The power of the Turtle

Love is everywhere.

To work with this affirmation I, of course, took it out in to nature. We all love hugging trees hey?

It began with my daily walks with my ‘doe-eyed’ Staffy and ‘old fart’ terrier x, which as any dog owner would know, is an exchange of big love and hence a great way to open the heart centre. I live in a sub-tropical area dotted with tidal lakes and green reserves and have always loved walking my boys amid its natural inhabitants. I walked with concerted consciousness as I let my thoughts go and focussed only on the love of this affirmation. I watched the pelicans glide in to land; the sea eagles stalk their prey and the tiny willy wag tails boldly chase the crows from their turf. It was a panorama of love and grace.

I took my IPod and chose a quite spot to sit in guided meditation, while allowing my dogs to explore. My Staffy, ever the love seeker, interrupted me several times to sit on me or share his excited slobber. I could almost hear him shouting “Watch me Mum”, as he found sticks and ran rampant.  It was the first time my meditation was accompanied by ‘wet dog odour’ instead of Grand Father White sage smoke, but it made me happy. 

I took longer walks along our quiet Hervey Bay beaches and honoured the sun, moon and water as I grounded each step in gratitude. I felt my body, witnessed my mind chatter, and honoured people I encountered. It was impossible not to acknowledge the beauty around me, reflected in such glorious diversity. It was clear that amid the different vistas I visited, the common ground was the love I felt in my heart and further, that this love transcended form, action and judgement. I felt a sense of melancholy though, as I could not help but accept that my love could not transcend my own self-judgement, or indeed in certain cases, my judgement of others. It was equally clear however, that the means to extend this loving awareness to myself did exist within me. I just wasn’t too sure where it was or how I would recognise it. I was like a prisoner who had long yearned to experience the world she observed and who had, for the first time, noticed the bars that kept it at bay. It will be interesting to see how solid or pliable those bars are.

Following this realisation, the very next day my family received an invitation to join friends on their boat for an adventure across the Great Sandy Straits, to Platypus Bay and K’gari (Fraser Island). The forecast was for one of those perfect days when the boating gods align – and how right it was. There was hardly a breath of wind; the water was like glass, the sky a cloudless azure and the temperature perfect. When we cut the engine and drifted with the tides, we were joined by several pods of dolphins circling the boat in a 20m radius and my heart swelled. The water was so flat that we sighted a turtle floating on the top and gently approached it as we thought it might be injured and we could assist. Then we noticed others in the vicinity doing the same thing. They were sunning their shells, getting some winter warmth, diving under the water only if our boat drifted too close. I didn’t even know turtles did that. It was as though I'd been invited to glimpse or share his reality and it was truly delightful.

We anchored and then waded ashore to picnic on the most pristine and largest sand island in the world. There were no people in sight as we sat in the shade of native trees, buried our feet under white sand, ate gorgeous food and sipped a little wine. Later, as I sat on the bow of the boat, dangling my feet in the cool water I was, for maybe the first time in my life, fully present in the moment. I’m not talking here of merely an absence of worldly ‘worry’, it was much deeper than that. It extended to the core of my usual self-identification; I became part of nature rather than an ego observing it ‘outside’ me. There was actually nowhere else I wanted to be, either mentally, physically, emotionally or spiritually. Those planes of awareness seemed to unify in that moment and as such I temporarily transcended my ego attachments, which are the things that I cling to, that we all cling to, that make us believe our stories and so be limited by them. The experience was both exhilarating as well as a little sobering.

The exhilaration came from feeling connected to such beauty in absolute gratitude, safety and awe. The sense of perfection of nature, the rise and fall of tides, the collective intelligence of the animal kingdom, the seasons and the sense of being an aspect of something much bigger, wiser and loving. The sobering feeling emerged from identifying the anomaly that existed within my own reality in that I could feel such love expansion for a turtle, but could not extend it to myself, even though we are both aspects of the whole. For me to love truly, I must see both of us as worthy. Could I ever authentically speak of loving nature again while I simultaneously cast myself from her in unworthiness? I didn’t think so. I’ve always been all about spiritual integrity and walking the talk, so I must work with this.

It has brought my Western identity to the fore and the need to look deeply at my beliefs and judgements that ares so ingrained that they are bars of limitation from behind which I engage my life. I want to be free and that process is an inside job that I and a few like-minded friends are now working with. Our foundations are already shaking and groaning – it is very exciting.

