The Forty Rules of Love

This beautiful and timely post is excerpted from The Forty Rules of Love: A Novel of Rumi by Elif Shafak. Thanks to Jean Hudon for the information!

Every true love and friendship is a story
of unexpected transformations


Rule 1
How we see God is a direct reflection of how we see ourselves.
If God brings to mind mostly fear and blame,
it means there is too much fear and blame welled inside us.
If we see God as full of love and compassion, so are we.


Rule 2
The path to the Truth is a labor of the heart, not of the head.
Make your heart your primary guide! Not your mind.
Meet, challenge, and ultimately prevail over your nafs (false ego) with your heart.
Knowing your ego (higher self/soul) will lead you to the knowledge of God.


Rule 3
Each and every reader comprehends the Holy Qur'an on a different level
in tandem with the depth of his understanding.
There are four levels of insight.
The first level is the outer meaning and it is the one that the majority of the people are content with.
Next is the Batini - the inner level.
Third, there is the inner of the inner.
And the fourth level is so deep it cannot be put into words,
and is therefore bound to remain indescribable.


Rule 4
You can study God through everything and everyone in the universe,
because God is not confined in a mosque, synagogue, or church.
But if you are still in need of knowing where exactly His abode is,
there is only one place to look for Him:
in the heart of a true lover.


Rule 5
Intellect and love are made of different materials.
Intellect ties people in knots and risks nothing,
but love dissolves all tangles and risks everything.
Intellect is always cautious and advises, 'Beware too much ecstasy,'
whereas love says, 'Oh, never mind!
Take the plunge!
Intellect does not easily break down,
whereas love can effortlessly reduce itself to rubble.
But treasures are hidden among ruins.
A broken heart hides treasures.


Rule 6
Most of the problems of the world stem from linguistic mistakes and simple misunderstandings.
Don't ever take words at face value.
When you step into the zone of love, language as we know it becomes obsolete.
That which cannot be put into words can only be grasped through silence.


Rule 7
Loneliness and solitude are two different things.
When you are lonely, it is easy to delude yourself into believing that you are on the right path.
Solitude is better for us, as it means being alone without feeling lonely.
But eventually it is best to find a person, the person who will be your mirror.
Remember, only in another person's heart can you truly see yourself and the presence of God within you.


Rule 8
Whatever happens in your life, no matter how troubling things might seem,
do not enter the neighborhood of despair.
Even when all doors remain closed, God will open a new path only for you.
Be thankful! It is easy to be thankful when all is well.
A Sufi is thankful not only for what he has been given but also for all that he has been denied.


Rule 9
Patience does not mean to passively endure.
It means to be farsighted enough to trust the end result of a process.
What does patience mean?
It means to look at the thorn and see the rose, to look at the night and see the dawn.
Impatience means to be so shortsighted as to not be able to see the outcome.
The lovers of God never run out of patience,
for they know that time is needed for the crescent moon to become full.


Rule 10
East, west, south, or north makes little difference.
No matter what your destination, just be sure to make every journey a journey within.
If you travel within, you'll travel the whole wide world and beyond.


Rule 11
The midwife knows that when there is no pain,
the way for the baby cannot be opened and the mother cannot give birth.
Likewise for a new Self to be born, hardship is necessary.
Just as clay needs to go through intense heat to become strong,
Love can only be perfected in pain.


Rule 12
The quest for Love changes us.
There is no seeker among those who search for Love who has not matured on the way.
The moment you start looking for love, you start to change within and without.


Rule 13
There are more fake gurus and false teachers in this world than the number of stars in the visible universe.
Don't confuse power-driven, self-centered people with true mentors.
A genuine spiritual master will not direct your attention to himself or herself
and will not expect absolute obedience or utter admiration from you,
but instead will help you to appreciate and admire your inner self.
True mentors are as transparent as glass.
They let the light of God pass through them.


Rule 14
Try not to resist the changes that come your way.
Instead let life live through you.
And do not worry that your life is turning upside down.
How do you know that the side you are used to is better than the one to come?


Rule 15
God is busy with the completion of your work, both outwardly and inwardly.
He is fully occupied with you.
Every human being is a work in progress that is slowly but inexorably moving toward perfection.
We are each an unfinished work of art both waiting and striving to be completed.
God deals with each of us separately because humanity is a fine art of skilled penmanship
where every single dot is equally important for the entire picture.


Rule 16
It's easy to love a perfect God, unblemished and infallible that He is.
What is far more difficult is to love fellow human beings with all their imperfections and defects.
Remember, one can only know what one is capable of loving.
Unless we learn to love God's creation, we can neither truly love nor truly know God.


Rule 17
Real filth is the one inside.
The rest simply washes off.
There is only one type of dirt that cannot be cleansed with pure waters,
and that is the stain of hatred and bigotry contaminating the perfect soul.
You can purify your body through abstinence and fasting,
but only love will purify your heart.


Rule 18
The whole universe is contained within a single human being - you.
Everything that you see around, including the things you might not be fond of
and even the people you despise or abhor, is present within you in varying degreed.
Therefore, do not look for Sheitan outside yourself either.
The devil is not an extraordinary force that attacks from without.
It is an ordinary voice within.
If you get to know yourself fully,
facing with honesty and hardness both your dark and bright sides,
you will arrive at a supreme form of consciousness.
When a person knows himself or herself, he or she knows God.


Rule 19
If you want to change the way others treat you,
you should first change the way you treat yourself.
Unless you learn to love yourself, fully and sincerely,
there is no way you can be loved.
Once you achieve that stage, however, be thankful for every thorn that others might throw at you.
It is a sign that you soon will be showered with roses.


Rule 20
Fret not where the road will take you.
Instead concentrate on the first step.
That's the hardest part and that's what you are responsible for.
Once you take that step, let everything do what it naturally does and the rest will follow.
Do not go with the flow.
Be the flow.


Rule 21
We are all created in His image, and yet we were each created different and unique.
No two people are alike.
No two hearts beat to the same rhythm.
If God had wanted everyone to be the same, He would have made it so.
Therefore, disrespecting differences and imposing your thoughts on others
is tantamount to disrespecting God's holy scheme.


Rule 22
When a true lover of God goes into a tavern,
the tavern becomes his chamber of prayer,
but when a wine bibber goes into the same chamber, it becomes his tavern.
In everything we do, it is our hearts that make the difference, not our outer appearances.
Sufis do not judge other people on how they look or who they are.
When a Sufi stares at someone, he keeps both eyes closed
and instead opens a third eye - the eye that sees the inner realm.


Rule 23
Life is a temporary loan, and this world is nothing but a sketchy imitation of Reality.
Only children would mistake a toy for the real thing.
And yet human beings either become infatuated with the toy or disrespectfully break it and throw it aside.
In this life stay away from all kinds of extremities,
for they will destroy your inner balance.
Sufis do not go to extremes.
A Sufi always remains mild and moderate.


Rule 24
The human being has a unique place among God's creation.
"I breathed into him of My Spirit," God says.
Each and every one of us without exception is designed to be God's delegate on earth.
Ask yourself, just how often do you behave like a delegate, if you ever do so?
Remember, it falls upon each of us to discover the divine spirit inside and live by it.


Rule 25
Hell is in the here and now. So is heaven.
Quit worrying about hell or dreaming about heaven, as they are both present inside this very moment.
Every time we fall in love, we ascend to heaven.
Every time we hate, envy, or fight someone, we tumble straight into the fires of hell


Rule 26
The universe is one being.
Everything and everyone is interconnected through an invisible web of stories.
Whether we are aware of it or not, we are all in silent conversation.
Do no harm. Practice compassion.
And do not gossip behind anyone's back - not even a seemingly innocent remark!
The words that comes out of your mouth do not vanish but are perpetually stored in infinite space,
and they will come back to us in due time.
One man's pain will hurt us all.
One man's joy will make everyone smile.


Rule 27
This world is like a snowy mountain that echoes your voice.
Whatever you speak, good or evil, will somehow come back to you.
Therefore, if there is someone who harbors ill thoughts about you,
saying similarly bad things about him will only make matters worse.
You will be locked in a vicious circle of malevolent energy.
Instead for forty days and nights say and think nice things about that person.
Everything will be different at the end of forty days, because you will be different inside.


Rule 28
The past is an interpretation. The future is an illusion.
The world does not move through time as if it were a straight line,
proceeding from the past to the future.
Instead time moves through and within us, in endless spirals.
Eternity does not mean infinite time, but simply timelessness.
If you want to experience eternal illumination, put the past
and the future out of your mind and remain within the present moment.


