Just a reminder of sweet Summer amid the dark days of winter…

Recently I have been contacted by many new clients struggling with strange things going on at their homes.  It seems that between midnight and 3:30ish am something odd is afoot.  Their dogs are barking at doorways, sleeplessness, feelings of being watched, unexplained anxiety and irritability are just a few of the complaints…

 If you are experiences any difficulties such as these, here are a few things to consider…

 Spring is a time of forward energy and anger.  In Eastern medicine it is viewed to be closely aligned with anger and the liver.  The idea is the anger acts as a force to break through – for a seed or plant, this would provide the energy to break through the ground and join the sun again.  Interestingly, Eastern medicine also divides the day into two hour intervals.  The intervals identify when your body/emotions are more susceptible to certain energies.  The hours of 1 am to 3 am are associated with the liver.

 The liver is said to process anger and emotions.  The liver is also related to water – which of course, our culture has long associated with emotions.  Are you angry?  And do you drink a lot of alcohol?  This could suggest you have repressed issues with anger and unspoken emotions.  Try drinking more water to flush your system of any stuck emotions or toxins. 

Another aspect to consider is the very energy that surrounds us.  For many individuals who channel masters and the like, now is said to be a time of great shifting.  The recent earthquakes (more are predicted by this group) are intended to not only open the hearts of all people by wanting to help those who are affected, but also to change the very core of the earth – readying the planet for a total shift in consciousness.  Karen Bishop is an excellent resource of this belief.

 She believes at this moment not only in the shifting earth, but that there are many ‘visiting’ entities.  Some are good and some are bad.  You have the ability to send any of these negative beings away with just the phrase, go back to the light.

 Personally, as of late I have been missing things.  I was in a session last week with a client and my pen just disappeared.  I had just gotten up and left the room to find a pen – my client and I even joked about kids and missing pens.  I put the pen on my desk and not five minutes later it was gone.  My client was speechless as we both saw me get the pen and put in on my desk.  It lay right next to us as we were talking.  Then it was gone.  She was aghast and I was laughing – damn leprechauns.  

 I’m kind of used to these kind of games and I know the pen will show again where I least expect it.  When you are more sensitive to your world, you will discover magic is still afoot.  I like to think of it as the universe letting me know it is all around me every moment and also letting me know who is really in charge – not me!

 So, if some odd things are happening right now you have options.  You can clear yourself and your home.  (How to smudge your home or office.)  You can have a sense of humor.  You can journal to discover and release any anger or negative emotions you are holding.  Finally you can seek help if need be, it’s there, waiting for you.   Ask and you shall receive.

Fall is a time of Harvest – a time of plenty…and it can also be a time of fear.  Fear of failure, fear of not enough.  Do you have enough to get you through the long winter?  Enough money and resources?  Enough love?  Enough light before the long slumber of winter draws ever-near?

 One of my favorite kids book is Frederick.  Frederick is a mouse. Instead of gathering food for winter like the other mice, Frederick gathers stories, sunbeams and fairy kisses.  He brings the light in the darkest hour when tummies rumble and hope is all but lost that Spring will ever bloom again.  In that hour, Frederick reminds them of sunbeams and dancing dragon flies.  He brings them to cool, trickling streams and fresh beds of new grass. Summer is born again within the nest, even as the storm swirls on above…

 What adventures and pictures have you tucked away to remind you of warmer days in winter?   There is still time yet to gather sunbeams and daydreams to keep you company for your long winter’s nap.  After all, Harvest is here. 

Some things to celebrate Mother Earth…

 1.       Skip the gas, and walk or bike today.  You may just get hooked on how great you feel getting outside today and make a more permanent shift in transportation…

2.       Clean up your garden.

3.       Plant seeds or a tree.

4.       At the trash can, stop and ask yourself – can this be recycled?

5.       Turn off the T.V. or computer and read, play cards, talk this evening…

6.       Don’t leave the faucet running while you brush your teeth, wash dishes, etc.  Fix leaky faucets.  

7.       Fill your birdfeeders.

8.       Enjoy fresh fruit! Be reminded of the gifts of harvest and healthy farming.

9.       Sit on the grass and marvel at the unfolding Springtime blooming all around you…Are there any seeds you want to plant in your life?  Do it. 

10.    Be grateful for the Earth that supports you every moment of your life. 

I love Spring and it also makes me a little nuts.  I like to remind myself and all my client of the many faces of Spring right about now…Yes, Spring tends to be a time of new beginnings and opportunities, but also there is the tilling of the earth…or more personally, chaos in your life.

