Letting Our Self Blossom

 

    I love to tell a good story and my life occurs to me like many good stories in which I see the deeper meaning shining through.  I happen to have three children all in their teens, this I mention because as many parents know, to have a child is to be willing to go through anything for the sake of the child’s life and the bond between them and you. In our lives it can seem a simple equation, that when relationships fail to offer what is hoped for, we can easily break the bond and over time separate ourselves and move into a new relationships and or situations.  I am sure there have been parents and also children who have chosen this path, but it is never an easy break. So, in life to truly live a life of power, love and peace we must be willing to go through whatever it is to become the “Source”, of it all.  Never to say I have had enough but instead to say what is the deeper meaning and the gift in this moment or situation. We must move the small self over and become who we truly are and that is a “being as vast as the cosmos.  A consciousness superimposed over all that is, (given by Almine at spiritualjourneys.com).  When we can step deeper into and not shrink away from what life presents to us we begin to realize that nothing is too much. Instead we are strengthened in it and then in all areas of our life, because the capacity to hold largeness expands in us.
   I recently found myself somewhere that I never in this life thought I would go; there I was in jail.  I had gotten into an argument with my husband, strangely enough over the inability for us to resolve the difference in paradigms we found ourselves to be.  I had come home from a trip with an enlightened master a month prior only to feel out of sync with those around me.  They wanted to know what was wrong with me, as this is how I was being perceived.  I myself felt fine, I had entered into what is called infinite time and my thoughts were very much in the background to a very blissful state of deep awareness.  The simplest moment sent blissful waves throughout my body.  I had wanted very much to stay in this place.  I was spending a lot of silent time and had requested to the best I thought, that communications be only spoken if they were important.  What I meant was to lessen the chatter that really went nowhere and to focus on what was the most important thing in each moment.  What I had considered in my expanded state to be very clear and obvious, was not so for those around me. I was met with more chatter and static filled communications.  One afternoon I lay in my bed floating in this bliss, I left my room and heard a dissonant sound from the another room.  My husband was watching TV. And the sound felt like a very loud attack on my senses. After so many disagreements the sound pulled me, what felt violently out of this state of eternal time. I immediately flipped out and an argument ensued. After that it went from bad to worse.  I finally booked another trip with my daughter to a dance camp for a week and off we went. I didn’t speak to my husband for a week. Back into my joyful world I went. A week of another kind of intensity, dancing 7 hours a day, along with my insatiable need to flirt and interact with others meaningfully. When one is in a constant state of joy one can easily become somewhat manic. Awareness can turn into quasi psychism.  It is difficult to explain, but staying grounded as one enters expanding paradigms is helpful advice.  Just be normal, go with it in a matter of fact fashion.  Don’t make too much of it.  I experienced several awareness altering events on my trip to the bay area after camp.  I could see the people around me so clearly and there profound state of self-identification and unawareness of it. This may sound haughty, all I can say is I became aware of my level of awareness juxtaposed against the backdrop of those around me, very profoundly. 
