Soren Kierkegaard wrote "Once you label me you negate me". We are amazing, complex beings. I do not believe in absolutes, and I definitely don't believe that what we do is the absolute of Who we are. That being said, some of the ingredients that make me the Who that I am: I am a mom of two amazing kids and a number of pets, a rolling stone/traveler, a writer, artist, a yogini/yoga teacher, transformative wellness teacher, 6th degree BB Karate/martial arts instructor, Thai massage therapist/Intuitive Healer. I love helping others to find their happy place, and perhaps most importantly, I am a conscious creator of my reality - and hope that maybe through some of the wisdom and experience I share, you will learn to be, too.✨
Practice any art, music, singing, dancing, acting, drawing, painting, sculpting, poetry, fiction, essays, reportage, no matter how well or badly, not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what’s inside you, to make your soul grow. – Kurt Vonnegut
Mary, Mary, quite contrary
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells and cockleshells
And pretty maids all in a row
And pretty maids all in a row
What grows in your garden?
Do you have a rich inner life, well watered and fertilized with all of the things that make your inner child happy?
Your happy, fulfilled inner child is the key to experiencing joy no matter your current age.
But for most of us, the better question might be: How often do you take a few moments to tune in to the precious, starry-eyed little boy or girl living inside of you?
It can be only too easy to lose track of those other parts of ourselves in the business and busy-ness of every day adult life.
But even if you feel like your younger selves are lost to the deepest reaches of your inner being, I can promise you they are still there, waiting to be acknowledged. Waiting to come out and play.
Waiting to create a deeper sense of joy and presence in the everyday business and busyness of life.
Meeting that child (even if it’s for the first time) can be as easy as sitting quietly for a bit and asking that little one to come out and talk to you.
Can you feel the sense of that younger you peeping around the curtains of the stage of your subconscious mind and deeper realms of the body? If so, can you let them take center stage for a bit?
What does she/he look like? What are they wearing? What would they like to do as they stand in the center of your mind-stage?
Would they create a masterpiece from clay or paint? Or maybe fingerpaint the walls? Would they spend time in the woods or on the beach? Would they dance? What kind of dance? What colors make them happy?
My inner child is especially fond of hip-hop, Latin dancing, singing, dancing and skipping on nature walks and spicy foods. She loves painting, animals, seeing new places and talking to random strangers.🤷♀️. She’s also goofy, temperamental and a little emotional.
Adult me isn’t quite so outgoing, leans towards logic and isn’t always comfortable with strong emotions. Adult me holds pain and past trauma a little closer to the heart.😣.
So allowing her to stay integrated also keeps those opposing parts of my personality balanced.
A big part of this integration is finding time each week to tune in to how she’s doing, and find activities that will make her happy. I also try to tune in to those younger aspects of myself when I’m making a major decision – our inner children tend to be closer to our intuition and that which connects us to Source/God/All That Is.
Connecting to our intuition and Source also allows us to manifest our dreams and wishes and bring the desires of our hearts to us quicker and easier than we may have believed possible. ✨💫🪄
Win/win, right?😁
What are the tools that you use to connect to your beautiful inner child?
The last months have brought more challenges and difficulties to my life than in the many years before.
I separated from my husband of nearly 14 years early last spring and moved out and onto a boat this fall. Boatlife is awesome in so many ways but also very challenging in others, especially living on a 1969 wooden yacht in the winter.
I still own my farm in the country and we’ve been through two rounds of major flooding now.
Watching your life float away as your property is under a foot or more of water is a surreal experience. Digging out the mountains of mud after the first round of flooding only to have even heavier flooding the following week was in some ways highly charged emotionally, but at the same time, knowing that there is nothing I can do about it at the moment makes it easier to let go of the anxiety and grief that I experienced the first time, standing in my garage up to my ankles in water and mud as my stored possessions and tokens of my children’s life floated around me.
One of my “most important people” passed away last summer. My aunt Sandra was one of the three women in my life who showed me unconditional love growing up. She took me in when I was a teenager headed in the wrong direction and gave me a new start, likely altering the entire course of my life for the better. Her death was earth-shattering for a few weeks.
I also had an ending to one of my dearest friendships of many years, which is so, so hard as I still hold much love her, but I know that the toxic elements that have been in the relationship for many years are always going to be there, and I have to release those things and relationships that cause ongoing strife and pain in order to move into the place that I know I want to be.
My daughter has just gotten married and is moving to Okinawa, Japan in January. I am beyond excited for her (and a little jealous, lol) but it is difficult knowing she will be so far away. She has been living in Tempe for the last year and a half and it’s pretty easy for me to jump on a plane or plan a road trip to go see her, or fly her up for a family visit. Not as much when it is a 20-plus hour flight.
