Category: conscious living

Noticing as a path to truly living

.Reading time 2 minutes.

When my child says something is beautiful be it a scenery, painting, a person’s face or an experience it goes right to my heart. It is a felt experience for me to hear and know that he’s noticed something that truly touched him. I learn from my son the art of appreciating what is in the moment and banking those moments into a bundle that is a life truly lived.

When we notice, we are present, we are in a felt experience of what is going through us and touching us as a living being energy. The more detail we notice in something or someone the deeper we go into the moment of being present with what is now, what is alive and speaking to us.

To me hearing my son express his delight in what he observes represents a true living rather than a passing energy of existing in a chain of life events, day to day, week to week. It tells me something is always worth noticing, examining, learning no matter how small. It speaks to me of a quality of always wondering what the next day, trip, touch and experience might bring. It is remaining curious and fully in life at all times. It is, to me, is beautiful, and who is better to connect us to that way of being than children, whose light shines through unapologetically and if it’s expression is allowed to be authentic at all times then we benefit from that more so through connecting not just to a real experience of knowing our children, but also re-connecting to our own inner child, which often gets forgotten as we get old.

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Descending into darkness with joy

.Reading time 4 minutes.

descend into underworld

The excitement within me rising this Mabon in anticipation of the descent journey that is starting. This part of the year is not going to change for me, I feel, as I adore the darker part of the year and get truly excited about the journey within. I love shorter days and the fact that days do end and we can go to sleep (in more ways than literally) and wake up with new perspectives, tapping into our treasures offered by dreaming and journeying in the dark.

As moaning for the summer is apparent I am happy to put that to rest to move on. There is a clear flowing movement within me that taps into places deeply intuitive, magical, wise and feminine within me. Observation of the decline in nature is beautiful to me, as I am aware of just how much lies within the idea of dying and living, dying and being born again, of the potential that is held safely within nature and all of us. The journey of going within and descending into all the corners, even the darkest ones of our psyche is incredibly exciting and I am fully aligned with the wonder of the gifts that it holds. Only through going down we are able to come up. There is again no light within darkness and that is the nature of things. It is how life is, nature is, weather is, cycles are and embracing the beauty of constant regeneration and transformation will offer a lot of wisdom and insight into how we are in the world, our ways of relating, giving and receiving.

Energy begins to bubble within me at this point in autumn that is nicely contained and deeply nourishing to the soul. My dreams begin to take me places I am yet to visit or had already visited before, reminding me of possibilities of paths one can take spiritually or in the physical reality. Dream world presents richer and fuller with imagery, colours, motifs and themes that tend to repeat themselves. Faces are clear, sensations are felt fully, voices are clear and directional and my steps are steadier and more in line with my purpose than ever. I look forward to going to bed, I notice that more clearly. I like darkness.

I wish you all a blessed descend this quarter and if you never thought about it or felt like attempting it, do it consciously and with no fear. You will not regret what you can potentially discover on the other side and as spring comes again a renewed psyche will propel you into new dimensions and ways of being you never thought possible. It all begins with the darkness and that is why the dark part of the year is so needed and important so when light returns it shines brighter and more conscious than ever in areas that will lead it to the meaningful and purposeful ways of relating, being, thinking and feeling.

Many blessings!

On meditation

.Reading time 5 minutes.

I have had a reflective Sunday today on the subject of meditation. I felt I just could not let it pass without doing one and it was a good and interesting experience. I am a strong believer in everything coming at the right time and today aligned intuitively with meditation subject, which also turned into some intuitive healing spell work, which I had sensed was on the cards last night. It took me on a long journey through very beautiful chakra colours. I had a meeting with the elements and crystals were pointed out in a way of integrating energies. Flowing, simple, incredibly soothing and perfectly aligned.

People talk about how meditation changes lives, removes fears and blocks, rids us of frustration and anxiety and so on. I wonder how interesting it is that by going within, which is essentially what meditation does, things become better. Why haven’t we always been going within, which would make the most sense to turn inwards for answers. It speaks loudly about our collective avoidance of ourselves, devaluing of our own resources and qualities. If it is a tool to know ourselves better. If that’s the case why doesn’t everyone do it?

