ORIGINAL BLISS

It's Time.

 

I have taken some steps through so many new, OPEN doors, these past two weeks. This post should actually be three separate ones!

Something about the moving, being in limbo, between worlds; moving out of a world that is completing a cycle and a into a new one that is healed and free and ready.

First, I started a nutrition plan, lost almost 20 pounds and have had an enormous increase in physical energy. I have been hiding from my body for 3 years, ignoring it, not wanting to feel it because I felt uncomfortable and unwell. It was easier to pretend that it didn't exist.

Shedding - releasing - that 20 pounds, so relatively effortlessly, was like molting. I let it go and stepped out of my shell, back into a being of vitality.

Surely, I gush!

Second, as a mentioned a few posts ago, I was driving home from work one butt crack of dawn, because that is what 3:30 in the morning is, the butt crack of dawn, and I was feeling overwhelmed by the clean slate rising on my horizon. A clean slate, with endless possibility and opportunity is a frightening thing! I have had them many times before, only to muddy them up with "fillers" that weren't really my soul's desire.

I had a whisper of an idea from my commuting angel to turn on AM 1530. Really???? Who listens to AM anymore - all talk and static and hum. But Coast to Coast AM was on and Ian Punnett speaking with Zen DeBrucke, who was talking about our natural intuition, as she calls it, an Internal Guidance System. There were several times during her interview I got a full body opening - every cell in my body, from head to toe, was a-tingle.

I had to explore this further.

So I have been spending the past two weeks, using this technique. Now, I have always had a very strong intuition, but I haven't been very good at directing it, understanding it clearly, or following its signals. This practice has had amazing results. Very quickly, I have been able to tune in and get very clear "yesses" and "nos". 

You can listen to that Coast to Coast Interview here.

SO THEN! I was experimenting with this technique and exploring my IGS about something that has tormented me my whole life. A deep disatisfaction that I am not really on my true path. Yes, I have been a fabulous mother. Yes, I love creating, art journaling, and facilitating others in the exploration of their creativity. But all of that falls shy of that total resonance that only being on PURPOSE can bring.

So I am journaling (writing, rather than art) PAGES and PAGES of my insights, digging for the gold vein that has ALWAYS threaded through my life, where I feel most joy, excitement, peace and rightness. And I FOUND it... but it made me really anxious and afraid.

The next day, I opened up my SPAM box on my email. There were 30 of them in there: "Your account is expiring - send us all your passwords so we can save your account." "You are the benificiary of 33 million dollars"... you know what I am talking about....

I don't even know why I opened it rather than just hit "empty". But I did. And in the list of shit, one email caught my eye. I opened it and found an invitation to a seminary program - exactly what I had written in my journal the night before. And then very clear it came to me. 

"It's time."

Namaste, 

C H E Z

Synchronicity is a Messenger

Synchronicity is a term originally created by Carl Jung to explain meaningful coincidences, unlikely conjunctions of events, surprising serendipity, and "winks from the cosmos".

When synchronicity happens for me, I get a very strong knowing, that I am on the right path, that I am in the flow and aligned.

So it has been the past couple of weeks.

Beautiful, simple events falling into my presence at just the moment I am thinking it to happen. It is hard not to feel like you are in good graces with the divine when synchronicity happens. It is such a miraculous moment.

We have all had this special magic touch us at times. What is amazing to me is the frequency at which it has been happening in my life.

I have been trying to figure out what the trigger was for the current rain of miracles... which by going into my numb-skull brain probably moves me right out of flow... but I want to "figure it out" so I can keep it coming.

I was contemplating this HUGE idea at 3 o'clock in the morning while making my hour long drive home from work. 

The only trigger that I can figure was that moment I let go of attachment was the moment the flow began to happen. I just let go. It wasn't a "fuck it", apathetic, letting go. It was more a "God's Will be done" or "inshaAllah" or "eh, whatever will be will be", let's see where it goes from here. I stopped trying to swim through a river "my direction" and began floating with the river the direction it was heading.