I often get messages from friends and loved ones like “I am so sorry for what you are going through” or “Are you ok? You must really be struggling right now”. But the truth is, I am happy the vast majority of the time. I have an amazing life – and really am not struggling. For the most part.
I have times when I have to deal with the literal and metaphoric mud that is in my life. I’ve got a few dumpster fires for sure. But here’s how I process the “Contrasts” that we all experience in life and manage to remain happy and grounded 85-90% of the time:
I fully acknowledge and really allow myself to feel the shiznit when it happens. I yell a little, or cry alot. In the moment. I take an honest look at what is happening and what my emotional experience is. And then I step back and ask myself two questions: Is this a problem I can solve right now? And – Is it going to serve me to hold these negative emotions?
Sometimes, very occasionally, using a so-called negative emotion such as anger to be a catalyst to get off our ass and make some positive change or to drop the toxic elements of our life that are causing the anger can be a good thing. But more often than not, we allow our negative emotions to hold us as captive as those situations or people that are at the root of our emotional state do.
So for me, I usually make the decision to let that sh#t go.
If there is a problem I can solve, I look at the steps to fix it. One of the biggest challenges to living on an old boat in winter is power usage. I can’t cook and have my heat on at the same time. I can’t have my hot water heater on and anything else besides the lights going. It is an exercise in frustration and I am constantly tripping the circuit breakers. I’ve had a few times when everything has gone out and it takes some time to trace the problem to its source. But by addressing each element of the problem in turn, I can usually get things going again.
With my currently flooding property, there is absolutely nothing I can do to fix the situation. At the moment. So I say “fuck it” and set aside the emotional aspects of that problem until I can begin taking steps to dig everything out of the mud again.
Self-care is absolutely crucial in maintaining a healthy sense of balance and happiness, even in the middle of the shiznit. Taking time to get some healthy exercise, eat well, spend time with friends and family, take some long, hot baths or whatever mode of self-care feels best for you can make a huge difference in holding onto your happy state.
Right now, I am overlooking a spectacular view of the Pacific ocean and Haystack Rock in Cannon Beach, Oregon. I have good coffee beside me as I write, and a fabulous, oversized bathtub in the room to soak away all of the residual stress of life. I’ve been walking the beach, wandering quaint shops and of course, hitting the bookstores.
Tomorrow I head back to reality but taking some time – whether it’s just a few hours or a few days – to step away from it all keeps the bigger picture in perspective.
Ultimately, the contrasts are there to remind us of the good. When we are in the middle of life’s challenges – especially the big ones – it can be hard to see the big picture. We get stuck in that tiny bit of black paint that seems our only reality. But with practice, we can learn to step back and “see” the portrait of our life, recognizing that that bit of black paint is just one small spot of darkness in an otherwise bright and beautiful composition.
More importantly, that black “paint” is vital in bringing forward those lights and brights. It may suck for a bit while you are in it, but beautiful, when you see the whole picture, you will be astounded by the brilliance and beauty of your life. Truly.
What are some of the contrasts that you have been experiencing lately – and how do you keep your happy space forward in your mind and heart amidst the challenges life may bring?
If you are going through some of your own dark spots right now, I hope you know that you are not alone. I am here with you, and you’ve so got this – but if you need a little extra love and support, I’ve got you back. You are amazing. You are worthy. You are capable, and so very loved.
Charlie Brown, in the comic strip Peanuts, expressed it perfectly – What if today, we were just grateful for everything?
Better yet, what if every day, we were grateful for everything? What if we were grateful for every single experience life has or is bringing to us?
This may seem like a strange way to think. Why would we be grateful for all of the negative or even awful things that we experience in this life?
It can be so easy to regret and lament past decisions and the “negative” experiences life has brought to us. But this can keep us in a negative loop – holding “victim mentality”, and inhibiting our abilities as creators.
So what if instead we learned to be grateful for it all? What if we viewed all of the negative experiences of our past as opportunities for growth – to gain wisdom, to learn greater compassion, to experience the contrast of those things that don’t work for us to better know those things that do?
What if we considered the possibility that we came to this life as spirit, ready to be born into flesh to learn those lessons and to fully experience every single aspect of life from the sunsets to the sh#t on our shoe?
You may be reading this and rolling your eyes, thinking that I am being a wide-eyed idealist rather than a realist. What could possibly be the motivation to be thankful for the sh#t on our shoe or any other “crappy” experience life throws our way? (pun intended )
Would you reconsider if I told you being grateful not only increases life quality, overall happiness, physical and emotional health but also builds a better brain and significantly fatter wallet?
