spiritual growth
The Ideal Starting Crystals For Beginners
Crystals and gemstones are a popular resource in modern metaphysical practices, mysticism, and alternative spirituality. It can be used in various powerful ways, including healing, energy protection, meditation, prayer, manifesting, divination, psychic reading, and channeling.
Crystals are versatile and useful in enhancing one’s spiritual practice or energy work, but there are so many to choose from that it can difficult to know where to start.
Three of my favorite crystals that I recommend for beginners to get started with are amethyst, rose quartz and black tourmaline. These three crystals are affordable and easy to find, so they are ideal to start with if you wish to explore using crystals to expand your spiritual practice.
Amethyst
Amethyst is the ideal stone to start with because it has a gentle energy that almost anyone can tolerate without being overwhelmed by its influence. It is a fantastic stone to help you get in touch with your intuition and find your calm center. Amethyst’s calming energy especially enhances meditation and dreamwork.
Amethyst is associated with the crown chakra. It heightens our spiritual and personal awareness, which in turn helps us to self-reflect and evaluate more honestly where we need to make adjustments in our beliefs, behavior, and perspectives. Amethyst thus supports us in maintaining clarity in our self-reflection, which is a vital first step in a spiritual journey of higher consciousness and personal enlightenment.
Forgive, But Never Forget!
I’ve been reflecting on the notion of ‘forgive and forget’ in this season of thanksgiving, joy, generosity, and gratitude. Is it indeed necessary for us to both forgive and forget when others wrong us? Does that not make is doormats or losers? Consulting spirit on this matter, I found that the concept of ‘forgetting’ actually implies something quite different to our typical understanding of it.
True forgiveness is to ‘turn the other cheek’ when we are wronged. It is an essential aspect of our spiritual growth and soul evolution. When we practice forgiveness, we increase dharma, which is essentially ‘cosmic law and order’ and therefore ‘good karma.’ If we have good dharma, we begin to receive more gifts and blessings from the Universe, and spontaneous kindness and generosity from others. We also become more approachable because our ‘gratitude glass’ is always more than half full with spiritual champagne!
Spiritual practice and energetic self-care are the optimal ways to practice and strengthen our forgiveness. Through daily prayer, meditation, candle work, or journaling, supplemented by anointing ourselves with healing essential oils, for example, or taking an Epsom salt bath, we can release all resentment, anger and bitterness that block our energy flow and holds us back.
The other person does not need to know that we’ve forgiven them. It is of course even better if we tell them, but their participation or approval is not necessary. Forgiveness is a private matter and a gift we give to ourselves.
Forgetting harms and hurts is however an entirely different matter. If we forget too easily, we also tend to stop reflecting gratefully on our joys and blessings. Bad things happening to good people increases our appreciation and gratitude for the good things in our lives.
Messages From My Totems
Do you have a specific animal, bird, reptile, or insect that keeps catching your attention? I am not speaking of your dog or cat or pet bird, but of those that you repeatedly cross paths with in nature, or even in your dreams.
Each one of us has at least one totem or spirit animal, and sometimes more, that show up in some way throughout our lifetime. The term totem comes from the Ojibwa word ototeman and was introduced in English in the 18th century to refer to a ‘designated guardian spirit animal.’
When our totems show up, the most important thing is to recognize what is currently happening in your life, or what thoughts are going through your mind at the time you see it. You may also notice that whenever you are in turmoil you tend to see this specific creature (or creatures) more than when life is going smoothly.
Each totem is a symbolic representation with a specific message. They warn us of danger, or help us make important life decisions, or comfort us when we are struggling, or just bring a confirmation or a sense of peace.
They bring to us whatever we most need at the time they cross our paths. It is up to you to just trust the energy you are in when you come across one of these beautiful creatures.
Three totems that have been present in my life at specific times are the Eagle, the Owl and the Wolf. Each offered me specific support I needed at that time, and they brought me reassuring messages. At times they have also inspired me with confidence, power and strength when I most needed it. Below are a few examples of what these totems have represented to me. Maybe it will help you identify, understand, and trust your animal totems.
Signs That You Have A High Vibration
Spiritually aware people know that it is important to achieve and maintain a high energy frequency to live a truly conscious, empowered life. Diverse spiritual practices, metaphysical techniques and lifestyle activities can be pursued to achieve this elevated state of ‘beingness’ and higher consciousness.
But how does one know for sure that all your efforts to raise your vibration are indeed successful? How do you recognize an elevated ‘vibe’ in yourself and others? Are there clear signs of someone having a high energy vibration?
