Heal Your World

Fire and Rain

2012-02-02T15:24:00.000-08:00

“I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain…”

James Taylor, song lyrics¹

Question: What do Groundhog’s Day, Candlemas, beeswax candles, and St. Brigid all have in common?

Answer: They’re all celebrated today, on February 2nd!

In many cultures and spiritual traditions February 2nd is an important day. It marks the halfway point between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox, thus the significance of the groundhog seeing its shadow (or not) in order to decipher the remaining winter weather patterns until spring. Interestingly, many of the celebrations of the day have to do with the element of fire (and its balancing element water). Candlemas is a Christian feast day marking the ritual purification of Mary after giving birth to Jesus. Her ritual purification would have been done, according to Jewish law, by immersing herself in spring water. Christians have traditionally marked this day by blessing and burning beeswax candles. The Pagan holiday in Ireland on this day is known as St. Brigid’s day, a day of celebrating her sacred flame by burning candles and by immersing oneself in healing wells and springs. Farmers in eastern Europe on this day spread ashes from their fires on fields to fertilize them and leap over bonfires to purify themselves. In ancient times in Greece and Rome, the period was set aside for the infernal gods for fertility and purification. And relatedly, since this is also February, the month of Valentine’s Day, the season of Eros, it is a time modern Americans celebrate passion, red, and love—all fiery energies. (The early Christian Valentines were celebrated as persecuted martyrs—fire energy, too!)

This year, 2012, we’ve got it especially hot! According to NASA we’ve just had a severe solar storm that knocked out some satellite reception and thus GPS didn’t always work and plane routes had to be rerouted. The storm resulted in a radiation storm hitting the earth this week and even triggered a rare geomagnetic storm around the earth. NASA photos have showed the aurora borealis in beautiful, vibrant forms over the planet’s poles. In addition, Mars, the planet of fire, is in retrograde right now, meaning there is a lot more of its energy around. If passion, anger, anxiety, emotional or physical pain, love relationships, or other situations in your life have been intense this week, now you know a strong reason why!

Question: Are you on fire?

Of course, we can look at this from a detrimental point of view as to “burning up.” We can also look at it positively, as Victor Frankl, Jewish psychiatrist and Nazi concentration camp survivor said, “What is to give light must endure burning.” Or, as an energy that propels us to pursue our dreams with passion, as in “I’m on fire! No one can stop me now!”

In my family this week, we celebrated my dad’s retirement from 49 years as a volunteer firefighter and 20 years as fire chief! In my own body, my nerves have been especially fiery, which has happened before during intense solar storms. The extra heat in my body has been releasing some toxins from my kidneys, a purification for sure. Energy work on myself didn’t help alleviate the heat much, so I’ve been balancing the fire by going to bed with a big ice pack on my back where my nerves were especially hot.

Fire and rain. Fire and water. Fire and ice.

It is good to have fire, to have passion. The trick is balancing it, holding it, working with it, without burning yourself, burning yourself out, or burning others with your zeal or temper flares. Passion is a lower chakra phenomenon, meaning strong feeling or suffering. Compassion is a heart phenomenon and means, “to feel or suffer with.” In other words, compassion means to understand another’s feelings or suffering and want to help. We can move our strong lower chakra fiery feelings and energy into our hearts, which are then balanced by being aware of and caring for the feelings of others. We can also make sure and clarify what our passion is for in the first place.

Question: What is your passion for?

Is it to meet basic hunger drives: food and sex? Is it to meet basic emotional needs for safety? Is it primarily centered on your own needs? Are you devouring others through lust or anger or control or are you devouring food, sex, or drugs to try to feed the fire? How is that working for you? Is there a way you can channel that fiery fuel into forward motion to pursue a dream of yours? If your dream is to help others or the planet are you balancing that with enough self-care so you don’t burn out? Are you so ardent for a cause that you attack your opponents without seeing they are just as passionate and feeling as you and learning from them as mirrors?

Question: What is this passion fire teaching you right now?

Looking squarely in the eye at all your lessons with passion helps to purify your motives. Ironically enough, this type of purification is humorously depicted in the movie, Groundhog’s Day! Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell are the main stars in the film, and in the plot, Bill Murray’s character relives Groundhog’s Day over and over again (a trial by fire!) until he learns to purify his love for others. You can also help purify your passion by setting the intention to use and balance fire energy appropriately and for the highest and best of all. Then ritualize this. You could burn a beeswax candle (fire) in the bathroom while you take a bath or shower (water); take a deep breath or do some breathwork (fire) and before and after drink a lot of (water); or maybe make a small fire outside, leap over it if you want, and then extinguish it with water. An extreme ritual would be to make a big bonfire on a beach and do an arctic bear plunge in icy waters. Perhaps you can come up with a unique fire and water ritual for yourself today.

Fire is a powerful element in our lives to help move us forward as individuals and society, even burning things up like phoenix fire, if necessary, to enable us to rebuild and be rebirthed in ways we previously could not or would not. Fire is powerful and beneficial, but like my firefighting dad always taught me, you have to be careful with it and you have to respect it. My highest and best intention is to “Be on fire for Love!” and to hold this passion within the cooling energy of universal Awareness.

*James Taylor wrote these lyrics in part after undergoing shock treatments (fire) for depression as a teenager. These treatments would end with cold showers (water/rain). It was also written partly to express suffering during times of great loss or struggles with success.

Finding Clarity in the New Year or "Resolving your 'Yes? No? Maybe So?'"

2012-01-11T11:45:00.000-08:00

The other day I drove by a young man standing on the middle berm of a busy highway right beside a stop-lighted intersection. He was holding up a handmade cardboard sign common to roadside panhandlers that read, “Need gas money!” with the appropriate prop sitting on the ground beside him: a red, plastic gas can. All the while he was sipping on a venti Starbucks frappuccino which as you probably know costs as much as a gallon and a half of gasoline at current prices. Even if he had been given that drink by some generous soul driving by, he was still unknowingly sending a mixed message to all other passersby: “I need gas. Not.”

We humans are brilliant mixed message senders. You might insist “I am fine,” when it’s obvious to everyone in the room by your gloomy countenance that everything is not fine. At all. You might be told “I love you” but it strangely feels much more like an attack as it’s said to you with eyes that are glaringly angry.

In my own belief system (subject to change at any time without prior notice), I see the universe functioning as a giant mirror. It reflects back to you who you are in all your beauty and complexity. So when you are lacking clarity in your life and the universe doesn’t seem to be helping, it is often because you are sending mixed messages to the universe and the universe is simply reflecting back to you your own inner conflict. For example, you say, “yes” with your heart to the dream of your soul, but your mind ticks off one negative thought after another as to why you shouldn’t/couldn’t/daren’t move toward the dream. And when you feel one way, but think thoughts in the opposite way, the universe is unable to respond in a clear fashion: does it respond to your feelings or your thoughts? Thus, you set up the universal mirror to act like one big pushmi-pullyu of Dr. Doolittle fame: a two-headed beast going in two different directions at once which gets you nowhere except maybe frustrated and exhausted.

When you are clear, you are in alignment—heart, mind, body and soul—and you will experience the Flow in totality, to support your every need in fulfilling your life’s purpose (not the same as your ego wants). This doesn’t mean you won’t encounter obstacles. You will. It is part of the hero’s journey to learn how to transform obstacles into stepping stones, as well as learn how to read obstacles as signposts redirecting you to fulfill your purpose in a better way than you could imagine by yourself. Without clarity, though, you don’t even encounter obstacles—you just experience inertia, the blahs, and lack of creativity and insight. You feel stuck in the mud and your inner lake stays muddy as the universe reflects back our own unclarity in a spiraling feedback loop.

So how do you find enough clarity to make a commitment (and then surrender the results to the highest and best)? Here are 10 steps to inner clarity!

1) Get quiet. Notice your inner chaos and confusion. Observe it for awhile.

2) Examine your thoughts. Ask “why” a lot. “Why do I think that way?” Keep asking “why” until you discover some understanding which will generally lead you to…

3) Feelings of fear. It is a simplification but a generally accurate one that we are either moving from a place of love or from a place of fear. If we’re stuck and not finding clarity, it’s usually stemming from some unacknowledged fear. So name the fears you find in this process.

4) Go deeper. Go below your thoughts and feelings to an inner place of peace and calm. You can visualize this as going below the stormy white-capped sea to a place of undisturbed water below the surface of the storm. Say some mantras here like “I am safe. I am calm.” If feelings or thoughts arise that bring up anxiety just notice them, thank them, let them go and return to the deep, peaceful calm.

5) When you are calm and still ask your self, “What do I really want?” See what comes. It could be anything!

6) Then ask, “Why do I want this?” until you get to the feeling you believe this new thing will bring you more of, whether that’s love, joy, peace, satisfaction, security, etc. Give yourself that feeling now. Imagine that you have exactly what you want and it has given you the feeling that you want more of. Continue to feel this feeling.

7) Realize that since you can give yourself this feeling, you already have and can give yourself at any time what you truly desire! Now that you are feeling this love, joy, peace, or whatever it is, now what do you want to do in your life since you are feeling good? What clarity comes to you now?

8) What one step of commitment can you make—as tiny as you need it to be to not bring up paralyzing angst—to go in the direction of your clarity?

9) Take that step and then let go and see what guidance the universe gives you. The universe might redirect you or adjust your direction along the way. If nothing comes back to you or if confirmation comes back to you, keep taking steps in the direction of your clarity.

10) Repeat process above as necessary!

May all good things Flow to you as you seek ever greater clarity in your life!

American Mystic - Movie Review

2011-11-30T19:55:00.000-08:00

When you self-identify in greater society as a mystic, as I do, you get 1) a lot of weird looks and 2) a few great perks. Recently, the perks have been outpacing the looks. I have guest lectured on mysticism at several local distinguished universities (and they didn’t throw me out!) and a request to do a review on my blog for the indie documentary, American Mystic. Being an amateur movie buff, I jumped at the chance for a free home screening of a film subject near and dear to my own contemplative heart.

Alex Mar, in this fascinating close-up, follows three young adult Americans who traverse their own unique paths as mystics-in-the-making. All have to learn to cope with, among other things, a society that largely marginalizes the spiritualities of non-traditional religions. You learn this goes far beyond getting weird looks by others, however, as the three narrate the personal meaning and struggles their counter-culture journeys bring to their daily lives.

Kubali, an African American young man from Rochester, NY, is the first we meet. He is studying to be a medium and a healer within the spiritualist church of his upbringing. Ever since he was a child he could hear, through his gift of clairaudience, his name being called by spirits. Chuck is the second to whom we are introduced. A Lakota Sioux, raised as a Christian on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, his plans in his teens to be a priest are interrupted when he is introduced to native spirituality. After a drunken crisis, he decides to change his ways and pursue his heritage under the guidance of the local medicine man. The third and final person we learn about is Morpheus, a self-identified witch from California. Growing up she spent much time in the woods, and after the Santa Cruz earthquake found herself spontaneously going into trances and chanting. Just as with the first two, she underwent training—Morpheus with a local witch in the faerie tradition while she worked at a pagan shop.

Trees, nature’s mystical beings, provide a unifying visual theme for the film as they center in ceremonies for all three narratives. We see Kubali and the spiritualists at a gathering place in their retreat center in the woods, called “inspiration stump” where mediumship is practiced and honed. The piercings Chuck undergoes during Sundances allow him to hang suspended from a tree by his own skin, allowing his spirit to fly free from his body. For Morpheus, her rituals take place under trees and in forest glades, surrounded by them. Throughout the interweaving of the stories, each self-narrated, we learn how the need to make ends meet keeps the three functioning as a part of society even while their main life’s purpose is oriented away from the hustle and bustle and toward the spirit-world.

American Mystic is a hauntingly courageous look at those who live close to “the other side,” trying to integrate that awareness in the midst of an increasingly materialistic and technological society.

Occupy Your Heart: On being a catalyst for systemic transformation

2011-10-20T09:34:00.000-07:00

The Occupy movement continues to highlight the grave inequities and injustices in our economic system. There appears to be enough energy in the United States and even around the world to keep the ground swell going for awhile. Good. It will need a lot of sustained energy to make a difference over time. It will also require a societal heart transplant.

Systemic counseling for group transformation defines two kinds of change: surface change and second-order change. With surface change the motto really is “the more things change the more things stay the same.” Surface change does nothing to fundamentally alter the system, the underlying order of a group, large or small. It’s like putting on new clothes over a still unwashed body. The stink will eventually become all too apparent in time.

Second-order change brings systemic change—a real, fundamental re-ordering of the structures that sustain groups, be they mental, relational, financial or other forms of power infrastructures in societies. Giving women the right to vote was a second-order change. So were civil rights laws. Whenever there is a redistribution of power, there is second-order change.

In order to effect a second-order change that is sustainable, not only is a lot of collective energy required, a heart change is also required. Having been a catalyst for systemic transformation on a national level, let me explain a bit of my story and what I mean.

At a church I was an associate pastor of many years ago, I experienced sexual harassment and when I reported it along with some other things, I was retaliated against. I eventually ended up filing civil rights discrimination lawsuits to hold the larger church body accountable for its many inequities and injustices against me and many others as well. It was a long drawn out case that dealt with constitutional law, church-state issues, and clergy sexual misconduct. It required me to take an activist stand, just as the Occupy movement is doing.

But for true transformation to happen, it required more than just taking a stand, important as that is. It also required that I find all the places I criticized about the system in my own heart. If I criticized the aggressive tactics of the larger church body against me, I looked for aggression within myself. If I was furious with their lies against me, I looked for the lies I told myself and others, no matter how small. I would then look for the core of good within the bad. I would find the light in the darkness. I would see that aggression and lying were tactics I used to protect myself when I didn’t feel safe. Then I would understand that the impulse to protect was good, even if I or they had twisted it into aggression or lying, and I would have my compassion for myself and them and then I could forgive myself and them.

When I would heal my own heart and soul by doing these steps above, the system would shift—often immediately. Right after I would heal within, I would get a phone call, email, or other notification that the courts had suddenly had a “change of heart” and rule in my favor. Or the larger church system would suddenly relent and choose to negotiate when previously they refused. This happened repeatedly over several years until finally the story played itself out. In the end, I became the first ordained minister in the country ever to be granted civil rights by a federal ruling—a second-order shift establishing new rights for clergywomen.

So, in shifting our unjust economic system, the Occupy movement is taking a crucial first step. The next step for all of us who wish to shift the economic inequities is to look at our own hearts with regard to how we use money. Upset about corporate greed? I hear you. But let us look within. How much of your income do you donate to charity? Even, or especially, on a good year? How many things do you buy that you don’t really need? The latest flat screen tv, the latest iPhone, the latest ____? Where are you wasteful and unaware with where your own money goes? Do you balance your checkbook, keep a budget, and balance necessities with play that help and do not hurt the environment (extra car trips to do errands, or plane rides to vacation spots around the globe)? Where are you not honest with your accounting? How much debt do you have on credit cards? Any criticism you have of the system, turn it around and ask yourself where it is in you.

I have seen some of these things in myself and in many people who are protesting the inequities in our larger system. These questions of mine, uncomfortable as they may be, are what is required to bring about lasting, heart-full change on a systemic level. There is no judgment in these questions. It is honest self-inquiry only. But after taking a stand, until we heal within with all the love, compassion, and forgiveness we can give ourselves and others along with any corresponding corrective action we can take in our own lives, any change we are able to generate will either be surface change or short-lived at best.

Use the Occupy movement’s energy to motivate you to look within and heal. Occupying our hearts is a stimulus plan that will really bring true second-order change!

You are Safe (No, really, you are.)

2011-10-03T13:11:00.000-07:00

The question of security comes up a lot in healing work. It is a fundamental issue that needs to be addressed because it is difficult to heal if you think you are in danger on any level. Mentally, emotionally and physically, your energy is drained when consciously and unconsciously you are trying to make sure you (and your loved ones) are safe and not destroyed. This is instinctual in so far as our bodies are wired for survival and our DNA has generations of coding in it to pay attention to signs of danger. We evolved this way in order to ensure our species would survive in hostile environments with predators around threatening to attack.

