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ROSEMARY’S EXPLORATION: What Would You Do? Do It Now!
What would you do if you were old enough not to care what other people think? What would you do if you gave up having to succeed and just wanted to enjoy the experience? What would you do if you had no old tapes playing in your head that tell you you can’t?
What if I give you permission, right now, today, to be old enough, to enjoy, to ignore/erase those old tapes? What would you do?
Well, you do have permission. Go out and do it now!
How often do you hear yourself qualify your dreams with ‘if only’ or ‘when X happens’? Now is the time to shift that thinking into ‘HOW can I do it?’
There is an urgency about the energies around us today. We each have a reason that we were born into this time on the Planet. Have you discovered your purpose? Are you clear about what you are to be doing now? If not, then that is your work today.
If you know your purpose and have a list of reasons why you can’t be about that work right now, then lose the list. If you are alive on the Planet Earth at this moment in time then you are ready to be living your purpose. Period.
So now, what would you do if you were living your Soul Purpose, the reason your Soul incarnated into this lifetime?
The students are looking for their teachers. The folks with dis-ease are seeking the healers who can help them. The masses are waiting for the speakers who will inspire them. The weak need strong leaders. The strong need wise teachers. The sleeping ones need help in their awakening. YOU have a purpose and other souls are waiting for you to show up as the person you agreed to be before you were born. They are looking for you.
Reach inside and find that purpose. Get help if you need it. Decide who you were born to be and then, no matter what has to shift in your physical reality, commit to being that person.
Simplify your life. This message is coming through IN CAPITAL LETTERS for all of us. Do you really need all the ‘stuff’ in your life? Do you need to be entertained all the time or can you take some time to reflect, to retreat, to relax? Are the people around you supporting you or are they critical or demanding? Simplify your environment, including the people with whom you surround yourself. Simplify your work. Do you need to change jobs? Are you working to pay bills? Are you working too much or not enough?
Simplify your life. Find your tribe and learn how others are accomplishing this. Many are adjusting their finances. Some are restructuring. A lot of folks are seeking spiritually like-minded groups with whom to bond.
Become aware of your choices. Do you need to buy that thing or is there a way to trade/recycle/reuse something? Are you keeping active to avoid doing inner work? Are you seeking something outside yourself that you just might find inside if you paused and looked there?
What would you do if you were living your purpose, simplifying your life, seeking joy instead of momentary happiness?
Do it now!
PS: Through the month of Rosemary’s birthday month she is offering a very special price on a Reading: $65! Get help with direction, with waking up, with finding your purpose. This special expires August 31. Purchase Here
MONDAY’S POEM: Community
Yesterday Rosemary and I spent much of the day with some very special people working to form an expanded vision for the Annapolis area ACT (A Community of Transformation) organization. It was inspiring to spend such quality time with some highly conscious creative people as we continue to transform ourselves and the Community for future action!
The day inspired me to think about what it means to be in community. Here’s what I wrote:
Community
Safety
Numbers
Together
Family
Extended
Tribal
Sharing
Working
Playing
Singing
Stories
Dancing
Creating
Caring
Healing
Wholeness
Heart Center
Love.
©2013 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
New Moon in Leo I Ching Divination
The New Moon in Leo occurred on Tuesday, August 6 at 5:51 pm EDT this year. We had completed the heavy lifting of our move to Severna Park the day before. We were united with all of our stuff for the first time in over two years. Of course we didn’t know where everything was yet (still don’t) as the job of sorting and searching, finding places for things and finalizing what we need and what we can store or purge in another round of down-sizing proceeds. As we look at the stacks and array of boxes to be opened and managed the task seems daunting.
With this background it is no surprise that I cast a highly appropriate initial Gua for the month ahead! At least I was able to find my yarrow stalks and my current favorite “bible” on the I Ching, Alfred Huang’s The Complete I Ching.
