by Lori | Mar 25, 2016 | Blog
It is puppy time! My husband, Pat, and I welcomed Ruby Sunshine into our home on March 13. She is a Labrador puppy. Wow, the learning curve for me has been steep! As I have mentioned before, I have not had the experience of babies or pets in my adult life. I was quite content having my own time and own routines, or no routines. However, Pat’s and my collective guidance was that it was time for us to add this bundle of joy to our home. Ruby is joyful, fun and cute. I believe she will be a wonderful companion for us. She is however, a real live being with needs, fears and her own personality. She has her own will and her own teeth!
As I mentioned in last month’s blog entry, I knew I would need to stop judging myself that I would mess up Ruby’s life. Well, I guess I had not totally crossed that off my to-do list when we picked her up at the breeder. I am grateful that Pat has had experience with pets as the first couple of days found me second guessing everything I was doing, or feeling bad about it, even when I was doing what the books on puppy behavior recommend.
At a particularly low point for me, Pat told me that the only way we could truly mess Ruby up would be to abuse her, which is not in our nature. I was meditating on the topic a day or so later trying to clear through my reluctance to follow the recommendations for Ruby. I heard from my own guidance that Pat was right, but in addition, the other way to mess up Ruby would be to not train her. That was my “ah-ha” moment.
Instead of looking at the actions to modify behavior as “discipline,” I was be guided to look at the actions as training. For me, this is a very important distinction. If I look at what I am doing and what all the books say to do as training for Ruby, then it is no different from how I would look at raising a child to eat with a fork or learn the alphabet. What a disservice it would be to allow a child to be lawless and uneducated. That would ruin the child’s life. The same would be for not training Ruby to be a well behaved Labrador.
I also heard from my guidance and these behavior books that I needed to not anthropomorphize animals. I need to honor them for who they are but remember that they are part of Source and not a victim to the whims of a feckless deity who made them be animals. Being an animal is just another great experience here on earth. Ruby is a pack animal and needs to be trained and loved the way a pack animal needs to be handled. Treating her as a human is not fair to the essence of who she is. Treating her as a human is not fair to who she truly is. Thus, training is on the agenda!
Fortunately, I can couple the physical training with the energy work and resonances which are part of my service to my clients and to humanity, as well. I am seeking guidance as to how to balance Ruby’s needs individually with the needs of the family unit, as well. I continue to work with the feeling states of Harmony, Cooperation, Unity and Oneness for Ruby, Pat and me. This is how Pat and I will attempt to raise a conscious puppy.
Where in your life would you benefit from looking at a situation as needing training v. discipline? We might look at our exercise regime and think we need more discipline. Or we might look at our meditation practice and think we need more discipline. But, doesn’t the idea of more discipline sound daunting? Sometimes the idea of more discipline makes me think I am being punished. What if I changed the way I look at the situation from discipline and punishment to training and the rewards of that training? The rewards of more exercise might be that I feel better and I am able to fend off colds and viruses more effectively. The rewards of increased meditation time might be that I feel more at peace even in the midst of the chaos that I see all around me.
The energy of training allows me to see the benefit of the end state. The energy of discipline sometimes feels like it is the avoidance of unwanted characteristics. It is the difference of looking at something as the carrot vs. the stick. Let’s say that thirty more minutes of meditation is the goal. If I look at the thirty minutes as training to make myself better, I will go into the training with a positive attitude and a higher energy frequency. If I look at the thirty minutes as discipline, it is possible I will have a lower energy frequency and resent the time. The time will still be spent, but the intention and the attitude of one will give much better results than the other.
Ask yourself to evaluate in your life where you would benefit from looking at the energy of more training vs. the energy of more discipline. Allow yourself to focus on the end state and the benefits of not believing yourself to be a victim of the circumstances around you. Instead, view yourself as training yourself to be the best version of yourself you can be. Let the training begin!
by Ginger | Mar 1, 2016 | Blog
In the English language, “love” can be used as both a verb and a noun. In our physical experience, the mental body tends to perceive love as the verb. We love another person for certain qualities, we fall in or out of love, or we actively express our love by baking pies and giving hugs. We have reasons for our love and then we act on them. But Divine Love is more of a noun, a feeling state. It has absolutely no defining parameters or limitations. Love Is, pure and simple.
As physical beings, we often feel the need to direct our love to a person, object or activity. We might say, “I love you” or “I love this coat” or “I love this view”, but our love always has a specific focus. We rarely say, “I love” or “I am love.” In Divine Love there is no need for a recipient of our love because the love is not an action, but our inner feeling. We may take actions which are expressions of our love, but the experience of Divine Love is within. It does not change depending on who receives it or how it is received. It is not bound by any outcomes. Divine Love Is.
