Thursday, December 19, 2013

Get through Venus Retrograde

Gahl Sasson, the Cosmic Navigator, regularly shares valuable information through his newsletters and website about astrology, kabbalah and tarot. I love how he is able to pull together these three areas and tie them together. 

He recently shared a post about Retrograde in Venus, which happens December 21 - January 31st (as he writes, 40 days and 40 nights). We view retrogrades as negative periods where we can't get anything done, technology and communication breaks down (Mercury Retrograde - I'm looking at YOU), and things generally just don't go well. But if you think of retrogrades as a time to re-evaluate and make changes in your life, retrogrades can be invaluable periods of reflection.

Here are some great guidelines from Gahl about what you should do and avoid during Venus Retrograde (read the full article at http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=29caaeae0d13471b1035629c9&id=78876eb9d7)


What to do? 

  • Great time to sell things (there are many who don't believe in astrology, let them buy it from you).
  • Redefine and renegotiate partnership agreements. 
  • File divorce. 
  • Change lawyers. 
  • Buy second-hand objects, go on a garage-sale hunt or on craigslist, antiques shop, flea markets.  
  • Great time to refinance.
  • Redesign your office, house, bedroom. 
  • Redefine and reevaluate what and who you value. Who do you need around? Who you do not? 
  • Reconnect to people in the past. Ask forgiveness and forgive. Time for peace and reconciliation. 
  • Create budgets, financial plans. 
What not to do? 
  • However tempting, try to avoid starting a new partnership or a new relationship. Not the most auspicious time to sign a partnership agreement.
  • Refrain from buying luxurious items.  
  • Avoid temptations (Capricorn's tarot card is the Devil). You will be seduced by chocolate cakes, extramarital affairs, shopping therapy and the like. Like Jesus who said "no!" to the Devil in his 40 days in the desert, so will you have to say "no!" to desserts for the same amount of time. 
  • Plastic surgeries. Nose jobs, botox and other mischief.  
  • Organizing big parties, cocktail parties, fashion shows and events. 
  • Buy a car or a house or anything too expensive. 
  • Get engaged. 
  • Planting.
  • Buy art, unless it is from Banksy for 60$ in Central Park, NY. 
  • Make investments. 


Final words:
There is no good or bad, above or below, true or false. What I am trying to say is that Venus retrograde should not be feared but welcomed. It can help unbind negativity in relationships, it can undo artistic or creative blocks. It can unclog stagnated relationships and help us push forward what was going backward for a while. So be nice to each other and yourself during this period and you will be surprised with the gifts that you will receive.

Sign up for Gahl's newsletter - he travels the world teaching classes and doing astrology readings! You never know when he will be in your city.

Friday, November 29, 2013

Citta Chatter

Citta Chatter

The other day I was scrolling through Facebook and saw a post by a dear friend that I've known for 15 + years. I knew she was a dedicated yoga practioner, but wasn't aware that she had started writing articles about her experiences in yoga and meditation and I was so happy to come across them!

The article I am sharing today can relate to almost any area of our lives and not just yoga. Chatter is rampant in my mind - as a Virgo I find it very hard to turn it off.

Now it is time to try to make peace with it!

Gailanne's article, written about her yoga practice, makes me feel a little better and realize that EVERYONE is going through something, no matter what they are sharing/showing to the outside world. I hope to take this lesson and expand it to my interactions with people and try to realize that maybe they are acting/reacting in a certain way b/c of their internal dialogue.

Link to the article "Citta Chatter" is: http://www.breatherepeat.com/2013/11/26/chitta-chatter/#.UpiPQI2E7Lg

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Miracle Thoughts

Last night while playing with my iPhone I thought "I have all of these wonderful resources available to me through this device that I do not take advantage of. Why not find some podcasts to listen to on my morning commute - a daily meditation, affirmations. They can't be too touchy/feely or out there - I like my spirituality straight forward and to the point.