Here is the hexagram I cast as the starting point:
Notice it is made up of two identical trigrams; the name in Chinese is Dui or Lake in English. Master Huang says this word means something more like a swamp or marsh, similar to rice paddies. When put together the hexagram is also named Dui. The meaning of the hexagram is Joyful.
Notice that the initial, lowest line has a circle in the middle of it; this was cast as a nine and means it is the changing line for this Gua; it changes from a yang, closed line to a yin, open line yielding a new Gua with a very different meaning. So, as the month opens I have a joyful period to experience. I equate this to the joy of being reunited with all my stuff, of setting up a new household where everything is where I want it to be, even those items that need to be stored or purged. Rosemary and I are both in a state of great joy that we now have a new home to both live in and work from.
The specific meaning of the changing line gives another layer of meaning; the yao text refers to “inner harmony” as the basis for joy. This is excellent advice. Yes, while all the surroundings are lining up to bring joy, the primary source of joy is always inside. As long as I remain harmonious inside, all the boxes and frustration of sorting and deciding can remain incidental to the overall state of being joyful.
How are you being joyful this August? Seek inner harmony and all external circumstances can drop away.
Now for the approached gua, the one formed when the initial yao changes from yang to yin:
This is Kun or Exhausting. No surprise here! After the strenuous move and all the sorting, deciding, arranging and purging I do expect to experience a level of exhaustion. This gua also refers to other resources, like money. It will be easy to over-spend as we are joyful about settling in and enjoying our new spaces.
Symbolically, the lower trigram moved from Lake to Kan or Water. With Water under Lake the lake drains away, resources diminish.
According to Master Huang, the Sage rides out these periods of low energy and drained resources, realizing this time too shall pass. The advice here is conserve what little energy remains. Go inside to consider next moves. Wait out the period of exhaustion; there will be plenty of opportunity ahead.
How do you deal with exhausting states? The advice of this gua is to conserve and wait.
As another note the mutual gua for Kun is Jia Ren or Household! The mutual gua holds additional meaning for the reading. I am again not surprised that Household comes up; for me at this time my household is both the source of joy and exhaustion!
How is your household bringing you both joyful and exhausting experiences?
Moving Forward – Richard’s Commentary
Rosemary’s “Exploration” in her MuseLetter on Friday and again in her post yesterday was timely considering our physical move of home and belongings over this past weekend. Clearly we had a lot of experience “moving” and I can only hope, given the energy put into this move, that it was “forward”!
The move itself went very smoothly. The weather was great, especially for early August in Maryland. The logistics all worked well from rental truck to professional piano movers. Even the “baby grand” cooperated by just squeezing neatly through the door.
I expected to be sore from all the physical lifting and lugging, the twisting with heavy boxes and the tight hold needed to boost them into and out of the truck. And I do have twinges of an ache here or an over-used muscle there. But I don’t feel nearly as stiff and sore as I expected.
And immediately following the move I began a new Qigong class series this past Monday evening. As I was doing my final preparations and going through the form one more time before class I realized why I survived this strenuous and very physical move with relative ease: I had been practicing Qigong for well over a year and mixing in a steady dose of Yoga as well. I am fit and ready for this kind of physical exertion.
Qigong consists of circle-motions and spirals, movements to gather and focus the Qi. The more I practice and the longer I experience this building Qi the more effortless it becomes. The practice is to evolve to effortlessness. And while my move over this past weekend was anything but effortless, it certainly wasn’t as exhausting as I expected.
And then I reread Rosemary’s post and this paragraph caught my attention:
Our personal journeys are not linear – they do not go forward in a straight line. They spiral, around and around. And, if we are moving forward in our personal growth, we are able to see from a new perspective with each return of the spiral, to understand in a new way what we couldn’t see before. This is moving forward along our path of personal growth in consciousness.
Just as our Qi spirals and turns around and around, so too does our journey through life. As Rosemary observes, every cycle presents us with a new perspective to grow into.
