On Creating Contentment

Tags

abundance, contentment, creativity, giving, sharing

It is perhaps not an accident that one of the newest, if not one of the youngest members of the community shared the change that a shift to abundance mentality can bring into our lives. She first joined our monthly Zoom chat in November. In the December conversation, she wisely shared:

“Every morning when I wake up, I say to myself – there is enough for everyone” – @Quratulain

This simple and straightforward affirmation reflects a profound truth that we often tend to forget. Yes, we all have our daily challenges and conflicts. On some days, it may even seem that some parts of us are living contradictions of what we were just yesterday. And yet, it is when we find the courage to be open to the big abundance that is the nature of the universe, we take a small step toward creating contentment.

How is energy of contentment different from the energies of happiness and joy? In order to create and sustain happiness, we may often invoke an energy of ‘doing’. Our accumulated life experiences inform our heart and mind that certain people, communities, things, events, actions, seasons, holidays and such tend to make us happy or unhappy. Our natural inclination to avoid pain feeds into our ‘pursuit of happiness’, no matter how temporary that energy of happiness may be. “Do that which makes you feel good” – haven’t we all heard that mantra?

Ah. I have now infused ‘feeling good’ into the energy of happiness. If ‘feeling good’ equates to ‘optimal health’, then, yes, it would indeed be a welcome infusion. The good health of our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual containers energizes and elevates us towards joy – a more permanent energy beyond happiness. We move from merely ‘feeling good’ towards ‘feeling better’. After moving from ‘good’ to ‘better’, the natural question to ask would be, what’s next? (My gratitude to @GaryGruber for asking that question in our December zoom meeting).  

Perhaps the answer to the “what’s next” question can be found in our attitude towards abundance and  an evaluation of our state of contentment. On self-examination, if we find ourselves in a better state of contentment than we were a month ago, a year ago, or even a decade ago, then we are closer to the answer. If not, then we perhaps need to examine the breadth and depth of our discontent. What is its root? Where did its seed come from? What feeds it? What feeds on it? What role do happiness, joy and abundance play in our state of contentment?

The journey to answer these questions often raises more questions than it answers. And yet, content is the traveler who remembers that joy can be infused in every twist and turn, every spring and autumn, every dawn and dusk, every breath. And that there is enough for everyone. Namaste.

Kumud

P.S. Join us for our weekly twitter gathering – Sunday, December 8 at 9amET / 730pm India. We shall share on the topic of (dis)contentment, and start planning on our “what’s next” for the forthcoming decade. Bring some answers, will you?! – @AjmaniK

A state of contentment flows from a walk along the river (Dec 6 2019)

Circles of Gratitude

Tags

abundance, gratitude, spirituality, thankfulness

No matter how long one she been away from the house – whether it be fifteen minutes or five hours – his welcome home greeting is always the same. It is as if his heart flows immense gratitude, and I can tell by his frantic dash to the door that connects the garage to the house, that “Mom’s back!”

Last evening was no different, other than that all of us had been out for a little bit. The sun had set in the interim between when we had left the house and when we returned. After his greetings and hugs, I opened the patio door to let him out on to the deck, so he could go and burn off some energy running around the yard. There was a rush of cold air which took me by surprise, as I had forgotten how quickly the temperature drops on these winter days after the sun goes down. What a beautiful circle of warmth is our Sun, I was reminded.

Stepping out and looking up at the crystal clear night sky which had just a solitary puff of a cloud hanging low under the firmament filled with stars, I caught my breath. Every single star, every visible and yet to be discovered planet and its moons, is another magnificent circle weaving a sphere. I stood there in the cold, clearing my mind of the day’s events, expressing gratitude for the great circle that is our near and far universe.

The owls in the forest may have caught a whiff of my standing reverie, for they decided to provide some impromptu background music . A single owl started the circle of sound, and it didn’t take long for the circle to expand into a full blown forest-jam. More gratitude flowed with a smile, as the louder they sang, the faster he seemed to run around the yard under the glittering dark sky.

From the small to the big, from those close to earth to the extremely distant, the spheres and circles where we may find gratitude are omnipresent. It may be our inclination to be easily distracted by the seemingly perpetual stream of aches and pains, trials and tribulations. In challenge-filled situations, our propensity may be to contract our circle(s), when in fact we may be well served by doing exactly the opposite.

The truth is that we can actually expand and contract our circles at the same time. If we find ourselves contracting our family circle, we may decide to expand our circle of friends. If we need to contract both family and friends, we can expand our circle with nature by simply walking outside. In our spiritual practice, when we make time for yoga or meditation or silence, we may be contracting within, and yet often find ourselves expanding the love and light in our heart.

The key is to remember that all of our circles and spheres, from the microcosm of every electron with every cell of our body, to the macrocosm of distant stars and galaxies, are playgrounds for life. When we accept the invitation of life’s myriad circles with an of attitude playing with a smile, of singing with joy, to observing with the heart’s light, life fills us with her abundances.

