compassion
Dealing With ‘Unawakened’ Friends And Family
Spiritual awakening is a profound shift in our perception that forever alters the way we experience life. But after we have made the shift it can be difficult to relate to less spiritually aware friends and relatives and leave one feeling lonely and deeply isolated.
The following strategies can be helpful in cultivating more harmony between yourself and ‘unconscious’ people without compromising your own energy vibration.
COMPASSION AND EMPATHY
At one time you were also not awakened. Think back to what that was like. What kind of thoughts dominated your mind? How did you feel about your life? How did you feel in general? The truth is, although you’ve gone through a spiritual awakening, you can still relate to those who have not. You have a point of reference for this.
Someone who is unconscious typically doesn’t have a pleasant inner world, because they aren’t intentionally governing it. Think back to what your life and most importantly – your relationship with yourself and your mind – looked like before your awakening. What did your own resistance look like? At some point your perspective shifted. But prior to that point – how receptive were you to changing your views and ideas? Especially when a family member came to you and said, “Hey, you’re doing it wrong.”
Put yourself in their shoes. Now that you’ve awakened you have the pleasure to start putting it to use in a way that serves the highest and best good of all. Remember that every soul is a spiritual being, and just because you have awakened to this fact, does not make you ‘better than’ anyone else. This is a trap that the ego likes to throw up early, and often along the spiritual path.
The ego is something we must constantly be mindful of. You are not more spiritual because you are vegan, or because you meditate, or because you do Yoga. If you are living in judgment of others through these practices, you are trapped in ego. Be mindful of yourself and come back to a state of compassion and empathy. Allow people to awaken in their own time.
Learning The Lesson Is The Only Way Forward
Doing readings for people all over the world, I am asked ‘why’ questions every day. Why am I so unlucky? Why does nothing ever go right for me? Why is God punishing me? Why can’t I ever win in life? Why am I never successful and happy like everyone else?
Prior to coming to this earth plane, each of us asked to experience certain life challenges and lessons for our soul growth. For example, some of us asked for the lesson of unconditional love. However, to achieve unconditional love, someone must first cause us harm or hurt, for us to learn to truly forgive them. Only then can we truly experience unconditional love.
I have had many clients tell me over the years that they will never forgive someone for what they had done to them. They refuse to let it go. It is indeed a difficult lesson. In fact, all life lessons are very challenging. To make matters worse, if we do not successfully learn the lesson to complete the process, the same lesson will be presented to us again, and again, until we do.
This is why you someone will repeatedly have the same relationship issues with different partners. No matter who they form an attachment with, the complications, challenges and dramas are always more of the same. The spiritual growth lesson is never dealt with and released. Many people spend a lifetime in these never-ending loops.
Ask yourself what you want to see change or happen in your life. What do you consider to be the most positive, best outcome for your future? Then imagine for a moment that you have already achieved this life goal. Now, how does it feel to be in that positive place? If you can see yourself in that place and sense the love of your guides and angels in that place with you, then and only then, are you truly ready to move forward with the positive energy you need to actually achieve it.
The Fierce Journey To The Heart Of The Goddess
There are many divine beings around us throughout our lifetime. When I do a reading, a variety of angels, spirit guides, ascended masters, and goddess archetypes may show up to lend their wisdom, love, and guidance to my clients, for whatever situation they are going through.
Not only do we have guardian angels constantly with us, but we also have various ‘inner band’ and ‘outer band’ spirit guides who interchange through different periods and cycles in our lifetime. We also have deities or higher-level beings with us during certain times.
Recently I have had many encounters with the goddess Kuan Yinin during readings. She is the Buddhist bodhisattva associated with compassion and was first known as the ‘goddess of mercy’ among Jesuit missionaries in China. Guanyin, Guan Yin or Kuan Yin, is short for Kuan-shi Yin, meaning she who ‘observes the cries of humanity.’
She is a popular goddess in Chinese folk religion and worshipped in many communities and cultures all over the world. In the mid-17th century outlawed Christians in Japan created statues of the Catholic Virgin Mary disguised as Kuan Yin, known as the ‘Maria Kannon.’
I have always associated her with compassion, kindness, and forgiveness, but I was recently reminded that Kuan Yin rides a dragon! This makes a lot of sense to me, now that I have examined her legend more closely.
Kuan Yin is teaching us by example. To arrive at a place of compassion and kindness, we must first piece through some uncomfortable feelings of anger, sadness, and fear, to arrive at the ‘heart of the goddess.’ Kuan Yin rides her dragon of fierce bravery through stormy waters and scorching fires. She follows through with the journey to a place of completion and does not avoid the challenges that confront her along the way.
To Hate Is A Self-Destructive Choice
When I was in middle school, around the age of 13 or so, I remember an older, more popular girl used to constantly bully me. I also remember coming home from school and telling my mother about it. I told my mother that I hated that girl, but she very sternly said, “Oh no, you don’t hate anyone!”
I defiantly replied, “Oh yes, I do!”
My mother then patiently replied, “Okay, well if you are going to insist on hating her, please go and do it somewhere else, young lady. I do not want to hear about it anymore!”
