Spiritual Hospitality by @llake

Tags

awareness, hospitality, spiritual practice, spirituality

 It’s 9:00 am. The toddlers are fed and playing quietly. The entire house is spotless. I look around and feel very accomplished. Time for a shower! Dinner guests are coming tonight. I want the evening to be extra special. My plan is perfect, and I’m on schedule. 

I skoosh down to talk to my kids to let them know I’m going in the shower and I’ll be out in 5 mins. (moms and dads have this down to a science) I ask them to please play quietly, and we’ll have snack time when I get out. 

I head into the shower feeling excited and confident that tonight will be epic! I get out of the shower. Dry off. Dress. And then the surprise hits. 

I look into the dining room, and indeed all three wee ones are playing quietly and happily. My son had gotten out his matchbox cars, bull dozers, and backhoes, and all three (under the age of 5) were playing in the dirt from around my large elephant tree. They had spread the dirt from one side of the hardwood floored room to the other. Inside I was extremely upset. I quietly (this is how my kids always knew I was really mad) told the elder two to go to their rooms. I didn’t want to see them. We would talk “later.” The littlest one I picked up and put in her highchair. I told her I didn’t want to hear one word. Not one. 

I wanted to cry. How in the world would I get this room clean again? I still had dinner to make. And how would I ever have time to get those kids cleaned up? 

Most of us have been in a relatable situation. We extend aninvitation. It feels right. Then when the day gets closer, we wonder “what was I thinking?” My house is dirty! What will I make for dinner? We begin to feel unaccomplished and “not enough.” Where is the joy?

Isn’t there supposed to be joy in offering hospitality? Isn’t hospitality supposed to be about serving others? Sharing what we have that others may also feel joy? 

In the moment of seeing dirt spread across the room, I was not feeling joyful. But wait. 

“Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.” 1 Peter 4:9 (NIV)

I remembered the looks on my babies’ faces as they looked up at me gleefully and showed me what they had done. After all, I had asked them to play quietly. The road configuration they had created was a masterpiece! 

My heart softened.

Hospitality is mentioned numerous times in the Bible. Every religion or spiritual guidance mentions hospitality and ways of ceremoniously expressing our joy by sharing with others. Why? What do we miss about being hospitable when we become obsessed with the “Pinterest” version of sharing what we have instead of the spirituality behind being hospitable? 

The truth is we don’t have to be in a specific location or have specific food – although, both add to the moment and it’s a nice gesture. The menu does not have to be spectacular. Our homes do not have to be the “Better Homes and Gardens” version of shiny and spectacular.

The spirituality of hospitality – the true meaning of hospitality – is when we put our guest first and be present with them. We focus on them. We love on them. We cause them to feel joyful in knowing they are appreciated and are special. They relax. Their pressures melt away. Love in action.  

– Lillian

Lillian is a Maine-based writer and compassion consultantwhose topics explore everything related to food, human trafficking, and caregiving. She is patiently honing three writing projects – a “love of home” cookbook, a collection of interviews with caregivers of all ages, and inspirational cards for children. In the summer of 2018, she swam a total of 2 miles to rescue a 70 yr old kayaker and push him and his kayak back to shore.

Editors Note: I am excited and honored to invite you to join Lillian Lake (@llake) as she hosts our weekly #SpiritChat on Twitter, Sunday March 3rd at 9amET / 730pm India. Please do join, and enjoy her wonderful heart-filled hospitality. Come. Sit. Stay. Namaste – Kumud

Common Ground Spirituality

Tags

action, awareness, healing, relationships, spirituality

Common ground, like common sense, is becoming increasingly difficult to find. It isn’t that common ground doesn’t exist any more – it is perhaps that it has become buried under the layers of our increasingly fragmented lives – like the bulbs we planted in autumn, biding their time waiting to spring from underneath the layers of snow and frozen earth.

When we may think we have reached the end of the line, and that we have nothing more left in common, perhaps we can dig a little wider. We can step back, take a walk, or even sit in morning meditation and ask – what is it that we may have ignored or overlooked? And the answers may surprise us…

Commonality of backgrounds (immigrants from different continents), forgotten common interests, overlap in family values, shared beliefs (in goodness and kindness), common celebratory practices (food!) – even agreement in things we disagree about, things that annoy us, our shared dislikes, and much more….

