I’m not one to be a Debbie Downer, but dang if I’m not feeling an unshakable sense of doom, but it’s mixed with a sense of knowing that whatever is coming is destiny. It’s world changing. And isn’t our world in desperate need of change? But part of the problem is that here in our neck of the woods, we, at least until now, have perhaps been some of the least exposed to all that needs to change. It’s not that some fucked up things don’t happen here, but for some reason, we have a tendency to keep so much of that under wraps. For the things that effect our wallets, we jump on a bandwagon of blaming the democrats or the republicans, and if you actually still think we will fair better with one party or another, you especially need to open your eyes to that theater designed to keep us not paying attention. Not that I necessarily recommend paying attention either.
Pluto in Aquarius is all about kicking over that which doesn’t belong…ideally making room for something better. There are a shit ton of things going on in the world that just aren’t right. Far away AND close to home.
I had the thought, what if the reason I find it so hard to be at peace for any ongoing length of time (anyone else?) is that until all of those on the planet that desire peace, have access to it, none of us can. Perhaps we are absorbing the energies of the unrest of the world at large, even if for all intents and purposes it looks like all is relatively “business as usual” behind our proverbial red, white, and blue picket fence.
What I know for sure is that we can’t begin to imagine the effects of things like bombs dropping on us from above (much less a nuclear attack), or an army of aliens landing, or the powers that be deciding to shift directions and abandon and/or manipulate the economy of the US for its own gains. Not only can we not imagine it, rather it seems impossible. We’ve been allowed to believe that we are a powerhouse…untouchable…that we come to the rescue of others because we are so “bad ass”. But what if any of those things did happen? What would we do? To survive, we would have to be extremely present. Not dwelling on the past or fearing the future. We would have to be so still to be able to align with the way forward, which would be nothing like waiting to recover from a recession in hopes of getting back to the way things were. Perhaps, instead, we will be waiting for a whole new way of life never before experienced. And I’m pretty sure it will be irrelevant as to who our president is.
We could decide in the moment that this is our new reality and choose how we are going to proceed, or we could suffer and dwell on what we no longer have or what might never be again.
I’ve heard it said before that most of what we worry about will (and never has) come to fruition. But also, other things we didn’t worry about happened despite us not having thought about them.
So, worry not??? That’s easier said than done. To be honest, I don’t even know what I’m worried about. I just feel uneasy in general. I used to think that was a personal problem. Decades ago, I thought it was what drove me to success. Sometimes now I think it interferes with my success. But more so, lately, I think it’s a collective consciousness thing because the writing is on the walls and it’s rippling through all of us, like a teeny tiny little whisper of a warning.
I’m sure it hasn’t helped me that I recently binge watched three seasons of the show “Saving Grace” which first came out in 2007. The main character, played by Holly Hunter, is given a “last chance” angel named Earl to try to get her to turn her life toward God. I thought it was going to be all warm and fuzzy, like another old show “Touched by an Angel”. Well, it wasn’t. Instead, episode after episode has her questioning why God lets bad things happen. She is angry at God. Despite that, it really was a good show, and I kept on watching because I was sure she was eventually going to come around. She sort of did, but it was after a string of tragedies, and there was no “happily ever after” that I expected to come round by the end. In fact, I hated the ending. Unfortunately, I chose to watch that episode this morning, before I started to write, because I thought it was going to have an entirely different ending and then I would be all warm and fuzzy as I wrote today’s article. Instead, you’re getting this.
Similarly to the way that I judge the productive me as “good” and the procrastinating me as “bad”, I noticed that I judge the way life unfolds as being a similar version of fair and unfair. Sometimes it seems that certain people have it better than others, and that doesn’t seem fair. Less trauma, less tragedy, while others seem to get more than their fair share. But I also think it only seems that way because not everyone processes things the same way. Some people wallow in grief most of their lives and other people adopt a “good vibes only” attitude and come across as though nothing will ever get in their way. Also, sometimes life seems like a box of chocolates, and you never know what you are going to get (in my case, from one day to the next).
I’ve been pretty energized and focused this week, but also I’ve been pretty confronted about the things that are and have always gone on in the world at large, but from which we’ve been largely immune to here in the United States. But for the first time in my life, I can’t help but wonder if that will start to change, and what effects that will have on our futures.
For certain, the way we choose to move through it will be crucial. And yes, we do have a choice in the way we spin things to ourselves, most importantly.
As a side note, in my love of everything “woo”, I just asked the pendulum if it was right for me to be writing something so authentically dreary, or if I should try to put some frosting and sprinkles on the shit cake I seem to be operating on top of at the moment. It said, yes, so brace yourselves. But not to worry, I know the “soul-ution” and I will share that, as well. Not sure if that’s good news or not, because it does require practice.
