and a reflection of who I am. NOT AN EASY TASK for someone who likes to think outside the box, and defy labels and perimeters.
I was feeling like things were getting to a good place and was ready to take a break as the holidays were about to commence and Mercury was about to go into retrograde. Now, don’t get me wrong. There have been MANY times that I have stuck out my middle finger and said “IN YOUR FACE, MERCURY!” as this pesky planet has decided to do the moonwalk backwards across our stellar landscape. And most of the time it has little to no impact on me, but I had a feeling that, along with the coming of the dark, this planetary phenomenon was a signal to be more inward and to allow the rest of my business platform to come together with grace and ease . . .
However . . . something unexplained but very clear came to me in a meditation just 2 days before our national day of giving thanks: “Do a Thanksgiving Day call to support people who are going home for the holiday.”
It would be the first day of Mercury in retrograde. I had just barely signed up for Maestro Conference and had only just a brief opportunity to check out the site. I had never done a teleconference before in my life. “Sure! No problem,” I thought, and once again, with a cocky little strut taunted the fates yet again.
I like to surf the unknown. Surprises are my bread and butter. If it’s new to me, I am drawn to it, at least to understand it a little better. So, needless to say, I frequently find myself on adventures, and sometimes not the good kind. The famous explorer, Roald Amundsen, once said “Adventure is just bad planning,” but to me, no adventure is a bad plan altogether, and real adventure is about what happens outside the plan. Now, I’m not promoting irresponsible treks to the South Pole without some good gear and a bit of research and experience, but I would like to suggest that when we try to exert control over our circumstances (which can appear in the form of “planning,” we are 1) Fooling ourselves if we think there is any such thing as control and 2) Cheating ourselves out of the opportunity to have an experience much bigger and more fulfilling than our limited perceptions and projections could have manifested.
Stepping into the unknown is CRUCIAL if you are going to have anything different than you have now.So, here it is, just a couple days before Thanksgiving and I am choosing to defy the fates and hostess my first teleseminar. I invited my friend, Betty-Louise, to be on the call with me to help me to relax and to help keep me on topic so I could focus on managing the Maestro Conference calling system. Betty-Louise has a radio show about Organic & Orgasmic living (she interviewed me for her show: http://www.coachbettylive.com/2011/11/05/cbl143-the-inner-beauty-and-sexuality-of-the-goddess/), and brings out so many great ideas and has such a great flow. I knew it was going to be a really great call. I went on to Maestro and looked around and everything seemed really straight forward. So, I scheduled the call and sent out announcements.
A lot of people signed up for the call. Even though it was last minute, so I had a lot of wind in my sails. So, the morning of the call I woke up early and had a nice meditation. I logged on early for the call and got everything set up. Turned on the pre-call music, checked in with Betty-Louise, and just focused on getting present with what we were going to share.
The call lines filled up and the moment came to start our call. I felt good right out of the starting gate, but within a few minutes, several people dropped the call. I was a bit disheartened and wondered what I was doing that was turning people off, but I couldn’t get distracted by it. I had to make sure I delivered from the heart to those who were into what I was sharing.
I took a few moments and then introduced Betty-Louise, who is so fun and dynamic (www.CoachBettyLIVE.com), but within less than a minute, more than half the calls disconnected. I couldn’t believe that people were responding that negatively. It was puzzling, but I decided to not give too much time to Betty-Louise since this seemed to not go over so well with our listeners. There are ways of communicating with a guest without letting the others listen in and I wanted to just let her know what was happening, but I was new enough at this and already felt like my brain was at its multi-tasking limit, so I had to just trust that she wouldn’t be offended at me hogging the mic.
I had an intuitive hit that there might be technical difficulties, so I mentioned, several times, that if there were any technical difficulties, the callers could communicate that to me by typing in questions for me. Nothing came in.
So, on I went. A bit puzzled, feeling anxious, but not letting any of that stop me. The content, despite the dwindling audience, felt like it was really coming from Source, and I was quite enthused about it. I chalked the dropped calls up to elements outside my control and sallied forth. As the class continued, a listener here and a listener there would disconnect.
