The Last part of us to shift is the body. In India, when all of the different practices were created, they were created to work on us in different ways. And the reason for that is they understood that we exist at different rates of vibration. Emotions exist at a different rate of vibration, thought exists at a different rate of vibration, and the body exists in a different vibration. 

It’s time we address the body. Your body is like a hard drive. What is it recording? It’s recording the residual memory of you – who you used to be, how you used to be, emotions from the past. Your body is a living, breathing record of your unconscious. This is why in mystery schools and ancient transformative processes, there was always a physical component to one’s development. Because at some point, there has to be a cellular rotation and as a result, a vibrational rotation within one’s being

Imagine for a moment if the body is the hard drive, then the identity is what is continuing to hold the pain, the trauma, the suffering, the separation in place. Whatever is happening in your body is because of who you are at the level of your identity. 

The world is changing so fast we can hardly keep track of it. Reports on what is or isn’t happening clash with one another on a daily basis, both in the media and among those we know. “Reality” as a perceivable, agreed-upon entity no longer exists, if it ever did (the emperor’s clothes have disappeared). Time as we knew it has also ceased to exist. So how do we navigate this seemingly chaotic and uncertain path before us? One clue is that it is no longer a place for human identities (names, family roles, job descriptions). What lies ahead is completely unknown and can only be approached as a spiritual mystery and soul adventure.

We are moving ever more rapidly into the time of Soul Presence. It’s been a long time coming. And I don’t just mean since the flower children of the 60s called out the Age of Aquarius. I mean millennia. Thousands and thousands of years in the making, with incarnation after incarnation of spiritual seekers and masters moving forward and shining an ever-brighter light. Today we have finally reached the era of collective enlightenment. No more gurus, priests, leaders, or authorities of any kind. It is dawning on each of us that we carry the wisdom and light inside us. God is within, not sitting on a distant throne issuing orders. God and soul are one. We living beings on a living planet are One.

When we awaken fully to that oneness, our separate identities and polarized world views will dissolve. Our souls will emerge in full presence and meet with loving-kindness and compassion, instead of the competitiveness and self-centeredness that formed our old personalities. The harshness of ego gives way to the softness of soul. Fear of survival and the illusion of control are replaced with trust in a perfectly designed divine unfolding. That is why so much is falling away and there is no longer truth or time. We have no idea what is ahead, but more and more we can see a light shining, from within us and from the Earth herself. “We are stardust; we are golden,” Joni Mitchell wrote so many years ago. And the flowering garden of light in our future is being born from that golden stardust that makes up our souls.

I've Been Thinking...

It was dark when I woke up. I made my coffee in silence, then sat down to do my morning meditation. I’ve come to notice that it’s in these early hours when it’s still that I can feel the most. I'm able to make sense of life for a bit when it’s quiet. The stillness allows me to just be.

As soon as I closed my eyes the other morning, the tears started to flow. They came slowly at first, then picked up steam. Within moments, I felt overcome. 

I felt overcome with the heaviness of what is happening an ocean away. Overcome by the heartbreak, the sadness, and the brutality of what we have been witnessing. Every image has pierced my heart. Every story has brought me to silence. Watching women my age and older walk for miles in the freezing cold, holding their purses, falling and getting back up, and charging ahead as they fight back tears. Watching children hold their parents’ hands with looks of confusion, fear, and sadness on their faces. Watching men put their hands up to train windows as they say goodbye to their families leaving, while they stay home and fight to defend their country. Watching loved ones cradle those who lost their lives—weeping and wailing with emotion.

First, I was very clear about the outcome I was desiring.

Second, I bought a pair of dark red patent leather shoes that I named my ruby red slippers and I wore them as a reminder that I had as much or more power than he did.

Have you ever had the experience of seeing the same repeating numbers over and over, everywhere you go? It might be on the clock, a license plate in traffic, a phone number, or anywhere else numbers show up in your daily life. Everywhere you look you see it… 1111, 222, 444… 

Some people live in the same place most of their lives; others move frequently over the years. Wherever you choose to go, your soul remains with you, as does your identity. The soul travels lightly, no passport, no possessions. The identity or ego, however, usually has a lot of “baggage” to declare. That baggage can take the form of either physical objects or nonphysical opinions and beliefs. Both can weigh you down, but the latter actually constricts your future experience. What you plan on, what you think should happen, places a limit on possibilities. It also limits whom you allow into your experience. The soul, without the opinions of the ego, would live life open-endedly, open-heartedly, inclusive of many kinds of experiences and people. An expansive circle instead of a small box.

