Julia Cameron, author of The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, is personally facilitating a twelve-week workshop on her book Sunday afternoons in Santa Fe, where she now lives. It is a course on discovering and recovering your creative self. Along with forty other painters, poets, graphic designers, musicians, photographers and writers, I am privileged and honored to be participating. Julia has expressed her creativity as an award-winning journalist writing for the Washington Post, New York Times, Rolling Stone and Vogue. She has been a film and television writer, director and producer of independent features and documentaries, a novelist, playwright, songwriter and poet. She has published over thirty books.
So, what does this have to do with biking in the bosque (forest along the banks of the Rio Grande)? This is the way women often talk, think and write, spiraling around the topic, exploring adjunct nuances, instead of just making their point. My topic this week is guidance, and I’m getting there.
Julia assigns homework each week including two twenty-minute walks on your own without a dog. Forty minutes of weekly walking isn’t the best match for a person using a walker and scheduled for hip replacement surgery May 14th. I substituted feeding blue corn to the cranes for several weeks until they migrated north ten days ago. This week I decided to substitute biking in the bosque. That may sound simple until one realizes one side of my body is not working as well as the other, and I haven’t been on a bicycle in 40 or 50 years. A bit daunting. My painter neighbor loaned me her bike since she isn’t using it. She fell off it, broke her hand and had surgery in December. Even more daunting. She is quick to point out that didn’t stop her from laying down a 6’ x 12’ brick paver patio this week. “You’ve got to push yourself,” she said. “Not bad for someone in her sixties.”
Mindful of her biking experience, I wondered about my own. Could I do it? Could I do it safely? Could I do it without injuring myself? So I asked for guidance, which some people call knowing or intuition, to provide the answers. Whom did I ask? Universal Mind, Spirit, the Force, God, whatever you want to call it. How? By muscle checking for a yes or no answer to my questions. Muscle checking can be done several ways.* The body doesn’t lie. It tells the truth. I have friends whose guidance comes as goosebumps in the presence of truth, or the hair on the back of their arms standing up, a warm feeling in the chest, tingling along the neck, spine, shoulders. Signs of guidance are probably as varied as people. I have been listening to guidance for 25-30 years now. I distinguish between hearing and listening to guidance. To me, hearing it means receiving the information. It can actually come in the form of internally “hearing” an answer (clairaudience), which I have experienced. But listening to guidance not only involves receiving the information, it involves acting on it. This can require courage since it may not seem the logical thing to do. Counterintuitive at times, acting on information received can require trust or faith, at least initially, until one is confident with the validity of the process. Faith and trust can be built. Confidence comes from direct, personal experience. Start small.
Some people start with a pendulum. It can be as simple as a washer on a string or as fancy as a crystal on a chain purchased at a metaphysical bookstore. The first step is establishing the movement that determines a “yes” or “no” response. The pendulum may move north/south for a “yes” and east/west for a “no.” Ask it which is which. My response is a circle to the left for “no” and to the right for “yes.” If you are worried you are making the pendulum move by not holding it perfectly still, hang it up so you are not touching it. In either case, focus your intention on receiving a response to your question.
It can be a long way from a washer on a string to trusting your body to tell you whether or not to firewalk across coals hot enough to melt the metal poured to form the engine of your car. On different occasions, I’ve been guided to walk or not walk, and I listened (acted on the guidance) each time. My firewalk experiences were part of sacred spiritual ceremony with Unity minister Edwene Gaines. She has walked on fire countless times and was burned only once – when she didn’t listen to guidance. She received second-degree burns when she willfully decided to walk, listening to her ego rather than her guidance. She emphasized to us, “You MUST listen to your guidance, for your own safety and that of others.”
Start small. I received bike riding guidance to take my time, go slowly, stop as needed, use the street by the nature preserve with very little traffic, put my left foot (bad hip foot) on a pedal first. I received guidance I could do it safely without injuring myself. So I did. I plan to continue practicing on the street until I can realize my dream of riding on the bike path along the Rio Grande. Guidance will let me know when I’m ready. And I will listen to it.
