Back and Forth

When do you stop looking back? When do you stop trying to find the answers in your past? When do you stop reliving mistakes, missteps, miscommunications and mis-alignments? Or perhaps you are someone who puts all your energies into what will happen tomorrow? You keep putting off in hopes that your situation will improve with the new day. You invest in the future with a commitment to what could happen and who might be involved. When do you stop all this and take a look at now, this moment, who you can be, what you can do, and where you can go? If we choose to spend time looking backwards we will run the risk of what is being offered to us today. Living in the past does only one thing for us. It keeps our focus on the past. It keeps us stuck there. It keeps our energies mired down in events that have long gone by and nothing we bring to them is of any use. The past is a place that if you visit too often or for too long we are running too close in a land of regret.

If we choose to spend too much time looking to the future we lack follow through with what we can do now. We invest our energies into possibilities to the point that we stall what is involving in this moment. The future is a place to visit from time to time to explore for opportunities, make flexible plans or goals, but if we visit too long we are ineffective in our efforts.

If we want to bring ourselves to this world in a positive and powerful position, we must live in the present. Spirit, the Universe, your Higher Power, (whatever your belief is), presents to us continuously opportunities that hold gifts, lessons, possibilities and promise. If we are constantly looking over our shoulder, we most certainly will miss these treasures.

It takes presence of mind and intention to live in the present. It takes commitment to the moment. It is a challenge too, for our society encourages us to live in our past or in the fantasy of tomorrow. That is how advertisers pick at our wallets and how movie directors sell tickets. These are lands that can be fun to visit if done in measured doses. When we overload, just as with too much sun or too many potato chips, we don’t feel too good. Our bodies rebel and complain. In this case our spirits suffer as well. Living in the now gives us the presence of body, mind and spirit to address what we actually have the power and thought and heart to have impact upon.

Blessings ~ Lisa

©COPYRIGHT 2012 Lisa Meade

The Phantom Judge

Who sets the standards that you live by? How often do you find yourself struggling to carry out what is expected of you? And who holds those expectations of you? Sometimes, without our even being aware of it, we are still holding on to the expectations of others from our past. These people could be parents, teachers, old lovers, or even friends. They may not even be a part of our life any longer. If we experienced a time in our life where we felt criticized or judged by them we may have an even harder time letting go of the need to try to meet those expectations, as we feel we have failed and long to “get it right”.

Living with the struggle of meeting others expectations often keeps us out of the light of our own personal power. This way of living keeps us from being our brightest and fullest self. When we judge ourselves and have expectation of our self that are not realistic we create the same scenario.

In order to live the life we have been blessed with in truth, authenticity and strength we need to see ourselves clearly. We also have to be honest with ourselves. And finally we need to hold some compassion in our hearts for our self as well.

Self-compassion softens edges. It allows fluidity. Allowing compassion to have a place in your heart allows you to walk in grace and be open to all possibilities. Compassion makes room for forgiveness and healing. Compassion makes it hard for judgment to take hold. Compassion gives you the strength to rise above doubt and discrimination.

A favorite quote by Nancy Lopez that I have copied into my journal is, “Doubt yourself and you doubt everything you see. Judge yourself and you see judges everywhere. But if you listen to the sound of your own voice, you can rise above doubt and judgment. And you can see forever.”

Blessings ~ Lisa

©COPYRIGHT 2012 Lisa Meade

Bountiful Blessings

How blessed we are to be living in a time in history when our most ancient ways of understanding the world and the universe are intertwined and joined with the most advanced ways of viewing reality. This supports the creation of a new paradigm for honoring the earth and for supporting one another as we grow into our human spiritual being-ness. A true Shaman continuously expresses their spirituality, but not in a pompous or arrogant way. They live it, not only when they are teaching or healing or in ceremony, but in the everyday. The keep their profound gifts of spirit congruent with the aspects of living in today’s world.

