Health, Wealth and Wisdom

2019-04-30T17:10:00.000-07:00

From the inimitable Ariel Spilsbury:

Happy Beltane, Beloveds...

Our culture has it so backwards. Get your work done, then if there is any time left in your day, find a moment of pleasure or joy. Over time, I have found that the more I stay in my joy and ecstasy and out of struggling with the 3D world, the more the Universe, in its delight, is magnetized to joyfully support my life!

A friend's letter that arrived a couple of days ago (that follows) is a prime example of this divine truth. She had been struggling financially to keep up with her daughter's college education expenses, and her ex partner continued to be unresponsive. Though her fear and anxiety were escalating, one day she made a conscious choice to give up her worrying, and instead put her intention on her creative expression. When she allowed herself to do that, she spontaneously entered an ecstatic state with her writing.

When she had finished writing and opened her email, there was an email from her ex partner saying he had changed his mind and would help her! So what turned things around? We need to start asking ourselves that question and get on with doing whatever that is with whatever appears to make us contract or thwart our living in joy.

In my interpretation the hallmark of that turnaround is clearly ecstasy... the choosing to enter the ecstasy of hearing the rejoicing dawn birds singing, the ecstasy of bringing form to the mystery in writing, "dancing a jig", building an altar... anointing oneself... etc.

Here is the friend's email so you can decide the answer for yourselves:

Though I was feeling downhearted, I decided to drink " joy juice” yesterday, focusing my intentions on the largesse and abundance that surrounds me at all times.

"I woke up this morning at 4:45 am to the sound of a woman in ecstasy somewhere in the neighborhood. It made me smile. The pre-dawn breeze was so delicious that I could not, would not go back to sleep. The Muse appeared at my bedside, with pen and pad in hand. She had a bemused, and slightly piqued expression that said, “Let’s get back to it, shall we?!?” I took the paper and wrote page after page until sunlight drenched my room and the song of birds rejoicing was too overpowering to dismiss.

I got out of bed and danced a jig, anointed myself, and proceeded to create an altar on top of my dresser of bird nests and flowers and beeswax candles. It was decidedly a most excellent start to the day. After taking a walk in the impossibly verdant hills near my home, I came home and booted up the computer. Two emails stood out: One was from my ex partner, saying that he was willing to pitch in with our daughter's extra college expenses (!) and the other was from a friend offering a part-time job I could do from home (!!!) All I can say as I laugh out loud is “Goddess is Good!!!”

So if you are heads down getting your work done, blatantly ignoring the fact that it is Spring... Beltane... the season of Ecstasy Exalted... you might want to reconsider your choice generally in your life or at the very least to take a day off to celebrate Her High Holy Day of Beltane on May 1st for Goddess' sake! Consider celebrating this Turn of the 8-spoked wheel, the precious Holy Day of Beltane, simply by choosing to do whatever gives YOU ecstasy, pleasure and delight... enacting and bringing to life the Celtic tenet: "All acts of love and pleasure are Her rituals!"

In Delight, Ariel

August 11, 1999: An Opportunity To Heal Through The Heart

2018-07-15T12:42:00.001-07:00

My exuberant article on the August 11, 1999 eclipse. Originally published in now-defunct Conscious Life magazine, and exceedingly relevant for our upcoming eclipse on 8/11/18:

Before our ripening millennial moment arrives, we’ll face another potent portal to either walk through or ignore: the total solar eclipse of August 11, 1999.

This is no run-of-the-sky eclipse. It’s a card-carrying galactic gateway. Astrological adepts have been waxing prophetic about the date's significance for a while; it also precedes, by just two days, the Aztec-prophesied "day of destiny."

What’s so special about this eclipse? If we’re willing to meet our celestial shadow at the level of metaphor, we’ll be insight.

Consider: the Moon blots out the light of the Sun. Perhaps our hidden, dark, or "feminine" side is asking our fiery, now-now-now, tick-tock, "masculine" energy to take a nap. The Moon signifies the night side, what’s unexplored within us, inviting receptivity, nurturing, allowing, rather than the solar-aggressive, "go-for-the-gold, the burn, the competitive edge" that plays out in our daily dramas.

Becoming One with Ourselves

Coming to wholeness — embodying our masculine and feminine energies, both within ourselves and as a planetary organism — is the quest and question of our time. First, are we willing to go there, and second, do we know how? It’s a call to alchemical union, this wedding of the light and the dark, and we could use a transformational map.

As a longtime student of ancient wisdom traditions, especially Mayan cosmology, I walk in both worlds, following an indigenous calendar that corresponds to seasonal and biorhythmic cycles, alongside our more linear Gregorian one. So I was intrigued to see what "natural time" might reveal about this auspicious access point. (The traditional Mayan symbols have been translated into modern equivalents, so decoding a day’s "energy" is like a game — it’s fun, and it expands one’s ways of thinking and perceiving.)

August 11, 1999 is an epiphany.

In the Mayan sacred calendar, August 11^thwill be a White Planetary Dog. The dog archetype is about loving through the heart, and loyalty — sounds a lot like "man's best friend", right?

"Planetary", in this case, is a frequency, like a note on the musical scale. It’' the frequency of manifesting, and it vibrates to how we perfect ourselves in order to produce a desired outcome.

"White" is one of four colors that correspond to the four directions, the four elements, and our four "bodies" (physical, mental, emotional, spiritual). White is north and air, a dimension of mind.

Finally, each archetype has a guiding energy, like a wise teacher or mentor. The guide for White Planetary Dog is the Mirror, which of course is about inner and outer reflection. It also connotes endlessness (ever been in a funhouse hall of mirrors? Did you gain an enhanced perspective on where "you" end? Look deeply into the mirror…) The Mayans even have a saying that reflects the mirror: In Lakech, I am another yourself.

The complete energy for the day reads:

I perfect in order to love

Producing loyalty

I seal the process of heart

With the planetary tone of manifestation

I am guided by the power of endlessness.

Head Heart, Wholeness

It’s a fantastic window of opportunity calling to us. Listen: "Hello, humans! By connecting your head and your heart, you perfect your love. In so doing, you produce loyalty to one another and to the greater good, which will manifest as unending heart-centered love all over the planet!"

This is our possibility, our invitation, our initiation, our healing.

And this is the beauty of Truth: it doesn’t matter what vehicle takes you there. The message is always the same. Come home to yourself. Remember the Love that you are.

However it's expressed, there's a universality that’s unmistakable. Tears of recognition flood your eyes as you choose to see clearly, as you inhale back your authenticity and power.

You're unconditionally invited to join in the cosmic celebration on August 11^th, as the Moon of Communion eclipses all the old ways that no longer serve. Joy is waiting on the other side of the window. Let's ride the carrier wave of the frequency of the heart into the ocean of resonance with all that lives. You are Love. Let Freedom Ring!

Living in the Noosphere: Some Thoughts from José Argüelles

2018-06-26T16:48:00.001-07:00

José Argüelles (known as Valum Votan in Mayan cosmology) was a man if not ahead of his time, then with a spherical perception of time which the rest of humanity is on the edge of understanding.

With the upcoming annual Day Out of Time (July 25th), here are some of Valum Votan's thoughts worth contemplating (from LawofTime.org):

· The noosphere is a “cosmic Internet” capacitor and universal thought processor.

· Thoughts are actually the function of different thinking layers distributed radially and discontinuously throughout the universal cosmic mind.

· The human brain is a noospheric transduction chip with an attendant hyperorganic nano circuit (etheric body chakra system) for the realization and fulfillment of self-reflective cosmic impulses.

· The biological unit in which the transduction chip-etheric nano circuit are housed is a thermic-luminic cosmic insulator.

· Self-centered thoughts create an electrostatic air inversion around the insulating unit, which inversion is perceived as the self or ego of the particular unit. This inhibits noospheric accessing and short-circuits the etheric nano circuit. Hence the activation of the nano circuit for the activation of the self-reflective cosmic impulses remains dormant in the preponderant majority of humans, for many of whom the very idea of such a nano circuit would seem to be a preposterous fantasy.

