About Me

"The real juice of life, whether it be sweet or bitter, is to be found not so much in the products of our efforts as in the process of living itself, in how it feels to be alive."

                                                                                       George Leonard

There are no secrets to living a happy life. When we move away from the voice of Spirit whispering the way to go, we find ourselves adrift. Getting quiet enough to hear is what keeps us from listening. We get busy and involved with life on the merry go round. As a society we covet being busy. The busier we are the more important we feel. But somehow it all begins to blend together and we are not satisfied when we lie down at night and let go of the day. 

Only recently I wrote about feeling disconnected and discombobulated. I allowed myself some sacred space to feel my discontent, to quiet my inner landscape, even though it felt uneasy.The wonderful gift of that day was a retreat back to daily meditation. Quiet time with Spirit...daily. Yes, everyday. Sometimes just puttering in the garden. Sometimes before during and after my yoga practice. Or before working at my computer. Always, as I lay me down to sleep. My Soul is filled with joy. Not the exuberant, oh my goodness how happy I am kind of joy, but and inner connection with Spirit that comes only when we take the time to quiet ourselves and pay attention. 

Life is not perfect, (or maybe it is) but now I am noticing who walks beside me, within me, constantly. God/Spirit is with each and every one of us. Though many are so focused on what is not in their lives that they are missing the very truth of their being. 

Put space around your thoughts don't let your thoughts think you. Notice the chatter and let it go...it really isn't all that important. It will come back, anyway, it always does. There is a quiet hum behind the noisy world in which we live...stop there a moment. It feels really,

really good to be alive.

Until next time...

 

Reasons To Celebrate

"Learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else."
                                                                                         Leonardo da Vinci

Lately I have been pulled into a piece of my past that I had laid aside for many years. We do that sometimes, put things and memories away for later. Little snippets of thoughts and pieces of dreams would come to mind and then drift away. 

This was a time that has warm memories. A time when a group of twenty somethings were living in southern California.

My teen years were spent listening to (and singing with) the Beach Boys. Outside, the Ohio winters were howling but inside my room was the sound of the beaches in California. A state I had never set foot in. In fact, other than my grandparents farm in Tennessee I had never left Ohio and Michigan.

But there came a day when I decided to go. When I told my Mom I was leaving, she just said "I always knew you would do something like this". I didn't understand what she meant but she didn't try to stop me. I had no credit cards and little money I also had no doubt that I would get there. I slept in rest stops along the way sometimes lying back on a picnic table for a quick nap. I wasn't fearful at all, just living the adventure moment by wonderful moment.

When my car broke down in the desert on the last leg of my journey I just got out of my car and tilted my head back soaking up the sun. Shortly a van with extra water for my radiator stopped to help and in minutes I was on my merry way. I loved that journey! I was venturing out on my own at last, hoping to leave that lost mixed up soul I had become, behind.

My mother had also reminded me that I would be taking me with me, and she was right. I brought my habits, my thoughts, my image of my Self. I also brought the frightened girl who continually talked to Spirit/God asking for guidance while sometimes not listening and making many mistakes. Making my Self feel bad then trying again. I love that younger me for always trying again...for never giving up. She was sometimes foolishly fearless and somehow always protected. She still makes me smile.

The rule breaker rebel I once was is still here. She is living peacefully with the nice girl who does the right thing just because that is what she wants to do.

Take good care of those parts of you that you may not want others to see. Those are part of the very fiber of your being. What you did, thought, said, that you wish to keep hidden helps you discover the parts of you that you shine up and put on display...on Facebook, at work, in front of friends.

There is a loving force that is always there to call on...that permeates our very existence with love. Pause a moment and feel this beautiful energy with your next breath. Always there. Always faithful.

Until next time...take really good care.

About Me

"Happiness...not in another place, but this place, not in another hour, but this hour."

                                                                                       Walt Whitman

It is a stormy day in Florida...it kind of matches my mood. I woke up this way...feeling like a tiger in a cage that is too small. Striding from one side to another snapping my tail and growling if someone dares to speak to me. Doesn't sound very Spiritual does it?

My Soul feels unsettled and I noticed right away. The inner dialog with Spirit goes something like this: " I am feeling caged, trapped and like a nobody...why am I angry?" Spirit says: You are choosing these thoughts and with them come these feelings, stop. Me: That's easy for you to say you aren't the one who has done nothing with her life. Spirit: Is that the way you're choosing to see your life today?

I know I cannot continue the assault on my being I have been listening to Spirit for far too long.

I walk outside to work in my garden, there are new azaleas to plant since I want to fill them in from one side of the yard to the other. Working in the dirt is good for me. I dig and plant and somehow work through my jagged edges. 

I learned from Spirit long ago not to heed the negative thoughts that sometimes pummel me telling me I am not a worthy human being because I am not a type A doer that I sometimes I wish I were. I am not as accomplished as I had hoped to be. I am mostly quiet, always paying attention inside my mind and outside in life. I am a nurturer. A space keeper. 

