memories
Free Yourself With The Power Of Forgiveness
How can we possibly reconcile the feelings of anger and betrayal with a need to forgive? Are we compromising our integrity in doing so?
Forgiveness can seem like an impossibility… but it doesn’t have to be. It’s really one of the few things in life that really matters, whether it means forgiving ourselves, or someone else. It is said that allowing someone to continuously upset you, is to allow them to ‘live rent-free inside your mind.’
Others hurt us all the time. Holding on to this hurt for long periods of time can damage us physically and psychologically. And then there are those ‘little things’… like someone cutting you off in traffic, or forgetting an important date.
One thing forgiveness does not do, is make us forget the source of the pain. What it does is allow a reconciliation with what happened, and allows us to move on in a productive way. When you were a child, perhaps you got hurt with a hot stove burner or electrical outlet. You didn’t (hopefully) spend the rest of your life being angry at stoves or electrical outlets! This is basically how forgiveness also works. We can acknowledge that someone or something caused us to hurt, and be aware of how that happened, but still move past it and get on with our lives.
Holding on to anger and bitterness will color all your relationships, until you learn to forgive and let go. If, for example, you ended a toxic relationship and decided to start dating again, you might not be able to fully trust, because of the possibility of reliving that pain. A truly intimate relationship will never happen without forgiveness.
Strange Connections
A few years ago, one of my daughters and I discovered the intricate and intriguing world of the meditative state. As it turned out, my daughter had an inherent ability to bring anyone who was interested in participating to a complete and extremely fruitful outcome. This could mean meeting a spirit guide, animal guide, finding and understanding of one’s own soul color, or a plethora of other magnificent occurrences that can help to enhance an individual’s life.
It soon became known in our area that we were offering a free and viable service, and it was not long before our little workshop was at its full capacity.
One particular day, as we were getting ready for our next workshop, my little three-year-old granddaughter informed us that a deaf man would be arriving that day. We never thought to question the validity of her statement or even questioned how she would know this for a fact. She said it, we believed her, and simply waited for him to arrive. That’s how we do things in my family.
Well, the next thing we know, one of our regular participants pulls up in his vehicle and out comes another older gentleman, who we find out fairly quickly is completely deaf in one ear. As we became more familiar with him, he was more inclined to share with us his life’s story.
He was born and raised in South Africa, came to North America as a teenager with his family. Although the medical community could not determine a real cause for his hearing impediment, they did conclude that he was indeed legally deaf.
The Gift Of Kindness
I was thinking today of the many beautiful acts of kindness people have shown me since my husband passed away last year. And then, some song lyrics from the movie, The Sound of Music, came to mind:
Nothing comes from nothing
Nothing ever could
So somewhere in my youth or childhood
I must have done something good.
Yes, perhaps I did some good somewhere in my life, and now I am getting some of it back, tenfold, or more!
There was a period of time, after his sudden death, when it felt as if I was carried by the locals here in Spain. I was pretty much told what to do and not just offered help. For example, when I got the news of his passing from the policeman who answered his phone at the car crash scene, I immediately went on ‘autopilot’ and attempted to cancel a coffee date I had with one of my best friends. But she simply said, “I am coming, you aren’t going alone to the scene. I am going with you!” And then she saw to everything. I was unable to speak in any language at that point, and fortunately she took over.
Christmas and New Year followed, and again my friend told me, in no uncertain terms: you are going to be with me and my family during this period. I began finding reasons and excuses as to why I might not be able to get to their home, including a possibility of snow, which had us housebound for a few days a couple of years prior. But, they were having none of that. My friend’s husband said, “My tractor will reach you whatever the weather!”
‘Decoration Day’ At The Old Home Place
Memorial Day, which we referred to as ‘Decoration Day’ in my family, is full of precious childhood memories and nostalgia for me. My folks were of Southern heritage mostly, although I grew up in Oklahoma. We lived in the country, on an acreage we called ‘The Old Home Place,’ because it had been handed down for generations.
We had big ole vegetable gardens. In fact, we called one of them a ‘truck patch,’ because it was so large. Soul food, ya know. Nothing better! The truck patch covered five acres. A truck patch is when so many vegetables are produced, there’s enough to truck them out commercially, although we never did. We gave all our friends and relatives what we couldn’t preserve (can) and store in the cellar. In those days we all shared whatever we had.
