Thursday, December 24, 2015

I've loved the dark, Always~

"I like the night. Without the dark, we'd never see the stars."

Happy birthday, Stephenie Meyer! When the Twilight author was four years old, she met her future husband, Christian Meyer. They got married seventeen years later.

Monday, December 21, 2015

Love "Your" Window by Mark Nepo

So Wonderful~
LOVE YOUR WINDOW 

No matter how small or old. Keep it 
clean so you can see what comes your way. 
When the lost bird flies into it looking for 
its mate, keep the feather stuck to the glass. 
Take it with you and dream of finding what 
completes you. At the edge of winter, open 
the window of your heart and see your 
breath, how what you bring up becomes 
the air. When you’re ready or pushed, 
close your eyes and the other window 
will appear, the one that faces all of 
time. What flies there never lands, but 
hovers, dropping seeds of infinity in the 
breaks we can’t heal. So open the window 
of your pain, though the whisperers tell you 
to nail it shut, and let in everything that’s 
ever lived. What flies and never lands has 
been waiting. Be brave. Don’t run. Let the 
fire around your window burn until you 
become the opening. 

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Sometimes less is more!

"In our deepest moments we say the most inadequate things."


Happy birthday, Edna O'Brien! The Irish PEN Award recipient didn't know what kind of books she would write—if any—until she stumbled across A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce and realized it was autobiographical. Inspired, she started writing what would become her award-winning debut book, The Country Girls.

Saturday, December 12, 2015

Life IS a resilient thing!

"There’s no such thing as ruining your 
life. Life’s a pretty resilient thing, it turns out."
 
Happy birthday, Sophie Kinsella! The bestselling British author had already published five books under her real name—Madeleine Wickham—when she submitted a manuscript for a breezy chick lit story called Confessions of a Shopaholic. Worried her publisher wouldn't like the new direction, she used Sophie Kinsella as a pen name.

Monday, December 7, 2015

The heart of another~

"The heart of another is a dark forest, always, no matter how close it has been to one’s own." 
American author Willa Cather (born December 7, 1873) only ever owned one house, a secluded summer cottage on Grand Manan Island in Canada. The small home had neither indoor plumbing nor electricity, but Cather liked the fact no one could telephone her there.

This is absolutely the truest thought I've read~ Although we may rush in saying, "Oh I know, Oh I've been there, that exact thing happened to me, Oh I can just feel your pain~   Never can we experience the same feelings, have the same reaction, or truly know how another feels...no matter how close.  Our dark forest belongs only to each of us~

Can two minuses make a plus??

Sometimes two minuses make a plus.
--Edith Shannon

What appears to be a problem sometimes turns out to be a most beneficial circumstance. We live only in the present, and it generally takes the perspective of hindsight to get the full meaning of an event. Over the years, we have learned that some of our best lessons actually caused us pain while we were in their clutches. What a relief to be able to see, now, that they had their silver lining. This principle still holds true.

We have had a lot of years to learn to take our experiences in stride, giving them no more weight than they deserve. But it's easy to forget that it's the accumulation of them all that defines who we are. The lost jobs, the friends who left, the hurdles in a marriage all played their part in the people we've become today. We are who we need to be right now.

I can't let a setback set me back today. I am evolving right on schedule.

from Keepers of the Wisdom by Karen Casey

Friday, November 27, 2015

Come squeeze my hand~


"Come to me, squeeze my hand, know my loneliness, and give me the love, the strength to prevail on the perilous road before me."
 
Vietnamese civilian doctor Dang Thuy Tram (born November 26, 1942) was only 27 years old when she was killed in a gun battle. Her wartime diaries, which chronicled the last two years of her life, were published in 2005 under the title Yesterday, I Dreamed of Peace.

Thursday, November 26, 2015

Happy Thanksgiving 1015

I am blessed and thankful beyond words~
thank you!

Wednesday, November 18, 2015

Air~


"I would like to be the air that inhabits you for a moment only. I would like to be that unnoticed and that necessary."
 
Happy birthday, Margaret Atwood! In addition to writing modern classics like The Handmaid's Tale and The Blind Assassin, the Canadian author is also a part-time inventor. She came up with the idea for the LongPen, a signing device that lets people write remotely in ink from anywhere in the world.

Sunday, November 8, 2015

NO wrong turns!!


"There are no wrong turnings. Only paths we had not known we were meant to walk." 

Happy birthday, Guy Gavriel Kay! The Canadian fantasy author had quite an enviable job as a young university student—Christopher Tolkien hired him to help edit his father J.R.R. Tolkien's unpublished work.

Friday, October 30, 2015

Letting GO~

You'll never get what you truly deserve if
you remain attached to what you're supposed
to let go of~

from a very special client~

"Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most"

"Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most"

Once I was a sentimental thing,
Threw my heart away each Spring;
Now a Spring romance hasn't got a chance
Promised my first dance to Winter;
All I've got to show's a splinter for my little fling!