So I spent a little bit of time looking for some that are short enough to listen to on my 25 minute commute and found Marianne Williamson's Miracle Thought podcast. Although from 2009, the subjects are quite timeless and are associated with The Course of Miracles, which I have never read. My only experience with them is working as the assistant for a very highly strung woman in San Francisco who taught the course (and at the time I had no idea what that even was - and now I wish I had!).

This morning I listened to two podcasts from the series: "Forgiveness Offers Everything I Want" and "Responding with Affection". When I started the lesson on forgiveness I immediately felt defensive and thought "I do not want to forgive xxx for what they did to me." I guess I started out on the right lesson b/c by the end of the short 8 minute audio file I knew that I had some work to do.

Then I got to the "Responding with Affection" lesson and thought I would test that out in my day (the forgiveness lesson is going to be an ongoing thing - that shit ain't happening overnight!). So instead of getting aggravated when someone stepped in front of me cutting me off on the subway I let it go, smiled and went on my way. You know what - I realized that is a pretty easy adjustment to make in my life to make ME feel better. The point she made in the lesson was that 10% of a situation is what happens to us while 90% of a situation is how we react. While I've known this for a long time (and have said it to my husband many times) I really need to start living this. I think I will be a much happier person.

Just think if everyone started taking responsibility for their actions and reactions to others and instead of lashing out responded with kindness (or at least not anger). The world would be such a better place.

Looking back through the blog I actually had an unpublished post about how to change your reaction to people and situations. You can read that at http://thecommunityquest.blogspot.com/2013/10/stop-blaming-and-start-being.html


What are your favorite meditation/spiritual/personal development podcasts? Share them in the comments so we can check them out!


Monday, July 15, 2013

What are Spirit Guides & How to Work With Them

Based on a conversation last night I decided to read more about how to connect and work with Spirit Guides. Today while searching the web for a site that had articles bout this subject but wasn't too far out there I discovered the blog by Anna Sayce - Psychic But Sane. I love it because I understand her point of view. She is practical but spiritual. The name of her blog says it all!

There are so many informative articles posted and I can't wait to explore them as time allows. You can check out the articles at: http://www.psychicbutsane.com/articles

Hope you enjoy the article by Anna and that it helps you connect with your Guide(s)!!



---------------------------------------------------

What are Spirit Guides & How to Work With Them

Here are some tips for getting to know your guides and working with them:

Know What Spirit Guides Can Help You With

We all go through the veil of amnesia when we incarnate. Most of us forget who we are as souls, where we’ve come from and what the heck we’re doing here. Spirit guides know that it is challenging to be incarnated here at Earth school AND keep a connection to your higher self and your soul’s purpose.
The role of your guides is to gently but consistently guide you via intuitive nudges to stay on track with your soul’s purpose. In addition, if something is in your purpose to accomplish, you will find support from your spirit guides in that endeavour. They will hook you up with resources, people, money, books to help you reach your goals. They can offer insight and comfort when you feel lost.
But there is one important condition to the help they can give us and this condition serves us:
Your spirit guides will only help you to accomplish and achieve things that honour the purpose that YOU set for yourself before you incarnated.
I personally know it is not in my soul’s purpose to win a million pounds on the lottery. I don’t have a project to accomplish at this time in my life that requires that kind of money. Instead, I know I would benefit from the growth I would experience in utilizing my talents to tap into abundance. So if I asked my spirit guides to help me win the lottery, I’m pretty certain they wouldn’t oblige.
I also have a friend who wanted his guides to help him win betting on racing dogs! The guides really weren’t interested in helping him, for the same reason mine wouldn’t help me win on the lottery.