Such was the invitation this week… to (re)discover, uncover common ground. To (re)search for it and renew it yet again. And the more I stepped back and looked with fresh eyes of the heart’s light, the more I found it in my close and distant relationships, even some faded and forgotten friendships, and particularly among the few that are especially close to me.

I discovered that it is perhaps in retraversing that common ground that the heart can find new paths, and find reasons to do some (not so) random acts of kindness. It is beneath frozen lakes and lagoons that the lighted waters flow again from the spring thaw in the heart. It is tending to common ground that enables us to repair the bridges that have grown algae because they haven’t been tenderly paused on, gently walked on, lovingly talked to and softly sung to for so long…

But why would we bother to do the work to find common ground in the first place? To assuage our guilt? Or to save, heal, being back to thriving, that which is worth keeping? And why is it worth healing? Because we have invested so much in it and come so far? Or whether we still see the potential for future growth, success and expansion – the spark that can kindle a thousand more micro explosions of joy when given the proper conditions of pressure, temperature, timing and ideal mix of fuel and air in the combustion chamber that is called common ground?

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us in our weekly twitter chat, Sunday Feb 24 at 9amET / 730pm India – walk and share some common ground (over tea and cookies) with us. Namaste – Kumud.

Visiting some ‘common ground’ bridges and pathways… as spring broke through briefly (Friday, Feb 22 2019)

Why Spirituality – I Wonder

Tags

awakening, awareness, happiness, joy, spirituality, wonder

For those of us who have been in and around the weekly conversations with the #spiritchat community on topics related to spirituality and spiritual practice, the answer to “why spirituality” may be plain as daylight. Many of us may even think the question to be irrelevant, or take the answer for granted.

Yet, I have been wondering about this question over the past few days, with a sense of wonder, with a sense and spirit of inquisitive, curious, scientific examination.

So, let me share my sense of wonder with you, and ask the short question – “why spirituality”? What is it about your ‘spiritual practice(s)’ that sets them apart from the rest of your daily life? How do you integrate the results and outcomes of your spirituality into solving the challenges of life and living? Has your approach to ‘spirituality’ changed as your life situation(s) have changed? If yes, how so?

I have often found that the answer to the question, particularly the question that is borne of wonder instead of being borne out of doubt, is already present in our awareness. Over the past few weeks, in preparation for spring, I have been doing some ‘house cleaning’ of my books, media, music and notebooks. During one such episode this week, I came across a few books that were given to be by my mother over my past few visits to India.

As I was sorting through them, one of the ‘bookmarks’ that I came across was a trifold brochure called ‘why spirituality’! The brochure, published in 2011, contains a few quotes from the then leader (Chariji) of the ‘Sahaj Marg’ foundation (http://sahajmarg.org). It contained not one, but a few answers to my sense of wonder. Let me share some of them with you in the quotes below – maybe one or more of them will resonate with you.

“Spirituality is the need for an inner existence. The whole idea of spirituality is to revive in us that which is sleeping in us – the true inner being, the Self”

Why Spirituality? It is a path to an awakening within. It is a yearning for something more than the routine of daily, worldly life. In spirituality, life becomes a wondrous journey to uncover that inner Self. Wonder leads to a wondrous journey. Yes!

“As a bird needs two wings to fly, a human being needs the two wings of existence, the spiritual and the material, to lead a natural and harmonious life”

Why Spirituality? For harmony, for the restoration of balance. Balance is restored by integrating a spiritual practice into daily life. A practice that blends into our daily living like sugar dissolves into tea.

“Happiness is the natural inner condition that we will reach when we have removed all unnecessary things”

Why Spirituality? Spiritual practice leads us to find true happiness and love. Joy is the quality of the inner Self, and is nurtured in spirituality, along with other qualities of the heart – courage, hope, faith, wonder, compassion, tolerance and, most of all, universal love. By following a spiritual practice, we have the possibility to experience universal love, the divine essence, within our own heart.

The brochure holds more wondrous messages. I shared the thoughts above with you, so that perhaps, you too shall wonder with a sense of inquiry – why spirituality? What is this spiritual path that I walk in my practice? How does my spirituality grow my heart and its inherent qualities, and the sense of joy and love within it?

