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“Never discourage anyone…who continually makes progress, no matter how slow.”
~Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

For years I believed that manifestation, the metaphysical process of bringing into reality the desires of your heart, was something that was supposed to happen quickly once you had set your intention and let go of your limitations. What I have come to appreciate more recently is the process part of manifestation. As part of this an appreciation for the element of time has also evolved.

Let me give you an example:

For years my husband has hated his job. He works in a university library and for a long time he enjoyed helping faculty and students with research, analysis of materials usage, and ordering new materials. Then a new dean of libraries came in with a new vision, one that included using librarian as sales reps to hawk the library’s programs to faculty rather than continuing to focus on the “old fashioned” skills of research and collection management. Husband bitched and moaned. We talked for hours. And over time we slowly built a picture of what his ideal job in the “new” library would look like—continuing to be the “go to guy” for research questions, being not only valued for but specifically given the job of doing complex analysis of materials usage to aid in purchasing decisions, helping with troubleshooting projects for the online catalog. The picture we painted together of this “perfect job” was wonderful, but we could never see a way for it to happen.

Finally out of depression and desperation Husband started talking about early retirement. About the same time a new department manager was hired, a woman who had worked in the library before and who Husband has always gotten along well with. He was able to talk with her about his frustrations, about his inability to be a sales person due to anxiety issues, and his desire to be valued for his unique skills. A few weeks later, New Manager tells Husband that she has created a new position just for him! He is now the go to person for all research questions, asked to do detailed analyses of use records and help his colleagues make purchasing decisions, and helps with troubleshooting. He had just been handed his perfect job on a silver platter! :)

From the time we started imagining the perfect job and the time it was given to him, Husband and I had spent almost five years manifesting this change.

I have learned several important lessons from this experience:

#1 Manifestation works! Yay! But not always on the time schedule you think you want, or you think is best; the universe has its own time schedule. It would be easy to insert a “DUH!” here :) , but the truth is that as spiritual beings in human form we tend to forget that time is limitless. We get, at best, only 80-100 years in each body, so we tend to want everything good right now. We forget that we are often unable to fully appreciate “good” things received at a “bad” time.

#3 Non-attachment creates flow! I don’t think that Husband would have been able to fully appreciate this opportunity even a year ago. Until recently he was still too tied up in knots about judging the new dean’s abandonment of services he feels are central to “good librarianship” to be able to relax and let the universe do its work. The new job came within just a few weeks of his finally letting go of this, and other, job-related attachments.

#2 Being nice to yourself is a source of great power! My belief that manifestation “done correctly” should happen quickly was a limitation on the universe that constricted the flow of energy both around the issue and within and through me. It became a source of self-judgment, and ultimately of self-doubt, both of which limit our powers of creation. People who are confident, self-loving, and open to possibility will find manifestation easier because they are likely to be more centered, better grounded, and more open to the flow of universal energy.

I’ve probably learned lots more good things from this experience, but these are the ones that are sticking with me most strongly. We are both very grateful for Husband’s new opportunity and these lessons. Hopefully we can put them to good use on manifesting more good things! :)

Tobeme wrote a post today asking “How Does Your Light Shine?” inspired by the lyrics of a Three Dog Night song, Shambala, followed by the questions: “Are we lighting the way? Are we radiant with love? Are we kind to all or just the ones we feel deserving our kindness? Do we look for the light in our brothers and sisters even when the ones who seem to be void of light?” In thinking about the post and the comments that followed I was most struck by the idea of radiating, rather than what we might be radiating. So, I commented:

I do think that I radiate light, even when I’m in a bad mood. No matter what emotional state I’m in or how loving (or not) I may be feeling at the moment I, and everyone else, always radiate the light of Divinity. Afterall, we are all God. What I try to do in my daily life is to keep this awareness fully conscious. The more mindfully conscious I am about my own and everyone and everything else’s Divinity the more likely I am to be patient, kind, loving, etc. with others as well as myself.

