The Effects of Doubt

I don't doubt. I never have. I have always seen the fun in making things happen. Even seemingly impossible things do not thwart me. I fully enjoy the challenge of asking, scheming, seeing the problem through, working towards it as if it were going to happen etc. Sure, not everything comes to pass, but the important stuff always does and the rest is still unfolding as I continue to breathe in and out, in and out. Hey, it ain't over 'till it's over, and its far from over from where I sit now. I am thoroughly annoyed by the pessimist. I have teenagers (with dreams) who use pessimism as a means to avoid disappointment. It drives me crazy to witness their self limiting pessimism. They fear not achieving the goal more that they want to reach out and grab it. I am trying to teach them to use my technique, but its hard to turn fearful people into optimists. Still, I have an excellent track record and it's hard to say that it all came from chance. My daughter Kiran is much like me. She manifests. In another blog I chronicled her manifestation of a female orange tabby named Clarissa, whom she requested from the universe for her sixth birthday. Clarissa, born under a house in Pacific Palisades in March, was delivered to Kieran one week before her sixth birthday, exactly as she had requested. Kieran is patient. She makes her request, draws pictures, makes lists with her object of desire depicted in a requesting format, like an order. She did this many months ago in the form of a request for a baby chick. She asked me, "Mom, can I have a chick?". "Absolutely not!", I said. "We do not live on a farm, we don't have room for chickens". This request and dialogue was made more than once. I even went so far as to add, "You may have as many chickens as you want on your very own farm, when you are a grown up. But not here and not now."

Guess what I have in my back yard in a bunny hutch right now. One guess. Go on. Say it. You know what I am going to say, so just spit it out. Yes, you are correct. I have a chick. No Kieran has a chick, rapidly developing into a chicken. Her name is Henny. The way she came to be was so sly, so underhanded that the universe literally got my husband Tom and I to go out of our way to secure her. I am sure someone is giggling somewhere right now at our predicament.

It started with a windy evening and a walk around the block. Tom and the kids came across a baby bird, who appeared to be dead, in the middle of the sidewalk. Tom picked the bird up, and noticed that it was warm and still breathing. He thought that a safe warm box would be a better place for this creature to die than out in the open as food for a predator. He brought the bird home to me. It had small wings and was covered in feathers but was only the size of a walnut. Kieran named the bird Patch while I force fed it gruel through an eye dropper. We tucked it into a box with a warmer and I got up with it twice during the night to feed it drips of wet cat food in warm water. It survived the night and the next day I suggested that we return it to its nest. Tom didn't think that was a good idea, since the nest wasn't locatable. We kept dripping food into the crack of it's beak, though it never opened up like a baby bird should to allow a full dropper of food in. I was literally force-feeding it. It had long legs for a chick and started hopping out of its box. It even ran away and was lost from me, but found by my oldest child, Cadence. During the second night, it occurred to me that Patch was a quail. Like chickens, quails are born ready to peck for themselves and are ground nesters. There would be no way of returning Patch to his nest. On the third day, I knew I needed to get Patch to peck for himself, but didn't know how to do this. You know the saying, "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink", it was a lot like that. Patch just stood there, cheeping, not pecking. I was getting desperate. I couldn't let this quail chick die. I called around, looked on line, receiving this advice: I needed to get a chick to teach Patch how to peck and drink. There was no time to waste, the kids and I were off to the feed store. We were set up with a warming lamp, chick feed, food and water containers, a bale of wood shavings and a tiny chick for Patch. Kieran named the chick Hatch. Hatch successfully taught Patch to eat. We all saw this, the two of them pecking at the food trough, Patch happily nuzzling Hatch, trying to nest under her fluffy body. We were so happy. We thought we had saved the quail. We never saw Patch drink though. I tried to show him how, like they taught me at the feed store, by dipping his beak in the water. He wouldn't let me dip his tiny beak, he never learned the lesson. By evening, when we were celebrating our success, Patch was growing lethargic, almost drunk in the warmth of the heating lamp. In the morning, we found his still body, nuzzled under a warm blanket, peaceful and gone. We all cried. I buried him in a special place in the garden.

We were left with a single tiny chick, Hatch. We tried to return Hatch to the feed store, but they had a policy that prevented such action. They said they had another customer attempt to return a chick that morning, one she had purchased for her brooding hen, but whom the hen had rejected and tried to kill. This chick needed a home, and we could rescue her and provide company for our lonely Hatch. It all happened so quickly. I only had time to marvel at the irony of it a few times an hour, as we introduced Henny, the new chick to Hatch, who was substantially smaller. The term "pecking order" became clear to me as these two chicks came together. I wouldn't say that Henny "killed" Hatch, only that by the end of the next day, Hatch was dead too and I dug anther small grave next to Patch's.