Most of us no longer live in an environment where a lion could be poised to pounce on us at any time. However, many of us still live with this constant sense of needing to be on the alert or an underlying dread or foreboding. This is especially the case when some kind of trauma has happened to us, destroying any sense of security that we may have managed to have prior to the trauma, despite our predisposed genetic hardwiring telling us to always be ready to fight or run for our lives.

As is well known, after big trauma people will often respond by curling up into the fetal position. This is also what can happen energetically when you go through any kind of trauma—big or small. Your energy draws up from the ground and curls up tighter around you to try to protect you. This is all fine and good. It is the animal instinctual part of you trying to reconnect with the feeling of total security in the womb. The difficulty is that once the trauma is over, your energy may not relax and re-extend itself, thus keeping itself cut of from the earth’s energy and from the grounding needed to heal. This can result in getting into a constant feedback loop of fear and anxiety which can also get hardwired into our brain’s patterning. The ability to move and release these anxious energies out of the body and into the ground can remain unavailable because you have unknowingly blocked your root chakra (energy center) from reconnecting with the earth.

Thus solution #1 is to reground yourself. We are electromagnetic beings. We need grounding just like electricity does to work properly. People in many developed countries, especially urban and suburban environments, don’t get enough direct contact with the earth. For one, your shoes’ soles are mostly made of synthetic elements that disrupt the back and forth flow between the earth and our bodies. For two, we sit on chairs, sleep on beds, ride in cars—all keeping us up off the ground. For three, if you live above the ground floor in a condo or apartment building, there is even more distance between your natural connection to the earth. For four, much of non-rural life is connected to machines and technology more than nature.

The more we disconnect from the earth the harder it is to stay healthy and to heal when that is needed. The extra energy we carry in our bodies from stress is unable to leave effectively and it becomes stagnant and stuck causing inflammation and heat in our physical body, anxiety in our emotional body and compulsive thoughts in our mental body. This is one of the main reasons I think it can be difficult to heal thoroughly in a hospital. Some of them are skyscrapers! How can someone in a room fourteen floors up reground their energy after a trauma or surgery if they are so far away from direct contact with the earth on a 24/7 basis? (I think some research should be done to see if ICU psychosis could be reduced or eliminated by situating ICU’s on the ground floor and if possible, letting patients walk outside in their stocking feet.)

So, too, for you, walking outside on the ground or grass without shoes (leather moccasins are one exception) is a good way to help reground your energy. Sitting or lying on the ground or grass or beach is another good grounding exercise. Kneeling and putting your hands in dirt (gardening) can help too. I noticed that almost all of my clients who suffered from situational depression had blocked root chakras, so I encouraged them to spend time in direct contact with dirt!

Solution #2 to help yourself reground is to visualize that you have roots growing out of the bottom of your feet and tail bone (the root chakra) and into the earth. Send them all the way into the earth and see them spread out throughout the earth, then come back up into your feet and tail bone with your awareness. Feel or imagine the connection and flow between the earth and you. Say the affirmation, “I am safe.” Then feel safe. Imagine this if you have to. Imagine that nothing can harm you ever. Imagine what that would feel like. And let your body feel that feeling from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet. Tell your body, too, “You are safe.” If you’ve been through trauma talk to your body compassionately and gently like you would a frightened child.

“You are so grounded.”

I get this statement a lot from intuitives who read my energy. I believe it is because of the mystical awakening I had several years ago. I learned I was safe when I woke up and knew that my truest self was God—that my core was divine essence, (and so was everyone else’s.) After the shock of that startling insight wore off, I realized the direct implication of this was that I was safe no matter what. No matter what! No one could really do me harm in any way, even if they killed me. I was who I was and nothing for all eternity could change that.

So solution #3 to ground yourself is using this bit of mystical mojo. That fetal position our bodies like to curl into to feel safe? The understanding that each and every one of us has God within is also true in reverse. Each and everyone on of us is also always in God, in the womb of God. Imagine yourself all curled up inside God, totally safe (and all your loved ones, too). Affirming this spiritually can ease the need to physically curl up into an actual fetal position after trauma and keep the fight-flight-or-freeze triggers at bay even after trauma. When you know you are safe, even disease that comes up is not an occasion for worry, because it is just a teacher to help you learn and integrate more. But it can never in no way destroy the real you or your loved ones. EVERYONE IS SAFE! This is a truth that can heal the world. No more grasping. No more hoarding. No more striving. No more greed. No more attacking. No more fear.

To be sure, this is a knowing that comes through direct experience with this truth and cannot be manufactured through gimmicks, and being human, we will still have fears, griefs, and other emotions that arise in our being to work through and process. In the meantime before this truth becomes your own internal knowing, spending time in nature, connecting directly with mother earth, and visualizing and affirming that you are always safe can help your body relax again, stretch out, and begin to feel the security that is always true: You are safe!

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The idea that you are safe is one of the key chapters in my book, You are Light. For more writing about this truth and meditations and exercises to help you read You are Light. Energy healing sessions that unblock your root chakra can also help as can EFT-Free for Life—a tapping technique considered “acupressure for the emotions” that neutralizes the hardwiring for anxiety, stress and PTSD triggers. I offer both of these in my healing practice. For more information visit my healing webpages or email me at monica@monicamcdowell.com.

My 9/11 Premonition Story

2011-09-07T15:27:00.000-07:00

Excerpt from My Karma Ran Over My Dogma
Chapter "Reality is a Unity"

My unusual experiences went beyond asking and getting immediate, specific answers. I began noticing a unity with events and my surroundings that went way beyond any previous experiences in my life. Once more, the first episode I had was when I was still working at the church. It was Ash Wednesday morning, February 28th, 2001. I was to preach that night for the church’s Ash Wednesday service. I had prepared a sermon based on a scripture passage about how catastrophes have within them the potential to help us open up all of our hearts to God and to one another. Just as I was about to email my finished sermon to the office administrator who was in an office down the hall from me, I was silently lamenting to God: No one is going to connect with my sermon. We don’t suffer social catastrophes of any kind in the Northwest, let alone one on the order that could open up any hearts. Why did I feel so strongly compelled to preach on this topic? This is completely irrelevant.

As the saying goes: be careful what you pray for…

For at the exact moment when I hit “send” to forward my email to the office administrator with sermon attached, the earth started to move. It moved and it moved some more and I looked out the window and saw the normally straight, statuesque evergreens dancing as though they were made out of rubber and the earth rolling in fluid waves like the sea. As I dove under my desk to wait out the earthquake, my first thought was, NEVER MIND, GOD! Forget my complaint! I decided an irrelevant sermon on catastrophe was much more desirable than a relevant one after all.

As I looked out from under the desk watching the trees continue their dance and the earth its rolling, I pleaded out loud with God over and over, “Save my children, oh God, please keep my children safe.” Then, in a matter of seconds it just stopped. The rolling, the shaking, the rumbling, it was all over. I ran out of my office and the church staff and I gathered for a quick prayer. I then sprinted outside, jumped in my green Volkswagen Beetle (license plate: HUMBUG), and drove the all of two blocks to the school and then pre-school to check on my kids. There was terror in my son’s eyes, but everyone, everything was fine.

Back at the ranch, I surveyed my office. Only one thing had fallen over—a picture that had been sitting on a picture stand. The picture was a calligraphied scripture verse, “Be Still and Know That I Am God.” Wow! Then it hit me. This verse comes from Psalm 46 that begins, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear though the earth should quake, though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea.” It would be a good story for my sermon that night, Ash Wednesday, when we remember our physical mortality.

Church was full that night. The Nisqually Earthquake, as it was to be named, had shaken everyone on a lot of levels and spiritually they wanted reassurances. Preaching my already finished sermon on how “catastrophe can open our hearts to God and to one another,” and “God is the one we can rely on during a total crisis” was surreal. Twilight zone chills kept running up my spine. How could I have prepared a sermon so relevant to the day’s events without any conscious knowledge of what was going to happen?

Later that year, after everything had blown up when I’d filed complaints of sexual misconduct and was retaliated against by the senior minister for doing so, catastrophe hit again. Extraordinarily, for the second time in a few short months, I experienced a knowing that came from a profound interconnectedness.

By Labor Day of 2001, we moved into a house in Lake Forest Park, a suburb of Seattle, and settled our kids in their new elementary school situated just behind our house. I loved being able to walk them to school, past all the towering, stately Douglas Firs lined up like sentries along our street. After walking them to school every morning, I would then take my whistleblower survivor routine and walk to Starbucks and then on to Third Place Books. Many days I would meander through the bookstore to find a good read and spend the better part of the morning in an oversized leather armchair, sipping my chai latte, contemplating all the while. Nothing like good old-fashioned escapism when your life is falling apart.

The next Sunday, September 9th, early in the afternoon, I was sitting in our sunroom praying and reflecting on my ongoing travails, when suddenly I was overcome by “something.” An impression? A premonition? All I know is that I gasped and said out loud, “Oh no! There’s not just doom for the church, there’s doom for our country!” I immediately started praying, “Lord, have mercy on our country. Lord, have mercy on our country. Lord, have mercy on our country.” In fact, that is about all that came out of my mouth for the next hour as I went about household chores. But it gradually faded away and I totally forgot about it.

Later in the afternoon, my husband walked up to me rather jerkily and mechanically, like a robot, and declared in monotone, “I need to go to New Jersey. I need to fly out tomorrow.”

“Okay.” I replied casually, “If you must, you must.”

So, he went back to his office, booked a ticket online (a very expensive ticket), and started packing.

This did not strike me as unusual at all. Looking back I really don’t know why I didn’t question my husband’s strange behavior. Usually he planned his business trips well in advance in order to get good prices on tickets, and so I could pre-plan the kids’ and my schedules while he would be away. I guess it was because he sounded so certain that he had to fly, that I just shrugged my shoulders and went along with it.

I took him to the airport the next day, Monday, while the kids were in school and he called later that night to say he’d arrived safely.

The next morning I woke up hearing the phone ringing—early. Way too early for me. I slowly got out of bed, brushed my teeth, and went downstairs to find out who had called. I figured it was someone from the East Coast—probably one of my husband’s business associates who didn’t yet know that my husband was actually on the East Coast, and who had forgotten that we on the Pacific Coast are three hours earlier than our Atlantic cousins. I was fuming at whoever it was who had forgotten to check the time and their brain before trying to reach us at such an ungodly hour.

Just as I got downstairs the phone rang again. I picked up the remote phone and said mildly, “Hello?” successfully withholding my early morning, pre-chai grumps.

“Monica! I’ve been trying to reach you. Have you seen the news? Oh my God, there’s another one! I’m watching TV right now. Go downstairs and turn on the TV! Oh my God! A plane just crashed into the World Trade Center and now another one. Oh my God! Hurry! They think it’s a terrorist attack. I’m watching this live on TV!”

It was my husband. I ran down to the basement with the phone and turned on the TV. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Airplanes crashing into skyscrapers? It looked like a scene from a movie. Maybe a bad joke. Maybe a “War of the Worlds” error, but no, it was on all the channels we got with our antenna (about 5) and it was the top news agencies reporting. This was no joke. This was no movie. I immediately flashbacked to Sunday afternoon: “There’s not just doom for the church, there’s doom for our country. Lord, have mercy on our country.”

“Oh my God, I had a premonition on Sunday that there was doom for our country, but I completely forgot about it. Oh my God. I can’t believe it.”

“I’ve gotta go, Monica. I’ve got to make some more phone calls to reach some people here about meetings in light of this. I can’t believe this. I’ll call you later. I love you.”

“Love you, too. Bye.”

I sat shell-shocked for a minute or two, and then I checked the messages. My husband had left several, as had my mom. I called my mom and recounted my premonition. I also recalled while talking with my mom that my daughter had night terrors during the night after she had gone to bed. I finally let her crawl into bed with me, because she just wouldn’t settle down. She kept stirring, moaning, muttering, and waking up. I had never known her to do this before. Perhaps she was on some level having a sleeping premonition as well.

As you know, the rest of the week was a bit hellish. Airports were shut down; the stock markets plummeted. In fact, this is why I believe my husband had automatedly declared on Sunday afternoon that he was flying to New Jersey the next day. On some level he too had known. With the stock markets’ nose-dive, the family business went upside down, and the banks it had loans from were all in New Jersey. If my husband had been in Seattle when the World Trade Centers were attacked, he never would have made it to New Jersey with all the airports closed, and we would have lost everything.

But because he was already in New Jersey the very evening before the morning of 9/11, he could arrange face-to-face meetings with business partners and bank personnel to salvage what he could. It was a divinely appointed flight he took on 9/10. He was able to salvage enough to keep us afloat for quite a while. It was a miracle of protection. Even so, things would still be crashing down around us for a long time to come...

Why You Want to Make a WIG

2011-07-21T21:25:00.000-07:00

A WIG is the brainchild of life coach and best-selling author, Martha Beck. In her book, Finding Your Own North Star, she suggests a WIG for helping you leap ahead on your true path in life. What is a WIG, you say? WIG stands for Wildly Improbable Goals. It recently occurred to me that I hadn’t set my own WIG in awhile and so I took a little time, went through the process of setting my own Wildly Improbable Goal and (gosh darn golly!) it worked yet again. If you’d like to know how to set your own WIG, read on, my friend!

The first step is to think of five things that would make your soul blissfully happy. These are things beyond your ego needs. They are deep down soul desires. In fact, they may be very small things. That’s okay—we’ll use them later. But try to write down some biggies as well. For example, when I started to daydream about my own WIG, an idea sprang forth for an inter-spirituality meditation summit in Seattle. As my soul started to hum and purr I continued to write down all sorts of ideas around this central idea. By the end of my creative process, my sentiment was generally: This would be ABSOLUTELY AWESOME, but I do not have the slightest idea how I would even begin to get started with this, let alone get this done! Not. A. Clue! This is the perfect sentiment a WIG should instill in you. So once you’ve thought up some big WIG’s then choose the one that feels the best right now to you.

The second step is then to let go of it. “What?” you stammer. “Aren’t I supposed to DO something?”

“Why yes,” I would reply, “You do something by letting go.” Say outloud to the universe: Universe, this WIG would be something I would totally LOVE to do. But I don’t have the slightest idea how to accomplish it. So right now, I’m giving the whole idea over to All That Is. I surrender.”

The third step is to wait. See if the universe responds in some way over the next few days. When I set my latest inter-spirituality meditation summit WIG it was a Monday evening and I had said almost the exact same words above to the universe. The very next morning, I opened up my facebook and lo and behold a local business associate, someone I’ve only exchanged emails with and never actually met, had posted, “Does someone want to help me organize a meditation flash mob in Seattle like the one in this video from London?”

Shock is not too much of an exaggeration of the feeling I had as I stared at her post. Since I was pretty sure her post was my cue from the universe, I replied, “Yes, I would.” From there with a few interesting turns, including getting in touch with the main organizer of the worldwide (94 cities, to date) “medmobs” I am now the official Seattle organizer! (Let me know if you want to attend…Here’s the facebook page to stay up-to-date!)

So fourth, after waiting to see if and how the universe responds to your WIG, then take a tiny step that’s very simple. My first step was simply to type “Yes, I would” on the business person’s facebook post. Now note, a flash mediation mob was not exactly what I had envisioned by a meditation summit. What I was thinking about was far more complicated and probably a lot less fun to put together and participate in than a flash medmob. This is why the total surrender and letting go of the WIG is so important. By doing so, you allow the universe to take care of the details and to show you how what you thought was the ultimate idea could be even better!

Even if you wait and the universe doesn’t seem to respond to your initial WIG setting and subsequent letting go, take a tiny small first step towards the WIG anyway and again wait and see what happens. This is the way to accomplish your WIG. Take a step, wait. Take another small step, wait. Over and over. If over time the universe isn’t responding at all, take that as a clue that either it’s not the right time or you need to choose another of your WIG’s or dig a little deeper into your soul to find the sweet spot that will yield an even better WIG. This step, wait, step, wait is a much less stressful and much more exciting way to find and accomplish your true path.

