“Fear: A Progression Towards Love”

Where there is fear, there is anxiety

Where there is anxiety, there is turmoil

Where there is turmoil, there is indecision

Where there is indecision, there is blockage

Where there is blockage, there is opportunity

Where there is opportunity, there is willingness

Where there is willingness, there is hope

Where there is hope, there is openness

Where there is openness, there is awareness of Love

Where there is awareness of Love, there is Love

Where there is Love, there is no fear”

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“What if you Inherited ALL the Resources?”

We are here to create heaven on earth

I was blown away by the question my dear friend George asked in regards to an organization we belong to.  He asked, “What would you do if you inherited all the resources?”  It was the question I have been looking for and didn’t know it.  This is the question that allowed me to see what I had been truly missing, ie, ALL THE RESOURCES.  I had been looking in my own backyard for things I could do or say to help but I had forgotten about ALL THE RESOURCES.  I decided to do a resource inventory and was delighted in all that was already present to move ahead and create anew.  ALL the resources in this case included a massive library of brilliant step by step teaching, deep and committed founders, willing and creative staff and past students, an online presence etc.  But the really bonus goodies came flooding through me in the form of realizing my own resources.  I love taking inventory like this yet constantly forget to do it.

ALL THE RESOURCES (in no particular order…….”There is no order of difficulties in miracles.”)

my humor; my husband; my beautiful daughters; our friends who know things I can only imagine; my bestie pals who cry and laugh with me; my mentors and coaches; my indefatigable desire for beauty, harmony & peace; God; God’s Voice; I can hear, speak and totally delight in God’s Voice of Love; my garage filled with history; my thoughts; the Universe (as in the ONEVerse we are all joined in singing); my home and office; electricity, running water; blow dryer (I’m sorry, but good hair is part of what I call a loving resource of God-so-loved-the-world he inspired the invention of blow driers); I can sort of find my way around a computer (with 3in1’s help of course); my body (in all its glory and hilariousness);  of course I have come to really notice and enjoy breathing which is very cool because it turns out to be THE important resource here on earth; our corgies (Rugby is especially a great resource for practicing forgiveness of his constant need for attention, which is absolutely NOT a projection of my own need for attention, really it isn’t);  Color; the infinite Qualities of Love that give me such great joy to feel, share, notice and celebrate; extending said Love to my thoughts; the 5 Steps to Hearing God’s Voice; food, water, champagne; the bank; all the amazing men and women who support my every breath from fighting fires, to working feverishly to form a government budget to those willing to fight for my right to sit here and dish (let’s not forget the Baristas, insurance agents; hairdressers, manicurists , financial advisors who make my world safe, leveraged, beautiful and caffeinated).

Ok, I have realized ALL THE RESOURCES could fill a page, a book, a world, a Universe.  In fact they do.

Let’s hear it for the power of ALL THE RESOURCES we each have individually and collectively  Thank you thank you , amen & thank you!

“Ten Qualities of Love I Couldn’t Live Without”

Love Collage created by V. Padley

It has been so long since I posted here that I have nearly forgotten how to!  I have been writing up a storm and my work have been seen mainly on http://www.thevoiceforlove.com community page and can be found at Fearlessly Female Magazine.  But, for reasons unknown I feel like posting again here.  There is no perfect “first post after years gone walkabout” quite frankly and this one will no doubt fall a bit flat.  But that is OK!  I have given myself permission to write, as Anne Lamott says, “a shitty first draft (post)”.

Yesterday I started reading the book”Ten Poems to Change Your Life” by Roger Housden  I’m already a fan (he had me at Mary Oliver’s “The Journey”).  It got me to thinking, what are ten qualities of Love that will change your life.  If you could only have ten (out of the infinite qualities available). What would they be.

Here are mine and I’d love to hear yours:

1. Forgiveness (without this I wouldn’t even get up in the morning)

2. Innocence (all thoughts, people, situations, governments, pain is totally & completely pure, holy, true)

3. Acceptance (this is where the rubber meets the road; it is: i notice it; i feel better)

4. Beauty (it is all beautiful but how delicious we get to notice and feel all the flavors of beauty)

5. Clarity (who, what when, where, why, does it hurt…..ie answers, guidance, revelation….whew!)

6. Strength (power, immanence, majesty, wholeness all in one neat package)

7. Peace (spacious, free, open, still, quiet, relief)

8. Joy (happy, delicious & bubbling, pouring forth the delight we are made of)

9. Comfort (yummy, cozy, gentleness meets you exactly where you are)

10. Truth (now IS eternal)

“The Holy Instant: Mad to Glad in 60 Seconds”

Here is the Holy Spirit’s answer to my previous post:

Me:  Holy Spirit please tell me more about entrance and en-trance (see previous post “Holy Spirit Sure Can Make An Entrance”)

HS:  Precious One, Good Morning and blessings to you this fine day and moment.  We are so pleased you are awake.  Thank you for taking this time to practice joining with your emotions and thoughts of MAD.  Notice how quickly you moved through the momentary tightness like a kink in your love hose was unwound without fanfare or suffering.

