Healing

Balance Off: Journey of Creation – Day 20

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Copyright Tam Black 2017
Designed for susanwithpearls.com

Guiding Thought

There are no degrees of Love. Love is Whole, Full, and Perfect. Love in action is Creation; Love’s creations are Whole, Full, and Perfect. When we express Love, we are being creative in the Truest sense. Creativity is Love in action, and produces activities, relationships, and experiences which are Whole, Full, and Perfect.

Reflection

I’ve been talking with people this week, who have used the terms yin and yang; since I do not generally use the terms yin and yang, this phenomenon is something to look at. And as everything is currently in the context of Journey of Creation, I am applying it to my own Journey.

Yin and yang is a symbol of forces, or energies. Yin means the shady, shadow, or dark side; yang is the sunny, bright, or light side. In addition to the two “sides”, you will notice through the picture on the left that there is symbolic movement between the two sides: light turns to dark, which returns to light. Neither side is ever complete of itself; each contains the other, and only together is there wholeness. Each side contains the other, moves into the other, and is complete only with the other.

Here is how Lao Tzu describes it in the Tao Te Ching:

“When people see things as beautiful,
ugliness is created.
When people see things as good,
evil is created.

Being and non-being produce each other.
Difficult and easy complement each other.
Long and short define each other.
High and low oppose each other.
Fore and aft follow each other.”

This past week, one of the ways that this concept has been discussed with me is in the context of balance: Yin and yang work together in balance, but we can disrupt that balance with too much or too little of either yin or yang.

What does all this mean to me, in the context of today’s Guiding Thought, and the Journey in general?

First, I feel like I am off-balance. I am experiencing something in either excess or as deficiency. How do I know? I feel foggy, fuzzy, unfocused, as though I cannot grasp my own thoughts. The Guiding Thought was mere words; I could not reach the inner depth or meaning of the words today.

Second, I have been doing some intentional cleansing and releasing (among other things, I have stopped coffee cold turkey–no wonder I feel fuzzy and foggy!). I’ve been working on physical improvements to my health and well-being, but (as you know), everything is connected, and I am experiencing mental and emotional side-effects (releases) as well.

All of this has been in the context of my own Journey of Creation. Nothing happens during a Journey that is not part of the Journey.

I believe that the off-balance is, in the bigger picture, getting me back on balance–the movement of yin and yang. I must re-balance what is either in excess or deficient, and I am experiencing that as fuzzy, foggy, and unfocused. A ripple in the water is only perceived as “more” until its motion stops and it again becomes still.

As for the cleansing and releasing: such things always have side effects. Toxins come to the surface for release, but when they come to the surface, I experience their effects. This goes for physical, mental, or emotional toxins. I feel that I am releasing, but going through the symptoms as the toxins leave.

As for how this all relates to Journey of Creation: I am making way for Truth and Love, and the experience of it in my life–getting rid of stuff that no longer serves me or my goals of co-creating with Love. Though I am a bit “off”, I am happily here, moving through, past, and onward!

 

Why a Journey of Healing 2016

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Greetings and welcome! Today begins a new Journey–oh, happy day!

As the title suggests, we begin the Journey with thoughts about why to do this Journey. This is the place to begin to sift through your intentions and expectations. It’s a place to begin to get clear about what you want for yourself (and/or others–we are all One), what you want to work on for 40 days. You do not have to know exactly, but you do need to reflect as best you can, and write down some thoughts about what you want to focus on.

This is what I do here, today. Please keep in mind that your reasons for doing this are all your own. Stay true to yourself. Be honest with yourself. This is your Journey. My thoughts will not be your thoughts. My thoughts are here to inspire you, to offer one way to think about how you might proceed, or to open your flow of energy. If you like what I write and you are stuck…follow my writing–use my thoughts as a springboard, put them in your own words, then they become yours. Viola!

I’m so glad you are here with me.

___________________________________________________________________________________

There are two related things that I will be working on. The first idea was introduced at the end of the last Journey, the second is a familiar idea, revisited.

