Harvest Moon's Long LIght

Harvest Moon's Long Light

Love this time of year. My favorite season for a lot of reasons. Each year when the Harvest Moon rolls around a powerful feeling sweeps through me and I feel joy and gratitude. The full Harvest Moon has always provided light for farmers to work late bringing in their crops. It's light was valuable and appreciated in helping to complete their work for the season. And that makes it the gateway for the season of gratitude we begin on this full moon which occurs this month on Saturday, September 10. What do I mean by the season of gratitude? We begin by expressing gratitude for the farmers and all the wonderful food they produce for us. Here again, for those of us who are not farmers, what other things have happened in our life this year that we are grateful for? Your harvest might be your new job, new relationship, new home, new friends, or other new developments that you wanted in your life. Then comes Halloween which is also a time for expressing gratitude for the people we knew who died this year. Next is Thanksgiving, which is a time when we gather with family and friends to share a meal, conversations and appreciating these people who are an intimate part of our life. Christmas/Winter Solstice/Yule is a time when people, both Christian and pagan celebrate as a time of spiritual renewal. Then, of course, comes the New Year, when we as a society express gratitude for making it through a year as we welcome in a new beginning. When you look through this lens, this group of holidays embody a whole season of gratitude. Let the Harvest Moon light up your life as you gaze at it and savor the joy of living. After the craziness we have lived through these last few years, this year, we have much to celebrate and I am looking forward to celebrating this season with you. I always love hearing from you, so if you feel like sending me a note, calling or coming to see me, please do! Have a wonderful day!

Our Gut Instincts

 

Our Gut Instincts

We all have ideas about gut instinct. That yes or no feeling that we get in our gut when we are making a decision is our spirit guides steering us, helping us make our best choices. A related gut energy is our solar plexus chakra, the bright yellow one located in our stomach. Chakra means wheel and chakras are energy centers, the wheels that move us. Chakras are an energy map of our body. The solar plexus is associated with our self confidence, self worth, self esteem, our pride. That connects it strongly to our will. When we are hit with a big loss, like death of a family member or friend, loss of a job or career, loss of a relationship, loss of a home, any of those big events, it dings our sense of self for a while. When I measure people's chakras during a reiki healing session, I have seen this many times. And what I usually find connected to that is a decreased energy in the throat, our communication, our voice. If a person's self confidence is down, they will not speak strongly or clearly, they will feel frustrated in their communication. Those two energy centers often run in tandem. When one is strong, both are strong. When one is weak, both are weak. Not 100% but, a large majority of the time in my experience. So what does this mean for how we use our energy? Start with feeling strong and confident and glowing from your core, your spirit, your happy, smiling self when you are making a presentation in a business situation or an interview. That projection of confidence will certainly facilitate a successful meeting. That sense of strength is often what a partner is looking for. That sense of yes. Alignment. Of course, partner in all respects. Business partners, counselors, workout partners, study partners, mentors, good friends, in addition to romantic partners. Two strong partners will accomplish more together. Strong, bright glowing energy from the solar plexus lifts our spirits and brings a smile to our face. When we have accomplished something important or challenging, our solar plexus gets larger with satisfaction. When we encourage each other, we lift our spirits in this way, we inspire strength in someone when we express our support for them, acknowledge what they do well, and remind them of their true capability and spirit. Yes, we can all do this for each other. You want that "Yes, I can do it" and "Yes, I am putting my energy into this" and "Yes, I am am pursuing my goal" and "Yes, I am doing what I love" attitudes, and the sense that the energy of joy that goes into that kind of creation. When those vibes are radiating out from us, we attract more alignment with the people and events in our life. It is our heart that guides us to what we love, and it is our solar plexus, our gut, that exercises the will to do what we intend to do. I always love hearing from you, so if you feel like sending me a note, calling or coming to see me, please do! Have a wonderful day!

