A Mantra for Tough Times

When you give voice to the truth within you, the angels also sing.

Lama Surya Das

Being Southern Baptist and baptized twice as a child, becoming agnostic as a young adult, returning to Christianity in mid-life as an Episcopalian and then as a Methodist while processing through formal discernment about becoming a traditional Christian minister led me to abandon all of the above and seek an alternative spirituality.

Engaging in the study of the Human Energy Field, becoming a Licensed Massage Therapist, and integrating that body of knowledge into my work as an artist-educator is my ordination.  Helping myself, the planet, and others heal is my ministry.

I don’t know about you, but walking the human path of ordinary days is challenging enough for me.  Between birth and death, I will walk many roads, each with its own landscape.  But in these economically, environmentally, and politically tough times it is easy for me to be convinced that remaining centered, not allowing apparent pitfalls and distractions to rob me of a fearless life full of joy and contentment is impossible.

"What do you mean 'apparent pitfalls and distractions?'  My problems aren’t apparent.  The problems of the earth aren’t apparent.  They’re real," you say.

That’s just my point.  Yes, the experiences we have are real.  We are having them.  Incomes fluctuate or disappear, bodies become ill, accidents happen.  But beyond all that, beyond the noise of those experiences and the passionate responses we allow them to evoke in us, is another reality.  The Reality.

That is “the truth within” of which Lama Surya Das speaks.

The Truth is that we are not merely our physical bodies.  We are much more and the influence we have as beings on the planet reaches far beyond our bodies.  Our thoughts have power.  What we focus upon changes the apparent reality we eventually experience.  Whatever I am thinking about strongly becomes my meditation and therefore my prayer because it sets up a certain vibration within me to which other like vibrations are attracted.

In other words, if I walk around all day harboring anger, I am producing in a real-time, physiological way, negative vibrations in my body, in the physical space around me (my auric field), and on and on into the atmosphere in the same way a light beam never stops.  It is simply not enough then to make a supplication to God to bless the one at whom I am angry.  If I vibrate angry (let myself hold onto the energy that is angry), I emit and attract angry or some other negative vibration of the same quality.

The only way any God can help change that vibration is for me to summon, focus upon, and then resonate “the truth within” which is of the Highest Vibration, BECAUSE I have free will.  If I want to hold on to the energy of anger, Great Spirit will not interfere.  But if I desire to release and move the energy to a higher vibrational level, Great Spirit Moves to help make this happen.  This allows the Highest Vibration (which is God) to change me from the inside out, remembering for me, through me who I Truly Am.

It is a quantum shift. The problem didn’t arise from the apparent level, so it’s no use me trying to “solve” it from the apparent level.  I have to choose to enter the non-physical dimension and trust the mystery of its workings.  Using a mantra is one way to do this.

A mantra is to meditation as the gadget is to a web page: an easy way to get where you want to go in order to achieve a task.  These sacred words of extreme power have been used for millennia to shift energies for the Highest Good in the individual practitioner and in the atmosphere.  It is not necessary to focus on the literal translation of the words.  In fact, it is not advisable, as the purpose is to lift the mind-body-spirit out of the literal world.

So, the next time you find yourself clogged, befuddled, tense, or simply undone try this:

Wherever you are simply begin by intentionally turning your mind away from thinking about “the problem,” and begin to sing or chant the following mantra:  Om Mani Pedmé Hung.  Om Mani Pedmé Hung.  Om Mani Pedmé Hung.

It is a Tibetan mantra, the divine mantra of unconditional love and compassion.  The words literally mean “the jewel in the lotus.”  Make up your own tune or say it in a rhythmic, patterned way.  Try doing this for as many minutes in a row as you can manage.  Even one minute of chanting can make amazing, palpable shifts in your perception of and experience of your world.

Reference: 

Awakening the Buddha Within Tibetan Wisdom for the Western World

Lama Surya Das, Broadway Books, New York, 1998.

