Hello all! It's been awhile:) Instead of a post here's a sample from a chapter of my upcoming book, which has something to do with a few cosmic jokes! I would love feedback and thoughts, and thanks for reading, it's a bit long so grab a cuppa and cozy on uppa…..:)

 

EVOLVE

Speaking of looking at things backwards in order to see how to positively move forward, let’s go Darwinian for a moment. Many natural sciences talk about the evolution of species or the planet as a study in opportunism. The natural world is in a constant process of balancing itself thru experimentation, destruction, or filling a hole in the great web of life. For instance, a little fishy needs to escape being lunch or is in hot pursuit of it and finds itself flopping around on the primordial banks. After a huge lapse of time and enough flops those little fish start to develop feet like fins and the ability to gulp air and remain slimy enough not to dry out. Eh voila! The lungfish is born and evolution just leapt, or flopped, forward.

It sure seems like we are no different from those slippery little dreamers. We too are in a constant state of balance and expansion, whether we are aware of it or not. This very second, as I type and try to sound even a tad smart my cells are dieing and duplicating, ideas are inspiring, and thoughts are ping- ponging from excitement to doubt and back. All the while my heart just beat about 10 gallons of blood in the last two paragraphs alone. I reach for a word, my brain jumps on the bank, and I slip back into the waters of my go to descriptors. I jump again, this time grab onto a tasty morsel like “exquisite”, chew on that for a spell, then slip back into my cozy waters, now with the sweet taste of wanting more juicy words in my mouth. And that desire propels me to hurl myself up on that exquisite bank of delicious expression again and again until, as a writer, I feel satisfied with my own evolution. I may even sport a more functional pair of writing flippers because of it, evolving a smidgen of my self judgment of thinking I have two left hands when it comes to writing anything of value.

The saying ‘evolve or die’ sounds dramatic, but I wager that it is damn true when you choose to look at life in its raw and simple form.  Every second of every day we have the choice to choose. Sure, the subconscious is at work 24 hrs. a day and thank goodness for that! Imagine if you had to not only bring home the bacon and fry it in a pan, but never let your body forget that you are a woman by coordinating billions of processes per second within your autonomic nervous system. Forget the bacon because we’d all be back in that primitive swamp of single cell simplicity! No, we have this lovely super power bestowed upon us my the Gods, evolution, or The Field, called self awareness, which means we get to perceive ourselves while we are perceiving ourselves. Sounds like a mind tease, right? Nope, just a being who is conscious that they are conscious. Which sometimes feels like our greatest blessing or the most excruciating curse, depending on the day and circumstances, and especially on our story telling habits around how we explain life to ourselves.

The other day, as I was hanging upside down in my aerial yoga class, blood rushing thru my brain cleansing it of all stale thoughts, I exploded internally with gratitude around the chance to see things upside down. I realized that the only way I grow sometimes is to do the opposite, to speak the new scary words, and to expand in love when I want to contract. So ready to invert with me? And what does love have to do with it all anyway?

The game we are playing here is that in order to EVOLVE we need to LOVE. Take a look, it’s backwards in the very beginning of the word itself! A gorgeous word asana, just waiting to be stretched into, to help release the resistance, and to hopeful remind us to stop trying so fucking hard to make it in life. A few months back I wrote a blog about how we might be happier if we decided to trust our life flow instead of push with our life force. Yes, indeed, all growth and evolution involves discomfort. There’s nothing comfortable about feeling like a fish out of water gasping for breath while the image of that tasty morsel in front of you goes in and out of focus while you fade in and out of consciousness.  Been there, done that, in fact this very morning was a gasper kind of start. But that’s also how I know I am evolving, by feeling that internal nudge to love my dreams and efforts even if my life is not yet showing the evidence I expect or the evolved fins ( read fin-ancial ) as fruits of my labors. 

We are propelled by the love and happiness we want to experience, giving and receiving, and again, there’s a flip we can do with that little number too. The art of life and love is to give before we take, offer want we want before we expect to get it back, and that takes evolving out of the WIFM world. Which, by the way, sands for ‘what’s in it for me’.  A prehistoric brain says me me me!, an evolving brain says you you you. And where does it all begin? Well that’s a no brainer…..within. Loving our inner Neanderthals of negative thinking, our Cro-Magnons of cowardly fears, and our Homo Homo Erectus of expectations, victim hood, and entitlement. Hairy backs and all, mono brows, bad manners, and grunting survival driven lumps of Stone Age like attempts to communicate…ALL of it.

Nothing evolves in the darkness of negativity and criticism.  Remember Gollum, obsessed with unattainable shiney objects and deformed in all ways by isolation? Our shadow selves and self sabotage may feel as creepy and our fears may seem as precious to us as our fixation on remaining in control. And yes, I did say those caverns feel safe. Ever heard of being our own worst enemy? We get to stay small and safe when we keep ourselves hidden, by not taking the risk to evolve, and therefore, going against the very essence of life itself. By leaving our safe caves of blame and condemnation and turning to the light in love we get the chance to let life form us into the  beautiful beings that is already in our soul’s blueprint.

