What's so great about babies anyway?

Let me start by saying that this post isn’t about how awesome my baby is. To be fair, he is pretty awesome though. Nor am I one of those moms who fawns over every precious little poop. Granted, I get a bit excited if it ends a bout of crying. Before I was a mother, babies were definitely part of my pile of good. But it wasn’t until after I got to hang out with one so much as a mom that I began to ask myself why. Why do so many people just go gaga over babies?

One of the purest moments of joy I’ve ever felt was the first morning I was waking baby   E-Max up, leaning over his crib and, after stretching like a true Yogi, his eyes focused on mine as he flashed me a HUGE smile. Now I live for that first morning smile. I’ve always known baby smiles were sort of a big deal. But when it’s YOUR baby..... If only I could find away to bottle that emotion up, well let’s just say I wouldn’t have to worry about putting E-Max through college in 18 years.

But I learned quickly, you cannot trust baby smiles. For as quickly as a baby’s face lights up, it can turn all baby frowns and wails. One minute you’re singing your heart out to your baby, laughing at all the monkeys falling off the bed and bumping their heads, and in a flash, you’re getting swiped at with sharp little baby claws as your child throws his head back and lets out a screech as if to lament his tiny place in this world. “What the actual f*** just happened?” you may think.

At first, I was reminded by this quote about the most famous literary fairy from Peter Pan:

Tink was not all bad: or, rather, she was all bad just now, but, on the other hand, sometimes she was all good. Fairies have to be one thing or the other, because being so small they unfortunately have room for one feeling only at a time. They are, however, allowed to change, only it must be a complete change (J.M. Barrie).

Is it just that E-Max is so small he can only have one feeling at a time? Is there not enough room in that tiny baby brain of his for the subtleties of emotion?

My conclusion is well, yeah, sort of. Because of his developing brain, he isn’t too aware of his past and, at just over 3 months, he probably would have a difficult time even grasping the concept of “future.” Babies exist wholly in the present.

Does this sound familiar?

For all those who have experienced first hand the benefits of meditation, you’ll recognize “being present” as key to any successful meditation practice. It is something so many of us struggle with - getting caught up in the stress of yesterday or the worry of tomorrow. Yet, babies so effortlessly live in the moment. In fact, it is all they can do. Sometimes that means being filled with joy just because you caught your reflection in the mirror.  ometimes it means beaming with pride because you’re able to pull yourself up on your own two feet. And sometimes, being completely in the moment means crying out because of gas pains.

The cool thing is that we were all babies at one point. We did it once, we can certainly do it again. We can all “be present”, no matter how big our dumb ol’ brains get.

So take a look around you. What little gurus are in your life? And what do they have to teach you?

Growing your Intuition 101: Discerning the Source

Last week I wrote about how we each have a Divine Right to choose our signs.  We can choose what is meaningful for us and in what ways.  This is helpful for those of us just learning to listen.  When we begin to open ourselves up, we can be faced with a lot of doubt.  Am I imagining things?  Is this just a coincidence or is it meaningful?  Recognizing that we can choose meaning and that the act of choosing doesn’t diminish the power of a symbol or message is a practice that can help us with the important first step of learning to trust ourselves and our connection with the Divine.  

As your Spiritual Self continues to unfold, you open yourself up to receive more and more messages.  They could come in the form of an object or animal that frequently crosses your path.  Perhaps there are words, phrases, or even a song that you hear or see on a daily basis.  Sometimes they come in the form of “gut feelings” or instincts.  Other times, they may come as powerful dreams.  You know when this happens because you won’t be able to ignore them, although you may try.  You may also experience a lot of “aha!” moments as you go about your day.  This occurs especially when you are able to discern the meaning of the messages and signs you’ve been witnessing.  When you make the connection, it fizzles and sparks seemingly in the very synapses of your brain.  

Developing your Intuition, growing your Connection, and BE-ing in CommUnion are all the same thing.  There are countless books, workshops, and other resources on the subject.  It is a practice I am actively engaged in and one I suspect I will be for my entire lifetime.  In this post I offer just a little tip and I will continue to offer them in the weeks to come as I learn and process them myself.  

