There is a huge difference between thinking about what’s really going on and speaking about it.  Each of us can “think” our way through anything – a job, a relationship, broken bone, a challenge, whatever.  In our minds we can examine every option or consequence in a vain attempt to fool ourselves with the illusion of control.  If I think about it enough, I can control it, feel safe, discover the correct answer…but can you?  Unfortunately no.

 Here’s the thing, ‘thinking’ avoids ‘feeling.’  As long as you keep your thoughts to yourself and locked exclusively in your mind, you block much of how you feel.  However as soon as the words are spoken – all bets are off and the feelings come flooding in – both good and bad. 

 Let me give you an example, I live in Colorado.  We’ve lived here for over nine years and I’ve been saying I want to move for the past five years.  The timing has just not been right.  Of course, I see the benefits, the gifts received from being here but it doesn’t matter anymore – I need to go.  I can’t think/reason my way through this any longer.

 This past summer we visited Switzerland and I felt full again.  You see, here in Colorado, we live in the high desert – brown, little water, fierce sunlight and stunning, masculine mountains.  In Switzerland it’s lush, green, wet and the beauty is balanced – stunning peaks nestled against gentle green, rounded mountains and lakes.  It’s like being next to the ocean, I felt fed by my environment instead of starved. 

 Now this isn’t a thinking thing, this is a feeling, an energetic experience.  As much as I may like to – I can’t think my way out of this.  Being here in Colorado is now becoming more intolerable and it’s not because of a person or a thing, but how I feel. 

 Once you connect to the truth of how you feel about anything – the truth becomes annoying loud – vibrating in your mind over and over.  Hence impassioned difficult conversations begin happening with the important players in your life, unexpected tears flow and more surprising feelings unfold.  And best of all, grace finds you.   

For when you are living from your heart, magic is not far off.  It is close.  The heart operates from a place of light.  In this light, all can be illuminated, if you are courageous, if you are willing to live fully and dare to live your most abundant life.  So Be It! What are thinking about instead of feeling????

Sometimes I forget I am blessed.  I start spinning with the ‘to-do’s’ and the very important matters of life like toilet paper and milk.  I focus exclusively on the needs right before me – make lunches for camp, drive, write for an hour, exercise, what’s for supper, go to the store, drive to camp, snack time, to the garden…My head is down and I march through.

 That is until life bumps into me – I see a commercial about small kids with cancer.  I hear a story on NPR about a guy with leprosy (what?  Isn’t that gone?) or another inspiring story about two girls helping other kids struggle with military deployed parents.  I see a woman in the community with cancer, again, hug her kids.  Flipping through the channels, I pause on Michael J. Fox’s new show – Adventures of an Incredible Optimist on TLC.  The next channel is a news story about the hunger in Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Africa…My shelves are full, even my garbage is full…

 And there it is, I am so very blessed.  I may worry and fret about the time-table of events, but above all, I am blessed.  I am before you in grace, poured out for me over and over…poured out for you too, but can you drink from the well of peace?  Or must you continue to spin???

Maybe you are fighting with a spouse, a child, a parent or even a co-worker, guess what?  The problem is you.  I know this is annoying, but it’s true.

 Years ago, I would walk into my therapist office to report all the things my husband was doing wrong and the therapist would constantly redirect me back to myself – much to my annoyance.  Didn’t she get it?  If he would just do this different and that, then everything would be fine.  Uuuuummmmm, nope, she didn’t buy it and after awhile I understood.  The only, only person who is really going to make you happy is you.

 Now this doesn’t fit the fairy tail most of us bought with the castle and Prince Charming.  There is no one person as Jerry Maguire famously said, “who makes me complete.”  No, that’s a movie and this is real life.  You choose your thoughts and your life everyday.

 Now if you are rebelling right now, that’s good, because we are hitting close to the truth.  Let me give some examples of what I am suggesting…

 Say you are a stay-at-home parent and your mate is leaving you “stuck” with the kids/house while he/she goes out to work and sometimes play.  My question to you is, why aren’t you having any fun?  The reply of “who would take care of things” is not an answer but a set up.  Do you have a parent/child relationship with your spouse?  What role do you play? 

 Maybe your spouse is taking advantage of your kindness and guess who’s partly responsible for that dynamic? – yupe, you.  Why?  Because you are getting something out of this too – you get to be “better.” 

 Or maybe you go off to work and your partner has is so easy.  What do they do all day?  No stress, no schedule, get to exercise, no boss.  Can you feel the resentment building in this scenario???

 In marriage we make small concessions along the way to “take care of” our partner, however somewhere along the way we tend to get lost.  Our good intentions usually end up biting us in the bum later.  I wouldn’t say this is anyone’s fault as much as a natural course of learning and growing with another person. 