External has dominated so many aspects of our lives for so long, concepts made up by men, rules of the society, ideas based on social conformity and abandonment of self, there is no wonder. It is incredible to think that we would turn away from the gold that lies ready and available within ourselves for the things that shine on outside, but have no depth or real value. It makes me very sad to think about it that way.

Meditation is going within, observing and honouring that breath that keeps us alive at all times. It is, indeed, powerful to notice our thoughts and patterns in which they come and go and most importantly where they go. We also notice how most of us don’t breathe, forget to breathe. We hold it, which creates all sorts of restrictions, blocks and anxieties within our bodies. We find sitting still difficult just as we find being alone difficult without external stimulation. Instead we aim to avoid and shut down. It is curious to imagine that it is easier to be without yourself than to be with yourself.

Meditation is a wide term for what your relationship is with yourself, it seems. We all can find our own way of meditating, practicing stillness and awareness. For me, it seems, meditation is just that being with myself as I am and where I am. Just there, present with all there is. Meditation can be done any time anywhere, as we speak, walk, sleep and sit with another. It is not just one way of relating to yourself, it is unique to each. For many years I was unable to meditate, afraid of what I would find within. That’s just it, it is that fear I referred to earlier of being with and avoiding is much more habitual. I suspect it is similar to many. I remember wanting to cry every time I sit in meditation, which was hard, so I would abandon and distract myself with other things rather than paying attention to what was asking me to be present. I also at times had some powerful meditations, which left me in wonder and distress at the same time. There was too much within for my external self, adapted self to hold. Just think about that. We are proficient in being in our adapted selves positions yet our true self is hard to relate to. After years of therapy I am able to meditate and really understand what it means for me and what it does for me. It is once again an inclusion of the whole self just as it is, true and adapted, positive and negative, wounded and healed. As practice develops one becomes more curious, more at ease with experiences, feelings and lessons that come through sitting with oneself and in time it becomes soothing, comforting and full of wisdom. That wisdom that lies within each and every one of us is open and available if only we allow ourselves to go there and become aligned with what we were always meant to be.

Many blessings!

Summer and patience

.Reading time 4 minutes.

What is patience? It is allowing. When things are being as they are we stand in observance of what is. I find it deeply healing, humbling and liberating when there is no fight against what one thinks should be because there’s a discomfort present. Where there is no resistance a space opens up for observing what is being and living in that moment. Summer is a hot season, of course, it is, that’s the nature of things and when it is hot in summer things are aligning to the vibration of what summer means. It is not cold or raining all the time, although it is sometimes, it is simply being what it is.

I have experienced a high degree of tolerance towards summer this year. It happened due to conscious effort not wanting things to be something else and me desperately wanting to change it. That never works. This can be applied to so many aspects of growth and healing when we drop resistance and allow things into being there’s a release of freedom of attachment to what we think should be in order for us to be soothed. There’s a lot to be said for being uncomfortable, however if one fights it actively it will always persist and increase in its intensity.

I stood back or rather decided to travel alongside summer this year and observe everything there’s to witness about the season rather than shutting myself off from the experience and waiting for it to be over. Such a waste. By being present with summer I noticed how present I have been with everything else and everyone around me, every day, every week, every event and moment shared with those in my life. The value of everyday presence overtook my resistance and dislike of summer. I found I didn’t want to complain or participate in the fight within, which had previously been there always. Instead I lived each day and found a lot of positive aspects in the season.

I have been patient and allowing with myself and the summer to be what we are meant to be, living, moving, flowing and grateful for experiences granted.

It is not wanting to cut off a part of the whole, which can be applied to the seasonal wheel of the year, as well as parts of ourselves. We will always have preferences for certain seasons and aspects and ways of being and that is not to say that lessons and joy can’t be found in less preferable places, in fact, those aspects that we mostly resistant to carry some of the most vital and profound teachings.

Patience is a beautiful way of being in a state of non-judgement, slow flowing with energies just as they are and allowing expression of all that is necessary. It is acceptance and a silent stance of holding a space.

The ‘shadow’ Fire of summer

.Reading time 8 minutes.