Rule 29
Destiny doesn't mean that your life has been strictly predetermined.
Therefore, to leave everything to fate and to not actively contribute
to the music of the universe is a sign of sheer ignorance.
The music of the universe is all-pervading and it is composed on forty different levels.
Your destiny is the level where you will play your tune.
You might not change your instrument but how well to play is entirely in your hands.


Rule 30
The true Sufi is such that even when he is unjustly accused,
attacked, and condemned from all sides,
he patiently endures, uttering not a single bad word about any of his critics.
A Sufi never apportions blame.
How can there be opponents or rivals or even "others"
when there is no "self" in the first place.
How can there be anyone to blame when there is only One?


Rule 31
If you want to strengthen your faith, you will need to soften inside.
For your faith to be rock solid, your heart needs to be as soft as a feather.
Through an illness, accident, loss or fright, one way or another,
we all are faced with incidents that teach us how to become less selfish and judgmental,
to become milder, while some others end up becoming even harsher than before.
The only way to get closer to Truth is to expand your heart
so that it will encompass all humanity and still have room for more Love.


Rule 32
Nothing should stand between you and God. Not imams, priest, rabbis.
Or any other custodians of moral or religious leadership.
Not spiritual masters, not even your faith.
Believe in your values and your rules, but never lord them over others.
If you keep breaking other people's hearts, whatever religious duty you perform is no good.
Stay away from all sorts of idolatry, for they will blur your vision.
Let God and only God be your guide.
Learn the Truth, my friend, but be careful not to make a fetish out of your truths.


Rule 33
While everyone in this world strives to get somewhere and become someone,
only to leave it all behind after death, you aim for the supreme stage of nothingness.
Live this life as light and empty as the number zero.
We are no different from a pot.
It is not the decorations outside but the emptiness inside that holds us straight.
Just like that, it is not what we aspire to achieve but the consciousness of nothingness that keeps us going.


Rule 34
Submission does not mean being weak or passive.
It leads to neither fatalism nor capitulation. Just the opposite.
True power resides in submission - to a power that comes from within.
Those who submit to the divine essence of life will live in unperturbed tranquility and peace
even when the whole wide world goes through turbulence after turbulence.


Rule 35
In this world, it is not similarities or regularities that take us a step forward, but blunt opposites.
And all the opposites in the universe are present within each and very one of us.
Therefore the believer needs to meet the unbeliever residing within.
And the nonbeliever should get to know the silent faithful in him.
Until the day one reaches the stage of Insan-I Kamil, the perfect human being,
faith is a gradual process and one that necessitates its seeming opposite: disbelief.


Rule 36
The world is erected upon the principle or reciprocity.
Neither a drop of kindness nor a speck of evil will remain unreciprocated.
Fear not the plots, deceptions, or tricks of other people.
If someone is setting up a trap, remember, so is God.
He is the biggest plotter.
Not even a leaf stirs outside God's knowledge.
Simply and fully believe in that.
Whatever God does, He does beautifully.


Rule 37
God is a meticulous clockmaker.
So precise is His order that everything on earth happens in its own time.
Neither a minute late nor a minute early.
And for everyone without exception, the clock works accurately.
For each there is a time to love and a time to die.


Rule 38
It is never too late to ask yourself, "Am I ready to change the life I am living?
Am I ready to change within?"
Even if a single day in your life is the same as the day before, it surely is a pity.
At every moment and with each new breath, one should be renewed and renewed again.


Rule 39
While the parts change, the whole remains the same.
For every thief who departs this world, a new one is born.
And every decent person who passes away is replaced by a new one.
In this way not only does nothing remain the same but also nothing really changes.


Rule 40
A life without love is of no account.
Don't ask yourself what kind of love you should seek,
spiritual or material, divine or mundane, Eastern or Western
Divisions only lead to more divisions.
Love has no labels, no definitions.
It is what it is, pure and simple.
Love is the water of life. And a lover is a soul of fire.
The universe turns differently when fire loves water.

Approaching The 11:11:11 Gateway

Six years ago this month, I blogged about the upcoming 11:11 portal, which also equaled 11:11:11 numerologically: 11 + 11 + 2005 (7) = 2+2+7 = 11. (Of course, this year we won't want to add up the elevens, of we'll end up with 6!).

While I'll be covering the upcoming Stargate extensively in my November What Shines newsletter, this information from 2005 is extremely on-point:

Archangel Michael through Celia Fenn calls the 11:11:11 the Doorway to Absolute Integrity, an alignment of all aspects of our higher and lower selves. This balance is achieved through the Heart chakra, and will not be an easy passage, as everything that isn't aligned with your higher purpose will fall away — including work and relationships.

Michael says that "Energetic and Physical Symptoms of the 11:11:11 Stargate may include:

* Physical exhaustion and the need to sleep very long hours. This is because the physical and emotional bodies are aligning with the higher vibrations of the spiritual bodies to facilitate the complete alignment of higher and lower aspects.

* Emotional stress and the ending of relationships. Everything that is not in integrity will end. Some endings may include hostility as repressed angers come to the surface.

* Depression and sadness. A feeling of being unable to cope or of failing. Fear not: this is meant to be and your higher aspect is guiding the alignment process. It is not a test and there is nothing to pass or fail. If you are experiencing these symptoms of the alignment, then you have succeeded in this next step of the Ascension process.

* An increase in the apparent chaos of life. As you become more centered within the peace and stillness of your Soul and Divine Essence in the alignment process, the outer world will appear even more chaotic and frenetic. Do not allow this to pull you out of balance. Stay within your calm and peace.

* Feelings of emptiness and loneliness and becoming tearful. This is part of the complete surrender to the higher aspect. You have released the hold of the lower ego self and surrendered to the guidance of the higher. This process of alignment represents a 'no space' or 'void' in which the ego self may feel very alone and lost. Do not allow this to overwhelm you. Just know it will pass and you will move forward into the full realization of your potential as a human angel.

* Deep feelings of peace and gratitude as the alignment is completed and you move into the full experience of the 11:11:11 portal. As you wake up to the inner changes you will celebrate the intense power that you will feel as the higher and lower aspects lock together and the flow of crystal energy and higher awareness moves through your bodies and into the planet's crystal grid system. You will begin to feel a sense of complete harmony between yourself and the planet as your ninth dimensional energies activate fully into the crystal grid system. It is time to celebrate!"

This Is Your Brain on Earth's Magnetic Field: Another 2012 Perspective

Four years ago, I was riveted by Barbara Hand Clow's astonishing premise that a cataclysm circa 9500 BC plunged humanity from unity consciousness into duality and survival mode, which is still encoded in our limbic brains — even as this tectonic shift transmuted the planet herself into sacred geometry! I summarized her work in Back to the Future: Remembering How to Live As One with the All.

Now Aluna Joy Yax'kin ups the ante with this information about the Earth's magnetic field and our minds:

"Sri Kalki Bhagavan says: "As the Earth's molten core is rotating, the magnetic field is created. The thought sphere of the human mind is located in the Earth's magnetic field. This magnetic field has been weakening dramatically over the last ten years. Now, in physics there is a parameter called 'Schumann's Resonance'. Using that we can determine the strength of the Earth's magnetic field. While for many centuries it was constant around 7.8 cycles per second, during the last 7-8 years it has risen to 11 cycles per second and is continuing to increase dramatically. If you work it out mathematically, it appears that by the year 2012, the 'Schumann's Resonance' is likely to be 13 cycles per second. When this resonance is 13 cycles per second, the Earth’s core would stop rotating.

"With the magnetic field gone, your mind is gone. When I say 'your mind', what I mean is your 'samskaras'. The pressure of the past 11,000 years of samskaras will vanish."

This means we are literally starting with a clean slate, and can choose to source our future from the heart of wholeness.

Sri Kalki Bhagavan adds, "Your heart and the Earth’s heart are connected. The Earth’s heart can be influenced by your heart and vice versa. That is why it is essential that your heartbeat synchronize with the Earth’s resonance. This means your heart must flower. Your heart will flower when you discover love in your relationships."

What we've known intuitively is being actualized now in each human being and in our beloved Gaia. Heart synchronization creates the wave of love that carries us into the next stage of evolution!

The Beginning of the World

"To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour."

~ Auguries of Innocence, William Blake

Have you been feeling a sense of urgency for a while — as though an invisible undertow is pulling you in over your head? The Hopi prophecy about these times begins, "There is a river flowing now very fast. It is so great and so swift that there are those who will be afraid. They will try to hold on to the shore…"

We are all swimming in an emergent sea of consciousness — and, since this is so new, we may tend to fall back on old models to try to understand what's happening. "Oh! This must be an emergency!" Remember that emergency equates to crisis — and crisis means turning point. Emergence (minus the "y", or "why," of our scrambling, questioning minds) means to come out, to gush forth — like flowing waters. The cosmic comic Swami Beyondananda calls it, "Emerge and see." Let's take a slow, luminous look at where we are now.