Here is the idea from the end of last Journey, which I have been mulling over for the past 10 days:

Transformation through the light of Love is the only way to change the pain, suffering, guilt, or blame in anyone, at any time. Transformation, transmutation changes everything. This is the secret to dispelling karma, this is the secret to unraveling death, this is the secret to getting out of the birth-death cycle: Love. Transformative, transfiguring, transmuting LOVE. The old is gone. Love remains. Love is all there is.

Love is all there is. Yet, Love is not all that people experience. In fact, most of the time people experience things that are not-like Love (anger, greed, grief, betrayal, let down, etc., called suffering, in some traditions). Healing is another word for the transmutation or transformation of the experience of those things that are not-like Love to an experience of Love.

Thus, the first thing I am working on is a better awareness and understanding of what is required for this transmutation or transfiguration into an experience of Love.

The second thing I am going to work on is something I’ve mentioned here before, but now I am including it in this particular context:

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” – Rumi

This seems related to transformation/transfiguration, because I must first find the things that need to be transmuted. Love is all there is. There is no need to seek for Love, because it is there already, within me, as me. Unfortunately, I have built my own barriers to Love. It’s up to me to find them and transform them. This is also healing.

As I mentioned in the recent Afterword, there have been a few moments when I think, spontaneously, “I Love myself”. Let me tell you: Love feels good. I am talking about that Love that comes from nowhere, has no origin, no impetus, no thought, no connection with anything other than Itself, which bubbles up and enfolds and feels totally genuine and authentic.  Love feels good. You know it when you feel it. Somewhere within myself, I know this Love is all I am, all I want, all that is. I am reminded of that when it bubbles up from nowhere; It gives me a taste, a hint, a reminder, “I am here; I am what is possible; I am all you want”.

Why a Journey of Healing? Because it’s right. And it’s up to me to be with the Love which is already with me.

 

Unraveling Healing: Journey of Courage – Day 28

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Copyright Tam Black 2015 Designed for susanwithpearls.com
Copyright Tam Black 2015
Designed for susanwithpearls.com

Guiding Thought

We allow ourselves to connect with our pure Inner Divine Heart of Oneness We are aware of the expression of the Divine Heart through us, as us. We connect with our heart, and are aware of embodying its pure Love intention for All. We are filled with Joy as we embrace our heart’s Love.

Sharing

I started this Journey not knowing or understanding what courage “should be” about. Then, a wise person reminded me the Journeys reveal themselves. Each day on the Journey unravels something, uncovers something, or connects to something. Each day reveals something hidden, or illuminates an aspect of the Whole. Each day offers a method for changing perspective, for shifting into ideas of a higher vantage point, a higher “nature”. They bring me out of my “I” and into Love and Oneness.

Today I feel like I am unraveling; the Guiding Thought is giving me perspective.

I mentioned a few days ago that I “found” a healing technique called Jharra; for the past week I’ve immersed myself in its healing energy. If you’ve ever done any healing work, you know this can be intense.

Courage today means facing the unraveling necessary for healing, without falling apart! The old must be made new. I must have the courage not only to face the old but also to take responsibility for it, and take responsibility for its transformation.

“I” must change. I must change my “I”.

My “I” has (“lower”, “ego”) wants and needs that it expects others to fill (this is the nature of the “I”, to keep itself immature and irresponsible). When those people don’t do what “I” want them to, my “I” feels overlooked and unloved, and blames the other person (do you see how circuitous this is?) When it blames the other person, it withdraws, thinking, “Why should I give anything if it’s just going to be ignored or overlooked?” and “If giving and not-giving produce the same result, why bother giving?”

But you see, this kind of thinking is rooted in giving to get; it is thinking from the lower-mind, the ego-mind, always wanting something in return. My higher-mind knows better; it knows the giving is the receiving, but my lower-mind is asserting itself. There is tension.