Spring this year has got me feeling like a horse that never left the post;
I lie in my room staring up at the ceiling,
Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most!

Morning's kiss wakes TREES and flowers,
And to them I'd like to drink a toast;
I walk in the park just to kill lonely hours,
Spring Can really Hang You Up The Most.

All afternoon those birds twitter twit,
I know the tune, "This is love, this is it!"
Heard it before and I know the score,
And I've decided that Spring is a bore!

Love seemed sure around the New Year,
Now it's April, love is just a ghost;
Thank you Tom for singing this song to me, over and over, with tears in your eyes, a choke in your words, I know, remembering New York City, your life, your daughter, your ex-wife~ Now please, get well, take care of you!  

Spring arrived on time, only what became of you, dear?
Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most!
Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most!

Spring is here, there's no mistaking
Robins building nests from coast to coast;
My heart tries to sing so they won't hear it breaking,
Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most!

College boys are writing sonnets,
In the "Tender passion" they're engrossed;
But I'm on the shelf with last YEAR's Easter bonnets,
Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most!

Love came my way, I hope it would last;
We had our day, now that's all in the past!
Spring came along a season of SUN,
Full of sweet promise but SOMETHING wrong!

Doctors once prescribed a tonic,
"Sulphur and MOLASSES" was the dose;
Didn't help a bit, my condition must be chronic,
Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most!

All alone, the party's over,
Old man Winter was a gracious host;
But when you keep praying for snow to hide the clover
Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most!

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

The Present?


"Sometimes, I feel the past and the future pressing so hard on either side that there's no room for the present at all."
 
Because of his first name, readers often believed Evelyn Waugh (born October 28, 1903) was a woman. The confusion only increased when the English novelist married another Evelyn—leading friends to helpfully dub them "He-Evelyn" and "She-Evelyn."

I must admit that this is often true for me~ most likely when I'm alone with seldom found time to just be~  My mind wanders backwards and forward, thinking on those things that did and will fill me up or empty me out.  I so enjoy reflecting but I've learned there is no better place than right now sometimes~ I will try to think on these other places when I decide it's a good time, not when I should just be still~

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Thursday, October 8, 2015

Self~Care and Being Strong~ Un Re Un Re

Why Self-Care Is So Important to Recovery

Yesterday I spoke to a reader who has been struggling to hang onto her sobriety. She is able to go alcohol-free for weeks at a time but then drinks for reasons she doesn’t understand. Each time it happens she can feel herself make the decision to drink again, but doesn’t know why she does it.

“I am a strong person,” she said. “I have always been strong and can handle anything. Why can’t I get this?”
Here is what I have learned about being a strong person: it’s easy to fool ourselves. We mistakenly think we are being strong when we don’t get upset, don’t let things bother us, and then press on despite discomfort. “Suck it up” we tell ourselves, and then somehow we find a way to keep going.That looks like strength on the outside, but in truth it is denial. True strength is dealing with these things, not stuffing them down and refusing to acknowledge how we really feel.
When we deny reality for the sake of appearing strong, we are destroying ourselves from within. We live with some niggling discomfort we can’t name (refusing to address the real cause), and so look for relief in some acceptable form. This is how it started for me – a glass of wine before bed worked so well at first. It relaxed me, comforted, and brought on sleep. I kicked ass in the world all day, then came home and kicked off my heels and enjoyed a lovely glass of wine – a perfectly reasonable strategy. A glass of wine a day is even said to be healthy so no need for concern.
But over the years….
One glass a night became two or three or more and the wine glasses got larger and the bottles became boxes. I couldn’t quit, or even cut back. Each morning I vowed to quit, but by mid day I’d found a reason why it was important to still drink that day: if something good happened I needed to celebrate, if something bad happened I needed comforting, and if nothing at all happened I drank out of boredom.
I felt the same bewilderment as my friend: I am so strong. Why can’t I stop drinking?
Two reasons: because the illusion of strength I’d cultivated depended on a release valve, and because the addictive nature of alcohol caused it to become the one and only release I wanted. I was caught in a vicious cycle that was camouflaged (and perpetuated) by the outward appearance of achievement and strength.
It is easy to think that life is perfect except for the black mark of the addictive element, and if we can just get rid of the wine (or drugs or roulette or shopping or Chigaco-style popcorn – whatever is being stuffed into the void) then everything will be finally, fully perfect. That’s it, that’s all.
So we quit drinking, or try to quit drinking, but then things go sideways because we no longer have any release valve – the wine goggles destroyed the ability to recognize other pleasures. “What was I thinking? Things aren’t better without alcohol! They’re WORSE! I might as well drink because this sobriety nonsense is screwing up everything.”
First, it helps to recognize that our old ways of doing things were probably not as effective as we thought, or else they wouldn’t have led us to seek ongoing relief. The idea of what strength really is must be revisited and revised. Strength is grounded in honesty, in saying “no” to the things that aren’t serving us well and dealing with painful issues instead of sweeping them under a rug. This is the work of recovery (changing for the better), which takes us past mere sobriety (abstinence from the addictive substance or behaviour). It is possible to get through life without constant discomfort.
The crucial role of self-care then, is to not only nurture ourselves through these changes but most importantly to teach ourselves how to enjoy all of the pleasures that our addiction overshadowed. A walk in the sunshine, a massage or pedicure, a cup of coffee. It is important to plan activities or pleasant actions throughout the day and especially during the “witching hour”, so when cravings for alcohol come we can recognize them as a longing for comfort and offer an alternative. The most difficult part is that in early recovery, we don’t necessarily feel like doing much and little else is appealing. Do it anyway. Try lots of different things and little by little those discoveries will come. The herbal tea I once sneered at has become an indispensable part of my evening routine. The yoga I assumed was stupid is now my favourite way to unwind. Connecting with friends is about conversation, tears or laughter, and not just an excuse to drink. I can even sit still and do nothing, which I avoided before because that’s when all the hurts I had buried in the name of strength would surface and pester.
Be open to approaching things differently and you’ll learn to avoid unnecessary discomfort. Practice self-care and you’ll find new ways to console yourself when needed (and  to celebrate the good things, too).
Undo, redo. Unlearn, retrain. Understand, rethink.
Un Un Un. Re Re Re.

