Forward

Have no fear of moving into the unknown. Simply step out fearlessly knowing that I am with you, therefore no harm can befall you; all is very, very well. Do this in complete faith and confidence.

-Pope John Paul II

Moving on. Packed up, moved out and closed, on to the next thing. After almost two years in our current home we sold our house and are downsizing from our downsize. When we first came to Florida I must admit, I came here from suburbia life clawing and scratching to keep things as they were. Nothing must change! With change comes the unknown and even if the known is not so great at least we already know it.

My husband, who is always, sometimes maddeningly so, himself, like him or not he is 100 percent his authentic self, and as he says, he is not for everyone, (but I admit he is for me.) In every aspect of his life, what you see is what you get. He tried to fit smoothly into the round hole I had created for us. But we are square pegs and he knew it and after awhile he couldn’t choke it down anymore and he said, “I gotta go. Let’s try something new.”

 We have been together for a long time and I am a team player so I said, “Sure, let’s go.” Not realizing then that the hardest most introspective times of my life were lying in wait to pounce on me like prey. I packed up New York and headed for sunny weather.

We moved our family with a kid in college, a kid in prep school, one going into ninth grade and one in sixth. Everyone said, “That is so great, I wish we could be so flexible…but you know, the kids.” Yeah, I know I have four kids too. I have found that going against the grain works for us and each new experience weaves new texture into our already colorful tapestry. We thrive on moving forward, even if at times it may feel like a step back. However, I have faith that we are blessed and everything we go through in life is a necessary step to prepare us for something else. Watch Steve Jobs commencement speech from Stanford. He talks about life experiences that seemed completely random were in fact actually all dots that connected to enable him to do what he did.

 Our belief that we knew in our gut that this was a good move for our family was reinforced at the time by our daughter who would be entering high school in a new state when she said, “I’ll try it, I know you always do what is right for us.” Gulp, I do? And off we went.

The first year here was not an easy one. We went from one end of the spectrum in every aspect of our lives to the opposite. We left community, comfort, and familiarity all for the unknown.

I had made busy work of my life up north and never had a moment of downtime to suddenly I was down two kids, half the responsibilities and a whole lotta social life. It got real quiet and I was not ok with that at first. I searched around for the root of this feeling of discomfort I was now living with on a regular basis. I didn’t know at the time that discomfort is your spirits way of telling you a change is coming. I began to make excuses and lay blame on anyone and everything for my unhappiness. The only person I didn’t blame was myself.

Something was not quite right. But it must be someone else’s fault.

I told my hub a few months in, all right NOW I know what will make me happy. All I need is a house of my own and I will feel better because then I will feel like I have solid ground under my feet and a place for all my things and my kids will have a home here and its all I need. Just like that movie The Jerk, that and this ashtray, paddle game, remote control, matches, lamp and this chair and that’s all I need. I laughed at the absurdity when I watched that movie but the irony was lost on me at the time.

So we bought a house and fixed it up and made it feel like home. While that was happening I was simultaneously moving away from my old norms and moreys. Being on my own, I started to enjoy the quiet that at first I feared. In that space I started to think for myself for the first time, well probably ever. I went from a kid to a wife and mother in one crazy year. I didn’t have time to understand and know myself. When my friends were spending their twenties learning about who they were or were about to be, I was running a household for a family of 6. When I was younger I thought what my family thought and then I spent a few years to overwhelmed to think beyond how long is a Barney episode, do I have time to shower? I evolved to hanging out with a nice group of people and morphed into thinking along with what my friends thought and now finally I was breaking off from the pack and understanding that when I heard or said something that didn’t feel right I felt it in my body literally. So much so that my throat would feel like it was choking, that was my instincts talking to me. I was just trained to put on a pretty smile and ignore it till it went away tempered down in the depths of my soul, (not to be melodramatic but down there deep anyway.) because I was a good girl, and that is how good girls survive in the world until they learn better if they ever do.

I was suddenly learning to listen to what I was trying to tell myself all along. I started to let go of so many what ifs and what would they think and started to embrace the who cares? It is all smoke and mirrors anyway. I started to view my possessions and my house, my geography, my family in a whole new light. I went from holding onto everything with white knuckles to keeping my hands. heart and mind wide open. 

Our youngest will be leaving for prep school in the fall so we suddenly find ourselves having an empty nest and with that comes this freedom we never experienced on the front end. We put the house on the market, got rid of a lot of as George Carlin calls it, “stuff”, found a little apartment on the intercoastal and traded in a dining room table for a paddle board. I feel like the weight of the world has been lifted. We are fortunate that we still have a home base on Long Island where our family can come together. Who knows, maybe we will end up where we started, living back there full time someday. I know enough to know that I have no idea. I realize now I never did but now I am ok with that. John Lennon was right  “Life is what happens while your busy making other plans.”

Absolutely nothing has changed except my perspective. Instead of resentment I feel gratitude for my husband needing to try something new. Not something I freely admit because it is really hard to be the wise one when he is constantly teaching me things. Dammit!

Someone said to me in a recent exchange on Facebook of all places, there are no obstacles, only opportunities for spiritual growth. Which I agree with wholeheartedly except I propose that there are obstacles and it is up to you to recognize that you can either fight them kicking and screaming and make your life and those you love more difficult. OR…you can accept the obstacles that come your way as an opportunity to learn something about your spirit. You may not be for everyone, but that is ok. We all can’t be for everyone, but you are for the ones that matter.