Keep moving forward. It is not just for you. It is not just to ease your pain, extend your life or live more comfortably. It is to expand your consciousness and to be an essential part of the evolution of Universal Consciousness.
How? Practice. It doesn’t have to be Qigong, although I highly recommend it. Keep moving forward, spiral around and take another look from the new perspective. Learn, grow, take the next step and wake up to a new you!
ROSEMARY’S EXPLORATION: Moving Forward
With each sunrise your new day, your new life, begins. Every morning is an opportunity to make new choices about the direction in which your life will lead. Do you consider this when you wake up?
Or do you start your day with complaints? About not enough sleep, or aches and pains, or a long to-do list?
At this time in human history, you are being asked to step into your power and your purpose and propel yourself forward in the direction of your dreams. Yes, it is your dream and your vision of your future that pull you into that future. You can move into that vision or you can choose to stay in your present, fighting against the energy to move forward.
Believe it or not, it takes more energy to stay stuck than it does to move forward. You must fight the strong current of the energy of the Universe that wants to support your forward movement if you would keep everything as it is. When you surrender to the forces that carry you forward on your personal journey you will find the fulfillment that we all seek.
Decide today that you will choose to move forward in your life. When you wake up tomorrow, start your day with the thought, ‘How can I take a step forward along my path? What can I do today that helps me to grow, to advance in my consciousness, to understand something I’ve struggled with before, or to live my purpose more fully?’
This first decision is the hardest part. It’s much easier to pull the covers over your head and go back to sleep, literally or figuratively. But now is not the time to sleep. It is the time to awaken to the wonderful opportunities that abound in front of you.
This is not the time to look at the past and judge yourself harshly for not doing/doing something in the past. Today is a new day. Give yourself a pat on the back for opening to the awareness that there are opportunities in front of you and for making the decision to move forward in your life.
I recently came upon some notes from a while ago where I struggled with a problem that has cropped up again for me. Sometimes I think, ‘Haven’t I already dealt with this one?’ The answer I receive from my guides is often, ‘Yes, and now you have the opportunity to delve more deeply into this issue and to move yourself even farther forward.’
Our personal journeys are not linear – they do not go forward in a straight line. They spiral, around and around. And, if we are moving forward in our personal growth, we are able to see from a new perspective with each return of the spiral, to understand in a new way what we couldn’t see before. This is moving forward along our path of personal growth in consciousness.
Once you have awakened you cannot unlearn what you have learned. You might try to stand still but the energy within you leads you to move forward.
Keep growing. Keep moving. Reach in front of you for help from someone leaping ahead. Reach behind you to help someone who is moving more slowly.
Keep moving forward.
ROSEMARY’S INSPIRATION: Are You Moving?
Rosemary’s “Two-Minute” video for the week: Are You Moving?
Change…and moving in the rain!
As I write this I have finished up our first day of moving. I’m feeling a bit tired and stiff…some muscles were stretched a bit more than usual today! But thank goodness for Qigong! I moved well through the day and after a rest will be ready for another one tomorrow!
I woke up on the first day of August to rain. My first reaction was, “oh, no, moving in the rain won’t be much fun” (as if moving is ever fun!). Then I quickly recalled my Dad’s admonition to never complain about the rain. He was a dairy farmer his whole life. The grass and the crops that provided all the feed for the cattle depended on the rain. And when you are in the middle of a field, putting up hay for the winter, the rain can be inconvenient. But it is not something to complain about, ever!
I quickly changed my “oh, no” to an “oh, well, we do need some rain; and in any case there is nothing I can do about it!”
Fortunately we live in Maryland where the weather can change on a dime. By the afternoon the rain was gone and the sun was shining and we moved our first load without getting wet at all!
Whether we are talking about change in the weather or we are talking about bigger changes, like moving an entire household to a new house, change is inevitable. The only question is what attitude to assume when looking at the on-rushing changes.