"What the future held for her she didn't know. Of two things only she was certain. There would be children-her own or other people's-and there would be books."


Alice Dalgliesh
Alice Dalgliesh (born October 7, 1893) was science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein's editor for many of his books, but the two did not get along. She rejected his manuscript for Starship Troopers, which prompted Heinlein to officially terminate their professional relationship and find another publishing house.

This IS me.  I hoped for many!! children and was blessed with two priceless wee ones that chose me to be their momma ~ xo  And without a book at hand I grieve.  I adore books and always have one or more at the ready to absorb, learn, and reflect upon.  Books are my pleasure~ pure and simple.

However did I get to be such a lucky girl~ children and books.... pinch me!

Sunday, October 4, 2015

I am free to detach myself ~ Wayne Dyer

Live today. Remove all blame from your vocabulary. Catch yourself when you find yourself using your past history as a reason for your failure to act today, and instead say, 

"I am free now to detach myself from what used to be." - Dr Wayne Dyer

Don't we all have aches and pains from days gone by~ Tis my blessing that I don't blame to much, in fact, if I were, it would be on myself.  This reminds me that no matter, yesterday is gone, and if I dilly dally in it I am wasting this moment.  So I am no free to let you go~ because Wayne tells me it's so.  I know for sure that even though, I will continue to miss you terrible.  I can remember though when we were young and you loved me very much.  I give this up to you~

Saturday, October 3, 2015

Synchronicity~

"There is an odd synchronicity in the way parallel lives veer to touch one another, change direction, and then come close again and again until they connect and hold for whatever it was that fate intended to happen." 

October 2, 1975: On this day, American true crime author Ann Rule found out that her friend Ted Bundy had been arrested. Bundy eventually confessed to committing 30 homicides, and Rule wrote about her personal relationship with the serial killer in her book The Stranger Beside Me.

I think synchronicity is wonderful to watch, to feel, and to have~ I really don't think it's odd at all!

Monday, September 21, 2015

Time Machines!!

"We all have our time machines, don't we. Those that take us back are memories...And those that carry us forward, are dreams."

English writer H.G. Wells (born September 21, 1866) first fell in love with books after an accident left him bedridden with a broken leg when he was eight. With nowhere to go and no one to play with, the boy became devoted to fictional worlds.

What a lovely way to think about our thoughts~ clj

On Children~

What I Have Learned as I’ve Matured…  Don’t Be In Such a Hurry to Grow Up.

Why?
"Children deal well with their fears…
They admit them.
Children deal well with their problems…
They ask for help.
Children deal well with their pain…
They cry.
Children deal well with their tension…
They play.
Children deal well with their uncertainty…
They ask questions.
Children deal well with their vulnerability…
They accept help.
Children deal well with their weaknesses…
They rely on those stronger than they.
Children deal well with their dreams…
They follow them.
If only KIDS knew what NOT to change
and
If only I could learn to be a kid again."
By: Amie Joy Chiarelli – Wylie
If only I could be a child for a bit of time I may relearn or remember a few of these very simple things~ clj

Saturday, September 19, 2015

Wisdom~

"Every generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it."

September 18, 1917: On this day, dystopian fiction novelist Aldous Huxley began teaching at Eton. One of his pupils was Eric Blair, a young writer who would grow up to write 1984 under the pen name George Orwell.

Gosh this is so true, so true, so true~

Thursday, September 17, 2015

Make a Decision!!

“Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.”  