Fire element in distortion

I am exploring the wounded, sensitive point in my psyche that comes up in June, before Summer Equinox. It produced feelings of depression last year, which lasted all the way to Samhain – a long time. This year I am determined to un-tangled and look at what is going on with an aim to acknowledge, heal and integrate. It is the 3rd June and I have been feeling the now familiar energy rising within already. This feels very hard and resistance is overbearing. The defence is always distorted Fire, which is cruel, ugly, merciless, the kind that burns everything to ash without any hope of new growth or so it seems at the time. This Fire is very different to a healthy Fire, which I would normally tap into during winter, post Yule and that energizes me to a degree of high productivity, enthusiasm, high energy and success.

Fire element in its distorted state prevents life from flowing, yet a healthy manifestation offers a chance for a re-birth. Fire is a glorious element, as it is transformative. We often have to burn, be in pain in order for something else to manifest through it. Calcinatio operation in the alchemical process.

This Fire stops a part of me being seen, it blocks any possibility of reconciliation within the psyche and ‘burns’ everything in my physical reality. Yet, we do come back from it every year and every time I look back on it with bewilderment and gratitude for having survived the ‘war’. It often feels like it. Sometimes it goes on for a month or two, other times it lasts longer and it can be exhausting.

I am writing this in hope that it might resonate with many and to explore/explain what happens when we reject, suppress parts of ourselves we are not willing to bring back, integrate and look at. One might refer to it as the material, which resides deep within our psyche and now and again pops out to say hello and we are in no way thrilled to welcome them back. Then a battle commences to avoid, resist, push it back and not having to deal with whatever it is that is asking to come back.

In my case this is my inner child – an extremely sensitive, delicate, vulnerable self that to the rest of me is so overwhelming I get thrown off-balance every time I feel her approaching. In order to defend I tap into my anger self and take a position of a distorted Fire, which is the only way I know how to send my ‘vulnerable self’ back to where it came from. My desire to project becomes almost unbearable, which tells us how difficult it feels for me to contain feelings of that inner child that comes into full view. When previously attempting to heal this I always resorted to giving it away to someone else, who is better equipped to look after it. It had worked for some time, but this time it seems that it wants me to take her in. It wants to come back from exile.

In dreams this part of me comes as one particular person, which I have come to recognise. It always appears a gentle, good part of me that everyone loves, apart from myself. In dreams as it wants to get close to me (not others even though they are more than happy to take her in) I begin my process of avoiding and running away from it. Last night I had such a dream and reflecting back I do recognise having been doing the ‘rejecting’, but on another level wanting to get close to it also and that’s where the clue lies towards integration. Not all is lost. In the dream last night the soft part of me also decided to reject me and that really hurt. It jumped on a ‘runaway’ train seeking separation from me and expressing its disappointment. That hurt. It is not that I don’t want to, but more I can’t bring myself, don’t know how to deal with it. I reject before it rejects. This plays out in my physical reality in a way of projecting exactly that. What I am projecting is the anger with myself and seeming inability to deal with the vulnerable self. Anger is also laced in disappointment, shame, self-punishment, etc., which also manifests in real life and is projected outwards when the angry self becomes shaming of others, expressing disappointment openly and emotional eating, e.g.

These insights are the first steps towards the ultimate goal of integration. My dreams and being aware of my emotions as I awake every day have been invaluable to me in reaching a position of clarity of what is happening within my psyche and physical body, a key to my conscious and unconscious material. Post-insight comes an even clearer awareness and links are made with the day-to-day manifestation of wounds and conditions, i.e. what one does in their physical reality, relationships, work, etc. that manifests that behaviour. Once awareness is established then come choices, processes we put in place to attempt to heal, trial an error, if you like, but nevertheless there are choices. There are opportunities to put things in place in order to move forward. Healing comes from acceptance and a successful implementation of all of the above and integrating day by day, learning a new way of relating to yourself first and foremost before it becomes harmonious on outside with relationships with others.