Tom and I decided to draw the line and not try and add any more chicks to our crazy predicament. The days turned into weeks and our little Henny bonded with us, but especially Kieran, and is now a young, very people-friendly hen. Again, I suspect that somewhere in the universe, someone is chuckling. I have instructed Kieran to not ask for any more animals for awhile, or to add the caveat, "when I am much older" when making her requests to the universe. She is a powerful manifester and this I respect greatly. I would rather combat issues of abundance any day. The effects of doubt are much less fun to deal with (or NOT deal with).

It's Only Called Drowning If You Stop Wanting to Live.

You know the saying, "Just trying to keep my head above water"? I have given up on that. My life has been so harried lately. I can't keep my head above water any more. I can't keep swimming with the same view ahead of me. I have taken a deep breath and succumbed to the depths and the blue of below the surface. It's only drowning when you give up and stop wanting to experience it all. I have given up trying to keep it all afloat and keep juggling the same tasks, keep going at the same frantic pace, keep doing the same heroic things. I am taking a lung full of air and diving in deep to see what I have been trying to avoid for so long. Maybe under the surface, it is paradise, and all this time I have been fighting against it. To be completely open to life, is to be willing to endure the inevitable pain associated with living fully. To take that lung full of air, feel the pain of doing something completely new and scary- not just fighting to keep up the same old stuff, struggling to keep your head above water. I am doing it. Rolling with the waves, holding my breath like a free diver, taking in the new world before me. It's adventurous. It is risky. It is possibly going to get me into trouble that I cannot foresee. It is, at this very moment in time, FUN.

Achieving The Marvelous

To Achieve the MARVELOUS, it is precisely the UNTHINKABLE that must be thought. -Tom Robbins

Being FULL of crazy ideas myself, I think, "I am destined to achieve the marvelous- because there's seemingly NO END to the "unthinkable" in me." I have become creative in a kind of crazy way. Ever since the structure of my career was taken from me (as a pharmaceutical sales representative, due to a realignment lay off) and I was thrust into the world of stay at home motherhood in a town where all things are possible, I have been coming up with and implementing crazy ideas for my success. I have developed two on-line stores that showcase my love for helping others -via my creations of therapeutic gemstone belly chains and jewelry. When those sites didn't explode with business, my idle mind began concocting yet another scheme....at the suggestion of one of my best friends, Lara, I created a collection of thirty cards in the size of a business card, incorporating my photographs and thought provoking and inspiring words from wise people. I call them "Presents of the Present". I invested real money to have them printed. So far, I can only give them away. Do you think I am thwarted in my achievement of the marvelous? NEVER! I often think about J.K. Rowling and her die-hard attempts to get the first Harry Potter book published. I believe she received over 100 rejections of that manuscript, which she unthinkably, NEVER GAVE UP ON. She never gave up. Even with all the doubt that comes from rejection, she never gave up. She is my inspiration. I will never give up on my achievement of the marvelous, because the only thing I will truly allow myself to doubt are my limits. This goes for you too.

Song For My Mother

This poem was written by MY mother, Kathryne Neches for her mother, Beatrice Edell Richardson Campbell.

I publish it here in honor of them, and my two older sisters, my BELOVED heroes.

Shelley

Song For My Mother

Mother,

when I judged you, I didn’t know you Not your struggles, not your pain. Not your triumphs. When I judged you I was ignorant.

A selfish, spoiled child, though I was seemingly mature. Though I knew better. Though I pretended not to judge.I was arrogant, entitled and short sighted. And I did judge you. You knew I did, though you may not have known my own day of being judged would come, or how soon. I judged you living. Each one of your everyday struggles. How long it took you to put on your make-up, to eat your breakfast, and how you embellished a story. I judged you.