How to Begin Enlisting the Help of Your Guides

Contrary to what you’d think, you don’t need to have really well developed psychic abilities to begin working with your spirit guides. You may not be able to perceive them at all times but your guides can certainly perceive you. You only need to set an intention and they will pick up on it. Address them out loud and they will hear you.
One way of setting your guides to work is to request their help with specific goals.
I have got into the habit of doing this automatically by writing down my goals for the coming week and month and I ask my guides for help in achieving each of my goals.
So here’s an example list of goals:
I would like X amount of money to decorate my new home
I would like to work with X number of clients next month
I’d like to spend X more hours per week of quality time with my partner
I’d like to be a more tolerant mother to my children and remain calm when they are acting out
I’d like more fun and laughter in my life
Read this aloud:
“My spirit guides, my spirit guides, my spirit guides, I request your assistance in achieving the following goals, provided these goals are aligned with my highest path and purpose and in the highest good of all. Please impulse me so that I can recognize assistance and opportunities when they manifest. Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Why do you have to do this? Surely guides should already know where and when they could provide assistance? In fact, your guides will not intervene until you ask them to because to do so would violate your free will. This is why consciously enlisting their help is powerful. It effectively transfers some of your vital life force to them that they can use on your behalf in the spiritual. And of course everything manifests from the spiritual (or energetic) plane into the physical, not the other way round.
Your spirit guides work to help you manifest your desires into the physical, often in ingenious ways! I recently realized that I have a particular guide who hooks me up with the clients who could benefit from a session with me. Clients often report being prompted to get a reading with me in their dreams.
It’s not usually a good idea to ask for assistance to come to you in a very specific format. The wrong way to do it would be to say ‘please send more overtime work my way so that I can pay off my mortgage’.
Instead, say:
‘I would like to pay off X% of my mortgage by the end of the year, please hook me up with the resources and opportunities to make this happen’.
Be open-ended and the Universe will send you the resources you need in ingenious and creative ways. If you are attached to receiving help through a particular channel, you may miss or discard the help that shows up in other ways.
According to the above list, you could be gifted with some money to decorate your home or be offered second-hand items for your new home. You might get invited to a party or meet a new friend who is fun and makes you laugh. You may come across a book about conscious parenting to help you with raising your children. There are so many possibilities! Be open to them all by seeing the opportunity in every experience that comes your way.

Instruct your Guides, Do Not Pray to Them or Supplicate.

Many of us with a religious background have been taught that to invoke the spiritual means to pray, to ask very politely, or even to beg, stating one’s unworthiness. You do not have to do this with your spirit guides. They may be at a vantage point where they can see the bigger picture but they are no better or worse than you. See them as your helpers in spirit, rather than your superiors.
There really is no need to beg or to ask repeatedly. Begging or repeated requests may amuse the guides but it won’t set them to work faster!

Get to Know your Guides

Do you know what you guides’ names are? What they look like? What they do on your team? It’s important to know a bit about your guides before you can begin developing a close relationship with them. You wouldn’t begin a relationship with a real person without knowing their name and what their role is! Make the first move in your relationship with your guides. If you’re stuck with that first step of finding out that information, find someone who can tell you so that you can begin to get to know them.
My relationship with my guides began when I had a reading with psychic medium Erin Pavlina, who told me about my primary guide, who calls herself The Raven. Once Erin told me how this guide was helping me in my life, I saw how she had been helping me all along. And I began to take my spirit guides seriously.

Know How Your Spirit Guides Impulse You

To communicate with you, your spirit guides often choose the intuitive vehicle(s) that you’re most adept at using.
There are many intuitive gifts, but the basic four - clairvoyanceclairaudience,clairsentience and claircognizance cover most possibilities.
If you’re more visual, your spirit guide may pop into your mind’s eye with a message or an image that means something to you. If you’re clairaudient, you may become aware of an inner voice speaking to you or a lines from songs which appear in your head. Those who are claircognizant can have their guides ‘downloading’ information to them in the form of thought. I have very developed clairsentience and my guides impulse me with a funny tingling sensation on the side of my head. Once this happens, I know to listen carefully because a message usually comes through to me. They also impulse me with a cold, prickling sensation on my right thigh and the back of my calf. It makes me shiver and the hairs on that part of my leg stand on end!