 What is interesting to note in the above scenarios is both are projections.  Although there is some truth in both situations, most of what binds us to a dysfunctional dynamic is “not enough.”  Not enough time, space, love, money, sleep, self-worth, sex…not enough, not enough me. 

 Hence, I invite you to look at your problems anew and discover what is your part and ask yourself, how can I take better care of me???

I slept with an alligator last night, my six year old son.  I was kicked in the ribs, elbows to the head, covers – gone.  My son said to me in the morning, with a big grin mind you, and mouth gaping, “Did I take over the bed?”

 “Yes, in fact, you did,” I reply with a begrudging smile.  For the past couple weeks every other night, one the kids will wander in saying he/she has had bad dreams.  I’m not surprised because I know what’s really going on – stress. 

 One of the best indicators of what is going on with you, is to examine what is going on with yours kids or your partner.  If they are acting out of the ordinary, guess what?  I’m betting you are too! 

 Lots of things are shifting in our home right now – new doors opening and a move is on the horizon.  As exciting as that is, it’s stressful too.  That’s how the unknown tends to be.  Yet somehow, slipping into bed with Mom and Dad seems to make it a little bit better…And surprisingly, it is.

 Are the loved ones in your home acting out of the ordinary?  What are they be reflecting back to you????

Today I am going to guide you through a process of opening the door to that which you desire – be it health, a new job, or maybe, simply, a brand new beginning…This is a powerful experience that not only connects you more fully to your desires but also offers insight into the blocks or true possibility of this desire…

“What?  I am not shutting down because that would mean I’m getting old…”  The horror.  I sat in my acupuncturist office slightly stunned…We were discussing sex and how at 39 years old, my sex drive is ever increasing. 

My friends and I (all late thirties/early forties) recently were discussing how much our sex drive has changed.  For those of us having sex with our partners (half were not, but that is another tail…) – the two weeks before ovulation are, shall we say, game on, while the following two weeks are, well, not.  I joke that my body is just trying to get one more baby in – a mantra of “must procreate” vibrates throughout causing amusing results.

 First off, in those first weeks in the cycle, I attract lots of men – this has got me believing in pheromones.  They must smell/hear my ovaries message of, sex, sex, sex.  When I was in Vegas last, my friend and I happened to be in that first part of our cycles at the same time.  I had just told her of my theory when two drinks were delivered from the gentlemen at the end of the bar…we just about fell out of our chairs laughing, along with spilling the drinks…

 …back to the doctor’s office, sitting stunned – “I’m shutting down?”…Yes, in a sense I got that with the ovaries shouting – just one more! But I avoid the shutting down part because that might imply I was aging and that can not be???  Why I feel 29/30 years old? 

 And suddenly I was laughing inside, this monthly curse, which I have almost dreaded my whole life, whether through inconvenience or interference, has now become precious.  (Hearing a chuckling God inside, reminding me to be humble at every turn.) 

Ughhh, wow, life is a kick, just when you get it all figured out – flip.  What was dreaded once now becomes a friend and life, here and now, becomes just a little more precious…

Lately I have been focused on the word surrender.  I can frankly say surrender is in exact opposition of my personality – I’m a doer.  In the beginning of the week a friend said to me, “Sounds like you have to surrender.” 

 What the hell kind of comment is that?  Can we say “useless?”  Imagine that I could surrender?  Me, the girl who’s name means “warrior?”  No, no there has to be something more I can do???  I think, think, think, twisting and turning the issues in my mind looking for anything not thought of – hopeful to see the puzzle finally set right, but no there are no new angles.  It is just beyond my control.  I can only see in part while so much has yet to be revealed…

 I tell myself the tricks – focus on manifesting, see the picture you desire, light candles, pray…yet still I am left in the dark.  I vacillate between shaking my fist at God and fear of what will be.  I feel myself on this hinge point between what was and what will be. 

 What I do know is life has changed forever – and amusingly, it was nothing I did or expected.  Life bumped into me – not tragically, but a powerful, unexpected awakening that blew apart long held beliefs of right or wrong.  A door I chose to close years ago burst open and I am grateful, even as I hear a chuckling God. 

 And I also see, surrender is my only path to peace.  I have done all I can do, said all the words that need to be said, I must wait for heaven to act.  So I light candles, say prayers, see the picture I desire in my mind and I comfort myself with the firm truth – I will not be in limbo forever, just awhile…Therefore I savor this life right now because it is shifting beneath my feet forever.  Things will be lost just as assuredly as new things will be found. I wait on the will of heaven to be revealed, confident I am protected and thrilled at what is to be…