Archive for January, 2009

Are you studying?

January 28th, 2009 by Elizabeth

Accept what is. What you resist persists. Go with the flow.

Undoubtedly, most of us have heard one or all of these phrases. And they sound oh-so-great when you are sitting in the seminar room or with your fellow practitioners at a meditation sit or even as you pour over a Byron Katie book. But let’s be honest. You never fully understand those phrases until you get down and dirty in your own life and just experience first hand, putting all that learning to practice.

I have taken a lot of self development courses, but the one that I am presently enrolled in is by far the BEST I have ever taken. It is on-going. It is called “My Own Life”. Full enrollment began on October 20 1962 the second  I was born. Sometimes I am a bit perplexed as to why I would have registered for such a course. But the great thing is that the rest of the world is also enrolled in the same course at the same University: LifeU. Everyone has different curricula than I do, but some of us have similar professors, some of us prefer taking the tests without studying and going blindly into class, and some are even trying to cheat on their final exams. But we all answer to the Dean of the Universe. We can struggle and fight as we learn and move along toward Graduation Day, or we can quietly pull our chairs up to our desks and crack the books with honesty, integrity, courage, and a zest to learn.

Sharing our learnings is one of the neatest aspects of LifeU. Why not look to your classmates for assistance in cramming for that mid-term? So now, if you don’t mind, this classmate would like to share intimately with you what she learned while she got down and dirty in her studies this past weekend (this blog is G-rated, by the way, for any of you wondering about the “down and dirty” part…).

I have fairly recently closed the door on a traumatic, unhealthy relationship of 11 years and, as a result of that, I have entered a phase of renewing, blossoming,  learning the true meaning of self-love, and beginning to see the True Love that is Elizabeth.  Light is flooding my life with a gorgeous new relationship, I am selling my house, and my spiritual work has taken on new incredible and exciting dimensions. So much excitement, love, and light in my life! So here I am, just sailing along singing and laughing and then…do you hear that? Yup. That sound you hear is of that other shoe dropping.

Last Thursday I woke up with feelings of dread, loneliness, and despair, coupled with self-doubt and great feelings of self-hatred (and goodness knows what other darkness was thrown in there). Out of the blue. Nothing in particular had happened. Nothing that I could put my finger on at least. My lonely empty house felt to have doubled in size and the halls echoed with the sounds of my wailing as I felt the loneliness and trauma arise. My dogs ran to help, but their tender pawings at my body and kisses on my face did nothing to soothe me. The cold and the dark of the winter loomed and seemed to intensify all of the pain. I felt so removed and disconnected from the world. My boyfriend was working and on the other coast, adding to the isolation. The tears and the wailing went on into Friday and  Saturday. The fortunate thing was that I have been in similar classrooms before (with different teachers), and the pages of the book seemed familiar.

So what LifeU had previously taught me was to look at what it is that is coming up. Observe it. Then you will become separate from it and it will eventually dissolve. So I was aware and did that. The odd thing was that this time, the intensity was far greater than anything I had ever experienced. In those moments I could totally understand how some of our classmates ditch school and flunk out.

So at 4 AM on Sunday morning, as I lay crumpled face down on the floor, I experienced one of the biggest revelations of my life. In a moment of satori (instant enlightenment), I saw that I had been looking and observing the “crap”, the negative stuff coming up, but I realized that I had not been fully ACCEPTING it, and I was judging it for being there. The minute I accepted and stopped judging, even if it all didn’t make any sense, I  reconnected and felt peace. In that moment of exquisite realization, my teacher handed me my paper with a big A+ on it with a big gold star.

So you may be wondering why I could have all that stuff coming up if I am in such a joyous, love-filled place in my life. Here is exactly why: one of my glorious teachers, Sondra Ray, taught me that “Love brings up everything unlike itself for the purpose of healing”. So then  it is no wonder. With so much love in my life, there was no escaping this accelerated learning portion of my Life Course.

I highly recommend practicing the acceptance part. No matter how unpleasant or strange it may seem. Love it and embrace it. Fully and without reservation. Perhaps this can help us as the semesters  roll along. I personally want to go to the head of the class. I intend on graduating with the highest of honors. Maybe even with a Ph.D and summa cum laude…

Frozen computer got you down?