Synchronistically, Rob Brezsny’s recent Free Will Astrology column just featured a fascinating description of an ancient form of guidance: “How did the Vikings navigate their ships through rough northern seas on cloudy and foggy days? Medieval texts speak of the mysterious ‘sunstone,’ a ‘Viking compass’ used to detect the hidden sun. Modern theories suggest that this technology may have been Iceland spar, a mineral that polarizes light, making it useful in plotting a course under overcast skies. Do you have anything like that, Libra? A navigational aid that guides your decisions when the sun’s not out, metaphorically speaking? Now would be an excellent time to enhance your connection with whatever it is that can provide such power.” I’m glad to say I do have my own navigational aid.
*(See google)
Showing posts with label intuition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label intuition. Show all posts
Monday, March 26, 2012
Monday, November 21, 2011
Questions That Keep You Awake at Night (or “Film at 11”) Part 2
This is a continuation of last week’s posting, my response to an email question received from someone who has known me for more than 50 years asking me the question I’m asked most frequently: “How could, or why would, you move to New Mexico?” Here’s how she expressed it: “I thought about you all night. Why, at this point in your life, have you moved away from Bill and even Grant? My Elizabeth is pregnant, and I wouldn't think about being anywhere else. Pregnancy is quite common. What Grant has been through isn't! You are such a brave and independent woman, but....” She was asking how I could move 893 miles away from my son, recently treated for melanoma.
Continued…
“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1) “Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path.” (Psalm 119:105) This has been a journey into the unknown, one of faith, trust and surrender. Most people deny, rather than embrace, the unknown. It’s challenging, and can be terrifying, to acknowledge we live at the edge of the unknown every moment of our lives. Embracing the unknown and taking action is different from just acknowledging the unknown. It takes not only faith and trust, but also the courage to surrender to the guidance received, to act on it. The Aladdin-like oil lamps of history cast a small amount of light, only enough to reveal the next step, on the path. I have faith I will be shown the way, a step at a time. My life is about “Where the rubber hits the road,” or applying spiritual principles in the physical world.
I also believe the best way to teach my son is by example, to be a role model of how to live life – courageously listening to one’s own inner guidance, trusting one’s own knowing, instincts, intuition. While attending college and working for the Ritz-Carlton, Grant was presented with an opportunity to relocate to Florida. I saw clearly he might move far away to live his life…and that I needed to live mine.
Elisabeth Kubler Ross’ writing about wild geese, quoted in Edwene Gaines’ book, The Four Spiritual Laws of Prosperity: A Simple Guide to Unlimited Abundance, was pointed out to me by a friend leafing through it on my bookshelf as I prepared to move from Santa Barbara. I hadn’t read it yet!
How do geese know
when to fly to the sun?
Who tells them the seasons?
How do we humans know
when it is time
to move on?
As with the migrant birds,
so surely with us,
there is a voice within,
if only we would listen to it,
that tells us certainly
when to go forth
into the unknown.
My moving to New Mexico is a demonstration to Grant that I know he is healed. Grant was on many prayer lists, involved in several miracles, including the fact that he’s in the 15% of the population who respond to Interleukin-2 treatment for melanoma. He no longer needs me. He can go on with is life. What I am doing, he can do. Our lives parallel one another, are mirrors for each other. My leaving is evidence of the gift he has been given, the gift of life, and my encouragement that he accept the gift. Here is what he recently wrote on my birthday card: “Happy Birthday, Mom. Thanks so much for being there for me in one way or another over all the years, but particularly the last 3. I’m blessed to have a person like you in my life, and despite a physical separation, you are with me every day! Love, Grant.” When Grant and I want to be together, we are a two-hour and $223 airplane ride away. Once I have my own home, we’ll share face time on Skype.
I hope this gives you some understanding about how and why I was able to move to New Mexico. I can certainly understand and appreciate why the question kept you awake at night. It kept me awake at night too! For a long time. It was a decision that evolved over many years, a process. It was not simple or easy. And I’m still not sure about the “calling” or spiritual “pull” that brought me to New Mexico. What is that about? I don’t know. But I do have some “clues!” All I can do is continue my spiritual practices and respond to the guidance given. I’ll write about guidance in future blog postings. Responding to this question has been a rich experience for me. Thank you for asking. “More to be revealed,” as I always say, or, as a dear friend puts it, “Film at 11.”