Let the wondering begin. Let us share our wonder, our heart, and our joy and universal love with each other. And I will keep cleaning, exploring, practicing, uncovering more wonder. Namaste.

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join the #spiritchat community in our weekly twitter conversation – Sunday, Feb 10 at 9amET / 730pm India. Bring your sense of wonder with you, as we share the answers to ‘why spirituality’, over a cup of tea. Thank you!

After the storm, a double rainbow outside my door…

The Spirit of Loyalty

Tags

heart matters, loyalty, poetry, service, spirituality

“I am loyal to the throne. Who are you loyal to?”

It is interesting that we can watch a two-plus hour movie (during a polar vortex shut-in) filled with action, and the one fragment that adheres to us, days later. In the movie “Black Panther”, the question above was asked by Okoye (the General) of Nakia (the future Queen), in the moments after there is upheaval in the country of Wakanda.

I thought about the question that evening, and it kept returning to my brain box for a few days. I am still thinking about it. Let us begin at the beginning. What is loyalty? One definition of loyalty is a strong feeling of support of allegiance. The other synonyms are faithfulness, obedience, adherence, devotion and the like. It would seem that loyalty would be a good quality or virtue to develop in our character, yes?

Before we answer the original question (who are we loyal to?), maybe we can reflect on some related questions. Where does our sense of loyalty come from? What qualities in others incite, grow and sustain loyalty within us? What makes our loyalties wax and wane over time? Have you experienced real-world examples of long-term, unwavering, even permanent loyalty in your life? If so, how did such examples of loyalty influence you, your life?

Now that we have put the questions out upfront, we can reflect on them and probe for the answers. If we choose not to probe, we can cast the questions out like seeds, and wait for the answers to bloom in their own time. Either way, if we remain loyal to the process of asking, and then provide space and time for the answers to be received by us, the process has a chance of working. In this increasingly hurried world, we can perhaps reflect on the question – how loyal are we to the process of receiving (answers)?

But I digress a bit. As I asked myself some of the questions about loyalty, one common answer that seemed to emerge was that a lot of our loyalties, allegiances, adherences, even devotions – are transitional and transient in nature. Time and space and relationships change as we transit through life, and so do our loyalties. Even the long-term loyalties of satellites (moons) to planets are constantly changing (albeit ever so slightly) over time. (Aside: what examples of ‘deep loyalty’ may Mother Nature reveal to us?) So what chance do we mere mortals, of finite life-spans, have of developing and honoring permanent loyalty?

Maybe we need to look beyond, if we are to experience a permanent sense of loyalty. Our physical frames of existence and our actions within them, bound as they are by time, space and causation, are bound by impermanence. Hence, the resulting loyalties are (mostly) impermanent. What if we were to go beyond the physical, and into the spiritual domain? If we were to become and be meditative, examine our heartspace and feel our heartsense, what deeper loyalties may be revealed in That light?

Before she asked that question of Nakia, Okoye actually said… “I am loyal to the throne, no matter who sits on it“. If we ask the same question of our heart, what will be the reply? Who sits on our heart’s throne? Who are we really loyal to? Does that relationship have a nature of permanence?

Kumud @AjmaniK

On behalf of the #SpiritChat community, I invite you to join us for a conversation on this topic – Sunday, February 3 at 9amET / 730pm India. We would love to know – who sits on your heart’s throne? Namaste.

Postscript: Fragments of a poem, that keep coming, as answers to the question… if you can think of additions, please share in the comments… Namaste…

There may be be love without cause,
Just because…
But what is the nature, of cause without love?

There may be clouds without rain,
With loud refrain…
But what is the worth, of rain without clouds?

There may be heat without light,
Warming the night…
But have we felt the love, of light without heat?

There can be sight without vision,
A heart’s decision…
But can there be vision without sight?

– A Traveler’s Loyalty

The Spirit of Mentoring

Tags

guidance, guides, mentoring, mentors, spirituality

I miss my mentors. All of those who have passed…

My Dad was perhaps my first real mentor. Long before there were those outside the home, and they were few and far between because good mentors are hard to find, Dad was there. Even though he had an inclination towards silence and stillness, it was his carefully measured, softly uttered, frugally spoken words that still linger with me.