January 18th, 2009 by Elizabeth

Or perhaps you can’t tweet as fast as you want to due to a slow connection? Or did you just scream expletives deleted at your computer because you just got the oh-so-lovely Microsoft “program not responding” message yet again or you have become another victim of the Blue Screen of Death?(okay you Mac-ers! My PC can hear your unnecessary chortling from here and it is very sensitive…)

If so, let’s try a new perspective: How awesome is it that we can even be “friends” with someone in Singapore that we have never even met or learn about the origin of peanut butter on Wikipedia? I, for one, often forget the miracle of this incredible technology. And yet another beauty of the techno-world (other than using it to see how many “followers” we can get in one day–Sorry. Inside joke reserved for Twitteraholics), is for all of us to be able to share. Share our ideas. Share our points of view. Share our talents. Share our wisdom.

I used to think, “Yeah, but that person over there is already sharing with the world a belief I hold to be true”, or “but that person over there is providing a service I provide” and concluding from that, “Well, then why should I share?” The answer is because I MUST! YOU MUST! There really is a limited number of Universal Principles and understandings of Life and Being, but there is an infinite number of ways to present them! And that is why we are all here at this time. To present over and over again and, each time, touching someone new in a completely different way then your neighbor has. Ever have a book sitting on your shelf for five years and then one day you walk past it and it suddenly jumps out at you screaming, “READ ME! NOW!!!” That is because “when the student is ready, the teacher will appear” (kudos here to Wayne Dyer who taught me that one as well as “when the teacher is ready the student will appear”).

So we just never know when our students will be ready to hear what we have to teach. They could have heard about the same concept from 50 different people, but then you open your mouth or take pen to paper and they say, “Oh yeah! I get it! Wow!” and you have changed someone’s life forever.

That happened to me today. I was just perusing the internet and ran across this video on YouTube. It is 15 minutes long (14:33 to be exact) but so well worth your time. Here Steve Jobs, co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple, in a commencement speech at Stanford  University, speaks to us of age old concepts of love, trust, loss, and passion for what we do. And he echoes some of the concepts I write about and am passionate about. But he spoke in such a way that I was reminded yet again how important it is to hold all those principles very dear and to fully practice them in my life.

So as Mr. Jobs says, “Stay hungry. Stay foolish.” And I  say, “Please share of you. I want to know you. I want to hear what you have to say. Others want to know you and hear you. Let’s have dialogues and conversations. Let’s connect. Let’s change the world together.”

I hope this perspective helps ease your stress the next time you are watching a Lakers game on your computer and it freezes up just as Kobe is making yet another phenomenal 3-pointer to win the game…

Are you just gonna let some bully stand in your way?

January 17th, 2009 by Elizabeth

Did you know that we are all innately great multitaskers? It certainly is apparent to me, as I can be feeding my dogs, listening to the radio, talking to a friend, and while all this is  going on, I can be listening to and hearing clearly that little voice in my head telling me all kinds of stuff.  Yeah, you know about that “stuff”.

It’s really a game ya know. But who’s gonna win? Unfortunately, some of us are not into this competition and just roll over and allow the onslaught. I seem to have an unending fascination with this topic as seen in my  January 4th post, but bear with me as I feel this is truly a topic worth exploring!

So what is that little voice really all about? What the heck is that bully up to? You see, it really thinks it is trying to protect us; to keep us safe. And it, being the ego,  is trying to protect itself too. Quite the dichotomy.

So I’ll be bold here and share with you one of the things my little voice really enjoys trying to do with me (I am guessing that it enjoys it because sometimes it can do it so well…).  It so often tricks me into playing small and into not seeing my greatness by telling me how much better everyone else is, how I just can’t do it, and how I will surely fail. What a mouthful!

Read the rest of this entry »

The Glorious Melodies Of Life

January 15th, 2009 by Elizabeth

Years ago I worked as a department manager at a Target store in south central Jersey. I must admit that I just flat out hated it. And one of the things that bothered me the most was the fact that there wasn’t (and still isn’t) any piped-in music in ANY Target store.  The result of some silly survey I was told.  But without the lovely tones of some generic musak piece in the background, there was nothing to detract from that voice in my head that was yelling, “get me outta here!”  And the silence was enough to drive me crazy.  But then there was the stockroom. Oh yes! The stockroom! I was always so thrilled if a customer couldn’t find something on the shelf and I had to go see what was in stock.  Know why I was so excited?  Because they were playing music back there! Even if those crazy stock boys were playing rap or some insane heavy metal,  I would be smiling and moving to the beat! The tension would leave my body even for just a brief moment, and I would be reminded of LIFE.