And this is my point. Rosemary and I have both been writing a lot about change lately. We are anticipating many changes in the coming months. We know many will be great, in full alignment with our direction and goals. We also know there will be stumbling blocks put in our way; our lessons lie before us and we accept them. The question we ask as we move into every step, every change we either want to make or are forced to make by circumstances is: “how is my attitude toward this change?”
Some days it’s going to rain. Some days we might stumble. Some lessons may be harder to learn than others. But we both know we are on the right path, we are doing what we love, and we are ever expanding into our Soul Purpose Work.
How do you approach change in your life? Do you fear it? Avoid it? Do you rush into it with your eyes shut? These questions bring me to my second point about change: After I get my attitude about the inevitability of change set correctly I then face the choices in my response to the change.
All change comes with choice. My response today to the rain I awoke to could have been to postpone the move by a day. The weather report indicated the possible clearing by the afternoon, but you know how well the weather people predict! I moved forward with a certain amount of trust that things would work out. While my Dad was saying: “never complain about the rain” Rosemary’s Mom was saying: “things always work out for the best.” And sure enough, they did today!
So, maybe the big lesson today is “trust your parents.” They may have some pithy sayings and family proverbs to offer but in my case they tend to be right more often than not!
Adopt a positive attitude toward inevitable change, make the best choices you can under the circumstances and trust your parents! Good guidance for facing the changes that are coming!
PS: Happy Solar Return, Rosemary!! Yes, Rosemary and I have the same birthday. This year is the 41st one we’ve been happy to share!
ROSEMARY’S EXPLORATION: The Power Is in You – Richard’s Commentary
Rosemary’s Exploration this week contained a lot of good advice. I too have the sense that there is tremendous energy for change building in the World. I think a lot of this energy build-up is from the extreme polarity that we are experiencing. Whether it is political factions (both within and between political parties), economic debates about the best way forward, religious extremism or raging debates about social issues, people seem divided into camps of widely differing views and value. This polarization is creating the environment that will force change.
And there is another source of this change energy; as Rosemary observes: “It is time to transform. We’re still feeling the effects of the 2012 energy that gave a huge boost to the transformation energy. It’s not over yet!”
Rosemary and I are going through tremendous change ourselves as we are in the midst of packing up for our move to larger space and a greater degree of freedom. With any change of this magnitude comes the combination of excitement and trepidation. The questions: is this the right thing, am I taking the right steps, can I do it, do I have the energy, can we afford it, are followed by answers: yes, this is a necessary step forward, we have the way and the means, … and in the end, we trust!
And where does that sense of trust come from? Inside!
And this is the key response that Rosemary urges: as we face the building powers that are bringing about the changes we sense, we need to go inside to find the empowerment needed to make the best choices, to decide on our next steps for forward progress.
As I’ve written before, I am completely committed to writing my “morning pages” as urged by Julia Cameron in her book The Artist’s Way. I have been practicing this approach to inner work for years and for me it works very well. As I sit with my pages I move inside and let words flow up and out onto the page; I gain insight, strategies, confirmation, hope, trust…Where does this support come from? Inside, from both my self, and my Self!
If you have been reading this blog much at all you probably already know I have many practices for inner work (and outer, physical work): Qigong, Yoga, sitting meditation, breath-work, cooking (yes, I consider this a spiritual practice!) and even household chores (I enjoy doing laundry!). But when I really need answers I seek my pages and write.
I wrote in my pages this morning about the move, the strategies and logistics, the concerns and the excitement. And I ended the pages with a tremendous sense of hope and trust. Yes, this is a big change; this is a time for big changes and hope, trust, and courage. Fortunately both Rosemary and I are Leos, both born on August 2. We both have courage to spare!
MONDAY’S POEM: Devotion
Last week I wrote about our experience with Sri Karunamayi, Amma, and the Guru Purnima celebration we participated in during the July Full Moon, July 21. Her charge for the coming months is offered in her 2013 Guru Purnima message. She urges us to Bhakti, or true devotion to our Guru and the Truth. She suggests that rather than ask our Guru for favors, boons and blessings, we are to offer our Guru bhakti and seek our own Truth within, to seek the Self. With this energy in my heart I wrote the following:
Devotion
In India it is Bhakti,
Another word for worship.