I have enjoyed working with this affirmation. It has brought me to more fully engage my life as well as anchor gratitude for the present and hope for the future. I am even beginning to see the beauty of my soul shine through and fear is melting away. In the presence of soul, the finite is clearly visible and the urge to cling to it is revealed as futile. The only foundations we have are our finite illusions. If we give them up willingly, then there is no need for them to be ripped from us.

It seems timely to continue on with the next part of the original affirmation.

I am loving and loveable.

I chose the picture in this blog, like all of them, for a reason. Can I see my own beauty within it; can you see yours? 

I will only be able to embody this if I can get out of my Western conditioning – but that is the topic for the next blog. I hope you’ll join me, this should be interesting. 

Namaste Sally

www.yourbeautifullife.com.au 

The unreality of love

Love is everywhere, and I am loving and lovable. Loving people fill my Life, and I find myself easily expressing love to others.

Louise Hay

This is the affirmation I divined this morning, one that I didn’t even finish reading before I grimaced like I’d eaten a particularly sour lemon and responded with “Eeww I’m not doing that one!”  

Not ‘Ugh’ not ‘Ooh’ not ‘Hmm’ but a resounding ‘Eeww’, as though it had boy germs or something!

However, in the interests of honesty and walking my talk, I resisted the urge to ‘divine’ another affirmation until I got one I liked (admit it, you’ve done it before too), because do so, of course, is no divination at all, but an ego ‘judge fest’ in resistance. So here I am working with loved up lovingness amid loving everyone and everyone loving me - even the man who abused me for engaging in a courteous act of waving another driver through in front of me – yeah I love you too - arsehole!

So what is my resistance to this perfectly lovely, ideal vision for myself and the world? I mean, I would love this to be true for me, consciously cultivating a reality of giving and receiving love, where my higher thought and feeling attract only like situations into my life for growth and expansion -so why am I so reluctant to work with manifesting it? 

Well, in all honesty I have to admit, that as I read it, all I see is falsity and unreality of such magnitude that it feels as though working with it would simply set me up for disappointment and failure. This affirmation alludes to life being one dimensional, albeit a loving one and so nurtures only an aspect of the personal reality that I experience day to day.  It affirms the expression of love in all situations, those we can control, those we cannot and those sticky poignant matters of self-love. I actually do try to live my life in loving awareness, yet despite this, the world I encounter is not always ‘sharing round a campfire singing ‘Kumbayah’’, but can also involve sitting round a camp fire with gritted teeth trying not to ‘burn it all down’. Surely both experiences are valid.

Yes I know that finding love in the darkest places is one of the challenges of spirituality, but unless I can embody my Buddha nature (alas, unlikely in this lifetime) then this affirmation is just too big for me to digest in one sitting so feels inauthentic. So I will begin with a taste and see where that takes me. 

The aspect I will work with is: “Love is Everywhere”

(I was going to do I am “loving and loveable", but it made me wince, so that will be a topic for another blog) 

I’ll let you know how I go and would love to hear from you if you are joining me.

Namaste

Sally

www.yourbeautifullife.com.au 

The farmer who tuggs at the new shoots

My Oh my how quickly our opportunities for shifts in consciousness are manifesting; we really do live in exciting times. 

At the beginning of this week, it was my intent to progressively debrief all of my awareness that anchored during my recent trip home to Melbourne. I only got as far as the relationship insights and poof, it’s all moved and I can’t even touch it anymore let alone communicate it in a meaningful way. The times are certainly changing and I am thrilled to be working consciously within them even though the turns can at times be daunting.

I recorded in a previous blog that I had been harbouring deep feelings of yearning to return to Melbourne to live permanently and it was freaking my family out a little. However, in the process of honouring and following those feelings without attachment, it soon became clear that what I truly yearned for was connection to tribe and meaningful work in service to spirit. As the holiday progressed and we visited old territory, I was surprised to learn that the suburbs where I thought I might settle back in to no longer felt ‘right.’ Worse, there was a palpable sense of ‘wrong’. I had to admit that “the Melbourne solution’ was just my ego joining the dots, seeking a quick fix to quench my deep desire for re-connection to life. If you witness what you manifest, it will always reveal your truth as it appears in any moment. At this point in my journey it is very important that I live my life as it is, as opposed to how I think it should be. So I left Melbourne with my desire to expand and connect to my work burning bright, but with no idea where the pathway to manifestation would emerge.