My Spirit Loves

"With love, with patience and with faith, she'll make her way."-Natalie Merchant, Wonder.

I was driving in the car yesterday listening to Coffee House on my XM radio when Natalie Merchant’s song Wonder came on. On the Coffee House station they play a lot of acoustic versions to familiar songs so I felt as if I were hearing this song for the first time.

“Laughed as my body she lifted.

Know this child will be gifted.

With love and patience and with faith

She’ll make her way.”

I was just driving down the street minding my own business listening to the radio and the lyrics of this song moved me to tears thinking about my three daughters. One graduating from college next month, one going on to be a senior in high school and one entering ninth grade in the fall. All of them at pivotal moments in time.

As I drove thinking of them with heartfelt emotion my phone buzzed. Two daughters texting and one calling simultaneously. (Why couldn’t I have had this heartfelt emotion thinking about the mega jackpot??)

How amazing is that? My spirit was speaking to theirs and they picked up on it and contacted me. Kind of like how life was before cell phones. When we would be at a concert at the Garden knowing another group of friend's were also there. No doubt in your mind you would see them and of course you always would.

What does your spirit love? I mean really love? What makes your eyes twinkle when you talk about it or think about it? I remember back when I came home with my kindergarten school picture, my Dad said, “I love this picture because you are smiling with your eyes.” I thought for years as a kid that meant I was squinting or something. Smile with your eyes? Whatever dad. But now I know when I am truly happy and laughing that twinkle is my spirit talking. I am looking at crows feet with a new found love. These lines mean I have felt and heard my spirit A LOT!

What does my spirit love? My spirit loves my children and my husband and my family and my little dog. My spirit loves to laugh with friends and to nurture people, to share a meal, to be in esthetically pleasing environments. My spirit loves a great playlist and the feeling you get after a hard workout. My spirit loves to dance. My spirit loves adventure, travel and change. My spirit loves to write. My spirit loves to talk to open minded people. My spirit loves the ocean and good food and coffee and wine and books and clean sheets from the dryer.

If you are in any kind of transition period or if you are figuring out what it is that you truly would love to do with your life. (Either the second part or the first.) Go for a walk, or a run and breathe deeply and evenly and don’t think about anything but the sound of your own breath moving in and out. After awhile ask the question. What does my spirit love? The very first thing that comes to mind is what is true. After that first one you might have to say it out loud to see if it feels and sounds true to your own ears. (If you really want to know say it to the mirror. Can you look yourself in the eye and say what your spirit loves? Then it’s the truth.)

Then when you get home write it all down. My spirit loves…..

Look back at what my own spirit loves. Taking all of those loves you basically have the description of what I do and who I am. It took me almost 40 years because I wasn’t listening for a long time but I am completely happy and accepting of who and where I am in life. I have a great family, I teach, I write, I laugh, I change things up, I listen to my spirit and I give my spirit what it loves and my spirit rewards me. I think about my daughters with heartfelt emotion and they call me.

We all have this ability within us it is just a matter of tapping into it and letting it work for you.

It doesn’t work if you look in the mirror and say, “My spirit loves money.” But what you can say is, “My spirit loves being good at what I do.”  Think about a wedding, everyone celebrating love by laughing and singing and dancing. Sending that couple out in the world with collective heartfelt emotion. Then they have that “honeymoon period.” Not because they go to Hawaii but because they are still living on high from all of that energy being sent their way. Why is Ellen DeGeneres such a tremendous hit right now? She is true to herself because she listens to her spirit, she sings, dances and laughs everyday and she helps as many people as she possibly can along the way. She is in that upward spiral of listening to what her spirit loves and she is rewarded in turn.

I am going to go out for walk with my friend now. An open-minded person who makes me laugh. I wonder what amazing things will happen today? My spirit loves, my spirit loves.

The 100th Monkey

Here is there and then is now. -Gregg Braden.

Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself its own solution. It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it. –Niels Bohr.

There is a story about social change called the 100^th Monkey. The story goes that scientists were studying a group of monkeys and they fed these monkeys they were watching, sweet potatoes that they would drop in the sand for them each day. The monkeys seemed to like the sweet potatoes but they did not like the taste of the dirt on them. A young female monkey figured out that if she washed her sweet potato off in the stream than she could solve the problem of the dirt taste.  She taught this trick to her mother and soon her friends caught on and taught it to their mother’s. Only the adult monkeys that learned from the young monkeys learned how to wash their sweet potatoes. There were plenty of other adult monkeys who didn’t want to learn and just kept eating their dirty potatoes. A few years into the study there were roughly 99 monkeys washing their sweet potatoes and when the 100^th monkey went to the stream to wash, that is when it happened. The entire tribe, even the older monkeys that had never washed their potatoes before, all started washing the potatoes in the stream. And not only that, scientists from different colonies in different parts of the world all reported that monkeys everywhere were suddenly washing their food in the stream.

Malcolm Gladwell wrote about these phenomena in his book The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. He describes it as a “ Moment of critical mass, the threshold, the boiling point.”

Gladwell says there are three rules to epidemics. The first is “The Law of the Few.” You don’t have to have all the monkeys all over the world to start an epidemic but you do have to have the right kinds of monkeys. The connectors, the persuaders and the salesmen are the kind of monkeys that can really start something that will catch on.

