by Lori | Apr 28, 2023 | Blog
When I feel anxious and unsettled, which has been happening more than I would like to admit recently, I focus on breathing slowly and it helps immediately. I have also noticed that I start to sing to myself a calming and repetitive chant. I have some current favorites that bring about a peaceful feeling. But really, any chant seems to work.
When I was a child and I was having trouble falling asleep, I would pray the rosery. I would wake in the morning with the rosary in my hand knowing that I had fallen asleep within saying the first 10 Hail Marys. I do not discount the intersession of Mother Mary. But, I also postulate that the repetitive nature of the prayers stopped the “monkey mind” from spinning, allowed relaxation to take hold and sleep was finally accessible.
Now, I access the peace and relaxation through chanting. Most of the time I chant silently but sometimes I belt out the songs as the universal energy calms me.
In Standing in the Light® we have some old standbys that we use for meditations. “Eternal Om” by Robert Slap is a favorite of ours.
Over the last few years, we have added some lovely chants to our Sunday Night Healing Circles. These contemporary songs lend themselves to higher feminine energy which is a nice balance to the chants that have traditionally held more masculine energy.
The beauty of chants is in the simplicity and accessibility of the words, the music range and the repetition. The chants that I am using the most right now are by the artist Alexa Sunshine Rose. You can access her music here at this link for Bandcamp. I have noted some of my favorites.
“Every Step a Prayer”. Lyrics: Every step a prayer. Every breath a new beginning. Every Step a Prayer | Alexa Sunshine Rose (bandcamp.com)
“I Release Control”. Lyrics: I release control and surrender to the flow of love that will heal me. I Release Control | Alexa Sunshine Rose (bandcamp.com)
“Come Receive”. Lyrics: Calling all the people of the world. Come Receive the Light and Love. Come Receive | Alexa Sunshine Rose (bandcamp.com)
“Open My Heart”. Lyrics: Open my heart so I can hold all I need to hold. Open My Heart | Alexa Sunshine Rose (bandcamp.com)
“Center of the Center”. Lyrics: From the center of the center, the light that never ends. Shining from the center, the light that never ends. Center of the Center | Alexa Sunshine Rose (bandcamp.com)
“Arms of Love”. Lyrics: Come now, child, lay it down. Just breathe, just be. Come be cradled in the arms of love. Just breathe, just be. Arms of Love | Alexa Sunshine Rose (bandcamp.com)
It is interesting when I find myself chanting a particular chant. When I am hiking uphill, I chant “Arms of Love” to help me keep a steady pace. Recently, when I wake up at night, I am usually humming “Come Receive” to myself. It definitely helps me go back to sleep.
If you need a technique that can calm you almost instantly, in coordination with your breath work, please consider one or more of these contemporary chants.
Gratitude to Alexa Sunshine Rose for her beautiful songs. Gratitude to Myrtillemymy with pixabay.com for her beautiful image.
by Lori | Mar 28, 2023 | Blog
My husband and I were recently watching the movie Paul, the 2011 movie starring Simon Pegg, Nick Frost and Seth Rogan. Rogan voices the animated alien, Paul, and Pegg and Frost are Sci-Fi geeks touring America’s famous UFO sighting areas. Paul asks the two humans to drive him from the UFO landing sites in the Southwestern states to Wyoming in order for him to be picked up by his fellow planet inhabitants. My husband was willing to suspend his critical thinking regarding the possibility of an alien living in the United States for 50 years, helping Steven Spielberg to write movies, create the characters for the X-Files and advise the government on a host of topics. However, Pat had to step up his willingness to suspend his logical thinking regarding how fast the characters were able to drive from the Southwest to Devil’s Tower in the Northeast corner of Wyoming. I love when it is the practical aspects of movies and stories that are the hardest for us to suspend our disbelief.
“Suspension of disbelief” is the term used to describe when story tellers use the audience’s willingness to overlook improbable situations in order for the audience to enjoy the narrative of the story being told.
While we were watching Paul, I realized that our relationship with the Experiment in Duality is actually very similar to novels and movies where we have to buy-in to the facts and circumstances presented in order to participate and believe the narrative being told. But, unlike with novels and movies where we suspend our disbelief, when we joined the Experiment in Duality, we needed to suspend our BELIEF. We suspended our belief in ourselves as limitless, as love, as powerful, as forgiving and compassionate. We suspended our belief in our oneness with all beings. We suspended our belief in ourselves as Source.