Yet, without anything in particular on my radar to worry about at this point in time, I find myself worrying about the most outrageous things at times and then I stop myself mid-worry and consider if doing so is serving me. Of course, I conclude, it absolutely is not. In fact, even if some of the things I could choose to worry about did come to fruition, what would worrying about them in advance even done for me?
Instead of worrying, I’m practicing silencing my mind. That isn’t where the answers are going to come from anyway.
Every morning I’m spending at least 8 minutes doing deep breathing exercises to activate my pineal gland. Why?
Diagram from Wikipedia
In the 17th century, it is said that Rene Descartes discovered this gland to have a mystical purpose and described it as the “principal seat of the soul”. It wasn’t until the mid-20th century that it was discovered to be neuroendocrine organ, which generally speaking, means it produces a hormone in the serotonin (happy) family.
You know I love Dr. Joe Dispenza. He has a new movie coming out called “Source: It’s Within You” which I’m sure will eventually be mainstream and is said to be all about the scientifically proven benefits of meditation and activating the pineal gland. I’m sure this movie will explain this far better than I ever do, but I will at least attempt to speak to as why I at least spend some time every day activating that gland so that my thoughts will be clear, informed by my soul…my personal connection to the divine.
When our brains aren’t coherent, we are susceptible to off the rail thoughts, such as: there isn’t enough time or money; nobody cares about me; I’m in pain; I’m tired; I want; I need; I can’t…
But when our brains are coherent, supposedly we feel whole, happy, in love with our lives, trusting we will be able to navigate whatever comes in the future; that the universe is on our side; we are part of much larger plan than we could otherwise imagine.
I believe this is true and I also feel I have experienced this. I may not be able to stay in a place of continuous peace, as I do feel myself slipping in and out of the inner knowing that comes when I’m there, but I am getting better at doing whatever I need to do to get myself back there ASAP.
Mostly I meditate first thing in the morning and I’m not sure why I dread it so much, because I absolutely do feel better after doing so. When I’ve been especially anxious, I’ve done a meditation midday and I’ve experienced immediate results, so I have no plausible explanation as to why I don’t do it more often, other than I don’t feel like it. If I knew how to do so on my MacBook, I’d insert an eye roll emoji here.
Tapping would also help tremendously, and I’ve experienced it having done so, but I also consistently forget that tapping is even a thing, until sometime later when I feel totally fine, and I miraculously remember, “oh yeah, I should’ve done some tapping.” (insert another eye roll).
I have been going outside to sit on the ground every afternoon and I gotta say, that is pretty amazing. I have no idea why, but it seems to provide some relief. I’m letting the negative energy that has accumulated in my body, and the auric field surrounding it, drain out into mother earth, which is said to create space for the positive to flow in from above into the newly created space.
I have this little machine called a “chi machine” and it has a fluffy foot cradle where I rest my feet and I turn it on and it moves them left to right at whatever speed I choose. It is said to get the lymph in your body moving. It’s doing something, because I feel amazing after the 16 minutes or so I let it run.
I’m taking a hot bath with Epsom salts at least one day a week and I just lay there and let bliss envelope me.
I’m dancing around with wild abandon, mostly to country music, at least a couple times a week. Getting solidly in your body is a great way to get out of the chatter of your mind. Dancing alone is nice because you don’t have to worry about your thoughts about other people or what they might be thinking of you. Sex can be a great way to get in your body too, but I spent the majority of my life having sex while thinking various thoughts about it. I talk more extensively about this in my book, so you’ll have to wait for more information in regard to those particulars. I don’t have a partner right now, nor do I want one at the moment, so I’ll have to stick to dancing to get solidly in my body.
Actually, getting a massage is another good way to get in your body. I did get a massage last week, and it was nowhere near as lovely as getting a massage from my favorite massage therapist, but I’m 6 hours away from her so I had to make do. I made sure to enjoy every second of how good it felt to experience the relaxation that can come from being physically touched. I spent a good part of my life not particularly liking to be touched, so it is especially triumphant for me to be able to experience this.
A coherent/still/content brain sets the stage for spontaneous healing, receiving ideas and attracting opportunities toward you that fulfil your unmet needs, awareness, in general, of things that are blocking you so that you can remove them.
I get adequate sleep. It is so important to rest. To know you are worthy of being replenished.
I’m also eating way too many snacks. I don’t recommend that.
Me outside sitting on the ground while it was 35 degrees out. I wasn’t even cold.
The thing that was the most triggering to me this week was getting more up close and personal with what is going on in the world by learning about some of the 240 hostages held by Hamas, particularly those who are young women, especially as the United Nations has now said there is reason to believe that they are being raped and sexually tormented.
Even when I think back to the Holocaust, I am mind blown that an entire nation somehow found justification in killing hundreds of millions of Jewish people and I don’t doubt that something similar could happen again in our own country.