Precious One, as you take time to notice and feel emotions–which are thoughts with exceedingly high and powerful vibrations (loud clothes made to be noticed).  Notice the feelings in your body, this noticing gives you the moment you need to decide “Oh, I could extend love to this.”  In that thought is a doorway created.  This morning the thought  “Tear up the paper” was a tiny, easy way  to release the pent-up energy.  In that small release came the desire to extend love rather than NOT extend love.  As you heard the flavor of love is:  entrance, then en-trance. you were given (and could feel in your body) release, acceptance and relief.  The knot of not-extending love which originated in your sleep and subconscious rose to the surface to be healed and released.  Now the flow of love is free to communicate, adore and nourish.

Thank you for allowing this morning to be so fun for us.  Than you for your willingness to listen.  Thank you Precious One, thank you.

“The Holy Spirit Sure Can Make an Entrance”

I  woke up inexplicably mad morning before last.  I felt the vague residue of a memory of a dream in which I had rearranged the furniture in our home office (a beautiful detached guesthouse with a fireplace) and it had lost heart and looked ill-proportioned and unfriendly.  The furniture was clustered to one side, the bare concrete floors looked more 30’s sanitorium than  Lake Tahoe charming and the lighting was fit for an interrogation room with dark shadows and brassy pools of wavering illumination.  I was also stewing about a ridiculous situation in which a car that we were trying to junk had required more paperwork than my husband’s US citizenship.  I realized we were arguing and negotiations over JUNK.  Really?  My life included an argument about HOW to throw something away?? I got up to feed the dogs and my husband had not even noticed this kindness and went right out to do the same (as I had stopped in the bathroom first).  I finally got to my desk for meditation time and didn’t even like the comics I had left there to cut out for my journal.  I was MAD dammit and by this stage it didn’t really matter WHY.  Ugh and double ugh.

My plea to Holy Spirit was terse:  What the heck??!!!  Please help me practice [extending love to my emotions] on this feeling of yuck and mad.  Remind,even, what to do.  I just want to BREAK something!!!!!!!

HS:  Why don’t you tear up the rest of the comic section

Me:  I did tear it up and crumpled it into a ball and threw it in the bin with finality.  Oddly, I felt slightly satisfied. ( I need to point out I never shred, tear or crumple.  I fold my napkin neatly after a meal and place in next to my plate.  I fold the newspaper in neat organized, efficient bundles before committing them to the recycle bin.  I even rent a personal security shred bin for our home & office which is emptied regularly so I don’t have to take the time to shred our sensitive documents so ripping, tearing, crumpling is far outside of my norm).

At this moment I realized the wind had kind of gone out of my “mad” and I was now feeling a mixture of sad with an added dollop of desolation.  My chest felt tight,
tiredness gripped my head and I was flush with heat.  My breathing was rapid and I was just vibrating.  All I could eke out was “Holy Spirit, what flavor of  flipping love can I extend to these thoughts?

HS:  entrance……….en-trance

Me:  This means nothing to me so I flipped open my “Extending Love to Your Thoughts” cards and drew “I extend acceptance to this thought.”  Sigh.  So I looked up the definition to “entrance” and was blown away.

entrance:  1.  a point of place of entering; an opening or passage for entering; a doorway; the right, privilege or PERMISSION to enter  2.  In theater-the moment at which an actor comes onto the stage 3. In music- the point in a musical score at which A PARTICULAR VOICE joins the ensemble

en-trance:  to fill with delight or wonder, enrapture

I was laughing and crying at this point.  HS had me at “permission to enter”.  My brief, very half-hearted, grudging “Help me!” was not only heard but treasured and returned to me in such abundance I was left spacious and melty and even a little bit giddy.  These thoughts came streaming in:

My story and personality is a particular thought cluster.  I am the truth in which thoughts exist.  I am the way, the truth and the life.  All thoughts come to me for acceptance and absolution.  A creation washing machine allows great repurposing.  I am remains the same.  (I felt such waves of tingling cascading up and down my body, mainly on the left for some reason).  I finally was able to ask HS to please tell me more about entrance and en-trance.  (I will post this message later as to not wear you out now.)