· The next evolutionary stage is dependent on the activation of the nano circuit through conscious hooking up of the noosphere transduction unit with the noosphere as a whole. In general, this is dependent upon the dissipation of the electrostatic air inversion.

Creator Destroyer Preserver via Ariel Spilsbury

2018-05-15T13:24:00.001-07:00

How does "I AM ENOUGH" inform Creation, Preservation, Destruction?

This moon

An invitation

A reminder

I AM ENOUGH!!

Where ever you are on the continuum of the cycle, and SO much is turning,

what potentiality lies inherently in BETWEEN Creation and Destruction with "I AM ENOUGH"?

In breath

Space between

Out breath

Space between

A Cycle

Infinite potentialities existing simultaneously,

Ceaselessly

There is enough

"I am enough"

"You are enough"

How aware are you of the position from which your actions arise, release, and arise again? What are you aware of in the spaces between? I am aware of a need to go on and on here, yet the message this moon is simple. Play with writing "I AM ENOUGH" on your mirror, your hand, on the books and mirrors of loved ones; in your hallways, on paper, with crayon. "I AM ENOUGH", inhale, "I AM ENOUGH", exhale.

Whatever is occurring in your life at this time, or perhaps you are witnessing in loved ones - how does rooting in "I AM ENOUGH" shift or alter your relationship to those events? Does it shift your buying habits? Alter what you eat? Calm your nerves? Inspire an illuminated response? How does it shift what gets created or destroyed? Inhale.

"I AM ENOUGH". Exhale. "I AM ENOUGH".

This moon, may you lie back and receive yourself (and others) in

I AM ENOUGH!

I AM ENOUGH!!

I AM ENOUGH!!!

"Kalieyei Swaha! Kalieyei Swaha! Kalieyei Swaha!"

Radiance: Ariel Spilsbury's Full Moon Transmission

2018-03-01T13:30:00.000-08:00

RADIANCE

HEART

POWER

ancient memory revealing itself anew

in radial time..

emanating from the single bindi of light,

which you are.

Stillness increases the velocity of light..

radiance being born of stillness

which is where the Geneatrix of

the causal frequency patterns

of that which

you came to create in this life,

hangs out..

Have a moment?

Do you perhaps want to have a visit with Her?

(the voice of the Geneatrix speaks)

Let's start here..

let's check out what you have in your aura's lingerie drawer

you know like, overcoming the hermit's vow

Have you checked out the recipe for fear of being alone, abandoned, separate,

Or the big one, fear of death, for example?"

One thing i can say for sure is that it seems it can be

longer lasting than bicarbonate soda burps

from the perspective of a lifetime overview

unless you start by asking yourself

"Where did I

get that recipe for fear of death"?

..following it until it finally reveals its true identity

In Emptiness..

Next you might search out the ingredient called

"look in the mirror-like reflection of a mountain lake on full moon"

to request from the Lady of the Lake

a timeless, holographic movie overlay of your version of

"alone" "abandoned" "separate"

just for a brief dip into the icy chill of the collective sinking titanic waters

or perhaps rather, choosing a visit with the beatifically smiling, crone seer

living in a dank cave near the edge of the village

in your own inner pantheon

but then you might rather just want to ask why

the Fool and the Magician

live next door to each other in tarot decks

and further still

why the Wise Woman presides over crossroads and

three..

along with Isis, Mary Magdelan, Sarasvati and thee

Keepers of the Sacred Well

of Remembrance

As a conduit for the pure, overflowing power of Love,

Is there another power?

when it is your arms,

Her arms, whose graceful movements

keep Universe's spinning

and the blue flames of Silence burning in the temple fire brazier?

as a Witness

attesting your surrender

to radiance

to heart

which naturally consumes false masks of power

which can only mimic reality

not create it.

Quite a prize for your willingness

to hold the ember flame of wisdom alone within

until it burns off

everything but the purity of heart

that evokes the Awakener

in the electric blue lightening storm

that births a purple sun

within you

freeing the penniless, penitent, priest or priestess

who rather chooses to be Ecstasy

now gently pointing out the path of the opulence of the Beauty Way

embodying the tender vulnerability of a purple iris

by being empty and open to being penetrated by the Divine Impulse

revealing itself through the eternity of light in your eyes

the ice blue crystal radiance of presence, that awakens like morning sky

in which clarity has eternal tenure

having navigated the canyon narrows of "alone"

like the sun setting,

now setting an indelible frequency intention in you

that is irresistible, irrepressible, undeniable

like Love

in reception of an archetypal frequency permanent die cast

"ppst.. ppst"..

the mind, not wanting only cameo appearances in your holographic movie

interjects like a horse racing sportscaster:

"Which is why you may want to have a peek at the other drawers

in your aura's closet as well!"

Awareness, noticing that minds apparently have "feelings"

in this case like limp helium balloons that didn't get to be let go..

and so supports you in embracing your mind, loving your mind

for playing the forgetting game in the first place

because that's what you told it to do

while you were gathering true

HEART

POWER

RADIANCE

like a tsumani of light builds momentum

through surrenders that

take your breath away

as She breaths you...

until everything you thought was "you"

is melted and gone

like snow turned to steam in the sun's impassioned gaze

or kissing the mist over a lake at dawn

in a diapason song of the supernal

Radiance

that you actually are...

Imbolc!

2018-02-02T08:59:00.000-08:00

Imbolc has arrived! In the Goddess' turn of the wheel, we now move to the counterquarter of Imbolc that falls between Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox. That fresh energy of waking up as we notice the days staying lighter a little longer, lambs in the fields frolicking and the first of the snowdrops emerging their pearly heads through the frost to gladden the heart. How glorious to see flowers again! It seems so long since we were blessed with stem and petal growing randomly in their clumps amongst the bare trees. Mother Earth begins to hear the heart song of the sun like a lover kissing the beloved so she may join him and languidly uncurl from winter's sleep.

The Festival of Imbolc or Imbolg - pronounced without the 'b' sound - is sometimes known as Oimelc, means 'ewe's milk' - named due to the birth of the first lambs at this time, and celebrates the return of fresh milk. It is the celebration of the gradual dawning of increasing light, bringing nature to life again. For Imbolc we celebrate the Waking Light of the soul. Our spirits begin to quicken as we anticipate the rebirth of Nature. This celebration commemorates the changing of the Goddess from the Crone to the Maiden.

The Goddess is seen in Her three aspects at Imbolc, as the new-born Flower Maiden; the Mother, or bride of fertility, awaiting the fertilizing Sun God, and the Dark Crone of the dark half of the year. The sun is growing in strength, the Child of Promise, re-born at Yule, is now the growing Child. All is pregnant and expectant. It is the promise of renewal, of hidden potential, of earth awakening and life-force stirring.

Imbolc is a 'fire festival'. Particular attention was paid to the hearth fire and keeping it alight. Imbolc marks the transition and transformation from death to rebirth, as the light of day grows significantly longer and you can be assured that Spring is right around the corner. At this time the animal world comes out of hibernation, the birds fly north again. This is a very holy day for initiations of the priests and priestesses and a day to devote yourself to the God/dess and your own spiritual path. This is also a very powerful time for intuitive and visionary work and to seek inspiration, especially for healers, poets, and artists. At this time if you really tune in, you can just begin to feel and sense the "inner stirrings", the seeds beginning to stir, and the inner light growing stronger.

It is time to let go of the past and to look to the future, clearing out the old. Imbolc is a gateway indicating work to be done inside and outside ourselves before action is undertaken!

This is the time of Bridie, Maiden Goddess in her seasonal aspect of the land awakening. She strikes the land with her fiery staff, creating a shout in nature…'wake up, wake up!' The promise of spring is still a distant echo clinging to winter's chill, but we are feeling the awakening even so... This is the time of Imbolc, a fire season on the great wheel, when the year is as young as a maiden and awakening. Imbolc means 'ewes' milk' and in ancient times our ancestors would bless the land with the first of the ewes' milk, asking the Mother Goddess for a fertile crop for the coming year. It is a time for all things beginning anew. Growth, manifestations and projects begin to take on the energy of form. All things can begin again.

