In Resurrecting Venus, I wrote a chapter called Forgiveness is Freedom (shared here). In this writing I explained that when you hold onto anger, resentment, and non-forgiveness, you are the only one suffering. Think about it, when you’re holding negativity toward another, does it do anything to them?

No. Instead, you immerse yourself in the venom you want them to take. You give your power over to the very thing upsetting you–in this case a monster– and enable it to continue wreaking havoc and evil. In your non-forgiveness you empower and feed the very thing you despise and its reign of terror continues.

Forgiveness is an act of self-preservation and care. It has nothing to do with the one being forgiven. It is always and only about you.

We must forgive for our own health, peace, and healing. We must forgive to take our power back and use that power to create what we want to see in the world.

Forgiveness is not the acceptance, condoning, or forgetting of what’s occurred. It does not mean loving, approving, or accepting another or their behavior. We still hold them accountable for their actions.

We release the perpetrator to justice and release ourselves to freedom and love for those who’ve suffered. We take our power back and turn the other cheek by shifting our attention and energy away from the perpetrator and fixing our gaze on healing, preventative and helping actions.

Through forgiveness we become alchemists, transmuting pain into loving acts. We depose the monster by starving it and make our inner and outer world a better place.

I forgive and I go free.

I am an active advocate of oneness, forgiveness, and love always being the answer to every upset. This is the theme of my life and I’ve adhered to it through my own losses and tragedies. Yet, this story . . .  And why this story and not the plethora of others like it or equally as horrific as it is, is beyond me. This story has stretched my beliefs and and love center to their max.

I honestly cannot remember ever craving for someone to experience pain and suffering before. Inching along the 405 (the most congested freeway in the US) with tears streaming down my face, I imagined the parents of one of those girls, or even one of the girls themselves, finding a way to shoot the beast in transit and making the legal case for justifiable homicide. In those moments, I was anything but enlightened.

I believe there is order and purpose in all things. I accept that there are things that I do not have the capacity to understand. I see life more as a dream and death as waking up. I still believe that love is the most powerful force in existence and I am one with it. I also still believe that the world needs compassion, healing, kindness and forgiveness.  I need all of those things too.

We are all in process, all growing, all doing the best we can. It’s okay to feel what we feel and to tell the truth about it. It doesn’t make us any less Godly, it makes honest, trustworthy, and relatable.

I’m still spiritual, but I am also human.

***

Leave a comment. What are your human struggles?

This wasn’t entirely true. Even when you give your power away or feel that you are worthless, nothing changes the deepest truth about you. There is nothing you can do to destroy your inherent magnificence. You are drawn from the ocean of the Infinite and your essential nature is pure power and love. At your core, you are and always have been worthy of every good because our Creator doesn’t make creations unlike Itself.

Dark days come when you forget the truth about you and accept superficial, mortal illusions as truths. In those moments, you are as valuable and spiritually whole as ever, but you’re caught up in false beliefs.

Your greatest and most powerful responsibility is to remove the veils of illusion that hang between you and the truth. Become a conscious observer of your thoughts and actions that deny your truth and kindly, lovingly affirm:

None of these things define me.

When you begin to realize that nothing outside or inside of you changes your essence, you can choose to focus on living in a manner that is consistent with the greatest expression of the Divine showing up as you.

When you reach a place of knowing this truth, like you know your name, you’ll possess an inner joy and peace that cannot be shaken. This is heaven on earth.

Resurrecting Venus is the product of a lifetime of  soul-crushing challenges and ”impossible” successes. I’ve learned that the great strength of our feminine essence can transform misery into magnificence and I wanted to share this wisdom with the world. First, I wrote my memoir. It is a very compelling story and people loved it but, agents said that without a preexisting following it would be very hard to sell to publishers.

Instead of waiting for a publisher to pick me, I chose myself—something I encourage my clients to do. I started a blog and began sharing the wisdom and power of feminine grace and good sense. My writings resonated with many people and soon my blog was picked up by readers and sites around the world. I was enthused and really enjoyed the connection it created with my readers. At the same time, I was taking courses on prayer, meditation, ancient wisdom and manifestation at USTLA (Agape Int’l Spiritual Center). I saw a practitioner there weekly and I deepened my understanding of our ability to claim a friendly universe and co-create with it.

Around that time I wrote a very popular blog post called, Resurrecting Venus. It was inspired by my life experiences as well as my female coaching clients. In the article, I introduced the idea that the cause of many of the upsets and maladies women experience today is derived from suppressing their feminine essence. I found studies and an endless supply clients to support this conclusion.

In sum, as women lock away their need for intimacy, self-care, compassion, cooperation, kindness, joy and creative expression, their feminine essence festers until it lashes out in a negative way, appearing as physical, emotional, financial and relationship distress. I began to receive emails from around the world asking me to discuss specific aspects of expressing our feminine energy at home, work, in love and in ourselves. Many women wanted to know how they could trade in a life of being all things to all people, for the  joyful experience of creating their heart’s desires. I knew I could answer these questions. My whole life had prepared me for it.