The way you always had to be dressed - up, with earrings and a proper bag and shoes. The way you set the table with a cloth and pretty napkins. The way you took care of my father. Insisting he have three hot meals each day. I judged you. The way you fought with your hair, trying to erase the curl. The way you fought to be tanned a golden bronze instead of fair and freckled . The ways you thought a lady, a young lady should speak and act. I judged you. I thought you foolish. I thought you frivolous and old-fashioned. I thought you different from myself. And I sat idly, to smugly judge you. I judged you dying. From the early years when the drink took you. When you smoked and coughed and smoked some more. When you snacked on sausages and canned tamales. When candy bars and coffee were your fare. I judged you. When the hospital became your rest-stop. When rehab became your maintenance. When you never found a power greater than yourself, I judged you. When you said, over and over and over again, “I never wanted to be a burden to my kids.” I judged you and called you “liar!” When you had to live in your own town and not near mine. When oxygen became your elixir, and still you smoked, I judged you. When in the last hours of your life, you drew my sister, drunk herself to your bedside and waved me away, the daughter who had dealt with the daily difficulties of keeping you alive, I judged you heartless. I resigned. I retired. I recoiled form your coldness and thought I could simply reclaim my own life. But not yet, not yet, not until I judged you one last time.I judged you dead. You who had pulled yourself up from a fatherless childhood. A childhood of abuse and poverty in every way but that of love. You were loved. Loved by a fierce Mother with a love that gave you power. Power to defy the lack of education, the lack of a father’s love, the lack of resources and all the worldly, precious gifts you gave to me. Loved by a husband of fifty years in spite of your frailty, in spite of the humanity I turned from. I judged you in death to the depths of my soul. Then one day,when my own arthritic hands slowed my make-up brush. When I began to fight with my hair and wrinkles. When I saw myself change my clothes six times just to go to the store. When my stories barely resembled the truth. When my own daughters sighed in exasperation, rolling their eyes. When I remembered who it was that led me out of the alleys of alcoholism into the the sunlight of sobriety, I judged you again. When I set the table and pour milk from a picture and not the carton. When every meal must be served at a table fit for kings. When Christmas and birthdays all seem magical, because of you, because of your example, because you carved the way with the blade of your own believing. Believing in me. Believing in us. Believing a beautiful, rich abundant life should be my heritage. I judged you. I wept. I cracked open the cold heart of an ignorant child and called you my hero. My angel. My eskimo. My teacher. For three years following your death I cried and cried and cried rivers of rushing tears. Tears to wash away every harsh, harrowing hint of the hell you lived and died for. Your tears. The tears you never cried. My tears. Tears of regret. Tears of understanding. Tears of compassion and forgiveness. You came to me in a dream on the anniversary of your death.You wore the dress you were meant to be wearing to the great beyond and not the dress we put you in. You held up a greeting card that set me free. Free of a lifetime of judgment. Free of my own imperfection. Free to release my own daughters. The card said simply, “I love you and you love me!” and I put the judgment down.

Copyright

Kathryne Neches 2007

Song For My Mother

post script

if you are not crying,

there is something wrong with you.

copyright

Shelley Meaney 2007

post script

Letting Death be a Reminder to LIVE

A good friend of mine wrote me last week to tell me that her husband's best friend had died suddenly- doing something he loved- (probably of an aneurysm, during a spin class, if you must know). His name was Tim.

Here are my thoughts on Tim and on lifetimes,

We are blessed/cursed with never knowing how long it will be, this precious opportunity to be "in body". It's funny, the way we pretend that it's never going to happen, mourn a death, die a little ourselves when someone we love leaves us. BUT, as living organisms, it is the only inevitable we have. It is the one thing that we can safely predict, that all living things will reach an end to their lifetime and then they will nurture with their physical remains, or the impact they had on others, new or continued life.
Having kids means facing your fears about death. I talk to my kids about it- enough that it is a constant open dialogue- so they won't be afraid of it. I say- everything that is living will eventually die- everything and everybody has a life span. We do not know how long our life will be, because some things are just meant to remain a mystery. Embedded in the message is the feeling that every day that we are alive should be a cherished gift and an opportunity to celebrate. When we do go, we will feel like we devoured life, appreciating every breath, every caress, every kiss, every sweet-smelling flower, every violet sunset, every golden sunrise- we will have lost sleep to witness meteor showers, soothing sick children, dancing and drinking too much, taking trans oceanic flights to reach distant shores and new experiences. We will have experienced the rush of adrenaline from our first time driving fast, climbing high, sailing in a gale force and, of course, pushing ourselves in at least one amazing spin class.

We will have loved every second of this life, wasting little time. When our friends leave us, they are giving us the GREATEST GIFT- that is, to remind us of the opportunities we have been blessed with by being born human.

IN CELEBRATION OF TIM- I say- Good job in having a GREAT LIFE and in sharing your gifts with so many that you will nurture their soil in order for them to bloom another day.

My Terra Celeste Mission Statement

I love jewelry. I am a girly girl. I love the symbolism that a piece of jewelry carries with it. Like a wedding ring or a gold bracelet for graduation. I began making jewelry five or six years ago. My favorite materials have come to be gemstones, which are any naturally occurring crystalline or metamorphic rock that carry a unique vibrational signature. Gemstone properties are very interesting, and as it turns out, seem to have been made for us, to affect us. This is how I use them. The jewelry I create is beautiful, striking to wear, and will attract attention and admiration, but, has been created to serve a far more important purpose. Each piece is infused with the energy of the earth. The earth, as it turns out, is like a huge, natural pharmacy, open 24 hours. By finding yourself attracted to a piece, you are in a sense, prescribing your own stone therapy. I can also do this for you if you give me information. Gemstones are effective for the treatment of physical, emotional, spiritual, psychic, auric, chakral, and past-life ailments. They also provide the guidance, nurturing, filtering and love that you cannot get from an average pharmacy. With your jewelry purchase, I will include the properties of the gemstones and I will possibly give your piece a name that sums up the action it will provide. You will be drawn to certain pieces on any given day and will be, in effect, treating yourself, as needed. I love what I do. It gives me great pleasure to be able to connect with you and provide hope, healing, nurturing and solace from any given distance.Welcome to Terra Celeste. I look forward to working for you.