~ Ariel Spilsbury and Holographic Goddess

How to Become Lighthearted (It's Not What You Think)

2018-01-04T20:09:00.000-08:00

In The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Czech author Milan Kundera posits that you only live once (social acronym YOLO), and this "lightness" signifies freedom — though it's hard to hold.

But it wasn't until I read Thomas Cowan, MD's breakthrough book, Human Heart, Cosmic Heart, that I realized a conundrum: levity (lightness) means humor, and its counterpoint, gravity, equates to seriousness, tethering us to Earth. If gravity keeps us earthbound, it follows that humor would act as spiritual helium, helping us levitate: soar above our sorrow, at least figuratively.

Yet most people caught in a mirthful moment collapse with laughter, rather than rising into the atmosphere. And when the amusement subsides, the problems remain. What gives?

Cowan suggests far greater import to levity and gravity — one that impacts our very life force. And it's a scathing indictment of how we live now.

Where Levity Is Lost

Referencing the work of naturalist Viktor Schauberger, Cowan writes,

"When one lives almost entirely in nature that is unspoiled by human contact, one often develops strong powers of observation. What Schauberger saw is the force of levity that lives in water. This force of levity flows upwards in vortices in the river. It is in these force 'lines' that healthy trout live effortless lives.

"Of course, these factors only exist when certain conditions are met. That is, the forest must be intact, there must be continuous tree covering shading the stream, there must be no dams anywhere on the stream, and the stream must be allowed to flow in its own path, not a path constructed by water 'experts'. When all these conditions are met, once can observe the forces of levity balancing the forces of gravity, and, if in the river itself, one can experience the blissful life of the trout.

"When the forests are cut down and the streams straightened and dredged, the forces of levity are lost, and the trout has to swim for its life to maintain its position in the stream. Too exhausted to swim by muscle power upstream, it ends up with a life of continuous and useless toil. This is not unlike the plight of industrial man, swimming upstream for his entire life, getting depleted, weaker, sicker by the day.

"The important point here is that this force of levity, which allows for the effortless flow of water, is dependent on certain conditions such as temperature and flow dynamics (spiral- or vortex-based flow patterns). When these conditions are met, life is easy and health is the natural outcome. This state is the natural state of structured water. It is also the natural state of the structured water that is the basis for the flow of blood in our circulatory system."

Out of Circulation

Cowan's explanation unfolds layers of insight about the true cause of illness, on both a personal and planetary level. He describes my mother's life and health to a T:

"This model allows us to see the real cause of varicose veins, congestive heart failure and poor circulation. These ailments occur when the structured layer fails to form properly. It is as if someone cut down our forest, kept us from the sun and Earth, and gave us poor quality nutrients and water."

His analysis blew my circuits. No wonder mainstream medicine is inadequate in resolving chronic, systemic health issues: it doesn't address the root cause.

As above, so below: roots and wings, water and sky. Life's yin/yang is essential for our health and Gaia's health. If our life is not flowing with natural rhythms, health deteriorates. Sequestered from the life force, we remove ourselves from circulation, like a worn-out book, and slowly decay.

A Heart of Gold

Deep into my own healing odyssey, I wrote, "Gold, it has something to do with gold." Cowan answers this as well, with a chapter weaving the gold standard, the illusion of money, and modern alchemy on a higher dimensional loom:

"There is no significant amount of gold, as we know it, in our heart or our circulation. However…there is a 'pure' form of gold known as Orbitally Rearranged Monoatomic Elements (ORME, or ORMUS) that describes a change in form that can occur in gold, silver, and the platinum metals."

ORME is undetectable, nonreactive with other elements, non-conductive (i.e., doesn't get hot) and lighter than its conventional counterparts.

Cowan makes the case that human beings are quantum coherent superconducting phenomena — more than the sum of our parts — and that the ORME, or cosmic form of gold, is the primary superconducting matrix [from the root word mater, or mother] without which nerve transmission and life itself would not be possible.

The Mother of All Levity

To paraphrase Abraham-Hicks, we can always choose to enter the vortex. In Dancing With Water, MJ Pangman and Melanie Evans write, "Vortices bring in raw energy for use in the creative process. They also cause individual elements to spin at velocities faster than the speed of light. These elements take on new traits referred to by some as super energy." And ORME "borders on the etheric." It's a matter [= matrix = mother] of frequency.

Cowan says, "The heart of gold refers to its unique ability to carry out this transformation of an earthly element into cosmic gold, thereby providing the basis for life to exist."

It's what alchemists and sages down through the ages have been attempting to distill all along.

Celestial Call

At the close of 2017, Saturn moved into Capricorn, its home sign, where it will remain for the next three years. The arbiter of form invites us to take responsibility for the structure of our lives; to become their author, owning our authority.

If we wish to add more levity, joy — and possibly time — to our lives, we can infuse structured water into our body, and nature into our soul. When enough of us have done so, lightness will not only be bearable; we'll wonder how we lived heavy-hearted for so long.

Sources:

1. Human Heart, Cosmic Heart, Thomas Cowan, MD https://www.amazon.com/Human-Heart-Cosmic-Understand-Cardiovascular/dp/1603586199/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1514497705&sr=1-1&keywords=human+heart+cosmic+heart+by+dr.+thomas+cowan

2. A New Sacred Geometry: The Art and Science of Frank Chester https://www.amazon.com/New-Sacred-Geometry-Science-Chester/dp/0988749203/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1514497857&sr=1-1&keywords=A+New+Sacred+Geometry

3. Dancing With Water MJ Pangman, MS & Melanie Evans https://www.amazon.com/Dancing-Water-New-Science-Second/dp/0975272632/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1514497746&sr=1-1&keywords=dancing+with+water+2nd+edition

4. The Chestahedron: The Wonder of Seven presentation by geometrician, artist, sculptor and teacher Frank Chester https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQMpEAsNHmY

Of Two-Way Streets and Enriching Dichotomies

2017-09-23T13:39:00.002-07:00

Our world of apparent duality offers a wealth of disguised enrichment opportunities. Consider:

A cyber buddy who currently lives creatively without residence wondered why a stranger would open her home and heart to her. She emailed, "I don't understand why she's being so amazingly generous. I keep telling her she just blows me away."

I responded, "You never know what her own journey is…she may have needed to serve someone in exactly this way, and you are providing a golden opportunity, so it is a mutuality."

This is the way energy works. When my lifelong friend Ellie fell and broke her hip at 96, requiring a lengthy convalescence in a rehabilitation center and later at home, I initially despaired about why Spirit didn't simply call her Home.

Then I had a flash of insight: the enforced passivity enabled my fiercely independent friend to learn to receive, and blessed those who assisted her with the joy of service. I told her, "You would never have allowed it otherwise." With wonder and her trademark humility, Ellie exclaimed, "Amara, you're right!"

The Good, the Bad, and the Beautiful

What appears adverse can be advantageous. I needed to park my car on a different street due to an upcoming festival, and planned to be out of town the following week. I gave the young man who acts as my "car surrogate" the spare key, and asked him to please move the car back once the festival was over.

Unbeknownst to me, a road crew was about to repave the street; tow-away signs went up the day after I left. If the festival hadn't been scheduled (and, therefore, if I hadn't given Danny my spare key) my car would have been parked in its normal spot — and towed during the week I was away!

More profoundly: A dear friend was in a near-fatal motorcycle crash earlier this year. After a month in the ICU, he learned he'd need a walker once out of bed, and would have only minimal use of his right hand for the rest of his life (he's a southpaw, but still…). Eight months later, Rick says, "The accident was the best thing that ever happened to me."

During his convalescence he lost seventy pounds, and began exercising several hours a day as part of his physical therapy program; the combination reversed his adult-onset diabetes. He's grateful every day for the gift of life, and more open than he's ever been. He says, "I cry if I'm happy, I cry if I'm sad.