Yes, that is what music is.  It is Life.  It stirs our inner being.  It touches our hearts.  It reminds us of love, passion, and beauty while it fills us with joy and peace. With its simplicity it can bring a tear or a smile or even remind us of all the somethings that are beyond this 3-D dimension. And with its power it can remind us to breathe, to become present, to feel our hearts beating with the breath of Life.

Ahhh…the power of music.

And with that I would like to share with you a glorious re-make of a song I know you all know, but when I heard it I fell in love.  In love with that moment, in love with the piercing beauty of the melody, in love with All That Is.  Yes, some of you may say that I’m a cornball, but that is how I would describe to you what was invoked within me as I heard the beauty of this amazing woman’s voice.

Open your heart as you listen to the Beauty that is Eva Cassidy.  I hope you will join me in this simple bit of rapture.

Just bet it all…

January 4th, 2009 by Elizabeth

It appeared to be just another game of evening fun with my family and an innocent game of Texas hold ‘em.  Little did I know that as my nephew dealt the cards,  enlightenment was waiting for me just around the corner.

I looked at my measly pile of chips.  An odd sight as I was used to seeing  large chunks of change.  I looked at my cards and thought to myself, “Nope. Can’t do it”, and I folded. My brother dealt the next hand. My prospects dimmed as my pile continued to shrink.  I looked at my melting chip pile.  I looked at my cards.  “Nope. Can’t do it”  and folded again.

For some reason in that moment I became aware of the biting little voice inside my head. It was saying, “No! Hold onto what you have! Don’t be stupid! Don’t bet any more! You are close to having NOTHING! You will have NOTHING SOON!”  In retrospect I saw that the din of the vicious bully ego voice was drowning out the sweet, compassionate  tones of my intuition; my connection to my inner knowing.  That voice was telling me, “You have a great chance of being a winner this time! Go for it! It is safe!”  But in that moment, the bully won and I folded  (It turned out that if I had trusted and stuck in the game, I would have won the whole pot!).

My Mom dealt the next hand. Then, in a strangely timed moment of incredible awareness, I immediately saw the parallel to my everyday life and how I approach my issues surrounding my abundance with the same trepidation. The bully will say, “Hey! Hold onto all you’ve got! You don’t have enough! Don’t do it! You will end up with NOTHING!”  And the melodious voice of my intuition will gently whisper,  “It  will all be okay. You will be taken care of. You are safe. TRUST!”  So right then and there I saw how I could make a different choice, and I dared the bully to take me out again with its lies.  But this time it folded and I, the Inner True Me, won!

Trust. Trust. Trust.  Today I choose to fully trust.  Neat mantra, eh?

Just goes to show that our lessons are lying in wait for us everywhere.  Even under a poker chip.

The new year is here!

January 1st, 2009 by Elizabeth

As I saw myself moving forward into the new year, as if taking virgin steps on freshly fallen snow, I asked, “How can I move onto this untouched ground with respect, gratitude, and clarity?” Without hesitation I chose to rebirth myself.

Rebirthing is beautiful breathwork that clears the body of blocked energy, emotions, and toxins while healing and connecting us to Source.  Afterall, our breath is Life.  And just in case you are still not clear of how amazing and transformational Rebirthing can be, below you will find a list of reasons you should check out (or revisit) this divine breathwork:

1. It allows you to clear karma that’s been hanging out with you for  eons
2. It allows you to experience life fully and freely while being  present within each moment
3. It helps to clear old suppressed traumatic occurrences
4. It gets you in touch with your inner self
5. It is an extremely effective stress reduction technique
6. It allows you to experience the flow of life-force energy in your body
7. You will feel lighter
8. It will unravel mysteries of your mind, body, and life
9. Helps you say good-bye to negativity
10. It facilitates forgiveness

This is actually just a smattering of the marvels of Rebirthing.  Rebirthing is something that everyone should experience at least once, although I highly recommend hooking up with a trained professional rebirther for a series of sessions.

So today, as I completed my own session, I once again was reminded of the beautiful presence of something more masterful, more precious, more loving than anyone of us can barely imagine. What a grand way to enter into this new year of mastery for us all.

Just say it and it is so.