LIVING LIKE THERE'S NO TOMORROW

I remember sometime in my late teens, after buying my first car, a 1974 blue Volkswagon Bug, feeling a true sense of freedom. To me, it was the freedom of opportunity, the knowing of the emminant possibility that there were adventures to be had. I had friends then, who shared my sense of freedom and adventure and we made the most of out time together and our freedom in the form of cars and driver's licences. It was the sense of freedom and the fire of our imaginations that we were high on. I remember thinking "why would anyone use drugs when life itself can make you feel so high?" I think that thought came on a night that we parked one of our cars at the end of the LAX runway off Vista Del Mar, in El Segundo, and felt the roar of the jumbo jets as they ascended into the sky from right above our heads.

Now that I am a mother, and a "stay-at-home" one at that, I like to have adventures with my kids. This town, (Santa Barbara- if you don't live here) is so full of the possibility for adventure that I sometimes am forced to piggy back one adventure on top of another just to take advatage of the cornicopia of possibility. The sperm whale is one example. I got word that there was a beached sperm whale on a beach in Santa Barbara, and I knew exactly what I wanted to do. I am so lucky because I have a friend who is willing and able to have just about any adventure with me- and our kids adore each other, so as soon as I had the idea in my head, I called Jill and we were off! The thing is,....that was not the end of the adventure. The day after our kids communed with the corpse of the great whale by playing "chicken" with it in the surf, we again were alight with the firy spirit of adventure. We took a picnic lunch down to a beach just south of where the whale had been the evening before. Again, I trusted Jill's natural ability to connect with wildlife and encouraged her to choose the beach. I was not dissappointed. We finished eating our lunch and started walking down the beach. We were rewarded almost immediately with the sight of a giant excavator digging a whale-sized hole for the black mound next to it. There was a crowd of people around and as we got closer, we could see why. It was what whalers must have looked like, covered from chest to toe on yellow rubber pants, standing on top or inside the whale weilding huge, four-foot-long scalpels. There was a scientific team performing a gross dissection. We had to cross a stream of whale blood to get to the up-wind side of the decomposing whale. The intestines were being extracted with the help of a large hook and I think I identified the huge black liver. The team working on the whale was either affiliated with the UCSB department of marine biology or they were from the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. Either way, I was glad that the scientific community was taking the opportunity to learn from the magnificent creature who gifted her body to Santa Barbara.

As if the whale adventure weren't enough to keep us happy, just a few days later, we launched rokets off the blacktop at a local jr. high school, our imaginations stirring as they climbed though the low-lying clouds. A few days after that, I joined my daughter's first grade class on a field trip to the Santa Barbara Airport and we were treated to the most exciting surprize...a World War II B-17 Bomber, built in 1944. It was gleaming with it's polished chrome-riveted body, with thirteen gunnary positions to be located thoughout the plane. From the inside, we could safely imagine our young, brave soldiers, knowingly putting their lives on the line to man the war bird. We could even cross the catwalk in the belly of the plave to see where the bombs would be dropped as the huge doors opened exposing the runway below. It was a priceless experience. I returned the next day with Jill and our two young sons, to log another unforseen adventure in our book.

I feel like the luckiest woman in the world, living in a place where all things are possible and living like there's no tomorrow.

P.S. I realize that the picture of the gutted whale may be a bit much for some, but I'd like to take this opportunity to let you know that the smell was far worse than the sight. Decomposing life has a way of remaining in the olfactory lobe of the brain far longer than the image remains in the visual memory. I can still smell that whale, but I remain regret-free. A life devoured is guaranteed to be messy and smelly at times if not full-on GROSS.

Discovery

The adventure began when my sister Stacy called to ask about the beached whale in Isla Vista. It jarred my memory of a radio blurb that morning that I had heard but filed away somewhere in the back of my head for safe keeping. Upon jarring the idea loose, I was determined to commune with this amazing creature of the deep, and called my friend Jill. "Hey, you wanna go on an adventure?" I asked. "Absolutely!" She replied. We didn't know exactly where we were going, for the whereabouts of the whale had not yet shown up in the news. I told her I'd heard it was on Isla Vista beach. She drove. I trust Jill's connection to nature. She connects with animals (or they connect with her), even though she denies this vehemently. It may be purely coincidental, but Jill drove us to I.V. , found us a parking place. We descended the nearest set of stairs to the beach and found that we were within visual range of a beached sperm whale.