Of course whatever they are selling has to have what he refers to as a “Stickiness Factor” that stays with people after initial contact and means something to them. He gives an example of how when Sesame Street first came on the air and everyone was talking about it and all their kids were watching. 

And finally it has to have the “power of context.” The power of context means that human behavior is strongly influenced by its environment. Are you more apt to laugh at a funny movie in a crowded theatre or watching home by yourself?

I remember growing up my stepmother used to tell my father to lock the car door “Because it isn’t right to tempt people.” I didn’t really understand that at the time but that fits right in line with the power of context theory. If a perfectly nice person facing hard times is walking down the street and sees your purse on the front seat of your unlocked car, something may trigger that person to stray out of their normal character and steal that purse. But if the windows are up and the doors or locked or they don’t see the purse, the thought will probably never occur to them.

A few weeks back I went to listen to a man named Gregg Braden who is a trained Scientist who has written many fascinating books on the subject of Science and Spirituality. The book he was speaking about on this day was entitled,  Deep Truth; Igniting the Memory of Our Origin, History, Destiny and Fate.

He spoke about countless of interesting subjects that he included in the book and I would love to reiterate and share all of them here but I am not a scientist and I don’t think like one. I love stories and love to understand things through stories and he told us a great one that day. (You can read the whole book if you want to for all the stories, I am just giving you one of many!)

The main thing that “Stuck” with me was that people for hundreds of years have assumed that what we do on this side of the planet and what happens to people clear on the other side has absolutely no effect on either one what so ever. Scientists have found that we are in fact all connected by energy. The Earth itself has measurable geomagnetic field in and around it that we are all a part of. It is literally in and around all of us and that includes human beings, animals, plant life, oceans, atmosphere, everything. These geomagnetic fields affect us as well as we can affect them in turn.

I don’t know if you have noticed but our resistance is running low!! When our resistance is low, when our energy is low, we affect the geomagnetic sphere and it can run low too. When this happens we can get tsunamis, earthquakes, tornadoes, train derailments, murder and crime can go up. We can get in bad moods, depressed, upset about life. The more we are affected the more we affect. It is a catch 22.

Over the years scientists have been monitoring this geomagnetic field and they notice a few times over the years it has significantly spiked. Looking back the biggest spike was calculated as being on 9/11/01 at 9:00 in the morning approximately fifteen minutes after the first tower was hit. What that means is that the world was collectively having a shared experience of a heart-based emotion. No one was intellectually able to process what we were all witnessing but we were able to feel it in our hearts together. Our collective heartfelt emotion drove the geomagnetic field of the earth up to astronomical proportions and for weeks afterward you were able to feel the effect. Everyone was kinder, more sympathetic, we were bonded together and wanted to help each other get through the hardest time our generation has ever known.

Braden explained it doesn’t always have to be tragic circumstances that will spike the field either. Apparently after the very first season finale of The Bachelor the graph also showed a significant rise! Feeling it with our hearts! It happens on days like Super bowl too.

He spoke about the 12/21/12 “Doomsday” date that some people are making a big deal over. While he admits to not really knowing what that will entail he does know that the Mayan calendar is cyclical and it doesn’t end, a new cycle emerges. Remember the Godspell song “The Age of Aquarius”? Well we are cycling out of the very masculine driven Pisces and are moving into more of the feminine wisdom of Aquarius.

Now let me tie all of these things together. As many people have seen on the internet over the past few days there is a short movie called Kony2012 going around and with it some controversy that it may or may not have proceeds going to completely legitimate places.

Regardless of that, how did it make you feel when you watched it? When these young kids watch it and they want to do something to help other children on the other side of the world. That they are feeling a collective heartfelt emotion that what happens to someone on the other side of the planet does affect them and they should do something. Even if is just set an intention that you are praying for them, that connects us. That brings our geomagnetic field up! That protects us from solar winds and climate change and each other! The young people are showing us how to wash our sweet potatoes!

We don’t need the world to all think about this at the same time we just need that 100^th monkey to have a collective heart based emotional connection and we will change the world.

You Can Call Me Master

Just For Today

I will not anger.

I will not worry.

Honor your parents, teachers and elders.

Earn your living honestly.

Show gratitude to every living thing.

Four years after receiving my first Reiki treatment I recently received my own initiation to Reiki Master. I flew up to New York to meet with my mentor and begin the two day process to receive the attunements to the Master level. I had absolutely no idea what to expect.

After receiving my level 1 and 2 advanced I felt something had “shifted” as soon as I did my first self-practice. They say after you are initiated you are “empowered” to practice Reiki and that was certainly corresponding to what I was feeling. Yet it was only through my daily practice in the months to follow that first training did I truly feel all the benefits of Reiki. One session made me feel great, but a few years of daily practice changed my life.

As the day unfolded I found myself writing down the same phrase over and over again. “All work and no play make Jen a dull girl.” Just kidding. What I wrote on my hot pink moleskin notebook I brought along to jot down any gems of wisdom that came to me, (Reiki is taught orally so you really are not required or encouraged to note take), was “A daily practice of Reiki is my commitment to healing.”