She never explained to me why she felt it was inappropriate for me to hate anyone. I didn’t figure this out until much later in my life.
My own daughter is now also a teenager and she sometimes comes home from school with similar complaints. A girl at school has been spreading false rumors about her. Just like I did all those years ago, my daughter also told me how she hated this girl. And I replied the same way my mother did, except I also explained that hate only breeds more hate.
To hate someone or something only hurts you, no one else. My daughter hating this person she feels has wronged her, will only cause her to hurt herself more with negative emotion, every time she thinks about this person. Every time she tells a friend or family member about this girl, she will be refueling her own negative fire. Thus, she will only end up hurting herself more.
The other girl does not feel every occasion my daughter is upset, or reliving the hurtful situation that occurred. In reality, my daughter is punishing herself every time she thinks about how this person wronged her. This is what we all tend to do, when we find ourselves in similar or hurtful situations.
Love, Joy And The Pursuit Of Happiness
According to the United States Declaration of Independence “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” are the inalienable birthrights of every human being given to us by our Creator, God, Source, the Divine.
Sadly, I find very few people to be successful in their pursuit of happiness. The same is true for finding love and joy. It seems many are merely stumbling through life trying to find it.
A teacher once told me life is like school. For some of us it’s like kindergarten – easy, uncomplicated, and lots of fun. For others it’s like graduate school with lots of difficulties and challenges to overcome.
Searching for joy, love and happiness does seem to be a ‘wild goose chase’ for many people. It truly is like chasing wild animals. The faster we run after it, the more it seems to flee. I don’t believe joy, love and happiness can be found. Well, at least not in the ways that many of us are hoping to find it.
Like happiness, the right to love is also the natural inheritance of every person. The well-known channeled text, A Course in Miracles, delves into the idea of love from a spiritual perspective. It states that it is impossible to teach love. Instead, the goal should be to remove the blockages or obstacles we have to allowing love’s presence in our lives.
I have seen repeated evidence of this in doing readings for many years now. Certain reading themes are repetitive and common themes are ‘finding love,’ or the ‘lack of love,’ or ‘loss of love.’ In all these readings one thing always becomes very clear: love itself is not an ‘out there’ thing. It is also not something that can be received from another person or thing.
In readings, Spirit will often say, “Love is not a feeling.” This one initially took me a while to understand myself, until I realized that love is in fact an intrinsic quality of being. It is already within each of us. We refer to it as the Higher Self, the Soul, or the Spirit. No one is ever separated from this innate love because it is an intrinsic aspect of our very being.
A Smile Is Contagious Too!
As we continue to find our way through the seemingly never-ending twists and turns of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is understandable that many of us are anxious, frustrated, and worried. Our lives and health are still at risk, our jobs and businesses remain in jeopardy, and parents are unsure about sending their children back to school.
Even so, there is a light at the end of the tunnel as many inroads have been made. There seems to be a feeling of increasing lightness and hope as the restrictions are gradually being lifted. In some places, people are nearly back to pre-pandemic norms, but for many of us many challenges and restrictions remain for the time being.
If you are feeling stifled and frustrated by the circumstances, remind yourself that it is the little things that we will come to appreciate after having gone without them for so long.
For example, with masks no longer required in some outdoor settings, we can now see each other’s faces again! And is it not wonderful to be able to make even the tiniest connection again with a smile?
Whether it is a neighbor you have known for years, or a stranger on the street, why not take the opportunity to smile at them as you pass by? Grin at the cute kids playing outside, or the adorable dogs owners are walking. Appreciate the little things. Gratitude and appreciation is empowering. Kindness and compassion is healing. And a smile is powerful. It can transform someone’s day in an instant.
Smiling is universal. In every country and culture, people smile. A smile represents kindness, joy and happiness. A smile can break through worries for a brief moment and make someone’s day. A smile can be reassuring or comforting when support is needed most.
Are Your Erasing Your Blessings?
Our good deeds and random acts of kindness are never in vain, even when they are not acknowledged or appreciated. Our good deeds are written up on a ‘good deed chalkboard’ in the spirit realm. The unselfish gifts of our time, money, and resources as well as our labors of love bring us many blessings in this lifetime and the next. When we are kind and generous to others, we are also showered with good fortune in return. We know this from the ‘golden rule’ of ‘do unto others’ found in many religions and spiritual traditions.
Buy I have read for many clients over the years who are kindhearted and loving people, but complain about their life being very difficult and deprived. They never have enough money, or they cannot find love, or health and well-being seem to evade them. “I am always helping others, but I get nothing in return,” they might say.
Why is this the case? Why are these generous, caring people not being blessed more often for their good deeds? Well, my guides have made the spiritual cause of this very clear to me. It is my understanding that we do not only add items of charity and compassion to the list of entries on our ‘chalkboard,’ but we also delete or erase them!
You see, when we do a good deed, it gets added to our list of potential ‘return blessings.’ But, if we go around bragging about it, boasting, showing off, telling people how generous or kind we have been, those good deeds become nullified, neutralized, erased. It loses its metaphysical power and spiritual meaning. It can no longer bless us in return.