In the third dimension, we are often asked to give specific causes for our love. We see it as something rare and, therefore, something that should have a specific reason to set it apart from all of the other experiences we do not feel love. If we say we are in love with someone, we might be asked what made us fall in love. If we say we love that mud puddle, we may even get strange looks because a mud puddle is certainly unloveable. In the spiritual realms, we do not make the choice to love one specific thing or person, but to allow ourselves to be the essence of who we are, the love that we are. There is no need to justify the love for certain reasons because our feelings of love are not caused by anyone or anything outside. Divine Love is who we are.
In the physical experience, love can also have a time limit. We fall in love and then sometimes we feel as though we’re falling back out of love. At that point, our physical relationship with another may end. But in Divine Love, there is no black line marking the endpoint. We may find that our paths diverge and move in a different direction from a loved one, but in the spiritual realms you can never lose love. Divine Love is not finite but eternal.
Divine Love is love without expectations, conditions or consequences. Divine Love is not limited nor the consequence of anyone or anything. One cannot do Divine Love. But we can all allow ourselves to Be Divine Love. It truly is as natural as breathing to the physical body. It is not a choice, it is not work and it is not complicated. Relax, surrender and discover that Love has been there all along.
by Lori | Feb 29, 2016 | Blog
My husband and I are excited to welcome an 8 week old yellow Labrador into our home in two weeks. We have decided to call her Ruby Sunshine in deference to her yellow lab mom and her red lab dad.
As a woman without biological children and no pets in her adult life besides some Koi fish, which are pretty low maintenance, this is going to be a big transition for me. I know it is going to be a happy transition, but big changes are coming, nonetheless. I can already see some of the issues / mirrors that the situation is presenting to me that I haven’t felt the need to address prior to this welcomed addition. I have a feeling this will not be the last blog post where Miss Ruby is front and center.
The biggest mirror for me thus far in preparing for Ruby is the mirror of separation anxiety. I realize that there are more immediate physical / 3D concerns with a puppy than separation anxiety, which I have been lead to believe is more pronounced with older rescue dogs. However, this is the mirror I see, so it is the mirror I will investigate!
How will I manifest the intention that Ruby feels loved, safe and secure no matter whether she is with us, being boarded or being safely left at home? The first step I am being guided to take is to clear my own anxiety, nervousness and attachment. I need to be able to not judge myself that my actions are going to make a mess of Ruby’s life even when my actions are not quite as “Cesar Milan-ish” as I would like them to be. Fortunately, I have energetic tools at my disposal to send energy to Ruby to let her know of her safety and security, regardless. Sending Ruby energy is a recommended step to making the transition to a new home easier.
However, the ultimate mirror for me is how loved, safe and secure I feel in my own life, in my own skin. That is the true mirror for separation anxiety, the separation that I feel from Source, the ultimate divine energy. If I have the false belief that I am separate from Source, I will attract a dog who has the energy of fear of separation in her, as well. She will be my mirror. This is how the Spiritual Law of Like Attracts Like works. Thus, the best way for me to help Ruby to not feel separation is for me to not have the energy of separation in me. With everything in metaphysics, we must help ourselves before we can help others. As we have said before, the flight attendants tell you to put on your own mask first before helping others with their masks.
In the third dimensional illusion, I could look at a frightened dog as that the problem is hers alone. However, the illusion and the experiences we are having in the illusion are simply reflections of how we feel about ourselves. The more I feel oneness and security with Source, the more all my experiences and relationships will reflect that back to me.
Clearing my own separation anxiety will raise my frequency and because we are one with all and each other, that will raise the frequency of those around me, as well. This will bring more joy and peace to us all. As Gene Hill said, “Whoever said you can’t buy happiness forgot little puppies.” Welcome, Ruby Sunshine.
by Ginger | Jan 31, 2016 | Blog
I usually take note when I get a song stuck in my head or it keeps repeating on the radio because that is often a cue that my Soul is communicating with me. Lately, however, I’ve been missing my cue to a great message in the form of The LEGO® Movie theme song, I’ve found myself singing “Everything is Awesome!” on several occasions, most likely because I’ve been feeling lately that everything isn’t. I’ve been focusing on what could be improved or how things could be done just a little bit better, rather than enjoying the sheer miracle of the whole creative process. As Jim Rohn has suggested, “Don’t get frustrated, get fascinated.”