This obviously goes against my take & have it all under control nature. BIG TIME! It also goes against an unconscious belief that I have to WORK HARD to make things happen ~ The "I've got to knock on the doors and open them or they will never open" operating system I have slaved under my whole life.

So I am driving along, meditating upon this HUGE idea, when I remembered that Coast to Coast AM was on at this time and I could give my brain a rest and listen to some cool show about UFOs or Paranormal Activity.

I switched over to AM 1530 only to hear internal guidance system expert, Zen DeBrucke, discussing how the human body is naturally wired to physically connect with the divine, the many ways we recieve guidance and information, and how to tune in to it more efficiantly.

Really. 

I got a full body goosebump.

When synchronicity happens for me... it is an opening... a messenger telling me to pay attention, take the next step in that direction and trust that beautiful things are about to happen.

Namaste,

C H E Z

How Will My Garden Grow?

 

Damn! When things get to changing - they all change at once!

My life is shifting as abruptly as the Earth's lithosphere has been of late. 

I can't just focus on one thing; changing my nutitional lifestyle, relocating our home, exploring new openings in my business/career space. They are all bombarding me at the same time.

We have spent the past few years wading in a mire of obstacles and situations that had us stuck. Trying to strategize our way out of that swamp only got us halfway through it. 

But now the Universe has taken over and has finished razing the past, feeble constructions of my life.  The destruction is almost complete and I am looking out over a empty field of rich, fertile soil ready for my sowing. 

And I am being presented with a handful of seeds.

I am joyous.

I am scared shitless.

If I take a step to plant something, will it be torn asunder? I have good intuition and instincts about others and the world around me, but they are for shit when it comes to knowing and guiding myself. I have spent my life guiding, mentoring and advising everyone else, but I look at the path I have traveled and it is willy nilly, a dandilion rooting wherever the next wind took me.

Almost every seed that I have planted, has been for or because of someone else. Almost every choice I have made was out of neccessity rather than my own true desire. Other choices I have made unconsciously, or from an impetuous, rebellious, acting out space, because I was unhappy with my other choices. 

I may have planted only 5 conscious seeds in my life. 

Kelsea.

Going to Art School.

Mattea.

Jeff.

Original Bliss.

wow.

With this final phase of this current destruction I have resolved for myself to plant my next seeds with a conscious, full and open heart. Divine spirit, through me, is choosing how the garden grows this time.

Stay tuned.

Namaste,

C H E Z

For Love, Everything!

"Lover's don't finally meet somewhere. 

They're in each other all along." 

Rumi

So today, we began packing our belongings.

The clutter of moving is already strewn about - which sets my Obsessive Compulsive side on edge.

It seems that every year around my birthday, our life gets a little (or a lot) tossed. The complete paradigm shifting event near my 40th, Jeff getting laid off near my 41st, and packing to move on my 42nd. I thought my 20's were a wild sea of change... but my 40's are turning out even more tumultuous!

But each and every event and shift, though devastating in appearance, has only brought ABUNDANT blessings!

If it weren't for The Salinas Incident, I would have never started Soul Journaling again. I would have never started a blog. I would have never started teaching workshops. I would never have been published in magazines (3 times). I would have never begun publishing my own books. I would have never started living my passion and having it provide for me in return. As horrid as that period of time was, and all that it spawned that we still are recuperating from today, it provided me a fertile soil that has grown this magnificent, fruitful, live-giving and soul-saving tree.

Last year, Jeff was laid off. Part of the spawn of Salinas was that he could no longer secure employment in his profession of Code Enforcement. After serious assessment of his true self and gifts, he is re-training in a profession that is more in line with the truth of who he is, a compassionate, caring, and completely giving individual. Being realigned with something that resonates with his core has created a positive flow of more abundance and things are falling into place with miraculous ease.

Now this.

The move. 