To begin the healing process you have to decide whether you are trying to “feel Better” or trying to heal long term. If you want to feel better, you get a massage, have a drink, go shopping, take a pill, enjoy a spa day or read a self-help book. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with any of those things if you want a quick fix. However If you want to heal yourself for the long term have to be committed. It takes time and dedication to heal. I didn’t even know I needed healing when I first started this process. I just thought I was learning a new modality. But miraculously over time I found that this new lens I was looking through had started to put things into focus that I couldn’t even see were blurry before.

After the Master initiation I expected to feel “Reikfied” on a whole different level. For me that is a more balanced, relaxed state. Nice and easy. I usually explain the feeling Reiki gives me by telling people to envision themselves in their favorite weather.

For me that is sitting in a beach chair looking at the blue ocean, it is 76 degrees and sunny with a slight breeze and all is right with the world. Since Reiki goes where it needs to go and does what it needs to do, it had something else in mind for me that day.

As I sat in the chair to practice a few moments of self-Reiki after my Mentor had finished with the attunements I felt my heart start beating faster and faster. A feeling of anxiety grew from the bottom of my belly and rose up like wildfire burning up through my chest into my throat and eventually encompassing me entirely. I was wracked with emotion and fear. I opened my eyes and started breathing deeply and evenly trying to calm down. It was if every buried fear I had ever pushed down to the depths of my heart over the course of my lifetime has risen to the surface. Pandora’s box was opened and I was stricken with panic. I collected myself as best I could and made my way across the hall to the discussion room where my Master was waiting for me with a big grin on her face. I don’t think she quite expected dilated pupils and white knuckles.

“Something very strange has happened!” I looked to her and she motioned for me to sit down. As I shakily made my way to my seat she said, “Before you tell me what is wrong I want you to realize that sometimes during attunements you can experience quite a shift. Perhaps you have unlocked some things that had been suppressed for quite a long time. As soon as she said the words my breathing started to regulate and I immediately recognized that is exactly what had happened. Nothing Earth shattering was brought out of my memory banks. Just all of the everyday fears, frustration and worries that we keep tempered down because its just easier just said, time to go! I had turned the light on in the attic and mice were scurrying.

Occasionally during a Reiki session you will feel a twitch or heat where the practitioner’s hands are or have been and sometimes you feel the urge to swallow or your stomach starts rumbling. Reiki is like a snowflake and no two sessions are alike so sometimes these things happen and sometimes they don’t. However the Master attunements were so powerful for me that I had no room left for these buried hurts and I felt my soul purge itself of the waste I had been carrying around with me.

Nothing in my life has changed except the lens I am looking at the world through. And it ain’t really rose colored. Because healing doesn’t mean now I will float through life happy, calm and full of peace without a care in the world. I am a human being after all. I will still get frustrated and have fears but I have the ability to come back to my practice and accept, not change, but accept whatever is happening and move on from there.

It is my hope that now that I have the ability to initiate I will be able to help others make their own commitment to healing. Reiki is a wonderful way for anyone to reconnect to who they truly are.  Not what other people’s perception of you is but rather the balanced and whole person we all truly are. Mothers, Fathers, kids, whole families, people in the business world, absolutely anyone who through the course of everyday life comes out of balance, (so everyone!), would benefit from being able to practice Reiki on themselves and their loved ones. (Even pets love Reiki!)

I don’t feel that now that I have accomplished this level of practice that I have done it all. I truly feel that this is only the beginning for Reiki and me. I am filled with gratitude and excitement that I can pass along this miraculous gift to others and look forward to being a part of their commitment to heal themselves.

Just For Today

I will not anger.

I will not worry.

Honor your parents, teachers and elders.

Earn your living honestly.

Show gratitude to every living thing.

Lose Weight Eating Tacos, Ask Me How!

Fear is pain arising from the anticipation of evil. –Aristotle

 This blog has nothing to do with losing weight while eating tacos but I find that people stumble upon my blog from various Google searches so I thought if I wanted to get information out to a lot of people at once than I should probably give it a title that people would potentially search for. And come on, who hasn't searched for a way to lose weight while eating tacos? What this blog is really about is nutritional empowerment.

All this Mansanto talk has inspired me. I shared a link on Facebook that my friend Amy posted (Holla Amy) about an article  concerning Mansanto and Whole Foods working together. After a 12-year battle it looks like our heroes have caved to the evil empire and have agreed to grow genetically engineered alfalfa. A scary prospect for certain considering the nutritional value of corn and wheat are now under scrutiny. What will be left for us to eat?

Parents of young children are concerned about whom to trust and what do we do now?  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/ronnie-cummins/the-organic-elite-surrend_b_815346.html

Trust the same people you could rely on 100 percent before you found out this information…yourselves.

I don’t look at this article as being frightening even though it is telling us potentially frightening news. I choose to look at it as an opportunity for some positive change to happen.

It is like when you have to clean out your attic and you go up and it actually doesn’t look that bad and then you turn the light on and there is mouse poop everywhere. Oh no! I should have kept the light off, and then I never would have known!  So we get this information but all that has changed from yesterday is now we know.

All of these problems our kids have from peanut allergies to ADHD and obesity are all because their little bodies can’t handle the synthetic food we have been feeding them unbeknownst to us for years. Our own magnificent systems battle enemies foreign and domestic.

So you think you are buying healthy food for your family and really is has been genetically engineered so it isn’t real. We are literally tricking our bodies by giving it what we think is a healthy choice but really it’s a synthetic so the body goes into defense mode.