And for life’s abundances, the twelve pound havanese puppy named “bubbles”, and I are both grateful. How about you and your circles? Where are you discovering gratitude and expressing thanks today?

Kumud

P.S. Please join our weekly gathering on twitter, where gratitude often streams in abundance – Sunday, November 24th at 9amET in #SpiritChat. Our circle is ever-welcoming of new folks. Namaste – @AjmaniK

P.P.S. This post is dedicated to my maternal aunt, who was instrumental in teaching me so much about life and its circles and spheres, as she raised me from the age of seven to twenty one. It would have been her 90th birthday today, 23 Nov 2019. Thank you, dear Mom!

Raising the Divine Feminine

Tags

abundance, celebration, empowerment, feminine, spirituality

An Indian legend goes that when the Earth was overrun and overcome with the oppression of the Audra’s – those with evil tendencies – even the all powerful (male) trinity of creation, preservation and regeneration felt powerless. The three then decided to contribute their best strengths, and appeal to the universal force above them, to evolve a superlative, energetic being that would help restore order and righteousness to the world.

The result was the creation of Shakti – the energy of the divine feminine, which restores order, harmony and dynamic balance to the world. The arrival of this new energy, a new trinity, is celebrated over a nine day festival that is currently underway in India. I view the festival as an opportunity to reflect on all the trinity of feminine influences in my life.

Who are the ones whose creative power of navigating the next big obstacle still flows within me? Who were the ones who taught me about the power of the creative arts of singing, writing, dancing, cooking, and much more? Who are the ones that showed me, with their propensity towards giving and sharing, that prosperity grows and flows best through the channel of an open heart? I raise all of them, celebrate them.

It is perhaps time for all of us to consider contributing our best strengths, and raising the divine feminine within us. Endowed and graced with that new Shakti, what obstacle(s) couldn’t we overcome? What new wave of equitable prosperity could we send forth with our best new energies? How much new creativity could we evoke to find solutions to our current challenges?

Raising the divine feminine within, is thus, cause for celebration. I invite you to celebrate the Shakti within you – for the peace, joy and goodness that it can bring to all,

Kumud @AjmaniK

Join us, Sunday October 14 at 9amET on Twitter. We shall celebrate the best of the divine (feminine) energy of the community that is #SpiritChat. Namaste – Kumud

The energy of #autumn is a wonderful time to reflect on the divine feminine… avail a walk…

Abundance in Spirituality

Tags

abundance, lightness, spirtuality

What can an attitude of abundance bring to our daily life? This question is perhaps best answered when we are knee deep in a lack of abundance. It is often easy for us to get into the “lack” mode when life isn’t quite going the way we expect it to. It is when we reach for the peanut-butter jar – and end up scraping the bottom – that we appreciate the abundance of the full-to-the-brimness that we had enjoyed recently. How easily we take all the wonderfully abundant ‘things’ for granted in our life, don’t we?

If we have an abundance of clean air to breathe or fresh water to drink and shower with or nourishing food to eat – we can be grateful. If we have an abundance of all three, we are perhaps in a small minority on this earth. If we have an aboundance of healthy relationships (friends, family, neighbors) or good personal health and energy levels or vocations that afford us a good standard of living, we can be grateful. If we have an abundance of all three, we are perhaps in a small minority considered super-abundant. Yet, we are often unaware of these simple abundances, aren’t we?

There is something unique about a self-awareness of abundance. It provides lightness to the heart. The more that we become aware of our simple abundances, the less we tend to focus on what we lack. The less we focus on our lack, the more our heart attracts Joy. Abundance helps us become like the flower that revels in the Joy of its own color and fragrance. It is this Joy that eventually attracts Grace. The bees come visiting, sit lightly with our lightness, and create and spread even more abundance.

It all begins by celebrating the abundance that we already have in our life right now. We can then experience lightness in our heart and soundness of mind. Lightness of heart helps make available valuable emotional energy that we can direct towards creativity. Have you ever noticed that when your heart is heavy, in emotional churn, that your productivity drops off drmatically? I know that mine does. The quicker I return my heart to abundance, the easier it is for me to get out of my own way and start walking in Joy again.

I invite you to join me in a self-test. Let us ask these questions, everyday for the next seven days. In what area(s) of my life do I feel most abundant? Did I share lack or did I share abundance with others? What actions made my heart feel light, abundant? How can I include more of abundance-creating activities in my daily routine? Let us observe our answers, and watch if our daily actions change to create more abundance for us, and those around us.

Namaste,

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join me as I host the #SpiritChat weekly chat on twitter, Sunday August 27th at 9amET/1pmUTC. We shall celebrate the small abundance(s) in our life, and share some cheer and lightness with each other.