Again, we fought and cajoled, trying to find ways of clinging to what we thought were our dreams of growing old in this house, holding hands and drinking wine on our porch. To no avail. But in the letting go, again, the Universe, God, the Angels, The Great Whatever, has moved mountains to support us! It manifested our new space, literally right before my eyes, with so little effort. And every other need that arises, has its answer following right behind. It can only be "meant to be" - because otherwise, none of it makes sense.

So I am EXTREMELY GRATEFUL for the blessings surrounding me. And I am definitely assured a happy 42nd birthday!

Namaste,

C H E Z

A Day of Rest

"Study the old ways. 

Some knowledge is valuable... but you must dig deep to find the treasure."

It was a whirlwind of days off for me this week. Preparing for a workshop, a trip to San Francisco then workshop day!

Finally today! I slept in. Took a walk. Broke in my new, extra EXTRA LARGE moleskine with my new Rapidographs. Edited some photos from San Francisco. Read up on my new diet plan. Put this quick blog together.

Yeah, not much of a day of rest after all.

But it was sooooo fulfilling!

Here are some of the photos from our day in the City by the Bay. It is so easy to find that elusive "creative time" when you have a camera in your hand. (Click to enlarge).

Mattea

Awesome Graffiti Art

Mattea Again

Mattea & My Chocolate Malt

Eagle on Wells Fargo Building

In Bloom - Union Square

Opera in the Alley - Singing the most beautiful rendition of Ava Maria I have ever heard.
I cried.

The Sky is Falling!

Stupid has the Balls!

Young Love
Zack & Kelsea

My Hands

Namaste,

C H E Z

Which Comes First? The Water or the Thirst?

“Yesterday, my geology professor began rambling something about Passover… and the Red Sea being parted… and I tuned him out.”

“Well, maybe there was some geological proof about the Red Sea being parted that he was trying to explain.”

“I don’t see how anything can be significant about a story that didn’t really happen.”

Thus said my 18 year old daughter.  

While not devoting myself to any one religious expression, I embrace all of them.

If asked, I use the analogy of a wheel; each spoke, a different faith, leading to God at the hub. The goal is always the hub. The closer I move in relationship to the hub, the less the spoke that got me there matters.

A day does not pass without an acknowledgment of the sacred - a reflection upon the divine - a conscious connection to the Hub. But I am aware that this is my way, not the way for all and do not wish to impose my faith structure on others.

That includes my children.

After my conversation with my daughter, I sat in the dichotomy of wondering where I went right that my daughter can freely convey her personal belief, yet, where I went wrong that she could be so readily dismissive of a spiritual text.

It wasn't that I expected her to believe the Bible is the direct word of God and all factually and literally true...

I guess I was hoping that she was open to the possibility that it could be.

I wonder if my attempt to allow my children to develop their own spiritual concepts possibly created the absence of any…

Where does our concept of the holy come from?

Is it something that is imposed upon us, that becomes a part of our life from the outside?

Or does it spark and bloom from within the individual?

Which comes first? The water or the thirst?

Religion is a dogmatic and moralistic code that is laid out like a map for us to follow. It attempts to appeal to the mind, to provide rational understanding of the divine.

But doctrine does not seat itself in the soul and transform us.

In his famous work, “The Idea of the Holy”, German theologian, Rudolf Otto, coined the term "numinous" to describe the feeling of awe and trembling that humans feel in the presence of divinity.

The numinous experience is a personal experience, where one feels they are in communion with the complete and wholly other.

The numinous is irrational. It cannot be put into words or described without sounding like you are completely off your rocker.

Like a conversation with a burning bush in the desert.

Like falling off your ass and changing professions from a tax collector to a traveling preacher.

Like an angel telling you are pregnant though you have never had relations with a man.

Like the wave of chills that sweep through you when a choir reaches its crescendo of harmonies.

Like the vision of color and warmth as the sun touches the crests of the ocean.