So I returned north and I busied myself with work via the blog, our website and rejuvenating my healing work by ordering new light body essences and getting my space in order for new clients. My focus on these tasks was to ensure I was supporting my true desires but within that doing I kept observing the prods and pull of life, many of which I didn’t yet understand, but knew were still significant. In times like this all I can really do is remain mindful, aware of feeling and unattached. I work on faith that awareness is coming in and I have to make room for it to do so and over thinking crowds our reality. I always think of the anecdote of the farmer, so eager to assist his crops that he goes out at night tuggs at the new shoots. Selling and moving to Melbourne would have amounted to me pulling the shoots. There is always timeliness to growth that I must honour, and I knew that it would be revealed only without my ego interference. 

At our recent Temple gathering in Melbourne, Buddha emerged as another of the guides supporting Your Beautiful Life and a great deal has shifted energetically as a consequence. Usually, Susie works with new energy along-side me, pushing the channeling deeper, clarifying and grounding before we then ‘take it on the road’. But this time Susie is still overseas and so I was left wondering how this new impact was going to be anchored and what the deeper purpose of her absence was. Well today the stars aligned, in staggering perfection to provide those answers and all without any ego control or attachment on my part. I can see a new vision emerging and I hope I can hold it.

I love it when awareness links in and all of our ‘stuff’ makes sense. I especially love it when you realise that we are all indeed supporting each other, in all circumstances, if we have the heart to see it. Clearly anchored in a new phase, I decided to start afresh today with a new affirmation to blog about. I was ecstatic to draw this:

My work is deeply fulfilling.

Bang! Oh yes! Bring it on. And to those who are joining me to assist this birth, I honour our journey with love and gratitude.

Namaste

Sally

www.yourbeautifullife.com.au 

I am safe and I am free - Really????

I am safe and I am free

I chose this affirmation yesterday because I resonated with it in the moment and it articulated beautifully how I was feeling following making peace with much of my past. It was a statement of what I already had, as opposed to an attempt to bring something in. I saw it as a way to extend my good vibe, to consolidate and expand my good feelings and maybe even manifest a little more of the same. Yeah right!

You may recall that my earliest blogs revealed that affirmation and I had a chequered past. In my early days of spiritual exploration, I wasn’t interested in growth that required me to look at myself and ‘do the work’, instead I wanted a quick fix to manifest a beautiful life and affirmations filled that desire. They were supposed to transform everything that was wrong or lacking in my world, to joy and abundance. What I learned however, was that affirmation only showed me where I am not and so where my work is. Worse, I learned that no one was qualified to fix my life but me. So this new affirmation joined its buddies of my past and revealed the areas of my life where I am not aligned to it.

To be honest I should have seen it coming. My core belief is “I fear life” so anything poking around in the realm of safety is going to push some buttons. As for freedom, well that is all tied up with attachment – another area I have being working on, so of course triggers were going to manifest. I might pout or sulk for a while when the proverbial hits the fan under my guard, but in truth, I do truly  love that no amount of positive thought or ‘right’ action will keep your soul from gently manifesting circumstance that urge you to  keep moving inward. It is very cool to have that awareness in acceptance, faith and trust, but please don’t think that I’m anything special; I denied that truth for many years, wandering in circles, until Virgil channeled Your Beautiful Life actually. 

Anyway, how did this affirmation give me a slap? Well I decided to ring a friend who is going through an incredibly challenging time. I check in every few weeks to offer her my support and love and this time I also wanted to organise our lunch date.  Her life changed a few months back when, in the middle of the night, her husband revealed he had been involved in an extramarital affair for 4 years and that he had now decided he wanted out of their marriage to be with the ‘other’ woman. Like most wives busy running the house and kids, supporting him in his career and putting everyone else first – she didn’t see it coming. 

Of course she was humiliated and heartbroken, but it is the shock that was hardest to deal with. She thought she knew him, thought she was living a certain life, with a certain individual, only to find that the past four years had been a farce. The fabric and foundation of her life was ripped from under her leaving a mere toe hold of safety. When we get together, my friend and I try not to brood over the morality of his or ‘the other woman’s’ choices, (as gloriously ego-serving as such judgement can be) for spirituality does transcend morality. There is no point in getting stuck in the realm of who did what to whom, for we all do ‘good’ and ‘bad’. What we must do is look at it karmically (not to be confused with reward and punishment, but rather bringing in old patterning) and work to clear it rather than layer it further in this life or the next.

So once my friend and I get the ego venting out of the way, our discussion always looks at the higher aspects of this challenge and we work together to choose responses that will clear rather than layer further karma with her husband. Yesterday though, our discussions really left me speechless. His actions are simply not of the man I thought I knew. His wife, who let’s face it, is the only one of the three of them who has not consciously chosen this road, is being treated like an enemy to be eliminated. Despite all that they once meant to each other, there is no respect or compassion in this separation and it triggered me deeply. She kept saying "Who is this man and why is he doing this?" I couldn’t answer. I do know he is layering karma anchored in his own youth, rather than facing it, which is a tragedy. I just feel so sad for both of them. 