I thought that might catch your attention. Read on…
Dr. Laurie Santos, Professor of Psychology and creator of the wildly popular “Happiness Lab” at Yale University, teaches that gratitude is one of the key factors of happiness – and science is backing up this previously “woo woo” theory. In her course “Psychology and The Good Life” (most popular course at Yale in 300 years) she teaches much of that science.
For example, it has been shown in research that when we feel grateful, our brain produces greater concentrations of dopamine; a feel-good neurotransmitter. That dopamine increases when we express that gratitude through writing, speech, or compassionate action.
Gratitude also increases creativity and performance – professor SONJA LYUBOMIRSKY,, author of The How of Happiness, conducted an 8-month study of happiness at Harvard University. The results of this study showed that when a daily gratitude and affirmation practice was used, people were 19% more productive, analytic problem solving increased by 29%, and here’s the really cool one – revenue was increased by 36%. { Sheldon & Lyubomirsky, 2004, 2006a, 2007}
Crazy, right?
So what if we woke each day feeling happy, energized and ready to set intentions for an amazing day? And on those days that weren’t quite as amazing, what if we were grateful for the contrast – and even more so the ability to wake tomorrow and try again?
What if we made the conscious decision to begin to overlay those old subconscious programs of lack and negativity with something better?
What if we started a gratitude practice each and every day, in which we spent just a few minutes writing or really feeling into the space of gratefulness?
What if we wrote letters to our loved ones expressing all the things we appreciate about them?
What if we wrote a letter to ourselves expressing all the amazing things we loved and appreciated about us? Can you think of five things off the top of your head that you love and appreciate about yourself? 🤔
I’ve had a morning gratitude/affirmation journaling/meditation practice for several years now and I can tell you that not only do I feel better and more joyful – even in the times of intense stress – but my day flows better and I am able to create and manifest just about anything I can put my mind to.
Some days I like to “supercharge” this practice with a “handsa” – I write my daily affirmation on my palm to come back to throughout the day. Today’s handsa is “As my heart fully opens, my mind expands and that space is effortlessly filled with wisdom, freedom, joy, and abundance.” But there are days where I keep it super simple, too – “Big Juicy Life”, “I Create” “I am love” or “I hold myself in the space of”: (gratitude, joy, contentment, prosperity,etc.)
How can you make space each day for gratitude? What would a daily practice look like to you if you knew being in a place of optimism and gratefulness would absolutely improve the quality of your life?
Any woman was at risk of burning in the 1600’s. Sisters testified and turned on each other when their babies were held under ice.
Children were tortured to confess their experiences with “witches” by being fake executed in ovens.
Women were held under water and if they could float, they were guilty and executed. If they sank and drowned they were innocent.
Women were thrown off cliffs.
Women were put in deep holes in the ground.
Why do I write this?
Because knowing our history is important when we are building a new world.
When we are doing the healing work of our lineages and as women.
To give the women who were slaughtered a voice, to give them redress and a chance of peace.
It was not witches who burned.
It was women.
– Fia Forsström
Artist: Alexandre-Marie Colin:
The Three Witches From Macbeth
Witch Wife Pagan Goddess – Tammy Wampler, artist.
It’s Halloween – also known as All Hallows’ Eve, All Saints’ Eve, Samhain and Dia de Los Muertos. In the West, we celebrate mainly as a fun day to dress up and children to go trick-or-treating, collecting candies that will be eaten for weeks to come.
But this predominantly Christian holiday began as a way of incorporating pagan holidays such as the Celtic holiday of Samhain (pronounced Sa-ween) and the Latin American Dia De Los Muertos – The Day of The Dead – into the Christian holiday calendar. Both of these holidays were traditionally celebrated between the evening of October 31 and November 1.
All of these traditions believe that the souls of the departed, the world of the Gods, and other spirits are closer to this world than any other part of the year.
The Celts also celebrated Samhain as an important harvest festival, but would dress as monsters or animals and left out offerings so that the Faerie would not kidnap them. This tradition continued into the modern day as we dress as witches, vampires, skeletons and other “spooky” otherworldly creatures as a fun way to escape our ordinary reality for an evening.
Speaking of the tradition in modern times, what is more synonymous with Halloween than a witch – especially if she is riding a broomstick?🧙♀️🧹
Did you know that the word Witch means “wise one”?
Modern day “white witches” typically practice what is called a Wiccan religion. They often celebrate Samhain with bonfires, rituals and honoring the dead.
But let’s talk about “witches” in history. Between 1450 and 1750, It is estimated that between 40,000 and 50,000 people were executed as witches, an estimated 90% of which were women – but written cases of women being targeted as witches go back as far as 331 BC, when 170 women were executed as witches in Rome in the context of an epidemic illness.