A Butterfly Enjoys Simple Abundance…

A Conversation on Abundance – with @Simon_GB

Tags

abundance, spirit, spiritchat

It seems like our #spiritchat conversations gravitate towards the topic of abundance around the time(s) of spring and autumn. Earlier this year, we talked about abundance at the onset of spring in the northern hemisphere. Now, here we are, in October, and autumn is in full swing, and my host for this Sunday, Simon Harvey, suggested that we talk about abundance. And I heartily agreed with him. For I left autumn in the North, to come and celebrate spring, and abundance, in the South (of Brazil) for a few days.

Simon Harvey has been a supporter of #SpiritChat since the very early days (for almost two years now), and he might have well been a part of the very first #SpiritChat conversation. So, it is with great pleasure, that I introduce you to Simon, as the host of this Sunday’s live twitter conversation on #abundance. Simon was kind enough to share a few thoughts on abundance with me, which I share with you below.

If you look closely there’s abundance everywhere. Within abundance lives raw energy. When abundance is seen it can be overpowering. Abundance can be like a London bus, seemingly rare until there it is, and now a whole lot of them. But is abundance with us all the time, does abundance live within us and is our spirit the equilibrium to abundance? What does abundance feel like, what as we see abundance arrive in harvests, leaves and a season that has become abundant in giving, can abundance teach? – Simon Harvey

If we all were to develop a feeling, an attitude of abundance, how would it impact those around us? Do give it some thought. And then, I hope you will join @Simon_GB in what promises to be a wonderful discussion on #abundance on twitter, Sunday, October 12th at 9am ET (2pm UK BST). I know that all of you who participate will come away with a new perspective on this subject.

Be well. See you soon…

Kumud

Simon Harvey is the founder of @N2PeopleSkills, loves to talk about “People Skills Development” and “Self Awareness”, and is an “Activist of Compassionate Life”.

The Spirit of Abundance

Tags

abundance, spirichat, spiring, spirit

The last two weekly discussions in #SpiritChat have discussed the ideas of “Letting Go – Making Space for the Sacred” and “Springing to Spiritual Success”. Both these discussions have energized the community as we have incorporated the theme of a change in season (from winter to spring in the Northern Hemisphere) into the ideas of examining what is sacred to us, letting go of what isn’t sacred, creating space for the new. A sort of spiritual “spring cleaning”, if you will, which moves us forward on the path of “success” in our spiritual journey.

One characteristic that we observe in nature as spring emerges from winter is that of abundance, which happens as the earth around us renews itself, and literally springs to life. As I glance out the windows of my sunroom every morning, I slowly (but surely) see the buds emerging as signs of life on the branches of the tall willows and oak trees. The squirrels have an extra spring in their step as they dart around, excited about the change, and the abundance that it will bring to their seemingly simple lives. We all have experienced this change that spring brings with it, renewing us with hope for the future ~ the outward abundance bringing feelings of inner abundance.

However, it is very often that we, in the busy-ness of our daily lives, become inured or unmindful of this abundance that surrounds us. We are so busy trying to make a living, engaged in our “struggle”, enamored by our everyday stories, that we may lose sight of the beautiful stories that nature is unveiling every day around us. A few of us may become “hardened” over time, for we get messages like ~ “get a tougher skin”, “don’t let them see you sweat” and so on.

While some of these strategies are necessary to “survive” in the world, are they really meaningful to help us thrive spiritually? Do these messages create a “lack mentality” rather than an “abundance mentality” within us and cause our spirit to shrivel rather than expand? To take it a step further, what is the connection between abundance and prosperity? What does it take for us to let go of scarcity thought process and adopt a mindset of abundance? Where does true abundance come from?

I invite you to come and share your thoughts on abundance with the #SpiritChat community in our live, weekly chat on twitter with hashtag #SpiritChat at 9amET / 1pmGMT on Sunday March 10th.

Thank you, and I encourage you to Let Go. Think Abundance. Be well.

Kumud

Update:Here are the filtered transcripts for Qs 1 to 8 only. You may find the entire chat at full transcript version – Enjoy! Thank you to all who shared in abundance!

Ready? Q1. What area(s) of your Life feel the most abundant right now? #SpiritChat 

Q2. Where does true abundance come from? How do we cultivate it? #SpiritChat 

Q3. How can we develop abundance mentality? Why is it important? #SpiritChat 

Q4. Is there a connection between Letting Go and Abundance? #SpiritChat 

Q5. The spirit does not know a lack of abundance. Agree or disagree? #SpiritChat

Q6. How does our personal abundance affect our families and communities? #SpiritChat

Q7. What does a life of spiritual abundance look like to you? Are you living it?  #SpiritChat

Final Q8. What action(s) can we take to manifest abundance in all areas of our lives? #SpiritChat