"And you know what? It feels amazing. I have nothing to hide now; what others think of me is no longer my concern. I can be emotionally honest. I feel like this is another piece of the silver lining surrounding that terrible trauma."

Sustained by his new outlook and the outpouring of love and support from friends and family, Rick's regained almost full use of his right hand, and returned to work — as a practicing physician. Practice makes perfect.

Once you've been through the fire, you're recast as pure essence; the superficial no longer holds sway in your life.

How Your Light Is Spent

Milton's sonnet, When I Consider How My Light is Spent, exemplifies the nature of life's dichotomies, and how we choose to interpret our time here. The full text reads:

When I consider how my light is spent

Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,

And that one talent which is death to hide

Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent

To serve therewith my Maker, and present

My true account, lest he returning chide;

"Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?"

I fondly ask. But Patience to prevent

That murmur, soon replies: "God doth not need

Either man's work or his own gifts; who best

Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state

Is kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed

And post o'er land and ocean without rest:

They also serve who only stand and wait.

"Apprehension" means both anxiety and understanding. If you apprehend the meaning behind Milton's final line, you will understand that simply being is what matters most.

Whoever or whatever your messenger is, listen deeply. Once you apprehend the message, invite yourself to let go, so that you may embrace this wisdom farther along life's spiral. Allow yourself to be amused by the alchemical nature of any apparent dichotomy that shows up in your life. And know there's an invisible cosmic trampoline beneath you, so you can rebound from pain's mirage, spread your wings, and fly.

Lammas: Now the Dying Must Begin

2017-08-02T10:36:00.000-07:00

August 1-2 marks the mid-point between summer and fall. Known as Lammas, or Lughnasadh (LOO-ne-sah), it's one of the 8 "Cross Quarter Days" on the Wheel of the Year (the others are the Summer and Winter Solstices, Spring and Fall Equinoxes, Candlemas {Feb. 2}, Beltane {May 1} and Hallomas/Samhain {October 31}). Lammas is a celebration of abundance, the time of the harvest, and a potent moment to bring ourselves back into alignment with the natural world. Although it appears to occur at the peak of summer, in truth it's the first day of fall, and a time to embrace the dark.

An evocative description of this turning comes from a comprehensive mythology site with the delightful double-entendre title, Myth*ing Links, an annotated and illustrated collection of worldwide links to mythologies, fairytales and folklore, sacred arts and sacred traditions, loving compiled and updated by Kathleen Jenks, PhD.

"Lammas...is a hot, lazy, delicious time of the year. Bees buzz in the heat of the day, the air is still, and the force of the sun remains strong, even though its sway over the earth is slowly diminishing day by day. In the cooler nighttime, frogs and crickets keep us company. It is here, in the gloaming, when so many rituals begin...

"This is when the powerful gods of the grain harvests are honored. They are in their prime, sometimes generous, sometimes quixotic, and always aware with a bittersweet pleasure that their time will wane, as it always does, and they will die, as they always do, and yet nevertheless they will return to another delicious summer next year, as they always do, and have, and will, for this is the endlessly circling Wheel of the Year, and they ride it proudly.

"Yet there is a darker nuance, one that surprised me, for I had thought that this was a purely masculine god's festival. I learned however of Lugh's touching and loving devotion to his foster-mother, the royal Tailtiu, whose fate may be even more intimately woven into this season than his..."

Jenks quotes Parabola magazine author Mara Freeman on the further genesis of Lammas:

"...Lugh dedicated this festival to his foster-mother, Tailtiu, the last queen of the Fir Bolg, who died from exhaustion after clearing a great forest so that the land could be cultivated. When the men of Ireland gathered at her death- bed, she told them to hold funeral games in her honor. As long as they were held, she prophesied Ireland would not be without song. Tailtiu’s name is from Old Celtic Talantiu, 'The Great One of the Earth,' suggesting she may originally have been a personification of the land itself, like so many Irish goddesses. In fact, Lughnasadh has an older name, Brón Trogain, which refers to the painful labor of childbirth. For at this time of year, the earth gives birth to her first fruits so that her children might live..."

Dying to the Old

What needs to "die" so that the new can be born in your life?

Canadian astrologer and tarot reader Tara Greene says that Lugh's festival points Southwest, and resonates to the element Air. "Southwest represents the Place of Healing, of the Dreamer and the Dream. It is the place of both your Personal Dream and the Sacred Dream of the Planet. What is your Personal Dream? What is your Sacred Dream? The Sacred Dream is your Highest Spiritual Dream."

This August 1st, especially if you've never honored Lammas before, remember your relationship with the Earth and her cycles. Give thanks for the abundance of beauty, harmony, peace, love, healing, grace and balance you are inviting into your life and into the collective, and image-in your Sacred Dream.

The quintessential song for invoking Gaia's healing Sacred Dream came through John Lennon. Feeling deeply into these words now, there is a cellular resonance I've not been conscious of before, although I've heard the song hundreds of times:

Imagine

Imagine there's no heaven

It's easy if you try

No hell below us

Above us only sky

Imagine all the people

Living for today...

Imagine there's no countries

It isn't hard to do

Nothing to kill or die for

And no religion too

Imagine all the people

Living life in peace...

You may say I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one

I hope someday you'll join us

And the world will be as one.

Imagine no possessions

I wonder if you can

No need for greed or hunger

A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people

Sharing all the world...

You may say I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one

I hope some day you'll join us

And the world will live as one.

The Art of Awareness

2017-07-17T13:06:00.002-07:00

As we move into the next phase of our global renaissance, copious creativity is the axis on which our elevation will turn. How deeply are we willing to tap our inner reservoirs? Can we expand our perception of what constitutes "art"?

Jose Argüelles, who adapted the evolutionary secrets of the Mayan Calendar for the Western mind, saw art as the unifying field, a path to help us move "from biospheric waste to artistic regeneration," by attuning ourselves to a natural time frequency expressed as an equation: T(E) = Art. Energy (E) factored by time (T) equals Art. Energy is essence: a rock, a flower, a star, a human being. Time is a frequency. When we use our energy in concert with natural time cycles, we are living creativity. In other words, Time is Art…not the clock on the wall or the cash in your wallet.

Eye of the Beholder

What this means in terms of cross-cultural energy exchange opens unimagined doors. A woman traveled from Denmark to the tiny West African country The Gambia, toting numerous colorful plastic bags — prized by Gambian women as symbols of status and respect — to use as barter. (Women of The Gambia also recycle worn or ripped plastic bags into one-of-a-kind purses).

In the marketplace, she discovered a hand-carved figure of an African goddess and, through gestures, opened negotiations to purchase the stunning piece.

But the indigenous artist had no interest in money. She wanted plastic bags. The Danish visitor tried to give her all the bags she'd brought, explaining that there was a surplus of these in her country. The Gambian sculptor accepted three, and each woman felt she'd enjoyed the better bargain. Plastic bags or a unique woodcarving: equally sacred art in the eye of the beholder.

Then there is the children's book that became a collaboration between two Jewish translators, a Protestant editor, a Muslim painter and a non-profit publisher in the deep South. It was a collective endeavor all the way, explained one rabbinical writer: "An Arabic Sufi tale (originally penned in what is now Iraq) translated by a rabbi into Hebrew in the Middle Ages and translated by us (into 21^st century language and sensibility), with a Sufi publisher and a Pakistani artist." The subject matter — animals protesting their treatment by humans — transcended all ethnic, cultural, and religious boundaries.

The Art in our DNA

The universal urge toward the aesthetic is coded in our cells. Theologian and author Thomas Moore writes, in Care of the Soul, "Children paint every day and love to show their works on walls and refrigerator doors. But as we become adults, we abandon this important soul task of childhood." When we relinquish this soul expression to professional artists, "we are left with mere rational reasons for our lives, feelings of emptiness and confusion, and a compulsive attachment to pseudo images, such as shallow television programs. When our own images no longer have a home, a personal museum, we drown our sense of loss in pale substitutes, trashy novels or formulaic movies."

