Nurture Resilience with Stories for Body, Soul & Spirit

What a wonderful week it's been with the temperatures finally rising above 40 and the snow melting by the tremdendous power of the sun!

This weekend I am attending a conference with Nancy Mellon, the author of "Body Eloquence."  It is called, "Nurturing Resilience" and will feature storytelling to heal the body.

I took storytelling classes in college and loved being able to hold the energy of my listener's attention with the wisdom and truth of each story. 

In the past few years of studying compassionate communication, I've come to realize that we are "telling ourselves stories" all the time.  Some of these stories do not contribute to the truth of what is and then, we suffer.  Gratefully, we have the power to create a new story, one that can contribute to life and truth.  Yehuda Tagar says, "Within us lives the connection to the source of our creation.  We can re-create ourselves from within."  As we recreate ourselves by truly entering the stories of our lives, we will be graced with the connection with the awesome power of creativity and its many sources, both within us and all around us.

I find that archetypal stories speak the truth in delightful ways that allow us to hear what our souls may need. 

Look forward to learning new stories and living new truths.

Would love to hear from you if you've let go of an old story you've been telling yourself and how you've found a new truth.

Blessings upon the stories of your life, the graces of spirit, the joys and sorrows of the soul and the power of your body to hold them all!

Meeting Life Forces with Your Heart

Life is so full these days.  I have been graced in January with the gift of meeting Yehuda Tagar and experiencing a weekend workshop in psychophonetics and psychosophy with him.
     Check out the Persephone Institute website to learn more and watch the YouTube video, too, to witness the work itself.  I see this work as a process that can enhance the work of the soul that I meet in spiritual direction with others.  I am working to promote Yehuda's work in America.  We hope to bring Persephone Institute here to train new practitioners in psychophonetics.

http://www.persephone-institute.com  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2lMY0PrhKY
 
February has brought another gift in the work of Frank Chester.  I heard Frank speak of his work at a Waldorf school in Viroqua, Wisconsin this past Saturday night.  Frank has made incredible discoveries of forms that speak to the nature of our heart and the transformation needed in our hearts today.
 
      Check out Frank's website, too with many little video animations illustrating some of the wisdom he is opening to all of us to explore and deepen.
 
http://frankchester.com
 
What is it that Frank Chester and Yehuda Tagar share in common?
      For me, it is the work and the wisdom of the heart.
      We are called to develop, to expand, to grow in the capacity of our hearts...to grow compassion and love, empathy and self-acceptance, peace and good will, to seek the truth of Life, Light and Love that can be found there.

“Balancing” says Frank, “is the primary function of the heart. Our inner work improves balance. When we are able to see ‘periphery’ and ‘center’ simultaneously; when we see ‘self’ and ‘other’ with equal equanimity, then we give the heart a loosening quality of balance that allows it to evolve etheric forces." 

Yehuda says,

"Within us lives the link

to the source of our creation. 

We can re-create ourselves from within."

This is my work and yours, too.
      I enter it through the experiences of my life, the relationships of my heart, the learning of my mind, and the wisdom of my body and senses.  Thinking, feeling and willing invite consciousness in three unique paths, each with its own invitations.
 
      I invite you to join me in this work.
 

"Every idea which does not become your ideal

slays a force in your soul;
every idea which becomes your ideal
creates within you life-forces."

 

- Rudolf Steiner

(from Knowledge of the Higher Worlds)

 
Begin with a reflection on the above quote and take a moment each day to recognize what idea you've taken in during the course of the day, that can become a guide, an ideal to call you forward with expanding forces of life.  Feel the truth of the ideal in your heart.  Give your heart to living out the invitation of its call to something greater than and yet inclusive of--yourself.

Silence Beckons

In order to see birds,

it is necessary to become part of the silence.