There is also a beautiful and gracious reverence for all interactions with the spirits as well as with the interactions of the people and beings that cross the Shaman’s path. Honoring plants and stones, honoring spirits of all realms, honoring the neighbor and the stranger…the Shaman walks a path of respect and integrity while appreciating the interconnection of all.

Shamans have an understanding that everything in this world is of spirit and inspirited. There is no separation. Thus, there is a deep sense of being responsible to express gratitude to all for the relationships that offer lessons, gifts of understanding and relationship.

Putting action and intention together in the same moment brings an importance to spiritual practice that I am embracing and focusing my intention to put into an ongoing practice. It is so easy in our culture today to put what we believe as important in our lives, including our spiritual practices, into intellectual and theoretical folders in our minds. But putting these into action in our real lives, walking the talk, is where our personal power grows, our interconnectedness blossoms and transcendence occurs.

Keeping our thoughts, words and actions in alignment means living in gratitude, living in the moment, living with truth and faith. It means eliminating the thoughts of separation. In this place I am called to step up and treat all beings as treasured and cherished loved ones. Living this way supports the earth’s renewal. Living this way is the way of the Shaman and I aspire to become more gracious at my attempts.

Living this way is about deliberately loving what we practice, loving the world, and being part of the whole. It will transform lives. It is my hope that through the choice and intention that I bring to this way of life I will bring more balance to my days, step more fully into my power and create interactions that will be glorious examples of spiritual relationships.

Blessings ~ Lisa

©COPYRIGHT 2012 Lisa Meade

Saying What You Need To Hear

I once had a client who told me that she was almost always telling people what they wanted to hear. I asked her, “Or are you saying what you think they want to hear?” She paused and told me she wasn’t sure. But she did know that when she had session with me, she found herself saying things she needed to hear. “How can you do that more often?” I asked her. “Maybe when I really can believe it outside these four walls,” was her reply. Do you find yourself saying what others want you to say, or you think they want you to say? We all do it from time to time. “How are you?” “I am great!” (When the reality is that you slept poorly the night before and you have a tension headache and you just don’t have the strength to discuss any of it with them.)

Sometimes just going with the flow of the conversation is the best, though it may not always be the most honest, but little is served with expanding. BUT there are those times when our honesty not only serves us or the relationship but our future as well. If we continue to not telling people our Truth, we begin to deny ourselves of it. And then we run the risk of not recognizing it, not trusting it or worse yet, not even being able to hear it.

My client could borrow the trust in our relationship to tell her self what she needed to hear, to speak her truth. She was able to recognize she needed to break the cycle. And in the safety of our relationship she could have the courage to speak it, hear it and believe it. With time we worked on expanding outside the four walls, bringing this attention to truth into her daily life and having the courage to speak it.

It takes times for patterns to be broken, because it takes time for them to be born. But the more they are stroked and fed, by our selves, by our family and friends or by society, the stronger they become. Speaking our Truth is not always welcomed. It can cause waves of energies around us that ruffle people’s feathers, cause them to doubt their own patterns, and can be an affront to what has become the accepted norm in our society.

It takes courage to take the risk. It takes an effort to break the pattern. It takes desire to be authentic and it helps to have an a community that supports this. Do you have a community that applauds your efforts to speak your Truth? Do your friends celebrate when you take a risk to say something that is not the expected norm? Do you listen to your words with compassion and understanding, allowing your honesty to be bold and brave?

Sometimes starting in a journal is a great place to practice. Just the simple release of the energies surrounding our Truth empowers us greatly. Sometimes sharing an excerpt or two with a trusted confident and witnessing their understanding, appreciation or acceptance alters the belief that we are not worthy of this Truth. Eventually, with time, the pattern gets challenged and begins to break apart. We find our selves no longer wanting to only tell people what they want to hear, but instead begin to say what we need to hear. We step into our power more fully, even if it is for brief moments scattered throughout the day. And surprisingly, it begins to get mirrored back to us. People begin to believe your Truth as much as they believed your mis-truth! Affirmation, affirmation, affirmation!