A Symbol To Know The Unknowable
This morning, I ran into one of my friends in our little Spanish town, and we decided to grab a coffee and catch up. I was delighted at how she took an interest in my Om/Aum pendant. She commented on how I seemed to treat my pendant as something rather sacred, and with respect – an interesting observation! She loved the flow of the shapes, and asked if the pendant had any specific meaning.
I had to remove the pendant and study it closely to try and remember what I was taught years ago, in order to give her a brief description to the best of my ability. One by one I tried to connect with each swirl in the design and was surprised that I had remembered quite a lot of what my mentor had taught me. It was a long time ago, when we used the Om/Aum chant in our meditation sessions.
With my pendant on the table I began to explain the meaning of the dot at the top of the symbol, and recalled that this related to the silence after chanting Om/Aum. It represents the Enlightened Self, and is known as the transcendental state of Turiya. Continue reading
Spiritual Growth In Being Wrongly Blamed
We all tend to be terribly upset when blamed for something we haven’t done, or said. I have also found myself in situations of being blamed unfairly. This made me wonder… if everything happens for a reason, as many spiritual teachings suggest, then what is the lesson here?
My conclusion is that, perhaps, we can help ourselves by acknowledging the lesson in the unpleasant situation, as well as forgiving those who knew no better, in order to let them off the hook. Seeing things in this perspective can shift us to a place where we feel we’ve learned from the experience, and that we don’t need to attract the same pattern again. Continue reading
Poco A Poco
I thought today of how certain expressions tend to stick in our minds; thoughts which we adopt for a while, or even a lifetime. It can be the words of a famous writer we have read somewhere, an expression in a song, or even just the ideas of somebody we just had a brief conversation with.
Internationally renowned author and speaker, Wayne Dyer, once said, “You will never get everything done.” It’s a good feeling at the end of the day, to know that we’ve gotten through much on our ‘to-do list.’ But for me, I also gain some comfort from such as words of wisdom as Wayne Dyer’s, as well as the poem, Desiderata, which advises us to, “Go placidly amid the noise and the haste.” Continue reading
Programming Your Crystal
In a recent psychic reading, the client had just visited a psychic fayre, with no intention whatsoever to purchase any more crystals for her collection. She did browse one counter with its beautiful arrangement of crystals. As much as she kept walking away from that particular display, she felt one particular smoky quartz calling her back! So yes, she bought it. Her question to me was how she could best go about programming her new purchase.
Although crystals given as gifts are said to be more powerful, it is my belief that there are also times that a crystal will call out to us, because it has a certain role to play in our lives at a given time. A quartz crystal given as a gift will often be given with loving intention, which is empowering in itself. I have spoken to students who are convinced that they feel at their academic best when wearing a quartz-crystal given to them by a loved one, not to mention the sense of safety and self-confidence a cherished crystal tends to instill in us. Continue reading
The African River Man
During the time of my ukuthwasa (period of initiation to become a traditional healer or sangoma) some decades ago in Southern Africa, my mentor and some other village elders would join our group of ithwasa (sangoma trainees) by the campfire and discuss other spirits. That is, others in addition to those of our ancestors.
We heard many tales of other spirits who control the rivers, oceans and lakes, as well as those who live in the sky and control the rain. There were also stories told of sacred places where spirits inhabited mountains, trees and rocks. I loved hearing those stories from various individuals whom have had unique experiences and felt they had seen and communicated with those various spirits. Continue reading


