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Over the last few years I’ve finally come to realize that there are two basic ways that I can live my life.

I can choose to be open……….. or I can choose to be closed. (There is actually a choice!)

I’ve spent the majority of my life closed though I didn’t really know or understand it. It was so automatic and started so early it has been my normal.

I don’t like closed. It is my old normal. I want a new normal. My new normal is open.

Opening is a bit risky for sure. It means that when I feel afraid that I opt to open into the fear and feel it. It usually doesn’t feel all that comfortable.

It means that when my friend says he doesn’t want to hang with me anymore, I open to feel into the sadness, pain, anger and the love I still feel for him.

When my kid gets angry at me, I open to and feel my knee jerk reactions and what surfaces and comes up for me.

When overwhelm hits I open into it and feel what is really moving around in it. I find my way into what seems so chaotic and crazy instead of trying to pretend it isn’t really happening and end up sick in bed.

There is an inner fierceness required for me to open in these challenging situations. My default is to collapse and become frozen, paralyzed or numb.

I have to actually choose to move toward opening so I can stay with the flow of life. Life at its best  is full of all kinds of emotions and experiences. Some feel great and some don’t.

Being real means that I move with what is really up. I don’t get to pick and choose what is real.

I’ve spent years of my life fooling myself into thinking that I can actually avoid certain experiences and emotions. When something uncomfortable came along I would close down. I would walk away. Not respond. Not ask questions. Stop communicating.

The difficulty in closing is that the flow is halted. Nothing is moving any more. It’s blocked. Stuck. Paralyzed. Frozen. And I wondered why nothing was changing or shifting.

It can’t. Change requires movement. Movement requires opening. I can’t move if I am closed to what is really moving in and around me.

And yet to open requires incredible courage and determination. It means risking what has felt comfortable to flow with what is real. Fierceness is that energy that is propelling me into opening over and over even when it feels shitty.

Ultimately, opening is the incredible freedom of living life. It is being available to feel all of life. It is opening to experience everything available in this human body here on Earth. How cool is that?

What would you like to open to today? How would opening into that uncomfortable place change your experience?

What do you need to open into the flow of life more fully?

Let’s join together to create a new normal of being open and flowing with life.

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Recently I was working with a new client who was struggling with most of the significant relationships in his life. I suggested that he experiment and try ‘holding space’ for each person rather than trying to fix them, offer advice or suggest how they should do it differently and see what happens. This would also be in contrast to his other way of dealing with relationship interactions, which was to shut down and disconnect from the person so he didn’t listen to anything that they were saying.

He tried ‘holding space’ for a week and when we met next time, he reported that he was blown away by how much difference it had made in every relationship. ‘Holding space’ had positively improved every relationship that had previously been so challenging and difficult. He was amazed having done years of counseling that something as simple as ‘holding space’ could make such a profound difference.

What is holding space?

Holding space begins by placing your loving attention on yourself. It really helps to bring your attention into your lower belly anywhere that feels good. As you do, feel solid and grounded in yourself.  It is essential to be present with yourself first so you can be present with the other person.

Then bring your attention into your heart area directing your focus and energy on the other person with compassion and caring. See the other person knowing and trusting that they are complete, whole and perfect exactly the way they are without needing to do anything.

It’s a bit like seeing through the story to what is behind all of the words. When you open first to yourself and give your attention from inside you, and then focus on the other person, they can feel space inside of themselves. They can tap into what is really going on, how they feel about it and what they want to do next. They have all the answers inside and can access them when you see them as perfect and complete in this moment.

Holding space is one the most profound and amazing gifts that we can give to one another during these tumultuous and crazy times. Your loving presence can turn distress and confusion into magic. As a community we can create a new normal in a world where safety is readily available and we give each other permission to be exactly where we are now.

What kind of magic do you want to create in your relationships today? How can you hold space for someone who really needs to be heard and seen?

If you want to seriously practice holding space and feel what happens in an amplified field when you do, consider coming to one of the circle gatherings happening each month. Each second and fourth Thursday we meet at 6:30 and the first Saturday of the month we gather for the day from 10 am to 4 pm. It is an excellent opportunity to experience holding space as the person holding and as the person receiving. This is a powerful practice that will change the world.

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I learned early on as a child that it wasn’t okay to say “no”. In fact, I don’t ever remember saying “no” to anything that really mattered to me. I did have other strategies that indicated “no”, though I could never really say it.

While growing up, I went along with the choices and decisions of others, especially those of my parents, for years. I knew that in order to avoid punishment or conflict, it was much easier to do whatever they wanted me to do. In fact, I got so good at it that I could actually anticipate what they would like or want, and I’d do it before they could ask me for it.

I unknowingly transferred this pattern into all of my relationships including friends, teachers, partners and everyone I was in contact with, not realizing at all what was happening. It always felt good for a little while until I realized that I didn’t really feel better inside me. I felt drained, empty, used and resentful.

Then I would leave the relationship hurt, sad, confused and angry, unable to figure out what had happened. I’ve got a string of intimate relationships and two marriages that ended because I didn’t know how to do it differently.

What I know now, three decades later, as I explore what is real for me and what brings me joy is that my Truth is sometimes different than what I originally thought. There are times when my Truth is a huge “no” rather than going along with what someone else wants or what I think they want from me in the moment.

The tricky part is that in the moment, I may not be able to track my Truth because I often don’t feel safe enough to know what is really happening. I end up figuring it out later when I feel safe in my own space or with the help of someone who can hold space for me. Then the pieces come together and I am able to feel and see what happened.