I begged my daughter to let me wear her ipod to drown out the voices and conversations around me. I was on a journey into the deepest parts and a process of cracking open my luminous egg, this is somewhat like entering hell. After being mugged accosted and witnessing crazy people in the street and sidewalks I came home to a very strained marriage.  Russ and I had not spoken the entire week.  I was panicked over seeing him, as our conversations were always combative. The next day after getting home we had a fight that prompted me to throw pebbles at his office and I accidentally broke a window.  I know, not very enlightened of me.  Well let me tell you enlightenment is not always the way you think it is going to be. I am not some ascetic in a cave, I am a wildish woman and I have always been. I dance I sing and paint.  I embrace life the good the bad and the beautiful, all of it. I don’t apologize for my wildish nature I only work on taming it.  Off to jail I went for vandalism. I complied and only thought how glad I was that I was showered and cleaned up.  Several hours later the doors shut behind me as I entered the cold hard white holding tank. I was not upset, as I knew that I was on a sacred journey and that I could face whatever was asked of me. I was still in this blissful state and I thought at least I would have the time to sit and enjoy myself without my husband and family constantly bombarding me with questions and needs. So it only got bad around 2 in the morning, it was cold and the bench was hard and I only had a light cotton skirt and t- skirt on, they took my shoes so I was barefoot. I had conversations with the two women in there and they seemed interested in my lack of upset. Hours went by and the two had been released as I wished them well.  Sometime early in the morning in came a very terrifying woman.  She looked as though she could be beautiful with a gorgeous figure and very beautiful skin. At first she took the roll of toilet paper and said I am going to sleep, she lay down and looked as though she would soon be asleep.  Then the guard passed food in through the opening, she picked at it and then threw it down and went into a rage. She was terrifying and resembled someone possessed by a demon. She had blood on her hair as she yelled at me and screamed into the phone. I wanted to reach out to her, her pain brought tears to my eyes.  I told her everything is going to be o.k. She looked at me with such hatred and said shut the hell up.  I thought she might attack me. The guard asked me to step outside the room.  I thought great now I am being rescued, only to be told to face the wall. The whole experience was meant to strip one of any sense of dignity.  I didn’t particularly feel badly, but most certainly I wanted to be released.  I was finally put in the main jail around 5 a.m.  The woman who shared a cell with me was kind and very helpful and caring.  We bonded quickly and spent my final hours together in true kinship. Everyone in the various cells took to me during lunch and I felt sincere love there. It was a deeply sad place. Throughout all of my experiences I have been diligent in remaining aware and looking at, what is the deeper meaning behind it.  Of course don’t vandalize and take care of one before anger turns to rage. Anger is helpful as a catalyst, but anger turned to rage is always destructive and a poor choice.  There are many tools available and using them is wise.  I share this story with you as a way to reveal to you that growth and enlightenment are not an easy and smooth transitions.  Real growth and change can cause great seeming chaos and disruption.  Pay attention and remain aware but try to stay away from blanket judgments.  Life is never the way it appears, the deeper meaning and lessons can only reveal themselves to one who can stand unafraid and ready in the face of anything.  We must be careful when we say life and circumstances are too much, if we do this we may miss the opportunity to truly become enlightened in our lives.
   The habit of explaining ourselves making ourselves small and making excuses for the new paradigms we are stepping into is one of destructiveness not just to ourselves but to those we wish to encourage and teach.   When we do this we are expressing doubt in that which is still in the stage of forming, thus closing it of from ever branching out and becoming Real.  In this new world the one we are living in presently, the rules and laws are in a rapid change and progression.  We cannot afford and do not have neither the time nor the space to waiver and give into doubt and dismissal of the magic and great mystical mystery that is being revealed to us.  The realms that have long remained hidden will only reveal themselves to those who are ready to move quickly to drop false belief systems that are no longer holding value.  Hold on tight beloved ones imagine yourselves as though you were standing in the eye of a great storm. All of the winds blowing around you, as all of life is being taken up and blown to shreds, there you stand firmly planted in the Divines solid platform.  Take your beautiful and strong arm and reach out to those who will take hold, pull them up into your space of peaceful knowing.  This is the great task, the one you are being called to.
   After all this seeming chaos, I was looking through the photos of my trip to dance camp at just the right time of complete discouragement there they were. 38 photos with dozens and dozens of orbs floating in all kinds of scenes and happenings. The fairies I had been calling on and practicing fairies magic with appeared.  I never had any doubt, and now there they were in such whimsical joyful ways. I don’t need proof of how I feel and what I see and perceive.  This is a gift of the mother to me and I am through ally amazed by it.
   Practice what Almine calls eternal time, that is allow your heart center to open and to radiate out until it encompasses the edges of the cosmos. Imagine yourself as a being as vast as the cosmos, a consciousness superimposed over all that is. Continually drop all of your thoughts into the vast deep ocean until you are finally fully present fully aware of right now. Stay there goes there often.  If you can do this then you can begin to start to see what is there to look at.  What there is to do and what there is to be?  If you spend all of your thoughts on comparing that which is said to you and all you experience against the backdrop of what you believe or think about it you have missed the mark and you will be unable to discern really anything.  You are not your beliefs and you are not your thoughts, you are a being as vast as the cosmos, you really are all life and all things.  You are that. So in order to know what is, you are that.  In this state of consciousness nothing can really be hidden, unless of course for the sake of the journey, the flavor and delight of it all.  If you are suffering, then ask yourself what is the deeper meaning of this. You are a divine manifester of all life.  Yes you are as large as that.
