by Lori | Sep 29, 2016 | Blog
It is almost impossible to look at the world around us and not see general disarray.
In the United States, the political left and right are fervently trying to appeal to the middle that their candidate is the better of the two most disliked candidates in our country’s history if the opinion polls are to be believed!
Whether in religious, social, or international dealings, the standard for tolerance and compassion appears to be not taking violent action or refraining from verbally insulting those with different opinions or beliefs.
And one wonders whether Lady Justice is wearing her blindfold to hold the energy of non-judgment or because she can’t seem to see a solution for all the strife and divisiveness.
These are examples of how things might look in our outer world currently.
However, I know we are capable of turning the divisiveness and separation we feel into Unity for all. We must abandon the idea that the order and way things were done in the past – whether economic, political, social, or religious – is the only model for us to follow now. There is a reason we see so many systems breaking down. It is because we need to break through with new ideas, new techniques, and new processes that fit the circumstances we find ourselves in now.
The answers that worked in the past may still be valid, but only if the facts and circumstances are the same. Most of us realize that this millennium, this century, even this decade has new challenges that need to be met with ideas that we were unable or unwilling to see in the past.
We need to be willing to work toward unity.
We can start our journey toward unity with working with the energies of harmony and cooperation with our fellow humans and with our environment. Harmony and cooperation are good goals for the majority of us.
Many people are willing to strive for harmony and cooperation even if simply because these energies are the polite ways of getting along in a civil society. At a four-way stop, it makes sense for us to take our turns moving through the intersection. In a ski lift line, more people will get on the ski lift without empty chairs passing by if we line up orderly and move through the line more efficiently. Harmony and cooperation are logical in these situations.
The energy of unity is definitely a lofty goal. Unity must be experienced to be fully understood. Most of the time in our society, individualism is what appears to serve us better than unity. However, just like in the example of the ski chairlifts going by empty, individualism can lead to waste in one arena where more unity would have allowed for that resource to be utilized more beneficially for the whole. When we are coming from the energy of individualism, we may hold onto something longer than we need to because of a fear of scarcity. When we work with and strive for unity, we are trusting that our needs will be met in accordance with the highest plan. The highest plan for unity leaves no one behind, assuming each is willing to commit to the unity of the whole. You will want to check with your guidance to see if the energy of unity is a goal for you right now.
In our society, those of us who strive for harmony, cooperation, and eventually unity may be viewed by others as being in disarray and being out of sync with “reality”. You might even hear others say, “why aren’t you taking sides,” or “if you are registered as an independent, you aren’t doing anyone any good.” When you hear statements like this, you know that the person saying it is allowed her or his opinion, but it doesn’t stop you from having the long-term goal of tolerance, harmony, cooperation, and unity.
Following your guidance, you will be able to stand in your power and stand in the disarray of unity.
by Lori | Aug 19, 2016 | Blog
A few years ago, I went on my first “silent retreat” over a three day weekend. The goal was to not speak, read, listen to radio or music nor watch TV. We were in retreat at Benet Hill Monastery near Colorado Springs, Colorado. Everything we needed was within walking distance and we were on a meal plan provided by the Sisters. This helped to keep the outside stimuli and the need to “think” to a minimum. The goal was to just BE.
Before I went, I was telling one of my long-time friends about it on a phone call. Before he could say anything, I said, “Are you laughing?” He said, “from deep in my belly!” Then, a person who I just met said, “but you are so outgoing and gregarious.” This just made me laugh. I know that I have neither the inclination nor is it my path to take a vow of silence at this particular time in this particular life. But, I would like to share with you what I experienced in my 60 hours of silence.
We used a guided meditation to set the tone for the 60 hours. This meditation, channeled and narrated by Marsha Hankins, helped us connect to the larger parts of ourselves, to mother earth and the cosmos. By leaving this meditation in silence and not breaking it with any other outside stimuli was quite powerful. I could focus on experiencing the feeling of being connected and being one with everything around me in the physical world. I could also experience being connected and being one with everything in the metaphysical world. Experiencing the metaphysical world through the sensations and the sense of knowingness that is lost in the overload of the 5 human senses. This was staggeringly profound, and I was only 1 hour into the silence.