I created a vision board and set a rough foundation for the book. Much was still unclear and I recalled the challenge of getting an agent’s or publisher’s attention as a first time author.  On top of that there was really only one publisher in the whole world that I was drawn to:  Hay House. They represented the pinnacle of everything I wanted. They were a perfect match and nearly unapproachable without an agent. The idea of soliciting agents was not the most appealing prospect, but I could see no other way. I began strategize about how I would get an agent and get connected to people at Hay House. I’d take some of their classes, attend their events, write their authors, and find a window to go through. I’d write a query letter and do a mailing to agents (I wrote a couple of queries that so called “squirrels” on an internet forum tore to shreds).

I asked the Universe to support me and to see my plan through. I’ve since learned the ridiculousness and limitations of this approach. My little mind is no match for the Divine. I remind myself daily.

The following week I received a phone call from the CEO of Agape Media Int’l. He’d seen my blog on the Blog Catalog website and asked me if I’d ever heard of Agape.  Had I ever heard of Agape?  I’d taken classes there for years, the CEO’s office was literally across the hall from my practitioner’s office, I’d even attended classes with the CEO, and been in the same room with him at least 50 times. He went on to ask whether I’d be interested in publishing a book with AMI in partnership with Hay House. HAY HOUSE!

Over the course of the next two years, my every plan went awry and something better emerged and replaced it. Things really became wonderful when I stopped trying to control the unfoldment of the Universe.

I’ve learned that it’s important to know where you’d like to go and plans are useful in channeling our actions, but we must be absolutely open to having our steps ordered and reordered by the power that causes our hearts to beat. There is great love, wisdom, and knowing all around us and it far exceeds our comprehension. Show up. Do your best. Let the Universe take care of the rest.

I am very proud to share this co-creation with you. Now it’s your turn.

If you’re a women who’s ready to call forth and embrace the life you were created to live, read Resurrecting Venus. It will reconnect you to your feminine center and your innate power to create the love, abundance, success, and true beauty that you deserve.

Begin at the end

First, I will pray with anyone from any religion. To me there is no hierarchy of righteousness in prayer. Today, I want to share how I came to the way I pray when I’m alone and why it resonates with me.

The following excerpt from Resurrecting Venus highlights the mindset I grew up with and the basis for its collapse:

“The ubiquitous belief that we are separate from our Creator——and He, being a temperamental patriarch, blesses or curses us with the conditions in our lives,—lowers our consciousness and attracts chaos. Backward beliefs like these stem from fear-based interpretations of Divine wisdom. Many still think that God will take care of them when they behave and think as required by His jealous, scorekeeping, nature. If this is true, then it must also be true that the millions of suffering children around the world have done some horrible things to warrant the lives they are forced to endure. Few of us consciously agree with this, yet so many still pray for the Infinite to stop doing certain things and start doing others. Our Creator is doing what It has always done: being a force of infinite, unconditional, all-encompassing love and beauty. God is changeless, and not one of His beloved creations will be lost.”–from Embracing a Friendly Universe, Resurrecting Venus

Once it became clear to me that a God of Love would never seek pain or punishment, I was able to let go of the belief that God was doing things to me and accept that life, in all its ups and downs, was happening for my soul’s growth. I was able to look at every terrible event and see that the ultimate result was an increase in compassion, an understanding of love, and a burning away of everything superfluous. For me, this is the end game, the ultimate definition of successful living.

From here, I learned to pray by beginning at the end–making compassion, love, and authenticity the starting point instead of the destination. This form of affirmative prayer, turns away from the appearance of problems and embraces the highest good instead.

From an energetic and emotional perspective, what we focus on expands. If I see one in distress and I pray that the distress go away, I am giving my energy, attention, and my focus to the distress. This feeds it and magnifies discomfort and fear within me. Where there is fear there is not faith.

When I pray, I first turn my attention to the divine spark within me. I eliminate any sense of separation from the Divine by reminding myself of who breathed life into me. I affirm this connection. I call on the energy of love. I ask that it fill the space inside and around me. I meditate on this until I feel it to be true. I know I’m there when I feel peaceful and safe.

I then turn my attention to the person or subject I’m praying for. If one appears ill, I see them as whole and ask that only what is for their highest good manifest. I see them living in accordance with the Divine design–something that can only be for good. I surrender my will and all doubt and mental questions as to what form one’s highest good might take. I surround the subject of the prayer with love and grace.  All things exist in thought before form. I do my part to create a energetic basis –a seedling of possibility– for their complete healing.

When I encounter seemingly insurmountable problems (including legal or business related issues), I release my thoughts about what is likely or logical and saturate the people and issues in forgiveness and love. I affirm that all is well and everything is working together for the good of all concerned. I eliminate the necessity of a winner and a loser and “see” an outcome rife with peace. I have witnessed more than a dozen expensive and contentious conflicts resolve in ways that the professionals around me simply could not fathom.