Because art arrests our attention, living "artfully" might require of us something as simple as pausing: taking the time to shift from acquire to inquire, to let go of buying more in favor of being more. This is what honoring our collective creative impulse can do for humanity: restore us to wholeness, holiness, health. "Whole", "holy" and "heal" all spring from the same root. To be whole is to be balanced and harmonious in body, mind, soul and spirit.

It's this level of awareness that will characterize the coming Psychozoic ("spirit life") era, says Argüelles, when, having rediscovered who we are, we can create a culture based on the three virtues of true time: autonomy, equality, and loyalty to the truth in every moment. These are strikingly similar to the Three Commitments delineated by The Reconnections: stay free, stay present, follow the energy.

We already have fusion food: a culinary blending of cultures to delight the palate. Now we're primed to feed our deeper hunger, to fuse mind and heart into healing art, and reawaken the sacred dimension in daily life.

And if we make a subtle shift — move the "h" in heart from the start of the word to the end — we create "Earth". We live in a heart circle. Earth heart. The beat goes on.

Imagine Nation

2017-03-06T20:00:00.000-08:00

"If I could tell the world one thing

It would be that we're all OK

And not to worry 'cause worry is wasteful

And useless in times like these

I won't be made useless

I won't be idle with despair…"

~ Jewel, Hands

Here in the Great Turning, the predominant emotion is often fear — the same energy as excitement. What we feel is a matter of interpretation.

It's a time of incredible expansion, according to every cosmic weather report I've seen: an opportunity to compost our "harrumphitude" concerning Trumpelstiltskin (thanks to "mythic news" weaver of context Caroline Casey for these deLightfully winnovative words). If you have skin in the game vis-à-vis Trumpelstiltskin, this is the ripe moment to play your Trump card.

A Subtle Shift Makes the Diff

The key is our collective readiness and willingness to segue from living in Alien Nation to co-creating a global heart community, Imagine Nation. The shifts are subtle yet substantial: from thinking we're alone to realizing we're all one.

In Alien Nation, self-flagellation is popular. "I'm the only one I know who can blackball myself in my own community," a woman despaired recently, explaining how, in angrily speaking her mind about an issue vital to her, she piqued the one person who might have proven most helpful, had she spoken with Spirit Tongue. I empathized, as I've often carried my own whips, too. Practicing self-love is the hardest task most of us will ever master.

Yet it's so apparent that everything is vibration: while food shopping in a happy frame of mind at my local organic grocery, trading quips from old Monty Python routines with the customer in front of me at check-out, I was bowled over when the young cashier offered, "Would you like me to burn you a CD of their skits?"

True Happy Hour

A New Yorker cartoon shows a man standing in front of a sandwich board outside a bar. READ MORE

Inner Space, the Final Frontier

2017-01-07T21:33:00.000-08:00

"Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family.

Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one."

~ Jane Howard

In the 3^rd millennium, we're designing ways to travel that weave us more deeply into life's web. People are opening their hearts and homes to intrepid travelers from around the world. Airbnb is in nearly 200 countries and expanding by the micro-minute. FriendsinRoute.com caters to travelers over forty, with the same basic concept: stay in a homey environment instead of a sterile hotel, and learn about your destination from the inside out.

This Earth Trek might be the ultimate social network. Because we're searching for something beyond simple travel comfort.

We're all driven by a fundamental need to be heard, acknowledged and loved. One of the greatest challenges is remaining present, open and loving when the other party — often a family member — can rapidly reduce us to a needy, sensitive child. When another's reality clashes with ours, we must find a way to bridge the chasm. And sometimes the people who share our DNA are harder to reach than strangers. READ MORE

Homecoming

2016-12-04T08:45:00.001-08:00

Home. Except for love, perhaps no word in the English language conjures more evocative imagery. We crave the cozy, nurturing, roaring-fire scene depicted so effectively on film. Home houses our identity. It's less about the four walls than what they represent: "the abode of one's affections, peace or rest," according to Merriam-Webster. At some point in our lives, many women (and men, too, if they will admit it) harbor a fearful fantasy of becoming a "bag lady/guy," carting our belongings out on the street. We see the homeless and quake — "there but for the grace of God go I."

What we're seeking is a sense of security inside ourselves, a home within that can never be taken away. As national boundaries dissolve and corporations invite poets and spiritual mentors into their boardrooms, the hunger for this broader definition of home has never been greater.

From Me to We

Creating this inner sanctuary will entail a quantum shift for many of us: out of the competitive, "What's in it for me" worldview into a more collaborative, compassionate perspective in which the operative question becomes, "How may I serve?"

For instance: as record numbers of us skate towards elderhood, home care has become a hot topic. What does this mean? On one level, "home care" is about providing caregiving in the home to enable our elders and homebound to remain in their comfort zones. But the larger view begs our attention. Before we can care for our home, we need to know it viscerally. We must embody the place of wholeness that wants to be born in us.

Our own bodies and the planetary body are inextricably linked. Anthropologist Gregory Bateson speaks of "the pattern that connects," the common ground of our unity. We exist in relationship to everyone and everything else on Earth. What kind of home care is our aging Mother receiving? Maybe that's the real key to conscious aging: caring for the personal and the planetary with equal reverence.

Living in Tune with Nature

In other societies, the old ones are the keepers of wisdom. So-called developing cultures that honor their tribal elders also honor the land in which they live. "Home care" is a unified practice for them, as indigenous as the planting and the reaping, as natural as celebrating life's quotidian rhythms with ritual.

In this visionary view, we're all caregivers — Earth stewards, some say. Home care for our elders is rooted in how we create home in our daily lives. What kind of home do we want to cultivate and care for, inside ourselves, interpersonally, and as part of the collective "home body" we inhabit?

Try this: for the next week, take a time-out from worrying about the economy, your teenager's pierced body parts and the latest virus scare to live into the larger questions about the quality of life you're choosing in every moment, by the way you live, by what you do and don't honor. Does your definition of home serve you? Is it inclusive or exclusive? Will your practice of home care help create a sustainable future for us all?

Within a decade, for the first time in human history, the number of people in the world aged 65 and older will exceed that of children under five. If you're not already among this exhalted majority, one day you will look in the mirror and see your grandmother's or grandfather's eyes. Will they reflect the wisdom of generativity, of the home that you carry with you always, as a turtle does, caring for it because it is an intrinsic part of you?

Native Americans call this planet Turtle Island. I imagine this is what they mean.

Code Blue: Revivifying the Heart of America

2016-11-11T16:05:00.001-08:00

In hospitals, Code Blue indicates cardiac arrest or respiratory failure. It's an apt metaphor for our political emerge-and-see. Time to take a deep breath, revive from unconsciousness and plunge ever deeper into our hearts.

The body politic is broken, yet repairing what isn't working will just keep the existing system chugging along longer. We need to craft a new mythology, a wholly different story for unprecedented times.

Embracing the both/and with both feet on the ground

Early in 2012, when we were preparing for a quantum jump into a reality beyond the tide of prophecy, I referenced polymath Jim Channon, an author and corporate shaman with a military intelligence background (how's that for crossing borders!) who writes, of reimagining our future,

"Between the crack of time and the fold of space there is an impulse to seek the fullness of life. Let there be the slipstream of knowing that penetrates in the flash of an eye to the core of the prize. Let that edge of knowing blaze a trail of pure magic for the spiritual warriors of the galaxy to rise again in the grist of the great surge forward and strike the banner of pure heart into the midst of the fury and bring her all — home again."

It's time to move from being edge dwellers to center walkers, embracing the both/and with both feet on the ground. We're doing it: getting involved, questioning the structure of the Electoral College, connecting with allies we've never met to discover what the new path might look like.

It won't be constructed of asphalt ("at fault") but from pumps primed around the nation and across the globe: the pumps that live inside us, circulating identical blood whether our hearts beat in black, white, brown, straight, LGBTQi, American, Mexican, Muslim, or any other cultural body.