Learn How to Distinguish Between Input from Guides and Input from Other Places

Guides have our best interests at heart. Their behaviour is very different from how a negative entity would behave or how your ego would talk to you. Here are some key differences between how a negative entity or your ego would treat you and how a spirit guide would treat you:
  • Guidance from guides will always be uplifting and will raise your consciousness. It will honour the truth that you are the conscious creator of your life. It will hold you responsible for your life. By contrast, entities who align with negativity may have you believe that you need to do, have or be something in order to get to be the conscious creator of your life. They may encourage you to abdicate responsibility.
  • Guides will not tell you what to do. They may recommend a course of action that aligns with your path, but they will ultimately leave it up to you.
  • Guides obviously never get angry with you, or threaten. Guides do not deride or berate you. They are ever-patient and loving. Your guides may think you’re great but they won’t flatter your ego or encourage you to place yourself above others. The guides understand that none of these serve their agenda or yours.
  • Spirit Guides have faith in your ability to get through issues and negative circumstances. They will be there for you and show great compassion for you, but they won’t ever throw you a pity party.

Understand the Guides’ Agenda and their Background

Spirit Guides are not that different from us. Obviously they’re not in a body but most of them have experienced a physical incarnation so they know what it’s like. Many of them have evolved beyond the point where they need to incarnate here and instead they are pursuing the next stage of their soul’s journey in the capacity of spirit guide. Assisting you serves them on their path of evolution, so they aren’t really doing you a favour as such. It’s a win-win situation for everyone involved. They do however love receiving gratitude for their work, so be sure to thank them.

Friday, May 10, 2013

Forgiveness as a Gift (to Me)




Little Beach, Maui - one of my favorite places

Today I saw a post on my friend Don Simmon's wall that I thought I would share. It was written by Jennifer, who attends Don's Mindful Meditation classes, and posted to her Blog - "Mom's Soul Cafe".

The post introduced me to the Ho’oponopono Meditation practice, which was created by a Hawaiian spiritual leader/healer who had the insight that people were in constant conflict with themselves, and more specifically with subconscious memories collected and stored over the course of existence, and that this conflict needed to be resolved between the self and God (or Source, or however one wants to refer to this presence). [Copied from http://www.hooponoponohelp.com]

I have been reading a lot about forgiveness and grace lately so this really resonated with me and I can't wait to find time this weekend to start integrating it into my meditation practice. I hope that you find this article useful in letting go of the things you have been holding on to. In a way it reminds me of the St. Germaine meditations with my meditation class, which I will have to write about another time!


PS: If you live in the Atlanta area I encourage you to check out Don's classes and workshops on meditation, tarot and sound therapy at a wonderful metaphysical center The Phoenix and Dragon in Atlanta. He has several meditation cds that you can purchase if you can not attend his classes in person! Besides being a wonderful teacher, Don is a wonderful intuitive counselor and does in person and phone consultations - I've had many over the years and they always help me to know if I am on the right path or need to make some changes to get back on track. To learn more about Don's classes "Like" The Mystic Path on Facebook - Link to The Mystic Path Facebook Page.





Forgiveness as a Gift (to Me)

Originally posted to Mom's Soul Cafe:
http://momssoulcafe.com/2012/06/24/forgiveness-as-a-gift-to-me/

I believe I have choices in life. I make choices about happiness, about friendliness, about what I do, when I do, and how I do everything. And even when I do not have a choice (that I know about) I can still chose how I act or react to my surroundings.