Insight – Awareness – Choices – Acceptance – Healing – Integration

I am going on a journey with this part of my process actively this month. It is a challenging time, as we build up towards the ultimate Fire festival and Sun in its full power in nature. My aim is not to get hooked and blow it out to a point of losing control completely. This year it is going to be different and what is not present as much I feel, which is a blessing and new, is fear to engage with difficult stuff. This time I know deep down that if we fear ourselves we fear our potential at the same time and fearing potential is a limiting outlook, which simply doesn’t help us progress. The aim is to put things into a healthy flow, into an energy of progressing with purpose without resistance.

Have a good week.

 

Understanding sacrifice 

.Reading time 6 minutes.

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I have rejected the idea of self-sacrifice especially after my being got fragmented post stepping into motherhood, which now is clear only came from a point of not fully understanding its meaning and purpose. It always felt like ‘what about me’? The position of a wounded part within, which always felt unseen and unheard, the part, which felt her needs were ignored and not met. Limited perspective.

It has recently grown into a wider understanding through looking at my mother’s life. I find it’s always valuable to look outwards for examples of self-sacrifice and what that shows and teaches us. There’s one crucial key to self-sacrifice and that is a firm personal choice and from there what follows is meaning making. They go together to be more precise.
On the surface it looks like she completely sacrificed her life for her husband and kids. It often begged a question ‘but what about her’. I am sure she asked that enough times herself in moments of despair and uncertainty, however, she always remained firm in her choice to self-sacrifice. We might ask why? And the answer is for the greater good, for better outcome all around, for happiness on a wider scale, which she could contribute to. It is her contribution to the wider good and her choice in sacrificing if necessary that carried her through life and, guess what, she remained happy throughout. It is from seeing others happy and content she drew her own happiness and contentment. That always remained her personal choice and one might even say her life purpose.

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When familiar is no longer working 

.Reading time 4 minutes.

 When familiar no longer works you are ready for the next step, upgrade, adjustment.

I had an experience this month where I was left suspended in a vibration, which felt uncomfortable and unsolvable. No tools I have accumulated over the years could successfully be applied to that situation. I fought against it, resisted, projected my frustration onto external and that is normal human reaction when we are up against something that is problematic yet feels like it can’t be fixed. I understood my reaction well to that state as a natural push against something that I felt needed to be fixed or changed. Also to mention that surrender to a situation or a feeling state (one of my tools) also didn’t work.

In terms of elements, which I often use as a model when working with situations and parts of myself I couldn’t describe for the first time which element I was manifesting in my reality. That was the thing that really struck me as the elements always work for me in a simple way to help me understand what is distorted, what I am lacking and what needs to be introduced into the mix. Nah, not this time. There was suspension of all possible ways I have gotten to know to work for me so far in my life. I should also mention that my ‘magic’ seemed to have gone to sleep. There was access to that either.

I became curious about,firstly , what it was about that didn’t allow my known methods to work. It felt like there was an opening for something new to come in. I was meant to learn a new way, take a different step towards resolution and wholeness within myself. I was ready to engage with material completely new and it felt like there would be risks involved, super sharp mindful awareness in every moment and not abandoning myself under no circumstance, which simply only delays the process of learning and integration.

At this moment in time all I have is an awareness of the above having taken place. I am curious to what this will lead to. It feels like I am working through something on my way of becoming something new. Nothing is new within us, of course, there can only be something that we forgot or rejected perhaps. What’s coming up is more shadow work, I feel and whenever that happens I feel excited. Why? Because shadow work always leads to liberation, unleashing of what has been hidden yet can be used in a valuable way. It’s like fining a black box and feeling the excitement of opening it and not knowing what one would find yet it feels like home, you, a gift. And the work is to work out what that is.

I now remember feeling this way back in summer 2016 when all tools were taken away and I was forced to look at my physical reality manifestations. It forced me to get engaged with myself on a serious level, really look at myself in the mirror as the only thing available. I felt I didn’t quite get it that time and therefore, missed an opportunity to upgrade. Now I am being given the second chance and I am ready!

Always question how you feel, observe how you behave and what your thinking is like. Be with yourself always and whenever something doesn’t feel right stop and explore it’s meaning. It’s not that we are doing something wrong it’s about  becoming something new. Something is always growing within of us to be known.

Blessings!