Of course after our discussion, my thoughts shifted to my own husband and our life together, but it was in feeling where my triggers came in. Five or so years ago my husband and I separated for a few months, for good reason. It was a time of soul searching for me and I believed a time to uphold and honour the essence of who we are and what we mean to each other at a soul level. Despite it being, at that time, the most difficult of challenges, I was determined to hold my light so that I could clear my karma. Once we came to terms with the circumstances that triggered our separation, we dealt with each other with such respect and compassion, even tenderness at times. Initially I thought I didn’t know the man I married and that it was over, but my and his conduct through our time apart assured me that I did, that he was a good man with a strong heart. My friend doesn’t have this assurance, and it makes peace, tough enough amid divorce, impossible. If my husband had treated me as her husband is treating her, I’m not sure if I could have held my light – and in such a huge crossroads, the thought of that makes me shudder. If you can’t hold your light, expect more of the same, in a different form. I am determined to help her get through this with her soul integrity intact.

So yesterday I realised that, despite my thoughts to the contrary, I am still attached to the paradigm of my partner and marriage. I realised that a great deal of my safety resides in the connection I have with him and what we have made together. I ‘m actually a strong person, I have faced down financial crisis, health crisis, family crisis, and problems in my marriage, but if my husband morphed in to a copy of my friends husband, well even thinking about it makes my foundations shake. This sense of safety he gives me stems back to a specific past life, I think I even speak of it in my introduction in my book Your Beautiful Life. Knowing he has supported me through the challenges of this life, knowing that it is our karma playing out and that we have worked with it really just makes me love him more. Having said that, my safety has to come from within, for attachment is the enemy of freedom. This is where my work is.

I will continue with this affirmation in an attempt to manifest more experiences to anchor my safety from within, relinquish attachment and so manifest true freedom.

Namaste

Sally

www.yourbeautifullife.com.au 

When home touches your soul - relationship

Hello Friends,

We have settled back in to our home routine, especially now that our two girls are back at school and I feel a pervading sense of contentment, which is lovely.

Our trip to Melbourne coincided with the completion of my 7 month long trial so it was always going to be significant. While the family connection was wonderful, the freedom of not being tied to hospital routines glorious, the food, friends and vibe of the place stimulating, it still brought greater gifts than I anticipated. It brought gifts of the heart and soul, which I will progressively share over the next few days.

I mentioned in my last blog that I had a sense of my life flashing before my eyes as my husband and I revisited old territory and hence old memories, some beautiful, some, well…not so. Being together as we opened to both the dark and the light pathways that our relationship has traversed has deepened our connection. Together, we immersed ourselves in old energy and genuinely celebrated that we have ‘got through it all’ and still want to hold and love each other. To know someone so well that no amount of ego pretence can hide the truth is such a gift. It was an exquisite moment of soul recognition.

I will admit that before our holiday, some of the past events still held power over me because despite reconciling them mentally and emotionally long ago; memories would occasionally rise to taunt me. In meeting them physically, mentally and emotionally together, clarity began to emerge. It became clear that our true power lay in our connection through the journey and our ability to honour each other, even when we were at our ‘worst’. It is the difference between regarding the relationship as the cause of pain and instead realising that the connection and love that characterises it has been a support to enable us to manifest, transcend and evolve what we each most needed to learn.  I know I couldn’t have got through it with anyone else – I was always so quick to run!

It doesn’t mean that our life together is without triggers or problems; but it does mean that I can be grateful for a love that walks with me and endures despite the inevitable drama and pain of modern life. In the words of Buddha, “Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional”. In giving up my attachment to events and claiming the power of our connection, I believe I have embodied this truth in that moment and freed myself. I felt the past disconnect, even the good which is as it should be. To live in the moment and create life anew requires us to relinquish clinging, even to the good stuff. I feel free to manifest a unique relationship going forward that honours us both. I also feel more connected but less attached. I am so glad and grateful to be sharing my life with someone who also holds this awareness.

It is fantastic to be back blogging my thoughts and I look forward to regaining momentum. In keeping with my sense of freedom and contentment I have a simple affirmation to share today.

I am safe and I am free

Free your mind and the rest will follow.

Namaste

Sally

www.yourbeautifullife.com.au