A Light of Great Beauty

I have been revisiting the Course In Miracles 3rd as a tool for morning meditation.  Occasionally, when I settle back into stillness, I begin to "hear" a straightforward communication from my guides.  I do not hear an audible voice, but instead a stream of coherent thought occurs.  This is how Helen Schucman, the author of the Course describes her own experience, as merely taking a sort of dictation.  Much of the follow thought I offer is as a result of my twenty year study of the Course and how its teachings have integrated my spiritual understanding.  However, this "block" of teaching I received is written here exactly as I received it during my meditation and is not contrived or composed as an essay might be.  To my knowledge, there is only one direct quote from the Course in this teaching and it appears in quotation marks and is from Lesson 31 on page 48 in the Workbook for Students.  It is a particularly pivotal lesson in my own spiritual growth process, one to which I often turn for changing my mind and calling forth the "Holy Instant."

You will notice that the pronoun "I" is used in the first paragraph as the voice of the ego self and in the second paragraph  as the voice of the Teacher.  In the Course, the teacher's voice is identified as The Christ.  When I dowse to discern whose voice is coming through during this dictation, my guides indicate that it is also the voice of The Christ.

Now you know, if you have been reading my blog, that I have great doubt, even resistance to current religious context for The Christ.  Nevertheless, the teachings of The Christ do form the foundation for my spiritual understanding and my studies have shown, along with direct knowings like this one, that the same Great Wisdom that spoke through The Christ has also spoken throughout history, incarnate in many teachers, and continues to speak in the present day to and through those "who have ears to hear" and courage to speak.

So, it is with deep gratitude and profound humility that I offer to you what has been give to me. Perhaps the Truth of this teaching will be of value to you as well.

August 27, 2010

Meditation Dictation

It is not my job to change the world I see because the world I see is illusion.  It is only my job to correct the errors I have made in my perception of the world I see.  What I think I see may not be so.  I set down the burden of decision.  It is not my job to decide what is so and what is not so.  I have only to look on All Things with Love.  That is enough.  I do not have the eyes of Love.  But there is One Who Loves who will see through me for me if I will let Her.

Bodies die and decay yet I am alive.  Do not look with the body's eyes.  They cannot see.  Only I can see Truly.  Beyond the veil of flesh and appearances shines a Light of Great Beauty.  Do not hold it bound.  You cannot.  But you can choose not to see.  That choice does not dim the Light at all.  You are the Light and not the darkness, "not the victim of the world you [have] seen."  Let the moment come when All That You Are is all that you see.

when i get to the other side

THE DRESS

September 16 will be the one year anniversary of my mom's transition into Light.  She has been making her presence known for the past few days.

Last week, I went to lunch with daughter #1 who is getting married next October.  She wants to get married in Italy.  Mr. Friendly has been struggling with that request, understandably.  It's really far from here and you can't drive there not to mention the (ahem!) cost.  Note to 50-somethings:  save your money!  Last July, daughter #2 got married.  Mom was alive then.  She could not attend the wedding, but she bought THE DRESS.  Daughter #2 was a vision in it and Mom was delighted to gift it to her.  

When Mom died, she left me a small inheritance.  Since daughter #1 has been talking wedding in Italy, I've been saying, "And Mom will spring for the dress!"  That felt right and fair and I know Mom would be doing that herself if she were still in her body and had her hands on her check book! 


Back to Mr. Friendly and the balking.  Daughter # 2 visited San Antonio week before last for my birthday.  Over dinner I said, "We have to talk wedding with your sister.  I need details."  So, she and I grilled Daughter #1 over chips and salsa.  Daughter #1, who NEVER drinks at all, had two Coconut Margaritas (yuk! but like I said, she's not a drinker).  Daughter #2 had two real Margaritas.  I had too many glasses of iced tea.  But we got to the crux of it:  Daughter #1 is worried that she'll send out the "save the dates" and Mr. Friendly will flake and not actually spring for the Italian wedding.


Okay.  Now  we're getting somewhere.  And you're wondering what this has to do with Mom?  Back to lunch last week with Daughter #1.  It dawned on me that the price of a dress might go a long way toward a trip for two to Italy (did I mention that THE DRESS was a vision?).  I mentioned this possibility with some trepidation as Daughter #1 has a clear vision of what an Italian wedding looks like and I wasn't sure that the dress could be forgone.