I am not sure I ever mastered the “monkey mind” which is part of the goal of being in silence. The idea is to be in the silence long enough that you don’t feel the need to entertain yourself even in your own thoughts. Instead, you simply allow yourself to experience the “now”. I found myself still discussing scenarios with myself. Discussing conversations that I had in the past and why they were appropriate or how I could have handled them better. Or discussing different ways I could say things that I knew I was going to need to say when I was “back in the real world”. These discussions are all “judgment based.” I realized I was judging myself for things I did in the past or judging “what if I don’t get it correct” in the future. A whole lot of judging going on!
Finally, what I found the most surprising was the simple yet acute joy that I found when I was walking around the monastery grounds. It was a rainy weekend and it was cool at the altitude of 6000 feet. Never being cold but enjoying the coolness was a slice of heaven. Walking the Labyrinth at least twice a day and reminding myself of the innocence and breathtaking aspects of our shared reality that can include peace and relaxation if we allow it. I found myself trying to determine how I would be able to add in some of the aspects of the silence into my everyday life even as the 24-hour news cycle and access to the internet tempt me to fill every moment of every day with someone else’s thoughts and someone else’s experiences. I am setting my intention to claim a little bit of every day for the silence in nature, the silence in the cosmos and the silence within me. This will surely be how and when I find the God/Goddess Within.
by Lori | Aug 1, 2016 | Blog
Growing up Catholic in the middle section of the United States, I believed that God was male. I was raised to believe in equality of female and male humans, but God was referred to as a male. Being Catholic, we did venerate Mother Mary and other female saints, but their goodness and power came from their personal conviction, service to God, and willing obedience to God’s will. These beliefs served me well until they didn’t.
It wasn’t until I was exploring options outside of the Western traditional religions that I realized that God / Source / The All That Is is both male and female. God – indeed the Universe / Source – is made up of both divine masculine and divine feminine energies and I needed to find the truth in this both intellectually and experientially.
Eminent Reiki™ helped me integrate that Source is both masculine and feminine. Eminent Reiki™ is a healing modality that allows us to tap into the energy of the universe and then channel it for the good of ourselves, others, and all of Mother Earth and her kingdoms. We are taught from the very first class that this universal energy is both masculine and feminine and is balanced and in harmony within itself. One of the goals of Eminent Reiki™ is to balance the masculine and feminine energy within ourselves.
To understand the balance of masculine and feminine energies, take the example of a pendulum swinging from side to side. The balance point in the middle is when masculine and feminine energy is perfectly balanced and in harmony. If the pendulum is on the right side, there is too much masculine energy. If the pendulum is stuck on the left, there is too much feminine energy. The goal is the perfect balance between the two. This balance allows us to feel in harmony with the intuition and wisdom we tap into (feminine energy) as we take the action steps (masculine energy) we are guided to take. Taking action steps that are not well guided or without the wisdom behind them, might mean that we are looking productive but we are not actually accomplishing the goal, because they are the wrong action steps or are harder than they need to be. On the other hand, sitting back and waiting for the absolute perfect information before taking the action step might mean we miss learning what we need to learn in order to move forward. Potentially, too much masculine energy could be viewed like that old saying: we are lost but we are making good time. Too much feminine energy might be viewed as being too scared to make a wrong move that we don’t move forward at all. Both of these scenarios are out of balance.
In Eminent Reiki™, we specifically try to balance all of our physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual systems to be in harmony between the divine masculine energy and the divine feminine energy. We ask to balance the feminine energy in our light channel and the masculine energy in our light channel. We seek to have these energies in balance to the point that they are blended and there is the power, strength, and wellbeing in that combined energy. There is evolution in the combined energy.