If you have a question, please send it to terranda@hotmail.com
Continued…
“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1) “Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path.” (Psalm 119:105) This has been a journey into the unknown, one of faith, trust and surrender. Most people deny, rather than embrace, the unknown. It’s challenging, and can be terrifying, to acknowledge we live at the edge of the unknown every moment of our lives. Embracing the unknown and taking action is different from just acknowledging the unknown. It takes not only faith and trust, but also the courage to surrender to the guidance received, to act on it. The Aladdin-like oil lamps of history cast a small amount of light, only enough to reveal the next step, on the path. I have faith I will be shown the way, a step at a time. My life is about “Where the rubber hits the road,” or applying spiritual principles in the physical world.
I also believe the best way to teach my son is by example, to be a role model of how to live life – courageously listening to one’s own inner guidance, trusting one’s own knowing, instincts, intuition. While attending college and working for the Ritz-Carlton, Grant was presented with an opportunity to relocate to Florida. I saw clearly he might move far away to live his life…and that I needed to live mine.
Elisabeth Kubler Ross’ writing about wild geese, quoted in Edwene Gaines’ book, The Four Spiritual Laws of Prosperity: A Simple Guide to Unlimited Abundance, was pointed out to me by a friend leafing through it on my bookshelf as I prepared to move from Santa Barbara. I hadn’t read it yet!
How do geese know
when to fly to the sun?
Who tells them the seasons?
How do we humans know
when it is time
to move on?
As with the migrant birds,
so surely with us,
there is a voice within,
if only we would listen to it,
that tells us certainly
when to go forth
into the unknown.
My moving to New Mexico is a demonstration to Grant that I know he is healed. Grant was on many prayer lists, involved in several miracles, including the fact that he’s in the 15% of the population who respond to Interleukin-2 treatment for melanoma. He no longer needs me. He can go on with is life. What I am doing, he can do. Our lives parallel one another, are mirrors for each other. My leaving is evidence of the gift he has been given, the gift of life, and my encouragement that he accept the gift. Here is what he recently wrote on my birthday card: “Happy Birthday, Mom. Thanks so much for being there for me in one way or another over all the years, but particularly the last 3. I’m blessed to have a person like you in my life, and despite a physical separation, you are with me every day! Love, Grant.” When Grant and I want to be together, we are a two-hour and $223 airplane ride away. Once I have my own home, we’ll share face time on Skype.
I hope this gives you some understanding about how and why I was able to move to New Mexico. I can certainly understand and appreciate why the question kept you awake at night. It kept me awake at night too! For a long time. It was a decision that evolved over many years, a process. It was not simple or easy. And I’m still not sure about the “calling” or spiritual “pull” that brought me to New Mexico. What is that about? I don’t know. But I do have some “clues!” All I can do is continue my spiritual practices and respond to the guidance given. I’ll write about guidance in future blog postings. Responding to this question has been a rich experience for me. Thank you for asking. “More to be revealed,” as I always say, or, as a dear friend puts it, “Film at 11.”
If you have a question, please send it to terranda@hotmail.com
Monday, November 14, 2011
Questions That Keep You Awake at Night (or “Film at 11”) Part 1
This week I received an email from someone who has known me for more than 50 years asking me the question I’m asked most frequently: “How could, or why would, you move to New Mexico?” Here’s how she expressed it: “I thought about you all night. Why, at this point in your life, have you moved away from Bill and even Grant? My Elizabeth is pregnant, and I wouldn't think about being anywhere else. Pregnancy is quite common. What Grant has been through isn't! You are such a brave and independent woman, but....”
She of course meant, why did I move 893 miles away from my son, and only child, who recently completed treatment for melanoma? She and I were teenagers together in the youth group at the First Baptist Church of Garden Grove where her parents were our group leaders. I left the church at 18, unable to believe babies not baptized were destined for hell along with Methodists, who sprinkled, instead of immersing like Baptists. “Two paths diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by…” How could an esoteric metaphysician communicate clearly with a fundamentalist Christian about core values? All I could do was seek common ground when I wrote back to her.
Bill and I have been divorced for 29 years. We are friends. We call each other on birthdays and holidays. When we divorced, we divorced each other, we did not divorce Grant. Fortunately, we were both mature enough at the time to place Grant’s needs first and make sure he still had two parents. Both of us were with him during his treatment at UCLA. Bill lives in the L.A. area; I lived in Santa Barbara, a little over an hour away. We might see each other once or twice a year. Friends and family members say of us, “You and Bill have done divorce better than anyone else we know.” Still, why would I ever let the whereabouts of my ex-husband determine where I live or how I live my life? It’s not even a consideration for me.