I’m not sure what the first-or root-cause of this thought-pattern is/was, but I know it’s been with me a long time. I’ve seen it, acknowledged it, worked with it but it’s still there, even though it’s weaker and smaller than it was 5 or 10 or 20 years ago.

I think it is on its way to total transformation…or at least to a healthy dose of it. This past week has brought together the conditions for moving it on out…hopefully, anyway. I can feel it fighting. It doesn’t want to go; “I” don’t want it to go.

One of the energies I’ve been working with over the past week is that of the Protector-Healer: Anubis in the Egyptian, and Kalbairav in the Hindu/Vedic. I think it is this energy of protection from my lower-self, protection from my own shadows that is very key in these conditions of release. Not only am I able to heal, I am assured of safety as I do so. (It feels neither safe nor healing to “me”, though. Did I mention there is tension?)

Today is bringing up a lot of connections to other Journeys:

A Journey of the Heart: It takes courage to follow the heart, and do the healing necessary for it to emerge in Love

A Journey of Healing: is this self-explanatory?

A Journey of Worth, particularly the 10th day of each round: “I am willing to understand how I must rise above the struggles and pains of the world. I am willing to rise again and again with each call for help, each outstretched hand. I am willing to be the one to choose to change. I offer my pain, suffering, guilt, and blame up for transformation, into the light of Love that I may see and give only the light of Love always.”

I am feeling as many pieces coming together as I do being ripped apart.

The Marathon of Enlightenment

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My friend Ka (aka Fiesta Estrellas) is many things: an artist, a poet, an astrologer to name but a few. A few years ago she had a 9mm herniated disk (L5/S1), which she chose to heal naturally, through things like diet, exercise, acupuncture, but most of all, through learning to listen to her body for what it needed to heal. Her healing was slow; it took over a year. That process of healing she likened to what others might experience learning to train for running a marathon. She says:

“Many people embark on the journey/goal of running a marathon. More and more are interested in pushing themselves to states of peak performance. Yet, how do we train for a marathon other than running a longer distance, over time; in effect, we run further and longer than the marathon itself. That’s how we train!  That’s how we get ready for something that can seem so long, and like such a tremendous feat:  We aim even higher than [the] actual goal.”

For Ka, this is a metaphor for healing, and I thought this is a great metaphor for the Journey of Enlightenment.

If a marathon is representative of physical peak-performance, then enlightenment is its spiritual/mental/physical counterpart (total enlightenment includes body-mastery). Training to do a marathon requires running a longer and longer distance over time, until the body is trained to complete the 26.2 miles; enlightenment requires similar steps through meditation, contemplation, spiritual practices, etc., until being enlightened is the natural state of personal expression. Both marathons and enlightenment are tremendous feats—each attainable through aiming high and doing the training necessary to achieve them. Both are mental and physical journeys, requiring intent, focus, practice, determination, and persistence.

Ka continues:

“There’s got to be some kind of distraction while our muscles are working so hard; and while, in the beginning it’s so challenging, before we realize it, we’ve [got to] just keep going, and we keep going…The whole movement itself becomes sort of like a sitting meditation. We might not be able to wrap our minds [around] each and every step, but at some point – we trust our steps.”

The Journey of Enlightenment is the same way! In the beginning there are so many distractions. It is challenging to deny disruptive, unhelpful thoughts and to affirm loving, peaceful, beneficial thoughts and behaviors. But the more you do it, the easier it becomes; life smooths out and begins to reflect peace rather than tumult; life becomes the meditation, just as running becomes the meditation. Every step counts; continuing to take every step—whether you can wrap your head around it or not—matters. Then at some point, even without understanding, we begin to trust the steps…and then the steps themselves become easier!

Finally, Ka says:

“Of course, not everyone can run a marathon. But, I guess that’s up to the runner and the runner’s body to decide. What do we risk? What are the costs involved? Why do we do such things? What is self-development all about? Can we really improve the lives of others, just by being and becoming our best selves?”