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Wednesday, September 16, 2015

From Wayne Dyer's daughter, Serena


This is from Wayne's daughter Serena again from their family Celebration of Life ceremony in Boca Raton.
My dad didn’t have a filter, so I am going to not filter this either. I want to share with all of you some things about my dad that you probably wouldn’t know unless you were one of his children or closest friends…
Two things stand out to me about dad, one is his sense of humor, and the other is his desire to share, whether that was share knowledge, share money, share stories... He was always teaching and sharing with everyone around him.
One summer when we were on Maui and I was about 8 years old, our family and friends took a catamaran over to the island of Molokai, where we swam, ate lunch, climbed trees, swung on vines, and played in a giant valley of mud that we used to cover ourselves in from head to toe. Some of the little kids were running naked in the mud and my brother Sands asked my dad if he was going to get naked and run in the mud too. My dad replied to us that he couldn’t get naked and run in the mud for three reasons. The first was that if he did, all the women would go crazy over his peeper (our family word for penis) and chase him all over the island. The second was that the kids would mistake his peeper for a vine and try and use it as a swing, and the last was that his peeper would drag on the ground and scrape and he didn’t want to get hurt. We were in hysterics over his responses and to this day we have never forgotten those reasons, even though this happened some 20 odd years ago.
My dad is funny, really,really funny, and every time we were together we were laughing and telling stories. My dad rarely had a simple answer for any question we may have asked. Just a few weeks ago we were taking Sailor’s pacifier out and dangling it in front of her, trying to encourage her to use her hands to reach. My dad was laying there watching and said “this is like the myth of Sisiphus, every time she gets close you take it away.” Having no clue what he was talking about he went on to explain the greek mythology of Sisiphus, and all of this was before breakfast! He was always telling stories and teaching us, his children.
He was creative in his story telling, he had his own language, he could deliver a punch line like no other. He was obsessed with not wasting things. He never wanted to throw anything out and because of that, his fridge was full of items way passed their expiration date. He would sense Skye or myself sifting through the fridge, looking for things to throw away, and he would fly into the kitchen and exclaim, mustard doesn’t’ expire! I don’t care if it says 2009 on it that mustard is perfectly good you are not throwing that away. He went one entire summer using one paper plate for his toast every morning just to prove that could. One paper plate for breakfast for the entire summer!
He and technology had a terrible relationship. He could never figure out how to use his ipad and would call me and say something like “the google isn’t letting me youtube the website," or "I want to send my website to someone in an email, how do I give them the password." The first time he saw one of us put in a password on a computer he smirked and said, I know your password! And we were like oh yea dad, what is it? He was completely serious when he said “four stars.” I was at the mall with Matt recently and my dad called twice in a row, which meant a technology panic, and I answered while Matt was in the dressing room. For the next 30 minutes I had to explain to him how to copy and paste the link to a website that he wanted to email to someone. Other people in the dressing rooms were cracking up listening to our dialogue..
Another summer we put a couple of pictures of our family on the wall in the kitchen and when we came back the following summer, the collage of pictures was now covering the cabinets. That Christmas, when we were all there on Maui, the photos were now spreading out to the walls, but the best part about it was that about a third of the photos were of people we didn’t even know. We would say, dad, who is this kid? And he would say "I don’t know, his mom sent me his picture so I put it on the wall." His condo on Maui is basically covered in photos of our family and friends and complete strangers. His love for people always so apparent.
Dad had an inherent sense of justice, of doing what was right, even when it may have been easier to ignore something. He is just so good, so full of love, and he did so many generous things in ways that never brought attention to himself, and I would like to share some of those with you.
He saw an HBO show a few weeks ago that highlighted a story of an elderly African American woman named Harriett Cleveland who was 61 years old, living in Montgomery, AL and was raising her 3 year old disabled grandson . Unable to pay a driving fine as well as her medications and food, she put the bill in a pile of unpaid bills to be gotten to later. Over time, the fine compiled and built, eventually going from $75 to over $3000. She was arrested in her home in front of her grandson and brought to jail, spending 2, two week sentences in a confided cell. My dad, having seen her story, was so moved that he had his assistant, close friend, and coauthor, Dee, look her up, locate her, and he wrote her a letter and sent her $3000 to cover the fine, and additionally sent her two multiple thousand dollar checks just to make sure she was alright. The woman called him in tears, she couldn't believe that a complete stranger sent her more money than she had ever had at one time in her life. This woman’s story aired on HBO and only one person, one person in the whole world, reached out to help her, without seeking any attention or praise, and that on person was my dad.
He received hundreds of pieces of mail a week and there were always letters asking him for money or financial assistance. Coincidentally, there was always money being sent to him from his fans as well. People who believed in tithing would send him odd dollar amounts all the time. He had a system where, when someone wrote asking for money, he put it in a pile, and when he received money from someone, he would take a letter from his pile and send that person the money he just received. He maintained a constant flow of financial support to complete strangers just because he could.
He has paid for the education of over a dozen children unrelated to him, children of friends or even strangers just because he believed in the value of a good education and he was capable of providing one. He set up a million dollar college fund at his alma mater for inner city kids struggling to pay for school and to date over 74 inner city kids have benefitted from that scholarship.
Every time we took a walk together on Maui, which often times was everyday I was there, someone would stop him to tell him that his work changed their life and every time he would engage with them as if they were the most important person in the world to him at that time. Then, he would ask what hotel they were in and what their room number was and he would send me to deliver a few signed books to their room. This happened constantly. Daily, really.
He had an incredibly powerful platform. He attracted huge audiences all over the world and he knew how much sharing the stage with him could impact someone's career. Every year, without fail, he would find someone whose cause or story or message he believed in and he would include them in his program for that year. He would endorse their work and if they did work together, he gave them every dollar of the royalties he collected on it, never taking any of it for himself.
As weird as this sounds, I had a longing to be near my dad. I had a longing to talk to him, to hear his voice, as he has always been the person I most wanted to be like. Incredibly kind, generous to a fault, interested in the world and in people in particular, funny. On his birthday this year I sent him a card and in it I wrote that on his 75th turn around the sun, he should be so proud of the fact that his children take all of their free time to be with him, to be around him, and that that is the mark of a great man and an even greater father. He called me after he got my card and told me he loved that, he loved that his kids always wanted to be around him. I am so grateful that he knew how much I loved being with him.
My dad and I took several trips around the world together, just the two of us, and on one of those recent trips I wrote him a letter and told him how much I loved him. He read that letter at every one of his talks afterward and my sister Skye even turned it into a song that she sang to us while we danced together at my wedding. I am so grateful to have that memory. In that letter I told him that I could feel that he believed in me, and what greater gift could a parent give their child but to make them feel how much they believed in them?
When we came up with the idea to write a book together, a book about how I was raised and what it was really like to grow up in the Dyer household, I felt daunted and thrilled. I wasn't sure I could adequately express what it was like to have him as a father in just 10 chapters. But he was so encouraging, so loving. He worked with me, telling me over and over again, "Serena, you have a gift at telling stories, just tell your stories and it will be perfect." At the end of writing that book together, we were both so proud of it. I felt his love and pride for me. I am so grateful he is the kind of dad who shared that. I am grateful that he taught me to go within and find God. Grateful that he taught me to be open to other people's ideas and ways of living. He taught me to leave the judging to someone else, and instead, to just treat people with compassion, understanding that everyone is just doing the best they can. Most importantly, in this moment, I am most grateful that he taught me that even in death, we are just shedding one coat and putting on another. He told me he would never leave me, even when he left this earthly realm, and I am most grateful that I know this to be true.
Everyone that knows me knows I am a talker. My dad is a talker too. Talking to him is and was my most favorite thing in the world. I think that is what is so hard for me about all of this. Our relationship was built on talking to each other. We spoke on the phone almost every single day. We talked so often and about so many things that for me it is impossible to narrow down who my dad is to me on a few pages
In closing, I want to tell you that Dad and I agreed to name our book "Don't die with your music still in you" because for me, it was the most important lesson he taught me. Dad came here with music to play and he played it so loudly, it changed the world. One man, with some really big ideas, changed the lives of millions of people for the better. My dad, with his love of teaching, of sharing, of story telling, helped millions of people improve their lives. It is now my promise to you dad that I will not die with my music still in me. I carry who you are within me, and I will do everything I can to continue your message as you had just recently asked me to one day do. For me, this isn't goodbye. I could never say goodbye to the person who is everywhere and everything for me. To me, this is just learning to see you and hear you in a new and different way, cause as you said, when you die, you will still be here, just in another room… I love you forever and ever dad. Thank you, for everything.
I AM
Serena