What is this Heart-swell,
This sense of surrender?
Amma calls all to Bhakti!
The Holy Mother awaits response.
Hearts open out to Her,
Compel feet a step closer.
Her Lotus Feet walk a thousand.
Her surrender is complete.
What is one more step for now and
One more lesson to be learned?
There is no there to step beyond.
The path leads all within.
There is no outer self to worship.
Devotion to the Self is All.
©2013 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
PS: You can watch Amma deliver her Guru Purnima message for 2013 here!
Guru Purnima 2013
Rosemary and I spent a wonderful 20 hours in Trenton, NJ this past Sunday. We drove up from Annapolis that morning to join our friends from Colorado to celebrate the Guru, and in particular, Sri Karunamayi Vijayeshwari Devi. We have been followers of Sri Karunamayi, Amma, for years and visit her as often as we can as she travels the US on an annual tour.
The July full moon is the occasion of the celebration of the Guru and is known as Guru Purnima. It is an incredible festival in honor of all Gurus through time and our individual Gurus through our spiritual lives. We have been to several of these now and each celebration, held in a different city each year, seems grander than the last.
The Guru Purnima this year included a rare, once-in-a-life-time puja, or special honoring and offering for deities. This year Amma offered the Sahastra Linga Maha Puja as part of the Guru Purnima celebration. This Puja is conducted only once every 60 years and we were privileged enough to be in Trenton to experience it. This Puja is an offering to Shiva; 1,116 clay Shiva Lingas were used in the ritual. Words cannot describe the experience. But imagine a ritual that can clear away all karma, not only of this life-time but of all life-times!
Am I now clean, clear and ready for Enlightenment? Well, all I know is something happened in that honoring and celebration of Shiva and the Gurus. It was a magical time and the transformation energy was at a peak at the conclusion of the Puja and as we then entered the honoring ceremony. As we honored beloved Amma I also conjured all of my spiritual teachers and gurus that have helped me on my way, my path to spiritual awakening. I have been blessed by many. And they all seemed to join me during this event and were there with the 400 gathered souls to recognize and honor all Teachers.
Why is any of this important? Yesterday my comment on Rosemary’s Exploration on Self-Protection included a suggestion that we protect ourselves from misguided choices. The prescription to avoid these choices is to rely on our intuitive powers to make the choices that lead us onward and upward, on our paths to awakening. Intuition, from the Latin ‘intueri’, means “to look inside.” To use our intuition is to seek a priori knowledge to inform our choices. And this brings me to the key teaching of Amma, repeated yet again in her “Guru Purnima Message”. I have included some of her words here because they are beautiful and they are highly instructive:
Your body is not the external body, the mental body, or the intellectual body. It is the fourth body, which is the eternal Self, ultimate pure spiritual consciousness. You have to connect with your Self to unleash the light within you. Self-realization should be the ultimate goal of every human birth. How can you make progress towards that goal? Meditate.
The Holy rishis and even the gods are seen often in meditative posture. What are they meditating on? They are meditating on their own Self, the Atman, the soul. All the divine souls are merged into one. There is no discrimination for the divine soul.
Meditation is the only path to connect with the Self and attain eternal bliss. That is the path Amma wants all of Her children to follow. Once you start meditating, pride with give way to liberality; I-ness, Me-ness will give way to We-ness; selfishness will give way to selflessness. You will love everyone and hate no one. You will not criticize others but accept everyone for who they are. You will start developing faith in all religions. You will come out of your small boundaries and will be on your way to ultimate spiritual consciousness.
Meditate. Look inside. Access intuition. From that place you are completely protected from poor choice. And you step on the path to eternal bliss!
Jai Karunamayi!
Men and The Goddess 