I pray this way for all things including abundance, love, healing, career success and dream manifestation for myself and others. Where there seems to be no possible positive outcome I remind myself of my human limitations and hold the space for solutions that I cannot envision. I surrender to love and affirm that there is a solution, even if I don’t know what it is; I create space for it.

It’s important to distinguish this approach to prayer from the “law of attraction”–as taught by many popular teachings. Again, I cite my book for clarity:

A few years ago, the movie The Secret swept the world with its promise of material gain through single-pointed mental and emotional determination. It was described as a manifestation process that went something like this: (1) name it; (2) unwaveringly claim it; and (3) watch it appear (with “It” being the object of your desire). I can’t count the number of people I know who sat on their couches claiming cars, homes, and fame. They are more broke now than they were before. They lost precious time and endured much sadness when their wish list didn’t manifest. When asked what they believe went wrong, they blame themselves for not being “faithful” or “focused” enough. It’s tragic. Material items do not have a specific vibrational frequency. Money is a neutral energy. You can spend it on poison or paradise. You must align your consciousness with the wellspring of the abundance you seek, not more “stuff.”– from Embracing a Friendly Universe, Resurrecting Venus

An added benefit of praying from the outcome is it enriches my moment to moment well-being. I’ve become keenly aware of the moments when I feel as though I’ve disconnected from my Source. I’ve learned that I can always choose to return to Love and let It have Its way.

As a child, I silently pondered the inconsistent teachings offered by adults around me. They told me that God among other things was male, all powerful, all knowing, and absolutely loving, except that if you didn’t do as he wanted or your ancestors failed to, you would suffer his rage, jealousy and condemnation. On top of that, you should endeavor to be pious, devout, and Godly, yet you would still, no matter what, be a sinner. And finally, he had a rival that he had to contend with, the devil, and even though God was the creator of all that is and is unsurpassed in his power, somehow he couldn’t pierce the realm of the devil . . . well he could, but he didn’t want to or something (mumbling) about free will, but he could if he wanted to, but . . . little girl you ask way too many questions.

I prayed the lord’s prayer every night and did my best to accept what made no sense to me.

At twelve, I met my best friend (yes, she’s still my best friend). At the time she was Muslim and felt very strongly that it was the only true faith. Without the stigma and extremist interpretations that overshadow the West’s interpretation of Islam today I read the Quran and learned the peace-loving, love-based doctrine it so beautifully presents. There were also rules, restrictions, punishments and things I couldn’t rationalize with love.

It left me asking, how could one religion be better than another and how could anyone know which was correct?

Later, I studied Christianity and felt such a connection to the kind, loving, and forgiving nature of Jesus. Yet, I could not reconcile the idea that a child, created by God as all children are, could be born in Africa today and die without having ever heard of Jesus and be denied a return to her Creator, or that two human beings who loved each other and happened to be of the same gender were barred from grace. Love loves.

I continued my study, took classes, read texts, and met many individuals of many faiths. I learned that religious division has cost humanity about 800 million lives. Yet, there was tremendous overlap between all faiths, and when I stepped back from each religion’s rules, rituals, and dogmas,  two tenets emerged as consistent foundations for all of them:

1) Treat others as you wish to be treated.

2) God is Love.

This became my value system, it felt right way down deep in my center. This choice triggered a shift in my awareness that transformed my life. I could do this, even if I didn’t succeed all the time. It set me free.  I surrendered my need for a religion while still loving all who embraced theirs. I no longer had to worry about adhering to proper prayers, instead I could BE LOVE.

Love is a verb, something one does. Without the fear of being inadequate or the whipping post of an angry God, I could actively pour love, compassion, forgiveness, comfort and inspiration into a parched world. I could see the best in people and suffer no religious division. Every wise teaching from every tradition was now available to me.

Later, I was blessed with teachings by some of today’s most appreciated Wisdom teachers and writings that precede many of the holy books.

I’ve learned that the power within us is in fact greater than that of the world. We are responsible for the conditions of our lives (and this is a very good thing because it means we have the power to change them). We are never alone and Love really is the most powerful force in the Universe. We are drops from the ocean of the Divine, created in Its image, and more powerful than we ever really grasp. We are here to surrender to the desires of our heart– as distinguished from ego wants–they were placed in us by the Divine so that we would be drawn to give our greatest expression. We are here to express the Divine in and through us.

This revelation set off a cascade of changes in my life. I abandoned the “shoulds” and the admonishments of the various religious leaders I’d come to know. I turned within and sat in stillness until I caught a whisper of the Divine’s intentions for my life. Much of what came called me to stand face to face with my greatest fears (fear of rejection, failure, embarrassment, lack, and ridicule). Invariably, the fears subside when I connect with the knowing that I am simply a channel for Divine love to live through me. I’m not doing anything but surrendering to the power that lives in us all.

I’ve come to value and appreciate all faiths and I will joyfully pray with anyone, but I’ve found my place, it’s the meeting point at the end of all theological paths: the feet of the Divine.