There was a small crowd marveling at the amazing creature. Kieran, my daughter, said it looked like a big plucked chicken. It was an accurate description. The whale was wrinkled and pink. "Possibly from a sunburn?", I speculated. The kids were fascinated and tried to get close but the whale was caught in the slowly rising tide and moved in and out, as if still alive, raising its caudal fin occasionally with the bigger waves. The kids were playing chicken with the carcass of the great sperm whale, chasing after it as the waves receded and running screaming back as the whale surged closer with the swell. It was wild and windy and I feared someone from our car was going to have a close encounter with decomposing whale tissue. I figured all was well though. This was in fact an experience of communing with nature, wasn't it? When else could my kids get close enough to actually kiss a sperm whale if they so chose? It was a great moment. A great present of the present where we acted in the spirit of adventure for a moment of discovery.

Presents of the Present

It's funny. Sometimes the gift is something you didn't want. It is something you didn't ask for.

I wrote this great blog this morning about seizing the day, living in the now and really appreciating this day- the only moment you really have- right now. I wrote all this stuff about not projecting your fear or anticipatory judgement on what your day hands you. Every moment of every day is a gift and some of those gifts come completely out of the blue and some are gifts you have asked for and worked towards. I said that you shouldn't shy away from the surprises. Don't think that you know what the box contains or weather or not you are going to love it once you try it on. I said all this stuff and then the whole essay got lost. I realized the essay was for me. The gift was mine. I know this because minutes after my essay was erased I received a call that could lead me to a new career. I was excited but began to feel scared with the anticipation of how this new development would impact my life. I was doing exactly what I advised my readers to avoid. The message was for me. The gift was for me. I am so grateful for the presents of my present even when they scare me or annoy me. I love it all in all my imperfection- able to cheer on others but left sometimes doubting myself. Life is funny. I can do nothing but chuckle.

Meditation for the REBIRTH full moon

This is a meditation from the TARA text called "Setting the Motivation"

Today, April 2nd, 2007, is the full moon- the first full moon of the Spring Equinox, the time for rebirth. On the full moon, all intentions and actions are amplified 10,000 times. I felt it important to share this. If you are reading this, it was meant for you, at this time. It is a gift for you. Receive it completely.

The fundamental nature of my mind is pure.
Within me is an inexhaustible source of love, wisdom and power.
The purpose of all spiritual practice
Is to reveal and make contact with this.
When ignorance is removed,
Unlimited wisdom, compassion and power arise.
It is the mind's conditioning that limits
Understanding of who I am
And what I can become.
I will cleanse my mind of faults
And develop beneficial qualities.
This removes obstacles to my path
And creates beneficial conditions.
Recognizing the interconnectedness of all,
I will strive to be my best
To manifest my enlightened potential.
Ever dedicated to benefiting all beings,
I will think, speak and act as
TARA.

Doing Your Best

I try to do my best every day. I am careful about how I interact with people, trying to add positive energy to seemingly minute interactions. I try to do the right thing in my work. I give as much if not more than I receive. I am generous and trusting with people, I believe in bringing out the best in people by expecting it. I am as loving and caring with my step-children as I am with my biological ones. They are all mine and none of them are mine. I say "yes" when someone needs help. I step up to the plate, even when the job is tough. I do the best that I can, not always succeeding like a super-mom would, but by trying and being willing to fail, rather than by not trying at all. My sister, Stephanie thinks I should write a book about how to be a good step-mother. She says that she uses me as an example of "how-to" with her friends who need some perspective into the world of raising someone else's kids. What I have is the perspective of someone who has been step-parented. I had (have) one stepmother and four stepfathers. I was a child born of the marriage of children. My sisters and I looked up to our parents, expecting them to be right and good, secure and strong, with full confidence that they were all of these things. We trusted our step parents to behave well too. We trusted them to love us, support us, support our relationship with the parent they were married to and the parent they were filling in for. In trust, we were frequently let down.

I learned how to be a good stepmother by remembering what it feels like to be a stepchild.

I hold my older girls' mother in very high esteem. I am willing to support her in any way that I can because I know how much I loved my mother and wanted her to be held in the highest esteem. There can be no rationalizing about why a parent is not a good one in the eyes of a child. Nature makes parents perfect people in the eyes of their children. All misdeeds are forgivable. And so, as a step mother, my job is to join my girls in the love of their mother (something I wish my stepmother had done for me).