Tell a flower not to turn to the light and it will tell you to take a hike. Demand a tree log not to decompose and you’ll just get super weird glances and a wide path from other hikers. Life is in a constant state of flux, and so are we. So why not try to flow with your natural development and evolution with love and acceptance? If it’s true that what we resist persists then it’s also probably true that when we want to go with the flow then, as a wise band once said, all we need is love. Loving what is and loving what can be is evolution at it’s finest, but don’t take my word for it, just look at the natural world to see what a vast spectacle of abundance and infinite possibilities of life is possible when you let it BE.

And then get out there and start some big fires, fueled by your heart’s desires to glow and grow and play your part and help EVOLve us all.

 

 

copyrighted material, 2011.

 

10/28/11

Do you have a Life Force or a Life Flow?

" Fear is just excitement without breath " ~ Fritz Pearls

It's been a belief shifting bash for the last few weeks here in the Spiral Life house, and by that I mean the inner residence between my ears. Just like the leaves that are surrendering their connection to the tree that's been sustaining them, I have been challenged to drop the B.S., playing mental Olympics with the internal stories, and to just get over myself on many levels. I know I am not alone in this shedding process. So how about you?

On the outside world there is a real vibe going on that I believe we are all subconsciously tuning into. From clients to loved ones, entrepreneurs and non workers, we all seem to be feeling this hold on tight because something big is happening sensation. What scientist call 'the field' is abuzz with booty kicking energy. There is much talk about Occupy here and there, shifting securities, and even thousands of people following the current transportation of 12 crystal skulls across the country to honor the Mayan calendar time shift about to happen on 11/11/11. Wow, and I thought I was trying to shift time so I had more of it. There's a whole celestial movement afoot!

Change is everywhere and no one is immune to it. Our beliefs about our capacities and safety are being turned upside down as many seek to find balance on life's tight rope that we all traverse. The good news is that we seem to collectively be at a major tipping point and the time is ripe with possibilities and human invention. That old adage of necessity being the mother of invention is our current reality, big time. It is a phenomenal time to be alive and be part of a revolution happening on all levels. It is also a time rich with inner and outer story telling, some fear based, some enlightening. Have you caught yourself having flashes of rattling insight or seeing a far bigger picture for your life than you ever let yourself have before? Have you been hearing people all around you saying "I want more truth in my life"? There seems to be a deep yearning to birth a new world order of connection and community.

Yet, like any shift, it takes giving up on the old safe ways of believing. While walking my bizarro pugs the other morning I found myself reverting back to that tiring yet ridiculously familiar thought of lack which sounds something like this, and please sing along if you know the words: "I can't get no….satisfaction!" ( the DEVO version, please, I am an 80's girl after all). That self pitying melody of fear and frustration was skipping in my brain….again. So to pick the needle up I started pondering choice, intentions, and feeling compassion for the habit of seeing what isn't happening in our lives when the words life flow blipped across the screen of my mind.

I began to play with the idea of how life force sounds, well, rather hostile. Don't so many of us get into trouble because we just freak out at the thought of not being in control of our destinies? Do you tremble and have that stress induced eye twitch at the mere mention of "everything will work out if you just let go?" Yeah, I thought so.

I adore and applaud those who truly can release their grip on outcomes. Though most people I know and work with would rather be white knuckled and dragged behind their chosen vehicle of willpower to still feel like their ON IT instead of surrendering. Though we all do have those moments of grace, thank goodness. It is those sweet moments of trust that give us a taste of hope and what it feels like to FLOW with our hearts instead of FORCE results by squishing life into our current box of expectations. We do need to keep showing up, making those calls, taking those risks, and sometimes that may feel like forcing ourselves. The difference is we will enjoy the ride more if we can practice a positive perspective.

If you find yourself stuck on the groove of an old tune that sings of woe and despair, stop yourself immediately, visually pick the needle up in your minds eye, and place it on a positive didley. That may be taking many deep breaths, finding a person or picture in your surroundings that make you smile, or even writing down your problem and putting it in a box labeled 'Letting Go'. ANYTHING positive that shifts your perspective off the story of lack and on to a love song of gratitude. Cheesy as it may sound, your body will thank you for breaking the habit of hijacking your adrenal glands (stress) and autonomic nervous system ( anxiety) as you drive down a dysfunctional neural pathway of habitual thinking ( negative belief). Do it repeatedly over time and you will rewire your brain. Sounds too simple? Well, the stressful belief and thought happens in a moment so why can't the perspective shifting me just as swift? And yes, changing habits takes discipline, support, and conscious choice, all things we can have if we allow ourselves to believe in their importance.

We can choose to flow just as easily as we step on the gas pedal of self sabotaging control and forcing life to meet our expectations, especially the unrealistic ones like focusing on what isn't happening. As mere humans we can't change reality, just our relationship to it. By the way, this will affect reality, but more on that later. So what are you willing to do today to retrain your perspective so that you feel a lighter sense of flow and shed the weight of old beliefs?

May the real force be with you and enjoy the dance, remembering that sometimes we really just need to let ourselves be lead and sweetly surrender to the power of life flow.