I had something interesting happen this week. I love listening to Tarot readings on YouTube, but I go through phases of getting bored with them, and of late, I had only been listening to my favorite reader @ScorchedEarthTarot and of course, my cousin Liz’s amazing readings @HereticOwlTarot.
I find it fascinating that such readings, general in nature as they are being read for anyone with a particular astrology sign, are so often “spot on” to what I’m experiencing at that time in my life. I almost always find the perfect encouragement in them.
But I listened to a 3-month overview April-June by Scorched Earth for Sagittarius and to be honest, it sounded terrible, and I felt a little panicked about what could potentially happen over the next 3 months. I also listened to Gemini, which is my rising sign, and felt a lot better for that reading. I’ve heard it said that you sun sign is more your outer appearance/your ego/how the world sees you, whereas your rising sign/ascendant is more your authentic self, who you are on the inside, revealing more of as you become spiritually aligned. Hopefully I am stepping more into my greater purpose and if that is the case, perhaps the old me will experience struggle as I meld more deeply with where I am going.
I enjoy tarot, astrology, and many other metaphysical things that some people believe are sacrilegious, but to me are confirmations of my spirituality and direct connection to the divine, but I also don’t want to live my life as though they are hard truths rather than guidance while on my path. To me they are tools given to people who want deeper understanding.
But if this reading was actually a tool for guidance, then what was the lesson from hearing, for what is maybe the first time, messages interpreted by the reader of the cards, that didn’t feel inspiring?
Dr. Brene Brown talks about something she calls “foreboding joy”. That when things are going well, we worry that something is going to come along to take it away. We lose our tolerance for vulnerability, and put up the walls and in doing so, we stop connecting with those things that fill us with contentment. We brace ourselves. We sweat the small stuff. We can spiral into imaging the worst and suddenly life doesn’t feel okay even when it is. Instead, we wait for “the other shoe to drop”.
I didn’t want to do that. I didn’t want to spiral into things that “could” happen, and even worse, think about how I would feel if they did happen. I thought if I did that I would shut down and allow fear to run the show and that would get in the way of experiencing joy in anything at all.
So, I decided to really sit with the idea that bad things could happen and let’s say if this was somehow a “heads up” that they were about to, what exactly would I want to do beforehand?
Of course, the first people I thought about were my daughters. I know many people who have lost a child, and it seems most of them never recover. While my heart has broken for the parents I know who have experienced this, I also mourn for the soul of the child who, maybe, has to go on into eternity knowing that the idea of what they didn’t get to experience was never let go of by the people they left behind. What if that somehow keeps them tethered to the past and they aren’t free to experience what is next until everyone mourning for them has also gone on to eternity. That the memory of them and the amount of life they did live was limited to thoughts of what was lost rather than what was joyful.
In a much smaller, but somewhat similar way, I experience the loss of even knowing that my little girls are no longer little girls and I don’t see them every single day, like I did not very long ago. Even that can pull on my heartstrings, yet to allow myself to stay in those thoughts limits their purpose in life, as well as my own.
Interestingly, in those small moments of dwelling on the past, I choose to remember what was good and choose to forget the times I couldn’t wait for them to be grown and on their own.
In another small, but somewhat similar way, it reminds me of how everyone says nice things about anyone who dies, even if they were total monsters. Years after someone is gone, families still won’t talk about some of the horrific things some people did that might allow others to finally heal.
I know on the one hand, it seems so morbid to imagine the death of someone so close to us, but it felt like an exercise my heart wanted to experience, so I really let myself sit with what I would want to feel for the sake of my daughters’ souls, should anything ever happen to them, which I also understand would be so much harder if in fact something ever did happen.
But the bottom line is every single person will die some day and no one knows just when that day will be.
I allowed myself to truly connect with each of my daughter’s souls. One at a time, I thought about when they were born and what it was like to see them for the first time and what it was like to hold them skin to skin against my chest. I thought of the times I most wanted to protect them throughout their lives and what I most desire to protect them from going forward. I visualized planting in their hearts the knowing that no matter what, I will be right there forever and always. In my own heart I planted the gratitude that however long they may be with me, that I am so blessed they chose me to be their mama, as surely they knew in advance what flaws I came with. I was literally bawling the entire time. I’m glad I got to experience this in the manner I did and hope I never have to experience it any other way.
Interestingly, the very same day, they both reached out to me at totally different times “just to talk”. They didn’t need anything, which was nice, they just wanted to touch base. They both talked for over an hour, my oldest was on the train riding back to her apartment from school. My youngest was driving to the grocery store and kept talking the whole time she was there shopping all the way to being back in her car. At first, despite having done that exercise earlier that morning, I didn’t really feel like talking. I was in the middle of writing and riding the wave of words really flowing. The fact that they didn’t need anything in particular meant the “get into mama mode” adrenalin that often happens when I talk to them and “somethings wrong” didn’t engage. But instead of resisting getting into “talk mode” I let myself relax into the moment, closed my computer, snuggled up comfy in my bed, and just enjoyed being with them as they rambled on about life. The whole time I thought about how grateful I am that they are in my life and that at least for now, I know they are okay, even though they are also often “anxiety ridden” about their futures.