Children are children for such a short time but carry the moldings of childhood into the solidification of their adult lives. Being loving, supportive, kind, nurturing, firm and trustworthy as a step parent is the right thing to do for the children in my care. I don't distinguish between the lines of marriage and bloodlines. In our family, I like to include my step daughters' sister from their mother's subsequent marriage in our important family events. I can so easily make her happy and provide her with great childhood memories, just by treating her as I would want to be treated. My father never included my sisters and me on a vacation with his new family. I do the opposite. I don't take a trip without ALL of my kids. As an adult my I also have been blessed by the example of my amazing step father who parents like I do. He loves my sisters and me and all of our children like we are his own. He treats us with respect, kindness and generosity and he adores our mother.

Step parenting comes with the bonus of having a big family without having to go through all of those pregnancies. I love being a part of a big crazy family. We fill all seven seats of the car, play board games, take big, memorable vacations where somebody inevitable complains too much about the food, or how boring it all was, but I truly truly love it. Whether they love me as much as I love them is not important. I am sure my work will show its value when it comes time for these kids to become parents. They won't have to resort to "just do the opposite". They will know just what to do to make the experience of being a family as precious as it can possibly be.

Presents

The day was warm, like a caress. It left me with my shoulders bared and comfortable in a skirt with bare feet. It was truly spring in Santa Barbara- eighty five with bulbs emerging and a warm breeze even in the shade. Present. I am and it was. I even wrote a thank you note- in advance- to the universe for the presents to come in the remainder of the year. I know I will not be disappointed. I always get what I ask for. I am thankful for my future connections in business- more belly chain orders and people excited about my "Presents of the Present" cards. I am grateful for the impact I will make on the world, the lives I will change. I thanked the universe for my healthy, beautiful, fit body, for the adventures we would have as a family on our travels and for my husband and his prosperous business. I am a wealthy, content woman who dares to devour each day with lust and appreciation for the smallest distraction. If today were a gift, it would have been wrapped in cornflower blue paper and tied with a lime green and fushia striped bow. It would have been one of many many gifts that I have come to appreciate and share. I hope I can share one with you. Write your thank you note. deliver it. Move through your days as if it has already come.

Transformation

Metamorphosis. I am going through a transformation. Many of us are. We are shedding our outer layers, peeling away the old skin. We are physically changing, painfully at times. We have been sick, depressed, unnerved. We are shifting, shedding, growing and it hurts. I imagine it as a metamorphosis. We re learning new skills, waking up to find hidden talents and feel passion that does not yet fit into our daily lives. We are not alone. I bet you know what I'm talking about. I have been sick for six weeks. My brain is foggy, not sharp. My motivation for certain tasks is lacking. It's hard for me to slow down to allow the shift to occur. I can't say that I have been unhappy though. I feel hopeful and inspired. I have visions of my future self, confident, luminous and beautiful in all ways. My family seems to be growing ever closer as the months turn into years, as if we are very much on the same path. When I see friends struggling or suffering in pain, I visualize the shift happening in them. The breaking of old habits and the re-tuning of body instruments to play a totally different musical score. Happy to be here, as always, even in the struggle, even in the exhaustion, even in the fog. I am happy.

You may not believe this....

I love my body. I love the way it can change at my whim. I love taking the mental tour, riding the course of the blood through my heart, picturing the rhythmic, steady beating, pumping. When I used to donate blood regularly, I used to be amazed at how warm the bag was, as it filled, propped heavily next to me. Warm and comforting, waiting to share it's nurturing energy with someone else. I love my body and how I can both give and receive touches, to my legs, my belly, feeling the softness of the skin, or appreciating the rough that needs smoothing. I love the way the curves can be sculpted and that at any time in one's life, the body can be changed. It can wax and wane in size, like the moon. It can recover from famine and obesity. It can grow more muscle and gain strength at any site where muscle exists. This body allows me to hear music and soar in my imagination with the sounds. I can savor foods and have a thirst that when quenched tastes the best water ever. I can smell and see, touch and hear. I can move and feel the stretch of a tired muscle, take comfort in the feeling of my straight hair pulled between two fingers. I love my body and the opportunity it affords me. To curl up in comfort under a warm and heavy blanket for a guilt free nap in the afternoon. To retreat into my mind for trips into the past or the future, rich with possibility. The body is a gift, in any state. Pain, as I have experienced in childbirth, can serve so much as a pendulum. In labor, the absence of pain is pleasure. In debilitating disease, the pain is feeling, it is experience and I imagine, it allows one insights into realms unreachable without it. In any form, the body is a gift, a wonder and a delight. There is good in it all and in all its possibilities. I ask you, today, to look at your body with different eyes, seeing it for what it is; a miracle. Talk to your organs, your heart, lungs, kidneys, intestines, your muscles, blood vessels, brain and bones. Notice how cuts heal and change is always possible. Notice how food is digested and water is absorbed. See your precious body for what it is, and LOVE it, give it the gift of your appreciation, your care and watch how it responds.

