All posts by Jan

A Day in a Life: Your Guts Of Steel

Where do you turn for inspiration? - Photo of poster of St. Patrick's Cathedral by J. Ketchel
Where do you turn for inspiration? – Photo of poster of St. Patrick’s Cathedral by J. Ketchel

I look for inspiration for my blog. I’m putting all my energy into finishing my book, so I look for something to guide me. I pick up The Art of Navigation by Felix Wolf. I open it to page 141 and read the following: There was such beauty in intending impeccability and integrity. I believe, however, that the abundance and generosity of life that I was experiencing were not so much tied to the effort of intending and following principles, but rather the result of simply honoring and acknowledging the aliveness of life, every step of the way. Ultimately, looking life in the eye with recognition seems to be all that is truly necessary.

I like this quote, it inspires me, and yet I wish to save my energy. I look to Jeanne for another message today. When I channel, the words just flow out of my pen onto the paper before me. It’s easy on my brain, my time, and my energy. And so I break my attachment to my usual Wednesday blogging routine once again and go to the energetic source of life, as I experience it, to my spirit in alignment with infinity. And so I offer you the following channeled message that came through, as I looked the energy of life in the eye and asked: What message do you have for us today?

Here is what Jeanne replied:

It is of utmost importance that each one of you become fulfilled beings of light and energy, that you work through the issues that hold you in fear and regret, so that your energy may be used to benefit all of mankind. I do not say this lightly, but only because mankind is at such a turning point that good energy may be the only saving grace. The more people who free their energy—from greed and inflation, from sadness and petulance, from the insignificance of neediness and desire-of-no-benefit—the more hope will stir.

The world, as you all know it, is suffering. This suffering is largely due to the energetic component of man’s unstoppable greed. Where have all the good ones gone? Nowhere and everywhere, for all of you are the good ones. You know this already.

Do not get caught up in feeling one way or another about the self, but work to free the self from that which holds you back from fulfilling your true potential. And what is your true potential, you ask? Your true potential lies in your energetic self, your spirit self. Bound by the rules of the world, it is fearful. It holds back. It stays safe in its encasement. This encasement, however, will only last so long. In order to truly embrace the true self, it takes guts of steel. You know you have such guts—you all do.

Fear and worry are figments of imagination. They exist only in your mind. Your mind controls your body. Release the figments of mind and you release your body. Release your body and your spirit will find room, your energy will emerge from its encasement and give you all that you need in order to fulfill your highest potential.

Let life in. Let the encasements of an old world go so that the earth may finally be respected for what it is: a life giver! Let life give itself by aligning your personal intent with life today. Allow the self to take the first step in cracking the encasement that surrounds you and keeps you from your greater experiences of life and the world around you.

Seek the fire within... - Photo by J. Ketchel
Seek the fire within… – Photo by J. Ketchel

Sure, the world is a dangerous place. In many areas there is strife and evil, but do not look upon such devastation and disregard of humanity as someone else’s problem. Look inside the self for where you have the same strife and the same dangerous situations going on. The outer world is merely a reflection of the inner world and just as you all share the outer world, so do you all share the inner world. Do not think that your neighbor is not like you, equally holy and equally self-destructive, equally good and equally fallible, equally fine and equally exhausted by the need to uphold the insanity that life has become.

Find within that which you seek without, but also let life lead you and guide you to the answers you strive for within. Reconciliation with inner self will come from reconciliation without, but alignment will come from within. However, it is only in acquiescing to the non-specialness of the self—because all of you are equally special—that you will be able to access your guts of steel and forge a path to your inner self. Once that pathway has been secured, let it lead you into the world in a new way, in an energetically aligned way.

I cannot stress enough that in order to change your reality, you must dare first to change the self. How can you expect the world to change if you do not change your own habits and behaviors? How can the world change if the people who make up the world do not change? You are the first necessary agent of change. Be the agent of change in your own life. Grip your guts of steel and take the first step to cracking through your environment of encased energy and see what happens. Be open to life and life will meet you with equal openness.