To help me through this piece, I’ve been guided to look at some of my judgments about how things are unfolding for humanity and how various individuals are acting or re-acting in relationship to these changes. While I know that I’m a creator of my own experiences and others are the creators of theirs, I haven’t been focusing on the value of creating collectively. Any time we interact with another, we have the opportunity to learn and grow from that experience and vice versa. These opportunities expand exponentially the more people we include in our experience. We don’t have to meet all of them personally, just to hold the understanding that they are all aspects of ourselves, aspects of the greater One, who are learning and growing and creating just as we are.
In The LEGO® Movie theme song, the opening lyrics go like this:
Everything is Awesome. Everything is cool when you’re part of a team.
Everything is Awesome. Everything is cool when we’re living our dream.
Seen or unseen, everyone has key pieces in the puzzle. Simple items like sticky notes and more complex things like smart phone apps help me in my own work and service to enhance others’ lives. Likewise, watching how someone handles a situation or hearing their personal story is also an opportunity for me to benefit. The important piece is not in figuring out how it might have been done differently, but in marveling at the beauty and imagination of how it was done. I never would have thought of doing it that way, but I’m glad someone did! Without that person’s unique contribution, I would not have been able to accomplish what I did.
When we’re each creating from our joy and sharing our creations with others, we are indeed living our dream as part of a team. When we live in pure wonder at this amazing, giant creation of ours, then everything is truly awesome.
by Lori | Jan 30, 2016 | Blog
I had the wonderful opportunity to live in England for three years. As an American, one of the first things you learn is the old saying that the United States and England are two countries divided by a common language. Idioms are different, spelling and pronunciation of words are different. Even the influence of the proximity to France means that some of the words the English use are different than what the Americans use to describe the same thing. For instance, the English use the word aubergine for the purple vegetable that most Americans call an eggplant. I found all of these differences to be charming.
The only one that I found harder to grapple with was the collective or group nouns. In America, we say, “The crowd goes wild.” However, in England, they say, “The crowd go wild.” The American interpretation is that the crowd is a singular entity, a singular force, maybe even a singular mindset. In the English version, the interpretation would be stating that the individual aspects within the crowd are individually going wild. A bunch of individuals with individual mindsets all going wild at the same time.
This may seem like a distinction without a difference. However, when I was meditating on Unity and Oneness, this was the analogy that came to me to further explain the nuance of what it really means to be in Unity and Oneness.
To truly and completely feel and know yourself as One with Source, One with the All That Is, we must have the knowingness and experience of the singular entity, the singular force, and the singular mindset. Knowing and experiencing this singularity does not mean that we all must be the same. It just means that as unique expressions of Source, we are all part of the singularity of the essence of what it means to be Source. We all have the same opportunities to tap into the Divine Power that is Source, the Divine Love that is Source, the Divine Wisdom that is Source. We are the essence that is All That Is. When we master this understanding of Unity and Oneness the crowd really will go wild!
by Ginger | Jan 3, 2016 | Blog
I am 3 days late getting this blog posted. I’m also quite behind on several other projects which have their own deadlines. But over the past two days my house has been cleaned top to bottom, and I have re-organized closets, cabinets, shelves and drawers to sparkling, immaculate perfection. Ahhh! It feels so good to look around and see everything in its place. So, why was it a piece of cake to organize my house, but I can’t organize my thoughts enough to write a single page?
Try though I might to keep December a quiet, introspective month, it quickly ballooned with numerous commitments, appointments, meetings and various other deadlines. I was busy, and appropriately so. There were things that genuinely needed to be done in that time frame, all in divine order and perfect timing. But in all the activity, I lost my balance within. I veered too far into doing mode and kept on going without checking back in with my inner compass. So, when I tried to write, I was coming from a place of complete inner dis-organization, regardless of how well my house was shaping up.
As I sat here, laptop perched on my lap and waiting for words of wisdom to flow, I realized that while it may be fun to go to The Container Store and fill your cart with cute baskets and trays to get your life in order, it won’t last if you don’t have a strong foundation of organization and balance within. By next week, my house could look as disheveled as it had for those weeks in December. So now it’s time to get my insides back in order.
It’s not always easy putting the brakes on a train that has built up its momentum to a strong cruising speed. Proceed gently, applying the brakes a little at a time until you regain your balance between too much action and not getting anything done at all. We are still physical beings and there are things which genuinely need to get done. But, of course, we want to find that sweet spot of perfect flow between divine inspiration and taking action. So as I write this, I am holding the intention to come back into alignment with the present moment as I find that balance between the stillness of deeper meditation time and the next action steps for my other projects.
The good news is that once we bring our intention to something in our lives, the re-organization can happen rather quickly and effortlessly. Intention is key. We all have that point of balance and divine order already within us. We just have to remember where we put it!