These are my beliefs and opinions. This is my understanding based on my own spiritual journey. This is how I have made my decisions, why I live my life as I do. It is my soul journey. I recognize the inherent perfection of each person’s soul journey for them.
Moving away from Grant has been easier this time, the second time, because I’ve had practice. Lessons I’ve learned and understandings I’ve gained on my path have enabled me to move forward.
“But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matthew 6:33) In the hierarchy of my personal values, my relationship with God has always come first in my life, next my relationship with my spouse, then my relationship with my child. My child has his own life to live. It is not my life but his life. My job is to love and support him while he is on his own spiritual journey, following his own soul path. Spiritual practice is part of my life – prayer, meditation, contemplation, listening to guidance and intuition. My actions are based on these practices and the information I receive from them.
"He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me (and is in no way fit to enter into the kingdom of heaven).” (Matthew 10:37) In 1997, I left Grant, and everything else, when I moved from San Clemente to Santa Barbara to start a church. After I let go of my business, home, church, friends, community, I was still having trouble with one last letting go - my son. When I shared that difficulty with my mentor, Unity minister Edwene Gaines, she said, “I’m going to give you a hard lesson.” She then quoted Matthew 10:37. It’s another way of saying God must come first in your life. So I let go, left my son and moved to Santa Barbara. He subsequently moved to Santa Barbara to live with me while attending UCSB, but neither of us knew that would be the outcome at the time the decision was made and the action taken.
To be continued next week…
She of course meant, why did I move 893 miles away from my son, and only child, who recently completed treatment for melanoma? She and I were teenagers together in the youth group at the First Baptist Church of Garden Grove where her parents were our group leaders. I left the church at 18, unable to believe babies not baptized were destined for hell along with Methodists, who sprinkled, instead of immersing like Baptists. “Two paths diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by…” How could an esoteric metaphysician communicate clearly with a fundamentalist Christian about core values? All I could do was seek common ground when I wrote back to her.
Bill and I have been divorced for 29 years. We are friends. We call each other on birthdays and holidays. When we divorced, we divorced each other, we did not divorce Grant. Fortunately, we were both mature enough at the time to place Grant’s needs first and make sure he still had two parents. Both of us were with him during his treatment at UCLA. Bill lives in the L.A. area; I lived in Santa Barbara, a little over an hour away. We might see each other once or twice a year. Friends and family members say of us, “You and Bill have done divorce better than anyone else we know.” Still, why would I ever let the whereabouts of my ex-husband determine where I live or how I live my life? It’s not even a consideration for me.
These are my beliefs and opinions. This is my understanding based on my own spiritual journey. This is how I have made my decisions, why I live my life as I do. It is my soul journey. I recognize the inherent perfection of each person’s soul journey for them.
Moving away from Grant has been easier this time, the second time, because I’ve had practice. Lessons I’ve learned and understandings I’ve gained on my path have enabled me to move forward.
“But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matthew 6:33) In the hierarchy of my personal values, my relationship with God has always come first in my life, next my relationship with my spouse, then my relationship with my child. My child has his own life to live. It is not my life but his life. My job is to love and support him while he is on his own spiritual journey, following his own soul path. Spiritual practice is part of my life – prayer, meditation, contemplation, listening to guidance and intuition. My actions are based on these practices and the information I receive from them.
"He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me (and is in no way fit to enter into the kingdom of heaven).” (Matthew 10:37) In 1997, I left Grant, and everything else, when I moved from San Clemente to Santa Barbara to start a church. After I let go of my business, home, church, friends, community, I was still having trouble with one last letting go - my son. When I shared that difficulty with my mentor, Unity minister Edwene Gaines, she said, “I’m going to give you a hard lesson.” She then quoted Matthew 10:37. It’s another way of saying God must come first in your life. So I let go, left my son and moved to Santa Barbara. He subsequently moved to Santa Barbara to live with me while attending UCSB, but neither of us knew that would be the outcome at the time the decision was made and the action taken.
To be continued next week…
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)