Yes, there are indeed certain traits and indicators one can look out for to identify people with a high vibration:
Empowered. When a person with a high energy vibration walks into a room, everybody immediately takes notice of them. They have a powerful presence. Everyone will instantly light up and suddenly become more relaxed, friendly, happy, and joyful.
Healing. People seek you out others who have a higher vibration when they are feeling sad, depressed, anxious, or just need someone to talk to. High vibration people therefore often find themselves in the role of teacher, nurturer, caregiver, healer, or peacemaker.
Trusted. People with a raised vibration are often more easily and spontaneously trusted by others. Animals and children especially are naturally drawn to those who have a high vibration. Animals and children are sensitive to negative, low energies and tend to avoid it at any cost. If a crying baby or scared pet vehemently refuses to have anything to do with someone, chances are something is off with that person’s energy. Kids and animals prefer and only trust ‘light and love’ vibes.
Are You A Victim, Observer, Or Empowered Creator?
I have been doing psychic readings for many years now, and I learn something new almost every day. Many of the personal and spiritual insights I have attained in my sessions with clients, have been very beneficial to me in both my professional and personal life.
One of these spiritual messages revealed to me a powerful concept regarding the mindset we choose as our overriding outlook on life and the impact it has on our joy, happiness and fulfillment. How we view the world and interact with others depends on whether we choose to go through life as a Victim, Observer, or a Creator.
Most people shift between these three mindsets at different times and in different areas of their life, but we tend to revert to one of these positions as our predominant outlook on life. Spirit has shown me that the ideal for all spiritually conscious people must be to empower ourselves in such a way as to achieve the Creator level in all areas of our life. This has become my hope and aim for all of my clients.
Consider which of these three mindsets tends to define your outlook on life most of the time:
Victim – A victim allows the external to influence the internal and experience things such as constant financial hardship and debt, chronic discontent in relationships, co-dependency in relationships, boredom and frustration, chronic exhaustion, fear and confusion, and dissatisfaction in career and business. The victim‘s emotions are dictated by the ebb and flow of life and allows external events and other people to determine their daily state of mind.
Divine Love Abides All
When we have love in our life we can keep negative entities away from us on the lower realms, as well as on the earthly walking realm. There are both malicious people and malevolent non-physical beings in this world. Divine Love protects us from their evil.
When we live our life with unconditional love in our hearts, and keep a calm mind and spirit, we are easily read by others as being very kind loving people – it shows on our faces. You sometimes can’t tell on some people’s faces if they are good or evil, because Satan, or the Evil One, is tricky and manipulative. The Bible tells us that Lucifer was a beautiful angel in the beginning, before he fell and became corrupt.
It is so important to live with the Divine Spark inside of us and be mindful of what we put into our bodies, as I’ve seen energy shift and people’s faces shift when they open the door to negativity and evil influences in their lives. Some are more susceptible than others. For example, people who abuse alcohol allow really low spiritual entities into their lives, to seek and ruin and destroy anything good that they have going on – especially by way of relationships. Some people should just stay far away from alcohol, as they become very aggressive and belligerent, and just not themselves when they drink. I have seen people ruin their lives because of alcohol.
Anything that can deter you from Divine Love is not of the Light. Everything is best in moderation. But for some the negative energy keeps them wanting more as the negative entities around them wants them to fail, so that they themselves can grow stronger while their victim’s life slowly goes in a downward spiral. In some cases, their addictions make them so depressed they even take their own life, and it hinders their soul from achieving soul growth in this current incarnation they are in.
Creating A Brand New Life
Many teachers, philosophers and authors have said the same thing in different ways. We create our own reality; we are the masters of our own destiny.
Some of my favorite books with this message include James Allen’s As a Man Thinketh; Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich; Shakti Gawain’s Creative Visualization; Mike Dooley’s Manifesting Change; Deepak Chopra’s The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success: Bob Proctor’s You Were Born Rich; Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret; and Bud LaBranche’s audio recording What You Believe, You Become.
The average person has had access to this information for generations. For example, James Allen’s book was first published in 1903. If the universal Law of Attraction was indeed ever ‘a secret,’ it has not been so for at least a century. So, why don’t more of us apply it in our lives? Why don’t more of us take more control of our destiny and create the life we desire?
I think the first reason is that many people do not even think it possible. They choose to believe that life happens to them, instead of for them, and that they are merely meant to react to whatever comes their way in the best way humanly possible.
Others are so buried in the day-to-day chaos of their lives that they don’t have the time, nor the inclination to sit down and learn about a different way of living.
Then there are also those who believe that their life is simply pre-ordained, and they have minimal choice in the matter. For them there is no point in trying to get out of the rut in which they find themselves.