There continues to be doubt.  There may always be doubt.  I recently began getting out there and giving public spiritual readings, a somewhat terrifying endeavor.  Of course, I was (and still am) doubting, at times, my abilities and connection.  I truly believe receiving Wisdom on a psychic level is something each of us is capable of.  I will say it, with earnest, to your face right now.  I believe it whole-heartedly.  Yet when it comes to myself, I still hear that little voice that says I can’t.  My teacher and friend, Rich Braconi, says that voice is the reason I know I can.  It is the ego voice and it tries to counter the Spirit.  So everything I do in Connection with Spirit, the ego voice tells me is wrong or bad or stupid.  

So how do we know when that inner voice is coming from ego or coming from our Broadest Being?   Rich also imparted wisdom on this topic.  He simply states that when our ego talks to us it is fear-based.  When we receive guidance from our Higher Self it is love-based.  This seems simple enough but fear and love are rather abstract.  The translation can become confusing.  

Through further self-exploration on this topic, I discovered a sort of short-cut that helps me discern whether I am being guided by my ego self or Higher Self, by fear or love.  I have found that the ego tends to communicate in negative statements whereas your Higher Self usually communicates using positive wording.  

The same idea is found in many resources that speak about manifestation through positive visualization, such as The Secret.  I’ve heard many teachers and speakers stress the importance of using positive wording when setting an intention.  For example, if you were worried about your health, you’d want to set the intention to be healthy as opposed to asking the Universe, “Don’t let me get sick.”  The idea behind this is that the Universe doesn’t really understand our grammatical nuances like the negative.  To break it down further, our brains, and therefore our intentions, tend to latch onto the most concrete part of a sentence or idea.  The other words are sort of just filler.  So if I’m asking the Universe to keep me healthy, I’m focusing on and sending out “healthy, healthy, healthy.”  If I’m asking to not get sick, I’m focusing on and sending out “sick, sick, sick.”  

Wouldn’t it make sense then that the Universe, that our Broadest Being, sends us messages in the same way?  

The best way to illustrate this is with an example.  When I became pregnant and gave birth to my son, I received guidance to be a stay-at-home mom, at least for the foreseeable future.  Furthermore, I see that it is an integral part to my Life Path and that I will be learning lessons necessary for me to fulfill my Purpose from my experience as a mom that I can’t learn from any book or workshop. It’s true. I’m happier than I’ve ever been and am learning at what seems to be lightning speed.  Even though, being a mom is my favorite job ever (this came as a bit of surprise even to me!), doubt about this guidance creeps in.  I am worried about my family being able to sustain itself on one income.  I often catch myself asking if I can really afford to be home with my son.  I ping-pong between yes and no.  

No.  Look at couples around you where both people work and they can’t even make ends meet.  Some of them don’t even have kids.  You won’t be able to afford a house and food on one person’s salary.  

Yes you can!  You are supported by this decision.  It’s the best choice to keep you, your husband and your son healthy and happy.  

When I stepped back and looked at those two viewpoints battling within, one clearly comes from fear and the other from love.  When I thought about looking for a “normal” job, I was motivated by fear that my family wouldn’t have enough.  But when I thought about staying home with my son, just the benefits of such a set-up came to mind.  It also felt right.  I felt fulfilled.  I also noticed the support I received by those who care about me.  For example, I completed graduate school with a 4.0 GPA and received an award for student teaching, but I’ve never heard so much praise from my husband as when he’s able to come home to a tidy house and a happy baby.  He constantly reminds me of how proud he is of me being a good mom to our baby boy.  Since we are all connected, I know that his encouragement extends far beyond just himself.  His message is one of love and he is a conduit of the Universe, as we all are.

But what about guidance about a negative situation?  Take for example, walking to your car in a dark parking lot by yourself.  A reasonable situation in which to experience fear.   How can you know who is speaking in such a situation.  I’d still say that the negative/positive wording test works.  A message from fear might sound more like, “Don’t go that way!” Whereas true guidance from your Higher Wisdom might come as, “Turn left.” or “Lock your doors.”  In this particular example, I’d of course caution not to throw common sense out the window.  It’s better safe than sorry!  