In the Judaean Second Temple period, Rabbi Simeon ben Shetach in the 1st century BCE is reported to have sentenced to death eighty women who had been charged with witchcraft on a single day in Ashkelon. Eighty damned women. 😡
What kind of women were targeted as witches? Women who didn’t “fit in” to societal norms. Women who were born with the unfortunate trait of being extraordinary in a time when male dominance was at a peak – and any female who broke out of the “mother/wife/prostitute role risked being labeled as a witch.
This included willful, strong minded, intelligent women. Healers. Those gifted with “second sight“. Women who spoke their truth. Women and girls with birthmarks. Women who were more attractive than average were targeted out of jealousy or spite. Or sometimes a woman could be targeted just because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
If I had been born during that time period, the odds are good that I would have been labeled and likely burned as a witch, too. Can you relate?
I have several prominent birthmarks. I am a healer. I am intelligent and like to figure things out. I am outspoken in my belief systems. I am considered attractive. I have experienced what some would consider “psychic phenomena” since early childhood. So yeah. Basically, I’d be screwed. Thank God I and other women who are a little “extra” are living in modern times, right?
But even now, many in civilized countries still hold beliefs systems that keep us backwards, and it is estimated that 36 or more countries still murder people for witchcraft today. Between 1960 and 2000, about 40,000 people alleged of practicing witchcraft were murdered in Tanzania alone. Between 2000 and 2016, more than 2500 were murdered as “witches”.
But even here in the U.S., whether we are male or female, to be extraordinary, to be “other” or “more than” is often frowned upon, considered suspicious or targeted by trolls on the internet. And every female knows that we still live in a male dominated society.
Equality is closer than perhaps ever before in written history, but we still suppress strong women in subtle – or not so subtle – ways.
It is estimated that one in five women have been raped in their lifetime. 90% of all forced sex acts are to females.
The average age of women in pornography is 14.
Read that again.⬆️⬆️
Women are still routinely turned down for employment positions in favor of men.
Intelligent, strong willed women are still labeled as “bitches“ while men who lead organizations to success with a firm hand are revered.
Women who are open to their sensuality and enjoyment of sex are considered “whores“ while men are congratulated for their sexual prowess.
There are a hundred other ways that I can name that we continue to suppress and denigrate women, to keep them “in their proper place”.
As I said, yes, things are changing, but through awareness, we can make those positive changes accelerate.
If each of us chooses to spotlight our own particular brand of uniqueness and strengths, being extraordinary will become “new normal” as we all evolve to the fullest expression of ourselves.
Wouldn’t it be more fun to live in a world of wizards and witches, of magic and beauty then one of suppression, violence, jealousy, and hatred?
Today, beautiful, I hope you embrace your strong inner bitch. Oops, I mean witch.😋😉
I hope you choose to be a little less ordinary and embrace those things in yourself that make you feel “other”.
Just between us? Those are your gifts. Those “weirdnesses” are where you just might discover your power and purpose.
To be totally involved in anything, let alone everything can be a struggle. We tend to base our present and future actions upon our past experiences, and unfortunately, our past experiences are often linked to pain.
We have all experienced loss in love/family/friendship relationships, jobs or business opportunities, health, pets, or any number of circumstances that have set our neurological programming to “stay away”.
Those programs are there to protect us, right? If we burn our hand on an open flame or hot stove, next time we will exercise caution – so of course our brain tells us that it should be no different with other experiences in life.
We get jilted or broken by a relationship or lover – or two – and we become reluctant to love fully. Or at all.
Someone we think is a friend rejects us and we begin to assume this is going to be the case with all friendships. So we shut down – but loneliness is a poor substitute for the joy we often find in good company and community, my love.
We close shop on our dream business or get fired/laid off from a job we enjoy through no fault of our own – and we start thinking “maybe it’s me”. Or we begin to wonder if we are truly worthy of achieving our dreams or having the financial abundance that we desire.
We fail with that first art piece, poetry, novel, or gourmet meal, and instead of giving it a second, third, fourth or even fifth go, decide that it’s “just not for us”. Can you relate? 👀
We acclimate to allow our past pain to dictate our future experience. Our world gets smaller as we start to try to control every aspect of our lives in an attempt to keep us from more pain – it would seem that those same neurological programs that are created and there to keep us from physical harm (to ensure our best chance for survival) also control our emotional well being.
But if those same programs also keep us from living fully and joyfully, it might be time to overlay some new programs and ways of being.
If you aren’t feeling like you are living the full, rich, juicy life you were created for, it might be time to give up the self-limiting illusion of control, stop saying “maybe tomorrow” and start saying “yes”.