   I have a cute story to tell you.  I was talking to some friends at my recent dance camp.  Namely the superlative “Mendicino Music and Dance Camp” and I was joking about how whenever I walk into a party  I am surrounded by droves of adoring fans who surround me and clap at my every move.  We were having a great time laughing and joking.  Later on that night I kid you not I walked into the evenings performance and concert hall and was surrounded by a whole group of people clapping for me and kissing and adoring me.  The friend who was with me was dumbfounded, I looked at him and said see what I told you, he didn’t get it.
   Your spiritual practice makes a difference; the main idea is to stay in a state of love praise and gratitude for it all, (refer to books by Analee Skarin also Almine). Every spiritual practice is important as it leads to the next step.  Know that you are divinely guided and ask for your prayer requests fervently.  Be serious and really put yourself into the practice.  Your practice is not a means to an end; it is the thing itself so the way in which you enter into it is the fulfillment. Happiness is not the reward for the gifts you give for god, your happiness is the gift you give. In other words your practice is all of it. Every thought word and movement you make in life is living the abundant and awakened life or it is not. It is that simple. It is your choice whether you go back on yourself and continue to struggle to know or whether you rest in the knowing that is all around you.
  Please heed my words, when the mystery presents itself to you, scoop it up and get to know it. Get into life, dive in, roll down hills and learn hard things, travel to distant lands and abstain from junk food and drugs of all sorts.  Live life unaffected by the seeming bad things that have befallen you.  Scoop all of them up and wrap them in beautiful paper and bows.  Create rituals and burn incense.  Go on walks to meet cat’s dogs and horses.  Collect rocks and swim in oceans and rivers.  Dive in roll around and immerse yourself in life.  Disconnect from the habit of looking good in order to fit into a model that doesn’t even exist anymore. Notice how you move through life, are you fluid and bendable can you shimmy and twirl in a crowd to a great tune or are you stiff and confined and in a constant state of contraction and fear.  Ask yourself who and what am I serving by who I am being in this moment. If you are struggling that is fine, find someone safe to share this with so that you may begin to move out of this place in a comfortable and timely manner. There are resources always available for you no matter how deep you are. Sometimes fully immersing yourself in this deep place without self medicating and or trying to fix it or even get out of it.  Sometimes to deeply feel where you re is the most valuable place to be.

“The girl who wanted to be a porcelain doll”

   She already had long hair, but wanted to play with really long hair, so there she sat in the hairdresser chair getting a few extensions.  She was always thinking of the magic, she did magic in her room in the afternoon she did Bel Vas Pata healings in her car after the gym and in every free moment he spoke the language of the Goddess and spoke silent affirmations.  After a trip to see Almine she had fell asleep after many hours dropping her thoughts into the sea.  After that joy lived in her and her stomach tickled with glee.  She saw before what was so, and now her thoughts became more background to the majesty that she spent years to be present to.  Sitting became a very happy time for her and also a wonderful time to observe.
   Troubles came back after that in the form of her family. They wanted to know what she had to offer and only noticing her inordinate need for silence they became increasingly annoyed. She went on another trip with her teenage blonde haired daughter, the princess Jasmine.
Here she again entered sacred and eternal time. She moved through live unafraid  flirting and dancing. After that she again entered a hellish domain.  This time it was different as she was observing all that was happening still in bliss. She knew that she was experiencing a growth on a deeply personal level and at the same time something vast was happening .  These events were not only for her but for all life and all beings.  She went through it all sometimes stumbling ungraciously and even in those times she knew that at sometime this would to pass to reveal a heavenly life. It was this she kept marking. What an exciting time what an exciting  life and what a delightful body and mind to go through it with.
   Just something to think about……