I worked up my courage and after lunch, I ventured the plan:  I (Mom and Granddaddy too, to be fair, as he died 29 days after Mom last year and also left me a small inheritance) will give you the same "dress-money" as we gave your sister, plus a little so, no matter what, you can go to Italy and get married there.


She loved it.  She said, "That feels really good (knowing now she can go and if Mr. Friendly cowboys up for non-essentials like a dress, a photographer, a small reception, so be it).


As soon as I told her, tears began to stream down my face.  As I said, "I know Mom will like this too," I began to bawl and so did Daughter #1.  The whole truck filled with super-powered love, the kind that swirls and lifts and zooms around.  I began to shake.  I knew Mom was there and dancing a jig!  Daughter #1 hopped out of the truck, renewed with hope of her dream coming true.  

Now that's a grandmother's dream too, right?  So, just in case I had any doubt that Mom was totally "IN," on the way home the scent of Pine filled the truck.  That's the scent she and I agreed her Spirit would have, if she had a choice.  I'd sensed it over and over again, first on the morning of the day she died and then for weeks after her transition, but I haven't sensed it for some time now until that day last week.  Wow.  I began to cry again,  these tears a brew of bitter-sweet melancholy and joy.  I do miss her so.


Even though I have not sensed the aroma of her Spirit much lately, all sense that I do get of her is deep peace and assurance.  Last night I was aware of her Spirit in meditation.  I was feeling down.  I spoke to her, asking for "help."  A few seconds passed and then a song by Walela came to mind from a CD I'd given her a few years ago and which I played some during her memorial:  "And when I get to the other side, I'm gonna put on my wings and fly...."  Wow.  I wasn't thinking of that song at all and then there it was in my head, just that line.  I smiled.  "So, did you put on your wings and fly?" I asked.  The thought, "yes, yes I did" came back.  "Good," I said, "Good."  "Can you hear me?"  I asked.  The thought, "yes, yes I can."  "I really need some help," I said.  The thought, "I am here, but I am not The Christ.  Pray to The Christ."  

Ahhh!  She's still working on me from "the other side" and she's still here for me as she always said she would be.  

Apparently, the veil really is very thin.

Creativity Crawls

New poem yesterday morning:

creativity crawls in slow motion like the
snail up the
doorjamb of my day

her antennae the drum major
her shell the big bass drum

her underbelly a million feet marching

pop the popcorn
drag out the chair
line the streets

a parade is passing!

I sat on the back step with a cup of coffee, the door flung open.  I wanted to be outside, but it was drizzling, so this was as close as I could let myself get to wet.  I sipped, letting the brown brew purge the sleep from my sluggish head.  Wildlife, especially insects, were unperturbed by the rain and busily went about their doings.  At my right shoulder, a snail crawled up the doorjamb.  They seem to multiply and show themselves after a rain, and with all the rain we've had in South Texas this season, snails are everywhere.  So, I almost turned away uninterested.

But I have been re-reading Joy's Way, A Map for the Transformational Journey: An Introduction to the Potentials for Healing with Body Energies in preparation for another Healing Touch class.  The M.D., Brugh Joy, who wrote the book thirty-some years ago writes, "The initial task in awakening is to begin to ask whether there is more to experience in any given moment: then to conceive that there may be more; then to experience it; when it is experienced, to conceive that there may be more; and thus to go into the cycle again indefinitely (p. 16)."

So, because the snail had attracted my attention, and because the words "creativity crawls" had flitted through my mind, I asked, is there more?  This is a crucial moment, not only in the transformational process, but in the writing process.  I got my journal.  Well, I don't have a new one and the last one is spent, so I grabbed a used one from the shelf.  The last entry was dated November 25, 2009 (one month after the funerals of both my parents).  Serendipitously, that entry is also about creature beings!  AND it is about the ability to really see them.  It is about the ability to really see.