Progress is a process

Our differences are skin deep, and micro-thin. Beyond the clothes our organs wear, we are One. Poet David Whyte, whose words resonate equally in boardrooms and blogs, offers an internal aegis for us all:

"Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into 

the conversation. The kettle is singing even as it

pours you a drink, the cooking pots  have left their

arrogant aloofness and seen the good in you at last.

All the birds  and creatures of the world are unutterably

themselves. Everything is waiting for you."

Or consider the term Steve Rother, five-time United Nations presenter, brought through: "Espavo". Espavo means, "Thank you for taking your power". The ancient Lemurian acknowledgment is akin to the Indian greeting "Namaste", which means, "The Spirit in me recognizes the Spirit in you", and the Mayan expression, "In Lak'ech": "I am another yourself." The distinctive difference is, Espavo carries an implicit call to action.

The Heart of the Matter

And the moment is now. Pragmatic mystic Gillian Macbeth Louthan shares, "The 11:11 doorway begins its activation on November 11, 2016 and closes on January 11, 2017. It is a gateway into your highest potential as a human seeking divinity. Promises present themselves disguised as foxes in a henhouse." (Ahem…)

"When the forces of Eleven become fully activated they have the power to change history and even fate if enough love is globally broadcast. Eleven teaches us every problem comes as a divine opportunity to learn. It shows us how to see beyond what is everyday and boring. It tests our faith and our belief system. It forces us to listen to that small, still, quiet voice within: the silent witness. It reminds us we are all vast beings who have come to Earth to help with the healing and awakening process. It asks you to locate the light within and share it with all."

This is a potent time for powerful pre-emptive magic. Initiated Mayan elder and author Martín Prechtel suggests we engage in "love drive-bys", where we run up to someone, press chocolate into their palm and run away. What a deliciously playful expression of the true meaning of power: that which heals us into our wholeness.

We're on our way to Code Clear. Breathe from deep within your soul, and feel your heart expand to encompass winnovative solutions. Remember, Earth and Heart are anagrams: only the "h", for home, healing, humanity, moves from one end to the other. Espavo.

We Are the Trump Card

2016-11-09T12:40:00.000-08:00

"If you bring forth what is within you,

What you bring forth will save you.

If you do not bring forth what is within you,

What you do not bring forth will destroy you."

~ The Gospel of Thomas

When I logged on this morning, I flashed back to September11, 2001: a sense of unreality, time out of mind, where nothing mattered but connecting with the collective, reaching out to those in shock and mourning for a nation in emotional turmoil.

Energetically, 9-1-1 united Americans; the 2016 election results divide us. Or so it would appear. Today, as someone pointed out, is 11-9, the mirror image of 9-11. Each turn of the evolutionary spiral asks us to reach deeper inside ourselves to access hidden places in the heart. That's how evolution becomes elevation.

It isn't easy.

I've actually had to re-read my own November newsletter to see whether I could assimilate its noble counsel: polarity is illusion, there is only one side, and what we hold as true in our hearts matters much more than what appears real in 3D.

This is one of the most challenging tasks, as individuals and as a collective: remaining open and compassionate to those we "oppose". Danielle Egnew (who six months ago categorically stated that Trump would not win the election) speaks eloquently to what this commitment to overcoming polarity looks like.

Shadowboxing with the Culture of Celebrity

For me, the stunning political upset seems to be a result of our addiction to celebrity culture — Trump himself has made some well- publicized comments about what he is able to do as a celebrity. And, I admit, I get pulled into scanning celeb stories, too.

All of which prompts a necessary period of shadowboxing, as Egnew describes: dancing with our unhealed/unacknowledged aspects, observing how they control us in ways that do not serve our highest good.

The energetic of the new now means living as large as possible every day, not in some shadowy future. It's a continual process of reinvention. We've never been so primed "to boldly go where no one has gone before." This star trek begins in our bodies, minds and hearts, as we burn brightly with purpose and begin to activate our true potential in every realm.

It's time to shake hands with the shadow, unbox its message, and multiply our power exponentially.

The Inquiry

What's shadowing your potential?

· Someone you need to forgive (including yourself)?

· A phone call you're afraid to make?

· A long-standing debt (financial or otherwise) you've not repaid?

· A health challenge?

· A family or relationship issue that's quarantined your emotional energy?

· A job that leaves you too drained to think about anything else?

· Or "simply" an all-encompassing fear of living your light?

I invite you to face and embrace your strongest shadow. Say hello, ask it in for a spell (one you cast), offer it a chair, open a dialogue.

Conversation not your favorite mode? Go into nature; create a ritual to revisit how this shadow came to be. Dance it, sing it, journal it, paint it, drum it, dream it…

Do whatever it takes to communicate with the part you've been avoiding. What's important is to give it a voice. When our dark side is encouraged to share its gifts with us, darkness and light have a chance to unite.

The Hardest Place to Go

Jewel sings, "In the end, only kindness matters." As issues rise to the surface to be examined in a big way in each of our lives, it's crucial to be kind — most of all, to ourselves. Take time to ground, or center yourself, in whatever way feels best. Do you meditate? Practice yoga? Have you been longing for a massage? A walk in the woods? An evening lying on your couch in the dark doing absolutely nothing? Or maybe a night of full-out dancing? Say yes.

This multidimensional shift is all about frequency: tuning in to the frequency of love, peace and harmony on the cellular level. We are the trump card in our own lives. Perhaps we had to make the shadow manifest in a major way in order to allow our own brilliance to shine.

Much Love to you all ~

Entrenched? Try This.

2016-10-01T13:04:00.002-07:00

When we surrender in trust, we are always provided for — perhaps not in the way we'd expect or prefer, but which, at a higher octave, serves everyone involved. I know this. And just enjoyed a refresher course in living it.

The other morning, the a.m. radio personality on the station I listen to shared an arresting story.

Colin Cantwell, designer of the Death Star, described how the most memorable scene in the Star Wars franchise came to be:

"George Lucas gave me the project of designing a 'Death Star'. I didn't originally plan for the Death Star to have a trench, but when I was working with the mold, I noticed the two halves had shrunk at the point where they met across the middle. It would have taken a week of work just to fill and sand and re-fill this depression. So, to save me the labor, I went to George and suggested a trench. He liked the idea so much that it became one of the most iconic moments in the film!"

My trench in disguise

This tale foreshadowed the phone call I'd receive later that day. But first, a bit of backstory:

Throughout late August and into the Mercury retrograde that graced much of September, READ THE REST!

The Gold Standard: Morphing Out of Materialism

2016-08-31T12:26:00.002-07:00

"You sit here for days saying, 'This is strange business.'

You're the strange business. You have the energy of the sun

in you, but you keep knotting it up at the base of your spine.

You're some weird kind of gold that wants to stay melted in

the furnace, so you won't have to become coins."

~ Rumi

While many of us realize this pivotal moment we're living heralds a return to unity among all peoples and all life on Earth, visionary author Moira Timms takes the shift a step further, painting a lucid picture of how wealth and wholeness are one. As we remember and reclaim our wholeness/holiness, we elevate the concept of abundance to a "whole" new level.

In Beyond Prophecies and Predictions: Everyone's Guide to the Coming Changes, Timms describes our emerging "true wealth" consciousness this way: "The mind analyzes — the heart synthesizes. The turning point is where the heart is awakening. The United States motto (inscribed on the banner in the beak of the eagle found on the Great Seal, on the back of a one dollar bill), reminds us that America was founded on the principle of 'E Pluribus Unum' — 'Out of the Many, One.'"

Further, the inscription beneath the Great Pyramid (also part of the Great Seal) says, "Novus Ordo Seclorum" — which translates, appropriately, as "A New Order of the Ages". Isn't this amusing? The answer is in money, but it's not about who can become the richest at others' expense. READ MORE

Lammas: Season of Fire

2016-07-31T08:58:00.001-07:00

President or Precedent?

2016-06-08T14:23:00.002-07:00

A decade ago, after watching An Inconvenient Truth and reading Al Gore's breakthrough book by the same title, I wrote, "We're actually fortunate he's not in the Oval Office, ensnared in the vast political machine. Instead of a sitting president, Gore is setting precedent..."

