Ideas of the Mind vs the Heart- Saturday, July 26, 2008

As usual, my mind always has it’s own ideas about what to write. It can run circles around me that are so impressive. Yet when I sit down at the computer, even though I may have believed that a certain idea would be great to write about, I can’t remember any of it! This is the blessing of my soul to be sure. Yes my mind is occcasionally brilliant but that’s not what I or probably you, what to hear.

Unless I ask for another part of me, I just hear the mind. This new journey calls me toward a resonance deeper in my body, where I sit in my heart and listen from there. This is the challenge, to do this every day, to begin to let another part of me be in charge. In longing for the musings of a deeper clearer part of me, the heart offers it’s own intelligence. Yet the mind says not to trust it, so it took alot of small steps to get here, where something else is leading me. Breathing, listening, following in trust even though results were not guaranteed. Well really, that’s what my mind says, it says the mind KNOWS, so I should trust it. Yeah right!

What I know is I am a lot more me, simpler and clearer, without the mind leading. Here is no fear, just embracing what is, being. Just see what happens when the mind gets to take the back seat. Every moment becomes fuller, more vibrant. Here, here, just here. Yes this is all there is. Here is where my heart sings and I can let go of looking for things to be other than they are. There is really no other truth than the present. This is freedom. Being here shapes my whole day, one moment at a time, breath by breath. In trust, I give up searching , I am all that is.

So sorry, the mind had some interesting things to talk about but really what is more important than learning how to BE. To be in love with my life, to feel all my cells sing, to feel so full it’s delicious. Maybe another time this will be more interesting for the mind. Today it’s an all Hearts day.
Blessings,
Laurel

Time to Not Think- Sunday, March 16, 2008

Mercury is in Pisces right now, the same place as when I was born. This lends itself to a mercurial space where thoughts are hard to pin down. It’s a blessing really. When I was younger, I would get lost here and commune with other seemingly unseen aspects of life. As adulthood approached, I attempted to grow up, ie; stay in my thinking self and avoid this more fluid place. It is not an easy place to accomplish much.

Now I enjoy the ease of letting go of all that thinking and allow myself to drift around, all the while tuning into my breath, my true ground. As always the breath and my body are my anchors; the feet that sustain me so I can let go into my imagination and daydreams.
Listening from this place to the deeper rhythms of nature and life gives us all a break from the overfocused and linear reality that we too often call home. That is not reality, it’s just a construct to help us feel safe and in control. Reality is something deeper and contains both the form and the formless. Out of the formless all creation is born. This is a great time to tune into the unknown and allow our creativity to bloom by allowing what is to be mercurial and not so pinned down.

Let’s relax the mind and sit in our beingness and call this home. Loving what is, being present in acceptance and appreciation calls us to a new home. Today is a great day to be alive:)

Blessings,

Laurel

Being Present- Monday, January 21, 2008

Dear Friends,
Today is a good day to spend a little time with yourself. Today is a new beginning, a day like no others. Give yourself this gift of today. Take a few deep breaths and settle into your body. What cozyness is there? Are there any places of tension? Breath into the tension and let it go now. Today is your day so take with you just what you want and let anything else go. ( I drop my shoulders ) Listen carefully to the magic in you, the wondrous workings of your physical body and the subtle feelings that move through it. Wiggle a little, access the little child in you who wiggled alot all day long. Maybe wiggle a lot if it feels good:)

I want to share a story that helped me understand the wealth of depth and memory of what’s in our bodies. Quite a few years ago in a CranioSacral Therapy class for treating children, I had an unusual experience. In order to teach us about the birth process, we were lead back through our own birth. We did this a few times, starting at conception and feeling and moving with the process as it flowed. We were working in groups of two and I had teamed up with a kind gentle man that I felt I could trust to let go deeply. It was instructive to feel so much of what was going on with my parents and feel the whole journey from start to finish.

As I came out the birth canal, the whole room reaked of cigarettes. I kept asking my partner if he smoked and he didn’t at all, never had. Where was the smell coming from? It was coming from me, from my memory, from my cells memory! I knew my Mom smoked during the pregnancy, but this was NOT from my thoughts, this was from me. It took me awhile to really understand that it’s all in us, really it’s ALL in us. Every memory, every smell, taste, touch, sound is planted in you way before your cognitive processes develop and function well. This may be forgotten as we grow into our minds and we start allowing our thoughts to rule what we attune to each day.

So today take back your body, it’s not just something your mind drags around to do what it wants. It’s you, an important part of you and keeper of so many feelings and understandings. It is your master puzzle. Pick up a piece now and take it in, fully allowing yourself to be with it. You can accept it now, you have the maturity and insight to know it doesn’t have to run you anymore. Breathe it in and then let it go. Your life now is what you choose and all the memories can be opened gently so their weight doesn’t hold you back anymore. Now you belong here, now you are free.
Blessings,
Laurel

Making Ourselves Ready for the New Year- Wednesday, Decemeber 26, 2007

Dearest Friends,
It’s almost the New Year and instead of resolutions, let’s just let go. Let go of our old ideas, thoughts, belief systems and old choices. So much of what happens around us feels like it’s happening to us, not from us. If we didn’t create it we are not responsible, right? Yet we can create our lives if we give up the idea that we are small and ineffectual. We are not!