September 11, 2001 was a wake-up call, our planetary initiation into a higher way of being. If 9-1-1 was the conception, our global gestation has been underway for the past decade. Because we've never experienced a global birth process before, there's no template for how to do it, or what it might look or feel like. Some of us are responding with hyperactivity; others are exhausted; we may fluctuate between the two. Some people are feeling ravenous all the time; others have little or no appetite. An expectant mother knows that the baby growing inside her affects all aspects of her life for the nine months she carries the being in her womb.

How strange and wonderful to be part of a collective birth, a worldwide rebirth of consciousness, here in the body of our Earth Mother! On October 28, 2011, the 26,000-year cycle of the Mayan Calendar concludes, initiating us into a higher dimension. (This evolution is also affecting animals, especially cats, which are helping to anchor the vibration of transmutation.) The more we can take care of ourselves and of one another as we prepare for our emergence, the more joy-full it can be.

Once again, a subtle shift in perception may help. Consider the word n-o-w-h-e-r-e. It's usually pronounced "no where." If we subtlely shift our focus, however, we arrive at the key to living in the present moment, which is where all gifts reside: now here.

This is a new dawn, our collective inauguration. The word inauguration contains the word "augur," which means to predict, to forecast. What do we want to vote for, as a planetary people, in this ripe moment of rebirth? What augurs well for our growth as a species? Blake's "Auguries of Innocence," quoted above, suggests one positive pathway.

Woo-Woo in a Wow-Now World:Living As a Practical Mystic

"Only those within whose own consciousness the sun rises and sets, the leaves burgeon and wither, can be said to be aware of what living is."

~ Joseph Wood Krutch, US naturalist and writer

What does being "conscious" actually mean? My online dictionary defines it as, "awake, aware, supraliminal…". Now there's a word to roll trippingly on the tongue. Supraliminal. It's the exact opposite of the subliminal media messages we're bombarded with daily.

Supraliminal means above the threshold of normal sensation. So, instead of being anesthetized by the jackhammer rhythm of life in the third millennium, a supraliminal person moves to a different cadence. You live an aesthetic life — in tune with the beauty all around you — rather than an anesthetic one, numbed out on sensory overload and emotional angst. This is being conscious, and we get to choose whether to walk this path, every day.

It doesn't mean we have to live "woo-woo" in a wow-now world, however. There's a way to "walk the mystical path with practical feet," as one of my own great teachers, Angeles Arrien, often says. Her lucid book, The Four-Fold Way: Walking the Paths of the Warrior, Teacher, Healer and Visionary draws upon her vast experience as a cross-cultural anthropologist and educator to show us how indigenous wisdom can help us live richer, more joy-filled lives, both personally and professionally. The approaching winter season corresponds to the way of the Warrior, or leader, whose challenge is the right use of power. Angeles reminds us that Native peoples use the words "power" and "medicine" synonymously. If we fully express who we are, we are "in our medicine."

Earth herself offers us a bountiful opportunity to grow, by planting ourselves in presence. Louise Hay, in many ways the founding mother of the personal growth/self help movement, says being in nature, nurturing the soil, and growing her own food is a kind of meditation for her. She lived in New York City for forty years, so she knows what it's like in the asphalt jungle, and feels especially blessed to be able to garden on her acre of land in California now.

Louise says, "My garden sustains me a lot. It is nature at its most abundant and beautiful. And what I do primarily in the garden is build soil. I do everything that I can to make the soil better. I have a big chipper shredder, and not a lettuce leaf or a leaf from a tree leaves my property. It's all ground up, nature makes it into wonderful rich soil, and I put that back into the soil. And it's the same thing with the people, with their own lives. You know if you enrich yourself, if you pull the weeds out, if you get the rocks out of the way in your consciousness and enrich yourself with good reading, good study, good meditating, understanding — then life takes care of the rest."

As the Northern Hemisphere turns inward now, it's a good time to compost any aspects of ourselves that no longer support who we're becoming. And perhaps, as we continue to build our inner soil, enrich our soul, and live a more conscious life, we'll also lose our fear of the next threshold.

Awareness Into Action:

What practical steps can you take this week to build your own soil, to live your medicine? Choose a specific action and put it into practice with everyone you meet, all week long.

Lightworkers As Light Anchors

As we in the Northern Hemisphere enter our Fall Equinoctial gateway this weekend, we're also entering the end of time: the Ninth (and final) Wave of the Mayan Calendar concludes on October 28, 2011, according to Mayan scholar Carl Calleman's research. Then what?

Equinoxes, when day and night are of equal length, are all about balance. This one is also about deep integration, beauty, and yes, despite outer appearances, peace. One of the best ways to bring more of these attributes into your life now is to see yourself as an anchor of light, itself an oxymoron. Yet this is the moment when all paradoxes coalesce into perfect sense.

Cosmic weather reporter Irma Kaye Sawyer introduces the designation, Light Anchor: someone who is "grounded, yet familiar with travel in 4/5D states, either to share energy (as a healer), information, or both. Light Anchors usually have Sun in an Earth Sign, and/or predominant earth planets, but this is not always the case. Their job through the Shift is to 'hold down the fort' (they like that term!) and create a safe space for people to awaken to their own light resources. Most of our spiritual visions are seen in our meditation time. Many Light Anchors are Adult Indigos (1st and 2nd wave) and also 'Wizards' who are in their late 60s all the way to their 80s now. Light Anchors often work with words to convey their messages and can serve as teachers, writers and channels."

In nautical terminology, a light anchor, or kedge, is used to help turn a ship around. The flip side, an anchor light, indicates a vessel is stationary; not under power. And while it's gratifying to anchor the Light, right now many of us seem keen to sing, "Anchors Away!"

So yes, balance is key, along with acute creativity. A very early name for my work, before Live Your Light, was Metamorphosis: The Center for Creative Change. Astrologer Allison Rae offers a potent look at creative change this Equinox weekend, in the form of 100,000 Poets for Change, who are creating social artistry via global public readings, demonstrations, concerts and vigils.

We each have the choice and opportunity now to become social (r)evolutionaries: light anchors for an emerging world.

Radical Evolution: Commemorating 9-1-1

[My follow-up to "This IS A Test!" sent later the week of 9/11/01:]

Dear Ones,

We stand at a crossroads in our evolution. The old structures have been shattered, in every sense. What will we build from the ashes, now?

We could choose to dive deeper into polarity, into us versus them, and vote for war. Has this approach worked in the past? Does it further our growth as a species? Think about it: the U.S. has spent vast amounts of time and money on space exploration. Suppose we actually were to make contact with a race of advanced extraterrestrial beings. How interested might they be in fostering relations with a planet whose inhabitants still resort to killing one another as a means of resolving their differences?

We are all cells in the body of Gaia, our Earth Mother. If we view life in this way, the attacks in New York and Washington become like a cancer assaulting our collective body. Cancer cells have lost the ability to cooperate with other cells for the greater good of the whole. Yet malignancy does not arise in an instant; it builds over a period of time. If we plunge ahead intent only on annihilating the "cancer," we will also destroy healthy cells, and possibly the entire body of humanity and all other species. Unless we heal the root causes of this illness - our collective shadow, our pain, our perceived separation from one another - it will recur in another form down the road. How do we do this?

Nationalism, while a natural response in such a crisis, is not the complete answer. Internationalism is. Vietnamese Zen master and peace activist Thich Nhat Hahn, who has been living in exile from his homeland for 35 years, speaks eloquently of how we "inter-are" with all life. Interdependence is the key to ending the exile for all of us. We are all responsible to and for one another.

Can we now be courageous enough, can we open our hearts wide enough (courage means "of the heart") to choose to grow beyond our grief and outrage at this critical time? Will we look at the lifelong habits that have created this dis-ease, and begin to make global "lifestyle" changes that will help us return to harmony?

In "Letters to a Young Poet," Rainer Maria Rilke counsels, "Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us." To meet our indescribable suffering and fear with an outstretched heart is a faithwalk. The Bible tells us that faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Substance means that which stands under you, "sub" and "stance", and this is also the definition of understanding. That which stands under you; what you know, from inner wisdom, to be true. So as we grow in consciousness, in understanding, as we walk more and more on faith, the light of compassion will become the ever-present substance of our lives. We will begin to recognize it as the light shining forth from within our own souls.