Do I always make the choice I am proud of? No – with a capital “N.” But that’s the point, I’m human. I’m learning. And so are most of the people I know. Maya Angelou says, “I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.”
In this tradition of choosing and doing better, there is a meditation Don Simmons, my regular meditation guide at Phoenix & Dragon bookstore, gives on a Hawaiian philosophy called Ho’oponopono (pronounce that however you like. If you giggle at the way you say it then you have pronounced it perfectly). It is a process where a person takes 100 percent responsibility for everything.
Don likes to say at the beginning of this practice, “Notice how when anything happens to you, the common part of it all is that you are there.” Then we all give a quick, nervous giggle. Taking 100 percent responsibility for all things in your life, and beyond, is a fairly tall order.
During the meditation, there are four statements repeated over and over. They are, I’m sorry, Please forgive me, Thank you, I love you. You say this to yourself, to loved ones you may have issue with, to acquaintances, and then to the world at large. By taking responsibility you gain compassion and release anger you might have at believing something is being done to you rather than something you have control to change.
Taking responsibility gives you the power to change anything you are not happy with in your life, even when you believe you do not have the power. And don’t mistake responsibility for blame; that is covered too. It’s not about blaming yourself; it’s just saying the mantra I’m sorry, Please forgive me, Thank you, I love you. It is about observing happenings and circumstances without judgment.
I always leave this meditation feeling changed. Knowing that the control is in my hands and feeling much more compassionate for my fellow man.
Don’s meditations are known as Mindful Meditation. It consists of thinking, since we are thinkers by nature, but allowing that thought to pass by like a cloud. Standing outside of the thought, it is easier to let it float by while I say to myself, “thinking.” Or something to bring myself back to the present moment.
Sometimes when I am in meditation my thoughts might run like this: I wonder if my children are at a restaurant running from table to table while my husband yelled at them to sit down. How I really should have stopped by the grocery store for that bread we are out of. And, I think about what I will eat for dinner once I am done with this meditation. Each time I think, I put it aside and go back to my breath. Breath in, breath out, I say. Then somewhere along the way, the thoughts stop and it is just me and my breath and the sound of Don’s voice guiding me.
In Ho’oponopono, I am guided to forgive. Forgive myself, forgive my fellow man, take responsibility for my life and know that I am one with something much bigger than me.
If you are interested in learning more about ho’oponopono: This is a new moment. I am free to let go.http://www.hooponoponohelp.com/

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Remember...It may be a Stroke of Luck!



I recently saw this posted on Facebook and stored it away until I could write out this post. You always hear "Hindsight is 20:20" and other statements, but this one really rang true for me recently.

My husband and I were in the process of buying a house in the Hudson Valley when Hurricane Sandy blew through the area and destroyed the property. At least 40-50 trees were blown down on the property and the remains of the walls of the old stone barn, which was one of the main reasons we wanted to buy the property, had crumbled when the roots of the trees were uprooted. It took three weeks before we could get down the road to the house for the inspection. When we got down there we found a total mess and knew that we couldn't buy the property. We were crushed as we had been looking for over a year and felt like this was "THE ONE"!

Flash forward a few months and my husband's Broadway show closed several months earlier than expected. While we felt a relief not to have two mortgages it was the height of the summer and we were dreaming of the barbecues with friends and planting flower and vegetable gardens in the yard!

I was up in the area a few weeks ago and I had to show my friends "the house that got away". As we drove down the gravel road towards the house looking at all of the trees that were blown down by the storm, a truck pulled up directly in front of our car and blocked my access to go any further. A man got out of the truck and asked what we were doing down this road. I told him I had almost purchased the house and he said "well, you really dodged a bullet". Turns out the previous owner had misrepresented the amount of land that was included in the purchase, there was no dedicated power line to the house (it was running illegally off of the neighbor's power line), no phone/cable lines or ways to install them, and the owner had failed to clear the fallen trees as promised after the closing. He also said he stopped the car because people were illegally hunting on the land and he was trying to track them down.

I started writing this post a few weeks ago - and at the time I was feeling very blessed that we were saved from all of the many hassles that would have come with the purchase of that property. While we couldn't see it at the time, we really were being taken care of and I was finally able to move on past the sense of loss that I felt.

Today I experienced a personal disappointment and while going through the emotions of that I remembered I had never finished writing this blog post, which was so relevant to the current situation as well! I realized that while it is okay for me to feel disappointed that this thing didn't happen, I have to trust that it wasn't the right situation at this time for whatever reason I do not, and may not ever, know.