You will encounter fear along the way, even in taking those tiny little steps because you are stretching yourself beyond your self-limitations into the unknown. I had to breath deep several times before I typed in “Yes, I would.” But any fear you feel should be good fear not bad fear, though—the kind of exciting fear you feel on the top of the roller coaster right before it reaches the top of the track and plunges down. If it helps, promise yourself that after taking a small step you will reward yourself with one of the small soul pleasures that came to mind when you were brainstorming back in #1. For me, a small soul pleasure is a fuzzy velour coated pencil. I LOVE those. If even a small step along this medmob path seems a bit too much I might promise to go and buy a velour pencil for myself after I risk and take that small but soul-stretching step. That way I satisfy my soul with little rewards along its true path until it can accomplish fully the WIG that was beyond all that I could even imagine. And that accomplishment will be reward all in itself.

Good luck with your WIG! Let me know how it goes!

6 Tips to Increase Your Intuition

2011-06-09T00:01:00.000-07:00

This is probably the question I am asked more than any other: How do I increase my intuitive skills? So, to help you in that regard, assuming you, too, want to be more intuitive (I mean, who doesn’t??), here are my top six tips.

But first, a disclaimer. It is my belief that everyone and everything is an interconnected part of All That Is. It follows then, that at our core level of Oneness, we all have access to all the information in the universe(s). We can access this information through empirical study and research (via the left brain, aka, the slow way) or through intuition (via the right brain, aka, the fast way). If you do not share my belief, that’s okay, but try these tips out anyway, as an experiment and see if any of these work for you. Even Einstein said, “Logic will get you from A to B, imagination will take you everywhere.” And this takes you right to my first tip…

1) Spend more time in your right brain.

This means enjoy daydreaming, visualizing, making music, art, dance, stories, or anything else creative. Why? Both intuition and imagination are processed through the right brain. By getting to know your right brain a little better through your imagination, even if it’s all pretend, you keep the portal open to intuition as well. At first, it may be difficult to distinguish between what you’re “making up” and a direct intuitive hit. That’s okay, too. With practice you learn the differences. The important thing is to visit the right brain and value it by keeping it stimulated through imaginative play.

2) Act on the intuitive hits you get.

Many of us are getting a lot of intuitive hits throughout our day, but since we live in a culture that devalues intuition as medievalism, mental illness, or even of the devil, we are very good at dismissing, rationalizing away, or simply ignoring the glaringly obvious intuitive guidance that is staring us in the face.

For example, a few months ago, my husband had the impulse to buy a lottery ticket at the grocery store. This isn’t common for him at all so it was probably already his intuition guiding him. He then had the sudden thought to play the famed numbers that the character Hurley used in the TV show Lost. Later that day, when the lotto numbers were revealed, indeed four of the winning numbers were the Lost numbers which meant a $150 prize! However, my husband didn’t get the prize because he didn’t actually play the Lost numbers. Why? After he had thought to play those numbers he reasoned that if we were fated to win, it wouldn’t matter what numbers he played; he’d win no matter what. So he played different numbers and didn’t win anything. This is exactly how the left brain tries to trump the right brain. So the next time you get an intuitive hit, try it out and see what happens! It may be all that happens is you save yourself an hour in traffic by listening to your intuition and taking an arterial instead of the interstate you later find out was completely blocked due to a protest march. (Yes, this happened to me!) By acting on your intuition no matter how small it is or seemingly insignificant, you build your trust in your abilities. Intuition is just like a muscle: the more you exercise it the stronger it gets.

Again with Einstein: “The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”

3) Meditate and contemplate.

It doesn’t matter too much what practice you follow. Just do what appeals to you and therefore, is easiest for you to keep at on a regular basis. Most meditative and contemplative practices increase mental strength through focus which enables you to train your brain. You are then able to quiet down the left brain that is usually streaming a steady flow of commentary about everything and free up the right brain to be in the ever-present now, watching, aware, awake and open to the flow of intuition.

4) Pay attention to your body (and nature in general).

You body is more connected to intuition than your rational mind. Ironically, in our materialistic society, many people are disconnected from their body’s awareness, so it may take some time to get back in touch with your body’s wisdom and learn to trust its intuition. A general rule of thumb is that if you are going away from your intuition, your body will constrict in some fashion: your gut clenches, your throat constricts, your breathing gets shallow. When you are going towards your intuition, your body relaxes, opens up, and feels better. Nature responds similarly. When I am “in the flow,” I notice eagles overhead or some other “sign” that confirms my intuition.

5) Do your inner work.

It’s not sexy, but it is imperative. Some of the main blocks to getting clear intuitive hits are heavy emotions, limited thinking, and unseen shadow. Some people give up on their intuition because when they have followed it, it hasn’t been accurate. The issue isn’t with the intuition itself, but how it’s being received and process by you. Like a radio, if you’re not tuned in exactly to the right station you’re going to get static or pick up multiple stations at the same time. Fear, anger, sadness, and pessimism can all be like static and shadow can twist or add to the pure intuitive message trying to come through. If you have no idea how to do inner work, find a reputable therapist, spiritual director, healer, or wise religious leader to help you discover your inner world and integrate it.

I once received intuitive guidance not to attend a class I was interested in. The instructor, also an intuitive, told me I was wrong not to attend, and that by not coming to class, I was dooming myself to being in a car accident. I trusted my own intuition over hers because 1) she was financially and emotionally invested in the outcome of my decision - she would make more money and have more attendees – both ego concerns that might twist or warp her intuition; and 2) her message of doom was a fear-based threat. Pure, intuitive messages are emotionally clear. Even if they are warning messages to keep you safe, they do not carry fear, or threats, but are simply matter-of-fact.

6) Learn the language of your dreams.

One of the first things I did to begin to become more aware of intuition through dreams was to keep a dream journal. Not only would I write down the interesting dreams I could remember in the morning, I also wrote open-ended questions down in the journal right before I went to bed at night to see how my dreams might answer them. For example, I’d write “I need guidance about which job to take” or “I am asking for guidance about this relationship.” It’s amazing how many intuitive hits would come in the dreams, or even the next day as I went about regular chores. The subconscious is very connected to your intuition, and even though its language is often cryptic, symbolic and archetypal, by connecting with your subconscious intentionally, you open another door to your intuition.

Good luck! Let me know how your experimenting and playing goes…

The Sound of Angels Singing Over Me

2011-05-09T22:00:00.000-07:00

In My Karma Ran Over My Dogma, I wrote about an event when a choir of angels sang to me. I didn’t know if I would ever hear that glorious sound again, this side of heaven. Now I do know, which I will write about at the end of this post, but first, rather than rewrite about the original event, here’s the excerpt from My Karma:

“Around the time I started to see energy, I was filing lawsuits in federal and state courts for civil rights violations. Reluctantly.

Some time later, after a long day of bemoaning my litigious fate to God, I happened upon a little book about Rosa Parks. As you probably know Rosa Parks is considered “The Mother of the Civil Rights Movement.” She is well known for standing up for herself and others by insisting on sitting down. In 1955, she refused to move from her seat for white men who had entered the bus and she was subsequently arrested.

What I learned from this book, however, was that this was not unique to civil rights activists of the day. Many refused to move from their seats to protest segregation on public transportation. What is less well known and what made Rosa Parks stand out from the crowd was that she sued, albeit reluctantly, for her arrest. This lawsuit with the support of the NAACP, went to the US Supreme Court and in a landmark decision, the highest court in our country declared bus segregation illegal. This ruling was then the precursor to the Civil Rights Act of 1964—under which my own discrimination lawsuits were filed.

Knowing it was a lawsuit that had made a difference in the African American struggle for equality made me feel a little better that I too had sued for civil rights violations. Even though I knew the church needed accountability, I truly had not wanted to sue. It’s costly, it’s time consuming, not to mention a drain on one’s mental energy, and in general a real hassle. Plus, I had loved the people in the church. I had loved being their pastor. It grieved me to be in litigation with them. I would have walked away several hundred times over throughout the whole ordeal if I hadn’t been completely convinced that God wanted me to stay in the thing.

Needless to say, God made sure I knew I was supposed to stay in the thing.

One day I was questioning God as to why I had to sue. I mean really…why? Why was the legal part of it so necessary from God’s perspective? What was it going to gain? It seemed rather severe from my own perspective. The next morning I received a devotional scripture through a daily email subscription of mine that said in summary: “The farmer knows each grain she plants. She knows how much threshing each type of grain needs to be harvested. Some types of grains need very little threshing, but some need a lot, like wheat, but the farmer knows.” (The sex change for the farmer—my idea.)

In other words, some situations need more intense treatment than others in order for something productive to come out of them and God knows which ones do. My task then was just to trust and follow the continued leading of God to the best of my ability.

Still, not one to just trust, (although “I just must trust” did become a necessary mantra to help me cope over the years), I would repeatedly find myself struggling to come to grips with the litigation. One evening in particular I was wrestling with God about why the lawsuit had to be. The next morning I awoke to music as if my alarm clock had been set to a radio station. One problem, though. I didn’t have an alarm clock that played music. Moreover, it sounded like a choir was singing in my head…or maybe in my bedroom…or both? I couldn’t tell. It was glorious angelic singing or I presumed it was angels anyway. The words? “That all may be free. That all may be free. That all may be free.” This phrase was sung several times in hauntingly beautiful melodies and harmonies and then it gradually faded away.

I sat up, rubbed my eyes, and looked around—seeing nothing. Yet another bizarre event to wonder about, but whatever the source, the message was clear. Without civil rights (even for ministers), no one is free. Thank God for Rosa Parks. Without her, I wouldn’t have been able to file my civil rights litigation in the first place, let alone win a civil rights victory for clergywomen.

But contemplating the angelic choir in my bedroom, made me more suspicious than ever about other strange events that seemed to confirm the existence of disembodied spiritual beings around me. I kept running into them, or they into me. Why me? I mean it wasn’t just a few angels singing that morning…oh no, no, no, no, it sounded like I got an entire tabernacle choir of them.

Maybe because I was still uncertain as to what to do with the few experiences I’d had up to this point that I metaphorically needed to be hit over the head with a two by four of a whole legion of angels singing to get that this is real. It’s not that I didn’t believe in angels. I was, in fact, raised in a church that did believe in them. It’s just that somewhere down the line, attending an intelligent academic-oriented Christian university and then Princeton Seminary, that I (along with many other like-minded ministers) relegated talk about angels to Sunday School theology and ancient scriptural stories. I don’t recall any Presbyterian ever talking to me about their encounter with angels. It went right along with seeing auras…

So while in essence I believed in angels, I didn’t really figure them into everyday modern life. The mystical was not in my worldview. I had a strong faith and a close relationship with God, but really on the whole my spirituality had been normal, for lack of a better word. I would later learn that more than 78% of Americans believe in angels, according to a Gallup Poll, and the percentage keeps going up. But for some reason, even though the vast majority of people in our country believe in angels, the acceptability of talking about such things is low. I have had many friends, clients, and strangers in the years since tell me about their encounters with spiritual beings. Alas, they usually begin their story with, “You’re going to think I’m crazy, but...”

I could relate to that worry. I was so afraid someone was going to think I was nuts, especially since I knew there was a senior minister running around out there declaring exactly that sentiment about me. So to whom could I talk about these strange events? No one, I thought, so I kept it all under wraps. I hid the fact that I had not only heard angels, but I was starting to see them…” (pp. 45-48 )

So, here’s where the story, almost nine years later, picks up. A couple of weeks ago, I clicked on a link for a TED talk on facebook. As soon as the speaker, Eric Whitacre, started to play a clip of his virtual choir singing Lux Aurumque (Light and Gold), my eyes filled with tears. Here was the angelic sound I had heard in my bedroom almost nine years ago—the same haunting melodies and gorgeously dissonant harmonies! I was moved and quietly wept as I watched and listened to the whole video later on YouTube. Of course, the legion of angels singing to me were vocalizing the words, “That all may be free. That all may be free. That all may be free.” Over and over they repeated these words but with an amazingly similar sound to Eric Whitacre’s virtual choir. And interestingly, Lux Aurumque is a Latin translation of a poem written about angels singing to Jesus:

Light,

warm and heavy

as pure gold,

and the angels sing softly  

to the newborn babe.

~ Edward Esch

Here’s the video of Eric’s virtual choir of people from twelve countries singing Lux Aurumque:

Thank you, Eric Whitacre! If you’d like to hear his fantastic TED talk about how his virtual choirs came to be, here’s the link for that. May you be blessed with knowing your angels are watching and singing over you today!

Be the Peace You Want to See or "How to Detach from your Emotions in Three Steps" (Without Denying Them!)

2011-04-21T23:22:00.000-07:00

Emotions can be very powerful fuel for actions that benefit or for actions that harm. In general it is better to be in touch with your emotions than not. But, once you can express your emotions, learning to detach is an excellent skill. Why? Well, for one reason, as I just stated, emotions you are not in control of can cause you to say or do something harmful you greatly regret afterward. A lot of people in prison could tell you that is exactly how they got there; their emotions got the better of them in the heat of the moment.

Even if your emotions don’t lead you to criminal behavior, out-of-control and reactive emotions can still create a lot of havoc in your relationships and career. Learning to detach from your emotions is a way to create an empowering awareness that allows you to choose your emotions and therefore your actions. The challenge is that when emotions strike, it can be difficult to choose what actions are thus forthcoming. The emotion rules rather than your intention! To create more balance and less reaction in your emotional life, learning the art of detachment is necessary.

First, in order to detach, you have to get in touch with your emotions. Only when you are accepting of your emotions’ full import and at home with the gamut of them, does the ability to detach from them become possible. However, sometimes getting in touch with long denied emotions is a little (or a lot) like opening Pandora’s box. If you find yourself getting overwhelmed by your emotions, use the services of a reputable counselor, therapist, spiritual director, or healer who can help you. Once you can name your emotions and accept them, without them overwhelming you, then you are able to move on through the process of detachment.

Second, notice your language. Most often, once someone is in touch with their current emotion, they will say something that clearly identifies themself with the emotion. For example, “I am sad” or “I am angry.” Whenever we fill in “I am _____” we are essentially saying, “I = ______.” So, rather than fully identifying with the emotion, change your language. Say something different, such as, “I am noticing sad/angry feelings arising.” This makes you the observer of the emotion without identifying with it. This in and of itself creates distance from the emotion yet without denying that it has come into your awareness either. By creating some space between you and the emotion, there is far less chance that the emotion will overwhelm you. Then you can process it without being reactive or destructive.

Third, once you have named it, and disidentified with it, then you can dialogue with it. Talk to the emotion as if it’s a guest who is passing through with a gift for you. “I see you anger/sadness. I am glad you have arisen so you can teach me something. What are you here to teach me?” Allow the emotion its own voice to speak to you. Once you have heard the lesson, then you can thank your emotion for being such an excellent teacher, and send it away or release it. Add visualizations if this helps you.

I learned this skill by myself out of necessity. It was a time of great grief and stress (see my book, My Karma Ran Over My Dogma, for the details!) and expressing all of my emotions was literally killing me. Thus, I had to find another way to process the emotions without emoting them and stressing out my body more, and yet without denying them either. I found that I could visually process my emotions by looking at them in my mind’s eye, having a dialogue with them and then releasing them up and out my spine or by pulling the energy out of my body. I did not have to emote or express them in order to release them. I only had to acknowledge, honor, dialogue and learn from them. Today, I do the same process with clients who come to me for energy healing.

The bottom line is—You are not your emotions. You can observe your emotions. So who is the You who is observing? You are not even your thoughts. You can observe your thoughts so who is the You who is observing? This is the trillion dollar question. When you know the answer to this, the resulting emotional equilibrium is a calm, deep sea that brings peace to your life as well as to all around you. Be the peace!

Sexual Attraction and Soul Mates

2011-03-21T18:55:00.000-07:00

This topic has come up several times with clients in recent weeks and months and thus, it must be I am to write about it! Sexual attraction, as far as I have been able to determine it, is fundamentally a soul question that our spirit has the answer for. Yes, hormones and the biological imperative to reproduce the species play a part. But even hormones and biology have a degree of consciousness that plays into the deeper soul question.