This has been happening for a long time now. The only thing that is different is that now we know. Nothing has changed except the light bulb was turned on. Were you afraid of this 5 years ago when you didn’t know about it? Nope, but it was still happening. The only difference is now we can do something about it! Yay! Not scary but opportunity.

We have ALL gotten so used to things being easy or at least easier when it comes to food. Nuke that easy Mac, viola! Dinner is served. Maybe I’ll make a salad…Naa, to much chopping.

So sorry all you Mom’s of little kids, the light bulb was out at my house when my kid’s were little. I had four kids and a busy life and I thought it would have been silly not to take advantage of how easy it is to make dinner in 5 minutes flat. Now that it has been turned on, we can’t go back to the dark days. So things will take more time and effort. Parents will have to make things from scratch and know the ingredients. No easy way out anymore.  It is not going to be easy getting home from work and thinking up what can I make for a quick dinner? It will take becoming really organized and planning meals. It will take time and effort. You may want to start a garden even a little one in your kitchen where you plant your own organic seeds. Then you know exactly what you are getting! www.heirloomsolutions.com 

Sounds exhausting? At the very least daunting? I know but taking control and accepting the accountability and responsibility of what we feed our babies and ourselves will empower you. Empowered people are not afraid. It will be worth the effort, I promise. Nothing worthwhile comes easy if you are doing it right.

I am envisioning this beautiful picture of whole families becoming closer and happier together all from just changing how we eat. It took an hour to prepare the dinner but we did it together and now we are sitting down and eating whole food that makes us balanced and happy. And don’t worry about the 4 hours of homework because now that you are eating the real food, your kids won’t have the learning difficulties they had been struggling with then everyone's anxiety level goes down. You will have a calmer, happier more meaningful life. Ahhh, insert deep breath here.

Thank you Mansanto, with out you a lot of us would have never have known just how good and beneficial whole food really is. It is not until we are sick do we appreciate our health. Get more information on what you can do at http://thenaturelyceum.org  

Default Setting

Action and reaction, ebb and flow, trial and error, change - this is the rhythm of living. Out of our over-confidence, fear; out of our fear, clearer vision, fresh hope. And out of hope, progress.

                                                                           –Bruce Barton.

Time to change the default setting on my motherhood mechanism. I have been a mother and a wife for more than half of my life. Making decisions at a very young age to be fully committed and do the best job at both that I possibly could. My husband and I were “all in” and we loved it. It was not without some serious good old-fashioned struggle, but I suppose we needed it.

Twenty-three years later kids are grown and growing and so are we. Part of what I thought went into being a good mother was being a strict disciplinarian. There was not a lot of parental guidance in my house growing up and I would pretend there was all the time.

I would impose on myself rules and regulations, curfews and traditions that didn’t exist. A good friend of mine had similar parents and we would say things to each other like, “ I think we really need more guidance.” Or “Do you think we should eat more vegetables?” Then we would shrug our shoulders and have a keg party because we could, no one seemed to mind. If my friends looked at their watches and were worried they would be in trouble if we stayed out much later I would feign being worried as well. "What time is it? Oh no, I’m going to be grounded!" (Grounded? What’s that??) My parents now claim they were so repressed growing up that they went 60’s style crazy and let me run my own life to a degree. Great idea, newsflash, kids don’t know shit. Looking back, I had plenty of people to run around with though so obviously others were living in a similar way although being the star of my own show it didn't seem that way at the time. My friend and I would chalk it up to our parents living through the “me” decade of the 70’s where adults of a certain age typically got divorced and put themselves first. I learned that I wanted to find more of a balance in my own parenting style. I longed for control in a life where everything seemed to be so out of my hands. On my own yet completely dependent, an inmate running my own asylum.

I don’t know how much you want to argue the nature vs. nurture debate but our kids actually grew up to be really great. Maybe we had a little something to do with it, I don’t know. I am fairly certain they were born this way. The four of them are all with their own faults because they are human beings after all but they are such solid, nice people who make me laugh. Which is basically all I could ever want in anyone, child or friend.

An interesting thing happened when everyone was home for Christmas. My son and I had an explosive argument where he for the first time in 19 and a half years yelled at me! He was always a sweet kid and maybe its because he was so cute and sweet as a little boy that I never got out of that mode of I am his “mommy”. The setting I put my mothering on was still the same one I used when he was a wee boy. We needed an explosive moment to signal to us that a shift was in order. At first I was devastated and I still had to remind him that no matter what I don’t call you sun cuz you shine, I call you son cuz your mine so watch yourself. We ended up having a very open and honest, great conversation.

My brain finally caught up to what was actually happening naturally and instinctively. That much needed shift that we felt happening in our bones long before our minds understood, things have changed. I didn’t need to have that same default setting of mommy that I had when he was 2 or 4 or 10. He was a man now and it was time for our relationship to evolve just like every relationship must do in order for it to keep growing in a healthy and positive direction for everyone involved. 

All relationships are constantly shifting. Relationships with our spouse, our kids, family, friends and our relationships with our selves are, god willing always going through some sort of evolution. Every ten years or so you may look around your house and say, You know, that couch we bought 23 years ago isn’t doing it for me anymore. I think I need a change. The cabbage roses I loved in 1989 just are not buttering the biscuit for me in 2012. Then you recover your couch and you have a little pep in your step when you walk through the room looking at your new/old couch. You feel better. You don’t need to get rid of the old couch; you just have to tweak it a little bit. It’s still the same comfy couch, but now it’s exciting again because you are seeing it in a whole new light.