Some people may not think it necessary to distinguish or intentionally bringing in feminine as well as masculine energies. They might ask if we are bringing in and feeling the energy of Source, why is it necessary to specifically ask to bring in divine feminine and divine masculine energy. These people may have a point if they are holding the highest intention that Source is truly made up of many aspects and they are integrating all those different aspects as they refer to and experience the overall energy of Source. However, most people are not experiencing the oneness of these divine aspects that way, yet. Most of us have false beliefs that keep us in either too much masculine energy or too much feminine energy. Our pendulum swings out of balance to one side or the other where we experience life too passively or too actively and in reaction to the belief systems that may no longer serve us well.
If most of us were balanced between our masculine and feminine energies, we would have less strife in our personal lives and in the world as a whole. The energy of Oneness and Source, when balanced with all the different aspects of Source rolling up into it, would manifest in the physical, emotional and mental world much differently than most are currently experiencing life on Earth. Asking to fill with and balance divine masculine and divine feminine energies is the next step to then feeling the oneness of the combined energy.
For me, recognizing that there was more than just a masculine God, then moving to want to feel the energy of the divine feminine with the divine masculine, and then feeling them as One / Source / All That Is is the progression of evolution that is working for me. I encourage you to start to feel this, too. The ultimate goal is to feel this energy as the Oneness that it truly is, but most of us need to take this realization step by step just as we do in most other areas of our lives. We walk before we run. We babble before we speak. Thus, ask to fill with and allow yourself to feel divine feminine and divine masculine energy balanced within.
If you would like more information on Eminent Reiki™ please follow this link www.eminentreiki.com or leave a message below. Namaste.
by Lori | Jul 1, 2016 | Blog
I will admit it. I have been struggling with the concept of Divine Gratitude.
Readers of my blog know I teach and believe that we are all aspects of the God/Goddess All That Is / Source. Source is all there is and we are a part of it. We are unique aspects of this wondrous universal (perhaps “multiversal”) energy of Source. This is the key point to the teachings of Standing in the Light® programs and classes.
Another fundamental aspect of the SITL classes is that in order to consciously create we must hold the intention of what we want to create and the energies of Divine Love, Divine Surrender, Divine Detachment, Divine Trust and Divine Gratitude plus whatever qualities of what you are trying to create – such as a car, house, or new job. However, no matter what we are trying to manifest or create, we must be holding the first five energies sufficiently to bring our intention into form.
These are the reasons each of the five energies is necessary:
- Divine Love – to know and understand ourselves as love with the self-worth and self-confidence to bring the creation into form.
- Divine Detachment – to not be concerned how and when the creation comes into form.
- Divine Trust and Divine Surrender – to be willing to trust and surrender to what the highest plan is and to trust and surrender to our own ability to bring it into form.
- Finally, Divine Gratitude – to be willing to show gratitude and be grateful prior to something coming into form. (Anyone can show gratitude after what he/she is trying to manifest comes into form, but the master shows it before it is created with the confidence that it will be created.)
What I was struggling with was the intersection of knowing I am an aspect of Source and therefore ultimately I am Source with the idea of giving gratitude to the Source that I am. Why would I need to give gratitude to an energy source that I am?
What I figured out was I was under one of two possible misconceptions. First, I was misunderstanding that the gratitude I was giving was to some benevolent energy outside of myself that needs me to give gratitude to it as if I was borrowing its car on a Saturday night. At least this misconstrued gratitude was to a benevolent Source because the second one wasn’t. The second misunderstanding was that I was giving gratitude to an energy that wasn’t quite so benevolent as if I was a supplicant or subject needing to show unconditional gratitude out of fear of reprisal if I didn’t.
Having been able to see through these two misconceptions, I finally realized that the gratitude I was giving and feeling was to and for myself, myself as this wonderful aspect of Source. I needed to allow the gift of the energy and joyful feeling of Divine Gratitude for all the many wonderful qualities and frequencies that I hold ethereally which come into form physically because of the universal law of like attracts like. Because I am holding a certain cocktail of frequencies, I attract those physical manifestations to me.