I tried to take questions. A hand went up and I “called” on the participant . . . total dead air, and then more dropped calls. At this point, I realized that it was just me, talking. No Betty-Louise, no opportunity to take questions, and I sure wasn’t about to try to figure out how to do break-out groups! I may be brave, and I might be brazen, but I’m not set for self-destruct.
We got to the end of the call with a whopping 5 people on the line! Call it the undying optimist in me, but I felt really excited about the experience. The words that came out felt authentic and felt right and I was inspired by what flowed out. It was like opening my mouth, and letting the Wise Woman speak through me.
So, we ended the call and I checked in with Betty-Louise. She, too, was really enthusiastic about the content of the call and was perplexed as I was about the dropped calls. We only had 5 people on the line at the end! Just as we were finishing up our check-in, I got 2 text messages from friends who’d been on the call. One of them hung up early and the other had stayed almost to the very end. Both of them snet the same message: “There is Spanish guitar playing non-stop in the background that won’t shut off and no one can hear Betty-Louise.” Well, that explained it! No wonder people were dropping like flies! I wouldn’t have stayed on it either! And then I realized that 5 people had suffered through till the very end despite the crazy distractions and dead air! Then I was ecstatic! It’s one thing to keep people on a call when everything is perfect, but to reach the finish line with people who had to fight through frustration after frustration, well, that was a real vote of confidence.
I also found out, later, that none of the dashboards had been activated, so no one was able to type in questions. I’m still not sure why we couldn’t hear the caller, and there is no real explanation as to why I didn’t get the text messages about the technical difficulties until AFTER the call was completed . . . except for that darned Mercury in retrograde. I was humbled, I must say.
Then I really sunk into the perspective of the brave 5 who finished the call with me. God love ’em, they were real troopers!
The next day I got the following e-mail from one of those brave souls who stuck it out to the finish line:
Hi Amanda, Even with the technical difficulties, I thoroughly enjoyed your talk. You are SUCH a divine sweetie pie. I could tell you weren’t aware of the music and us not hearing part of it so I just enjoyed sitting and deep breathing and staying present until you would come back, and when you did, you had wonderful things to share with us. I was actually in tears a couple of times. Good ones. . . I really appreciate you! Thank you!
Namaste, [keeping this anonymous to respect privacy]
There will be so many other opportunities to get it perfect. The old me would have perseverated over the myriad ways in which that call did not go the way I’d planned, but instead, I allowed myself to focus on the gems, and that e-mail was at the center of it all.
Now the next time I do a teleseminar, I’ll have this deep experience under my belt, so much more confidence, and there’s almost no way it could get worse ; ) I’m walking away from this experience having learned how to navigate another sort of chaos, how to laugh through catastrophes, and I also learned that it helps to take the FREE on-line workshop that shows how to do a seemless tele-class, which I, of course, did after this comedy of errors. Wow, my dad really was right when he said “When all else fails, read the instructions.” Maybe next time I’ll even use that strategy first!
As I close, I want to share a not so verbatim quote by one of my teachers, Martin Prechtel: “It’s not so important that one accomplish perfection as it is to fail beautifully.” I think that I got that one down pretty good!
Stay tuned! I will be offering more of my personal experiences as a goddess emerging. It’s raw, it’s real and sometimes it ain’t so pretty . . . but deep down, it’s beautiful!
Read More- « Previous
- 1
- …
- 3
- 4
- 5
Products
-
Unlock Your Success Code: Subconscious Success Repatterning
$9.97 – $24.97
-
Best Day Ever (MP3)
$9.97
-
Divine Feminine Success Manifesting Abundance (MP3)
$9.97
-
Fantasy Trip (MP3)
$9.97
-
From Pregnancy to Motherhood (MP3 Package)
$17.97
-
Love Bomb (MP3)
$9.97
-
Creator * Preserver * Destroyer Goddess Primer
$64.00
-
Lady of Communion Primer
$64.00
Make sure you get your gift! Elevationship: Replace Conflict with Greater Intimacy