Love to you all,
Jeanne

Readers of Infinity: Life Is Waiting To Receive You

I set my intent to channel and here is what I got from Jeanne for us today:

Once my intent to channel was set, I let it unfold...this is what I received from intent meeting me in return... -photo of handwritten channeling by Jan Ketchel
Once my intent to channel was set, I let it unfold…this is what I received from intent meeting me in return… -photo of handwritten channeling by Jan Ketchel

Postpone nothing. Live your lives to the fullest. Do not reject or turn away from what comes to you as your next step, challenging you to progress. Be open to what life offers you. Know always that you are being guided. These things must be kept in mind if you are to learn how to leave your fears, your old self, and old places that are no longer nurturing, behind.

The time to move on has arrived. Please note that moving on means remaining fully adult, aware of life to come as more fulfilling than the life you now feel stuck in. Moving on requires maturity, compassion, and kindness to others. Moving on requires taking full responsibility for the self. Moving on requires impeccability in all that you do.

Strive for perfection in your daily lives. Such striving brings new energy. It makes you gain, in so may ways, crucial skills and attributes that you will need for your new life ahead. As you move on, new challenges will come to greet you. Life itself will come to your door. You must be prepared to receive it to your fullest advantage.

Impeccability is individually centered, an inner knowing that you are doing your very best in any given situation without inflation or greed for anything in return. To be impeccable is to do your best because there is no reason to do any less, ever.

Give life your all and life will give you all in return. Keep this in mind when you tire. Keep this in mind when fears arise. Keep this in mind when old voices from the past speak out against your more fully embracing life as it comes to you. Keep this in mind as you dare yourself to more fully embrace life and move on.

Life is unfolding, won't you too? - Photo of daffodils emerging by Jan Ketchel
Life is unfolding, won’t you too? – Photo of daffodils emerging by Jan Ketchel

This day is a day of newness, of energetic importance; a day of transition. Make the most of it. Make it be important on an inner level as well as an outer level. You may see it unfolding in transitory fashion in your outer life—one thing leading to another—but notice how your inner world responds as well. Let impeccability, maturity, detachment from the old, and compassion be your stability and your sobriety, as you take full responsibility for yourself and take the next step into your unfolding life.

Life is waiting to receive you. You just have to take the first step out of an old self and an old place, and into a new self and a new place. This opportunity is available every day, at all times. Sometimes it is more energetically apparent; at other times you have to work to discover it. Today, however, it is easily within your grasp.

Let yourself be open today. Look around you and you will notice that something is asking you to tend to it with impeccability. Go tend to it.

Be impeccable and life will meet you with equal impeccability and lead you onward. New life always awaits!

Readers of Infinity: The Pragmatist’s Way—One Step At A Time

Today, I asked Jeanne: What message is most important for us to receive today? Here is her answer:

Are you ready for the energy of spirit?  - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Are you ready for the energy of spirit? – Photo by Jan Ketchel

If you open to the world of energy you must be prepared for it. If you wish to invite intent into your lives you must be shored up with practical knowledge of how the world really works. You must be a strong pragmatic adult, but you must also be innocently open so that your experiences of a new reality will not be dismissed or denied.

In order to prepare, one must work hard to stabilize the self in the world you now inhabit. Determine within your own lives, My Dears, what this means to you and how you intend to go about it. Some things to keep in mind as helpful goals and objectives are the following:

Choose a path that will work for you, that is resonant with your inner spirit. This may take a while, but if you listen to your heart you will know when you have found it. You may even already be on it and not even know it. Keep in mind that life itself, your daily life and the life you were born into, is part of this greater path. The spirit’s path may be as simple as walking in nature or communing with a pet. It may suggest meditating, listening to music, breathing, dancing, just sitting quietly in calmness. In spirit will you know this path, for your spirit will be the communicator. Your spirit will take the path. Your spirit will guide you and speak to you of having found the way. This path will lead to others as you take it, each new path an off-shoot, but always resonant and connected to the original path—simply the next step. In spirit communication will you know where to go—your OWN spirit, by the way, not through or with someone else’s spirit. I speak only of your own inner spirit. No one can really make the connection with this inner self, except you. Someone else may provide structure, and this is good. The best guide is a good listener who will help you hear what you are saying, will point out the obvious, and will ask you what you want to do next.