Reclaiming is a key word for now. We can choose to compost our violence into the rich soil of compassion (literally, "to suffer with") as a new way of reclaiming our Earth body, and our relationships with one another. Soul/sole/soil are related in meaning, as are whole/holy/heal. Touching the Earth, our collective and only home, with compassion, we live into our soul's purpose more deeply. As we get the "whole" picture, we become more whole, holy, healed; more One with the All. From this soil teeming with understanding, forgiveness and love, we may cultivate a culture in which we are all welcomed home. Atonement is at-one-ment.

This is radical evolution.

Individually and collectively, we have the power. What do we want to stand for, to walk on as the essence of our substance, now? In "The Little Prince," Antoine de St. Exupery reminds us, "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly. What is essential is invisible to the eye." This is the strongest co-creative moment in human history. We stand at a crossroads. We can choose radical evolution, a new direction predicated on wisdom, by using the eyes of the heart.

In the Light, Love and Truth of who we are,
Amara
LiveYourLight.com

This IS A Test: Commemorating 9-1-1

[My first posting from 9-11-01]:


This IS A Test!

Dear Ones,

We are six days from September 17th, a date heralded as being an opportunity for planetary initiation. An initiatory crisis, personal or global, catapults us out of our prior way of life in an instant, and demands a creative response born of trust in the process. Crisis actually means "turning point," as well as opportunity. So while this morning's air attacks on key U.S. "nerve centers" (the World Trade Center Towers and the Pentagon) surprise me only in terms of form, the actions themselves were, in a sense, predictable. It was only a matter of when. The time is NOW. The question is, how will we (the United States, and the world) respond?

I believe it was Einstein who said, you can not solve a problem with the same level of thinking that created it. From stunned pain, shock and anger, the instinctive response is retaliation. The first person I talked with today, upon hearing the news, spoke of hoping the President would threaten a nuclear attack. This would clearly be the end of life as we know it.

Later, as I listened to reports on radio, I was struck once again by how rapidly people always pull together in an emergency to help one another. Tragedy is a great leveler. We all do need to come together, not to fight a common enemy (which is within) but to begin creating the Global Community we've been inching towards for decades. It's a spiritual emergency, as we emerge from the cocoon of complacency, the old paradigm, into a courageous new world.

We must now choose to go beyond the old, reptilian, limbic brain (the same impulse that drives materialism, separation, self-interest, and misuse of power) into the higher realms of consciousness, where love, wisdom and power are synthesized into service. This is a test of the highest order. It's not about who's at fault, who orchestrated the attacks, or whether we should now place sanctions against the Middle East or other groups. It's about recognizing this attack for what it is: a colossal wake-up call.

This event is a volcanic eruption, and in hindsight, the rumblings many of us have been experiencing the past few weeks presaged it. Several players on the path have been sharing stories of total strangers (as well as of acquaintances and friends) suddenly, savagely and inexplicably dumping truckloads of mental trash on them. Everyone has been feeling "the quickening" of these end times, but, since we're at different stages in our growth, those who have no context for what they're experiencing also don't know what to do with these volatile energies. The anger's been leaking out, and finally, here's the explosion.

It is, in a very real sense, a planetary birth process. Something old has to die in order for the new to emerge. Please understand, I am not in the least condoning the tremendous loss of lives or the tragedy itself, yet I do feel that some major catastrophe to serve as a worldwide summons to awareness was cued to occur. It also took place on a Tuesday, which correlates astrologically with Mars, the God of war. We are all learning how to transform the war within ourselves into spiritual warriorhood.

It is interesting that the attack on the Pentagon made it impossible for U.S. officials to meet in the Department of Defense, the War Room. Our old defenses have been dismantled, big time and instantly.

Consider, too, that the Pentagon is a five-sided structure. There's a lot of power in five, which configures a star. The number five, as the center of the Native American medicine wheel, signifies the place of transformational possibilities. Five symbolizes access to the Spirit world in the Mayan tradition. It is a unifying element in Tibetan culture. The Greeks called the fifth element quinta essentia, the pure and concentrated essence, or invisible connector that allows earth, fire, water and air to communicate. Five is, cross-culturally, a centering and balancing element. Think of the alchemical phoenix that could arise from this apparent tragedy…

The 13th century Sufi mystic Rumi wrote, "Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and right doing, there's a field. I'll meet you there." This is the field of higher mind, of creative possibility, of the One Love. The moment is now. This is a call to conscious unity. Sisters and Brothers of the Light, please join me.

May this Invocation, sent out from World Goodwill in New York City to commemorate World Invocation Day, June 5, 2001, inspire and support you now. Many blessings and much love to you all, Amara.


The Great Invocation

From the point of Light within the mind of God
Let Light stream forth into human minds.
Let Light descend on Earth.

From the point of Love within the Heart of God
Let love stream forth into human hearts.
May the Coming One return to Earth.

From the center where the Will of God is known
Let purpose guide all little human wills—
The purpose which the Masters know and serve.

From the center which we call the human race
Let the Plan of Love and Light work out
And may it seal the door where evil dwells.

Let Light and Love and Power restore the Plan on Earth.

Living On the Edge

My longtime friend and What Shines subscriber Paul White is somewhat clairvoyant and clairsentient. He's written before about extraordinary experiences that dovetailed with my newsletter posts, such as this, on seeing Beyond Visible Light.

The current issue is entitled Edge Dwellers, and deals with what it means to live edgy during these emergent times. Paul sent me this email today:

"This is really incredible. The day before you sent What Shines I had a dream that I enticed someone to come to the edge of a cliff. I then grabbed their arm, pulled, and we both fell off the cliff. I remember the first instance of falling: there was fear; it was a long way to the bottom. But then I really looked at where we were going: there was plenty of time to think. By some miracle or inspiration we started to fly. We flew over a town and started to gain altitude. The last thing in the dream that I remember was going into some clouds and the light.

Pretty cool huh?"

And I concluded the newsletter with this invocation, from Apollinaire:

"Come to the edge,
He said.
They said,
We are afraid.
Come to the edge,
He said.
They came.
He pushed them ... and they flew."

We are all One mind, linked by Spirit! Find your glowing edge, dearhearts, and take flight — because you can.

Feeling squeezed? Make juice!

It's August, it's hot, and our planet's going to Light. Everybody's feeling just a little squeezed now — in all ways, not just financially. Yet we don't necessarily envision the squeezing as creating more juice, which it can, and does.

This consciousness upgrade looks different from person to person, making for some strange interactions and a great reminder to take a deep breath before responding from habit when something or someone pushes our buttons. Weird feelings, depression, anger, etc., may not necessarily be "ours". Since we're all being strongly affected by this transition, it's important not to take on energy that is bubbling to the surface to be transmuted — to yield rather than shield.

This is core training in learning to surrender — into strength. In an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, (a reliable source of evolutionary metaphor) a boy is the only survivor of a decimated ship. When the same "enemy" starts firing on the Enterprise, Captain Picard orders, "More power to the shields," yet the assault worsens.

The youngster (who is on the bridge in the hope he'll know something that makes a difference) suddenly pipes up, "Hey! That's what the other captain kept saying just before the ship was destroyed: 'More power to the shields.'" Picard, always a quick study, immediately orders the Enterprise to drop its shields. His crew thinks he's given a suicide command — and it works. Resistance is futile …

This is an example of turning the squeeze into real juice: making courageous choices, strengthening our rapport with our inner voice. Evolution is putting the squeeze on us to expand into the unknown — and we're being "fresh-pressed" as a collective. Where we'll end up is wholly new territory: something we co-create by yielding dried-up beliefs to the extraction process. The more energetically hydrated we are, the more enjoyable the ride, even when the heat is on.

What Does It Take to Get Glowing?

Last Friday I dueted with Jennifer Alhasa on her new blogtalkradio show, Get Glowing. We discussed what it means to get glowing, what blocks us from shining our light — and how best to reclaim our power, passion and purpose. Enjoy the replay (just 30 minutes long), and please let us know what you think!

Zapped! Are You a Victim of Electronic Pollution?

Power. From our iPhones to iPads, Wii to DVDs, plasma TV to wifi, we're living in an electronic fog that may be causing a whole host of illnesses and conditions, from ADHD to chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia to heart disease, and much, much more.

I've been reading Ann Louise Gittleman's Zapped, and it's blowing me out of the water: years ago I lived through a health crisis of what I've long referred to as environmental toxicity, and written about the experience. I thought I was well aware of the chemical challenges of modern society, and have been doing my best to minimize my load as well as educate others.

But Gittleman adds a whole new dimension to everything I've understood until now, by demonstrating in her staggeringly well researched book how electro-magnetic (EMF) pollution stresses everything from our hearts to our immune systems, endocrine to digestive to reproductive systems. It's like the missing magic layer.

Before you panic, toss your Blackberry into a lake and head for a remote island (there's probably wifi there, too), take heart: Gittleman provides sound guidance and resources to help us reduce our electronic overload.

