by Lori | Mar 30, 2015 | Blog
I was using some great hand lotion the other day – Everyone Lotion – and I just happened to notice the directions. It said, “Use Freely and Enjoy”.
How do you think our current world vision would look if one of the Ten Commandments was – Use Freely and Enjoy?
What a wonderful outlook for life that would be. No – “thou shall nots”, No – “Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain”, But instead – Use Freely and Enjoy.
Regardless of which version of the Ten Commandments you look at, the majority of them have a “shall not” in it. In the Catholic Version, which is the one I was originally taught, only two don’t have the word “not” in them. (Keep holy the Sabbath and Honor your father and mother.)
Would it be easier to take the underlying message and good ideas of how to live in a society and how to have self-growth if the suggestions were written in a positive way? That way the focus would be on the positive actions instead of restricting negative actions.
If the commandment of “Thou Shall Not Kill” was instead “Love All” how would we react when faced with the situation where we were debating an action that might seem like killing someone was justified. If you are in the situation where you are trying to justify killing someone, would you be less likely in that situation if the other person also had as her commandment “Love All”. Can we change the dynamic and change the energy if we focus on the things we want to create instead of restricting the things we don’t want to create? It goes to the old saying of it is easier to get bees with honey than with vinegar.
With that as the idea, I believe we would have a much different world if our Ten Commandments were more like life suggestions on the ways to improve ourselves and improve our world. I would rather use the name “Ten Suggestions” to take away the judgment and punishment aspect of the energy associated with “Commandment”. Again, I believe this “lighter touch” will pay dividends in the execution of the suggestion.
So let’s try these alternatives on for size.
The Ten Suggestions
- You are part of a wonderful loving and powerful universe. Use freely and enjoy.
- Know yourself as peace and joy.
- Know all intelligence and all beings as wondrous and abundant. Speak of all of creation well.
- Every day is beautiful and wonderful. Be in gratitude for it and keep it holy.
- Honor your father and your mother, in whatever form they take.
- Honor and love all humans. Hold them in the highest regard just as you view yourself. (Yes, this is a paraphrase of what Jesus taught. He is right. We should live this more!)
- Create what you need from the abundance of the universe.
- Know yourself as Love, Loved and Loving.
- “Be impeccable with your word.” (To quote don Miguel Ruiz from his book The Four Agreements. He is right. We should live this more, too!)
- Be abundant and compassionate with all you meet.
Try these Ten Suggestions for a while. Use them freely and enjoy!
by Lori | Mar 5, 2015 | Blog
Do you ever wonder, like me, about the sound-bites you hear in the media, from politicians or even from your own guidance? Sound-bites like “we need to do something about income inequality” from our politicians on both sides of the aisle. And from our own guidance, “hold more serenity and release judgment of self and others?” You usually don’t hear anyone arguing that the sound-bite is invalid. You also don’t hear the next 10 sentences beyond the sound-bites that might actually give you some ideas or some action steps to work on these “universal good ideas.” When I heard from my guidance that I needed to have and hold more “serenity” and to “release judgment of self and others” in 2015, I was thinking, “tell me something I don’t already know!” So – my guidance told me more! Here are some excerpts from our conversation.
Our Lower-self looks out at the world and judges a situation. Is the situation good or bad? Does it affect me or my loved ones? Does it affect my livelihood and my way of life? Does it challenge the way I look at myself or the world? Whereas, Our Souls look inward and discern, “what is my truth? What is the universal truth regarding this situation? What is in the highest good of all in this situation?” These are the type of questions that concern us at the Soul Level.
Next, the Lower-self looks out at the outer world situation and judges who is to blame for the situation. Can I be viewed as the victim and therefore, blameless? If it isn’t my fault or “they” started it, can I be viewed blameless or justified, if I retaliate? Again, Our Souls look inward and discern, “what do I need to do to raise my vibration and the vibration of all to heal the situation?” Our Souls aren’t concerned about keeping a scorecard, who may or may not have started it, who may or may not have dirt on their hands. The Souls are concerned about returning to when all we felt was love. There is no scorecard. We aren’t playing for keeps. We are just playing. Life on earth is a grand experiment and illusion.
Finally, the lower-self looks out and asks, “How can I save face?” The Soul isn’t concerned about saving face, it is ONLY concerned about learning all that can be learned in the experiment zone, wrapping up the experiment and recognizing the Love and the Light in Everyone and Everything.