Words uttered on a railway platform as the train was departing and I had come to bid him farewell till the next school break – “I expect nothing but the best of effort from you”. When you are in middle school, that stuff somehow stays with you for a while. In my case, it’s been a few decades and I still remember that message from my mentor. The home was always stocked with all kind of books (mostly from American fiction authors!) and music (Indian and western). It was his way of creating an environment for me to ‘learn’ outside of my education. And there was much more. That was Dad’s mentorship.

My mother’s sister’s husband, my second Dad, was pretty much cut from the same mold of silence. I got to know him well because I spent fourteen years (from age seven) growing up in his household. His mentorship to me came through his relentless devotion to providing for his family. He worked long, long hours working the family business, and you did not want to be ‘talked to’ by him after he got home after a twelve hour day. His reverence and dedication in celebrating the major Indian festivals was also a great lesson in ‘slowing down’ for me. And when it came time for me to leave his home and come to the USA for graduate studies, he was instrumental in convincing my parents that it would be okay. He was my biggest cheerleader, and that gave me tremendous belief in myself. That was Uncle’s mentorship.

When I moved to the US, his youngest brother here became my ‘American Dad’ and mentor. He and his family provided a sense of ‘home away from home’ that was vital for someone whose nearest family was on the other side of the world. An electrical engineer for Ford, he always kept a keen eye on me all through graduate school. I looked forward to meeting up with every Thanksgiving and Christmas, so that I could learn from him about how to raise a family with a blend of American and Indian values. A lot of his wonderful advice about faith, career and family, continues to linger with me. That was my Ann Arbor uncle.

And while all three of them have physically departed, I can honestly say that I often find myself asking – what would Dad (or my Uncles) do in such and such situation? I can also say that I have had a very tough time replacing them as mentors. The closest ‘replacement’ was my NASA mentor – I am greatly indebted for his decision to take me under his wing when I was first starting my career.

All this talk about ‘male’ mentors doesn’t mean that I did not have any ‘female’ role models. I have talked about them (my Mother, my Aunts, my maternal grandmother) extensively in many previous #spiritchat blog posts. For some reason, as I sat in morning #meditation this past Sunday, I was asked these questions – Who are your mentors? Who are you mentoring? How are mentors different from role models? And what about our (spiritual) guides? How do I go about identifying some new mentors in my life? What effect is the (apparent) lack of influential mentors in my life having on me and my growth?

I share these questions that were asked of me with you, with the intent that perhaps you can relate to (some of) them. Yes, we have all the power within us to do great things, but a lot of that potential lies latent – like fuel needing a spark. What if the heart-based guidance of a good mentor could ‘raise us to that stage’, and help us manifest our power, so that we may expand our experience of truth, awareness and joy?

Kumud @AjmaniK

Share your stories about mentors and mentoring in our weekly twitter conversation – Sunday, January 27 at 9amET / 730pm India in #SpiritChat. Who knows – maybe you will find a new mentor, or have an opportunity to mentor someone you haven’t even met yet? Namaste – Kumud

Swami Vivekananda – A mentor whom I met through his books, poetry, lectures and essays…

On Ritual and Science

Tags

philosophy, science, spirituality

A New Daily Ritual

Every morning, some days even before our multiple rounds of morning tea (or coffee) were yet to be completed as we sat by the pool overlooking the vast lake, she would arrive. Her smiling, glowing, full-of-life greeting was always the same – “Namaste, Sir. Namaste, Madam”. She would be decked with gold jewelry as if she was ready to attend an Indian wedding. This ritual became part of every single one of our ten days in Kerala.

She was the housekeeper who took care of the entire span of the five bedroom home that we were staying in. After her welcome greeting, she would immediately start her work. Broom in hand, she would start her slow back and forth walk. First, in all the common areas and all the walkways. Then, when we were at breakfast or at lunch, she and her helpers would take care of the bedrooms and attached bathrooms. Every time I saw her, she was working, focused on her task at hand, standing tall, head slightly bowed, radiating pride. If she ever took a break, I did not see it.