We also had a small vegetable garden right behind our house, for every day fresh veggies, such as beds of lettuce. In front, we had a potato patch. In other areas there were blackberry bushes, a pecan orchard, a fruit orchard, plums, blueberries, and so on. We were pretty much self-sustaining.
All of the vegetable gardens were plowed by hand with mules, in rows for planting. I used to help with the planting and canning when I was just a little girl. We also butchered our own chickens, pigs and cattle, and made lye soap in a big ole iron pot outside on a wooden fire…all in the old ways. I don’t miss butchering the critters and to this day, I can’t eat animal flesh, except for fish and seafood.
Spiritual Hypnosis
Did you know that there are parts of your consciousness from which your spiritual being transmits? Many of us tend to trudge forward on a little known path toward finality, oblivious to our spiritual being. We often only dwell in the here and now of the conscious mind, and we forget or neglect those aspects of us that pertain to our higher spiritual self.
Each one of us has a spiritual mind. It’s our wise mind, the all knowing self, which guides us to seek peace, to love one another, and to forgive others, as well as ourselves. It calls us to be healers in every sense of the word, to seek bliss and enlightenment, and to have a better human life in a better way.
Some hypnotherapists, who practice spiritual hypnosis, define our different levels of consciousness as follows:
The Conscious Mind – from which comes everyday thoughts, actions, logic and judgment
The Subconscious Mind – where all your life experiences, memories, feeling, habits, and reactions associated with them, are stored, as well as our unconscious body actions such as heart beat, breathing, digestion, bio-action, and so on.
The Super-Conscious Mind – the I am of the higher self, of unconditional love, light, and wisdom; being of peace, compassion, forgiveness and the bliss of enlightenment.
The Unconscious Mind – the over-soul of all incarnations of lifetimes; stored karma.
Spirit Courage, Body Bravery
We all know someone who clearly walks to the beat of their own drum. These people typically have a robust inner strength, and refuse to accept at will any pertinent information handed to them by anyone in a position of authority. The one such character that stands out in my life is my maternal grandfather.
We came from a small town of 8,000 souls. Although our neighbors enjoyed the comforts of electricity, running water and all the modern conveniences of that time, my grandfather instead chose a code of living that suited him best.
The farmers in the area also had the use of tractors and other types of modern farming equipment that enabled them to work in a more worldly fashion, but my grandfather stubbornly refused to adhere to these modern trends. He had reliable horses to pull his plow and haul the hay, used kerosene lanterns when electric lighting was easily available to him, and firmly kept to his agenda with a tedious water pump that was needed for the normal household chores.
He was a very dedicated and diligent employee, working in the shipyard. He helped to load cargo ships from all corners of the globe, which came for the mighty salmon our region was extremely well-known for. Papa, as he was known to one and all, married at a very young age, which was a normal occurrence in those days, and managed to sire 15 children. He was also very well-versed and totally immersed in politics. The entire neighborhood would first ask his advice before casting their ballot, or not, for any politician brave enough to run for local office.
Astrological Magic Of The New Moon
The Moon card in the Tarot reminds me of the Facebook relationship status: It’s Complicated. It not only can bring up our deepest fears, but also speaks of the natural cycles of life. I am ever changing, reinventing myself, navigating by Moon time.
In the summertime and living in a big city, my mother’s fear for me always used to be that I might “get into trouble,” since I had “way too much time on my hands.” So, every summer, before I was old enough to get my work permit to land a summer job, she would schedule summer classes just to keep me busy.
One particular summer, I was enrolled in a sewing class at a woman’s house down the street from us. I was able to choose from several projects, and I immediately chose the two piece bathing suit! I was so proud of my work, and could not wait to show it off, but my mother was understandably cautious, because of my red hair, fair skin, and freckles. I suggested a compromise: “moon bathing.”
Reluctantly she agreed, so I took out the lounge chair, flashlight, my small transistor radio, and some reading material. Wearing my two-piece bathing suit, I basked in the Moon’s glow, while listening to music, reading, and even dancing. That’s the summer when I fell in love with the Moon, and started on the path of following her cycles. And I have been forever changed.
For me, every New Moon brings her own magic and invites us to make wishes for that lunation. Each New Moon has her own personality and asks us to dwell in the possibilities. We also experience different New Moon energies according to the annual procession of the Zodiac. As you make your wishes for each lunation on the New Moon, the ideas below may inspire you in setting your own New Moon intentions for every month of the year.