Another example is two years ago when I had an appendectomy.  It was finals time at school and I was working on a paper that was due at the end of the day when I started to feel pain.  It wasn’t excruciating like the pain one normally hears about associated with appendicitis, but it was enough to be distracting.  My fear told me not to pay attention to it.  That if I didn’t get my work done in time, I’d wouldn’t get an A in the course.  But I was also lovingly guided to go see a doctor, and that in doing so, I could at least get a doctor’s note for an extension on the paper’s due date which would make up for the time lost going to the appointment.  It turned out that I had a “fat ol’ appendix” that needed to be removed right away.  Not only did I receive extensions on all my papers, but because of my current A-average in one of my classes, I was excused from taking one test completely.  Even a rather common surgery like an appendectomy can be a scary thing, but the messages that led to my well-being still came from the point of Love.

So what messages are you listening to?  You may or may not agree with me.  I’d love to hear about how you let your intuition guide you.  Thanks for keeping me company on this leg of my journey!

Sacred Choice: Choosing What We Notice

        The most common question of anyone trying to develop their intuition or psychic abilities is, “Is this real or am I making this up?”  The answer is always, “Yes.”

Just because it stems from you doesn’t mean it’s invalid.  After all, Divinity is within.    There is a poster in our bedroom that I hung up when E-Max was born.  It is one of those stunning images from the Hubble Telescope - the Universe in breathtaking technicolor.  At the bottom there is a quote from Albert Einstein: “Imagination is more important than knowledge.  Knowledge is limited.  Imagination encircles the world.”  I want to take that idea a step further and say imagination is essential to knowledge.  Imagination is the precursor to knowledge.  Everything you see before you, every object in your life, every rule that governs your day, every individual action, every collective belief, every societal norm, every accepted fact started in the imagination.  Began as a “what if” or vision.  There was a moment, at least, when your cup of coffee, your car, your home, these words you’re reading, existed as just a thought or a speculation.

I try to live my life with a skeptic’s eye and an open mind.  One thing that can bother me about skeptics, however, is their gusto for debunking.  Being able to explain something within the known laws of science and logic shouldn’t make it less important or amazing.  Sure, search for an explanation, but don’t seek to take the power from an experience.  The two can coexist.  Finding an explanation shouldn’t make it any less meaningful.  

Here’s an example of what I mean.  After returning home from Kathy Milano’s Angelic Immersion Retreat, I started noticing that I would see the time 11:11 at least once a day.  A quick search on Google and it’s clear 11:11 is kind of a big deal and many consider 11 to be a number of the Angels.  There are many forums in which I would be able to share my 11:11 experiences and get many stories in return.  

However, this obsession with 11:11 can be easily explained.  Our brains like patterns.  They like symmetry.  And though we have a limit, they like repetition.  Seeing 11:11 on a digital clock is like candy for our brains.  They take note of it and it gets priority seating in our memories.  You can notice a slight difference in your reaction if you were to observe this time on an analog clock.  Not nearly as “exciting.”  

As a new mother, constantly concerned with feeding times and nap times, I find myself looking at the clock quite frequently each day.  Also, technology has made it so that there is always a digital representation of the time within my view: cellphones, time displays on the TV and computer, cable boxes, microwaves, ovens, iPod docks, radios, cars, etc.  It’s not unlikely that I would catch the time at 11:11, am or pm, each day.

But do you know what first occurs to me whenever I see 11:11?  I get a little happy.  A little lighter, as if I just remembered something important and wonderful.  Do I merely explain it away as a idiosyncrasy of the brain?  No.  I suppose I could, but where’s the fun in that?  My first thought, even though I know all this, is “Angels!”  Usually followed either by “Thank you!” or “Help!”  You see it doesn’t matter if 11:11 is an Angel number or just a pattern my brain finds pleasant to notice, because I’ve decided that it will serve as a meaningful sign for me.  It is precisely because my brain urges me to drop everything and take notice every time I see 11:11 that makes it a perfect reminder of my Connection with Divinity.

  And you know what?  That’s perfectly okay.  It is okay to choose our signs.  To choose what we notice.  We are well within our Divine Right.  Free Will is a defining characteristic of our Humanity.  Our practice of it is integral to our Re-Connection with the Divine.  Begin with the simple practice of choosing your signs.  Set your intention and then see what you notice as the days and weeks unfold.  Give credit to your imagination.  It is a powerful tool.  Don’t close your eyes to it or dismiss it as child’s play.  Instead, tune in.  Listen to what it’s telling you and see what happens.  Witness the magical transformation of your life.  I’d love to hear about your journey!