 Think of a seed bursting open in springtime and driving it’s seedling to the sunlight above – it takes a lot of energy, a violent force of nature really.  In Eastern medicine – the season of Spring is connected to your liver and anger.  So what this suggests is people struggle with liver, urinary and issues around anger more during this time of year.  Just like all the seasons, there are wonderful opportunities for growth and transformation, but Spring holds a dizzying balance of new beginnings and endings…Joy mingled with loss.

 Are you struggling with feeling of rage or anxiety this Spring?  Is there a nervous energy of possibility clinging to you?  Feeling a bit overwhelmed or out of balance?  Here are five quick things you can do today to support yourself during the Springtime…

 1.       Water.  Drink more water.  Go for walks in the rain if possible.  Intentionally bathe more or spend time in a body of water – the ocean is best, but a good salt water bath is a great alternative.   

2.       Clean out a drawer, closet, or room.  The best way to attract more into your life is to purge the things you no longer need.

3.       Eat fresh fruit.  When you eat only processed foods, you disconnect from the earth.  Maybe this is the year for that vegetable garden you have been dreaming of?  Lettuce and peas are ridiculously easy to grow…

4.       Laugh.  Nothing changes energy faster then good humor.  Call a friend or read a funny book to connect to that light place again.  Sometimes the most chaotic and stressful situations are absolutely ripe with humor if you can just get a lighter point of view…

5.       Meditate…Spend a few quiet minutes each day focusing on what you DO want your life to look like.  Just anytime you have couple extra minutes, close your eyes and see this Spring unfolding the way you desire – be it with a new job, or maybe a health transformation, or a new awakening of love, whatever, just that you are focusing your energies on what you DO want instead of negatively responding to what you don’t want. 

 Happy Spring…The blooms are coming…

I had been feeling blue for awhile.  This damn snow just won’t stop.  Early Spring – one of the ugliest times of year, everything is brown and cold.  I have been taunted more then once by a day of blissful warmth and sunshine only to have the temperature drop thirty degrees in 6 hours.  What is that?  Is Mother Nature trying to drive me over the edge? 

 Then I went to the spa – a micropeel facial and a pedicure with that wax thing too.  I always laugh about a facial as you look like hell afterward – pinched and blotchy and this one was no exception.  The micropeel is a diamond encrusted suction tube that they drag across your face/neck to remove the dead skin – slightly painful at times, but I no longer look grayish.  The flush of youth has returned to my face…or maybe that is the slightly raw, red skin they promised as a side effect of the treatment…oh well.  Honestly, my pores have never looked better, even though I lost a layer or two of skin in the process…

 But the pedicure.  First one of the year.  I like to give my toes a break over the winter.  But I now have beautiful, rosy toes and am delightfully happy every time I look at them.  I had forgotten the pleasure of a pedicure.  To me – ultimate decadence.  I mean really, it’s not like I can’t do it myself.  I feel pampered and indulgent during the service.  I have even introduced my husband to this indulgence on a date night.  Needless to say a convert was born that afternoon.

 So, if you are feeling blue – remember the power of the pedicure and go directly to a nail salon.  I don’t care if you are a man or a woman – taking “extra-special” care of ourselves is important.  Give it a try – promise, you’ll be surprised… 

Today, February 1st, is the first day of Imbolc, the Feast of Brigit, pagan Goddess and Christian Saint.  I like Brigit.  She’s a Goddess of action and focus.   The fiery goddess of inner strength and will.  A redhead after my own heart.

Imbolc is the first day of Spring in the Celtic Calendar, February 1st.   I look out my window and I see snowflakes falling, one after another, tumbling down.  The ground has been hidden by two feet of hard, half-melted snow for five weeks now.

I haven’t seen a bird at my feeders for two whole days.  They are hiding too.  Deep, within the branches of the pine trees.  Trees that poke and prick at us is where they find refuge—these are their warm places.

A week or so ago, I was with a friend and we were discussing his garden.  He couldn’t wait to show me this big vegetable he had just picked.  Mind you, this was January 18th and there had been snow on the ground for weeks along with frighteningly cold temperatures.  I just nodded my head and smiled at this crazy comment.

Off to the fridge he ran and returned with a grin from ear to ear  holding this massive, gorgeous purple turnip.  This had been growing in his garden since last Spring.  Underneath the snow, this had been growing still.  Thriving in fact.

I could not ignore the message.  The reminder that sometimes we can’t see the change.  The shifting beneath the surface.  We see the snow on top.  Still there, not melting completely.

Looking at that turnip, I felt a leap of excitement.  I heard in my mind one of my favorite quotes by Kahlil Gibran, “In every Winter’s Heart there is a Quivering Spring…”

Maybe I couldn’t see Springtime out my window between the falling snowflakes, but I know it is there.  Quivering and thriving beneath the snow on Brigit’s day, Springtime is borning.