The same goes for our relationships, (In case you weren’t picking up what I was putting down with my furniture metaphor). Sometimes you just have to shift the perspective. I chose to look at our argument as the greatest gift the boy could ever give me. I was so sad that I was missing him so much when he was away at school. But what he showed me by his exercise in autonomy was that I was missing a 6-year-old boy that didn’t exist anymore because that was what my mommy default setting was still on. We shifted in that one beautiful moment and I saw the man he actually is standing in front of me and not the boy I have to protect and mother. I can still be his mother but I can now care for him with out making him feel like he can’t take care of himself when he is around me. I was so intent all those years ago of being the best mom I could be I kind of got it in my head and I guess everyone else's head too, that I was the only one who could take care of you this way. You need me. (Or rather, I needed you to need me.) In that instant the chains I shackled myself with disappeared, I was free and so was he. Free to be us now, today.

The stages of a relationship infatuation, struggle and commitment are true for everyone. The beginning is infatuation, Oh! This is love! Then you move into the struggle of negotiation and evaluating and reevaluating. And you come to a spoken or unspoken agreement of the way you are going to live and you commit to that. But what we don’t realize is that the negotiations should never stop because we never stop evolving. Do you have what it takes to allow someone to grow and change and evolve without getting stuck in a default setting of “But that is not what we agreed on 10,20,30 years ago!”

Do yourself and the people you love a favor and pay attention to the shifting tides. Each day brings new awareness and possibilities. These moments that seem hard to get through are invaluable for personal growth. Next time you find yourself in this place where your body senses a shift coming long before your mind acknowledges that it is happening, like it or not. Ask yourself, where is this taking me and what is this telling me?

Don’t fear the change, every stage of a relationship can be new and exciting. The future holds endless possibilities, its all how you look at it. Things come to us when we need them the most. The universe is just designed that way I think. It is up to us individually to bear witness to our own evolution.

The Fall of US

“Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.”- George Bernard Shaw


The history books say Rome fell in 476 AD but in reality it took 300 years for Rome to fall. It didn’t happen in a day. The barbarian’s were at the gates watching and waiting for these fat cats to become “to big to fail” and slowly but surely, much to the Roman’s surprise, Rome tumbled.

There were many reasons why it fell; the empire was too large to govern. The military was corrupt, as was the empire itself. Inflation was rising as trade was decreasing. The poor were over worked. And all Romans had decreasing interest in religion and morality and an increased interest in luxury and gold. Hmmmm.

There was not enough food grown within the city walls of Rome, so whoever controlled the importing of grain controlled the people.
 The phrase “Bread and Circus” comes from the poet Juvenal who was referring to the ploy that the empire played on its people by distracting them from how bad things really were by giving them free low grade grain and entertainment by way of inviting them to stand up for twelve hours every Sunday watching the Gladiators kill each other once a week at the Coliseum or watch the chariot races in the Circus Maximus on the Palatine Hill. (Like government cheese and The Kardashians!)

In the movie Gladiator there is a scene where the people are thrown loaves of bread just as the Gladiators enter the ring to fight. The common people would cheer saying  “Isn’t the emperor great?! This beats slaving and starving all week long! Long live super creepy Joaquin Phoenix!” (Or whoever was in power at the moment because by the time Rome was failing the only people who held office were born into the position and were “professional” politicians or they took it by violence and coercion so no one was really qualified therefore they were always easily being over thrown or poisoned.)

Professional politicians? Whoever heard of someone holding office without ever having to live and work in the private sector, that just doesn’t make any sense?? Oh wait a minute…never mind.

Suzanne Collins just wrote a book trilogy called The Hunger Games that is a great Young Adult series. There are parallels to the fall of Rome and to what is going on now in the United States. The main theme of the books are controlling the masses through hunger and starvation and the people, finally having had enough, rise up together under the leadership of a sixteen year old girl fighting for independence from a big brother government called The Capitol.

In the bible it states in Isaiah 11:6 The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them.
Interestingly enough I believe it is our generation that will end up changing things for the future of our children. I truly believe no other generation has done more to protect the welfare of their children than ours, or at least that is our generations intention. (Sometimes catering to instead of caring for gets mixed up.) Whether that is good or bad is irrelevant. I think people are motivated to work together to help make the world a better place for future generations.  Surely on that we can all agree. Our parent’s assumed our futures were all set as long as we worked hard. We know on every level economically to environmentally there are no guarantees for our kids futures. Can we help them unite this country as it ought to be or will we show them by “what not to do”? One way or another we will be gone and they will be left here holding the bag.

 

Not that throwing money at a problem will work across the board but can we start with, where is all the money that the government collects from everyone going? Can I get a break down? (Break it down) Why are there career politicians in this world? I am certainly no expert but it seems logical, just to keep things from getting unbalanced that a congressman should not be allowed to hold office for more than a few terms not 50 years.