Adherence to Ritual

Now that I have been back for almost two weeks, my sleep cycle has mostly reset itself. Except when it isn’t. I was awake at 1am last night, and decided to pull the “Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda (Vol. 1)” from my go-to stack of books. Randomly opening the book, I found myself in the midst of the essay on “Karma Yoga” (Science of Work) titled “We help ourselves, not the world”. It happens to be one of my favorites because it includes the following quote:

This world is like a dog’s curly tail, and people have been striving to straighten it out for hundreds of years; but when they let it go, it has ruled up again. How could it be otherwise? One has to know how to work with attachment, then one will not be a fanatic. If there were no fanaticism in the world, it would make much more progress than it does now.When we have avoided fanaticism, then alone will we work well.

It often comes to pass that we so fervently believe in our path, our vision, our righteousness, our desire to do good that we may unwittingly take on the traits of working like fanatics. Our work-ritual becomes our refuge, our excuse to become so hyper-focused on our goal that we lose sight of detachment and the real purpose of our life’s work. We think that our single-minded devotion to our cause is doing good to the world. But is it really so?

Ritual and Philosophy

At the beginning of the same essay, Vivekananda posits that there are three components of every religion: philosophy, mythology and ritual. Philosophy forms the essence; mythology explains and illustrates through legendary lives of great men and women; and ritual gives to that philosophy a concrete form so that every one may relate to it. Ritual is in fact concretized philosophy.

Ritual leads to symbols, to language, to communication and connection. In its pure state, it is in fact the seed bed of the science of work. In addition, the connection between word and thought often occurs through symbols. When I offer a greeting to you with folded hands and a radiant smile, my whole being assumes the symbology of love. The energy transfer in this ritual needs no scientific proof – try it and experience the goodness that it creates for the world, and more importantly, within you.

The Ritual of Hope

Her name was Asha. It simply means, Hope. On my last day at the lake house, I engaged her in a bit of conversation. A high-school graduate, married to Shenoy, mother of two kids – a boy aged eight and a girl aged six. She worked because she wanted to help supplement her husband’s income, so that they could save up enough to send their boy and girl to college. Her philosophy in life seemed to reflect her simplicity. “Do the work that is assigned to you with joy”.

Every time I think of her approach and attitude to her work, I draw hope from her daily ritual. She seemed to model Vivekananda’s suggestion for us regarding work:

It is the level-headed person, the calm person, of good judgement and cool nerves, of good sympathy and love, who does good work and thus good to themselves.

Thank you, Asha. I am going to adopt your attitude to work. And if you will allow me, I also plan to adopt your family – not to help you, but to you help myself. For you reminded me of the power of joy in work, and making work play.

Playing with Ritual

And as I played with this topic, it dawned on me that ritual is embedded in spi(ritual)ity. It may seem like wordplay, but maybe there’s more to it. There’s more. Ritual begins with ‘ritu’, which means season, i.e. in every new season, we can adopt a new set of actions, create new rituals. A further reduction leads us to ‘rit’, which reminds me of ‘writ’ and the Sanskrit ‘reet’ – which means code (of ethics), tradition, and yes, concretized philosophy. Finally, there is ‘ri’ – which is the root word for ‘rishi’ – those who follow the path of goodness and become illumined.

So much for science, eh? Sometimes it just gets in the way of play. Maybe we will just rebrand ritual as #workscience. What do you say? Who’s with me?

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us in our weekly conversation on twitter with the #spiritchat community. Sunday, January 20 at 9amET / 730pm India. We will talk about the role of ritual(s) in our lives. Which ones did we inherit? Which ones serve us well? Which ones do we need to walk away from? How do our ritual(s) help us on the spiritual path? Does science understand the effect that ritual(s) have on our emotional and spiritual well-being? So many questions. Come share – in the ritual that has become an integral part of my well-being. Namaste – Kumud.

Asha – the Hope of Kumarakom, Kerala

The Spirit of Curiosity

Tags

curiosity, discovery, science, spirituality

The Spirit of Curiosity – by Christy Johnson

Recently I had yet another conversation about how radical it was for me to quit engineering to start an energy healing practice, which made me curious about the differences and similarities between my two professions. After all, if my soul embraced both for me as part of who I was and who I was becoming, are they that incompatible?