I know I sure have no aspirations to run a marathon—but could I if I wanted to? I’d like to think so. If I properly focused my mind and body, I think there is nothing I couldn’t do. But marathon running is not my aspiration, enlightenment is.

Could you run a marathon…heal yourself…or become enlightened if you wanted to? What is the risk of thinking, “maybe someday”? What would you have to give up? How would you have to change? What could you gain?

My answer to Ka’s final question is an emphatic yes. Yes, we can improve the lives of others just by being and becoming our best selves. Aspire. Choose your journey. Take the steps. You are worth it.

Read Ka’s original post here: https://fiestaestrella.wordpress.com/2015/05/07/how-to-train-for-a-marathon/

Read about Ka’s Healing Journey here: https://healingmydisc.wordpress.com/

 

 

 

The Power of Choice: Journey of Gratitude – Day 38

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Copyright Tam Black 2015 Designed for susanwithpearls.com
Copyright Tam Black 2015
Designed for susanwithpearls.com

Guiding Thought

I seek only to Love in Unity. Love is Pure in Oneness. Let me Love All including myself in Oneness, that I may Know gratitude as the result of Being Whole in Love.

Sharing

“How do you feel?” This is a simple enough question for most. Most people have a baseline for how they feel in general. When asked, “How do you feel?” if they are at this baseline, they will simply answer, “Good.” or “Fine.” If they are slightly above this baseline, they may respond, “Really good.” and if they are well above the baseline, the response might be, “Really good!” or “Excellent!” or “Fantastic!” If they are slightly below the baseline, they may respond, “Okay.” or “Okay.” —with a slight facial twist to indicate they are not quite baseline okay; if they are well below the baseline, they may simply respond, “Eh.”

Everyone has a baseline and a corresponding response. It’s almost as though it’s woven into the fabric of social relations that we understand the responses. Most of the time, the responses don’t really answer the question.

When I was about 8 years old I remember being in a fairly traumatic situation (this is a relative view, the perception of an 8-year-old. With maturity, hindsight, and a bit of inner work, it was not that bad). During this situation, I was not-gently prodded to express my feelings. I froze in that moment. I remember thinking to myself, “FINE. Then I just won’t feel”. In that moment, I made the decision to disconnect from my emotions.

Until I was about 23, when I was asked question, “How do you feel?” my emotions froze…completely. I never knew how I felt. I took the question literally, not as a social interaction, because the situation as an 8-year old made the question literal in my head. When someone asked me how I felt, I was not wired to give the expected social answer, but to analyze my emotions and try to answer the question, but I couldn’t, because I had shut myself off from them.

At age 23 I was introduced to a tool called the behavioral barometer. This has been the single greatest tool for me to identify my emotions and to work through them. With it, when someone asked “How do you feel?” I could pull out my barometer, look at the words, do an internal assessment, and answer the question (the full use of the tool goes way beyond this, but this is the simplest explanation for the current purpose). Though I still keep a barometer with me about 75 percent of the time, I can now feel and identify the feeling without it most of the time; it has become a natural tool for me.

For every emotion on the barometer (the right hand column), there is a corresponding “State of Being” (the left hand column). The goal is to work through the emotion and to realize (in the fullest sense of the word) one’s own state of being. The catalyst is choice.

When I was 8, I made the choice not to feel. Since age 23, I have been choosing to feel more and more, because I understand feelings as a clue to understanding my true state of being—who I really am.

Emotions are not who I Am. Emotions flow through me; they are not me. Emotions pass and I can watch them. They are an expression of something, but I do not have to define that something as me. If I am feeling, I am not being.

I can choose.

Who do I want to be? How do I want to be? Ultimately, I know that I will need to dissolve even the concepts of “I” and “me”…but I am not there yet. For now, it’s enough to want to be more. This goes beyond being a better person, a kinder colleague, a more loving and understanding friend, a compassionate teacher.

I want to be whole. I want to be pure. I want to be Love.

I choose. I am.