Upon our first meeting, an acquaintance who also happened to be a psychic, had asked whether I'd ever "seen" my power animals.  We'd been discussing the sensory ability to smell the scent of discarnate entities.  I'd said, "No, I haven't seen my power animals yet." I assumed she wondered if  I'd seen them in visions or as shape-shifted entities.  I didn't even think about how I see them in the apparent world or during Dreamtime.

I have done some Shamanic Journey work and have drawn my spread of nine totem or power animals from the Medicine Cards: The Discovery of Power Through the Ways of Animals.  These represent the medicine I carry on this Earth Walk.  All but one of the animals that appeared in my spread are common to this area, so I am aware when I see those particular creature beings, but I sat right there and told the psychic asking me that I'd never seen them.  Harumph!

Apparently my mules wanted me to become even more aware of their presences and messages, because within days, one of them appeared to me in a dream:

a beautiful yellow-brown hawk flew over my head, circled me a few times, then landed on the ground beside me.  I said "Look!  Look!  There it is!  Isn't it beautiful?"  I had been telling someone about power animals when the hawk instantly manifested above me.

A few days after the dream, I saw a sign in a place I have frequented for thirty years that read, "If nothing changes, nothing changes."  It made me realize, again, how long I've been playing a "victim's" role, allowing the energetic imbalances and apparent dysfunction of individuals whose lives touch mine to knock me off balance.  I came home that day determined to paint, to be true to my highest Self, to be the most expanded version of the Self I have been created to be.

I blocked in a copy of a recent sketch, thinking I would paint something to enter in an upcoming contest.  But, no matter how I worked with it, I couldn't force my will onto the canvas.  So, I stepped back.  Turned the piece upside down.  Sat down to stare.  Behold!  I saw the image of an animal taking shape.  As I began to pull the image out, dog appeared!  A smiling, yellow Labrador.

Immediately, I went to the Medicine Cards to read about Dog Medicine:  Be loyal.  Be your own best friend.

Yep, you guessed it.  Dog is another of my power animals.  My totem for the Above Direction:  "teaches me to honor the Great Star Nation, guardian of Dreamtime, my access to other dimensions (Medicine Cards, p. 20)."  And Hawk?  My Eastern Totem:  "guides me to my greatest spiritual challenge, guards my path to illumination (ibid)."


Back to the dream:
I was asking to do work that I really didn't want to do, work that wasn't my work in the world. I knew the two women owners of the gymnasium where I applied for the job.  I was playing me, in my present Daydream circumstances, feeling lack and grabbing at any work to get income. I thought, "this job won't really help me.  It won't empower me.  It will only take me away from my art and my writing and use up all my energy and time."  I knew I didn't really want the job, but I was going through the motions of getting it anyway. Repeating a pattern. But Hawk circled overhead.  "Circle your life and view it from a higher perspective.  Grab an opportunity that is coming your way.  Discern the hazards that bar me from my freedom of flight (Medicine Cards, p.45.)"

Wow! So what does it mean to me to fly?  How does having power feel?  What does it look like to be my own best friend? Can I look beyond appearances of lack and see abundant supply without falling into damaging patterns and belief in fear and lack?  WhooAhh!  Talk about being guided to my greatest spiritual challenges!  Talk about needing to see from a higher perspective!

As for snail?  Well, there's no medicine card for snail.  But yesterday morning, I think she spoke for herself.  And apparently, she has plenty of power!

this is how it goes is finished!

Click on the image to see all nine painting sessions and the finished piece!  TA DA!

 

 

 

 

C

I Take It Back

Well, I may let a cosmetician thread my eyebrows.  Got a hair cut and (ahem!) color today.  I look fabulous except for the eyebrows.  Too thick.  Too dark.  Don't match my hair.  Yikes.

Is this even spiritually relevant?  I think so.  I let you know.

I'm fickle.  I'm freckled.  I'm graying and I have wrinkles.  Attractive.  Right?  Right!  All of the above is attractive.  I'm whole.  Period.  And everything counts.  All of the neurosis, all of the profundity, my youth, and my aging.  All of the projects I start and don't finish.  All of my accomplishments.  My understanding and my misunderstanding.   The way I love and when I do not love.