The soul question that is inevitably in every instance of sexual attraction is “Do you complete me?” to paraphrase the line from the Jerry McGuire movie. In other words, there are places in us that do not feel complete or whole and the attractive person, either someone known or unknown, represents to our subconscious what we don’t feel we have in our own selves.

This is seen very dramatically in the Jungian based Myers-Briggs personality types. The vast majority of us choose a mate whose personality is the “opposite” of ours in 3-4 out of 4 categories. For example if you mostly function as a T (thinker) you are much more likely to choose a mate who mostly functions as an F (feeler) and vice versa. I put opposite in quotes because the personality qualities that Jung depicted are not on an either/or scale but rather a continuum. They do not mean that a thinker cannot feel or a feeler cannot think. All of us have both parts to us, but we prefer and are energized by operating on one side of the spectrum. To operate on the other side takes more energy, effort and conscious intention to learn and utilize those underdeveloped skills.

From what I have seen energetically and spiritually, this is true not only about personality, but about ANY quality on some level a person thinks or feels they do not have. For example, a client came in for an appointment obsessed about a new woman. He said, “She’s a real friend, but I’m not ready to jump into a relationship with her, but I can NOT stop thinking about her. What do I do?”

“Well,” I queried, “What does she have in her personhood or what quality is in her that you don’t feel you have?”

He thinks a moment and says, “She’s so self-confident. I wish I had that self-confidence.”

“When you claim self-confidence for yourself, rather than thinking subconsciously that you need her in order to get that self-confidence, your obsession with her will stop.”

“OH!” he said, very surprised.

The next time he came to see me a few months later, I learned that his obsession with this particular woman had ended quite soon after I had suggested he claim his own self-confidence. He had also recently begun a relationship with someone else. Much less intense, perhaps more balanced.

I could go into why our hormones respond to the “opposites attract” rule but it really comes down to the same thing. We are looking for our wholeness, looking for a way to develop all of who we are. That is a pretty tall order and we need others to show us through either direct teaching or example, what it looks like to develop our underdeveloped qualities. When we can acknowledge a sexual attraction though, as our body’s way of trying to tell us to pay attention to what we think we lack, it can be a fantastic tool for spiritual transformation.

I should note that we can also be attracted not just based on qualities we desire, but also qualities we don’t want to acknowledge in ourselves. If we have a shadow that is repressed we might find ourselves attracted to a mate who lacks integrity. Or if we have an aggressive shadow, we might find ourselves attracted to someone who is very passive. This, too, is a matter of the soul’s need to integrate all of its parts and find balance and heal within. There is also the larger karmic question of soulmates. With souls we have traveled with through many lives, we may have some unresolved issues that attract us to them in this life. Yet, this attraction is still based on finding our original wholeness.

How does our spirit (the part of us that is divine and is always in union with all that is) answer this question? Our spirit is already whole. Every one’s spirit is whole. However, we are all healing back into our original wholeness by reintegrating all of our forgotten parts. The more inner integration work that is done, the more choices can be made consciously through thoughts and feelings of love and security rather than subconsciously through thoughts and feelings of lack, limitations and fear.

I should clarify that I am using the word “soul” as the layer over our divine spirit that has traveled through life times. In these manifested “travels” our souls experience duality: light and shadow, extroverted and introverted, etc. until our souls can embrace it all, hold the dualities and the paradoxes and transcend them into non-dual unity and wholeness. It’s all a holy process, no matter who, what, or how we choose, consciously or subconsciously. So no worries! Just claim the best, learn from the worst, and LOVE it all!

You are Light

2011-02-28T22:40:00.001-08:00

UPDATE: You are Light is now available on Amazon, at the distributors and available to order internationally through your local and online bookstores! I'm a big supporter of local indie bookstores, so I encourage you to try to buy through your favorite store. You can also ask your local library to purchase You are Light so it can be shared in your community.

You are Light is a healing meditation workbook to help you thrive during tumultuous times. It will teach you how to have all the love, joy, peace, and security you desire. Writing this book was not a creative endeavor. As C.S. Lewis said, "I never exactly made a book. It's rather like taking dictation. I was given things to say." In the same way, You are Light is a gift from the Divine Heart for me to write. My hope and intention is that You are Light blesses you abundantly as you read it!

You are Light

2011-02-23T14:10:00.000-08:00

You are Light is now at the distributors and available to order internationally through your local and online bookstores! You can also pre-order through Amazon now and Amazon should be able to ship mid-March (due to a printing delay). I'm a big supporter of local indie bookstores, so I encourage you to try to buy through your favorite store. You can also ask your local library to purchase You are Light so it can be shared in your community.

You are Light is a healing meditation workbook to help you thrive during tumultuous times. It will teach you how to have all the love, joy, peace, and security you desire. Writing this book was not a creative endeavor. As C.S. Lewis said, "I never exactly made a book. It's rather like taking dictation. I was given things to say." In the same way, You are Light is a gift from the Divine Heart for me to write. My hope and intention is that You are Light blesses you abundantly as you read it!

The Health and Wealth Gospel??

2011-01-23T15:38:00.000-08:00

The Health and Wealth Gospel?? Um, No.

However…

The so-called “Health and Wealth Gospel” is a version of Christianity that espouses that health and prosperity are what God desires for all of us. The shadow side of this is 1) you will only truly prosper in the material world (let alone the spiritual world hereafter) if you are a Christian, and 2) if you are therefore sick or in a financial slump, then you are sinning or doing something terribly WRONG. In other words, guilt, guilt, and more guilt be heaped upon thee for daring to be, you know, human.

In my shift into the world of energy healing, a similar version of this gets bantered around A LOT. In this Guru–version of the Health and Wealth Gospel, if you are not living in alignment with divine or universal principles, it will show up as sickness or poverty or some other kind of something you really don’t want and never in your right mind would have asked for. Donna Eden, a pioneer in the field of energy medicine, states in her book of the same name, that she has seen a number of clients who carry around with them what she calls “new age guilt.” They know the right things, believe the correct beliefs, keep clearing the heavy emotions, eat healthy, set the proper intentions, and yet, here they are in her office, sick, poor or both. And they BLAME themselves for not “getting it right.”

So are we healers, teachers, counselors and coaches setting people up to fail? “Do this and you shall be healed. Do this and you shall prosper.” Shadow side: “If you are still sick or not prospering, you didn’t follow the teachings correctly or with enough energy/purity/whatever.” You are therefore to blame. (And I hear this in my head said with the same accent of the mad doctor in The Princess Bride played by Billy Crystal, when he says, to blathe. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, well, you are to blame. Just kidding.)

So, let’s go to the opposite extreme and see what lies there. The critics of “Health and Wealth” point out that the care of the poor and the sick, and seeing God/the divine/the Self in the least of these is mandated by the highest ideals of all the world’s religions. Yes. This is true. And yet, I question this opposite extreme as well because it begs the question: what do you serve the poor/the sick for? To secure your own spiritual satisfaction now or future reward later for helping them? Maybe, but I think the true aim of most bleeding heart activists is to get people out of sickness (if possible) and out of poverty (if possible) into thriving and well-being. You see, if you can’t say that you want people who are sick and in poverty to get out of it (if possible), and that’s one of the main reasons why we who are relatively healthy and prosperous are to serve them, it’s like saying you believe God prefers people to be sick and poor so spiritually mature/healthy/wealthy among us can help them so we can feel better about ourselves and they can simply be happy about their poor, sick, state of being until they transition to the afterlife, which doesn’t seem too right either. Even the critics who desire social action aimed at reconstructing society so the more don’t keep getting more at the expense of those who keep getting less, must say that what they want is for everyone to have a decent chance of thriving and prospering.

But what does thriving and prospering mean? Can everyone be as filthy rich as many have become telling the rest of us how to get filthy rich? Adapting my publisher’s comment: “if every writer met his/her sales goals, civilization would collapse because nobody would be doing anything other than reading,” it is also true that if everybody were as rich as say, Oprah or Bill Gates, society would also come to a halt because societal economic well-being is dependent not on rich people/corporations who have and hoard and keep millions and billions, but on the majority of people sharing and circulating.

So what is true health and true wealth?

It is interesting that the origins for the words health and wealth are related and inter-changeable. Health is from “hale,” and the word “whole” also derives from “hale.” Wealth is from “weal” or “well” another version of “whole.” So it’s not too surprising that in our modern English, the words health and wealth share 5 of 6 letters and therefore rhyme. In the root meanings they are inter-related and connected. Energetically they are too. When do many people lose what wealth they have? When they get chronically sick. Conversely, if one is continually sick, it is difficult to work enough to make ends meet. But I do want to distinguish between them, too, because though they are inter-related, they are not the same. We can all think of people who though wealthy, would not meet our definitions of holistically healthy, because their souls are languishing forgotten in the dungeons of their consciousness or their hearts are as hard as the gemstones they collect. We can also think of people who are holistically healthy: body, mind and soul, and live very simply, even in poverty, whether chosen consciously or not.

So what do we want for people who are suffering? What do we want for ourselves? Our children? Our planet? How do we achieve true thriving and prosperity for most people keeping it all in balance with the earth and each other?

These are all important questions to keep asking ourselves. However, I do want to turn my stream of consciousness here in a different direction. Though this veer may look similar to “the health and wealth gospel” it really isn’t because of one fundamental difference. I believe this difference may help us all shift into the new paradigm the Spirit is trying to create out of the chaos of the old breaking down.

In this shift we are aware that at the core of each and every person is wholeness. This wholeness is the divine spark, the core star, the piece of the Creator, whatever you want to call it. But this is the Truest Self and is therefore whole (and well, healthy, and wealthy). This is true already of each of us. We are not separate from God’s beingness. We are it. Therefore, we are already whole at our core no matter what our circumstances.

We can this live from this awareness regardless of what state of being our body or our bank account is saying to us. It means we live from the place of total assuredness of what is True. The odd thing is that when we live from this awareness, indeed our circumstances do in fact start to shift. They may not shift into our ego’s idea of “health and wealth”. In fact, you can probably bet they won’t. But it will begin to bring into reality something awesome beyond our wildest dreams. Health and wealth of all truly good and beneficial things begins to emerge in our life. And we take responsibility for what does come without blame for where we are learning and growing.

Blame and responsibility. It sounds like a bad Jane Austen novel. But when we can shift out of blame and thinking that something is inherently wrong with us into the wholeness that ever was with us and in us and working through us, we are offered a treasure beyond measure. We are given the conscious choice to use the infinite Source of all well-being responsibly and even magically to help create a new way of being human, a way where we are sharing and circulating and giving and receiving without greed and hoarding, and without fear and suffering for we know who we are. We know we are whole and well and wealthy and healthy, no matter what. And if you are familiar with the mad doctor in The Princess Bride, you know that when he was saying to blathe, he was really covering for true love. Ah yes, that is what all true health and wealth is sourced with, Love. Be rich in Love today!

Finding the Light in the Darkness

2010-12-13T11:07:00.000-08:00

“We are all meant to be mothers of God, for God is always needing to be born.”

~Meister Eckhart

With the winter sun sinking below the horizon by 4 p.m. in Seattle now, there also seems to be a corresponding dip in many people’s spirits as we enter into the darkest days of the Northern Hemisphere. When all around the culture and religious festivals shout “Rejoice!” some people struggle with grieving the passing of loved ones—glaringly apparent during festive family gatherings, others with Seasonal Affective Disorder (with the appropriate acronym, SAD), and still others with losses of various kinds the holidays can emphasize in painful contrast, like a season sculpted in high relief.

Even if this is not your own reality during the holidays, if you’re human, you’ve experienced down times, pain and suffering, and perhaps even a more intense “dark night of the soul.”

What is this dark night written and spoken about for millennia by saints, mystics and everyday people of faith? All those “d” words come to mind: death, disillusionment, depression, despair, or even worse, dissolution, the void, the place thought of as the absence of everything. Many fear it, flee it, or avoid it until the darkness can no longer be denied, and even when there is no more ignoring the fact that they are smack dab in the middle of it, they resist it to the seventh heaven.

For example, this was recently tweeted (on Twitter for those of you still catching up to the digital age) referencing God:

“I PRAISE YOU 24/7!!!!!! AND THIS HOW YOU DO ME!!!!! YOU EXPECT ME TO LEARN FROM THIS??? HOW???!!! ILL NEVER FORGET THIS!! EVER!!! THX THO…”

Sounds like modern day Job questioning epic-sized suffering during a dark night, eh? Alas, no, just Steve Johnson, receiver for the Buffalo Bills football team, after he dropped a game-winning pass. Still, Johnson’s protest is characteristic of responses to God during dark seasons of life.

I am surrounded right now by people who are, if not smack dab in the middle of a dark night, are at least dipping a toe into those deep waters and finding themselves chilled, fearing a frozenness of spirit if they descend into that icy sea.

In my present paradigm (always subject to change without prior notice), I embrace a reality of unity or non-dualism. Darkness is not, from this perspective, the absence or the opposite of light. Darkness is nothing to be afraid of. Darkness is necessary and even good. But in order to not be afraid of it, we need to understand it.

Michael Bernard Beckwith teaches there are three types of darkness:

1) times of deep cleansing: during this type of darkness, our shadow or subconsciousness is brought more into our awareness so it can be integrated.

2) times of gestation: during this darkness it may seem like “nothing’s happening,” but it is a necessary time for the seed to lie fallow underground waiting for the right season to call forth new growth.

3) times of temporary blindness: this darkness happens when the next stage of our growth is so overwhelmingly beyond our current vision that we are blinded by its light and we only see darkness…until we catch up with our soul’s paradigm shift.

My own dark night of the soul (which, interestingly, was NOT my whistle-blowing saga as you who know my story might suppose) in addition to the being all three of the above was also an initiation into mystical spirituality, though I didn’t know that at the time. It would lead many years later to an even greater initiation (now the whistle-blowing saga comes into play!) with a full-blown mystical awakening. This, in fact, is what I believe is a rarely grasped but crucial nuance in the Job story. After his long and painful dark night, he is initiated into direct communication with God (a signature of the mystic). After God speaks and answers Job with a whirlwind tour of the miracles of the universe, Job capitulates: “Before I had only heard rumors of You (indirect), but now my eye (singular) sees You (direct) [Job 42:5a]. Job’s dark night then is his initiation into unitive vision (another signature of the mystic). Jesus said, “If your eye is single (or one), your whole body is full of light” [Luke 11:34a].

When you can see all as one and God in all, you see darkness or the void for what it is, that space of the pregnant womb, where the new is ever-born. Then you can see God and see as God sees, that “even the darkness is not dark to you, the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you.” [Psalm 139:12].

One mystic, Mellen-Thomas Benedict, was initiated into the Light, then into the Void/the Absolute during an “after death experience” (his body was clinically dead from terminal cancer for more than 90 minutes). This is, in part, what he says about his experiences with the Void:

“It is less than nothing, yet more than everything that is! The Void is absolute zero, chaos forming all possibilities. It is Absolute Consciousness, much more than even Universal Intelligence. The Void is the vacuum or nothingness between all physical manifestations. It is the SPACE between atoms and their components. Modern science has begun to study this space between everything. They call it Zero point. Whenever they try to measure it, their instruments go off the scale, or to infinity, so to speak. They have no way, as of yet, to measure infinity accurately.

“There is more of the zero space in your own body and the Universe than anything else! What mystics call the Void is not a void. It is so full of energy, a different kind of energy that has created everything that we are. Everything since the Big Bang is vibration, from the first Word, which is the first vibration. The biblical “I AM” really has a question mark after it. “I AM—What am I?” So creation is God exploring God’s Self through every way imaginable, in an on-going, infinite exploration through every one of us. I began to see during my near-death experience that everything that is, is the Self, literally your Self, my Self. Everything is the great Self. That is why God knows even when a leaf falls. That is possible because wherever you are is the center of the Universe. Wherever any atom is, that is the center of the Universe. There is God in that, and God in the Void.”

Benedict’s own death led him to his greatest discoveries, including finding God in the Void.