Twenty~Four Hours a Day~ September 16, 2015

Meditation for the Day

"We seem to live not only in time but also in eterity.  If we abide with God and He abides with us, we may bring forth spirtiual fruit which will last for eternity.  If we live with God, our lives can flow as some calm river through the dry land of earth.  It can cause the trees and of the spiritual life~ love and service~ to spring forth and yield abundantly.  Spiritual work may be done for eternity, not just for now.  Even here on earth we can live as though our real lives were eternal.

Pryaer for the Day

I pray that I may try to make my life like a cool river in a thirsty land.  I pray that I may give freely to all who ask my help."

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Obstacles~


Guest Writer for Wake Up World
You probably don’t need me to tell you that spirituality isn’t all about feeling positive or uplifted. The enlightenment path requires us to sacrifice things that hold us back and keep us from making spiritual progress, and maybe this is where the literal notion of religious sacrifice first originated; from the external and even internal sacrifices we have to make on the enlightenment path.
Why do we have to make sacrifices on the spiritual path? Because there are a lot of things here on Earth that stop us from making genuine progress toward enlightenment, so we are best to release or avoid these things if we want to elevate our consciousness and contribute to the awakening of others.

The purpose of self-sacrifice isn’t to boss ourselves around or give up things we cherish, unless they cause serious damage – it’s to detach from things that are destructive or which hold us back, so we can make room for more wholesome elements in our life, that accelerate our evolution.
Here, I’ll discuss five things you’ll want to consider releasing from your life, if your goal is to walk a spiritual path without falling back into limiting habits and mindsets. Taking steps to rid ourselves of these attachments right now will allow us to forge ahead with strength and clarity. Over time, they will fade away and eventually stop influencing our lives.