Today I am holding sacred space for my Self...even my writing is disconnected, but, I am writing anyway...knowing that these thoughts and feelings will pass. They do not come as often as they used to and they do not stay as long...there will be a time very soon when they will dissolve at the noticing. 

"You are confined only by the walls you build yourself"

                                                                                        author unknown

I call this blog Spirit, Soul and Work because I feel Spirit working through my Soul a lot of the time. I am paying attention to the whispers of Spirit most of my waking moments. It is important to me to live in such a way that honors and allows time for quiet talks with the Master.

For the last few days I have served on jury duty. The process was long and arduous (because of the constant sitting and waiting) but I held my self open to the experience. After some time I was placed on a jury.

Our case was relatively cut and dry. A man robbed a bank, was caught with money a short time later and admitted his guilt. The defense attorney had hoped for guilt on a lesser charge. We, the jury, found him guilty to the letter of the law. 

At first two of the jurors thought he should be guilty of theft and for a few minutes during closing arguments I leaned that way. But it was clear that this man robbed a bank. After the verdict, the judge told us that this man had just gotten out of prison after 16 years for the same crime and had been incarcerated many times before.

I walked away saddened for this man. He has been in prison his whole life and would likely die there. He never opened himself to the possibility of freedom from his own demons. He just couldn't do it. I sent a silent blessing to him I pray he feels the love surrounding him. I am glad he is no longer on the street and will have food and a regular place to sleep.

My Soul knows that we all create little prisons for ourselves...little imaginary cages that keep us confined. The only way out is to notice that they are created by our own thoughts about things and are not really holding us back, unless we choose to believe they are. There is so much love here, so much joy.

Choose to love your self, to take care of yourself in the most loving way possible. Step out of self imposed shackles. Is there something in your life that it's time to let go of? Give it some thought and know that there is a loving Presence with you now. You can notice or not...still there...helpful, loving, encouraging...

Until next time...

Namaste

Work As Play

"I will act as if what I do makes a difference" 

                                                                                     William James

I continue to work for an internet company doing mostly customer support. What I find amusing about this is, I am the least technical person I know. 

If the world around us is a reflection of the world within us...what does this mean?

My yoga practice is becoming more important in my daily life. For the past few years I have practiced yoga at the Y. I began with an incredible instructor who breathed us through entire classes and rarely took a pose except to demonstrate when necessary. This gave me a foundation, an inner awareness of each asana and the breath that accompanied it.

After this instructor left to open her own studio I continued classes with other instructors using the awareness  I learned from her. This week I have begun an at home practice and a renewed strength is building inside me. I will be writing about my practice and the changes taking place both inside me and outside. Because, as we know, when something changes on the inside it will become noticeable in the rest of our lives.

I am excited to journey into these changes finally allowing my Self to "come out". Not in the way so many athletes and actors have been lately, with their inner gayness, but with my own secret...my inner hippie! :) I am not woo woo. I just know that there is a loving energy that pervades all things...I have always seen it and felt it and hid my knowledge of it to fit in. But where do I fit except into other peoples ideas of what is real?

Journey with me, if you like, into your own awareness of the pulse of life beating within you. Breathe in this life force, God, this Spirit that has always been with us and stays with us until our last breath.Then lovingly escorts us to the next phase of our Soul travels.

Until next time...Namaste

"Yesterday is already a dream, and tomorrow is only a vision;

but today, well lived, makes every yesterday a dream of happiness,

and every tomorrow a vision of hope.

Look well, therefore, to this day!

Such is the salutation of the dawn."

Sanskrit Proverb

When I come downstairs in the morning and walk into my kitchen, this is what I see. These beautiful cats came into my life about thirteen years ago. They live mostly in the yard but sometimes come in to sleep if it is rainy or cold.They follow me around the garden adding a quiet contentment to my day. I pour a cup of coffee then walk into the garden to feed them. Roxy, my doodle dog is always by my side during this morning ritual. Animals add certain elements to our lives...Roxy exudes joy! She teaches me to let go...to allow my happiness to unfold. We had another dog before her, Dartanya, whose energy was wisdom. I learned from her to pay attention...to slow down and really see.

                                                                       

.
It isn't only the animals in our lives who can help with learning on our journey, of course, the people we live with or encounter can do that also. Lately I have noticed that my husband's silly antics which lately have irritated me are now beginning to make me pause and smile and laugh! Why do I feel so serious? Where did this shell of irritation come from? My yoga practice has given me space around my thoughts. I can look out now and see how I am living in the world and create a shift if I want to by conciously allowing myself a different point of view.

Life really is very good. Choose joy today.

Until next time...

About Me

"When you lose yourself in some positive behavior, you forget your fears and worries; temporarily they cease to exist."

                                                                                            David K Reynolds

It is a gloomy day. I love these days...the cloud filled sky is casting dark shadows over every corner of my house. My office is dark but there is light on my computer so I light a candle for my writing. There is something about dark days and candles that comfort me. As I light the candle I take a moment and honor my Mother, it is a ritual I started after she died...