The one question that seems to be at the heart of dark nights, though, goes right back to Job and to Steve Johnson’s tweet: Why does God allow pain, suffering, and loss in the first place? I myself have worked through this question at deeper and deeper levels and am okay both with this question and the resolutions I have discovered. I am often reluctant to state these resolutions because for me it has been that in searching and staying true to the questions themselves that have emerged in times of darkness, this is when and where the light has been reborn for me. If you can hold on during dark times, calling out for the help you need from God, your angels and your human angel friends, and accept that you are in a dark night rather than resist it and fear it, so much more soul strength and illumination can come. You may even be initiated into the journey of your greatest rebirth, your Self-discovery (yes, capital S, the divine spirit Self).

And so during this season of darkness, that is difficult for so many, I hold space for you in great love and in great expectation of the Light that will shine forth again for you and your loved ones. The pregnant void, the Great Womb that holds all in pure potentiality is ever-birthing the eternal Light. If you can stay true to the birthpangs of this spiritual labor, the newborn Light will dissolve the darkness like the brilliance of the morning sun at dawn and you, too, will become a mother of God.

How to set an intention in 5 steps

2010-11-03T13:15:00.000-07:00

I just finished a great book, The Intention Experiment, by Lynne McTaggart. As a journalist, she has been following and working with physicists and other scientists to study if and how consciousness impacts life. In this book, she summarizes the results of many experiments showing that, indeed, our intentions can positively and negatively affect our daily and global life. Mind over matter is a little too simplistic of a summary of the studies, but as a healer I often see how a client’s beliefs and thoughts directly impact every aspect of life, from health to relationships, and from finances to the earth’s environment.

However, setting an intention is a little more challenging than just wishing upon a star. Based on the experiments detailed in her book, McTaggart gives some great tips that significantly affected the outcomes of intentions. I’m going to combine her suggestions with my own non-scientific and somewhat biased observations, along with other teachings from healers.

To demonstrate how intentions work, let’s use the metaphor of a balloon.

If you have ever entered a party supply store in recent years, you know that the types of balloons you can choose from are practically endless. The party store in my town has an entire wall numbering up to over 100 types, and that’s not counting all the traditional latex balloons they offer, available in the myriad of colors and sizes they come in as well.

1) This is akin to the first challenge of setting an intention: choice. We have an infinite supply of time and energy at our disposal (believe it or not, this is true, according to me anyway). This follows from my belief that we are, at our essences, eternal, infinite beingness. You may not believe this. That’s okay. Bear with me and join in the fun of experimenting with intention anyway. Even if you do believe this, you may not yet be able to access infinity and eternity in your body. That’s okay, too. Neither can I. Other than a few yogis, mystics, saints and shamans, most of us for the time being are limited to our bodies and 24 hours in a day (and even that isn’t quite true, but moving on…).

However, you still have a nearly infinite amount of choices and options in a given day. You may think your day is “set” and “pre-ordered” for you, given your job or family obligations, school homework, etc. but this is false. You have these conditions because you are choosing them. You can leave your job, relationships, school at any time, if you choose. You remain in them, because you are choosing to do so or at the very least choosing not to experience what would happen if you walked away from these experiences in your life. And choosing anything, anything at all, begins to focus the unlimited supplies of opportunities we have available to us in any moment. You begin to funnel the ocean of infinite possibilities into the pipeline of your life. Or keeping with my initial metaphor: you begin to narrow down the choices of balloons. Maybe a “have a great day” balloon is good for you today. Or maybe just a nice cherry red balloon.

Whatever it is: you choose.

So to set an intention, you must choose what you want from an infinite supply of possibilities. To not be overwhelmed by this, start small. Make an intention for one day, either today or tomorrow.

2) Now that you’ve chosen what day, choose a specific intention for it: A “have a great day” balloon in silver or white background; Or the cherry red latex balloon in extra large size. So let’s say you’re setting an intention for tomorrow. Tomorrow I intend to experience peace in all of my relationships.

3) Now that you’ve ordered up your intention, you need to energize it. So just as you would order up your balloon to be filled up with helium at the balloon store, imagine now that your intention you’ve set is fulfilled. What would that look like? Imagine it in your mind as vibrantly as you can. What would it feel like? Imagine this feeling. Feel this feeling. Feel it all the way from your head to your toes. Living in the energy of your intention having already been fulfilled, helps to bring that intention’s vibration into being.

4) Now you’ve got to go outside and let that balloon go! Rather than try to “make it happen,” which is a controlling and therefore fear-based way to go about life, instead play with the universe by sending it out into the sky and seeing what happens. Follow your balloon’s intention as it floats through your day. Observe it. Learn from it.

5) The universe communicates and responds to each of us uniquely. So as you observe and learn how the universe responded to your balloon intention being set free, alter or add, or delete as necessary to any of the above steps as they work/don’t work for you. Repeat and practice. Perhaps continue the same simple intention for several days in a row to get the hang of it and to see what variations occur.

I did this the other day to be my own guinea pig for this blogpost. I set an intention to have a joyous, awesome day and I did! The next day I set the same intention and bam! Everything that could go “wrong” seemingly did go wrong. Nothing had changed with my intention. In fact, I realized I was being tested on my intention: Could I hold a joyous, awesome state of mind despite my circumstances? Yes, I did pretty well and the next several days after setting the same intention, I noticed a shift in the level of energy I was working with and a corresponding shift in circumstances.

Some other tips from scientific experiments:

*Set your intention in the same space every day. A regularly highly positive, energized space greatly impacted the effect of setting intentions.

*The timing of intentions is a little trickier, involving sun, star and planetary events. Rather than look it all up, I just say trust your gut and follow your intuition as to when during each day seems to be the best time to set your intention. It may be different every day and the best time may NOT be in the morning when you get up. Whenever it is, how you feel does impact the effect of the intention so make sure your body feels good and general health is well.

*Before you set your intention, calm your body and increase your mental focus by doing some conscious breathing or other meditative practice such as chanting or drumming that gets you into the “zone.” Also, having a sense of being one with the universe or one with another person if the intention involves that person or your relationship with him/her, helps as well.

*Focus on your heart and on feeling compassion when setting the intention in addition to feeling whatever feeling you believe you will have after the intention is fulfilled.

*Be as specific and positive in your wording as possible. Eliminate no’s and not’s.

*A group intention is stronger than an individual intention so you may want to start a group or ask others to join you in your intention. Make sure everyone is stating the same specific intention.

Final Advise:

If the intention you are setting is not working, it may be for the simple reason that while your conscious mind is all set to go, your subconscious mind is saying exactly the opposite. And it is a general principle that the subconscious tends to trump the conscious mind. Seek out friends, healers, therapists, spiritual directors, etc. you trust and ask them honestly where your own blindspots may be blocking you. Energy clearing and breathwork are very helpful in helping you let go of old energies that are keeping you from moving forward.

Many blessings to you as you use your intentions to move into greater creative expressions of your innate bliss!

What happened when I went to a mosque

2010-08-25T12:58:00.001-07:00

At the time I visited a mosque, I was a curious college student majoring in cultural anthropology and cross-cultural communications. The study of world religions was a particular love, even obsession, of mine. During a class on said topic, I was required to take a personal field trip to a place of worship outside of my religion. I selected a mosque for my assignment, and since I had many international student friends from around the world, I asked a few of the Muslim Arabs I knew about visiting their mosque in the Northgate neighborhood of Seattle. One friend from UAE told me where I could purchase a head scarf (or hijab) —which I bought in basic black—and then he said he’d meet me on Friday evening right before services to introduce me into the mosque.

The next Friday, he did as promised and I was ushered up the stairs to the women and children’s section above and partitioned away from the main prayer room by glass. In the church I grew up in, such a room was called the “cry room.” It was provided for the parents of restless youngsters so the cries of their little ones would not disturb those in the sanctuary and yet the parents wouldn’t miss out on the main service as it was broadcast through the sound system into the cry room.

As soon as I emerged at the top of the stairs, I was greeted with warm welcomes, hugs, and cheek-to-cheek double kisses from many if not most of the women there. Few spoke English but their hospitality I remember vividly to this day, some twenty-five years later. They had absolutely no reservations inviting a white-skinned woman from another religion into their midst. None. I wonder how many churches would be so welcoming with the situation in reverse?

As I observed the prayer service for the men through the glass, I noticed that only a couple of women in the “cry room” were following along with the prayers and prostrations. They seemed to be older women, perhaps beyond the years of mothering youngsters, who therefore had some time and freedom to devote to worship and spiritual practice. (On the other side of mothering young children myself, I know how hard it is to devote oneself to one’s spirituality, when diapers, feedings, tantrums, and general lack of sleep intrude.) Otherwise, the room full of Muslim women and children was joyous, with lots of quiet laughter, playtime, and community-making going on between the children and moms.

At one point toward the end of the service, my black scarf, having not secured it very well, began to slip off the top of my head, revealing some of my hair. I kept pulling it all the way forward of my bangs, not wanting to offend them in their place of reverence.

However, after several futile attempts at keeping it up, one of the older women decided to help out. She came over and rather than helping me pull it up or retie it, she simply pulled it down all the way and said, “There.” The rest of the women gasped and came forward, admiring my golden blonde hair, touching it, commenting on it—clearly not offended in the least.

Soon after this event I would spend a summer in the Middle East with Muslim Arabs. Again and again I was treated with ultimate respect and generous hospitality in every house I entered, even though I came from America.

If you have never been friends with a Muslim or an Arab or have never attended a mosque, I would encourage you to do so. Fear of the “other,” the “stranger”, the unknown is what fuels the fire of assigning blame to whole people groups and entire religions for the actions of a few extremists.

Love thy neighbor as thyself. Muslims taught me what this looks like.

A Great Undoing

2010-08-17T16:19:00.001-07:00

This is the time of a Great Undoing. And this scares many people to their core, so much so that denial, adamant pushing ahead, forcing things to be as they've always been, pushing to do things as they've always been done, can produce crazed, anxious patterns that end up crashing and burning in the end. Understanding that times of Great Undoings are necessary and beneficial can go a long way to helping you ease through tough times with grace and peace. Collectively, we have gotten ourselves into many knotted up patterns that are not sustainable for the human family as well as the plant and animal families, let alone all of the other interdependent eco-systems on earth. We know this. We KNOW this, yes? But what do we do with the seemingly insurmountable number of things that need to be fixed in order to be sustainable and functional?

I've found that understanding how to heal huge systemic problems is much easier when there is a simple metaphor that can be used to grasp the nuance, the symbolic message, from the macro to the micro. So here's one for you: What do you do when you find your favorite shoes have somehow sprouted large entangled knots in their shoelaces seemingly overnight? If your shoes are going to continue to be functional to you, you are going to have to do the work of a Great Undoing. Of course, you can sit and ask forever "How did this happen?" "How did all of these problems/knots come to be?" Asking this may be useful for the future in order to prevent future Big Knots, but sitting and fretting just uses up time you could be using to start the Great Undoing. You may be tempted to just cut the laces off and buy new ones. But we can't really do that with humanity and planet earth. Throw it away and start over? Nope, not an option. We are here. The planet is here. Denying the Big Knots isn't going to work.

For the present time and the present situation, the only thing that's going to work is simply doing the work of untying the knots. Untying Big Knots can be slow going, frustrating work. I've found that it takes a lot of patience and focus. Tracking each curve of lace through every twist and turn and gradually untangling the stuckness. Being the expert knot-untier of the family, which probably goes with being "the mom", I've also found that once I've worked on a knot for a certain period of time, all-at-once the knot completely untangles the rest of the way easily and effortlessly. It's like the knot simply "dissolves."

This is the potential benefit of a Great Undoing. By tracking where and how our own energy is knotted up and begin the untying process, we can free up an amazing amount of energy that allows us to be in greater alignment with the Flow of Love-purpose in the divine unfolding of the universe. The greatest benefit to the Universe is for you to look within (first) and see where there is stuckness and begin to untangle, dissolve, and free your energy in that area. Then you will see clearly and passionately where you can be an instrument of divine benefit to healing the world.

The steps?
1. Set your intention to find where you are knotted (blocked) in your own life so that you can set yourself free.
2. Focus your attention on the knots/blocks looking at it from all sorts of angles, to find the source or core of it. It is usually a fear-based emotion attached to a limiting belief.
3. Affirm and feel your loving compassion for yourself in this area.
4. Take a tiny step of action to demonstrate your new unlimited belief and unfettered love about yourself and the world.

When we heal ourselves, we automatically help to heal the world. If you have any questions, have any comments, or want more info, let me know!

To schedule a healing session or speaking event with Monica call her at 206-306-1144, email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com

Copyright © 2010 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, speaker, spiritual teacher, and author. Her second book, You are Light, will be released by O-Books in Feb. 2011. Monica¹s first book, My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic, is available on her website, on Amazon.com or in Seattle's independent bookstores. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

Dancing the Dream

2010-06-04T14:35:00.001-07:00

Today I'm recommending a great book, Dancing the Dream: The Seven Sacred Paths of Human Transformation by Jamie Sams. You can read my book review here.

http://www.sdiworld.org/amazon/book-reviews/bonus-reviews/dancing.html

You are Light Wordle

2010-04-01T23:17:00.000-07:00

I thought I would share my next book's wordle! A wordle is a word cloud created by compiling the most common words in a selected text and making a picture of them. The most common word is the largest. I love that Light Love and Always are the most common words in my book! Go to wordle.net to create your own wordle. Very fun, fast and super cool!

A Spirituality of BEing

2010-03-19T15:43:00.001-07:00

A Spirituality of BEing

Sometimes I wonder ~
after Rumi, why write?
What is there left to say after a master has spoken
and everything essential has already been said~

recorded for generations millennia ago?

For that matter, what is there left to sculpt~
after beholding the perfection of a single daffodil?
or to paint ~ after witnessing a thunderstorm and the unfolding skies have erupted in
an array of pinks, purples, and reds so vibrant they rival even the glory of a
peacock's green and blue plumes?

Really, who can compete with that?

And what remains to be sung in a day~
after the morning arias of the warbling winged

(their melodies far surpassing any diva's)

have finished until the morrow?

When a person has awoken to BEAUTY,
is there ever a return to sanity?
When someone has burst open with LOVE,
what is not consumed by that unquenchable flame?

When one goes beyond all Light to merge with the Deep
~that dark sea dissolving all ideas and identities of Self
~that formless Soup of non-being, less than nothing and more than everything
~that pregnant Void ceaselessly extinguishing and birthing all form~
Mind you, where then does one go next?

What is left to dream that has not already been dreamt?
And what of desire when one knows the secret of eternal contentment?

What is left to do? to create? to say? to write? to sing?
when the Artist Nonpareil has already upstaged everyone for all time?
Tell me, what is left?

All I ever hear in reply is:

YOU are the art ~ a living masterpiece
forged in an alchemist's fire where creator and created forever emerge as One
YOU are the magic ~ transmuting the mundane into healing elixirs of immortality
YOU are the dancer and the dance in an infinite flow of Awareness.

All I ever hear is:

You are.

Just BE.
It is enough.

To schedule a healing session or speaking event with Monica call her at 206-306-1144, email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com

Copyright © 2010 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, speaker, spiritual teacher, and author. Her second book, You are Light, will be published by O-Books in late 2010. Monica's first book, My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic, is available on her website, on Amazon.com or in Seattle's independent bookstores. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

EEG's and Thanksgivings

2009-11-10T14:36:00.001-08:00

Or: How to Heal Negative Thoughts (Part One)

This past weekend I participated in a scientific experiment to see if positive thoughts and intentions significantly affect brain waves and personal health. Several thousand people around the globe, many of whom are healers and healthcare workers, checked in on a website at a synchronized time to see the picture of a woman. We were instructed to focus on her for exactly ten minutes with specific intentions and visualizations. It was an awesome experience for me and the results of her brain wave scans and other tests appear to be off the charts!! (We're still waiting for the data to be analyzed completely.) The woman who was the case study had no idea when the experiment would begin. She says she was just sitting in a room off by herself, all hooked up to an EEG, and...