Or better still, say “ Hellllll Yeah” to those opportunities that come your way.
Say hell yeah and jump eyes, heart and arms wide open off that ledge – and into the waiting arms of Source and All That Is. Sadhguru called it “Life”, but this is just another word for Source. When we give up control and take that leap, have faith that Source has your back.
So say yes to that new love. Yes to that bakery, bookstore, crystal shop or any other business you have been dreaming of. Yes to the dream job you have been offered. Yes to the travel, yes to the poetry, yes to the art, yes to the big jammy wines or the light-on-your palette wines. Say yes the birdwatching, whale watching, boy or girl watching – whatever does it for you. Say yes to new babies and puppies, to big hugs and long embraces, yes to conversations with strangers, to new coffee shops, pick-up games of beach volleyball, bowling or tree climbing (even if you think you might suck)
Say yes to new adventures. Or misadventures 😉, as long as it’s fun.
Say yes to that sexy new neighbor with the fabulous French accent. Or Spanish, Romanian, or no accent at all. But say yes, babe. In fact, just say yes to anything that points you in the general direction of bliss, of a feeling of ease within yourself and the fullest expansion of who you are. It just might be the best thing you ever did.
Is it possible that if you dive right in you might get hurt again? Of course. But we heal, and every single experience teaches us something about ourselves, our world and others, right? So it’s never wasted.
And I can guarantee from personal experience, once you do jump off that cliff and into the waiting arms of Source, you will never, ever want to go back to that place of lack, of allowing the past to dictate the future.
It’s a brave new world, my love. If you are receiving this message, know that this is your time to take that leap into the unknown – and into the waiting arms of Source, of Love, of bliss, of expansion and authenticity.
I can’t wait to see all that the future holds for you. I know it’s going to be absolutely magical.✨Much love, beautiful.
We’ve all heard the adage “Fake it until you make it”.
This advice can help us to get to the place that we want to be – or cause an emotional trainwreck if we aren’t being honest about where we currently are at the same time.
Does this sound like a bit of a contradiction? 🤔
In simple terms, we are creatures of habit. Our brains are vast fields of neurological pathways, and these pathways are the tracks for our physiological, emotional and psychological patterns, conscious and subconscious.
The route we take to go to work each day is a pathway. The apple oatmeal and black coffee that we enjoy for breakfast each morning. The way we respond to our partner, parents or friends when we are joyful and excited – or feeling criticized and devalued. Our habits of industriousness or sloth. Our temperament, routines and rituals, tendency to isolate or our extroverted qualities, the way we value others – or ourselves.
All of these and every other thing we do and think are pathways through the dense field that is our mind and brain matter.
This is good news because it means when it comes to pulling ourselves out of the mud to begin the trek to the top of the mountain – that place of expansive views, joy, connection and the deliberate creation of our best possible life – it is, more than anything, just an action that we continue practicing until it becomes a habit.
In the same way that we learn and improve when we practice the piano, painting, a new profession or study habit, picking ourselves up out of the mud to move on to something better after a period of grief, depression, anger or inertia is essentially the same mental action as picking up that paintbrush, textbook or laptop to prune old programs and replace them with new habits and neurological subroutines.
It might feel uncomfortable, difficult or challenging to begin, but once we practice envisioning a new reality for ourselves – or maybe a new identity would be more appropriate – and we begin to act upon what it is that we wish to see and become, eventually, that vision becomes our new way of being – our new reality.
Imagine • Practice • Do • Become
So what is it, ultimately, that you would like your life to look like in six months? A year? Three years? Five years?
How would you like to see your personal reality unfold? What would your close relationships look like?
Where would you like to live? Do you see yourself in a villa by the ocean, living in an urban setting – or maybe a tiny cabin in the woods?
What would you see yourself doing for a living – what do you think or feel that your purpose is?
What would your income be?
What would you imagine your daily habits being? Do you go to the gym or run each morning, do you meditate, or sleep in until 10?
How will you change your life? Whatever you can envision, you can achieve.✨😎
Let me give you an example from a friend/client of mine:
“Rebecca” grew up in a dysfunctional home. She was taught that her value was in what she did rather than who she was and it was best if she was “seen and not heard”.
So of course, Rebecca grew up to behave in ways that reflected this value system.
She neglected her own well being. She put all of her energy into caring for others. She withdrew when there was conflict or when she was emotionally uncomfortable.
She topically believed she had successful relationships, all the while avoiding real intimacy.