Two things came together to lead me to this answer. First was the most recent Energy Alert (March 24, 200 8) in which Karen talks about our having reached an energetic milestone, long anticipated, which, in part, releases the many lightworkers who have been engaged in guiding others into expanded awareness from continuing with that responsibility. In addition to the universal implications of this release I took a more personal message that in this new energy I must finally, for sure and certain, let go of my habits of taking personal responsibility for other people’s growth and happiness. Second, was tobeme’s first question, “Are we lighting the way?”. When I first read that question I interpreted “lighting the way” as a directive to be actively engaged in drawing other people along the path (of enlightenment, awareness, growth, etc.). This annoyed me. I don’t want to be responsible for lighting anyone else’s path! I’m tired of holding up this damn light! But that irritation was good because it led me to what I think the deeper meaning of the question actually is, for me at least. Lighting the way can be, and is perhaps ultimately more powerful as a state of being rather than an action—each of us glowing from with in with the lovingkindness of our true nature, our Divinity, in such a way that our simple presence will positively influence (i.e. light the way) those around us.

May we all be fully conscious of our Divinity and in that awareness allow our light to illuminate the joy in our own lives and the lives of others so that we may all together experience the joy of being God!

I just added a new blog to my blogroll: Heartfelt Blessings. I “discovered” it by email when a friend forwarded yesterday’s post to me. I really like the premise of Kate Nowak’s site and blog: that we are both more empowered ourselves and are better able to empower others and thereby change the world for the better through blessing, rather than through struggle of any kind. Among other things, her blog entries provide reminders and inspiration about the interconnected of everything in the universe and the importance of giving ourselves as much blessing as we give others.

As with most of the best things in my life this new blog has come to me at just the right time. I’ve been struggling lately with old, unhealthy habits of putting others’ needs before my own and needed a reminder about my own divinity and inherent worth. This “blessing blog” has been that reminder. I hope it is also a blessing for you. :)

Sophie.jpgMany of you were very kind when I recently posted about missing my dog. So, I thought you might enjoy knowing that we have recently (finally!) found a new dog to adopt into our home. Meet miss Sophie Jane, a 9-month-old blond lab. After more than a month of haunting the kennels of the local animal shelter and visiting adoption days at the PetsMart I had begun to think that yet again the time just wasn’t right. Then almost on a whim I stopped by the adoption kennels at PetsMart while on an errand with my goddaughter. There she was. My dog! Finding Sophie was about recognition of a foregone conclusion not any kind of evaluation procedure. She was simply my dog and I was there at the right time to find her. Let’s hear it for synchronicity! I have my happy suspicions about her connections with my last dog Jona, but I’ll explore that later. For now I’m just celebrating. :)

Sarah and Chin-ai.jpgSadly, in the midst of this celebration my husband and I are also mourning. Our cat Chin-ai, who would have been 18-years-old on May first passed over on Saturday. She had been declining for some time and we knew she was in the process of transition. Then this week she simply stopped eating and was drinking less and less. It became clear that she was done. So, with the help of our wonderful vet we sent her home. We will miss her terribly, but celebrate her wonderful life and the love and energy she shared with us. Maybe when she’s rested she’ll come back and share another life with us. We will certainly welcome her wonderful spirit in whatever form she chooses to take.

“What did you do as a child that made the hours pass like minutes? Herein lies the key to your earthly pursuits.”

~Carl Jung

I found this quote on a site called Another Girl at Play, an inspiring site about women who have taken their creativity and talent and run with it into commercial success. (Unfortunately, with the mood I’ve been in lately it actually depressed me. Sigh. )

The quote seems particularly appropriate for me right now. I need to remember those “hours pass like minutes” times from when I was a kid ’cause lately nothing seems to generate in me that yummy-warm feeling of intense creativity. I feel like I’m just coasting in a clingy fog and I can’t get excited about anything. Ugh. Its been so bad that I’ve even been having random thoughts about selling off all of my beads, which is really weird, even sacrilegious. I love beads! I’ve loved them since I was four and some family friend gave me an old pimento jar full of tri-lobed, plastic beads and some thread. But lately I can’t make myself do anything with them. And the mere thought of preparing for the art shows this summer makes me want to crawl into the back of the closet and close the door.

ChineseBrownGeese.jpgAbout the only creative thing I’ve been able to do is take pictures. I like to go to the park near my house and take photos of the birds. Even that has been marred somewhat by negative thoughts about the new camera I’d like to buy. The icky, negative voice in my head is trying to tell me that I can’t really justify spending $800 on the camera and lens that I want if all I’m going to do is take photos of ducks (or Chinese Brown geese, left). If I’m going to spend that kind of money I should plan on trying to do something commercial with my photos. But I don’t want to! I just want to take nice photos for me. Aren’t I good enough to justify the expense if it really makes me happy? My higher, happy voice says “Yes!” My lower, icky voice says “Probably not.” I really hate the icky voice. :/

So, I’ve been taking pictures of ducks despite what the icky voice says. It gets me outside, both outside of the house and outside of myself. That’s good. That’s creative. That’s even meditative, and probably healing. I guess I’ll just hold onto that until this cloud that has sunk over me and the icky voice finally leave. Bleh.