Science and Spirituality

My musings led me to realize that spirituality and the forefront of science both spring from unconventional thought and result in new awareness. We may perceive science and engineering as solid, knowledge-based, and quantifiable. Yet while science pertains to what is already known it also explores what is unknown and uncharted, inviting us to be curious about possibilities and to let go of old certainties and beliefs. Both science and spirituality help us expandour understanding via curiosity.

Curiosity and Serendipity

I realized they also both have an element of serendipity.  An extraordinary shift happens when we surrender to divine timing and divine intelligence, curious to see what might occur beyond our own limited imagination. The discovery of penicillin is a prime example of this considering what revealed itself was not part of the original experimental design. Surrendering with curiosity leads us to truth.

 

Children arrive on the planet naturally curious. They come from a place of awe and wonder which happens also to be where spirituality arises. When we tap into curiosity, we can connect more deeply with nature, our selves, and others because we’ve released judgment and have embraced being present.

Engaging Curiosity

Returning to my own life, asking what, why, and how questions in the Akashic Records soul database or seeking a supportive Jin Shin Jyutsu flow for clients leverages my curiosity — just as it did when I used to use transmission electron microscopes to investigate why computer chips failed. Why do I see this and not that? What does this finding mean? How do we explain and resolve our thorniest problems?

 

Now my curious mind is engaged and more questions arise. What happens when we approach spirituality, and even life, with curiosity? What happens when we move beyond expectations and beliefs? What happens when we start asking questions instead of making statements? What’s the connection between curiosity and creativity? What relationship does curiosity have to healthy relationships, intelligence, and even longevity? How do we restore our curiosity? What hampers it? What is possible?

 

Please join us this Sunday, January 6th, 2019 at 9 A.M. EDT/7:30 P.M. India in #SpiritChat on Twitter, as we explore The Spirit of Curiosity. Please come to connect, learn, and share how you welcome curiosity into your outlook and your life. What magic might happen when spend an hour being curious together?

– Christy Johnson (@IntuitiveHeal on Twitter)

Host Bio: Dr. Christy Johnson quit her decades-long engineering career in 2010 to open her own integrative energy healing practice. She helps clients create love and compassion inthe relationships with themselves and others via soul level information, energy healing, and empowering self-help tools. You can connect with her via her website www.intuitiveheal.com , on Twitter @IntuitiveHeal and on her new YouTube channel.

Holistic Awareness by Janet Nestor

Tags

awareness, health, holistic, spirituality

Holistic Awareness is a choice and a way of life. It is present moment living that allows connection and awareness of our body, mind, emotions, our energy field and flow, our spirit, and our environment. Holistic Awareness is a way to feel vital and alive – to feel free and limitless – to find contentment.

Holistic awareness is not a mental activity, yet we have a better perception. There is a greater awareness and ability to use the information provided through our sense of touch, smell, sight, sound, and taste. Holistic awareness allows us to “talk” with our body and sense into our environment. It enriches our self-knowledge, self-understanding and allows interaction with our inner nature and the nature of creation.

Awareness and Childhood

As children, most of us need not be taught how to stay in touch with our own inner nature.
We are born connected to ourselves and the divine. We have present moment holistic awareness and instinctively know when we are hungry, sleepy, when our diaper needs changing, and when we are uncomfortable in our environment. We sense who loves us and we develop a connection with them that includes trust. But our culture expects us to learn certain things and most of them lead us away from our most precious gifts.

As we grow older, we are urged to wait a minute or deny our needs. We are asked to repress our hunger until a certain time, to sit still when we need to move, or eat when we are not hungry or sleep when we are not tired. Some of us have been urged to accept someone (caregiver or family member) who frightens us. Because our instincts are not honored on a regular basis, we learn not to trust them. Gradually we learn to live in our heads and from our thoughts.

Our Return to Awareness

A growing holistic awareness is essential to our well-being, and it is the key to our personal growth and our physical and emotional healing. It is how we learn to connect to our own divinity and the universal wisdom that makes everything possible. As adults, we have to overcome our lifelong conditioning and learn to trust the messages that constantly come from our body and environment. We even have to learn to trust our own divine nature.

The moment our holistic journey begins, we change the way we perceive ourselves and the way we perceive life and the world. As our awareness blossoms we slowly (or suddenly in an ah-ha moment) notice the hidden parts of our inner being and the realities of mother nature and our communities. The journey provides opportunities for us to know and understand our beliefs, our emotions, our memories (good and bad), and ask the most fundamental question: Why am I here now, with this family, with this job, with these life issues, with this body I’m not totally satisfied with, and with the health issues that plague my life or the life of someone I love.