I remember visiting a resort town in West Virginia. My husband and I were eating lunch next to three families who had been skiing. One table had all the kids and one dad at it. The second table had the rest of the adults. The kids were playing a board game where the goal was to get to the center of the board first and then, the game would be over. The first girl to get to the center of the board said, “Let’s play until we all win.” That is how our Souls feel about this grand experiment and the board game we call Life on Earth. There is no loser, there is no scorecard, we play until we all win. No one is left behind.
If we can start to look at everything from the perspective of Our Souls and The Spiritual Hierarchy with discernment about what we can learn from the situation instead of looking with judgment as to who is to blame, we can start to tailor our actions and beliefs to be more in alignment with universal truths and hold less judgment. That is how you hold more serenity. Eliminate judgment of self and others and what is left is serenity.
by Lori | Mar 5, 2015 | Blog
Of all the New Year’s resolutions we can set for ourselves, what would be the one underlying quality that would help all of them? What one factor would help you achieve a better diet, a more appropriate exercise regime and more joy in daily life? Being more aligned with Your Self, being more aligned with Source.
All the characteristics that we would like to improve about ourselves, all the projects we would like to manifest and all the ways we would like to serve Mother Earth and Humanity have at their core the need to know what our part in the Divine Plan is and the passion and perseverance to take the steps to achieve that Plan for ourselves, individually and collectively. The Divine Plan is the interconnected puzzle that We have developed for Ourselves in order to play out our experiences as humans here and now. It may sometimes feel like someone outside of ourselves developed this puzzle as a cruel joke or an elaborate party trick. But, Mother Earth and Humanity have always been involved in this plan as a fully volunteer army. There was no ambush, no draft and it isn’t a punishment for some egregious behavior toward a superior being. We are inter-related and One with the entire universe. The sooner we recognize this, the sooner we can feel the joy of no longer viewing ourselves as victims.
This is why it is imperative to feel and know the connection and alignment with Our God-Self, with Source, in order to be able to sift through cultural and systemic influences and, instead, realize the inner wisdom and guidance that will help us heal the daily struggles and rise above the distractions that hold us back from being the higher version of ourselves that we know we can be.
Before I started on this particular path, I knew there was an interconnectedness between what I saw as my reality and the Universe. But, I didn’t realize or comprehend the extent of the possibilities and the power to change my reality by tapping into those Universal Truths and Energies available to us all. The Universal Truths are that we are not alone, we are loved and we have the wisdom and power to act with the love to bring more joy to ourselves, our world and our universe. Anything other than this full and complete recognition of Our True Selves is the illusion from which we need to awaken.
We need to eliminate any false belief that only a chosen few are capable of navigating the truth and wisdom available to us all. We also need to eliminate any feelings of unworthiness or lack of self-confidence that keeps us from seeing the Divine Power and Divine Love that is the real truth of who we are. The awakening can be done gently, step by step, as part of the Divine Plan. We can start that awakening, now. Are you ready?
by Lori | Mar 5, 2015 | Blog
I have had the good fortune of being asked to speak at the Buena Vista community’s Collegiate Peaks Form Series (CPFS) in April. The CPFS is a forum for lectures in Philosophy, Religion and Science in the Arkansas Valley area of Colorado. My topic is “Synergies in Seeking Self Consciousness: The Importance of Healing the Male and Female Archetype in us all.”
As I start to prepare for the lecture, my husband has been giving me ideas for jokes and levity to keep the audience engaged. When he suggested a few lines from the movie As Good As It Gets with Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt (both Oscar winners for their leading roles in the movie), I scoffed at the idea that I would lend credibility to the stereotypes that the funny scene invokes. But, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that this comedic example does help further my point that we all need to balance the masculine and feminine aspects within us all.
If you aren’t familiar with the 1997 movie, Nicholson plays a famous reclusive malcontent writer and Hunt plays a single mom who is a waitress at Nicholson’s favorite restaurant. The scene that Pat suggested as levity takes place between Nicholson and a receptionist at his publishing house. The receptionist, to Nicholson’s horror, is trying to tell him what his work means to her and how well his writing understands what is in her heart and her head. The receptionist asks him: “How do you write women so well?” His response is, “I think of a man and take away all reason and accountability.”
This scene demonstrates the stereotype of women and men thinking differently as a consequence of them being different genders. The premise of my topic is that we will all be more evolved versions of ourselves when we balance the male and female aspects within ourselves to make a whole and complete healed being.