What if feeling my love and connection to them is what had them feel love for me and want to connect? And what if that happens with people who have passed? Is it possible they were thinking loving things about us and that made us think of them? And that when we think of them, wherever they are, they feel the love as well?
What if that happens to the hostages held in Gaza? What if they check out of what is happening to them and instead feel comforted by the love that is being sent their way. Harder to imagine is what might happen if love were sent to their captors, which to be honest, I don’t think I can do yet. There in could lie the problem. I am not at a point where I can think loving thoughts about people I think are evil.
What if whenever we still our minds (and activate our hearts and pineal glands or whatever the heck happens when we do so) we also instill a sense of peace in the collective consciousness and people who are experiencing traumatic events somehow suddenly feel a peace they otherwise wouldn’t have had access to.
What if half of the planet is on antidepressants because at some low rumble in the collective consciousness we know that life as we know it is about to erupt and we don’t think we will be able to handle it?
While I was midway through writing, I felt compelled to grab the book called “The Untethered Soul”.
I didn’t even remember buying the book, but my soul told me to look for it. I’d never even opened it, but lately, I’ve been guided to buy quite a few books that I am sure I want to read some day. When this happened this morning, I had no idea what I was even going to write about today. I decided to get my writing prompt by opening it up and seeing what passage my eyes landed on.
In this case, it was so good, I went on to read the whole chapter. Guess what it is called? “Let go now or fall.” Dang. I truly do believe that we can embrace what is happening in our lives as destiny and seek to understand it or we can resist it and essentially live hell on earth.
This chapter was the first in Section III, “Freeing Yourself”.
The first words I read were “Life is continuously changing, and if you’re trying to control it, you’ll never be able to fully live it.”
I wish you could read all 8 pages of the chapter, but for now I’m going to pick out a few paragraphs that most spoke to me as being pertinent to today’s writing.
“If you have a lot of fear, you won’t like change. You’ll try to create a world that doesn’t stimulate your fears. Fear doesn’t want to feel itself; it’s actually afraid of itself. So, you utilize the mind in an attempt to manipulate life for the purpose of not feeling fear.”
“Who said that the way life naturally unfolds is not all right? The answer is, fear says so. The part of you inside that’s not okay with itself can’t face the natural unfolding in a way that stimulates your inner problems, then, by definition, it’s not okay. It’s really very simple: that which doesn’t disturb you is okay, and that which does disturb you is not. We define the entire scope of our outer experience based upon our inner problems. If you want to grow spiritually, you have to change that. If you are defining creation based upon the most messed up part of your being, what do you expect creation to look like? It’s going to look like a frightful mess.”
“That which is blocked and buried within you forms the root of fear. Fear is caused by blockages in your energy. When your energy is blocked, it can’t come up and feed your heart. Therefore, your heart becomes weak. When your heart is weak, it becomes susceptible to lower vibrations, and on of the lowest of all vibrations is fear. Fear is the cause of every problem. It’s the root of all prejudices and the negative emotions of anger, jealousy, and possessiveness. If you had no fear, you could be perfectly happy living in this world. Nothing you would bother you. You’d be willing to face everything and everyone because you wouldn’t have fear inside of you that could cause you disturbance.”
Well, I guess it looks like I have to keep meditating and sitting on the ground at least once a day. It seems to me that these things are continuously shifting my energy.
To evolve spiritually means to be conscious of the effects of your energy not flowing and remove the blockages that cause the fear to build up. It’s not for the faint of heart. I’ve tried the alternative, as well, to look outside of my feelings and figure out how life was supposed to be and then make it be that way. To attempt to control everything in my environment, to define how life needed to look in order to be safe, to stuff down my insecurities to keep them from being stimulated.
I will leave you with this for now. It is easy to be hardened in a world that feels hard. But it takes great strength to be soft. To relax. To let go of fear. To tend to our hearts despite what is going on in the world, for our sakes and the sakes of those we love. To be still as often as we need to be. To trust in the divine unfolding.
I will be practicing and also sending you love and inspiration to hold you in stillness, as well!!
As always, I apologize for any spelling or grammatical errors. I could barely even go back to read what I wrote, because my eyes are quite heavy and I’m sure I will be sleeping as soon as my head hits the pillow.
I’ve been sending the special ladies in my this way… to your reads! I love your authenticity. 🙏🏽♥️⭐️love, Anita
Thank you for the reminder to keep moving the fear energy out and allowing the love energy back in. Wonderful to read your writings, Michelle. 🙏🌟🌈