Practical Ways of Choosing Awareness

Many of us choose holistic awareness and want to begin a spiritual journey, but we don’t know how. But we can seek answers and join groups like #SpiritChat. Here are four suggestions that might enrich your journey.

1. Become aware that you are becoming aware; learn to be a witness of your own actions and thoughts. Self evaluate without judgment or criticism. Allow your perception to expand.
2. Accept your life as it is now. Acceptance is the beginning of all change.
3. Realize that you are limitless and free and that you have choices and the ability to positively change your life.
4. Allow your mind to become peaceful, quiet, still, and unencumbered through meditation, spending time in nature, or sitting in silent contemplation. The result will be a reality-based communication and an increased sense of being part of the world around you.

-Janet

Author’s Note: This post is adapted from Revolutionize Your Health, a new book I co-authored with Cornelia Merk. The book is a seven-year collaboration that is filled with lots of researched information, deep soul searching, and personal stories from ourselves and others. It is interesting to know that Connie and I have never met in person. Social Media and fate brought us together in 2012. On that first phone call we were so synergistic that we agreed to merge our previous writing into what we thought would be an eBook. That eBook turned into chapters, we hired an editor, and a new book was born. Our book launches on January 22, 2019.

Editor’s Note: Please join me as I host our long-time friend, supporter, participant and advisor to the #SpiritChat community, Janet Nestor (@JanetNestor). We will gather on Sunday, December 16 at 9amET / 730pm India on twitter. Thank you – Kumud @AjmaniK

Janet Nestor of Revolutionize Your Health

The Gratitude Challenge

Tags

challenges, gratitude, spirituality, thankfulness, thanksgiving

If the number of blog posts that I have written about Thanksgiving are a good measure, then it is an open secret that this is my favorite American holiday. The confluence of many events after my arrival here in the fall for graduate studies, led to a heart-warning introduction to this family-first holiday of “giving thanks”. Even though the holiday itself was “all new” to me, the notion of giving thanks felt as old as the hills.

It reminded me of two words – the first being dhanyavaad – the formal expression of thanks in India. It is a combination of two words, dhanya, meaning blessed or most fortunate, and vaad meaning, an event or a happening. The second, somewhat informal word expressing thanks often used in India is shukriya – a combination of shu-bh meaning auspicious, and kriya meaning action or practice.

It ought to be no surprise that the words used in the expression of gratitude are similar across languages. The very sound of a heartfelt “thank you” or “gracias” or “merci” or “shukriya” is often music for our hearts. When the music of thanksgiving creates harmony, it brings joy to the giver and the receiver. So, with these apparent benefits, what possible challenge(s) could there be in the path of our practice of gratitude?

The first challenge is that we are much more open to giving thanks to others than receiving it. We somehow carry around the notion that we are perhaps undeserving of others’ gratitude. The second notion is that “no thanks is due” because we are simply “doing our duty” and that we are best off doing it without any expectation of reward and such. The third notion is that if we accept it from them, we are somehow bound into reciprocity. Do you identify with any of these notions of receiving gratitude?

The second challenge is that we are unsure of the who, why, how, when and where of giving thanks to others. In a world where our offline relationships are getting lesser and lesser time, space and engagement, we are perhaps losing the opportunity to practice the art of saying thanks. Or maybe we don’t have enough role models in our communities who give thanks with grace and unfettered joy. Who was a role model for “giving thanks” for you? For me, it was my maternal grandmother. I don’t know that I remember her saying “dhanyavad” or “shukriya” very often, but her actions spoke volumes. A slight smile, a gentle tilt of the head, a leaning in during conversation- they all felt like she was giving gratitude with every action, in every engagement.

The third challenge in our gratitude practice is the notion that we don’t have “enough”. The great irony that “Black Friday” comes earlier and earlier every year may not be lost on many of us. To my mind, it is simply an outsized attempt to somehow convince us of the “lack” in our lives.