Let’s take the traditional interpretation of the left and right sides of the brain, as example. In our society, people (regardless of gender) who are tax accountants and engineers might be considered “left brained” in that their professions require a lot of logic, linear thinking, analysis, order and planning. This type of thinking is considered more masculine. Whereas, artists and actors are considered “right brained” because their professions are intuitive, creative, spontaneous and “in the flow”. These traits are traditionally considered more feminine type thinking. However, when we look at anything in its parts, we may be missing the larger points about its whole.
You do want a tax accountant who is logical with the good analysis skills and the ability to plan. But, accountants who are the most valuable to their clients are the accountants that can combine the left brain logic with the right brain creativity. Many can read the tax law, it is those that interpret the tax law who find creative solutions to their client’s needs that are using both sides of their brains. (We will leave the ethical discussion of whether creative accountants have been using both sides of their brains for “good” or for “evil” for another day!) The point is that true problem solving is a mixture of logic and intuition, analysis and creativity. Balancing the traditional aspects of masculine thinking and feminine thinking is where the true wisdom is. Using logic ONLY can be stifling in its structure. Using creativity ONLY can produce a lot of ideas but might not allow for the follow through to bring something into form. Both are required for balance.
This desire and need for balancing logic and creativity is not dependent on which physical form a person has. The idea that Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus in its extremes does a disservice to both men and women who strive for balance.
As humans, we are served better by both “feminine” and “masculine” characteristics well balanced in wisdom, well balanced in power and well balanced in love. When we have balanced that within ourselves and within our societies, that is truly As Good As It Gets.
by Lori | Jun 15, 2012 | Blog, Blog Postings by Lori
Many in our world believe that there is a war between men and women. Many look to a glass ceiling or the gap between pay for jobs traditionally held by women v. jobs traditionally held by men to support this supposition. There has even been a resurgence of discussion regarding whether women who do not work outside the home are truly working, although this has been motivated partially by politics.
Most are failing to realize that the so-called war between the sexes is not really about men v. women or the value of male jobs v. female jobs, or even male workers v. female workers. Those are just the outer world reflections of what is going on within each of us. It is really about the struggle we all have to balance the male and female aspects within ourselves.
All of Creation is meant to be in balance between the male attributes and the female attributes. All of Creation requires both male and female attributes to be healthy, whole and to create. Even if you look at the act of conception and birth of human life, both the man and the woman each add to that co-creation in masculine and feminine ways.
One might look at the man’s contribution, the sperm, as being wholly masculine and the woman carrying the child as wholly female, but look closer. Before the man can contribute the sperm to the act of creation through ejaculation, he must first create, hold and nurture the sperm in his testicles. Holding and nurturing is a feminine act. The act of ejaculating is a masculine act. The man is both nurture oriented and action oriented.
Now look at the woman’s contribution. The woman receives the sperm and combines it with the egg in fertilization. She holds and nurtures the baby for nine months. Then, in a very masculine and action oriented way, she births the baby in what many consider the most womanly action she can take. The sequence of giving birth is 100% action packed and there are millions of home videos that will attest to this.
It is time to recognize that we all have masculine and feminine aspects within ourselves and it is definitely time to bring them back into balance.
In western societies, both men and women have been out of equilibrium with respect to their feminine and masculine attributes for millennia. Most of us have been swinging too far to the masculine side and are constantly in the “doing” mode v. the “being” mode. In our society, we believe that “doing” and “accomplishing” are more important than “being” and “receiving”. That masculine attributes are more valuable than feminine attributes. That isn’t so. They are equally valuable and necessary.
When I was in Corporate America (and Corporate Europe, for that matter) I was a project manager. I don’t believe anyone, me included, would have called for a project to have the masculine and feminine aspects in balance. That would not have been the terms we used. What we would have expected was for a project to be both efficient and effective. Those words are different labels for feminine and masculine.
Efficiency is the corporate word to describe Divine Feminine Energy. The Divine Feminine Energy informs the vision, informs the end state, and informs the level of the plan for which one is striving. Effectiveness is the word to describe Divine Masculine Energy. Divine Masculine Energy informs the action steps and whether they are taken and finished in a timely manner.
If you have too much feminine energy without the balance of masculine energy, you have a wonderful plan, a beautiful vision, but you get nothing done. If you have too much masculine energy without the balance of feminine energy, you are unguided munitions. We have all heard the old saying, “I am lost, but I am making good time.” This is too much masculine action without the balance of the feminine vision.
We need to realize that to come back into balance, to be able to create all that our souls’ desire for us and to remember who we truly are, we need both an efficient plan and an effective execution of that plan. We need to balance the Divine Feminine Energy and the Divine Masculine Energy to remember who we truly are.
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