These drizzly days also take me back to the day my son was born. It was rainy as we headed to the hospital and that day gave me the most blissful love filled moments of my life. I had him naturally... with no drugs and I experienced the opening between wherever we come from and our place in the world. Pure unencumbered Spirit filled the room with a love so strong it was palpable...even the light changed...very difficult to describe. Descriptions of people who have had near death experiences are the same...the light and being ensconced in a powerful blissful love.

Today my son came into my office to talk out a situation and solicit advice and when he rose to leave he thanked me for always being there for him. I looked at the intelligent, thoughtful man he has become and know that Spirit has led me to "guide him without interfering, to nurture without grasping and to shelter without claiming". It is Spirit that he is drawn to...he can go directly to this guidance and by pass me, but for now he sometimes comes to me. I am grateful for that since I released him to adulthood awhile back.

The other thing that I love about rainy days is the knowing that the rain will stop. That the sun will shine again and brighten the world as it warms my skin. Blue skies will appear as the clouds break away. Life is really, really good even on the darkest days.

My hope is that you know this to and that you can hold this knowing in your darkest times.

Until next time...

 

Work As Play

"...so me and my silence sometimes need this meeting"

                                                                                                  arteiracraft
  

It is national heart month...the paper this morning had an article on what to do for a healthy heart. The four "do's" that they mentioned are: eat better, exercise everyday, get enough sleep and manage your stress. This is good advice, I guess, though it leaves out an important part of the equation. "Pay attention to your heart", Spirit whispers.

I met myself on the mat this morning for a Yin yoga class. This is slow moving and holding poses for longer than usual. It is a good way to meet your discomfort. Most of us would like to sidestep discomfort and, usually I am one of them, but this morning with the sun streaming in warming my muscles, I embraced it. I allowed the healing light of Spirit to wash over me. Noticing where the stretch would end,,,then breathing there, letting the release happen, or not. 

How our heart feels is a good indicator of how close to Spirit we are living our lives. Sometimes I pay attention and many times I do not. But this morning the healing light of the heart chakra washed over me, opened me, leaving a quiet but pure joy. It was a beautiful way to start the day.

Arriving home I opened the front door to my light filled entryway...sunlight filled the room warming the terracotta floors. Everything was quiet for a moment then the ethereal sound of old Irish ballads came on (a gift from my husband who must have turned on the music before heading to the office). I need to remember to thank him since this is his least favorite music and one of my favorites.

During my meditation I turn to silence. Some days I live in silence all day...these days are dear to me, it is in the silent meetings with Spirit that I most notice my how my life looks and how my heart truly feels. It is in these intentional times with Spirit I gain insight and direction. It is here that I can forgive myself for not being "enough". 

Today my heart is somewhat troubled and a little like the discomfort I danced with on the mat...as I held that discomfort I knew that it would be over soon. The trouble in my heart is my Spirit letting me know that something is off kilter...in my noticing I also know "that this to. shall pass"....

What is happening in your heart today? I hope that you can lovingly embrace whatever it is...and know that it will not remain...we are changing every moment of everyday that we are here...even when we don't notice the change it is still moving through us.

Take just a few minutes in silence and be okay with where you are and who you are...and embrace the happiness if that is what you find.

Until next time....

Namaste

Reasons to Celebrate

"Let us not love in word or speech but in deed and truth"

                                                                                                John 3:18

It is January. A time for new beginnings. There are lonely places in my life and I want to change that. This is the year to fill those places with golden nuggets of friendship and love. To allow my Self to open and receive while letting go of the dirt mixed with the gold that I have held onto. 

This year I want to notice the miracles in my life...oh, they have been noticed before but sometimes only enjoyed a short time before I allowed my thoughts to think me. When this happens, the thoughts run rampant, moving my focus to futures not there yet or what is wrong in my life. This is the year I will choose my thinking. I will pay attention to the whispers of Spirit and not only talk about it but do the deed and reveal the truth of my Soul. It is time.

Somewhere I have read that we are all just walking each other home and I see that this is true. Parents die, friends die, the children of friends die. We are shocked and devastated even if there has been some forewarning. We are given a debilitating diagnosis and wonder how this can happen to us. Our husbands reveal how unhappy they are and our hands are bound because only they can make the changes necessary to unwrap the hidden gem of joy. We lose a dog, a house, a job, a leg, and then we are immersed in devastating thoughts about these things and believe our worlds have fallen apart.

This is the year I will have compassion for my Self and my friends but I will not see them or myself in our weakness. No more. It is time to live the truths that have been revealed to me over and over again. Like Mother Theresa saw the face of Jesus in the diseased and hungry people in the streets of Calcutta it is time to see the beautiful true Spirit inside our human weakness. 

My intention for this year is to live in this knowing. Holding on to the truth that miracles are always available to us. Sometimes that means spontaneous healing and sometimes it means loving the transition to the next realm.

I do not know what this year will hold for me though I written five things I want to create. I won't reveal those 5 things today but I hope that you will join me on this journey of life on planet earth as I set out to create these desires. I will share what happens from my truth in the knowing that you are a fellow traveler and perhaps a layer of remembrance will be revealed.

Sending love and appreciation to you...

Until next time...