Angels

I was given this beautiful Rose Quartz Angel by my friend Eveline Maria, who is an angel incarnate. One of many Angels I am working with these days. They seem to be emerging from the woodwork, eager to assist, generous beyond reason, connected to my heart, even when I have yet to know their faces. I set this Angel on my table, with my therapeutic gemstone jewelry at the Winter Solstice Goddess Party. She had many admirers. I promised a few of them that I would find out where my friend Eveline Maria found her and provide a contact so that other angels could be brought home to Santa Barbara. This Angel came from Austrailia, from a woman named Kimberlee. Kimberlee is working on a film called The Crystalline Peace Project, compiling earthy images of peace. She can be reached via e-mail at kimberlee@chariot.net.au . Happy Angel connecting!

DARE TO DREAM IT!

I have a dream. My dream involves a harmonious planet populated with beings who respect themselves and each other. A planet that is no longer called infear but referred to by it's true name, GRACE. I have a dream that we can build and achieve all that we can imagine if our hearts and minds are truthful and authentic. Our work is fun and prosperous. We are able to support one another and share our prosperity. It becomes infectious. My dream starts with a store front in SANTA BARBARA where in collaboration with my friend(s) we can create a sanctuary of tea and community, of ritual and celebration of cultures. Our tea house is called HEALING TEA. HEALING TEA will have tea rituals from around the world on the menu. We will offer Ceremonial Japanese Green Tea, Persian Tea, English High Tea, Himaliayan Chai Tea, Amazonian Yerba Mate, and much more. We will also offer healing teas for the mind, body and spirit, infused with gem elixers. We will provide delicious raw finger foods and traditional accompaniments to the regional tea services. We, of course, will also serve Italian Coffee and Peruvian Hot Chocolate. Our tea house will have space for the sale of arts and objects that add to the nurturing spirit of our community. Apparel, jewelry, ornaments and comforts for the home, and gemstones, of course, will be available for purchase. We will create a space for gatherings such as a knitting circle and other opportunities to nurture our creativity. We will offer special services for milestones such as birthdays, life transitions and accomplishments. We will nurture the uniqueness that our community houses and honor the strengths of the individuals that comprise its whole. Our HEALING TEA HOUSE is a dream that will come to fruition. We need a space and the financial investment resources to make it happen. Improvements to a space may cost as much as $250,000 and rent may be as much as $4,000 per month. So, I am asking the universe to connect me to these resources and guide me in the leaps that need to be made. I have a dream. I believe in my dream. Watch me make it happen. Join me in making it happen. Contact me if you have any ideas, leads on spaces, or a desire to provide monetary backing for this worthwhile project. Thank you. THANK YOU.

Appreciation

She wears a bell around her neck. She would be stealth and dangerous to birds without it because she doesn't meow like other cats I have known. Every morning, in the pre-dawn darkness, she enters our room with a jingle, jumps onto the bed, and tries to stir me by standing on me or approaching me head. I pet her a bit, or ignore her altogether. She leaves only to return a few minutes later. We repeat the same process. Again, she behaves like the snooze button on an alarm clock, trying time and time again to rouse me. She does this countless times each day until I finally do what she wants me to do, and get out of bed. This pattern has been repeating now long enough and predictably enough for me to notice. This is a working cat who knows my schedule. I am an early riser. It is in the quiet pre-dawn dakness that I am able to get my work done. It is the time that belongs to no one but me, and now, the orange tabby, Clarissa, who's occupation seems in part to be guiding me to my work. To own the hours that belong to me and make use of what is precious. In appreciation, I aknowledge her and others I am noticing more and more.

LOVE

It is such a common word. Thrown around casually or withheld in discomfort. It is simple and I think it is the key to heal, nurture, save, reconcile, forgive, rebuild, open up, step out and really live fully. Love. Love lets you crank up the Charlie Brown Christmas music in your car as you wait in line at school to collect your child so the parents around you can hear it too. Love allows you to heal the horrific wounds of war by allowing perpetrators to provide and victims to accept an acknowledgement and an apology. Love of life gives us the sight to see all that is beautiful, to feel all that is joyful in our everyday experiences. The full moon shimmering a path on the placid, black water. Love displaces greed. Love displaces fear. Fear that there won't be enough. Fear that if we give too much it will open a door to theft. Love provides an impenetrable armor against the most deadly attack. Love softens the blow of infidelity, betrayal, the human weakness that we are all capable of. Love of ourselves first strengthens our hearts and readies them to face any and all challenges. When we have love for ourselves, and we nurture our passions, we are whole and can not be shattered. Our souls are unbreakable. Love allows us to float in joy by attracting more of the same where ever we go. Love creates itself infectious and communicable. Love opens doors and hearts. Love melts frigidity. Love changes people. Love reverses tragedy. Give it to yourself. Give it away. The supply is endless. The more you use the more there is. Give a drop and receive a wave. LOVE. I mean it.