One great place to start is with her list of 21 Superfoods and seasonings, many of which you may already enjoy:

1. Artichokes (USDA's #1 antioxidant veggie)
2. Asparagus (more glutathione than any other food)
3. Blueberries (and blackberries, raspberries, strawberries: all high in antioxidants)
4. Cinnamon (blood sugar stabilizer and antioxidant)
5. Cranberries (free radical scavenger; kills H. pylori bacteria)
6. Cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, kale, cabbage: good sources of sulfur, zinc, selenium)
7. Cumin (enhances liver detox)
8. Garlic (keeps werewolves away; also powerful anti-inflammatory)
9. Grass-fed Beef (excellent source of glutathione, zinc, selenium, which EMFs zap)
10. Mushrooms (immune-boosting antioxidants)
11. Olive oil (boost glutathione levels dramatically)
12. Pomegranate juice (better than red wine for neutralizing free radicals!)
13. Prunes/Dried Plums (powerhouses at vanquishing free radical)
14. Red Beans (stabilize blood sugar, protect brain cells)
15. Rosemary (protects cellular DNA from radiation)
16. Sea vegetables (kombu, hijiki, arame, nori: reduce radioactive exposure, protect thyroid)
17. Tart cherries (melatonin powerhouse)
18. Turmeric (inhibits radiation-induced chromosome damage)
19. Wild Alaskan Salmon (rich in anti-inflammatory omega-3 fatty acids, which boost liver function, detoxify the body)
20. Walnuts (for non-fish eaters, alternate source of omega-3s; also high in glutathione)
21. Yogurt (replaces calcium leached from the cells by EMF exposure)

Here's to your health, wealth and wisdom!

Embracing Ereshkigal

This moon the Tao of Now (theme of my monthly inspirational newsletter, What Shines) is Embracing the Exponential, bridging the chasm between science and spirit, energy and matter, yin and yang, masculine and feminine … it's quantum, although for many of us, especially in this retrograde month of consuming fire, the dichotomy may loom much closer to home: namely, how to love our own dark side, our shadow, the part of our being that keeps us slogging through molasses, too tired to break free.

I've written and spoken often about "my Inannic journey," and my reverence for the Sumerian Queen of Heaven and Earth who descends to the metaphoric Underworld to e/merge with wisdom gained, bearing gifts for her people. What I haven't focused on is Inanna's dark sister, Ereshkigal, who summons her to the netherworld in the first place so that Inanna may expand her awareness.

For me, learning to love my root chakra, which grounds me yet is divorced from my perception of the Light, is my journey into essential darkness. In the original Star Trek series, there's an episode in which Captain Kirk is split in two due to a transporter malfunction, but the crew doesn't know this — and his "good" side becomes weak and unable to make decisions without his wild, primal essence to balance it out. Years ago I journeyed to the Underworld to meet my own darkness, and returned whole/holy/healed (all from the same root word, hale). Yet I've never loved Ereshkigal, even though she is part of Inanna, just as Kirk's split-off dark side made him the Captain he was.

I must welcome Inanna's dark sister home in order to be whole/wellthy/wealthy in the deepest sense. According to the classic Wheels of Life by chakra expert Anodea Judith, the first chakra resonates to Ereshkigal and the seventh vibrates to Inanna, anchoring me to both Earth and Spirit. Unified, I am greater than the sum of my parts, as true wholeness always is.

What parts of you are ready to be welcomed home during this fiery gateway? I invite you to embrace Ereshkigal, whatever the dark, split off, hidden, divorced aspects of your being look like, and expand the possibilities for who and what you may become on the far side of reintegration. It's time, and wholeness has never been more available for you than right now.

Blessings!

Lammas: Playing With Fire

New Moon in Leo. The start of the Fifth Day of the 9th (and final) wave of the Mayan Calendar. The U.S. debt deadline. Mercury retrograde (until August 26th). And oh, yes, Lammas, the potent cross-quarter gateway that heralds the Harvest.

Any way you slice it, this weekend lobs us an energetic fireball. Yet fire, like all elements, both creates and destroys. As someone who's been intimate with Kali, I understand what it's like to sit in the cauldron as it bubbles, feeling your old skin burn away. Not necessarily pleasant, but … a grand opportunity to restore balance, further along life's spiral.

Astrologer Allison Rae suggests we take "Big Baby Steps," because (I love this): "Evolution is not a spectator sport." Mercury Rx invites us to release/reimagine/recreate, before moving into the new in September.

So invoke Kali (or the destroyer/creator God/Goddess/energy of your choice), welcome the discomfort, let the worn-out ways burn clean in the crucible of truth and possibility, and prepare to start anew from pure marrow.

That's playing with fire!

Day Out of Time — Forgive Debt, Celebrate Possibility!

How intriguing that Obama says we are "out of time" when it comes to the economy and debt relief. He's absolutely correct, albeit on a meta-level he's not consciously aware of:

Monday, July 25th, heralds the annual "Day Out of Time" on the Thirteen Moon/28-day Calendar — a calendar on which every Friday is a lucky Friday the 13th! Breaking old paradigms and belief systems, the Thirteen Moon Calendar is aligned with natural rhythms and human biology, enabling us to access fourth dimensional frequencies by reciting each day's "energy signature". These daily affirmations (260 in all, referred to as "kin") work on an intuitive level.

What, then, is the Day Out of Time (also known as Green Day)? Here's a summary from the Foundation for the Law of Time.

Around the planet, this day is reserved for festival and community. Central focuses are: Planetary Peace through Culture, 'Time Is Art!', forgiveness, atonement, freeing of debts, purification, and the Art of Peace.

Celebrated annually since 1992, the Day Out of Time always falls on July 25th. On the Thirteen Moon Calendar, this day is not a day of the month. It is a day in between the closing of the previous year (July 24th) and the dawning of the new year on July 26th. The official flag for the Day Out of Time is the Banner of Peace.

The Day Out of Time is a day to celebrate "Time Is Art". This is what hundreds of thousands of people who follow the new calendar do every year on Gregorian calendar July 25th. And since art is the basis of constructive peace, this day is also celebrated as International Peace through Culture Day. Peace through culture is a fundamental premise of the Thirteen Moon/28-day Calendar. When you celebrate time is art you are promoting peace through culture.

Here's an article about How to See Yourself As An Artist, and one about how, by using the questions of the 13 Moons, Embracing Paradox Can Help You Beat the Clock.

The energy signature for Monday, July 25, 2011 is Red Overtone Skywalker, and sounds like this:

I empower in order to explore
Commanding wakefulness
I seal the output of space

With the overtone tone of radiance
I am guided by the power of birth.

On this Day Out of Time, we can join kin around the world in deepening our commitment to the truth that Time is Art, and that we can free ourselves from the oppression and confusion of the frequency of mechanized time. As we liberate ourselves from its distortions, we are awakening from the 5000-year spell of his-story, re-membering (making membership again) our connection to the galactic time magic residing in every human heart. And from this connection, true prosperity can flower.

In this time of reinventing resources (and expanding our resource-full-ness), Caroline Casey says of the U.S. economic crisis, "All debts are off!" And Jaison Starkes agrees: "Debts are an agreement on an old story."

The Law of Time site says: "Give the human a harmonious standard of measure and then a harmonious human will walk a harmonious mile.

Harmony ~ that's what the day of time is all about."

"The Energy is Not Your Enemy!"

This past weekend I was privileged to hear Jaison and the Nine (a wise and benevolent configuration of interdimensional beings who speak through him), address the wild 'n' woolly times we're enjoying — or NOT! — these quantum-shift daze.

One of the hallmarks of true channels is humor, something I discovered on my own evolutionary journey. Spirit (God/Goddess/The All/Creator/The Great Wazoo ~ choose your own term) has a wonderful way of imparting truth in language that enLIGHTens as it tickles our funny bone, making it easier to assimilate the gifts.

A favorite from Saturday: "pre-awakening, or 'pa'!" (said as if he was spitting it out!). An audience member chimed in, "Afterwards, it's "ah!" And this co-creation is exactly how learning happens, and growth occurs.

The essential message I took away from the 2-hour session: "We are erecting and perfecting a higher level of reality. Our higher self has returned and we are in the process of journeying up to meet it."

When you receive information like this in a room suffused with love from a group of "wise guides," you can't help but drop weight.

And this is another of The Nine's key messages: the distinction between "luggage" and "baggage". Luggage is what you need to move ahead; baggage is what you need to release. I dreamed years ago about packing for a trip, discovering when I arrived that all my heavy outer garments had been left behind. You can learn more about the journey that led to the creation of Live Your Light on the CD, What You Need to Know Now: A Road Map for Personal Transformation.