 

 

 

“Accepting Rejection”

I have a secret to share.  I hate, fear, loathe and retreat from rejection of almost any kind.  My own definition of rejection  is a wide and deep catch-all which includes:  not noticing; ignoring; denial; not talking; the words “I don’t want to talk about it” or “I don’t want to deal with it”; not focussing attention, not joining in, not, NO, NOT, NO, NO…NO…..NO………NONONONONONONONONONO.   This hypersensitivity is an all out judgment-cluster in which I go completely blind to Love’s presence.

This morning, after listing to the Holy Spirit my current feelings of loss and rejection in detail ranging from electronic devices at the dinner table to my daughter’s boyfriend failing to arrive on time. I finally ran out of steam and asked simply “Holy Spirit WHAT IS REJECTION anyway??”

Imagine my surprise to hear these words:

“Rejection is a melon.

A fully ripe, perfect, juicy melon, ready to eat.  Fragrant, cool, smelling of tropical waters and sunset.

The melon is a gift, a delicious morsel bringing satisfaction, fullness and completion.  The melon is forgotten on the kitchen table.  You are in a hurry and think, “I will eat it tomorrow–tomorrow it will be perfect.”

But tomorrow, the juice is gone, the flesh is mealy and rubbery and the fragrance chalky.  The moment is past.

You keep thinking, “I will eat the melon tomorrow, tomorrow is should be perfect.”  Yet the melon is now a desiccated, moldy mush.  Still you think “Tomorrow it will be perfect.  I will eat it then.”

The melon is now gone.  The plate rinsed and put in the dishwasher.  Someone took pity on the organic mess and disintegration and threw it in the rubbish.  You don’t even notice,  for you are still thinking “The melon will be so good tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow”.

Rejection is tomorrow.

It is the hope that tomorrow all will be well and tasty and complete.

Rejection is the unwillingness to see clearly now in Love’s eyes.

Right now.

All of the circumstances you view as rejection of you are in fact rejections of your own to what is standing right in front of you.  You are rejecting the option to simply view the moment without judgment.

Allow yourself the pleasure and possibility of having no idea what will  happen next.  Like watching a baby discover his toes or his voice.  See the computer interface  as the discovering of these things called toes.  See the unwillingness to talk about a difficult sadness as the process of discovering her voice, the timbre, screech or beatific hum.  Let yourself discover the magnanimity of joy in the unexpected seeing of perfection of the moment you inhabit.

The permission to be amazed is what will give you delight in the smallest of seeings.  See how your great desire to change ‘what is so’ is received, itself, as rejection.  Thus you see rejection in the mirror of your brothers eyes.

No talking.  No attention.  No undivided awareness.

Love is there, mind you, completely, utterly, always.

Allow yourself to give these thoughts of “not enough”;  “it should be different; “they should be different” a free, all expenses paid,  holiday to the Virgin Islands for a week.  See if you miss them……see if they miss you.

See what happens.  I wonder……………”

“Heartempty Dumpty”

Heartempty Dumpty sat on a wall

Heartempty Dumpty had a great fall

The chorus did sing

an aching refrain

Is it enough?

Is it enough?

Is it enough?

Drops of acid rain

drilling a hole in my brain

The audience whispers one to another

No…no…NNNNOOOO……

n………………o…………….o……nooooooo

My heart is rent in two

and three and four and twenty

How can I become whole again

with this Humpty Dumpty torture?

How can I embrace both chorus

and tittering audience?

I will bow deeply to both

for their magnificent performance

Bravo!  Bravissimo!!

Well done, YOU.

For you have given me

that double secret gift

I asked for long ago

The experience

of being

alone in spirit

adrift in limitation

awash in doubt

Thank you!  Thank you!

Now let us

together

reture to the

after-theater party

at Awakenings

Shhhhhhhh…….don’t tell………

the other plays are still going…………………..

“Jesus at the Cotillion”

I had an amazing experience extending love to my thoughts this morning.  After a period of being very aware of my protein drink; the coldness; creaminess; how the straw felt; the glory and mystery of swallowing; my cells each absorbing the nutrition; I was completely aware of,  in short,  the miracle of breakfast.  at this point I became aware of deeper, more emotional thoughts and saw instantly this scene:

“I was at a cotillion by a lake.  I could see the night sky fading and the outdoor deck festooned in paper lanterns.  I could hear light orchestral music playing and see guest mingling, chatting, laughing.  I was wearing a summer frock worthy of a Doris Day film, sleeveless, pouf skirt and white.  I was welcoming each guest, each thought, as it arrived.  I was quite surprised when  Hatred arrived looking for all the world like a dear friend.  I didn’t know what to do, Hatred had not been invited but I was committed to welcoming all guest, expected or not.  What struck me was Hatred’s beauty.  It was disconcerting to feel Hatred  as beautiful.