Then came Dennis Kucinich in 2004, catalyzing millions of Boomers to political activism — many, like myself, for the first time. Listening to Dennis, tears rolled down my cheeks, because he was articulating exactly how I felt; an astonishing realization for a presidential candidate. But the masses were not yet ready for his (r)evolutionary message.

In 2016, Bernie Sanders has catapulted the issues Al and Dennis championed to the world stage, with the same energetic resonance. Thanks to social media and the Millennials, especially, Bernie has brought the Age of Awakening to the fore. And he's not meant to be chained to the presidential pulpit, however much he may think he wants it.

As this psychic presidential prediction makes clear, Bernie is serving an exponentially greater role as a voice of the people, mobilizing consciousness. Whatever happens after the election, he has raised awareness across America and around the globe, no mean feat for any political candidate, anywhere.

Setting precedent is not for the timid. Al Gore stepped out after the 2000 election voter fraud and illumined the world about climate change. In 2004, Dennis Kucinich made cultural stewardship a global platform. Bernie Sanders is modeling how to be inclusive, not exclusive: the rallying cry that every person matters. There is no more compelling message than giving your vision a voice.

Thank you for your courage (literally, "heart"), Bernie. You are our precedent, is every way that matters.

Spirituality? Is That Like Religion?

2016-05-10T14:31:00.000-07:00

When I moved to California in 1981, spiritual exploration was still in my future. I had my first astrological reading that year, and the astrologer, who twelve years later would provide a reading that helped redirect my life during my awakening, referred several times to "spirituality." She recorded the session, and on the recording you hear me asking in a perplexed tone, "What's spirituality? Is that like religion?"

I needed to live my own spiritual journey before I understood. The terms can be synonymous, but often they are not.

The Difference Between Spirituality and Religion

The Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of the Tibetan Buddhist community, has said, "My religion is kindness."

The word religion derives from the Latin religare, which means "to tie fast" or "to bind together." One dictionary definition of religion is, "a set of beliefs, values and practices based on the teachings of a spiritual leader." This would seem to suggest that religion is a subset of a larger rubric called spirituality.

Yet defining spirituality is a bit like describing color to one who has never known sight. Perception will vary according to your beliefs. Of the myriad online resources attempting to answer the inquiry, "What is Spirituality?" a Unitarian Universalist minister offers this view:

Spirituality is being concerned with things of the spirit — the big questions of meaning, metaphysics, existence. Being spiritual is thinking about, wondering about, and exploring the deepest aspects of reality, values, morals, and meanings.

Spirituality is mis-defined if it is equated with super-naturalism, which tends to be the mistake I find when I hear people object to the word. Nothing about a search for values, morals, and meanings implies faith instead of reason, or emotion instead of intelligence. Spirituality can be all those things, and it is to some people, but not exclusively so. After all, 'spirit' simply means 'breath,' as in 'inspire', 'expire' or 'inspiration.' Spirit is about being filled with life. It's about all the ways that we try to make sense of our living, and our attempts to make good from our lives.

Thus, the Dalai Lama's statement, like his work in the world, broadens the scope of religion to embrace its spiritual essence: both begin with how we think, feel and behave.

How What We Believe Affects Our Health

In recent years, scientists have demonstrated in the lab what mystics and spiritual teachers have been saying for centuries: consciousness creates reality. Renowned neuroscientist Candace Pert, featured in What the Bleep Do We Know!? and author of Molecules of Emotion: Why You Feel the Way You Feel, established that emotional communication begins at the cellular level, with tiny proteins called peptides.

Breakthrough cell biologist Bruce Lipton, author of The Biology of Belief, confirms that our attitudes and thoughts create our physical bodies. He writes, "Cells respond to perception by activating either growth or protection behavior programs. If our perceptions are accurate, the resulting behavior will be life enhancing. If we operate from 'misperceptions,' our behavior will be inappropriate and will jeopardize our vitality by compromising our health."

In a nutshell: think negative, create warped DNA. Change your mind, change your body!

During the past few decades, medical science has also begun documenting the "faith factor" in healing. Physician Larry Dossey, a pioneer in exploring the role of prayer in healing, says, "I used to believe that we must choose between science and reason on one hand, and spirituality on the other, in how we lead our lives. Now I consider this a false choice. We can recover the sense of sacredness, not just in science, but in perhaps every area of life."

Stepping Onto the Path

So, how does spirituality "happen"? Awakening is a journey, and just as with literal travel, this metaphorical passage is different for everyone. For many people, the call to embark on a spiritual path is preceded by a period of questioning or difficulty, when one or more aspects of your life no longer flow smoothly. This was what my summons looked like.

Being willing to surrender into the unknown is a huge, scary — and necessary — initial step, because you can't "figure out" spirituality in a linear fashion. You might begin a spiritual exploration by reading about the world's religions, or sampling various types of spiritual services. Some people seek out a teacher or guru. Some learn to meditate. Others go on retreat in the wilderness. There are as many ways to claim your spiritual truth as there are people. A formal practice isn't required, although this can be a useful way to "get out of your head" in the early stages.

Ultimately, the journey to Spirit will be unique to you.

Spiritual vs. Material

Of course, it's important to balance spirituality with the 3-D world. You don't need to take a vow of poverty in order to live a spiritual life! This is a frequent misconception among both spiritual and religious aspirants: that a dedication to spiritual service requires one to renounce worldly possessions.

People often find that committing to a spiritual path dramatically changes their lives. Material resources may fall away, but this usually has little to do with religious or spiritual doctrine. It's more likely a result of a desire to pare down possessions in an attempt to discover what's necessary and valued, to release aspects of one's life that no longer serve, or a deep-seated belief that it's somehow "more spiritual" to be poor. Role models from Jesus to Gandhi to Mother Teresa have ingrained an unintentional link between spiritual service and self-sacrifice in our collective consciousness.

Those who possess spiritual wealth know that love and compassion are the true sources of sustenance. As the Dalai Lama so eloquently expressed, the most devout religious belief can be embodied as kindness. A person overflowing with goodwill towards others is incalculably richer than someone with a big bank account and a stingy spirit.

Full Circle

Fourteen years after wondering aloud what spirituality was, I was discussing my personal growth odyssey with my Dad. After I'd shared passionately for a while, he said, "You know, honey, when you say 'spirituality', I have no idea what you mean."

My heart swelled with recognition. I took a thoughtful breath, and began to frame my reply.

###

Blackberry Love: How to Pick the Ripe Relationship for You

2016-04-14T13:38:00.001-07:00

After living in the wine country of northern California for a while, I grew tired of whining. I wanted to segue from sour grapes to sweet, luscious blackberries. This is how blackberry love begins …

A friend and I were taking a walk near her rural home at sunset when she exclaimed, "I've got to stop and pick some of these delicious blackberries!" Yet until she said that, I hadn't noticed the blackberry bushes all around us.

I was amazed. Here I was, surrounded by a potential source of nourishment, readily available, delectable and free, and I hadn't even seen the bushes dripping with ripe blackberries until my friend pointed out what was right in front of me. It reminded me of the quote from The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint Exupery: "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."

I wondered how many times potential partners or friends might be right there in front of us, yet invisible, until someone points them out to us. "Oh, here's a blackberry, and it's ripe." Iridologist and holistic health pioneer Bernard Jensen called blackberries "one of nature's most perfect foods for healing". And when we truly heal, we do so on every level of our being.

So I began to pick blackberries, and to walk the path of wise relationship.

Gift #1: Zen and the Art of Blackberry Picking. Look for the berries that are ripe to be plucked right now. In this instance, the mantra might be, "learn to discern." If we choose berries that are overripe, they're going to squish in our fingers and we'll have juice all over the place. If we choose a berry that's too red, we'll have to tug to get it off the vine, and it's going to be bitter. An old commercial playfully vowed, "We will sell no wine before its time!" Forcing a berry to be yours as it's clinging tenaciously to the vine will result in whining. The perfect berry comes to you with a very slight pluck; tugging isn't necessary.