I know that we haven’t reached the spring equinox yet, but its spring in the Texas panhandle. I know this for three reasons: the wind, the birds, and the flowers.

The wind. In this part of Texas, on the southern end of the Great Plains we get lots of wind. A completely still day is quite a rarity. Most often breezes are between 5 and 10 mph with the occasional gust up to 20 mph. But in the spring things ramp up. It is not uncommon to have days where the average breeze is 15 mph with occasional gusts up to 40 or even 50 mph. And recently we have had several days with gusts up to 60 mph! In a year with average rainfall these blustery days are only mildly annoying. Holding on to your hat becomes the focus of any trip outdoors. But this year we are in a drought so there is nothing to prevent the wind from picking up all that dried-out soil and filling the sky with it. Skies full of red dirt are a challenge for human, animal, and car alike. Yuck! The few days like this that we have every year really make me appreciate the pioneers during the Dust Bowl.

The birds. This area of the Southern High Plains is dotted with thousands of small, shallow ponds called playas. Many of these are seasonal and come and go with the rains, but many are large enough that even though their water level varies widely during the year there is always enough water to entice water fowl and other critters to stop, rest, eat, breed, and enjoy the view. For this reason, this area is on one of the main migratory paths in the United States. It is also partly why the MyPlaya122507.jpgGreat Plains is No. 1 on the 25 most important and threatened waterfowl habitats on the continent. In cities and towns in the region, city parks have been built around many of these lakes. Ok, so maybe they’re more like ponds or even large puddles than lakes, but in this semi-arid region you take what water you can get and celebrate it! I am fortunate enough to have two such parks within a mile of my home (photo above). So, every time I drive in and out of the neighborhood I get to watch the ducks, geese, gulls, herons, kites, hawks, and whatever else may be visiting.

Geese122507.jpgLast week the Canadian Geese left. We always have many of these birds winter here, but there were more this year than in recent years. There were also many Snow Geese scattered through the large flocks of Canadians (photo right). I also saw my first Blue Heron and Cormorant last week; unfortunately I didn’t have my camera. The Great Blue Heron is a fairly common bird throughout most of the United States, and while it is supposed to be a year-round resident in this region I generally don’t see them during the winter months. So, for me, to see one is another sign of spring. The Double Crested Cormorant is also somewhat common, but we only see them in this area during their migration, which is usually in April and May. March is early and a definite sign of spring!

The flowers. Despite the wind and the continuing occasional bouts of cold weather (It’s snowing lightly today) the spring flowers are determinedly blooming. I have two flower beds packed full of daffodils that I look forward to every year and they began to bloom this week. I have also noticed the crabapple trees in full bloom in several places in the city. I’m happy that the other fruit trees haven’t started to bloom yet. So often they bloom in warm weather and then we get one last freeze that kills the bloom. But that doesn’t seem to bother the apple growers in the area. They seem to do quite well year after year.

So, its definitely spring! I’m so glad. Though we’ve had a fairly mild winter I’m ready for the full sun and cool breezes of spring. I’m ready for more birds and more flowers. I’m ready for change.

Passion for life

“There is no end. There is no beginning.
There is only the infinite passion for life.”

~Federico Fellini

I’ve been tagged for a book-related meme. Thanks Muse! :o) I find this particular meme fun because its really a sort of divination. In stichomancy, one chooses a book from a shelf at random, allows it to fall open to an arbitrary page, chooses a line or passage with eyes closed, and then reads that passage for insight into the future or current issues of concern. Another form of book divination is biliomancy in which one selects a holy book like the Bible or Koran to read from. Or, you can try the 21st century version of “book” divination at facade.com, or try the “random page” function at Wikipedia!

The quotes from both MusEdition’s and RubyShooZ’s (who tagged Muse) books were quite interesting. And darn if I’m not going to have to go out and buy the book from which RubyShooZ quoted. It sounds like a real winner! In an effort to be equally interesting I tried the rules (below) on my current favorite book: The God Theory by Bernard Haisch. Unfortunately there are only 5 sentences on page 123 of this book so I had to look elsewhere for inspiration. The book I picked up next was The Seat of the Soul by Gary Zukav.