Each of us evolve and change; this is a delightful truth in our world. Thus, we are always offered new opportunities. Will this constant tide of evolution eventually bring us to the Age of Enlightenment? Will humanity discover a state of mind, where we no longer bomb our neighbors, or is the Age of Enlightenment reserved only for individuals to experience?

The world is a reflection of you because you are the universe.

Perhaps that seems like a bold statement.

I share it because I’m often asked, “How can I change the world?” The answer is for you to come home to the core and build circuits so that you perceive with clarity and a loving, compassionate, conscious presence everything happening in the world.

I know that you are going through life changes and I know that you are being called to redefine your lives according to your hearts. And while this can be scary, there is no better time in human history to get divorced, or to go through a medical issue or to look for a new job. There is no better time in history than now. 

As so many of us find ourselves praying more often, more fervently than ever as bombs drop on Ukraine, the world economy is in turmoil, the pandemic continues, experiencing inner peace can be a real struggle.

I’ve been on several global prayer webcasts, collectively praying and holding strong intentions for peace, for healings, for miracles, even though at times I couldn’t imagine what kind of miracle to pray for.

Regardless of the assertion of any fearful state that seeks to convince you otherwise, apply this one great truth:

That fear must break down if it doesn’t succeed in breaking down your willingness to test its reality. How do you conduct such a test? You learn to look at its presence within you with the quiet understanding that, in reality, nothing in life is fixed. All things change. Everything passes. This is truth. Knowing this to be true is power over fearful states that hold us captive.

We are all survivors of one kind or another. Whether encountering a diagnosis, a deep loss, or daily challenges, each of us passes through various life experiences that can serve as gateways to more expansive awareness. Surviving doesn’t have to mean perpetual struggle. Among breast cancer survivors (of which I am now one), survival has become a badge of honor combined with a positive outlook. Having just completed treatment, I feel both relief and a bit of uncertainty at being on the other side of all that I have experienced since my initial diagnosis last summer. Because I have friends who are long-time breast cancer survivors and because I trust my doctors, I have felt optimistic throughout. Yet the kernel of “what next?” inevitably arises at some point.

Do You Care?

The Practice:
Have compassion.

Why?

Compassion is essentially the wish that beings do not suffer – from subtle physical and emotional discomfort to agony and anguish – combined with feelings of sympathetic concern.

Have you ever experienced a time in your life where you felt deeply connected to Spirit? Where things seemed to just flow and you knew you were on the path of your highest good?

Throughout your life, your feeling of connectedness to Spirit and your spiritual journey may ebb and flow. For many of us, there are times when we feel a sense of Divine guidance and clarity about our spiritual path, and other times when we feel disconnected, or even lost. 

Belief, when experienced as a teacher without a name, enables us to enliven a kinship between the living part and the living Whole. Such sustained care begins to heal us. With humility, it is not our place to denounce what others believe in, but to use the sincerity of their example as an encouragement to find our own particular inlets into the Mystery of Life.

Every spiritual tradition, East or West, speaks about waking up as an essential part of progress on the path. Whether the goal is God, enlightenment, or the experience of bliss, it is blocked because almost everyone is asleep. But the injunction to wake up is vague and clearly not meant literally—we think we are awake unless we are asleep in bed. It’s very important, then, to clarify what it exactly means to wake up.

On the day of my first radiation treatment for breast cancer, I had a sudden thought during my morning meditation: “This is the fire that will burn away the imprints of all that came before.” Meaning, what we each carry around with us from our past, whether pain, suffering, loss, or uncried tears. Every human being faces challenges in life that because of their intensity imprint us deep inside and thus affect how we live day to day, with hesitancy or fear perhaps. When the imprints come to the surface and are released, freedom and peace arise. Mostly my life has been filled with love and happiness, but I have also had difficult experiences, including breast cancer and a lifelong fear of death/eternity. Ironically, this current cancer path has opened up a deeply soothing and expansive soul connection. Now I am at the last fiery gate. The phoenix stands before me.

Have you noticed yet that wherever you go, the thing that you don’t want the most seems to know where you are? Seriously. It doesn’t just know where you are. The Divine has created the conditions under which a reaction will be stirred and brought into your consciousness so that you can finally realize that running from it doesn’t change the reality of it. Only bringing it into the light of a new order of awareness can bring into its presence the fulfillment of itself. Why? Because you start to understand the reaction is just what you don’t know about yourself yet.

Your soul is a fundamental part of you and it’s constantly feeling and listening to everything that’s happening in and around your life. It’s almost like a best friend standing by your side. If your soul sees that something’s not right or you’re heading for a negative turn, it’s going to do something about it.