These old patterns are all about surviving and they are amazingly strong and engrained on an incredibly deep level.  There are so many additional pieces of fear, judgement, guilt and shame that also bubble up as I access my inner Truth, which are  incredibly difficult, fascinating and humbling.

Can I hold fast to my inner Truth and longings while the layers of pain, conditioning and judgements reveal themselves? Am I able to stay firm in my commitment to me and loving myself first? Can I still maintain my connection to my own perfection and goodness inside of me while my Truth shows itself?

I want to, and I know that I need others to support me and help me with this process. I want the amplified field of a heart focused circle to hold me while I explore and find my real self inside of me. In the community of others who are embracing this practice of Heart Intelligence, I find the wisdom, courage and strength to access my own Truth and to stand in it with confidence.

What about you? Do you know what I’m talking about? If this is resonating for you in your own journey, please join us in supporting one another in awakening and living our own inner Truth every moment of every day.

We meet every other Thursday evening for Heart Intelligence Circles and on the first Saturday of each month for an entire day of Discovering More Joy. Come and be part of a heart centered community of individuals exploring and discovering their unique individual Truth. Let’s be the change we have been waiting for in the world!

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It’s been a couple of months since I began exploring my Core Desires. I started too big and got lost in the possibilities and did little.

Then I was reminded to start small, get really clear and focus. Less is more.

My core desires this year are Abundance, Pleasure and Love.

The biggest change that has happened for me is that in order to have true abundance, I’ve recognized that I need to simplify my life. I am choosing to eliminate old things by cleaning out drawers, cupboards and rooms of my house. I am getting rid of things I keep thinking I will get to and haven’t touched in two years or more. I am lightening my load physically which feels amazing and lightens what I carry energetically so there is room for abundance to come to me in profound and amazing ways.

I’m experiencing more support from friends and family. I have more clarity around decisions I need to make. I’m also finding that I have more time available to get things done as well as to relax and take care of myself. Money seems to be flowing much easier and more abundantly as well which is incredibly freeing for me.

I begin my days by tuning in when I wake up each morning and choose to feel Abundance, Pleasure and Love running through my body each in turn. I feel it until it is flowing naturally inside me. I often have ideas that come to me during this time that can do during the day that will bring in and create even more possibilities for me to experience my desires.

When I need to make a decisions about something that isn’t immediately clear, I use them as my guidepost. For example, if I choose to do “…….”, will I be feeling Abundance, Pleasure and Love? If so, it is a big “YES”! If not, I say “No”. Done. Finished. No second guessing and I move on.

The best part of the day is when I crawl into bed at night and pull out my journal to record what experiences I had in the day that brought me even more Abundance, Pleasure and Love. Little things I hadn’t really linked up to more strongly remind me that my desires are being drawn to me like a magnet now that I am super clear and focused.

I am also reminded that I get to choose how I interpret everything that happens in my life in every moment. This is real freedom.

I am Abundance, Pleasure and Love and it surrounds and fills me up in all that I do and say.

What are your Core Desires? What brings you alive with passion and joy to be all that you can be in life everyday? What is it that calls to you from the depths of your being?

Please share in the comments below what it is you long for……..together, let’s make our chosen desires the focus of our moments to create a new life and world.

Here is where you can find out more and be led, supported and guided to discover your deepest desires. May your desires guide and direct you clearly along your path.

Namaste’

PS    Be on the lookout for an upcoming day of Exploring Your Desires here in Victoria coming very soon where we will be utilizing the power of the amplified field in a group to do just that. Whoooo Hooooo!

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I was 21 years old when I sat in the memorial service of my roommate and best friend ever, and I told myself that I should be the one who was dead. It should have been me who died because everyone loved Shelley so much and she would be missed by so many people who loved her so much. No one would miss me because no one but her ever really loved me. I sat there not being able to grasp why she left me so alone. I should have been the one who died.

On Christmas day in 1982, my world went from one of bright colors, laughter, hope and dreams to one that was darkened by a cloud of black sadness and numbness that I have carried for over 30 years.

An enormous part of me died that day and what was left went numb. I couldn’t feel anything but a dark dense cloud covering up my entire world inside and out. I had no idea how to continue living after that day.

So I survived. I survived each moment in a state of shock and numbness forcing my way through another semester of nursing school. I told everyone I was fine. I couldn’t feel or see the pain everyone else could. My instructors tried to talk to me about it and I told them I was fine. At some deep level I knew that if I allowed myself to feel what was really there I’d break into a million pieces and I’d never be able to get up again.

Moments turned into days, days into weeks and weeks into years. It has been over 30 years now and the hole inside is as big as it was the day it happened.

A few weeks ago I decided that I would focus on and discover what my core desires in life really are so that I can refocus my life and it can finally really start working for me. I’ve been surviving in so many ways for so long and I’m tired of it all. I want something more. Much more in fact.

One of the first feelings that came to me that I want more of is to feel alive. I’ve had glimpses of feeling alive and I want more. As I’ve begun to explore being alive along with many others, I’ve found an even bigger cloud of darkness descending upon me.

My thoughts about me became incredibly judgemental and hard. I got really sick with a cold that basically kept me in bed for a week which exacerbated all my harsh thinking and guilt about what I wasn’t getting done and how I’m still failing at my life and my business.

It appears that if I want to feel alive, I must acknowledge and feel where it is that I died. The pain that has been bottled up all these years is ready to be let go. I’ve allowed the pressure relief valve to release grief off and on over the years, though never to the depths I can feel it coming from right now.

It is time. I am tired of surviving. I want to live. I want to feel more of everything. I choose to feel my pain and my death and to be gentle and loving with myself. I choose to feel it all and to open to feeling the relief and the joy in letting go after all these years.

Namaste’

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