Moving at the Speed of Life...

Everything is changing.  Everything is moving quickly.  Everything is lining up, turning around, and light is being shone in dark corners.  Our purpose, our challenges, our to-dos are becoming clearer and more central in our daily lives.  We can't ignore things anymore.  We can't pretend things away.  We can't stick our heads in the sand.  We must - and we will - start to create great shifts in our own lives and in the world around us.

The journey has already begun.  You're on the bridge.

Be open.  Whatever shows up is showing up for you.  Yes, things are moving quickly and that's because we are all changing so quickly.  The world is changing at a very rapid pace and while we need to be careful to take care of ourselves and stay grounded, we must also be aware of the shifting, changing nature of life so we can allow ourselves to move into the correct flow of life - and onward to the other end of the bridge.

The speed of life is hastening.  You don't try to fight it because the battle will be too consuming.  Be open to it and to what it is calling you to do.  You have an important job to do.  You have an important job that the world needs you to do.

If ever there was an important time to be busy during the times in which you are meant to be busy, now is that time.  This does, of course, mean that it is more important than ever to slow down when you are supposed to rest.  The increasing speed of life will call you to become grounded and honor your body.  After all, it is this one precious body of yours - and mine - that will carry us stealthily through the shifting changes happening in the world and on to the new world we are creating - on in which peace and love carry us all through.

Flip your perspective...

It's so easy to get stuck.  Really stuck.  In our thinking, in our worries, in our ideas.  Even in the good things, we can get stuck - but those are easier to navigate.  It's when we get so deeply lodged in our own fears that it is critical to flip our thinking.  The only way out, I've found, is to imagine - and keep imagining - the exact opposite of our current situation.  That's when you get leverage from the universal law that says that what you think about expands, what you focus on, you attract more of and what you give your attention to, you manifest.

It is easy to understand then - in understanding this universal law of expansion - that by focusing more and more on the bad stuff or the suffering in your life, more of that exact situation is created, digging a deeper and deeper rut until you feel so incredibly stuck that you forget how to look for a way out of it.

Flipping your perspective, by creating a situation that is so completely opposite from the stuck place you may find yourself in allows you to start creating the space you want to be in rather than the one you don't want to be in.  The more you think about the place you want to be, and the more colors you use to paint that picture and the more details and emotions you attach to what you want, the more you open that magical, mystical vortex that allows you to create what you want in your life - and, at the same time, you will be moving away from that place of stuck-ness that you so desperately want to get out of.

I'm a big fan of fake it 'til you make it - that's the what.  The how is by flipping your stuck situation and focusing on where you want to be rather than where you are.  Your mind is a very loyal and reliable employee of yours.  It works around the clock without judgement or argument and it will gladly respond to what you think about by creating a stronger and stronger thought pattern to solidify and: (this is your choice, not your mind's) either further entrench you in what you don't want or to create a whole new attitude and way of thinking about what you do want.  In turn, the cells of your body (another hardworking doobie on your team) will respond in kind by making you feel either sicker, sadder and more stuck, or if you just choose to flip your thinking, your body will respond to make you feel healthier, stronger and more free to create what you want.

So if you're feeling stuck, just try it.  Imagine the opposite situation from the one you are in.  There are endless different perspectives you can have so go ahead and just start creating.  Make your new perspecive as fancy and wonderful as you possibly can, meditate on it and watch what develops in your life.  Remember that all of your employees (mind, body and universe), will respond to create for you so be careful what you wish for...!  Just be sure to keep it up.  Rome wasn't built in a day, you know.

When life shows up....

Sometimes it's subtle.
Sometimes it's overly avert.

Sometimes it's a shock.

Sometimes it's been there all along....

Photo of artwork in a coffee shop, name unknown, message received.

Life brings us so much each day.  Just sit, quiet and look.  Can't see anything?  Close your eyes and look within. It is in the moments when you think God has forgotten to deliver that He is doing his greatest work within you.  Be sure to pay attention to these quiet moments because they are preparing you for the moments that will arrive around the corner when everything you need outside of yourself starts to show up.  Your tools, your relationships, your challenges and your opportunities.  All yours.  All for your work in the world.  It all shows up for you to use in delivering upon your unique, divine mission in life.  

Don't miss it.  Odds are that it won't look like what you expect nor arrive when you're ready, but it all comes.  For you.  And only you.  Are you opening the door?

Soul groups & the power of love...

Spiritual teachers are telling us that we are all on a path to enlightenment.  We are starting to know ourselves in a deeper way and we are connecting with our higher, divine selves.  I've experienced this for years.  We are also tuning into our soul-level connections with each other and our soul groups are being revealed to us.  Have you noticed?