Eventually Rebecca found herself depressed. She assumed it was just the “pressures of life” and took antidepressants – but while it seemed like she wasn’t really depressed and unable to function anymore, she still didn’t feel emotionally connected to her life. 😓
In fact, she didn’t feel very emotionally connected to anything other than a growing sense of desperation and anger, emotions that she desperately tried to suppress.
Can you relate to Rebecca’s story so far?
Eventually, Rebecca began to see a counselor 🥰 who helped her look at childhood patterns that were causing huge blocks in her ability to experience joy, to value herself, to adapt and evolve – and how those patterns were reflected in her current relationships.
She spent some time grieving for the many years she had neglected to care for the physical and emotional needs and wellness of herself and her inner child as a result of those patterns.
She learned to reset her vibrational field to allow good to come to her rather than repelling her wishes and dreams due to her subset programs of scarcity and lack of value.
She discovered that she had to learn to self-care and nurture her personal growth, set healthy boundaries with others, and began to prune some of the toxic people who couldn’t accept her boundaries, growth and the radical responsibility for the shaping of her personal reality. This was a process that was deeply painful but also deeply cathartic.
Fast forward three years. Rebecca is living the life that she hadn’t realized she was missing. She has a truly successful relationship with a partner who enjoys healthy dialogue and honest communication. This honesty also means intimacy and she understands what real vulnerability and intimacy means.
She has taken up several hobbies that had interested her in childhood and although she reports that it is sometimes frustrating to not be “better” than she is, she loves the process of learning and slowly gaining skill.
She had quit her corporate job a couple of years back, and now works largely from home contracting her skills to large companies. She loves the freedom this gives her.
She also makes it a point to spend time with friends and family each week to recreate and build personal relationships.
In short, she has radically turned her life around.
Rebecca still has occasional days when she feels a little blue. But knowing that feeling connected, happy and deliberately creating her life is just so much better, she gives herself some grace and space to deeply feel on those days, but also keeps envisioning an ever-expanding future – and joyfully continues to expand into that future.
And you know what? Rebecca’s blue days will become less and less the more she practices bliss, curating and cultivating the life of her dreams, healthy communication and community with others and most importantly, loving herself into wholeness. How cool is that?
If Rebecca’s story resonates with you, I’d love to hear your story, too. How do you lift yourself from the mud after those days that you need to give yourself a little more grace and space to feel deeply and acknowledge those past parts of yourself that might still feel a little broken?
What habits do you practice that keep your vision clear and ever-expanding and your vibrational field humming at a frequency that allows good to come to you – rather than repelling it with hidden subconscious programs?
Drop me a comment below!⬇️☺️
And just in case you needed to be reminded today, you are amazing. You are valuable. You are a magnificent creation and capable of achieving anything you can dream of, and babe, you are so very loved.🥰
How are you feeling today? Are you feeling fabulous and shining bright? If you are on-task and feeling amazing, I see you – you glow, girl!
But maybe today is a little rough. Maybe you are going through an especially difficult period and even the idea of getting out of bed to face the day is a struggle.
If this is where you are today, I also see you. I feel the pain you are going through. I have been there myself, more than a few times – and am sending you so much healing and love.
We all go through times like this. We all experience days that are challenging; days when we feel blue, irritable, or under the weather. Days when we don’t want to adult, and coping is a challenge. Frankly, these days suck – but are a necessary aspect of the human experience and can help us to grow.
There will be times when we come up against challenges, grief, new or unresolved trauma, or sometimes we just hit a wall because we are tired.
But here is a secret that modern society tends to ignore or overlook – if we are to get back to feeling fabulous and creating a joyful, connected life, it is vitally important that we acknowledge and honor our honest feelings on those days when we are struggling with keeping our “spirits up”.
In the same way that in healthy relationships with others, we validate another’s truth and emotional state, we need to do the same with ourselves in order to move forward and move on to a higher resonance and better vibrational state.
So babe, if you are in the mud today, it’s ok. Give yourself permission to squish your toes in that gooey mess a little. Talk to yourself or someone you trust about where you are at and why you are there.
Allow yourself to cry – tears release stored cortisol in the body, which is why we almost always feel better and lighter after we let go of the negative feelings we may have been holding or hiding, sometimes without even realizing it. 👀
Once you have validated your experience and given yourself time and permission to access and acknowledge the sh#ty aspects of your emotional or physical reality, start looking up again.