So, here are the rules:
1. Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

“We act as though we are not affected when we take and take and take. We strive for external power and in that striving create a destructive competition.
The introduction of consciousness into the cyclic process of creation through which the soul evolves permits the creation of a world that is built upon the consciousness of the soul, a world that reflects the values and perceptions and experiences of the soul.”

Oddly enough I find that these few sentences do speak to me, or at least the last sentence does. I’ve been working on manifestation and abundance issues and key to both of those is infusing our mundane world with soul to create “a world that reflects the values and perceptions and experiences of the soul.” In order to do that I need to be able to both connect with my soul’s higher vision and then creatively imagine that vision into reality. This quote is, for me, both a confirmation of my process and an encouragement to continue. Cool! Stichomany really can work!

Now, lets see what some others can do with this meme. How about… DoveLove and Ronnie?

At the risk of having someone on the playground accuse me of being a copycat, I thought it would be fun to reproduce here the results of an online test that I took in response to a post over at MusEditions. This is based on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, a personality test that I love and have taken several times. The reason I like it so much is that it gave me a framework to begin to understand different personality types, how they differed from me and how they were the same. As an empath I’ve always been aware of how people are feeling, but I haven’t always had a strong sense of what they were thinking–why they do what they do, what motivates them, how they think. This was especially true when I was younger. So, when I learned about the MBTI I grabbed hold of it like a life-preserver in the high-sea of psychological and social patterns I often felt I was drowning in. I used it not so much for labelling people (which I did quietly in my own mind) but for learning about the different ways that people think, are motivated, solve problems, etc. It was eye-opening to say the least! Something as seemingly simple as understanding that there are more people in the world who think their way through problems than feel their way through was a profound insight for me at the time. Now, in mid-life I’m much more confident and much more adept at reading and understanding people at all levels, not just emotional. But, I still enjoy a good personality test and sharing them with others! :o) So, my profile follows. What are you?


You Are An INFP


The Idealist–You are creative with a great imagination, living in your own inner world. Open minded and accepting, you strive for harmony in your important relationships. It takes a long time for people to get to know you. You are hesitant to let people get close. But once you care for someone, you do everything you can to help them grow and develop. In love, you tend to have high (and often unrealistic) standards. You are very sensitive. You tend to have intense feelings. At work, you need to do something that expresses your personal values. You would make an excellent writer, psychologist, or artist.
How you see yourself: Unselfish, empathetic, and spiritual-
When other people don’t get you, they see you as:
Unrealistic, naive, and weak

Today I read a short article in the New York Times, A Heartfelt Appeal for a Graceful Exit by Jane Brody, advocating rational suicide rather than face the pain, cost, and indignities of terminal illness.

The article is very thoughtful and personal. Brody talks about her 94-year-old former teacher asking her to help him die, which she declines encouraging him to talk with his family. She also shares how her mother made two suicide attempts during her struggle with ovarian cancer, from which she finally died. As a counterpoint to these stories Brody says,

“Modern medicine can keep people alive into their 9th and 10th decades, when in years past they would have succumbed to any number of conditions. Now a small but growing number of these people are asking why. What is the point of living so long if you can no longer enjoy living? What is the point of living until your mind turns to marshmallow and you are reduced to an existence that is less than human?…Why shouldn’t an emotionally sound, thoughtful person be able to call it quits when life has dragged on too long? When there is nothing to gain and much to lose from an ongoing existence?”

I believe that these questions are both poignant and profound. I also believe that these and similar questions need to be asked more often and more openly among families, communities, and lawmakers.

For me the issue of whether or not a rational person should have the right to choose to take their own life is similar to a woman’s right to choose abortion. There will be passionate opinions on every side of the issue but what it really comes down to is the right to choose. When making decisions about one’s own body, health, and life the only person’s opinion that matters is the individual themselves. I would never choose for myself to abort a healthy pregnancy, however I will go to the mat fighting for the right of others to choose an abortion. Similarly, I would choose rational suicide if my quality of life became intolerable, but I will fight to the death (pun intended) for others to have the freedom to choose differently. I have no more right to tell them they must than they do to tell me I must not. The point is CHOICE!

More information:
Compassion & Choices
Euthanasia and Religion
Final Exit Network
World Federation of Right to Die Societies