I was the head committee member of my kid’s summer camp when they were young and I ran a tight ship for five years. I will be honest; I didn’t want anyone else’s mom deciding what the movie was going to be on the rain day or when field day would be held. I was intoxicated by the power my clipboard could wield. By three years in I didn’t even have a committee anymore. It was all me. I had the power.  If it took Slurpees everyday just to get the kids and counselors to listen to me, then let them drink slurpees I declared. I had no shame. I didn’t even care.   When my oldest grew to old for camp, I came to my senses realizing that I needed to step down for the same reason I stepped up. Things needed shaking up, some new blood to make things fresh. Time served, moving on.

If I could easily slip into this totalitarian way of running a summer camp, then how could that not happen to someone in charge of a town, city, county, state or country? When one person has the power, the fear of losing the power becomes what drives them to keep the power at all cost. Everything becomes based on fear and not on the greater good of the people. Slurpees everyday is good for no man.

For everyone considering running for office of some kind: Get a real job, once you have worked and lived in the private sector, then run for office with a specific amount of money that all candidates receive so no one can be in anyone else’s pocket and can be owed favors and placed in positions that benefit their businesses that helped put the candidate they “purchased” in place to begin with. There are unfair politics in every business on every level right down to the schoolyard. How many times have you stood on a side line of a soccer field watching your kid play and have overheard Gladys Kravitz say “My Tommy would have made the A team but Billy took his spot because his Dad is the coach, it’s all political.”  OMG!

First and foremost USG, start reforming our education system.
Our outdated and antiquated system that was standardized years ago is obsolete. There is no room for divergent thinkers, artists and poets. What there is room for is learn it this way so you can take this test and if you don’t we will put you on medication until you do. If you don’t think the way everyone else does, than something must be wrong with you. Can we just try empowering all children and see if that works?

While we are at it, can we earmark some money for art and music? The fact that these programs are getting shut down in schools nation wide is preposterous.  Basically all creative people are essentially being told that they hold no value in this society.  Can kids still have recess or is there no time because if you give them 20 minutes to eat the food, (that is void of all nutrition and then they can’t think straight anyway!) Then there is only enough time for a 30-minute test review class and we all have to get high grades on the test so we have to have the review class! If you do badly on the test than you’re an idiot and maybe you can come over and mow my lawn because the world needs ditch diggers to Danny. (Thanks Judge Smalls.)

Growing up I rarely felt like I had the voice to speak up and I felt I should just do what I was told. I heard more often than not, “Children should be seen and not heard.” (Which I really didn’t get when I was younger but I also didn’t get it when my Dad would say, “You are a cute kid but who likes goats?” Wha?) Anyway, in my lifelong attempt to be a “good” daughter, wife, mother, friend, citizen, I obliged for the most part. What if someone didn’t like what I said anyway? I really didn’t want anyone to think I was anything but the illusion.  Smoke and mirrors baby. It was just so much easier that way. Until it wasn’t.

I am redefining what “good” means to me. Perhaps it is getting older or not wanting my own children to put up with anyone else’s bullshit but I can no longer ignore the tightness in my chest and the lump in my throat when my body is urgently telling me listen up! Something is not right. I urge my children to not go with the status quo. Question things that don’t resonate with you. Stand up for yourselves and for people who need you to stand up for them, but only if they deserve it. And don’t be a whiny pain in the ass and complain about everything without trying your best to help the situation. If something doesn’t seem right, it’s probably because it isn’t. Trust your instincts and don’t expect anything to be handed to you because everything worthwhile takes hard work.

Let’s not let “The Capitol” fool us into thinking it is us against each other. We are all in this together. Allow me have my beliefs and I will let you have yours and let’s together tell anyone who tries to tell us we cannot have our individual beliefs that “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” 

Tis the Season

Gratitude is the best attitude

As crazy as it seems it is already December and the holiday season is here ready or not! These are stressful times we are living in. Everyone is just trying their best to juggle health, family, friends, and work not to mention trying to squeeze in some fun for ourselves once in awhile!

Read the 5 Reiki principles whenever you find yourself getting stressed. Take a deep breath and remind yourself what this season is really about.

Our stress is measured by how we react to certain stressors in our lives. We can't get rid of bills, crowded malls and relatives visiting but we can control our reactions to these things. If you can breathe through it, shake it off and start over your health will be better, you will feel happier and so will your family.

The Five Reiki Principles 

by Dr.Mikao Usui

I - Just for today, I will not be angry.

Anger at others or oneself or at the whole world, creates serious blockages in one's energy. It is the most complex inner enemy.

Reiki is an excellent tool to remove anger blockages which have accumulated in the body over years, but it cannot remove the residue of current anger which occurs daily.

Letting go of anger. brings Peace into the Mind.

II - Just for today, I will not worry.

While anger deals with past and present events, worry deals with future ones. Although worry is not always a negative phenomena, endless worries may fill one's head, and each one bores a small hole in one's body and soul. While anger requires a focused Reiki treatment to remove obstacles, worry requires the energy to be spread throughout the entire body.

Letting go of worry, brings healing into the Body.

III - Just for today, I will be grateful.

Be grateful from your hart inward. Inner intention is the important element in this principle. Simple things as thanks, forgiveness, smile, good words, gratitude can improve others life and make them happy.

Being thankful brings Joy into the Spirit.

IV - Just for today, I will do my work honestly.

Support yourself and your family respectably, without harming others. Earn a respectable living, live a life of honor.

Working Honestly brings Abundance into the Soul.

V- Just for today, I will be kind to every living thing.