It’s ok and even healthy to be in the mud for a little while but babe, don’t stay there too long. Remember that our emotional states are neurological pathways that can become trenches and even personality traits when we dwell in them over-long, and ultimately, we go through the shiznit in our present to get to a healthier, happier place in our future, right? 😎🥳✨💫
Stay tuned next post for some tools on finding our way out of the mud once we are ready to start climbing that hill again. 🏔🏔🌄
The views up here are spectacular and beautiful, I can’t wait to give you a hug and a hand up. You’re going to love it here.🥰
Just in case you had forgotten – you are amazing. You are worthy. You are capable, beautiful, valued and so very loved.💖💖💖
Each morning I spend time in meditation, study and prayer/asking for wisdom. I have nearly a dozen books sitting next to my meditation cushion ranging from biblical devotionals, self-development, “A Course in Miracles” and several different card decks for accessing our own inner wisdom as well as that of Source.
This morning after meditation I did a basic four-card spread with these gorgeous “Goddesses Knowledge Cards”. ✨
The goddesses that I drew were Hera, Medusa as Pegasus) Psyche, and White Shell Woman.
Hera is symbolic of mature power and wisdom, nurturing, beauty, and luxury. For me, I feel the wisdom imparted is in holding my center in a place of strength.
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The second card, Psyche, is the Goddess who fell in love with Eros, god of Love, who flies away when she realizes who he is.
She searches the world for him and is given three “impossible” tasks by Aphrodite, which she completes but over the years of searching and trying to complete these fears, grows from an innocent young girl to a beautiful, mature woman who eventually wins Eros back where they live happily together in their sumptuous castle.
This is a card of transformation, but also of hard work and persistence. Patience has been a constant lesson for me over the past months as I wait for the future I seek to unfold.
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When Medusa was slain the spectacular winged Pegasus sprang from her blood. I especially love this story and symbolism. 💫
Medusa was originally a beautiful young girl and priestess of Athena who was raped by Poseidon – and then punished by Athena for the transgression (or possibly granted the wish for revenge against men).
As most of us know, she killed many men who came to the island where she lived in isolation and was eventually killed by Perseus.
To me, this narrative is about how holding anger and hatred makes us ugly and toxic – but transformation into something beautiful and iconic can happen when that part of us is out to death and we experience “rebirth”.
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White Shell Woman, creator and sustainer of life of the Navajo people, is a gift giver and mother of two important protectors of the People. I love the chant that is related to her – “All things around me are restored to beauty”. The lesson here feels like restoration and blessing.🥰
The overall theme of my spread is clearly letting go of the toxic sh#t I am dealing with right now, holding my center to persevere, and having patience – so not not natural to me – as I move through powerful changes happening to look forward to a beautiful unfolding transformation.
I feel like this is not only a spread that is incredibly pertinent to my life ATM but also the world in general.
This last year and a half has been all about change, right? And a boatload of toxic bullsh💩t that just seems the ongoing narrative of the world.😣
But if we persevere and hold our center, we can use it as powerful fertilizer to transform into something even better. Or we can hold that sh#t and become the gorgon. Always our choice.
For me, the wisdom, comfort and confirmation (same lessons I’ve been receiving pretty much daily) of these cards helps me to move through my days with greater faith and joy.
I know there will be moments of challenge and even grief as I move through these changes but every day also brings so much beauty and grace – and that is what will hold my focus on, letting that bad stuff go. 👀
Today, I hope this spread might bring you a little guidance, comfort and wisdom, too, my love – and maybe help you “let that 💩 go” to become something better. You deserve it, beautiful one.✨
If our thoughts produce emotions and emotions are resonance – and resonance/vibration is the language of the universe, what language are you speaking to Source?
When we ask for the outflow of our best possible life from a place of lack, anger, fear or other negative emotional states, it is impossible for Source to grant that reality because Good can’t be created from the building blocks of lack.
It’s like asking your mom to bake a decadent chocolate cake when all you supply her with is white flour. 👩🍳🧁🤷♀️
This might seem like a simplified metaphor but the idea is exactly the same. Good out, better back.
If you aren’t sure of how to create your highest vibe, start with gratitude – but don’t just list out those things you value.
What’s really important is that you practice feeling the joy of those things. From that place of higher resonance you can begin the process of co-creating the life of your dreams.
The next step is to look at the deeper held beliefs that might be holding you back or creating blocks to your best reality.
It’s estimated that a whopping 70-80% of us experience childhood abuse or trauma that greatly contribute to a negative subconscious state of mind.
What are the subconscious programs of lack of worth and value that may have been running since childhood that contradict what you want to experience in real time?
Here are some questions that can help you to understand whether or not you are asking for chocolate cake but putting out white refined flour, borrowed from Greg Baden’s book “The Spontaneous Healing of Belief”:
These questions target the heart of what we believe we deserve.
In the book, the author goes on to speak of the “Great Question” as our fundamental belief in the contrast of good and evil (good loves us, evil wants our destruction) in the world or the idea that there is One Source (that has our best interest at heart) from which everything stems.