"Really, I was becoming a little bit bored, when suddenly, I sensed a kind of wave, visually curling in front of me, and with it a slight, vibrational tingling spreading over my whole body. Then I saw what looked like stardust, many tiny light pulses just scattering all around me. After a moment these little particles seemed to coalesce into a very bright wave of light permeating my whole body, putting me into a rolling, wave like pattern. I felt that I was rocking slightly back and forth, kind of in the infinity loop pattern. The light wave became even stronger, engulfing me. I felt heat and prickling all through my body, a rush of physical energy pulling me along. This waxed and waned; it was not a solid, fixed entity but had movement to it. I felt I was wired to an ongoing energy source that made my nerves tingle, and my mind seemed to be expanded. I have no idea how long this lasted, I had no sense of time at all. The only awareness I had was my body and my mind simultaneously existing, awareness shifting back and forth on a continuum. It is hard to put this into exact words. When they told me the experiment was over, I did not want to leave it. I was in a state of vibration, of flux, of tingling, of sensations and emotions resonating within me. My heart was full of gratitude for all the people participating, sending energy to me."

I will write more about my own experience participating in this experiment in another blog, but it definitely showed scientifically that positive thoughts, intentions, and energy can make a huge difference in affecting our brain and our health in beneficial ways.

If you have trouble with negative or unwanted thoughts, below are three methods to help you heal negative thoughts. Each method is valid and each method has an assumption behind it that is equally valid. Which method you use is entirely up to you. I have found that different methods appeal to me at different times and sometimes my negative thoughts are multi-layered requiring several methods to completely heal them. Choose which method resonates with you and try it out!

PROGRAM IN, PROGRAM OUT

The first method is based on the assumption that the brain essentially functions much like a computer and follows the general principle: program in, program out. In other words, if you feed your brain negativity, that is all it's going to spew back out at you. You are what you eat. You become what you think. I could go on, but unless you're reading this while watching reruns of The Office, I think this is pretty self-explanatory.

So then according to this model, the way to change your negative thinking patterns is to reprogram your mental habits. Change the channel. Tune into a different frequency. I could go on..

Here is how to do that:

1) Whenever you catch yourself thinking a negative thought, immediately give your brain a new command and say to yourself (out loud if there are no people around, or at least no people who will question your sanity), "Stop!" or "Cancel!" or "Delete!" just like you would use these commands on your computer if you wanted to stop or cancel or delete a computer operation or file. Then, immediately replace the old negative thinking pattern with a new positive thought. So this is an example of what I might do.

I catch myself thinking, "Gosh, I'm just not able to get done what I want to get done!"

I then say to myself, Delete!"

I program in a new thought, "I am able to get done what I want to get done. I will use my time and energy effectively today."

Because our brains literally become hardwired into patterns, whether negative or positive ones, you may have to repeat this process many times to hardwire in the new positive thinking you want to have.

2) A variation of this that I really do not recommend, but I am going to mention it because some psychologists promote it. This method is to produce a small amount of pain whenever you catch yourself thinking a negative thought. For example, a person might keep a rubber band on their wrist and whenever they catch themselves thinking a negative thought, they snap the rubber band so that the brain associates the negative thought with pain and over time will stop. This may, in fact, be effective for some. But because it can so easily be abused and escalate into self-flagellation and also be associated with the belief, "I need to be punished for my bad thoughts, actions, feelings" that I don't recommend it. Although it may work, there are healthier methods that are just as effective, if not more so, and in the end promote a stronger sense of self-love. Here's an episode from the TV show, Cheers, you may remember. A psychologist tries to cure Cliff, the postman, of negativity, by electronically shocking him via a remote-controlled dog collar every time he says something obnoxious, boring, or outrageous. It demonstrates how out of control this methodology can get!!

TAP TO RE-TRAIN

The second method for healing negative thoughts builds on the first method. It also assumes the brain works like a computer and gets hardwired into thinking patterns. However, it adds an energy component. Not only are our brains hardwired in their circuitry, our brain's ENERGY also develops patterns that need to be re-programmed. This can generally be done through a process of energy tapping. This is by no means a new methodology. Rather it is an ancient one found in many different cultures, that recently has been discovered by the west. I will teach you the general tapping technique as found in the books, Energy Medicine and Energy Psychology, by Donna Eden and David Feinstein (with permission from authors).

1) Choose a negative thought you would like to change. "I don't like my body."

2) State the new positive thought you would like to have. "I like/love my body."

3) Now state this same positive thought but using a negative word(s) in it. "I no longer dislike my body."

4) The left brain is more sensitive to negativity and critical thinking, so now using the positive statement with the negative twist from #3 above, tap your left-hand fingers several times along the side of your head starting at your left temple, across the head above your left ear, and in a general arc down behind your ear as you say out loud, "I no longer dislike my body." Repeat this several times.

5) Because the right brain is more sensitive to positivism and creativity, use the positive statement from #2 above and do the same thing on the right side of your head that you did on your left. Tap several times with your right-hand fingers starting at your right temple, across your head above your right ear, and down in a general arc behind your right ear as you say out loud, "I like/love my body." Repeat this several times.

6) Repeat #4 and #5 a few times a day for up to 30 days. Tapping has been scientifically shown to create receptivity in the brain to new thoughts. The more you tap, the more you create a new energy field with a positive habit, and help your brain re-write its old programming in both its wiring and its energy patterns.

THE ZEN ZONE

The third method comes from Zen Buddhism. The assumption behind this method is that thoughts do not arise from any particular individual. Thoughts arise from a larger consciousness that we all are a part of, but the fact that you have negative (or positive) thoughts is of no significance. So, the solution is to detach from any negative thoughts that you have.

To illustrate, I might notice the thought arises in me when I'm walking down the street: "I really don't like that person's purple hair." Rather than attach significance to it, such as ("This must mean I'm a bad person for having such a nasty thought" or "Shame on me for thinking that" or having more judging thoughts about the person: "They really have issues"), I simply allow the thought to be. I notice it, and then I let it go. You can visualize this by imagining all thoughts that pass through your mind as clouds floating by or as balloons floating away. And, if it is helpful, name the thought as you watch it go, such as "fear" or "judgment" or "anger."

Because everything is energy, all thoughts have energy, too. I'm sure you've been in a room of negative thinking people and you can feel it, just like you can feel it when you're in a room with positive thinking people! This is what the scientific experiment I participated in proved. Thoughts have energy and they can make a big difference!!

Thus, energetically, by detaching from a negative thought and not giving any significance to it, this de-energizes the thought form. By not attaching "bad" to it or any "bad" feelings, it loses its potential power in your mental energy and health. If, on the other hand, you add more judgmental thoughts and feelings about yourself or someone else because you had a negative thought, you ENERGIZE the thought form, making it more likely it will repeat.

Detaching from thoughts is a helpful practice in general and can teach you that you are not your thoughts. You are greater than your thoughts. Your identity is not dependent on your thoughts (or your circumstances, or emotions)! By not judging yourself for having it, or thinking that the thought is any big deal, it can lose all its boomeranging power, and never return.

However, sometimes there is more to healing thoughts than any of these three methods allow. Perhaps you do all of the above and the negative thought STILL recurs. Maybe you notice strong emotions or unwanted behaviors coming along with the negative thought. Then what you might need is some good old-fashioned soul work, and what I do to heal these particularly sticky negative thoughts will have to be a blog all its own.

FAIL-SAFE METHOD #4

But in the meantime, give thanks. If you find yourself thinking anything negative, whether you reprogram, tap to train, or zenly let it all go, follow it all up with gratitude. Keep your attention focused on your heart when you do this and think of one thing, or five things, or everything you have to be grateful for, and then dwell in this state of being for a while. Gratitude can help shift you out of most negative thinking patterns by refocusing on the heart rather than the head and by stimulating in you a positive energy that's as strong as any method or trick or technique. Donna Eden states that "gratitude is the best vaccination for everything"and energetically, it generates radiant energy flows which help in your body's healing and health.

So as we prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving, remember that by giving thanks, you are helping to heal yourself mind, body, and soul. Heal yourself, help heal the world!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

To schedule a healing session or speaking event with Monica call her at 206-306-1144, email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com

Copyright © 2009 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, speaker, spiritual director, minister, and author of My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

The Halloween-Teen Syndrome

2009-10-28T13:57:00.001-07:00

(or How to Heal Your Fears, Part One)

A few weeks ago, a friend posted a video from YouTube. The introduction to it stated:

"This is a car advertisement from England. When they finished filming the ad, the film editor noticed something moving along the side of the car, like a ghostly white mist. They found out that a person had been killed a year earlier in that exact same spot. The ad was never put on TV because of the unexplained ghostly phenomenon. Watch the front of the car as it clears the trees in the middle of the screen and you'll see the white mist crossing in front of the car, then following it along the road...Spooky! Is it a ghost, or is it simply mist? You decide. If you listen closely to the ad, you'll even hear the cameraman whispering in the background about it near the end of the commercial."

Saying I'm fascinated by all things supernatural is like saying FaceBook is addicting, (duh!), so I eagerly clicked on the video's play button, turned up the volume to be sure to hear the whispering of the cameraman, got close to the computer screen so I could see the mist in front of the small car, and waited with bated breath for a ghost sighting.

If you're yelling, "Sucker!" at me right now, you guessed the set-up that I, with my gullible, Gilliganesque personality, totally missed. Yup, it was just a gag video to scare you out of your skivvies and I got reeled in as easily as a limp fish. When the sight and sound gag appeared, I let out a yell like a strangled peacock and about fell out of my chair from fright. My heart was hopping around like a rabbit on crack so I started doing lots of deep breathing to try to calm it down. After that I did something very unexpected: I started laughing—hard—harder than I should have without first putting on a pair of Depends.

(For all ye of curious nature, I've posted the video below. DO NOT get close to your computer screen and turn the volume up like I did unless you crave heart attacks. You have been warned.)

Apparently, these gag videos are all the rage among our young, for when I told my teenagers about the video, their response was "No big deal. Kids send that stuff to each other all the time." (Translation: Duh, Mom!) I should note here that my teens LOVED Bastyr University's "Haunted Trails" this year. A few nights ago they stood in line for over two hours in the damp, teeth-chattering cold just so they could be fake-spooked for fifteen minutes by masked ghouls and chainsaw-carrying zombies. Maybe this is a just an older version of the more innocent startle-and-laughter they got from Jack-in-the-Boxes. Or maybe teenagers deserve their own designation in the animal kingdom, as the only mammals who LIKE to be terrified.

Maybe, though, there is something to be learned from all of this about how to heal our fears.

The unexpected, regaling laughter that emerged out of my body after about being scared out of it, gave me a new awareness. Somehow I was able to see the humor in terror. Slightly demented, I know, but it led to another insight: Laughter is a stronger energy than fear. You cannot laugh and be afraid at the same time. Try it! Right now! Imagine something really scary. Feel your fear. Then imagine something funny enough to make you laugh, like your favorite Seinfeld episode. Now try to feel your fear while you're laughing. See! It's impossible! Both are generated in your belly (or for you energy connoisseurs, the stomach chakra) and laughing drives the angst right out!

Perhaps this is why J.K. Rowling had her Harry Potter characters think of something funny in order to defeat the fake-scary boggarts. And, perhaps this is what draws teens afflicted with the Halloween-Teen Syndrome to haunted trails and horror flicks like gluttonous pigs to slop: by experiencing fear and then enjoying it and laughing at it, they learn how to overcome it.

As adults, I believe we lose the natural ability that teens have to laugh at fear, because, well, we are aware that there are REALLY horrific things in the world: Terrorists, and swine flus, and global economic meltdowns! Oh my! Terrorists, and swine flus, and global economic meltdowns! Oh my! Can laughter really make a difference in light of such things? I mean, there are truly barbaric events going on in our world right now. Darfur, anyone?

On a recent episode of The Oprah Show, people and organizations that empower women and children were showcased. One person, a woman from Portland, started a successful fundraising campaign for Sudanese women who had lived through unimaginable horrors. She visited some of these women in Sudan earlier this year, to meet them and deliver letters from women in the States who had chosen to befriend them and sponsor them personally like penpals. The woman from Portland was amazed and learned a lot from these Sudanese women. "They were so joyful," she said, "They were always ready to dance, and sing, and laugh."

These Sudanese women who have lived through nightmarish brutality, know the secret to overcoming fear. Joy and laughter heals. (Perhaps this is why J.K. Rowling had her Harry Potter characters think of joyful events in order to magic away the truly scary dementors.)

We who are well-off and relatively sheltered in the West have much to learn about joyful living. We go around fretting about everything that might go wrong. Even petty fears consume us: What if I find out I don't have the best friends-and-family calling plan? What if a friend on FaceBook unfriends me? What if Paula Abdul leaves American Idol? (Oh wait, all of these teeny weeny fears of mine have already happened and the planet is still turning!!)

We don't realize that living in fear actually helps create our worst nightmares. For example...

Although there were definitely concrete reasons the global economy almost bottomed-out last year, whenever the collective PANIC increased, the stock market went down even further, making it even more likely that a total meltdown would happen;

Living in fearful stress lowers our immune systems, making us more vulnerable to disease; and

Bombing terrorists and their families, um, makes them madder, and increases their desire to retaliate against us.

So, worrying about terrorists, swine flus, and global economic meltdowns, oh my! can lead to the very scenarios we dread!

Undeniably, catastrophes can and do happen whether we worry about them or not. But the True You, your Spirit, is greater than anything that can happen to you. Your Spirit is always overflowing with joy. Always. You can choose to tap into that infinite resource at anytime and it will magic away your fears like ash in the wind.

So, if you're anxious about your life, rather than hiding under your bed, watch some Seinfeld reruns instead. If you're worried for the world, rather than running to the hills, try cracking a few jokes about the worst that could happen (if you need a few tips on how to do this, late-night comedians are geniuses here). If you're fretting about friends and family, rather than taking another Valium or picking up another bottle of beer, start to fake laugh as hard as you can (scientific studies have shown that fake laughter produces the same physiological benefits as real laughter.)

As your fears decrease, you'll have much more space and energy in your life to do what you truly enjoy, whether that's dancing, singing, or simply laughing. And the converse of the maxim "worrying helps create your fears" is also true: Living in the energy of joy helps create a world with less suffering, more love, and where people can fulfill their greatest destinies. Heal your fears, help heal the world!!

Happy Halloween!

To schedule a healing session or intuitive spiritual consultation with Monica call her at 206-306-1144, email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com

Copyright © 2009 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, speaker, spiritual director, minister, and author of My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

The Other Side

2009-10-21T18:53:00.001-07:00

This isn't my normal type of blog posting, but I wrote this for a Spiritual Director's resource page and thought I would share it here...

As a newly ordained pastor of a small, historic church outside of Princeton, New Jersey, I was thrilled that some of the residents of a group home across the street from the church began attending worship. These neighbors suffered from mental illnesses and though able to work and mostly care for themselves, they still needed enough assistance that living alone was not possible.

One of these neighbors was a young man named David. He was a regular attendee and several of us at the church decided he would be our honorary greeter because he was so hospitable to churchgoers and guests alike.

One night, David, who occasionally told me, "I have problems," managed to take his life. It was difficult news to receive as a fledgling minister. In the same phone call, the group home asked me to conduct his memorial service. This deeply moved me, because David held a special place in my heart; he was the first person to ever call me "pastor."

On the day of the memorial service, I arrived at the church early to prepare. Standing at the pulpit, I was looking down, leafing through my notes on the sermon I was going to give. The topic was God's compassion for all and I was using the scripture, "nothing can separate us from the love of God." I had been taught growing up that people who committed suicide were not assured of their place in heaven. I didn't believe such a thing anymore and hadn't for a long time. However, I knew there could be several people attending who might have been taught something similar, and I wanted to offer a different perspective. To my thinking, God understood David better than anyone. Surely, God knew all about the illness that would drive David to desperately seek his own death, and of course God had compassion for David's struggles and knew intimately of David's kind and welcoming heart. However, I wasn't confident my message would have much of an impact considering the grief and confusion surrounding this death, but it was all I could come up with to say.