The Secret

She whispers it to me. Laughing, hiding her mouth so I only see her eyes. It is fun for her to know this and keep it hidden from me. She says it is like a present that you can unwrap at any time. The secret is..... We create our own experience. In essence, we are driving our own destiny. We can play with the future. We can create wealth, poverty, heath or illness. We can create love and unity or discord and disruption. As souls in physical form, we are capable of attracting whatever we want. We have a hard time knowing what that is and even second guess ourselves when we do know what we want. We are afraid of being wrong. We are afraid to ask. We won't even vocalize our wishes sometimes because we believe they could never happen. We don't always trust ourselves.

I have since childhood, seen the future as a present. wrapped up for me to open and enjoy. My life has really been like that. I enjoy it. I, of course, have a list of manifestations that I am willing into action. Money - so much that I have plenty to share, an easement of the self criticism that hinders the manifestational abilities of my loved ones, health and a healthy appreciation of the miraculous machine that IS my body, and of course, world peace through a very specific visualization of my limitless heart energy wrapping around the planet twice, empowering each individual with the gift of self love and compassion. I dream big. I don't limit myself. How else can I propel myself to the status of benvolent ruler of the planet?

The Evolution of Doubt

Raising children provides a bit of an opportunity to study human nature. I have the privelidge of being a stepmother of two girls who are now in the mid teen and early adulthood stages of their lives, so I really have observed the course of self power that evolves as we grow. My small children, an observant and stubborn three year old and a dreamy, distractable six year old serve as my early childhood models. They are demanding of what they want. The ask for big and small, dream of trips to Disneyland and swimming with dolphins in Hawaii. They manifest with their words and in their art. They do not doubt in their ability to get what they want. My teenage children are at the stage of being afraid to want. They tell me, they can not have strong desires because their fear of not receiving or achieving is too great. Failure would be too painful. Fear of not getting is motivation for not asking, not wanting. The oldest, who is in college now, expressed her fears about not getting into the right college from the first semester of her freshman year in high school. Her motivation for learning was not to learn, but to earn the grade that would provide the best chance of getting into the most competitive schools. It was her belief that students who didn't achieve a 4.0 grade point average were doomed to sub-standard collegic experiences. When it came time to apply, she dared to not want any one college too much, for the fear of not getting what she wanted was greater than the hope that she would achieve her goal. She was confirmed when she auditioned for the UCLA school of theater, a very small, highly competitive program, and vocalized a passionate desire to be accepted into this program and was very disappointed when she did not get accepted. In hindsight, she is now a student at a small, highly respected liberal arts college in the pacific north west and has been very active in the theater department. I am now experiencing the same doubtful behavior emerging from my second stepdaughter. Now a highschool freshman, she is more mature and self-aware than most her age, but still limits her future with her verbal communication of doubt. I don't know exactly how she feels but what she verbalizes to me is the same fear her sister had about the grades and the colleges. She actually insisted to me that she was not a smart as I thought she was, implying very strongly that I didn't know the real her. Of course, this is all a bunch of "dark matter" which clouds the truth and weighs down the heart to the point of self doubt or even self-loathing. Being an optimist and a full believer and subscriber in the law of attraction, I prefer to see my children in the stage of believing in miracles and asking for the world. I know, from experience, that if there is something you really want, you can and will have it. You may have to take steps and never accept failure as an option, but you will have it. It may not fall into your lap, you may not know how it will come to be yours, but if you believe that it will happen, it WILL HAPPEN. I used to write notes to the universe or god and ask for very specific things. My husband started out as a journal entry with qualities listed and he showed up as a blind date. My child was a request made on a strip of paper placed in my Wish Box. She came to me as a positive pregnancy test on my thirtieth birthday. Our house, which we wanted to buy but couldn't (because the owner would not sell) came to us after a request was made to the universe, in writing, as a wish in my Wish Box. It was unforeseen circumstances that led the owner to a place where he needed to sell the house. My daughter was six weeks old when we signed the papers. Over and over I have made requests. I know that for me there are no limits to what I can have, so I am shooting BIG. I am shooting for the elimination of self doubt of all people. I am aiming for the birth of self forgiveness and compassion for ALL PEOPLE. I am envisioning the feeling for existing in a world where there are no limits to what we can achieve. NO LIMITS.