A very interesting question indeed, but regardless of which side of the fence you might stand on, I believe that realizing your essential sense of value and worth is 💯 crucial to the co-creation of an amazing, magical reality.
What you resonate, you draw to you.
Let me repeat that in a different way because this is the most important fundamental law of the universe:
What you vibrate, you create.
This is true of attracting money, a mate, the car of your dreams or a rusted out hulk, a home, health and vibrancy or illness and fatigue… and everything else under the sun.
Let’s say “Josh” wishes to manifest his dream career opening a travel agency but those inner voices (subconscious programs) tell him that it is safer to stay in the soul-sucking corporate job he’s been at for the last ten years, or that he will surely fail if he tries something different. Or maybe he doesn’t deserve to have a career that makes him happy and makes good money too.
Sad, right? 🥺
What do you think the odds are that Josh will ever see his dream become a reality? Probably pretty low unless he begins to re-write those programs to create a better reality.
We can take the same formula to everything in our lives. What partners do we tend to attract over and over? (What did your parents, family and social groups teach you that you deserved?)
How many times have we failed at our diet or getting in shape? (Do you really see yourself as you want to be?)
I know it might be painful to look at these lessons, babe. Change is rarely easy and often hard AF. But believe me, so very worth it.
You are worth it. ✨
Affirmations, vision boards, mantra and meditation are all great ways to begin overwriting those patterns of lack. Therapy can be pretty amazing, too.🥰
There are also many wonderful resources on YouTube for guided meditations that can help facilitate the process, too.
I especially like “Power Thoughts Meditation Club which combines powerful binaural beats with positive affirmations. Here’s one example:
For now, if you haven’t begun a daily gratitude practice, it’s a perfect place to start getting yourself into that higher vibrational state, and there’s no better time than the present to begin.💫
Today I am grateful for so many things – a lovely sunset stroll with a good friend, cold drinks and live music on a Saturday night, good coffee, an amazing meditation and relaxed morning, my happy pups…but family and friends top my list.
What’s on your list today? Are you holding the ingredients for a decadent chocolate cake aka an amazing reality in your field – or dusty white flour? 🤗
She represents fire, lightning, dance, wind, volcanoes and violence. Her poetic name is Ka wahine `ai honua or the woman who devours the land.
She is both a creator and destroyer. She erupts and the world quakes as she pours lava onto land and sea – but from that destruction new life forms.
Soil grows over mineral-rich lava, lush life begins to put roots into that soil and eventually, paradise is created.
As part of my morning time with Source, I read spiritual and self-development books and sometimes consult different “wisdom cards” that nearly always provide the guidance or comfort I need on a particular day.
This card of the Goddess Pele came up in my reading this morning, and wow, did it hit home.
I am in a time of upheaval in nearly every aspect of my life at the moment, and to be honest, it often just feels like chaos.
As I write, I am two thirds or so through a remodel of my home – largely on my own. I’m a handy-with-the-tools kinda gal, but I’ve also been incredibly grateful for the occasional help of good friends along the way.
Right now I have flooring torn up and paint halfway done as I prepare to lay new floors. I have furniture upended and shoved wherever there is room in order to have the spaces cleared that I need to lay the wood and carpets.
My personal life has been in a similar situation for some time too, which means I am feeling a little like Pele dumped a mountain of lava over a few acres of my everything.
“Elements” by Catherine Langwagen
Not a fun place to be.
But this card is the perfect reminder that from chaos and destruction new life is formed. Though aspects of my life have been razed, I know that spectacular new life is forming and growing, just beneath the surface.
When I’m centered in my heart, I can feel that growth, alive and so ready to burst forth into the sun.
But I’m not always there, and there are moments where all that I can see is the chaos. In those moments, I start to panic.
But I keep going back to Source, and I keep getting these wonderful reminders that right here is where I am supposed to be in order for my life to grow fully into where I want and need to be.
These reminders help me to come back into my heart-centered space. That space where I can feel excitement for the process of creation and for all that is to come.
Can you relate? Have you been in that place of destruction, when you look out onto the landscape of your life and just think “oh, sh#t.”?
That sh#t is fertilizer that will feed the new growth.
If you are there right now, babe, you are 💯 not alone. I’ve got your back. We will get through it, together .
I am so excited to stand with you as we look at the glorious dawn of new creation when the chaos is tamed and we are surrounded by light and lush growth, bursting through the fertilizer-rich soil of Pele’s destruction.
Have faith that it’s coming, beauty. I feel it. I know it.
Can you feel it, too?
Whether you are in the midst of a cycle of despair and destruction or feeling your new growth, I see you. You are amazing, capable and you have so got this.
This Blessed Sacred Life 