Gift #2: A Grasp That Equals Your Reach. Robert Browning wrote, "Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a Heaven for?" That’s poetic, but if we live this way in terms of relationship, we'll be forever hungry, grasping for berries that are always just slightly out of reach, or not quite ripe. After picking berries for several days, I developed a certain dexterity. I became adept at angling my arm in between the thorns to find just the berries that were ready right then, even if they were slightly above my head or a bit of a stretch from where I was standing. Sometimes the choicest morsels are a slight stretch outside our comfort zone. I began to get the sense of how to connect with them, and it became this wonderful dance: "Oh, hello berry bushes!" There was a grace, an ease, to my berry picking, and it was fun! Relationships can actually be fun.

Gift #3: Visual Acuity. My resonance, my homing signal, for "ripe blackberries" grew keener by day. Like anything else, you get better with practice. I learned to scan ahead as I walked down a row of bushes. On the way out, I'd pick the ones that appeared ripe. On the way back, I'd notice ripe blackberries that I'd missed the first time. I was enlarging my visual field, engaging my peripheral vision: "Ah, there's someone Spirit has placed in my path whom I didn't notice before, that I ought to consider." By looking again, we raise our sights to the highest possibility.

Gift #4: Choose Ye This Day Which Berry You Would Serve. My friend’s two dogs trotted along beside me, happily devouring any berries I tossed their way, ripe or not. There will always be people who are so hungry that any blackberry is better than none. They're willing to take the bitterness just to have the taste. However, unripe fruit will only give you heartburn. Nourishing berries feed your soul as well as your stomach. Once I started tasting the sweetest, most perfectly ripe blackberries that were ready for me, I couldn't return to a less discerning method of selection. There was just no comparison with a berry that was right for me, right now.

In this same light, it's most important to know what kind of berry you are. Are you so ripe that anyone who comes within range is going to get drenched in berry juice? Or are you clinging to the vine so steadfastly that if somebody wants to pick you, they're going to have to tug, and you're still not going to come loose? Are you hiding on a branch that's so low to the ground, or so high up, that no one can see you in your ripeness because you're invisible to the eye? Or are you ripe, sweet, available, and ready to be chosen?

I encourage you to know your ripeness level right now, because that's going to shift over time. Then, you can forage for the blackberries who are ripe to meet with you at this time, and enjoy the beauty, the elegance, the joy of the quest. When you find the berry who is right for you, there's going to be a fruitful recognition. And you can savor the sweetness of this remembering for a long, delicious time.

How to See Yourself As An Artist

2016-04-01T14:13:00.000-07:00

Are you an artist? You're probably thinking, "no, not me." Here in the West, we've been taught to squelch our creative impulse — especially at work. In other cultures people live as natural artisans, creating sand paintings and song, poetry and architecture, drumming and dancing in tune with the rhythms of the Earth.

We too can allow our inner artist to live out loud. As soon as we surrender our resistance to seeing what we do as art-in-action, we become artists.

Succulence: Your Natural State

Inspirational author and artist SARK has been demonstrating how to live juicy for decades. From a 200-square-foot self-described "magic cottage" in the heart of San Francisco, she writes all her books by hand, in a profusion of colors. Each SARK creation is a feast for the senses. She says, "My name has become synonymous with transformation, color, healing, movement & FUN."

I framed and hung her inaugural poster, How to Be An Artist, on my home office wall as I launched my first business. Her invitation to "Make signs that say yes! and post them all over your house" invoked my own creative impulse. Each night before bed, I'd face my office (set up in a corner of my tiny apartment living room) and give it the thumbs up sign. A simple, powerful, YES! for success. My business prospered.

Sarah Ban Breathnach, author of Simple Abundance, writes, "Creation has three layers: the labor, the craft, and the elevation. She who works with only her hands is a laborer; she who works with her hands and her head is a craftswoman; she who works with her hands, her head and her heart is an artist." READ MORE

The Cat Litter People: Getting in Touch with Your Inner Wildness

2016-03-16T11:14:00.001-07:00

I've done a fair amount of pet sitting over the years. While at the home of one high-brow cat, I spent several days visiting various pet stores in search of a certain brand of cat litter that was odor-free and promised "superior clumping ability," which was what I wanted according to the empty container I carried on my quest. (For the uninitiated, "clumping" is a euphemistic reference for how the cat's deposits will interact with the litter, for easier disposal.)

I'm no stranger to synchronicity, yet it always amuses me greatly to see how Spirit uses "the subject at hand" for its teachings. So here I am, having successfully located a sister litter to the one the cat's human prizes, spelunking gleefully in foreign bookshelves. (As a writer, the opportunity to peruse other people's books is one of the joys of housesitting.) I fasten on a book with the intriguing title, Deep Play, by poet and naturalist Diane Ackerman. I de-clump the cat litter and settle down to read.

In Chapter Three, "Sacred Places," I am astonished by the words, "…people seem desperate to clump and bunch, swarming all over each other in towns while most of the land lies empty." Ackerman is describing her return to Phoenix after being succored by the Grand Canyon, contrasting the Canyon's ineffable vastness with the matrix of human habitation. Yet what sprang immediately to my mind was: cat litter. READ MORE

Chocolate-Covered Prunes: Clarifying Your Intent

2016-02-08T14:22:00.000-08:00

Driving to Oroville, a five-hour inland trek from the California coast, I was hot, sweaty and creased to the car seat. As I neared my destination, I passed a sign posted outside a shack that read, Chocolate-covered prunes. I broke up. This is an oxymoron!

Prunes are a biological green light. Chocolate is a red light. Eating the two together is a mixed blessing, likely to create a traffic jam in your intestines.

How many of us do this with our own health? Or relationships, business, finances — you fill in the blank. Perhaps you covet a certain plum account, person, dream house — then self-sabotage by "mixing it" with an action that aborts the flow. READ MORE

Fire and Water: The Deeper Meaning Of What We Unleash

2016-01-20T09:38:00.000-08:00

When I was deep into my spiritual awakening, I had startlingly prescient dreams; in one, the words, "violent emergency" reverberated through my mind. It was a violent emergence; birth is fierce. There is an ocean of difference, however, between Nature's ferocity and that which is deliberately inflicted by human beings with their own agendas.

Theologian and author Thomas Moore writes, "Deep in the etymology of 'violence' is a strong Latin word, vis. It is the power in nature that we sense in the surging sea and the growth of grass. In our experiences of violence we witness the vain attempt of life to push itself into existence and visibility. This is a sexual power. Sex is not just about making bodies but making souls as well. The people of the world need every opportunity to be creative and visible. They need to enjoy life, not just survive. Without that opportunity, they will turn to violence, in spite of themselves."

Life's Novocaine

We tend to go through life anesthetized against our own yearning. The call to claim our power can be terrifying, because it means accepting our invitation to the Dance — and most of us have forgotten how to dance, if indeed we ever knew. We find it easier to lash out in anger: rage, the undiscovered country. If being "outrageous" means getting the rage out, Americans are black belts. Having lost touch with the wilderness within, we savage the Earth and each other in an effort to combat our loneliness.

War is the grand expression of this misdirected energy. It's akin to our ability, or lack of it, to harness the power of the sun. Yoked to our solar egg, we could shine on in all our ecological radiance for millennia. Yoking means union, but we're used to living the more limiting definition of bondage. Trussed to our desperation, we sigh, "That's life!" Since interdependence — becoming what Kenny Ausubel christened "Bioneers," or biological pioneers, co-creating with Nature — feels so foreign, we stay (un)comfortably in the familiar, pump up the volume, and wearily watch as the world turns.

There is a way out: it's through. The trees are gods and goddesses who in their stillness keep the Earth's counsel; the animals are our allies. We can commune with a snake or a sea lion as easily as with the people we call kin. The key lies in reclaiming our wildness — not as violence, but as an abiding, sensuous connection with Nature. Instead of experiencing everything at one remove, we can allow it to enter us. READ MORE