5 Attachments to Release on the Path of Enlightenment

1. Negative or Toxic People
I’m sure we all know someone who seems overly negative or constantly upset with life. Energetically speaking, we’ll want to keep our distance from them for the sake of our spiritual growth.
We’re all subconsciously connected, and the words and actions of people we’re close with can affect us in a deeper way than we realize. When we’re around other people, we tend to be influenced (subconsciously or otherwise) by their expressions and, sometimes, their outbursts. If we aren’t careful, we can end up repeating or reflecting their behavior and energy, find ourselves frustrated with life or with the people around us, without even realizing we were influenced by someone else’s negativity.
With all of this said, we should remember that the issue isn’t always black and white. We might have a loved one who means a lot to us but who tends to dwell in negativity, or who has random or not so random outbursts (or their opinion on any issue may just be too pessimistic to take). We don’t want to abandon our family or people we’re close with just because of their (relative) negativity, so we’ll have to find some kind of middle ground. We don’t want to spend so much time with them that they start to influence us, but we don’t want to avoid them just because we don’t like how they feel, or express themselves.
Walking a true path of enlightenment, we’ll want to stay balanced and listen to our intuition when we’re met with any difficult relationships and circumstances. Our intuition will help us to make the best and most helpful decisions to our spiritual wellbeing. It is also possible to spend time with a pessimistic or angry loved one while finding ways to stay impervious to their negativity.
2. Sugary, Artificial, Processed and GMO Foods
It’s no secret that our modern society is filled with cheap, fake foods that make big food corporations money while slowly poisoning us and ensuring that we’ll be sick (ie. good medical/pharmaceutical customers) when we’re older. Not to mention the health dangers associated with genetically modified foods.
These foods don’t just hurt our physical health, they’re a detriment to our spiritual health as well — because mind, body and spirit are one. What we put into our bodies affects us deeply on a mental, emotional and spiritual level, and if we want to be clearheaded as we go throughout our day or we want our meditations to be more potent, then clean, healthy and preferably organic food is our best bet.
We’ll also want to avoid unhealthy eating habits, like eating too much, too fast, too late at night, and without mindfulness and gratitude. We don’t often realize how these factors affect us while we’re eating, but the effects make themselves known at a later time when we don’t feel our best (and can’t understand why.)
I’m not trying to be one of those food snobs who tells you how to live your life, and while I try to be healthy. I have eaten as much fake, sugary food as anyone else. I’ve felt firsthand the difference between healthy and unhealthy food — the first choice gives us energy, clarity, vitality and an enhanced sense of passion while the latter pleases our taste buds before dulling our sense, making us feel lazy and tired.
3. Television and Excessive Technological Stimulation
Watching television is one of the most destructive things a spiritual seeker can do. Again, I don’t want to tell you how to live, but a lot of things in this world seem intentionally designed to keep people unhealthy, disempowered and unthinking. Television in particular dumbs us down while keeping us fixed on the artificial reality we’re presented with — a reality that’s usually violent, over-dramatized, fear-inducing, hypersexual or just plain juvenile.
[For more information, please see the article: Digital Deception – Can You Trust What You See?]
5 Things to Release on the Path of Enlightenment 2
Undoubtedly, spiritual seekers would benefit from avoiding TV and immersion in other kind of technological stimulation, but realistically, there will always be times when we have to use technology. Like most writers, most of my work is done on a computer, but when I’m done working for the day, I can always get outside, go to a spot in nature, ride my bicycle and generally detach from artificial technologies. It’s important to reconnect with nature, which technology can prevent, because it is our true home; it provides everything we’ll ever need for survival or leisure. That is nature’s way.
We can’t reconnect with nature if we’re too busy staring into the TV, our smartphones or any other gadget that distracts us from life, so we’ll want to put these things down sometimes and rediscover reality.
[For tips on reconnecting with the Earth, check out the article Conscious Connection – A Practical Guide To Grounding Your Energy.]
4. Laziness 
I know that fatigue is sometimes unavoidable, and we never want to feel it when it comes along. However, there are driving factors that we’ll want to be on the lookout for if we don’t want laziness to bring us down and impede our journey of enlightenment.
While the advice we’ve been given from various spiritual teachers to ‘become nothing’ is helpful on the path, I believe we should be active in the midst of all of our experiences and spiritual practices that reconnect us with nothingness. Exercising a little each day is highly beneficial to our physical and spiritual wellbeing, and is known to help reduce fatigue, which in turn helps to boost our meditations and make those higher vibes easier to feel. Eating well is also crucial to your maintaining your personal energy.
Being active can also help us find a sense of purpose, and once we find what we want to do in life, we can enthusiastically pursue it with an active, awake perspective instead of sitting down on the couch to be entertained by whatever reality TV show is on.
[For more on this, please see the article: Transpersonal Purpose and the Impulse for Spiritual Development.]
Being active is an important part of our spiritual evolution, and laziness or fatigue won’t go away until we take steps to actively release ourselves from the patterns that keep us feeling that way. It might require us to step outside of our comfort zone, but we’ll see that it was worth it when we begin to feel better and the good vibes can flow in without being impeded by our choices.
5. Suppressing Negativity or Avoiding the ‘Shadow Self’
We all have a ‘shadow self’, which is the aspect of our personality that’s constantly negative, hurtful, narcissistic, etc. Contrary to what you might assume, I’m not encouraging us to give it up; I’m encouraging us to give up trying to suppress it. The ‘shadow’ is a crucial part of our selves that we must learn to embrace, heal and release.
How we handle this is our choice entirely, and we can do it with grace, patience, and most importantly, centeredness. When we deal with these kinds of situations, leaving our center can cause us to lose ourselves in the emotional fray. In embracing the shadow self, we’ll also want to stop avoiding the negative, difficult or confronting situations we have to deal with in our lives. No matter how hard we try to stay ‘happy’ or aligned with our higher consciousness, we’re going to have to deal with negative situations that we’d rather sweep under the rug, sooner or later. It’s up to us.
Our destructive tendency to suppress negative situations or even the negativity we carry within ourselves will stifle our spiritual growth in the long run. So let’s give it up and willingly confront any negativity that comes our way – from the world or from within.
[For a deeper exploration of the Shadow Self, please see the article: Into the Deep – Learning from the Shadow Within.]