It feels a little scary to imagine a bigger future and begin to feel what we want in life. We don’t want to fail or do something to hurt others. If we hold a belief that if we have something then someone else must be lacking, it makes us hesitant. Is that true? No! Our success doesn’t equate to anothers failure, yet these old beliefs we were taught as children haunt us in moving forward in our lives.

Life is about making choices, conscious choices. When we choose, we can’t make a mistake. Maybe we learn something wasn’t the best choice for us, so we choose again. Still this is much better than living out others choices, riding along drenched in the ideas of the masses.
Every day we can choose to be present, to listen to ourselves, to express our biggest hopes and dreams. We can chose kindness and love, to accept our creation and make choices to create a better world.

Today, let’s let go of everything and start fresh, breathing in the potentials of our chosing, breathing new life into the world.

Happy New Year !
Laurel

Loving Yourself Part 2- Saturday, December 1, 2007

I was sick for a few days, the typical runny nose, stuffy head, sneezy thing. In the last few weeks I have received many messages from the Council of Trees, seen a Bald Eagle and felt like I was at school all night while I was supposedly sleeping. So at a deeper level I feel I am shifting again to a deeper understanding. This is not the easiest path. Learning to love and trust yourself is the hardest thing we can ever do. But it’s the only thing we ever need to do and that we can do.

It’s so easy to focus on the little things and forget who you are. Last night my mind’s going on about what I hadn’t done because I was sick and how I shouldn’t go to the party tonight. I was also lazy and fat and whatever! I hadn’t really been paying attention until it hit me with that one, then I’d had enough lies. So I took a deep breath and focused on that place of knowing and truth within me. It was there, in the background, waiting for me. It is always there when you look for it, just beyond the minds ramblings. The mind always has a story for you to live. You have your LIFE to live. Don’t be fooled, breathe and pay attention.

It’s normal to get emotionally attached to the story. It’s what you’ve used for so long to get by and it’s filled with history and memories, some good and some not so good. Most people are just going for a bigger, better and more expanded story. Your stories are also a weight that slow you down in your expansion process, keeping you safe. They are the framework you live by so you may not want to let them all go at once. But little by little you will come to see that alot of them aren’t so true and are just fed to us to keep us small and safe. Many are overlays of mass consciousness, ie women are less than men, we are here to suffer, you have to work hard to make it, etc, etc. There are so many you are not even conscious of! Stop believing someone elses truth. What is yours?

You are the master and creator of your life. Choose your truth!

Blessings,

Laurel

Death- Sunday, November 11, 2007

I woke this morning with whispers in my ears about death. Here in the piedmont of North Carolina we are in a severe drought. The weather forecast shows a possibility of rain about 2 weeks from now. My shrubs and trees need water and I need more buckets to catch shower water. But the death of something deeper is happening.

As we walk through our life we are constantly breathing in the new and being given an opportunity to leave behind what no longer works. If we breathe in the truth from the core of our being, our inner wisdom, we access a layer of knowing about who we are and what we are here for. As we stand in the knowing of our infiniteness, we walk through the pain and letting go into a new life each day. This is the life we are meant to live, a life full from the breath of divinity. We don’t have all the answers but the presence of knowing we can trust ourselves in the moment we are in. Walk through fear and doubt. Take it to the other side. Breathe in all of you.

Today allow all the little deaths that are necesary for you to step into more of who you really are. Embrace them, breathe into them, then let them go. The trees slow their growth during a drought and need less water, you also can adapt to lifes changes, breathing in and letting go of anything you may not need anymore, especially those doubts!
Blessings,

Laurel

It's All in You- Saturday,November, 10, 2007

What’s missing in a tree? Nothing. What’s missing in you? Nothing.
This is one of the most important things we can learn from the trees. You are whole within yourself, period. It seems we are so trained from an early age to focus on the external world and often raised to value what’s outside of ourselves more than what’s inside. It’s great to pay attention but let’s do it from deep within our own being, from our center. Let’s find that first so you know where you’re coming from!

As you breathe in your world today, breathe in you, listen to you, feel you. This may seem self centered at first. Let’s just say it’s self-full. It is from a full self that you know what’s real and true for you.

Listen to your body, listen to your mind, listen to your inner wisdom. It’s all there in you. What you feel and know inform how you see the world today, so start there. Is there something bugging you? Can you hold a space for it to be instead of running away? Breathe into whatever is coming up and allow it a safe space to exist. It does exist, might as well welcome it as your teacher and friend. Whatever you can allow won’t go hide and bite you later! As you are truthful with yourself, more truth can come in, so you will find yourself more aware. Give yourself the truth of you today. Allow a safe space for all of you. All feelings, all thoughts, all wisdom happen within you. Begin to make friends with yourself today. Show your human self a little kindness and compassion, you’d easily do that for others. We are all human, it’s okay:)
Blessings,

Laurel