More of The Nine's core messages:

• Prior to the celebration there's a recalibration, and that's what's going on now. (My April 2010 What Shines newsletter topic was "Calibrate," and I must say, listening to The Nine is affirming everything I'm bringing through!)
• The highest level of learning for your soul exists in your emotional body; the soul converts these experiences into wisdom. And it's usually the last place you want to go. One past participant said, "What I want is just beyond the place I don't want to go through!"
• The energy is not your enemy — it's "wrapped in the barnacles of the past". As Caroline Casey (who dueted with Jaison on her radio show twice recently) says, "It's not just viral; it's spiral!"
• Become the kind of companion you've not had in your life before: wise and generous and compassionate and kind. Woo-eee!
• Forgive yourself for all the judgments that have created limitation in your life. You are a powerful creator! Embrace all; you are not the victim here!
• View incompletion as a highly defined art. If you incarnated with people who embody this attribute, you will embody it because you want to help them! Release it emotionally so you can go forward, accept responsibility (the ability to respond) and complete what you've come here to do! WOW!

[This is when The Nine call in the clowns. Jaison said, "See how much light you can stand…until the Light Police come in and say, 'There's too much fun going on here, we have to shut it down!'"]

• Finally, money. "We're coming on a Jubilee ~ all the economies on the planet are going to undergo a fundamental change," Jaison says, as I've written often as well. What was fascinating is when he added: "Most people who are in control of large sums of money are in control of the idea of the money. The experience of money exists in the mind and the heart."

How much Light can you stand? Contact me for an energy upgrade! I'm offering an enlightening laser Summer Special: U Shift

A Rose By Any Other Name

The rose energies are enveloping us these days, and as I am a member of the Rose family of humanity, I feel called to share the rose wisdom. As I explain in my name shift article:

"The word 'rose' is identical in English, French, German, and many other languages. The rose is symbolic of female sexuality, and of the Goddess. In ancient Goddess culture, the five-petaled rose represented the five stations of female life: birth, menstruation, motherhood, menopause and death. The blossoming flower resembles the womb: witness the evocative art of renowned American painter Georgia O'Keeffe. Rose is also an anagram for Eros, the Greek god of sexual love. Down through the ages, it has been one of the secret names of Mary Magdalene.

In aromatherapy, rose carries the highest healing frequency. 'Rose' is also the past tense of 'rise,' which means to grow, to go beyond — to metamorphose! It's a verb, which is really what we are — we're more process than product. The interface of the spiritual and the material is where we co-create, co-evolve. I feel a broader sense of kinship with all life as Amara Rose."

Three years ago on Mayan New Year's Day (July 26th), I read an astonishing article in the now-defunct Psychic Reader magazine, which said that the earliest known reference to the rose was 5000 B.C., in ancient Sumer. Since I've long identified with the Sumerian Goddess Inanna, and her archetypal underworld journey, these words resounded in my being.

The rose is a herald of change, calling us to balance spiritual and material, peace within and harmony without. In 2009, I discovered a novel called The Rose Labyrinth, which arrested my attention with this:

"The rose … is a code showing the aim of all humanity to attain divine wisdom. The only path to that wisdom is through love, and knowledge; the blooming rose translates the whole meaning of the universe. To understand the mystery of the rose is to comprehend the essence of the universe. Through its simple perfection, we may become more perfect.

"To realize the possibilities of the rose, mankind must develop the capacity for love to the point of loving all peoples, all creatures, all that is different and foreign to us. We must enlarge our capacity for knowledge and understanding through the loving intelligence of the heart."

It's a tall order, and ~ we're being given Divine assistance as never before. In her June New Earth Rising log, Celia Fenn writes, "In the New Earth Grid System, the power flows from South to North and from North to South. The Flow that is known as the 'Rose Line' flow or the Divine Feminine Flow/Goddess Flow or current, moves from the Southern Pole area of Antarctica and northwards along the meridian lines that are called the 'Rose Lines'.

"The most active of these 'Rose Lines' at the moment is the South/North and North/South flow through the Americas … from Antarctica and up through Tierra del Fuego and Patagonia and then along the Andes, through Central America and up through the Rockies to the Northern Polar Circle. This is the territory of the Eagle and the Condor, and as they unite to fulfill the prophecies of the end times, we are experiencing huge transformation on the planet."

Finally, I went to a spiritual service this past Sunday that I attend very occasionally, with the Unitarian Universalists. To my delight, the service was focused on sacred drumming and chanting using Layne Redmond's Lotus of Light CD, Chanting the Chakras. I was privileged to hear Layne live during my awakening journey in New York State years ago, so I knew the power of this work with the frame drum. (Layne is the author of When the Drummers Were Women and an incredible shamanic healer.)

To my amazement (although nothing ought to surprise me any longer!), we closed the service with a simple hymn called, "I Know This Rose Will Open." The lyrics:

I know this rose will open
I know my fear will burn away
I know my soul will unfurl its wings
I know this rose will open.

So, dearhearts, the message is crystal now: We are being called, sanctioned, sanctified by The Rose, to open as the lotus, to live in and from our hearts, to love beyond limits and not to limit our love. This is the ultimate gift and key to the next stage of conscious evolution.

Blessed Be.

A Kinder, Gentler Humanity?

Change arrives not with a bang but with a whisper, and it's only our attunement that alerts us to its presence. While I know all is reflection — that how you act/react is in some way related to my behavior — yesterday two small but distinct interactions stood out as heralding a quantum leap in human compassion and kindness. Each is so tiny that you might wonder, "What's the big deal?" Yet aggregated with the myriad other such expressions of kindness and caring taking place in lives right now around the globe, I venture to say a shift in consciousness is indeed underway:

In the morning, I needed to print several pages while at the library. Though I have my own laptop, I long ago gave away my printer, so on the rare occasion I need to print something, I send the document to my web-based email, log on to a library computer, and send it to their printer, which then requires coins to print out the document. Laborious, though not time-intensive. The only challenge is getting onto a library PC, because they're usually in perpetual use during the hours of library operation.

I approached a miraculously free machine just as a young man slid into the seat and was entering his library card number. I said apologetically, "I was just on my way over here to print a few pages — will you be long?" He looked up, smiled, stood up, and said, "Go ahead!" I was amazed, and promised to be quick. Four minutes later I found him, gestured to the free machine, and thanked him again for his patience and kindness. He didn't seem to think he'd done anything special, so I added, "It's rare." Though possibly, becoming less so.

In late afternoon, I pulled into a busy gas station to refuel my ancient Toyota, which looks a lot worse than it runs. A fellow at the next pump smiled a few times, then came over to speak. I thought he might need directions, but he said, "I don't want to impose, but did you know your left front tire is low on air?" I did indeed. I smiled back and said, "Yes, it has a slow leak, but thank you very much! I really appreciate your concern."

As I drove away, I marveled at these two small demonstrations from strangers that we are becoming more connected, more caring, more open to serving our brothers and sisters from a full heart. Subtle shifts make all the difference, as I've written before: it's a tiny step and a quantum leap from scared and scarred to sacred, from density to destiny, from tough to touch, from passive to passion, from buying to being. And encounter-by-encounter, heart to heart, we're growing here.

What Does It Mean to "Live Your Light"?

When I was first feeling my way into a new reality — before my "dark night of the soul" journey that would transfigure my life and catapult me from marketing communications maven to "midwife" for the soul — I'd begun a women's spiritual circle, and had attracted a few coaching clients, though the term "coaching" wasn't even on my radar at the time. (The coaching profession has only been a formalized entity for about two decades).

I was in love with the Emile Zola quote, "If you asked me what I came into this world to do, I will tell you: I came to live out loud." I was yearning, burning to live out loud, even as I struggled to understand what this might mean. I bought a box of greeting cards bearing this epigram and an exuberant figure, arms upraised, and used them to write a personal message to each client at the close of a session, as both affirmation and exhortation.

Then one day my carefully constructed life crumbled, eclipsed by a health crisis that halted the old in its tracks and called me to live experientially what I'd heretofore only grasped from books and workshops. It was a three-plus year initiation in the wilderness of my soul, and I e/merged (energy and emotion merged) on the far side as a lighthouse for others walking this path of personal awakening. I won't detail it here, as my website, numerous articles, CD and monthly newsletter cover this and much more. What I will share is how the name for my service evolved:

On the far side of the journey, I created Metamorphosis: The Center for Creative Change as my service vehicle. And while this was accurate, "Metamorphosis" was already the name of a type of healing work (hence confusing for some people) and the name itself was declarative. I felt called to invoke (literally, "give voice to") the possibility inherent in every human being. And then I housesat for a woman who had the book, Bringers of the Dawn, on her shelf.