Honor your parents, honor your teachers, honor your elders.

Being Kind brings Love into the Will.

Life in Balance

Courage is grace under pressure. –Ernest Hemingway

Does the lid feel like it’s about to blow? Tension and anxiety appear to be building and people seem to be looking for answers but it doesn’t sound as if they know what the questions are.

If we are all somehow energetically connected, like a grid, as I believe, then I think we are experiencing a brown out. This amorphous dissatisfaction seems to be the common thread among most people. We are in desperate need of balance, but how do we get it?

What does being balanced even feel like? If we don’t know what we are looking for, how will we know when and if we get it?

 I stumbled upon, (literally), a great blog yesterday called Self Improvement Saga, one entry was entitled, “Vibrational Frequency and the Law of Allowing”  (http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/2r8y16/blog.self-improvement-saga.com/2011/05/law-of-allowing-vibrational-frequency/)

In it the author asks you to answer the following questions:

1)    Write down the 5 things you want out of life.

2)    What feeling or benefit comes along with each of these answers?

So let’s take some obvious goals anyone could want.

1) Be healthier

2) Be happier

3) Be more successful in my relationships

4) Attain professional success

5) Have financial freedom

By attaining any or all of these I will feel accomplished, confident, happier and whole.

Then the next step would be to ask your self the question, “What do I have to do to accomplish these things?” First off I would have to look inward and ask myself out loud, what is keeping me from having all of this?

Well, if I am being honest with myself (which is KEY) than I know the only thing that is keeping me from fulfilling my dreams is, well, me. I have to learn to get out of my own way to get what I want. Does that sound selfish? To actually get what you want? We have been trained to not think that way.  What do you mean your doing what is best for you?! How rude, who do you think you are?

What is better, not getting what you want because it is socially acceptable to do what everyone else wants you to do?  Or doing what is right in order for you to achieve your wildest dreams? (And BTW, there is a difference between working hard to achieve your dreams and being arrogant and demanding things you don’t deserve. There is no justification for entitlement.)

Everyone deep down knows what they have to do to make their lives better. They just choose to hang on to the default setting of, “It's not my fault, it's not fair, I don’t feel like it today, maybe just one more, if he/she didn’t do….then I wouldn’t have to do….” Sometimes the answers are really difficult to hear spoken out loud. We avoid saying them, desperate to keep the secret of what it really will take. but we are only fooling ourselves.

Maybe being in balance will change nothing but your perspective and how you see your situation But maybe that is all you need to have a better life.

Go into the ‘settings’ and change the default. Accept responsibility and accountability that everything we get in life is coming to us because one way or another we attracted it.

I am saying this not because my life is perfect and I have everything I want. I am saying this because I try to reset the default button everyday in hopes that someday my muscle memory will make the right decisions by default. I know everything I need to do to have everything I need.  As my friend Pat says, It is time to stop looking at the vitamin bottle on the counter top and just take one already. So true!

So here is what you do.

Listen to your intuition. Like I used to say to my teenage children before they went out on a Saturday night, “Jiminy Cricket!” And that meant, “Always let your conscience be your guide". Listen to that voice in your head, it speaks the truth! You already know what to do.

Practice yoga and/or some form or another of meditation. It doesn’t have to be hard-core Ashtanga or Bikram yoga and you don’t have to live in an Ashram.

An easy, restorative, therapeutic yoga practice will help your body create what Bo Forbes in his book “Yoga for Emotional Balance” calls, neuroplasticity, which is basically muscle memory for your nervous system. Return to who you really are. When you practice this even for a short time everyday your nervous system will say “Oh yeeaahh. I remember you! Haven’t seen you in years but this natural, relaxed and balanced state is who you really are!” Running and doing serious cardiovascular workouts are extremely beneficial, but I think turning inward and being gentle and kind with yourself is going to connect you to the balance you seek.

Practice breathing. Sounds crazy! Why would we practice something that we do all day long, even unconsciously?

Believe it or not, most people typically breathe short and shallow breaths rather than  deep breaths from the belly. To practice belly breathing you put your hands on either side of your rib cage and breath deeply and evenly through your nose and feel your rib cage expanding on the inhale and contracting on the exhale. By doing so you are stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system. This is the “rest and digest” system. This calms everything down and when you practice this everyday, than when something truly stressful appears in your life you will have this tool to go to automatically.

When you mouth breath and your shoulders move up to your ears on the inhale you are shallow breathing. This type of breathing stimulates the sympathetic nervous system, or the “fight or flight response”.  Of course this is vital to our existence on the planet but your body, not only responds to danger through this system but also stress, fear, depression, anger and sadness can trigger the sympathetic system. So when an intruder breaks into your home or you run into a bear in the woods you want that fight or flight response. But when your spouse or partner annoys you or you are in traffic, or in any situation where stress can be triggered its best to learn how to control your breathing thus helping you to control your emotional response to everyday life. Your ability to respond is your responsibility!

Every single person on the planet holds within them the key to living in balance. And it is balance for all human beings, that is our birthright, that will end the feeling of living in this simmering pot.

Have faith and keep an open mind. It is like everything else that is worthwhile you have to have a dedicated practice to be in balance. It doesn’t happen overnight but if you keep it going, one night it will happen.


Just like the vitamins, it is sitting right in front of you. Go ahead, take one already.