That is what I have to be grateful for: feeling, knowing and being the state of total enjoyment of what has been created and honoring that creation. That is what Divine Gratitude is. That is what we need to know and be in order to bring any intention into form. The knowingness of the Joy of Gratitude.
Want to read more about Gratitude? Check out these two blog entries by Ginger Withee and myself. https://iamstandinginthelight.com/the-grace-of-gratitude/ and https://iamstandinginthelight.com/grace-and-gratitude-two-ideas-whose-time-has-come/
by Lori | May 11, 2016 | Blog
Are you an Outlander fan, like me? Reading the Outlander series has given me cause to question how I might act if I were in similar situations as the characters.
The Outlander series is a time-traveling love story written by Diana Gabaldon. There are eight books in the series with the ninth coming out soon. Gabaldon has also written many short stories and side stories involving the same characters. Gabaldon’s books and characters are so popular that Starz has turned them into a cable TV series.
I am currently reading book number seven, An Echo in the Bone. I won’t go too far into spoiler mode but I need to give a little background in order to tell you what I have questioned about myself while reading the books.
The main characters in Outlander are Claire, an English World War II nurse, who time travels to 1743 Scotland where she meets our hero, Jamie, a Scottish Highland warrior. Jamie, although enamored with Claire, is not enamored with “outlanders” the derogatory term for the English. Claire eventually shares her time travel secret with Jamie and convinces him of her knowledge of the future, since it is history to her.
From the beginning of the shared knowledge, Claire and Jamie debate whether it is possible for two people to change the future. Although an ongoing theme, my metaphysical questions didn’t really come to me until reading An Echo in the Bone. Here comes the spoiler alert!
In An Echo in the Bone, Jamie and Claire are now living in the British Colonies of North America thirty odd years forward from when they first met in 1743. The Declaration of Independence of 1776 has been declared and for a few years running up to that, the British subjects in the North American Colonies are deciding whether to stay loyal to England or to take up the cause of those opposing the English King.
Claire knows the outcome of the war even when almost no one, including the rebelling colonists, would have predicted it.
The questions metaphysically are, if you had the insight and knowledge that Claire has regarding the outcome of the war between the rebelling colonies and Britain, how would you act? What would you do? Would you keep your eye on the end game? Would you work to help others see the truth of the revolutionary cause? Would you experience your outer world more calmly because you know how it will end? Or would you continue to be in fear because of the potential of dying in the war, regardless of the final outcome? Would you have the courage to move forward or would you move to a region of the world not affected directly?
These are basically the same questions we can ask ourselves regarding the experiment in duality. If we know the final outcome will be that everyone and everything on Mother Earth will remember who we truly are, will return home to the oneness of Source, would we have the courage to move forward regardless of how chaotic and physically challenging we see the outer world? Will we allow ourselves to move through the layers of our fear to our own evolution where we might be able to help others see the truth of this seemingly revolutionary cause? Or would we, with the knowledge that we have, try to deny the inevitable by staying with the status quo of the third-dimensional world even when we know that is not ultimately sustainable?
Asking and answering these questions will not change the final outcome. We all do make it home, even those who are trying to stay in the third-dimensional reality because that is all they know or because it is where they believe their power base is. All make it home because we are already home. We are already God/Goddess All That Is. However, the answer to the questions will determine how much joy we have in the journey and perhaps how much joy we can help others to experience, as well. There is no judgment from Source / God/Goddess All That Is regarding how long we exist in the experiment in duality. Time is also an illusion so there really isn’t a “how long we exist in the experiment” concept either. You can be the first on your block to adopt the revolutionary idea of evolving out of the experiment and remembering who you are even when all evidence to the contrary in your outer world might lead you to believe that the status quo is the only option you have. Don’t worry about holding onto the old paradigm. Master the illusion and move into the new paradigm. The new world awaits.