As I was continuing to look over my sermon notes, I heard one of the old wooden swing doors in the back of the church creak, which they always did when someone opened one of them, and then I heard an old, wooden pew in the back‹on the same side as the creaking door‹crack, which they always did as well when someone sat down in one of them. So, I casually looked up from my notes to see who had come in and sat down.

There, on the same spot of the same pew he always sat in every Sunday, was David. He was looking at me with a big smile, and I realized later that this could not have been a memory, because I had never before seen him with even a hint of a smile on his face. His body was translucent and filled with light and I knew, soul-deep and without a doubt, that he was healed and at peace. As I met his eyes, the whole sanctuary filled with a joy that lifted my eyes heavenward and an energy that coursed through my body telling me "all is well." It lasted for just a few moments and when I returned my gaze to David's pew, he was gone.

It is the only time I have every seen someone I know on the "other side." It was also the easiest memorial service I have ever had to conduct, despite the grim circumstances of David's death. A church member told me afterward, in utter shock, that it was the most joyful memorial service she had ever been to and she thanked me for talking about God's compassion for David. I never told her why there was so much joy in that sanctuary that day, nor why I could preach with such conviction that I knew David was in God's eternal arms of Love and Light. At the time, I didn't know if she or anyone would believe my story, and it was several more years before I took the risk of telling someone about it. I offer it now, though, in this public place, in the hope that it might bring some comfort to those grieving the loss of loved ones from suicide.

May God bring you all the peace your heart needs and hold you strong in those eternal arms of Love and Light.

To schedule a healing session, intuitive spiritual consultation or speaking event with Monica call her at 206-306-1144, email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com

Copyright © 2009 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, spiritual director, minister, and author of My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

The Why's Have It: Healing Limiting Beliefs

2009-09-23T15:32:00.001-07:00

Here in Seattle with all our rain (the past summer is an extraordinary exception to the norm) the growth of dandelions in size and number is truly spectacular. Pre-historic-sized. Copious. Even noxious. And very, very hard to get rid of.

This is how limiting beliefs function in our lives. They can grow so large and spread so quickly that without constant vigilance, in a very short amount of time your mental yard can turn into a limiting-belief-dandelion-field interspersed with a few patches of healthy-mental-green-grass.

As with all weeds, but with dandelions in particular, the solution is to get to the root of the plant. If it hasn't been uprooted enough, the dandelion will just re-grow itself from a partial root. This isn't "bad" as it just reveals that there's more to unearth in your limiting-belief-mental-yard. But you will save yourself a lot of time and effort in the end, if you can get most of the root out the first time, before the dandelion has the chance to re-grow and blow its seemingly infinite and eternally propagating seeds into the breeze to multiply all over again.

There are a variety of tools that can assist you in dandelion root excavation. So, too, there are many tools to search out and dissolve limiting beliefs in your life. Here is one I use that is easy to remember and effective. I borrow the general principle from Martha Beck who got it from Japanese automakers. Yup. True.

It seems that one of the main reasons Japanese automakers have become so efficient in their production lines is that they have adopted the philosophy of "The 5 Why's." If a problem emerges in their cars at any point in production, it is the supervisor's MO to ask, "Why did this happen?" No matter what answer they get, they don't stop there. If they did, they'd probably only solve a surface issue and the problem would keep repeating. So, after they solve the first "why," they ask a second time, "And why did this happen?" They have found that it generally takes up to 5 "why's" to find the source or root of their problem. By searching for the source from the beginning they save themselves a lot of time and effort (and money) on all sorts of levels.

I often apply this "5 Why's" principle to finding the root of limiting beliefs (and stuck emotions) in myself and clients. Let's say I have the intuitive hit during a healing session with a client named "Dave" to have him say the affirmation, "I love myself totally and completely" outloud.

If Dave then repeats this with all the force and conviction of an emaciated worm, I suspect that perhaps he doesn't really believe it. And then I know we're dealing with a limiting belief (or two or three or a whole yardful) that needs to be uprooted. Having him say the affirmation over and over again without uncovering the limiting belief behind it is like mowing over all the dandelions in your lawn: a temporary fix.

To begin the uprooting, I have Dave repeat the opposite of the affirmation. (Always side with the fear, the anger, the grief, the shadow, the unknown, the unconscious, allowing it to surface and flow while holding space for it in compassion, rather than fight it. It loses its power that way.)

So continuing on with the above example, I would have Dave side with his mostly unconscious, limiting belief and state out loud: "I do not love myself totally and completely."

Probably, Dave will confess this with quite a bit more energy, even relief, showing that this is the real belief lurking in his mental yard, controlling his life from the shadows. Even this early in the process, pain may start pouring out of him he didn't know he had, revealing how much emotional energy he has had to use up in order to keep this limited belief rooted and buried in his mental yard. Once any emotions that have surfaced have been allowed to be, have run their course and thus mostly subsided, our dialogue might continue like this...

"Dave, why don't you love yourself totally and completely?"

"I'm a failure."

"And why do you believe you are you a failure?"

"Because I'm worthless."

"Why are you worthless?"

"My dad told me so when I was growing up. Over and over."

"Why did your dad tell you that?"

"I don't know. I guess, because he felt worthless."

"And why do you think he felt that way?"

"Because his dad told him that, too."

Aha! In "5 why's" we've uncovered the root of this particular mental belief. It's a family belief that has been passed down father to son, perhaps for generations, like a worn-out, out-of-style suit that doesn't fit. The rest of the session, while I work with his energy surrounding this belief, I would ask my client to verbally release his family belief and affirm what he can now see as truth (that the belief that he is worthless doesn't have anything to do with him personally, and he can now choose whether to keep holding onto this belief or affirm a new one.)

There may be more limiting beliefs that have to be uncovered for Dave to truly begin to love himself totally and completely. Actually, I'd say that's a given. Dandelions and limiting beliefs don't live in solitary confinement for very long and so it's necessary for a person's mental yard to be excavated one dandelion belief at a time, until the "meta-shift" happens.

This "meta-shift" happens the day you suddenly realize, "Hey, I don't need limiting beliefs at all anymore." You then bulldoze your entire mental yard all at once and start living with a completely new reality. Your new MO? Unlimited potential. The sky's the limit. Vast possibilities. Unconditional love for self and all. Then when an occasional dandelion pops up, as they invariably do in even the most meticulously cared for lawn, you can admire it for its own beauty, its tenacity, thank it for what it has to teach you, gently dig it up by the root, and put it in the compost pile to eventually feed and nurture the flowers in the mental garden you do want to grow.

It takes quite a bit of work to unearth these limiting beliefs and dissolve them in compassion--what one healer calls "The Great Undoing." But emerging from the other side is a life full to overflowing with love, joy, peace, beauty, and fulfillment. Don't believe it? Then you may have some mental dandelions to start digging up!

In my own belief system, there's no time like the present to start re-creating your inner landscape and what you achieve inwardly, will absolutely change outer reality. I have no doubt about it!

Copyright © 2009 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, spiritual director, minister, and author of My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

The Great Equalizer

2009-08-17T17:56:00.001-07:00

How to Balance the Ego

Part 3 in an ongoing series on healing the ego

What weighs more: a ton of bricks or a ton of feathers?

We all know the answer--they weigh the same, but the mind's tendency is to vote for the bricks. What looks and feels like a weightier substance should have more value on the scale--even with all things being equal.

This is the same error the ego makes again and again with regard to a person's value. The person who looks or seems weightier/of more import is of more value, even though "we know this truth to be self-evident that all people are created equal" to quote our country's Declaration of Independence--with more equal gender language.
(Note: Even though our society has this ideal, in reality it is way out of balance here. For example, compare the wages of sports stars with teachers.)

But this belief--that all are equal--is exactly the tool needed to balance your own ego. The corollary--that everyone's gifts are also equal--is also a helpful belief. These beliefs are about value not about equivalency. I am not exactly the same as you. I have my unique gifts; so do you. But by nature we all have a divine spark and the same Source of genius, and therefore, we--and our gifts--are of equal value in the unfolding universe.

These beliefs are easy to assent to as ideals, but in practice our minds tend to make the bricks-over-feathers error. Here are ten quick tips to help you catch yourself and rebalance your own ego:

1) If you notice someone else's ego is bothering you, heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: we are of equal value.

2) If you notice you are envious of another's success, heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: we are of equal value.

3) If you notice yourself thinking that you are better or worse than someone else, heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: we are of equal value.

4) If you don't think it's important to look for ego/shadow within, start looking at the part of you that thinks that--it's from ego/shadow and heal that part of you with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: We all have egos/shadows and we are all loved infinitely.

5) If you find self-disgust, self-hate, or self-denigration within, heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: I am of infinite value.

6) If you find yourself exalting another or denigrating another, heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: we are of equal value.

7) If you find yourself evaluating your gifts in comparison to another, heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: all gifts are of equal value.

8) If you find yourself thinking that you are at a higher or lower spiritual/energetic level than another, heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: all paths and levels are of equal merit.

9) If you find yourself thinking, "I'm right and they're wrong," heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: everyone is right and everyone is wrong.

10) If you find yourself thinking, "I'm the expert here. My gifts trump theirs," heal your own ego with unconditional love and compassion and the affirmation: everyone is an expert of something and all gifts are of equal value.

Okay, so you're seeing a theme here, right? The work is always to heal the ego with unconditional love and compassion. Then the balanced ego can easily and gently move into trans-ego, for when the self (small s) knows its infinite, eternal value, when its own genius is validated, and when it is receiving a never-ending supply of unconditional love, then, of course, nothing matters! Of course, all is well! Of course, I can merge/dissolve with All That Is. Of course, because it's all One, it's all Love. Of course, of course, all are equal, because all is Self (large S)!

When you can let go of comparing yourself and evaluating others, life becomes joyful and free. You live knowing everything and everyone is a blessing and a gift. What a great way to live!

Here are 5 signs of a healthy and healing ego:

1) Whatever qualities you regard in others (love, beauty, generosity, genius, special, etc.), you regard in yourself in equal amounts.

2) Whatever regard you give to yourself is also given in equal regard to others.

3) When you catch your ego out-of-balance, you offer love and compassion to yourself, with accountability and apologies to others if needed.

4) Whatever you know, you hold in balance with unknowing, along with the reverence that all is ultimately mystery.

5) You operate from a place of gratitude and humility knowing everyone is a student, even the Dalai Lama.

I encourage you to keep healing your ego with unconditional love and compassion and infinite regard. Doing so will help our society and world regain its balance too, so that (to rephrase a well-known and oft-quoted prophet),

"Every valley shall be lifted up and every hill made low, and the glory of the Divine shall be revealed in all."

Next time: Healing your Thoughts

To schedule a healing session or intuitive spiritual consultation with Monica call her at 206-306-1144, email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com

Copyright © 2009 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, spiritual director, minister, and author of My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

Living from your Truest Self - Transcending the Ego

2009-06-09T07:11:00.001-07:00

Living from Your Truest Self - Transcending the Ego: Trick or Treat?

(If you haven't already, please read the previous post before reading this one. This is part two of a series on healing the ego.)

Gosh, it happened so fast. I had finally healed my self-worth, owned my shadow, and was coming into my own. After working through my dark night of the soul fifteen years ago, a lifetime's worth of loneliness and melancholy were completely gone, never to return. I had a master's degree, my career was established (in spirituality, no less), and I was married with two young kids, a house, a cat, and a dog. My life's path and vocation were set, or so I thought.

Looking back, I can see I was fulfilling the ego part of my journey, even though it felt to me like I was just getting started. I had most of what I wanted and was happy, feeling fulfilled, helping other people heal and grow spiritually.

Then it all began to be stripped away in the blink of an eye (actually, a wink of an eye - you have to have read my book to get this). My job, career, house, health, reputation, money, car, spiritual community - they were all dramatically and drastically eliminated from my life and identity.

This can be the irony of the stage of transcending the ego. What? After creating my fulfilling dreams, it all gets taken away? Why? What was the point of building a healthy self-esteem and identity only to have it stormed by the gates of hell?

Well, actually that was the point. You need a strong ego, a healthy, balanced self-esteem if you are going to transition well into the next stage - trans-ego. The universe/God/All That Is seems to know exactly when the ego stage has been fulfilled to the extent that it needs to be in a person¹s life. In other words, the fulfillment of the ego stage is NOT for the sake of fulfilling the ego. The fulfillment of the ego stage is for the purpose of establishing a strong enough foundation to transition into trans-ego. You must have a firm enough sense of self in order to survive having all of the illusions of self exposed, so you can then discover your true Self (big S). Tricky, eh? (I grew up right next to Canada.)

There are several other tricky insights I have found since I have awakened to my Truest Self.

Tricky insight #2: Because humans are complex beings, you can have parts of you that are in trans-ego, parts of you that are in ego, and parts of you that are in pre-ego - all at the same time! Yup, yup, isn't it fun?

So even when you have awakened to your Truest Self (you know who you are), you still have ego/shadow work to do.

Here is what we have all witnessed: spiritual leaders, healers, gurus who get sabotaged by their own ego/shadow, caught in indiscretions and abuses of power of various kinds. This may be because of ...

Tricky insight #3: The more you move into trans-ego, with more and more awareness of your Truest Self, the ego/shadow work gets subtler and subtler.

So subtle, in fact, that unless you are committed to doing ego/shadow work on yourself on a regular basis, you will probably miss the subtleties. The universe will help you, trying to get you to see the spiritual work you need to do, but this is part of the challenge of ego/shadow work. The ego/shadow is cunning and likes to hide and we tend to be blind to it in ourselves. It is also, as the wild horse analogy in part one indicated, very strong. Thus, it takes at least an equally strong commitment to doing the work to uncover it and continue to bring it to light so it can be integrated and healed.

Tricky insight #4: It is also challenging work because many of the rules that apply in transitioning from pre-ego to ego do not apply or are negated in transitioning from ego to trans-ego. This can create total confusion. Let me show you a few reasons why.

Pre-Ego-to-Ego Rule #1: Everything about you matters.
Ego-to-Trans-Ego Rule #1: Nothing matters.

Pre-Ego-to-Ego Rule #2: The individual self is important to develop in all its facets.
Ego-to-Trans-Ego Rule #2: The individual self is an illusion and its many facets need to be merged or absorbed into the Truest Self.

Pre-Ego-to-Ego Rule #3: To form a healthy ego, a great deal of affirmation, validation, and ownership of thoughts, emotions and actions are needed.
Ego-to-Trans-Ego Rule #3: To transition into trans-ego, a great deal of detachment and neutral indifference from thoughts, emotions, and actions are needed.

Pre-Ego-to-Ego Rule #4: Everything is evolving.
Ego-to-Trans-Ego Rule #4: Everything is well or perfect.

Needless to say, this can get really messy and missteps are common, especially in Rules #3 and #4. Some people who have awakened to their Truest Selves, forget or neglect to keep looking for parts of them that are in ego/shadow. Instead, they apply "Ego-to-Trans-Ego" Rules 3 and 4 to the "Pre-Ego-to-Ego" parts of themselves and others. They are indifferent where they need to be affirming. They detach where they need to be taking responsibility. For example, rather than taking ownership of abuse or boundary violations, a person might instead state, "Everything is perfect. All is well." No matter how true this statement is, in this particular scenario this statement is not coming from an integrated trans-ego place, but from a place of denial about significant ego issues that need integrating.

These missteps can result in the ego/shadow growing, fragmenting, and/or becoming unbalanced. If these missteps persist, they will set up a huge self-sabotaging showdown, which is what can derail so many spiritual leaders, healers, and gurus.

So how not to get too messed up in this process of transcending your ego and living from your Truest Self? Next time, I'll give you some tips. In the meantime, here is Trumping Principle #1: Unconditional Love works for all the stages all the time. So no matter what you run into in yourself or others, apply a large compress of compassion to your heart and theirs. This place of compassion is your Truest Self at its truest and nothing and no one can ever change this. The more compassion you are able to offer yourself and others and the more you are able to operate from this place no matter what your circumstances, you will transition into trans-ego naturally with gentleness, grace and humility.

Trick or treat? Transcending the ego may be tricky, but the treat is getting to live your life from your Truest Self. There is nothing, and let me repeat, there is no-thing (no dream, no ego fulfillment, no person) that is better than that.