Study the reality you are in...  - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Study the reality you are in… – Photo by Jan Ketchel

Know your present reality well. Study how it works and how you respond to it. Notice your habitual patterns of behavior, your tendencies, and your patterns of abuse, reaction, complacency, and inertia. Notice how you attach and how you reject. Notice how you allow and disallow; how you follow and refuse to follow. Know your strengths and your weaknesses, your inflations and your follies. Above all, be perfectly and ruthlessly honest with the self. Notice how quickly you lose all that you gain. Do not be discouraged, just keep going.

Absolve the self of so-called sins. With compassion for the self and others move forward. With love allow yourself to take your journey, even while you allow others to take theirs. Be responsible for those in your care and learn from them. Whether they are lovers or foes, whether you are duty-bound or acting out of love and compassion does not matter—they all have something to teach you.

Be impeccable in how you treat others. Treat all beings equally, with love, kindness, and compassion, with respect and understanding that all are on journeys of evolution. All are great. All are fallible. Even you. Even the most lowly creature and the most profound of scholars are innocent beings—some aware, some not, and which ones are aware you may never know, so treat all equally.

Guide those in your care with gentleness and awe, awe for their journeys. Be non-judgmental, even as you wish to be free of judgment from others yourself. Allow the self and others to fail, this is how you learn. Allow the self and others to struggle. Allow the self and others to go off the path when necessary so that the way back may be discovered. Allow the self and others to embrace results and advances, but do not get caught in inflated ideas of the self. Encouragement is always good.

Maintain a positive outlook. If you are naturally pessimistic, find out why and what that means to you and use it to your advantage. This same kind of examination for all energy types must be explored. Find out what energy type you are and use it as both your challenge and your catalyst. Find out where your talents lie and use them until you find some new ones.

Each day dawns anew... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Each day dawns anew… – Photo by Jan Ketchel

Always advance. Even if you cannot see the road ahead of you, know that it’s there waiting. Each step into the darkness is just like a step into the light—in both cases you are blind. Allow your inner vision to guide you. Hold fear in check. Hold the big baby inside you in check. Hold the ego in check. Find your way through practical navigation of the life you find yourself in. This is where you are. Begin there. Look around and discover something that you did not notice before.

Do a reality check several times a day. Say: Okay, where am I? And then decide what to do next based on your reality and your spirit’s intent. Don’t know your spirit’s intent? Don’t worry—just follow the path that opens before you. Eventually you will know that your spirit’s intent is to evolve. Just what this means for each of you will be unique, and how you discover it will be unique as well. How you experience it will be unique. How you grow will be unique.

If you are truly ready for the journey of your spirit, or even if you don’t know if you are ready but you hear the call, I suggest you pay attention. Heed the call and begin your journey with one step today. It will be the first step on a journey of greater fulfillment. One step at a time is the pragmatist’s way.

A Day in a Life: Evolving Recapitulation

I really am in the final throes of editing my next book in The Recapitulation Diaries series: The Edge of the Abyss. For this week’s blog I post another excerpt, as I am conserving my time for editing. As the recapitulation proceeded I constantly discovered just how my inner process was leading me to learn what I needed to learn about myself. Guided by the intent of the process of recapitulation itself—its intent set long ago by the Shamans of Ancient Mexico—I was swept up in that intent, for better or worse, married to it. Though I often felt that I had married a monster, at other times I knew I had married a prince. In the end I discovered that I had been married to myself all along—if that makes any sense! I don’t believe this excerpt needs the same kind of warning as some of the others that I’ve posted. It’s really just about gaining valuable insight about the journey of life and moving forward with renewed intent.

"Look what I bring!" my child self says... Bottle art by Haldis. Photo by Jan Ketchel
“Look what I bring!” my child self says… Bottle art by Haldis. Photo by Jan Ketchel

From February 6, 2003: My son, sick with the flu and a 103° temperature, sleeps in today. I get my daughter off to school and contemplate what I woke up thinking about earlier this morning: shame, and the child inside me who continues to carry it around like a heavy boulder. I’m pretty sure the adult self let it go a long time ago, but the child self sneaks into the adult world at times still bearing this heavy burden. She plunks it down in front of me and says: “See! It’s still here.”