Barbara Marciniak channels the Pleiadians, a collective of multidimensional star beings. In the book, they apprise us, "You must live your light …" The words chimed in my soul as a remembrance, and when I began to develop my website a year or so later, this was the invitation and invocation I chose.

When you live your light, you are living out loud, in tune with your highest purpose and service, as a beacon and resource for others. It doesn't matter what your 3D "assignment" is: whether you're an auto mechanic or mother, company president or country president, impoverished pilgrim or billionaire: when you live it, you shine, and this radiance is what uplifts and shifts humanity, and the planet we all share. This is what it means to become the gift.

Thanks for Living Out Loud ~ and for Living Your Light!

Blessings!

Summer Solstice: An Opportunity to Become More Whole

Summer Solstice celebrates the sun at the peak of its power. Both the sun (male energy) and the moon (female energy) are waxing, or increasing, now. June 21st marks the longest day and shortest night of the year, in the northern hemisphere. (Winter Solstice for our southern hemisphere allies). It's a stillpoint. A time to reflect. A potent moment to set your intention, because the manifestation momentum is strong.

The day goes by many names: All-Couples Day, Feast of Epona, Gathering Day, Midsummer, Litha, Vestalia. In ancient times, June was a popular marriage month, since summer offered a window between the sowing and reaping seasons. The June full moon was considered the best time to harvest honey from the hives, and newlyweds were fed honey during the wedding feast to encourage love and fertility. The tradition lives on in our modern post-nuptial getaway, the honeymoon.

How might we translate our ancestors' emphasis on love and union at Solstice to our lives today? In other words, how can we best live this light?

It's a grand opportunity to burn away old patterns that no longer serve our highest good, in order to become more whole. Whole, holy and heal originate from the same root. We can use the power of Solstice to assist us in integrating the masculine and feminine energies inside ourselves. The moment is ripe for sacred reunion. What do I mean by this?

Most books, films and songs that speak of love refer to romantic love between two people. We've been taught to look outside ourselves for completion, to seek the Other and to rejoice when we connect, or to keep searching.

What we're really seeking is a part of ourselves, which is why we often feel incomplete when we hook up with someone whom we hope will fill the empty place inside us. The wedding of the light and the dark, of the magnetic, receptive, lunar, "feminine" self and the dynamic, assertive, solar, "masculine" self, has to take place first within our own being. And yet — it's through relationship that we get there!

The beloved is a catalyst to help us merge the complementary aspects of ourselves. This is a radical idea, and challenging to hold. It turns everything we believe about romantic love on its head.

One of the ways to shine your own light more brightly is to celebrate yourself and each other, through whatever art forms call to you: music, dance, poetry, painting, comedy improvisation, theatre, ritual, chanting/singing, multimedia … and silence. Enlarge the lens you look through by asking, how can I expand this experience, become inclusive rather than exclusive?

This Summer Solstice, I invite you to sound the clarion call for your own companions of destiny — those who can see and honor your authentic self. The Mayan Oracle (a book and card deck based on the Mayan sacred calendar) says, "When you have been truly seen, you feel empowered, and remembrance of a shared sacred trust is ignited."

Acknowledge your connection with all life, and allow the simple to nourish you. Sitting beneath a tree, enjoying the sun on your feet and the wind in your hair, being thankful for life itself, is wholeness exemplified. The romance of living — and the wedding — begins first within you.

Timeshifting as the New Earth Rises

Celia Fenn offers an extraordinary discourse on what's happening now, beginning with the total lunar eclipse of June 15th, through Solstice on June 21st and through our November Stargate and into 2012. I highly recommend digesting her entire entry: New Earth Rising: Mastering Time and Embracing the Energy of Love and Support. Here's a summary:

Time in 3rd dimensional reality is only one measurement, and not the most effective, for accelerating consciousness. Celia introduces us to Astronomology, an amalgam of astronomy and astrology that combines the best of both worlds to enhance our perspective.


She writes, "the New Reality Science of Astronomology (is) a new way of viewing the evolution of the Earth and of humanity through the stellar charts of the Heavens, and one that incorporates thirteen houses instead of the twelve of conventional astrology.

"The thirteenth house is called Ophiuchus, and it falls in that area between the end of Scorpio and the beginning of Sagittarius. The name "Ophiucus" simply means "Serpent Holder" and this constellation is identified with healing and the Master Healing Energies, and the Archetypal energies of Aesclepius, Imhotep and the Snake Goddesses!

"Primarily, Ophiuchus is an energy that supports and nourishes and heals. But, it is also interesting that Imhotep was known as a 'Master Builder' and Architect, and in some accounts is credited with the design and building of the Great Pyramid. This is of interest because the Total Lunar Eclipse and the Solstice Alignments will be activating the Stonehenge SuperGalactic Portal, or 'resetting' the clock on the Stonehenge sacred site to align the Earth with the Galactic Center, and this resetting wil be transmitted to all those sacred sites that function as the 'nodes' of the Planetary Supercomputer, including the Pyramid Complex at Giza, and that will ensure that Planet Earth is perfectly aligned on her trajectory towards the 2012 alignment with the New Age of Light, which is also called Ascension.

"What is most important is that Ophiuchus is the energy of healing and support, and the energy of aligning with the Galactic Frequencies. So many people complain of feeling lack of support on so many levels. Yes, probably because you have been living according to one singular calendar or time cycle technology that completely misses out this energy of healing and support. As we shift into an awareness of the Zodiacal Healer and how these energies work with us, we can channel these energies into our lives in ways that are healing and supportive of our changes.

"On the 15th of June 2011, the Full Moon will rise over Stonehenge in Total Lunar Eclipse. The Moon will also be just 3 degrees from the Galactic Center, that is, almost in conjunction. At that moment, powerful Lunar and Galactic Light Codes will recalibrate the Divine Feminine energies of the Snake Goddesses and the Platinum Ray energies of the Shekinah into the Stonehenge Time Code Frequency Cycles. The Energy of the Great Cosmic Mother, Ma'at, will bring the entire Henge back into Cosmic Balance..."

Touching the Source

I've just read The Myth of The Great Ending by Joseph M. Felser, PhD (see my LinkedIn review) and, aside from the book itself being a must-read for anyone wondering whether the Rapture might yet be at hand, Felser cites some amazing material from Robert Monroe (founder of the Monroe Institute), whose work I'll read next.

Here's Monroe's description of a holographic, telepathic communication from Source, that Felser calls "a nearly indescribable and emotionally wrenching voyage to the very center of universal intelligence". Though it must have been virtually impossible to step the experience down into language, this poetic transmission resonates in me as "YES":

There is no beginning, there is no end,
  There is only change.
There is no teacher, there is no student,
  There is only remembering.
There is no good, there is no evil,
  There is only expression.
There is no union, there is no sharing,
  There is only one.
There is no joy, there is no sadness,
  There is only love.
There is no greater, there is no lesser,
  There is only balance.
There is no stasis, there is no entropy,
  There is only motion.
There is no wakefulness, there is no sleep,
  There is only being.
There is no limit, there is no chance,
  There is only a plan.

~ from Ultimate Journey

Breakdown, Breakthrough

A poem I wrote during my prolific high school literary period just tumbled into consciousness as an ideal reflection for these tumultuous times. If you're feeling what these words express, know that the breakthrough awaits. I'll speak to this in my June newsletter.


Breakdown

When silver smiles turn to brass
And bronze gods start to rust
A tenuous hold on sanity
Begins to disintegrate.

That's when you realize
Milky Way is merely a candy bar
And you feel yourself
s

l

i

p

p

i

n

g

Into a corner of your mind where

all
that
glitters

Are the gold fillings
in your teeth.

How to Retrain Your Brain

In today's nanosecond business climate, thinking outside the box is too small. Instead, try thinking outside your brain. How's that again?

We use our left brain—the logical, linear, analytical mode—for business most of the time. Yet it's the right brain—the creative, intuitive, emotional side—that can actually help boost your business dramatically … if you allow it the freedom to guide your thoughts and actions when your left brain is saying, "but that's a waste of time!"

Here are 8 mental expansion exercises to catalyze your own brain-retraining ideas. READ THE REST!

Stand! Mother's Day Message for World Peace

This Sunday the United States celebrates Mother's Day, a holiday that was originally not a Hallmark occasion, but a call for women to put an end to war. Poet, author and activist Julia Ward Howe first championed a Mother's Peace Day in 1870. In her Mother's Day Proclamation, she exhorted, "Arise, then, women of this day! 
Arise all women who have hearts … solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
 whereby the great human family can live in peace..."