Like a favorite movie, we need to allow ourselves to enjoy while we are here in the Experiment in Duality and just like in movies, we need to remember this is just an illusion. We need to step out of the narrative whether we are enjoying it or not and remember what is really true. We need to remember and believe that we are Source.
by Lori | Mar 1, 2023 | Blog
“When I stumble, I make it part of the dance.” A friend of mine recently said this. What a fabulous life philosophy. I believe it should be all of our intentions for ridding ourselves of self-judgment. This philosophy turns something that we judge to be a mistake into something new and creative. This turns a lifestyle from ridged and fear based into a willingness to try something out of our comfort level even if we might not be perfect from the very first moment.
Consider this. Break dancing (or breaking) started as street dancing in New York in the 1970s and went hand in hand with Hip Hop Music. I like to think that someone was trying something they had never tried before and they stumbled onto this creative dance movement which has become an art form. To that end, breaking will have its debut as an Olympic Sport in the 2024 Summer Games in Paris.
Just image what else we could evolve into an art form in such a short timeframe if we simply lived by the philosophy of “When I stumble, I make it part of the dance.”
Gratitude to Pete Linforth for the image.
by Lori | Jan 29, 2023 | Blog
I am reading a novel by Sarah Addison Allen called “Other Birds”. The lead character, Zoey, is an 18-year-old woman who lives with an invisible bird. The bird has a huge personality, sits on the Zoey’s head and pecks at the door when she wants to be let out in the morning. Zoey says that just because something is invisible doesn’t mean it is imaginary.
This is a great reminder for all of us regarding the power of the unseen. There are many things that we see the effects of the force without seeing the force. Wind and gravity are usually the first two forces that come to mind. But, what about the more subtle forces and energies that we don’t see that have big impact on our lives and our evolution.
Most of you reading this post probably have some training in a healing modality that is not visible to the human eye. We work with Reiki, Light, Resonances and Life Force Energy. We know that others don’t see what we feel but that doesn’t make it imaginary. And we have all seen the effects of the energy we work with, even if it is within ourselves and the result is as simple as our sense of peace.
As February rolls around with its celebration of Valentine’s Day, we also may not see the energy of love, but we definitely can feel the effects of it and the effects when it is withheld. How many of the world’s issues right now would be healed with more true love – healed love – swirling around us? Probably all of them. That isn’t a Pollyanna view. It is the view that what ails us as individuals, as communities and nations is a lack of understanding, a lack of acceptance, a lack of compassion and a lack of love.
This February, allow your love energy to shine. Allow Healed Masculine Love Energy and Healed Feminine Love Energy into your being – into your physical, emotional, mental and spiritual beings. Allow the Healed Balanced Love Energy into your life and allow yourself to send Healed Balanced Love Energy to all around you, your communities and to all the world, as well.
Be the beacon of love. Be the beacon of energy that is invisible but is very real. Be the truth of your love.
Gratitude to Anja with Pixabay.com for the image above.
by Lori | Dec 31, 2022 | Blog
As the new year rolls around, most of us have completed 6 weeks of celebration and are getting back to ordinary life. When I was a tax consultant in public accounting, all celebrations ceased from Jan 1 until April 15. It was normal to have no fun and not a lot of sleep for at least 3.5 months. In fact, when a friend of mine had her first baby, her agreed upon part-time schedule for “busy season” was for no more than 40 hours a week. That obviously was not a good work / life balance, but work / life balance was never advertised in public accounting!
What is the appropriate ordinary time / celebration time balance now that we have crossed over into a new year? That is a great question for each of us to take to our souls.
The qualified answer from my soul was another question. “What is it that you consider to be a celebration?” Does celebration mean the 3D version of celebration of parties, presents, family gatherings and fine food and drink? Or does celebrating mean living life authentically and gratefully for all that we create and experience on a daily basis? The later is what my soul is guiding me to consider for the energy of celebration.
As an example, Ginger Withee’s automatic signature for her emails is a quote from Hafiz, a Sufi poet. “Today the vegetables would like to be cut by someone who is singing God’s name.” The celebration is in the energy of how the ordinary action is being done. The high frequency is infused into the common act of slicing vegetables.
My intention for 2023 is to celebrate the ordinary because the ordinary really is pretty wonderful. The beauty and awe of the daily action of the sun rising and the sun setting. The comfort of spending time with a friend or loved one. The joy of dancing by myself or with friends. The anticipation of seeing my dog waiting by her bowl for the kibble to show up. The power of sitting in the silence and knowing myself as one within the energy of the universe.
All of these are times to celebrate. So – I will. So – I AM. May every moment feel extraordinary because every moment is a celebration.
Gratitude to Gerd Altmann for the image.
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