But I have news for you. The first part of the Heartfulness meditation practice is “relaxation”. The intent is to creates awareness of our body, in the form of a slow scan beginning from the toes, traveling through several parts of the lower and upper body, to the crown of the head. As I did the relaxation this morning, I became aware, and thankful, for the mere presence and good health of every single one of my body’s internal and external organs. The gratitude that swept through me after I was done, was a bit overwhelming. Try it. It will only take a few minutes, and you can do it wherever you are. Repeat this ‘relaxation into gratitude’ exercise often, and it will become a portable resource that you can take with you.

So, here we are. Thanksgiving is here again. Maybe we will continue to work our challenges, of giving, of receiving, of (lack of? too much?) abundance. So that the day of, and the days before and after Thanksgiving will bring us a series of opportunities to experience dhanyavaad or gratitude-filled interactions.

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join the #SpiritChat community on Twitter for our weekly chat – Sunday, November 18 at 9amET / 730pm India ~ shukriya and Happy Thanksgiving!

The Heart’s Intelligence

Tags

heart, intelligence, spirituality

Heart’s Intelligence (by Denna J. Shelton)

“If the 20 th Century has been the Century of the Brain …
then the 21 st century should be the Century of the Heart.”
~Gary. E.R. Schwartz, Ph.D., Author of The Living Energy Universe

One of the most astounding, exciting pieces of information I’ve ever received came while attending a lecture given by spiritualist/scientist Gregg Braden.  Every hair on my body stood on its end and I connected with it as deep truth. It validated from a scientific perspective what I already knew to be true. Gregg shared the findings from the Institute of Heart Math stating that “the heart, not the brain, is the most powerful neural-network within the human body.” I learned its electricity is 40-60% stronger than the brain’s and contains around 40,000 “brain-like cells” that literally communicate with the brain in every nanosecond of the day.

Coherence between our hearts and our brains is the ultimate state of being in experiencing overall emotional, physical, and mental health. “Unfortunately ego choices are overriding our heart’s intelligence,” states the Institute of Heart Math. Most of us already know this to be true and have no need for the science of it. Yet, do we really know how powerful our hearts are? Do we really know how powerful we are when heart-centered? Do we really know our impact on the planet by what lies within our individual heart?

The ultimate question may be… What old stories and beliefs are you holding in your heart that are governing your life and affecting the whole?

Science has proven what ancient wisdom has known all along. The heart is powerful and holds an intelligence all of its own – often referred to as the “master organ” and was revered and celebrated by the ancients. “It’s only in more recent history that the pendulum swung the other way in science and medicine in thinking of the heart as an isolated pump,” states Gregg Braden in his latest book, Resilience from the Heart.

Is now the time for the pendulum to swing back to the center balancing our hearts with our brains? Is now the time for us to access the wisdom our hearts hold? Surely now is the time to have a state of being which radiates love, joy, peace and harmony in a powerful way for our personal well-being and that of the worlds.

You’re cordially invited to join us for a global conversation to discuss the topic “Heart’s Intelligence.” This is a #SpiritChat community event taking place on the Twitter platform this Sunday, November 11 at 9am ET.

We look forward to having you join us!

Denna J. Shelton, CH, RMP

Heart’s Intelligence
A Global #SpiritChat Community Event on Twitter with Denna Shelton (@twentygems)
Sunday, November 11 @ 9a ET

Denna J. Shelton, CH, RMP has 30 years’ experience in whole wellness: mind, body, & spirit as a fitness instructor, consulting hypnotist, and Reiki Master Practitioner. Her strengths include her experience, knowledge, calming and soothing charisma, and passion for what she does. All of these characteristics, along with her pleasant voice, laid back and comfortable presence and ease of speaking contributes to her success in service to others.

Her unique approach to hypnosis and Reiki is in combing the two modalities. She thinks each stand effectively on their own, but the two together have proven to be a powerful combination for mind, body, and spirit. Denna believes the touchstone and balancer of all energies is love. Her role as the hypnotist/healer is to open your heart to love where transmutation and regeneration take place.

Denna’s belief: “Now is the time, more than ever, for us to embrace the Truth of who we truly are. It is time to align the quality of our thinking with the needs of our bodies and the desires of our hearts. To claim the power that is our birthright that leads to a life of joy, peace, love, and abundance in all ways.”

www.dennashelton.com