As I peer at this big boulder of shame that she drags around, I suddenly experience complete separateness from this child self, and with utter clarity I understand that she is the one who so tightly rolls into that fetal position every night. Clutching all the pain and shame, she’s still very much alive, residing somewhere deep inside me, while I—the adult—have gone on into life. I’ve grown up and done a lot of adult things, distancing myself from her as much as possible in order to do so. Now, I clearly understand that I went on so I could one day return to this moment, so that I could one day be in the position I’m in right now, intent upon rescuing the child self still inside me and, in so doing, rescue myself.

Until today, I’ve had such a difficult time seeing and believing myself to actually be more than one being, fearful of what it might mean about me, perhaps that I’m crazier than I thought. But only in acknowledging that I am many beings simultaneously will I be able to embrace the crystal clear insight that right now, in this moment, hits me: fragmentation is a valuable skill!

In one aspect of fragmentation, my fully present adult self is able to step outside the memories and from her perspective carefully and sensitively guide my child self. I see this as an evolving aspect of the recapitulation. I realize that in so doing I’m finally able to reciprocate what my child self once so protectively did, as she fragmented, repressing the memories in the process, so I could grow up. I’ve simply not been in a position to fully embrace this insight until now, but it’s very clear that fragmentation is an important tool that has a valid place in the healing process.

"I can do this now," my adult self says... Photo and painted bottle art by Jan Ketchel
“I can do this now,” my adult self says… Photo and painted bottle art by Jan Ketchel

As I continue to hone the use of this skill, I imagine that all of my parts will eventually merge. As my adult self joins forces with my fragmented child selves—my sixteen little girl selves—and grants them each an opportunity to express themselves, they will no longer be alienated parts, separate from the whole. Once each part has told her tale and been fully acknowledged for both her pain and her bravery, another part will link into this healing process, another part offered the way home. Clarity and wholeness will eventually come, as new ideas and new perceptions about life in general and the past in particular are accepted and assimilated too.

It’s really the job of the adult self now to make all this happen, to introduce the guidelines, for only she has the wherewithal and the stamina to take on this monumental task. It’s what I’ve been preparing for. She must nurture and prepare each of the fragmented selves now too, make them welcome, and fully assimilate them into the inner circle of the new self. It can’t happen without a strong adult presence, a loving, respectful, and compassionate self. That kind of maturity is key to this whole process.

Thanks for reading!
Jan

Readers of Infinity: It’s Time To Change

Today I asked Jeanne to show us something important for now. Here is her response:

There are many methods of change... do what resonates... Photo by Jan Ketchel
There are many methods of change… do what resonates… Photo by Jan Ketchel

Now is the time of great unfolding. By that, I mean that life will progress as it is set to until conscious shift is made. This refers to the lives of individuals, as well as nations and the entire universe. Energetically, you have already been swept into a process and as it is now so will it continue, until each one of you makes a concerted effort to change yourself in some deep and meaningful way.

The message for today is to take responsibility for the self. Investigate your personal life—looking for the mundanity, the repetitiveness—and the lack of energy that it gives you. Make it clear to yourself just what it is that you would like to keep in your life and what you know must go. Then begin a methodical shoring up of the good and letting go of the bad. Methodical is the key word here, not the likes or dislikes. Methodical implies diligence and attention, a method by which you elect to change yourself and the discipline you apply. There are many methods of change. I do not have to enumerate them. You know them already. Pick the method that works for you and do it impeccably. Do it in the unfolding of your everyday life.

It’s time to change. It’s time to really change yourself so that everything else around you can change too. This is absolutely possible. Everything will change if you begin to change yourself. Take my word for it—it works!

Change yourself; change the world! Those words have truth and power in them. I suggest you give it a try and then thank yourself for daring to break through the impasse that now holds you captive.