Accepting myself as I am without judgment is my practice.  Being playful is my practice.  Letting go.

So today, when I went to the salon for a hair cut, I thought I might let the gray show, just get highlights of blond.  When I told the stylist, she raised a questioning eyebrow. Maybe not, I thought.

Two things happen:  1) I tell myself the story that there are certain ways of being in the world that are "holier" than others like not wearing makeup or letting my hair be natural, not dyed.  You know the look:  like a yogi, clean, dressed in all white, shining from the inside out.  2)  I get confused.  I think, If I don't wear makeup, wear 100% cotton all-white clothes, eat healthfully, say the right mantra, and let my hair go natural, I'll be holier, more whole, less contrived.

This thinking means that I have attached APPEARANCES to the Holy and its manifestation.  If appearances made one Holy-Whole, white organic cotton would be flying off the racks!  People would be texting each other:  now trending-white organic cotton!  We'd be having burn parties for colorful clothes, chanting in circles around the fire, our bliss unable to be contained.

Unfortunately, it's not that easy to get bliss.  Let's face it, being fully human is innately paradoxical.  Besides, it was the "shining from within" that really attracted me anyway.

The trick is the "without judgment" part.    Can I embrace myself as I am with all my perceived fallacies and limitations and love myself completely anyway?  If I do, I'll shine from within. Only then, can I do the same for you, for the planet.

I dyed my hair.  I may have my eyebrows threaded (assuming it's not painful!).  I might even eat sugar and let an occasional explicative slip (last night they flew out of my mouth like fireworks after I stepped through a spider web and thought it had landed in my hair!).

I am no less holy-whole for it.  Because I AM NOT MY BODY.  I AM NOT MY MIND.  I AM NOT THE JUDGE.  None of us are.  I may be a mirror for you.  I may be your greatest teacher because of  who I am and how I live.  You may learn acceptance and forgiveness because of me.  Who knows?

In the meantime, I get to do what I want to do as long as it does no harm of which I am aware.  I have decided, again.  I will change my mind often and with great conviction.  So there.

Playing with posts

Instant gratification and I are like this: visualize fingers crossed here.

So.  This being Independence Day (Happy Birthday USA), I am figuring out how to blog (write) which is what I really want to do and not repeat myself or have to update six web-sites!  I want to put my thoughts on virtual-paper and be done with it.  I want to be "connected."  I want to keep up, show my pictures, find new friends, and, to be honest, gather readers.  All of these are payoffs for social networking in cyberspace. I hope.  So I'm in.  Finally.  After coaxing from many friends and family and much resistance.  I'm in.  All the way in.  Sucked in as one friend put it.


And that's what I don't want. 

I'd rather be gardening, like yesterday.  Mr. Friendly and I collaborated on a mulching project.  I'd weeded the farthermost section of our backyard one more time.  I'd spent several hours in the mud, fighting mosquitoes, sweating.  I did not want to do it again.   Ever.

I convinced Mr. Friendly to help me.  We loaded the pick up with a yard of "living mulch."  This mulch, I understand, is full of compost so it will not only act as a heat barrier and hold moisture, it will also continuously feed your plants.  And your weeds!  So we put down a poly-something-or-other barrier that will act as a weed block and probably still be there when our grandchildren are having children!

We perspired together.  Got filthy together.  Jumped into the pool to cool off together.  And fell into bed exhausted.  Not together exactly because Mr. Friendly snores.  The fifteen linear feet of happily weeded, blocked, and mulched garden looks fabulous.  We agreed to do the same to the rest of that garden.  Wow!  That only took twenty-eight years.  Progress!

Anyway, today here I sit at the computer.  One, because I wanted to check in with my cyber-community and two, because I'm so sore I can hardly stand up.  However, I never want to sit here for long.  So, bear with me as I navigate the enigma of how to post in one place and have it magically update everywhere.

I'll keep you posted. Ha!