The Final Word

We’re all unique. As we continue along the enlightenment path, we’ll each find plenty more attachments that we have to release into the ethers if we want to keep thriving. It might be a difficult or uncomfortable process for a lot of spiritual seekers, but it’s an inevitable part of the process of seeking enlightenment. Although we may not always see the benefits, the positive changes we make today becomes evident when we stop and look back tomorrow.
To move forward, we have to be willing to give up things that no longer serve us, and this gets easier when we can call on our higher consciousness and allow our spiritual/creative essence to work through us. Opening up to the ‘higher self’ will make our disciplines and sacrifices easier, and whether we know it or not, we have an infinite source of love, guidance, potential and creativity within us that we can access at any time. Our connection with this part of ourselves will become clearer and more refined as we willingly sacrifice and release the things that stop us from actively maintaining it, and the guidance we receive from our higher consciousness in return will make any future sacrifices easier.
With this in mind, we see that our sacrifices really don’t have to be hard. They will only be hard as long as we build them up to be that way in our minds. By opening the mind and connecting with our intuition, we come to understand that sacrifice and discipline boils down to a moment-by-moment choice ~ a choice that comes with infinite rewards.

My Spiritual Path~ Get on BOARD!!



5 Obstacles on the Spiritual Path
12th September 2015
By Wes Annac
Guest Writer for Wake Up World
Deciding we want to commit to the spiritual path is easy, but it can be harder to live up to our commitment. At the first sign of trouble, we could easily depart the path in favor of a lifestyle that doesn’t challenge us as much, but if we do, we’ll miss out on all of the incredible things the path has for us.
We’ll miss out on spiritual evolution and the wonders that come with it, and we’ll eventually realize we’ve taken a wrong turn. We might try to steer our ship in a more positive direction by then, but we would’ve been much further along the path if we hadn’t stopped in the first place.
I’d like to share five things that can distract us from the path, so we know what to look out for and what can hurt us.
The common spiritual seeker has to be diligent in this day and age, because there are all kinds of distractions out there that can halt our progress if we let them. Now’s a better time than ever to increase our dedication and find out how far we can go, but we have to watch out for the things I’ll list here as well as anything else that can stand in our way.

1. Fatigue, Laziness, Complacency

These three qualities can halt our progress by encouraging us to stop, relax and think more about the ego-driven self than our path or the people we want to help. If we give in to fatigue, it can take away our inspiration and encourage us to do little more than sit on the couch, binge watch our favorite TV shows and generally fail to get anything done.
Laziness compliments fatigue, because it encourages us to be unproductive for long periods of time.
Complacency is the icing on top of the cake that encourages us not to care that we’re no longer getting anything done. Complacency can encourage long periods of careless laziness, and if we can recognize and try to combat fatigue as soon as it starts to affect us, we can get away from all three of these qualities and continue with our inner work.

2. Difficulty

We’ve heard from practically every spiritual source that we’re infinite, and if we have love in our hearts and we can persevere in times of trouble, there’s nothing we can’t do. This includes keeping up with our spiritual practices (meditation, prayer, etc.), but we can easily convince ourselves that keeping up with them is just too hard.
If we convince ourselves we can’t keep going, we’ll naturally set them aside and we won’t pick them up until we once again find the motivation to give them a try. I’ll repeat what I said earlier: If we hadn’t set them down in the first place, then we’d have made a lot more progress by the time we were ready to pick them back up.
It helps to understand the role of love and perseverance on the spiritual (and creative) path, and the only time we fail at something is when we give up. None of us are failures until we allow ourselves to fail, and when it comes to our spirituality, that’s the last thing we want to do. If we’re serious about elevating our consciousness, we’ll quickly understand the importance of dedication and refusing to give up.
We might surprise ourselves with how much we can achieve if we keep going, and before we know it, we’ll be in a higher place each day and our radiance will become apparent to everyone in our vicinity.