I am glad that I can look back at my recent experience with the house and realize that perhaps this too was actually a blessing in disguise!

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

The Star of Your Own Show by Angel Lopez

I feel so fortunate to open Facebook each day and read inspiring messages from friends like Angel Lopez! 

His blog "Astrology Realness" is just that! It is a place where he shares his hopes, dreams, fears, challenges and relates them back to what is going on astrologically at that period of time. His courage to share his personal journey with everyone was one of the reasons I started this blog. I find his posts so insightful that I wanted to share information that I find so helpful as I navigate this thing called life.

This post is about how it is time for action. The fire sign Aries has arrived, Spring has sprung, and it is time for new beginnings and change. This relates to me on so many levels - like my finally sitting down and starting a blog that I have been talking about for at least 6 months!

For Angel's thoughts on each individual sun sign visit the site at 
http://astrologyrealness.com/2013/04/10/its-time-to-be-the-star-of-your-own-show/

To learn more about Angel or to schedule a personal reading, visit his website at http://astrologyrealness.com/about/

And be sure to like his Astrology Realness Facebook Page for updates!

--------------------------------------------------------------------


It’s Time To Be the Star of Your Own Show

10APR
Are you ready for the spotlight of your soulful awakening?
Like most of you, I am looking for a new beginning.  But what I have realized is that it’s not going to come in the form of a new job, a move, or a lottery ticket.  It is going to come from the inside out, so I must start by shifting how I think and feel about myself.  You see, I have been clinging on to pieces of outdated fiction that have structured my internal story, and I am finally able to see them for just that – stories.  Simply remnants from the young me that are unwilling to be left behind.  Old mentalities.  Wicked fears.  Childhood regrets and insecurities.  I have known of their existence for some time now, but my mind just could not detach.  They created a sense of safety, as they had been all I knew.  So even when I told myself it was time to let them go, it was just the old me creating a moment of self sabotage.  I knew I wouldn’t really be strong enough to detach.  Until now.
Given all the intense astrological business that’s been going on these last few months, I have crafted some new habits for myself.  They are allowing me to get some distance from the outdated thinking that was holding on for dear life.  Sure, there’s always a chance I’ll slip and end up eating a whole chocolate cake to myself, metaphorically speaking.  (Mine would be a carrot cake.)  But I have to believe that a new beginning is possible, one that I can cease and own.  I have to believe in myself.  For only from honest self-belief can one be inspired to birth his or her greatness.
Spring is here and the planets want us to move into action in a big way
The Aries new moon is here to illuminate the essence of our truest potential so that we can bring a soul-felt new beginning into existence for ourselves.  These last couple of months have been a lot of “who am I?” and “What do I need right now?” moments.  Lots of starts that have gotten us closer to our dreams, but then some stops too, which has made it all rather frustrating at times.  What we must realize is that there were some much-needed tweaks to our internal selves that needed to occur before we could manifest our goals.  Now hopefully you have been doing the internal work to get you more in touch with those necessary shifts you must make.  If not, stop reading and get to work.  Or just make this new moon all about initiating a more honest relationship with you.
A new cycle is upon us.  Spring is here and the planets want us to move into action in a big way.  No more daydreaming.  As some would say, it’s time to shit or get off the pot.  Either we are taking responsibility for the soul transformation into our new unique selves that wants to occur, or we are running away, perhaps never to be heard from again.  And you wouldn’t do that, right?
Let this Aries new moon be your opening number
I hear a lot of you feeling this shift – this urge to break out of old patterns (relationships, careers, ways of being) and really bring the real you to light.  Well now is “make it or break it” time.  And I want to see you succeed.  Think of it as if you have been working behind the scenes on the play of your life this whole time, and now it’s time to take center stage.  Are you ready for the spotlight of your soulful awakening?  Is it time to get out there and give it all you got?  Let this Aries new moon be your opening number.