To schedule a healing session or intuitive spiritual consultation with Monica call her at 206-306-1144, email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com

Copyright © 2009 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, spiritual director, minister, and author of My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

Living from Intentions vs. Living from Expectations

2009-05-15T16:34:00.001-07:00

Part One: Healing the Ego

Living from Intentions vs. Living from Expectations

We all have them. We all live with them. No, I'm not talking about dust bunnies (or in my case, dust elephants). I'm talking about expectations. Our parents placed expectations on us when we were children (and maybe they still do!). As we grew, our teachers, employers, friends, and partners also expected certain things from us. In general, this is a normal part of coming of age and living as a social being. Our parents', and others' expectations of us for good helped us achieve more than we would have by our own expectations alone.

But as an adult, if you realize you are still living the majority of your life from expectations, then you may start to feel like a wild horse that's constantly tethered to a post. The wild stallion or mare in you wants to break free, to assert itself, to roam fearless and brave. If you have never, ever allowed that wild horse free roam, watch out. It may indeed try to break free someday and if it does (and believe me, it's strong enough to do so) it may start wreaking havoc on your nice, orderly, secure life.

Does it want to destroy you? No. It's trying to get you to listen.

I have found the image of a wild horse is apropos in helping people tame the ego and release unwanted expectations for many reasons. For one, we all know that if you cage or corner a wild animal for a long enough period of time, it can become frenzied to a point that it is dangerous to itself and others. This is when the ego goes over to the dark side or shadow. It is still operating from a good intention (to protect itself) but it has the potential to do anything to anybody at anytime. Have you ever watched the TV show, Snapped? Me neither, but we all know what it is about: adults who, driven into extreme duress and not heeding their inner stallions or mares, suddenly "snap" and do horrific things to their family member. Things that on any normal day would seem, even to them, totally impossible. "I'm a good person. I could never do that." And then, one day, they do just that.

The wild mare or stallion is also apropos for constructive ego images, not just destructive. If you are able to tame a wild horse, you have the opportunity to ride on an amazingly powerful being that can take you to places FAST you couldn't otherwise go, due to time or distance constraints.

In transpersonal psychology, the ego is not seen as inherently negative but a normal part of human development. From one way of viewing it, ideally, we go from an infant pre-ego stage, to a young adult ego stage, to a mature adult trans-ego stage. The ego, then, serves an important part of a person developing a unique and stable identity that can more or less function in the world.

Unfortunately, many religious systems forget the need for individuals to form a healthy identity as part of normal spiritual growth. Instead, they encourage self-sacrifice, even to the extreme of self-abnegation or self-humiliation. (Whips, anyone?) They promote denigrating self to the point of extinction. They discourage self-love, confusing it with self-exaltation.

Thus, many people get the idea that to have good self-esteem and self-love is unhealthy spiritually. They end up living out much of their lives still in pre-ego based on expectations of others, never realizing that forming a healthy self-image from within is desirable for spiritual advancement. Their spiritual leaders have never told them that self-denigration and self-exaltation both stem from an ego that's out of balance. So their "self-sacrificial love" is actually, "I won't/didn't form a self, so you go and live my life for me."

In reality, every stage is important for spiritual development: pre-ego, ego, and trans-ego. Self-sacrifice depends on having a "self" to begin with, for how can you give away unconditional love to someone else, when you don't have any for your self? How can you pour if your cup is empty?

For populations that experience disenfranchisement due to race, gender, class, age, sexual orientation, or disability, forming a healthy ego identity can be even more challenging as layers of oppression create even more obstacles for a person trying to realize their full potential.

So, how to let go of living from expectations and heal this powerful beast called the ego?

First, affirm yourself. "I am a unique and valuable person. I am here for a reason. My life has purpose even if I don¹t have a clue yet what it is."

Second, make a list of all the expectations that are on your life.
My parents expect me to__________.
My spouse/partner expects me to_______.
My employer expects me to__________.

I expect myself to____________. (Even self-expectations are generally from outside of you—you expect of yourself what you are "supposed" to do, according to God, society, family, etc., all, in actuality, coming from outside of you.)

Continue on until you've exhausted whatever expectations you can think of.

Third, go through the list and select which ones you don't like or don't want. If you're unsure about some of them, you might want to say them out loud and notice your body's reactions when you say them. (Your body is very connected to that wild horse in you‹ more so than your mind.) You might find when you say one of the expectations, your stomach gets queasy, your throat starts constricting, your heart skips, or your body gets anxious. What is this telling you? Just listen and take notice.

Fourth, when you've identified all the ones that you don't like or want anymore, then do this visualization.

Visualize that wild stallion/mare of yours tethered to a post with many, many tethers. Imagine that each tether is an unwanted or unneeded expectation that has been placed upon you.

Now, one by one, release each tether that keeps your wild horse tied to that post. You might want to say each release out loud. For example, I might say, "I release the unwanted expectation placed on me by society that I always wear my pants right-side-out" (or whatever).

As you release them, visualize your wild horse gradually regaining its freedom. A little dangerous? Yes, but you can handle it. You're ready. You are a genius horse whisperer. You didn't know that, did you?

Now, when all the tethers are gone, let your wild horse run free in your mind. Where does it want to go, where does it want to run? Go with it. Just let it be free. Let it race around at top speed.

If you let your wild horse out like that all the time, you might never develop its full potential. It's time to start training that wild power, ever so gradually and gently. So after your horse is all tired out from its new adventures, tell it that you will let it out again next time, but now it's time to come home and stay in a corral. Let it know that the corral is large and spacious. It can run around inside whenever it wants.

Then, bring your wild horse back into the corral. Go as slow as it needs you to, building trust. Tell it you won't tether it again, or allow others to tether it without its permission. Apologize, if you need to, for allowing self and others to cage it. Listen to it. It may be VERY, VERY ANGRY or VERY, VERY SAD or VERY, VERY AFRAID. Allow it to express its emotion to you. Gently tell it that it's okay, that you understand. Listen to what it is telling you it wants. Affirm it and give your wild horse lots of loving kindness and compassion.

Next time: Allow that wild horse to run free again. And again, bring it back to the corral. Keep this up for several visualizations until your wild horse gladly and easily comes back into the corral on its own.

Later: When you feel ready and your wild horse gives you permission, slowly learn to ride it in your visualizations. First, just put a blanket on its back. Let it get used to it. Then put a saddle on. Again, let it get used to it. Talk to it, telling your stallion/mare what you are doing and why. Always, listen to it. When you have established enough trust, then let it know that you are going to ride it. Do so, only within the confines of the corral. It may buck you here and there. That's okay. Just stay with it, letting the horse show you what's permissible and what is not.

In time, you will be riding free, but first, let your own imagination run wild. Where would you like to go in your life? What would you love to see? to do? to be? that you've never done before? You may come up with some crazy, forbidden things. That's why you're still in the corral. When you let your wild ego express itself for the first time, it might want to do some things that would harm self or others. This is getting very much in touch with the part of your ego that may have gone into a bit of the dark side for being suppressed or oppressed for so long. That's okay. It's perfectly normal to have these feelings. They are valid emotions; you just don't want to act on them. (Please see note at end of blog.) So keep it in the corral. Keep it within your current values of morality.

If you were given extremely rigid or extremely lax values from upbringing, you may need to do some analyzing here. Is going out for a night of tango dancing harmful to self/others? No, not really. So, that's okay. Is having wanton rabbit sex with every person you meet harmful to self/others? Possibly. So that's not okay. Keep your wild horse in the corral and promise it, it can run free again. Put some reigns on, and let your stallion/mare get used to a measure of self-control.

Then: When you're ready to open the corral and ride your now tamed power-horse out into the world, establish some wild intentions that are still moral (reigns are still on), but are based on freedom from within. "I intend to live in an ashram in India. I intend to eat chocolate-covered beetles to my heart's content. I intend to wear my pants inside-out, every Friday." (Hey, why not?) Let your now tamed, but powerful stallion/mare speed you to your intention as fast as it can to make it happen. Imagine experiencing your intentions in your mind with as much joy and satisfaction as possible.

Do this with as many of your dreams/intentions as you can. Then choose one and develop a step-by-step plan for actually getting there in real life. When you've accomplished it, then choose another one and keep going!

When you live from in-tention, you are living from "in," from within. Living from within, from intention, integrates and heals your ego, helping you build a solid foundation of healthy self-esteem so you can fulfill your potential. And, it's fun! When you live from ex-pectation, you live from "ex," from outside. This divides your inner being from your social being, creating dissonance, disappointment, and even destruction. Choosing to live from within, from intention is an exciting, fulfilling way to live. It is also a fundamental step that is necessary to learn so that you can then work on transcending your ego, the next major path of your spiritual journey in this life.

Please note: If you feel you may be a danger to yourself or others, immediately seek out the services of a medical or other healthcare professional. If unavailable, call a crisis help line or 911.

NEXT — Part Two: Living from your Truest Self: Transcending the Ego

To schedule a healing session or intuitive spiritual consultation with Monica call her at 206-306-1144, email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com

Copyright © 2009 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, spiritual director, minister, and author of My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling.

FW: Monica's News

2009-04-27T14:53:00.001-07:00

Happy Earth Day!

If you would like, take a few moments now and send some loving and healing thoughts to the earth and all its inhabitants. Our collective intentions will make a difference! In honor of this day, I've included one of my favorite poems, The Sycamore, by Wendell Berry at the end of this email.

FREE Breathwork Healing Groups
I am feeling compelled to teach healing through breathwork to as many people as possible so I am now offering FREE groups. So if you have always wanted to learn this, or have already experienced it but want others to as well, invite some friends, neighbors, co-workers, or a spiritual community group, and let me know! If you host a group, you will receive $15 off a private healing session with me that you can use for yourself or you can pass it along to someone else. I'm kicking this off tonight with a church youth group in Bellevue. http://www.monicamcdowell.com/index_files/Page870.html

Sunday, June 7th, 4-7 p.m.
The next breathing/healing potluck will be at my home on the above date. These are free and I facilitate the time together. RSVP as space is limited. Join us! They are fun and transformative!

Blog
I haven't yet got the Healing Q&A up yet. That's because I've been hard at work finishing the first draft of my next book which has finally happened! Yeah! It's now out for collective editing and I've serendipitously connected with an artist who would like to work on the book with me. More later and keep sending/calling me with your healing questions, but in the meantime check out the couple of new posts on the blog... http://monicamcdowell.blogspot.com/

If you would like to subscribe to my blog feed just reply to this email with "blog" in the subject line.

Healing Sessions
If you're wanting some healing in your life, whether it's spiritual, emotional, physical, relational, or vocational, and you'd like to have a session with me, let me know. Hour sessions are $85 in person or over the phone. I'd love to help facilitate your healing and growth to the next level! I also sell healing supplies, candles, books, and breathwork cd's.

http://www.monicamcdowell.com/index_files/Page891.html

Facebook
Join me on Facebook! I'm having a blast and finding it's a little heaven on earth: everyone I've ever known all connected in one place. Find me under Monica McDowell in Seattle or put in my email monica@monicamcdowell.com

The Sycamore

In the place that is my own place, whose earth
I am shaped in and must bear, there is an old tree growing,
a great sycamore that is a wondrous healer of itself.
Fences have been tied to it, nails driven into it,
hacks and whittles cut in it, the lightning has burned it.
There is no year it has flourished in
that has not harmed it. There is a hollow in it
that is its death, though its living brims whitely
at the lip of the darkness and flows outward.
Over all its scars has come the seamless white
of the bark. It bears the gnarls of its history
healed over. It has risen to a strange perfection
in the warp and bending of its long growth.
It has gathered all accidents into its purpose.
It has become the intention and radiance of its dark fate.
It is a fact, sublime, mystical and unassailable
In all the country there is no other like it.
I recognize in it a principle, an indwelling
the same as itself, and greater, that I would be ruled by.
I see that it stands in its place, and feeds upon it,
and is fed upon, and is native, and maker.

Wendell Berry

Many Blessings to you today and to our physical home, mother earth!

Monica
--
Rev. Monica McDowell, MDiv
To order my book, My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic, send a check made out to Healing Light to 5022 NE 188th St.; LFP, WA 98155 and for credit and debit card payments, just let me know and I'll send you a Paypal invoice. With tax and shipping by media rate - $21.81, or by priority mail - $23.10.
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Press Release

2009-04-08T20:41:00.001-07:00

The lighter side of being blacklisted...

Do sexual harassment and angels, civil rights and auras, a precedent-setting federal ruling and mystical awakening even go together? They do in the Rev. Monica McDowell's riveting, stranger-than-fiction true story, My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic.

With a Master of Divinity degree from Princeton Theological Seminary in her back pocket, Monica lands her dream job at a Seattle Presbyterian church, only to find that within days, the senior minister is sexually harassing her. It all goes rapidly downhill from there, faster than you can spell l-a-w-s-u-i-t. But long before Monica is finally victorious as the first ordained minister in the country ever granted civil rights, her life takes another twisting turn -- this time towards the bizarre. Like a mangy dog draws fleas, Monica starts attracting unusual mystical experiences, convincing her she's about to win a one-way ticket to the local mental ward. From angels who take a keen interest in her on-going legal case to spontaneous healings that scare the bejeezus out of her but restore her stress-devastated body to health, Monica humorously tries to make sense of it all as she is catapulted into mystery beyond her wildest imaginings. With real-life drama that includes 9/11, the Nisqually Earthquake, and Julie from The Love Boat, Monica adeptly turns this dark tale of institutional injustice into lighthearted fare. Deeply challenging to conventional understandings of "the way things work," ultimately, this page-turning saga is an inspirational memoir of a truth so strong and a love so large, no one can be unchanged in the reading of it.

To read what others are saying about this book, go to http://www.monicamcdowell.com/index_files/Page508.html

To purchase this book, call 206-306-1144 or email monica@monicamcdowell.com

Cost $16.99 plus tax and shipping.

Lady Wisdom

2009-03-13T13:44:00.001-07:00

Do you hear Lady Wisdom calling?
Can you hear Ms. Insight raising her voice?
She's taken her stand at First and Pike!
at the busiest intersection, right in Pike's Place Market
where the traffic is thickest, she shouts,
"Hey, I'm talking to all of you,
everyone out here on the streets, Listen!"
(adapted from The Message, Proverbs 8:1-21)

It is clear from Proverbs 8 that God as Lady Wisdom is not the face of God that is hidden and silent. On the contrary, She is blaringly obvious. Can't miss Her! This passage teaches us that the problem isn't God; it's us. We are ignoring and dismissing God just as we might any street-corner preacher.

Why are we doing this? What She offers is abundance, honor, the right use of power, truth, justice, and fair laws -- in sum, wholeness, a good way of life for individuals and societies. Why don't we want that?

Maybe because we think the cost is too high. Personal integrity comes with a price tag; you might lose your job or career. Truth and justice are expensive, so let's just keep the organization as is.

Perhaps. But I think the reason is lack of faith. For Jesus said if we knew what the spiritual realms offered, we'd give away everything we owned in a second in exchange for it. So it isn't that we think that the price tag is too high. Oh no, it's that we don't believe in the real worth of what's being offered us. We think it's too good to be true! We think She's running a street-side scam, so we won't take the risk. We won't let go of the little we're clutching in our hand, so that we can receive the armloads of benefits Lady Wisdom promises us.

This Lent, take the risk. Let go, and believe She will come through for you.

Originally published in The Gift of the Lenten Journey, 2004, for the Church of Mary Magdalene.

Copyright © 2004 by Monica McDowell, MDiv. All Rights Reserved. This entry may be linked, forwarded, or copied in its entirety as long as this paragraph is included and there is no profit gained by doing so. Monica is an energy healer, spiritual director, minister, and author of My Karma Ran Over My Dogma: Lessons Learned by a Whistle-Blowing Minister Turned Mystic. She has the distinction of being the first ordained minister in the United States ever granted civil rights in a federal ruling. To schedule a mind/body/spirit energy healing session or for more information, check out her website at www.monicamcdowell.com or email her at monica@monicamcdowell.com