3. Forgetting about love

I mentioned love earlier, and I can say from experience that forgetting to call on it can make the journey more difficult; especially if creativity is a big part of it. In my opinion, we can’t have true creativity or spirituality without love, and love makes it easier to keep on in hard times.
Love gives us the inspiration to keep going when our stresses pile up and we don’t feel very enlightened or inspired, and to fall away from it is to fall away from the greatest creative, spiritual, inspirational source around. The journey’s a lot easier and more worthwhile when we have love, and without it, life can seem empty and hollow – and not in the good way.
Plenty of spiritual teachers encourage emptiness, but love offers a unique type of emptiness where the mind is empty (as it’s meant to be) but the heart is full of inspiration, creativity and the willingness to tackle our most difficult challenges.
We’ll still have a clear, open, empty mind, but we’ll also be aligned with the creative force that’s responsible for our existence, our planet’s existence, and, in my opinion, everything we create. It all comes from love, and we’ll understand this when we’ve done the most potent inner work that gives us access to higher dimensions where everything is clearer and more amazing.

4. The distractions of our mainstream culture

5 Obstacles on the Spiritual Path - Pop CultureYou probably don’t need me to tell you how our mainstream culture can distract us from the path.
Imagine it’s a Friday night and you feel inspired to meditate, write a spiritually inspired article or compose some spiritually inspired music. Perhaps your better half tells you they’d like to spend some time with you, and instead of the plans that were forming, you decide to watch a movie or catch up with a television show you both enjoy.
I’m not saying that spending time with loved ones will take us off of the path, but pay attention to how you feel once you’re done indulging in those movies or TV shows. Depending on the type of content you watch, you could feel awful or completely uninspired to do anything that has to do with your spirituality.
In fact, it could go in the opposite direction. All those influences swirling around your mind could encourage you to partake in more shows, movies, etc., and finding inspiration again could be difficult. You could fall prey to more and more distorted cultural influence, and as you all probably know, there are a lot of negative influences out there.
Television and movies are filled to the brim with negative, brutal and lusty programming, and they have a greater effect on our mind and our subconscious than we realize. If this type of programming takes hold in our subconscious, it can make us want more and more of it to satisfy the subconscious craving it created.
We might want to avoid these things altogether, and this is why so many spiritual seekers and organizations have removed themselves from the influence of western society. Its influence can keep us from making valuable progress, so instead of indulging, maybe we can find a healthier way to spend time with our loved ones.

5. Loneliness (i.e. the absence of people to share our spirituality with)

Being a spiritual seeker can often be lonely, because some of us are the only ones in our area who embrace spirituality or the various concepts that come with it. This might be different for people in western states like California, where there are a lot of ‘conscious’ people with various beliefs, but a lot of spiritual seekers are alone in their knowledge, their awareness and the way they feel about life.
5 Obstacles on the Spiritual Path - Loneliness
This can discourage us from making progress, because there are plenty of people around us who’ll talk about trivial, cultural things all day long. It never feels good for a spiritual seeker to take part in mundane discussion, because they’ve begun to tap in to the secrets of the universe and this quickly becomes their only interest.
Can you imagine having all these thoughts and feelings about enlightenment, UFOs, meditation, etc. burning deep within, but all anyone around you wants to talk about is the debt ceiling or everything wrong with the liberal or conservative parties? It can be maddening, and if we subject ourselves to too much nonspiritual influence, it can slowly take hold in our subconscious. Before we know it, our minds are once again on all those trivial things we wanted to get away from and we have to start the process of personal liberation back over again.

Conclusion

These are just a few things we’ll want to avoid if we want to successfully elevate our consciousness, and they’ll no longer hinder us when we reach a certain level of progress. We’ll have learned to stay away from most of them, but even the ones we can’t stay away from will stop affecting us like they once did.
The path will get easier as we learn to avoid things that keep us from making progress and embrace things that elevate our progress, and as long as we’re dedicated to the process and our intent is genuine, getting past the obstacles that stand in our way will be a breeze. We’ll no longer feel disconnected from our creator, our higher consciousness or anything else that liberates us, and with our love-fueled connection intact, we’ll be able to emerge into the world and make a positive impact on others.
For now, let’s keep in mind what helps and hurts us on the path, and in all situations, let’s call on our inner love to make things easier. Love is always here for us, and it can always help us through the challenges that could otherwise bring us down. Routinely calling on it can make life easier, more flowing and more worthwhile, and we’ll enjoy all of our challenges when we approach them with love and the willingness to stick with our spirituality in the face of all odds.