Just a regular death

 

Just a regular death

This past week, an old friend died suddenly. During these last few years of covid, it became a weird ironic joke when we would say this person just died a regular death, not covid death. A regular death. Like cancer. Dark humor to say that a person just died of a regular heart attack or a regular cancer attack. But here we are. Death is a regular part of every life. Two factors are significant in between here and there. One is how we take care of ourselves on our journey through life and the second important factor is to be conscious and aware of what we are doing with our life. My friend Mike and I had drifted apart over the years simply the way that we all do. We went to high school together, then after, we went in different directions, and we lost touch because our work took us to different parts of the world, and we were busy with our careers, relationships, and the people in our lives where we were living and working. Mike lived a good life and did a lot of good for people, contributing to charities in his community. Lots of testimonials were from people he mentored and people he helped. I always thought of him as a good friend even though we had not seen each other in decades. I regret not having kept in touch with him more over the years, but my attention kept moving forward focusing on my career changes and cross country moves. Although I regret losing track of this friend, I was never one for high school reunions. My life after high school was a whole new adventure, a whole new world. Once I got out of school and moved around the country for work, I got busy exploring this big new world, and my life got busy and took paths I never anticipated when I was younger. I did not grow up thinking that I would live in Colorado or that I would be doing this work, but here I am, and happy to be here. A lesson from this crossing can be to give some thought to those we have lost contact with and think about whether we want to reconnect. We all have some other people in our lives that we are happy to leave in the past. Mike and I never had any falling out, our lives just followed very different paths. Obviously, our time together was a positive influence in my life. Not saying that I would have changed my life path, just meditating on the difference between those we deliberately left behind and those who just fell off our radar. Even though we would still have been living in different parts of the country, pursuing different paths, we could have kept in touch more. This is not simply a function of growing older. Those of you who had someone die unexpectedly at a young age have some of these same thoughts. I had friends who died back at high school age too, and our perspective changes with experience. Drawing lessons from death experiences are powerful insights for people of any age. I see it in those of you who have come to me for help with your grieving. Death gives us lessons that lead to greater enjoyment of life. Yes, we grieve the loss of the one who is gone, but each death reminds us to make the best use of our time. Each lesson opens our heart more and our heart is our core, our center chakra, the center of our energy. Death is a powerful advisor in this regard. Death informs our future choices. Death makes us think about how we are spending our time. I always love hearing from you, so if you feel like sending me a note, calling or coming to see me, please do! Have a wonderful day!

Breaking the Code

 

Breaking the Code

When people speak in code, it is because they do not want others to know what they are talking about. That is one aspect of code. There is another aspect of code that often comes up in self help books or conversations when people talking about finding their life's purpose as if they have to break a code to find out what it is. But our life purpose is whatever we say it is. Years ago, a friend of mine was working as a manager in a large popular bookstore. This was in the 90s, when the Internet was new and computers were becoming more widespread in workplaces. Her curiosity led her to read books that taught her how to write computer code. Then she got a job writing code, and I remember her amazement at how different it was to work that way and how much more money she was making than when she worked at the bookstore. And she learned other skills and got raises and promotions and created a successful career path for herself. So in another aspect, she was rewriting her own code for her life. I would say that she did not discover her path as much as create it. A change that big brings all kinds of changes, not just in work or income, but also the people in your life, and maybe changes in what a person does for their health. A former client of mine had desires to be in the chef business, so for a few years, he and his wife operated a food truck. Then they sold the truck, moved far away and launched a chef business more along the lines of catering. So did he discover his path or create it? Did he rewrite his code? I began my career as a professional writer and editor, and later on, a creative writing teacher for adults. As a writer, I was always going out to meet and interview a variety of psychics, healers, authors, musicians, artists, and others and that is how I learned about all this stuff. So when I transitioned from being a professional writer to being a healer, I rewrote my code. Writing your own code for some people means posting their art, books or music for sale on the web while they still have another job to see what kind of response they get and then grow into a full time career change. Rewriting your code is what you do when you are fired up about what you do or want to do. If we do not have a burning desire to make a change yet, we will find it through curiosity when we discover something new and want to learn more. You see, it is about following your feelings. It is not about discovering some secret code. Where our thoughts go, our energy goes. So whatever your dream is, it is a conscious choice to rewrite your code. We do not have to break some code to find our best path. We just have to write some new code. When our thoughts and feelings are in alignment that is when we make our greatest progress. I always love hearing from you, so if you feel like sending me a note, calling or coming to see me, please do! Have a wonderful day!