- Robert Lynd

As I read this quote about silence, I am reminded of sitting on a bench near the edge of Mississippi backwaters with a dear friend one day last fall.  She was needing a friend to listen as her heart was grieving the loss of a friend who had died.  This friend has an ability to "see" in the silence.  As we sat there, she could spot turtles and fish under the surface of the water.  It took me awhile to adapt to the looking and to silence myself and focus my attention into the water.  Eventually, I remember spotting the turtle there that she had been following all along. 

I so enjoy being with people who have these eyes to see, but more importantly, who have the heart to dwell in the silence.

Another friend who I've longed to know from the depths, once described himself as a turtle and reminded me that he wears many shells to protect himself.  To see his vulnerability, I need to listen from the silence of my heart and patiently wait, quietly, gently...  He pokes his head out once in awhile and I know that I need to deepen the silence in my welcoming of his fragile, precious nature in order for him to truly be seen willingly.

Last night I was listening to another friend who recently faced the loss of his first wife suddenly.  His grieving is making itself known through many places in his body, soul and spirit.  His capacity to welcome whatever arrives has always amazed me.  He, too, knows how to be silent and to listen in order to see each and every visitor.

I am grateful for the silence of presence and the silence of listening.  I am grateful for the seeing and the knowing of every encounter encouraged by the gift of silence.  I realize that the visitors we are able to see and to know in the silence are always around and the meeting will happen when we are ready. 

Who have you been able to see and know, to truly meet when you have truly become a part of the silence itself?

Hiding in Plain Sight

Over the holidays, I went through bunches of old magazines and clipped images for a collage I created over the New Year's weekend.  This collage is focused on the seasons of the year.  One of the images I found in an old Smithsonian magazine is an image of a lion hiding in grasses that are the colors of the lion itself.  I placed it in the west or autumn portion of my collage.  Since I found this photo, I have been reflecting on questions to explore this theme, like:

What kinds of things am I aware of that are 'hiding in plain sight'?

How might the harvest of this new year be represented by the lion and what does the hidden quality of the lion speak to?

Being a Leo, what parts of me are not being seen, yet are fully present whether seen or unseen?

Once you ask yourself these questions, it is as though someone besides yourself is listening and then, pointers to the possibilities to explore them further begin to appear everywhere.  Images, poetry, inner images, feelings, and thoughts...  One image I found most intriguing was a photo sent to me in a daily email along with a poem.  The image is that of a female lion's dark shadow on a wall of stone.  It makes you look twice...is that the lion or is it its shadow--you ask yourself...  And that leads me to ask myself what is it I am really seeing?  Am I looking at what is really represented or a shadow/mirror image of the real?  What appears to be real may, in fact, be an external representation of something more.  What is that something more?  

I expect I will continue to explore this theme throughout my year, as it is being given to me as a gift, a messenger seeking to bring some insight, consciousness, and perhaps, guidance for my journey this year.

To close this particular entry, I'd like to share a poem by Jane Hirschfield which has its own pointers in it, as well.

The Kingdom

 

At times
the heart
stands back
and looks at the body,
looks at the mind,
as a lion
quietly looks
at the not-quite-itself,
not-quite-another,
moving of shadows and grass.

 

Wary, but with interest,
considers its kingdom.

 

Then seeing
all that will be,
heart once again enters --
enters hunger, enters sorrow,
enters finally losing it all.
To know, if nothing else,
what it once owned.

 

 (from The October Palace)

Welcoming What Is

January 14, 2010

Listening to birds this morning--a cawing bird outside my window asks for something, or is she proclaiming something. The caws change from a rapid series to single syllables, and then, I hear a meeting with another voice chiming in...now more slow and single syllables... Ahhhh, the sounds of life are active all around me and touch my soul with a reminder of my voice. I can share it here without speaking aloud and yet each word has its own sound in the silence of the heart and soul that reads and receives it.

We connect in this life we share. Each day brings new encounters, invitations to welcome the life in you and in me.

What stirs my soul is also a blessing and grace met by the spiritual world. To know my soul is met by something more than me is comforting and brings strength to my trust in living.