More than a century hence, women everywhere are heeding the call, via StandingWomen.org. Since 2007, this group has sent out a call for people to join hands and hearts for five minutes of silence on Mother's Day, in service to planetary peace. The global events were catalyzed by The Great Silent Grandmother Gathering, a children's story about two grandmothers whose vigil sparked an international movement.

As we awaken to our responsibility ("the ability to respond") to our Mother, and the beneficent power we can unleash, what shines through is:

It doesn't take slogans and permits. It doesn't take anger or weapons. It takes a village — and a vision. We have, and are, both. We are the ones we've been waiting for. To paraphrase Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., "I have a dream that one day this nation will wise up…" Let the global upwising begin!

Beltane: Celebrate Your Planet, Yourself

May 1st is Beltane: a time for celebrating the beauty and sanctity of all life. Today is a moment for reclaiming your power, balance, and inner strength.

Beltane is one of eight Shabbats on the Wheel of the Year. The others include the Solstices and Equinoxes, Lammas (August 1st), Samhain (October 31st), and Imbolc (February 2nd). Beltane breathes renewal into our cells as we acknowledge the Nature Kingdom and the advent of summer. For our Southern Hemisphere allies, the Wheel of the Year is reversed: they now celebrate Samhain.

In the West, we often water down our sacred days to become mere children's celebrations: Samhain, ushering in the dark half of the year, becomes a specter of itself as Halloween; Imbolc, heralding the return of the light on February 2nd, morphs to Groundhog Day; Beltane becomes a chance to dance around the Maypole. Yet the deeper meanings reflect our lost connection with natural rhythms, with the seasonal shifts we actually embody.

As Samhain honors the power of death, so Beltane honors the cycles of life and rebirth. Beltane takes place in Taurus, the zodiac's most earthy, sensual sign, and focuses on exuberant sexuality: the pollinating of flowers, the lush cornucopia of fruit-bearing plants and trees, the reproductive cycle of the entire natural world, from birds and bees to humans. It's a celebration of fertility in all its forms — and thus we dance in homage to Aphrodite, the Goddess Herself.

Although traditionally observed on May 1st, astronomical Beltane arrives about the 5th, a nice sync-up with Cinco de Mayo, giving us an entire week in which to renew, dance the fire back into our beings, and open once again to a sacred reUnion of our masculine and feminine selves. Mythologist Kathleen Jenks provides a page rich in Beltane lore from around the globe.

Renowned ritualist Ffiona Morgan says of an anticipatory Beltane celebration, "As I walk through the blooming earth to join friends, I realize that passionate love takes many forms, and that the earth is my greatest lover. I bless my blue planet, vowing unchanging devotion and care for Her. Seeing Earth as a living, breathing female has changed me, and become the cornerstone of my commitment to Her." (from WeMoon Datebook © Mother Tongue Ink)

Radiate: To Emit Light

The Unity Wave is turning fear on its ear, in every sense. Since Japan's cataclysm, the entire world has been sending love to the affected area and prayers for healing. Then I learned about the women of Chernobyl (see Meltdown), who returned to their native land not long after the incident, and have survived against all odds for 25 years, thanks to their love for the Motherland and abiding community, which appear to trump radiation for health and longevity. But in all this, we were still seeing radiation as "the enemy".

To radiate means to emit light. A few days ago, Jean Hudon sent this extraordinary tale via his Age of Awakening compilation: how radiation itself can be a path of spiritual emergence.

During her many years working in the former Soviet Union, and exposure to Chernobyl radiation, Rama Jyoti Vernon discovered one group of children who were doing exceptionally well. She asked their doctors the secret to offsetting the radiation poisoning, and they told her:

"Radiation is light and has a high vibratory frequency. Through our spiritual practices of meditation, prayer, Yoga, eating less dense foods and faith and love of God, we can raise our own cellular vibration to that of radiation to offset the harmful effects.

"'You see,'" one Russian doctor bubbled with excitement, “We are using radiation as our spiritual guide. It forces us to be more fully conscious each moment of every day. If we have a negative thought it reduces the vibratory frequency of our cells and we become more susceptible. If we are angry or critical, our cells vibrate at a slower pace and we can become ill. If we become lighter, we become light and become one with the light of radiation. You see,'" they beamed, "'radiation is our spiritual practice.'"

This flies in the face of everything we believe and "know" to be true; that's why it's all the more imperative to pay attention. Nothing now is as it was, and this is a profound teaching.

I read this story as I was being gifted my own opportunity to put it into practice: not with radiation per se, but in terms of transmuting my beliefs. A week ago I suddenly became very fatigued, and it lasted for four days with no apparent origin; I didn't feel sick, just exhausted. However, given all the evolutionary upgrades taking place in 18-day cycles now, that didn't seem so odd.

Then Sunday night the hurricane hit.

Wrenched from a peaceful sleep at 1 am (which corresponds to liver, the body's main organ of detoxification in Chinese medicine), I was fevered, sweating with chills, and had an overwhelming urge to release from two major orifices (that's about as delicate as I can say it, lol.) On Monday I went for a Network chiropractic treatment. I felt somewhat better by Tuesday (the fever was down) but still very sick. I ate nothing these two days, just some water and grapefruit juice. As I lay in bed, I had the clear sense that I wanted to embrace a raw food diet. I know very little about how one actually lives the raw food lifestyle, and don't own the requisite dehydrator, juicer, etc. Yet I suddenly knew I wanted to eat lighter ("eat light"!) — and I've been eating a healthy, organic diet for decades.

By today, though, my throat was still red and swollen, my tongue bright white, and I spiraled into fear: what if it's strep? I often had strep throat as a child, and took loads of antibiotics. The last antibiotic to pass my lips was 18 years ago when I had pneumonia. It did nothing except give me diarrhea, and I vowed that I would never take another unless it was a matter of life and death — and I was not complete here. My body does not handle drugs of any kind well.

Yet here I was, contemplating a pill. First, however, I needed a throat culture. Muscle testing myself, I got that I did NOT have strep. But I was in memory. Minus any primary care physician or health insurance, I contacted a few local urgent care clinics and learned that the fee for a throat culture for an uninsured individual is — wait for it — $3-400! Excuse me? A discussion about health care in America is a topic for another day. Suffice it to say, I turned them down.

I then called an acquaintance who works with clients holistically, prescribing nutritionally-based remedies that work at the cellular level. Her husband picked up her phone — she's out of town for two weeks! Oh, I should have called yesterday!

Then I began to smile. All the paths to diagnosis, traditional or alternative, are blocked. What's this really about? Radiation! Raising my vibratory frequency! I am ready and willing to emit more light. One of the supplement specialists at Whole Foods says she's been feeling the exhaustion, too, and numerous people have been coming in complaining of severe throat pain. Maybe it's a call to raise our collective voice in service to the highest, to speak our truth and honor all perspectives to a greater degree than we ever have before!

There has never been a year like 2011. We are in the New Earth Birth Canal, and the alchemical fires are licking us clean. I know I can withstand this, even as I surrender to the Light more completely than I ever have in my life — and I've been through the fire a few times!

When I think this way, feel this way, it brings tears of joy to my heart. If you are feeling these or other ascension symptoms, please share your story. It will benefit us all. Because we are, of course, All One.

Be the Wave of Now. Blessings, abundant health and much love to you, Beloveds!

Meltdown

My April newsletter, Nuclear Family, focuses on how to create a "nuclear reaction" that heals all, using "nuclear" as metaphor. But I didn't consider the word "reactor" until I heard Caroline Casey discuss it on her Visionary Activist radio show this week, in which she reminded us that in lieu of being "reactive," we could seek solutions.

"Reactive" is one of those delightful words that lends itself to a subtle shift, like scared into sacred, density into destiny, nowhere to now here: simply by moving the "c", we morph reactive into creative — and we're able to "c" clearly!

One inspiring group of women who see clearly demonstrated with their very lives that love and connection supersede radiation. Known as the "babushkas," this determined group of elders, all past 70, chose soon after the Chernobyl disaster to return to Ground 0, despite warnings that the area was contaminated and permanently uninhabitable. They have survived and thrived in the "Exclusion Zone," eating contaminated food, breathing contaminated air and drinking poisoned water, for a quarter of a century.

On the 25th anniversary of Chernobyl, More magazine did a story about these plucky people who chose their Motherland over fear, proving by example that love can transmute toxins. (Intriguingly and presciently, the interviews were conducted last December, prior to the Japan 'quake/tsunami/reactor breach).

How can we each become a "nuclear creator," choosing from our very core to heal our individual and collective problems through Love? It adds a whole new dimension of meaning to "meltdown," in which we liquefy into the heart of Oneness.

Feel free to Tweet me your ideas! Or post them as Comments here, and I'll relay them to the Twitterverse and beyond. Blessed Be.