It happens when you meet someone with whom you have an instant understanding.  Someone you feel deep and pure love for and with.  When that happens, that someone is part of your soul group and it serves as a sign for you that your soul group is ready to find each other and do more powerful work on our planet at this time.  

As your soul sisters and brothers are revealed to you more and more, know that the purpose of this is to teach you - and all of us - how to love.  When you find that you love your friends, your teachers, your students, your colleagues... for reasons that you can't quite explain, then know that it is for the purpose of learning how to love all humans on Earth.  It is this love - as it expands to people we don't know and will never meet - that will replace hate and violence with peace and compassion in the world.  

Several members of my soul group have been revealed to me in recent years and it is clear to me that we each get each other in a way that goes far beyond the kind of friendship I remember having with people ten or twenty years ago.  There is a shift happening.

Are you aware of your own soul group?  Do you feel a deep love for people unlike any you've had in the past?  Pay attention to this and take a moment to reflect on why you are being given this gift at this time in life. And know that this kind of powerful and selfless love is divine and healing and you are a messenger of God... so go... and spread the love.

Celebrating death?

I'm back from my hiatus and the first and most prominent thing on my mind is the state of peace and humanity in the world.  I am feeling a sense of sadness and disappointment amidst the celebration of Osama Bin Laden's death - and a deep level of concern for where we humans, in 2011, place our hearts on the grand scale of human compassion.  Is it really okay to celebrate the death of another human being?

Celebrating the death of Bin Laden - once I heard the news of both his killing and the wave of American response - struck me instantly as just a wrong thing to do.  Why would we metaphorically dance on someone's grave?  Spit on it, sure, I get that.  It's an expression of anger.  But can celebration be an expression of anger?  Celebration comes from feelings of joy and happiness and love.  This is just not something that computes for me - and whats worse, it feels wrong and lacking in some sort of alignment to what is truly divine within each of us.

I've learned with time and much spiritual work that my initial non- ego-created response to something always contains a level of truth that comes from something far greater than my own mind.  I - and I think many others - tend to "revise" our positions after we have our initial response to a situation (and I am referring to our initial solar plexus-located intuitive-level response).  That revision is done in consideration of social norms, learned beliefs and opinions which are all external creations.  Once our egoistic minds become engaged in the process of categorizing, judging and assigning labels to a situation - often to a degree that the response is no longer that inner truth that we can rely on - I believe that we become misguided and get off track.  And it just so happens that I think that is what has happened in this situation.

It turns out that my initial intuitive response to the news of Bin Laden's killing is precisely in line with my very conscious belief in peace for human kind.  As we have had a couple of days to live with this new information about Bin Laden's death, I have found myself feeling a great sense of concern for humanity.  It makes me sad that there is so much pain, fear, death and destruction in the world - and amidst all that, I'm also sad that humans are capable of celebrating the death of another human being.  To be relieved, satisfied, or even glad about the "loss" of a human being - one most humans have every reason to despise - is one thing, but this act of celebration and how that is tied to a kind of patriotism is rather upsetting to me.

Celebrating death, in my heart, feels sad, lonely and misguided.  Death is not something to be celebrated.  In this case, this death will not be mourned by most people, but joyous singing and dancing in the streets in celebration?  It just seems wrong.  What does that say about us?  Bin Laden killed so many people -- that he is gone should give us pause to honor the lives of all who have died and suffered because of this man. We should pay little regard at all to him and focus all of our consciousness and emotion on the love that still surrounds the innocent lives lost both here in the US and around the world.  (Americans are not Bin Laden's only victims.)  I think, instead, we should bond together in our commitment to end the violence and bring more love and peace to the world.  Let's honor the souls lost to senseless violence rather than celebrating the death of one man.

The way we respond to ANY situation in life is a reflection on us - not the person or situation we are responding to.  It's kind of entry-level spiritual work I'm talking about.  Forgiveness is not for the person being forgiven but for the person that forgives.  The way I react to someone who treats me badly says something about me, not about the person mistreating me.  And the way I respond to the news of death - especially of someone connected to so much violence and hatred and destruction - speaks to who I am at the core.

I'm simply uncomfortable with bringing happiness to this situation.  Rather, I'm left feeling a deep desire to heal the world, to give more love to others and to have reverence for the entire course of human action.  Many, many people died at the hands of this Bin Laden and his followers.  What, exactly, in this situation is there to be happy about?  Bin Laden is gone but he is just one person - there is an entire army of misguided human beings who have obeyed and tortured and died for him.  Do we really think that will change now that he is dead?  Is anyone really breathing a sigh of relief?  Does anyone really feel safer now?  What, exactly then is being celebrated?

The spiritual teachers from whom I seek guidance - Jesus, Buddha, the Dalai Lama, Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, MLK, Mother Theresa - would never celebrate the death of another human being.  Nor will I.