Next arrived Itching (my ears, nose, eyes), a dwarf drawing all kinds of attention.  I ushered him in, got him a glass of punch and introduced him to another guest.  Then I saw the thought guest “I must get things taken care of”, who was dressed as a maid, in a black dress with starched white apron and sensible shoes.  I came up to her and said “I am so happy you are here, please join the party.”  I took her apron, and gave her strappy black sandals and a glittering sequined shawl.  She took her hair out of the bun and let it fall loosely about her shoulders.  I was stunned at her beauty and regal nature.  How does she keep that covered and dialed down while in service?

At this point my daughter actually came into my meditation room to ask a question.  I saw her, too, as a thought guest at the cotillion, completely unaware of the ripples her arrival caused.

I felt rather than saw the next guest to arrive.  I turn to my left and gliding down the path along the lake, leading to the pavilion, illuminated only by starlight and the glow of the paper lanterns was a beautiful man.  A figure somewhere between Jesus and a European St.Nicholas in white and sage robes, wearing a wreath of leaves and flowers on his head, emanating utter peace.  All party goers turned in unison to greet the unexpected delight of his arrival.  The place came alive as if touched by a wand.  The guises of thoughts and roles dropped in the face of sheer wonder and pleasure and warmth and love for one another.  I saw the sparkling cloak of the night sky illuminate the shore, the night, the surrounding mountains, the country, the world and the galaxy.

He is here!  He came!!

We can be ourselves, we don’t need to pretend any more!

Hallelujah!  Hallelujah!!!  Amen & Hallelujah!!!!”

Thus finished my extending love practice.  My heart was light, full and emanating joy.  I entered my day with purpose, welcome and an unwrinkled brow.  Let’s hear it for step one, extending love to your thoughts!

“Coffee Cup Revelation”

In my preparation for the new class for Voice for Love I was at turns, excited, nervous, thrilled, terrified…..all the usual attendant thoughts with a new endeavor.  My own class was such a year of incredible transformation for me that I began speculating on what being a mentor in the class might mean.  It is always exciting to speculate about the future, the unknown and the circumstances that might be brought about to affect the very experience I desire.  I have been assured by Holy Spirit that the theme this year is “Joy” even as last year’s theme was “Peace”.  Now, picture me shifting in my chair, fidgeting, drinking coffee etc all in the guise of “quiet time”, my time of meditation,  prayer and practice of extending love to my thoughts.  I was arrested mid fidget with what I spied in my coffee cup.  A perfect reflection of Mary in full color.  I had never noticed this before though I sit in my study daily with coffee in hand.  I have a beautiful painting of Mary hanging over my desk and ONLY IN STILLNESS did I see the sweet reflection.  In that moment all my fears and fidgets drained away as the last of the bath water gurgles swiftly out of the tub.  I was instantly returned to my own stillness and truth.

I love the memory of how truth and beauty is reflected in the state of stillness.  No wonder we are called to stillness.  The beauty and truth are of course already present but we cannot see it for ourselves unless we commit to b.e..i..n….g….s…..t……..i….l………..l.

These words given to me that morning seem meant now for the new students and staff in the Voice for Love:

“Enjoy all the forms created by love, for love, in love. 

Let yourself be loved even as you love.

You are here to receive your Self as much as to be yourself.

This much is true.

You were/are/will be designed for great joy–an endless, eternal capacity for joy.

Be ready in your willingess to feel that which you are yet unaccustomed to–

Pure

overflowing

rightness

of what IS.”

“The Agony & The Ecstacy of Working with Stone”

I am reading the amazing historical novel about the artist Michelangelo by Irving Stone, published in 1961.  It is richly detailed and will require many pages for terrific quotes in my journal (not to mention trips to Google to look up his incredible works of art).  This quote reminded me of our work with what many call “the ego”.  I think this kind of fits because often it feels my ego is a solid block IN MY WAY of seeing truth about a situation, a brother or myself.  I have a friend who this last weekend had the unbelievable circumstance of losing his beloved mother on one day and then the family dog on the next.  A situation that could turn any heart to stone with the thoughts of “How could this happen?  Why me? My grief  is overwhelming?  Please make it stop hurting.”  Perhaps with Holy Spirit we can become as Michelangelo with his beloved stone and extend love in this way:

“The Topolinos had taught him to work the stone with friendliness, to seek its natural forms, its mountains and valleys, even though it might seem solid; never to grow angry or unsympathetic toward the material.

Stone works with you.  It reveals itself to you.

Stone does not resent the chisel.  It is not being violated.  Its nature is to change.  Each stone has its own character.  It must be understood.  Handle it carefully or it will shatter.  Never let stone destroy itself.

Stone gives itself to skill and to love.” 

—“The Agony & The Ecstasy”  p. 48 by Irving Stone