Like the marvel of your newborn's perfect, innocent fingers.

Like the breeze that just brushed across your face.

It is the unknowing knowing that there is a great and majestic something which cannot be seen that leaves you full and breathless.

The numinous came first for me... when I was very, very young. It befell me and seeded within. It was a thirst and set me on a quest to define it and recreate it again and again.

I have a few friends who experienced the numinous - and are as wacky-cocky-doodle as I am.

I have many acquaintances that have fully ingrained belief structures, but have never pierced the veil and experienced the Numinous Reality beyond the religious facade.

I have some friends that once had a fully ingrained belief structure, that failed them in horrible ways, and only the numinous can restore them.

Maybe this is why I refrained from structuring a rigid, religious belief system around my children.

I did not want to create any filters that would eliminate the possibility of a direct experience of the Divine.

I would rather have my daughter dismiss someone else’s religious experience as a “story” -

only to be knocked on her ass by an experience so profound that it takes her breath away and transforms her.

Namaste,

C H E Z

Silly Girl

"I'll never learn to keep my mouth shut - even in the face of stupidity."

I don't know how others do it.

Stand with a straight face and a "yes sir" and then just go about their business, when things are so WRONG. 

But that's what they want from us, right?

They don't want common sense or dissension. They want obedience. 

So which is worse?

Blind obedience?

Or conscious-but-turning-a-blind-eye obedience?

Isn't that how every major tragedy against humanity has been allowed to be perpetrated? The Inquisition? The Holocaust? The crazy Hitler and Pope had blind and conscious-but-turning-a-blind-eye followers, right?

The other thing I always hate hearing is "pick and choose your battles."

But if we keep giving the little wrongs a pass, doesn't that give permission for the bigger wrongs to happen?

If we say "No!" to the little battles, maybe the bullies will know not to trespass further against us?

 

Namaste,

C H E Z

En Theos

Lots of energy crowding the room lately.

Energy flying around keeping my brain off balance and unfocused.

Not spelling words right. My fingers typing all the wrong letters. I start doing one thing then forget why I am doing it. Trying to converse with my beloved and losing the words out my mouth... try to find them again only to wonder if the conversation even really matters.

Many visitors from another plane.

Grandpa Charlie has been tapping on light bulbs, giving Jeff some reassurance in what is truly immortal. Grandma Lil telling my Dad to be ready in his dreams. I visit old friends from eons ago, feeling like I just saw them last week.

Feeling that "shake up" in my third chakra again. We may be in for another earthquake.

I keep asking, "What I am supposed to do... right now?" I get nothing. So I keep doing the familiar routine.

Connect. Connect. Connect. Stay grounded and soul wide open. And remember who I am.

Namaste,

C H E Z

From Alpha to Omega

Tripping the light fantastic

& traipsing across the Universe.

Venturing far & wide,

deep & in between,

from Alpha to Omega.

Home is where the heart is.

From there I have access to

E V E R Y W H E R E.

Namaste,

C H E Z

The Hush Before the Symphony

I am so used to always being a go go,

forcing a jig,

staccato rhythms and rock and roll.

But there has come a stillness -

a full rest.

An interval of silence in the composition of my life.

In this pause, the once familiar song is unraveling.

I am no longer in tune with the discord.

Resonating instead in the harmony of my breath,

in the hush before the symphony.

I cannot explain it. No amount of meditation, wine, or bubble baths has ever been able to produce the quality of stillness that has come over me this past week.

The ease in which I can find center. The lack of engagement I have in drama. Things that once seemed so important... so necessary... do not. 

If I had felt this way before it was associated with apathy or depression. Something was wrong and needed to be fixed.

This does not feel like that. There is relief and joy and peace.

I have trolled around my usual blog haunts and have noticed something similar with others. A pause taking place. You are re-centering, re-focusing, re-arranging, re-evaluating and shifting, as well.

And that makes me happy.

Namaste,

C H E Z