Tag Archives: awareness

#769: There is No Stopping the Energy of Life!

Written by Jan Ketchel with a channeled message from Jeanne Ketchel.

Today I ask Jeanne to give us some guidance around the theme of now and what is most important for us to keep in mind as we go into a new week. Here is her response:

Remain optimistic! Imbue the self with positive thoughts and awaken positive life forces within. Even if dire circumstances surround you, either in your personal lives or in the world around you, move forward into your lives, My Dear Readers, with positive outlooks and inner compasses facing the truth of the energetic possibilities of self and world to continuously evolve and change.

In true reality nothing stays the same. Keep this in mind. Life is in flux, constantly changing, even if only incrementally, but this is change nonetheless. How do you think the great universe itself arrived at this reality of now, if not by incremental moves of change? In constantly shifting mode, life evolves.

So it is with all of you. Point your compasses, set your directionals, and make some life-altering decisions this week. Solidify already set intentions, staying more firmly upon your path, for now is the time of trial and testing, meant to more firmly set your agenda.

It may feel like giving-up time, like all-is-lost time, but that time of void, of unanchored free fall will only be momentary, as you use it to gather inner strength, to staunchly refuse the call of the big baby, either in self or others, and to reject the notions of impossibility or failure.

Now is the time of reasserting a deeper commitment to self and to the energy of life as the only reasons for life itself. For how can you expect fulfillment if you do not dare the self to take the next step? How can you indeed call yourself alive if you do not pursue life as if it were your only nurturance—sustenance and life force both?

You are all both the means and the way. You hold within yourself—in body, mind, and energetic spirit self—all that is necessary to truly live. Exploit your energy to more fully embrace life now. At all costs, do not falter or redirect your efforts unless your spirit tells you to. If your spirit is in alignment with your set intent, you are in the company of the proper traveling companion and this is your time of creation and fulfillment.

Just a little bit more of the usual confusion to go through and then you will be sailing into clarity and unwavering steadiness. Re-assert the rightness of your intent. Break no contracts. Live life to the fullest with knowing awareness, sobriety, humility, and deep appreciation for your fellow human beings, who support and fund your efforts to evolve.

Ready to take the leap?

Life is about to reveal itself more fully. Are you really ready for what awaits? This is what you must prepare for now: the great awakening moment of truth.

Not yet ready to face it? For those who are not feeling consciously prepared, I suggest allowing the awareness of the world and the universe as your propeller to come into play here. Here is the real truth: You are all going anyway. You are all going forward because the momentum is already in motion. The challenge is to realize it and go with awareness.

Even if reluctant, one can move into new life. Remember what I said earlier? Life moves forward in incremental shifts. Allow the self at least that notion of change and perhaps the journey may be more palatable, with less fear.

You and the universe have already had a lifetime of taking baby steps. You see how far you’ve come? Keep going baby steps or giant steps; it does not matter which. It’s the awareness that you cannot stop the energy of life that counts. Stay connected to that and watch how your intent greets you each day.

Await the wonder of the decisions you made to change to find ways to prove that you are always on the right track. Awareness is all you really need to accompany you. It will supply the answers. And don’t forget: They lie within!

Conserving and renewing energy while in free fall, I sign off; going forward without fear, I hope!
Thank you Jeanne!

#768 A Sip of Infinity

Written by Jan Ketchel with a channeled message from Jeanne Ketchel.

In her beautiful description of dreaming awareness, Moya, a reader of Jeanne’s messages, posted a comment last week, asking for clarity. She relates the following process:

When I left NY to go on my journey to the standing stones in Orkney, I set my intent to ride on the wings of intent and trust, and be open to freedom. Upon returning I was thrust into a deep recapitulation. I was totally unaware of what was happening initially as I came up against the voice of cogitation: relentlessly it unraveled using the “promises” and “uncomfortable truths.” Over the last two days I was able to become aware of what was happening, and last night I set my intention to dream silently on the wings of intent. A great large eagle took me to a foreign place, and I watched as things unfolded and this blissful realization came over me without words. I actually was smiling and felt detached and at ease. I was so elated I believe I was laughing in my dream. I realized that those promises no longer have any power over me. It was like I detached from the foreign voice without having to put up a fight. I simply said: you are not me. I also remember drinking from a sweet candle. The candle was handed to me by this light woman being. She was there to help me through this passageway. She broke off a piece of candle, handed it to me, and it started to melt in my hands. I drank the melting wax. It was like pure nectar and I felt a light kindling within me and it went outwards. I was riding between parallel lines. On one side I could see my true self: the self that is free to travel through infinity, and I chose to merge my intent with my true self. I could also see the foreign mind outside of myself—still there on the other side, outside of me. I acknowledge now is now. I am still a little daunted. I feel like that light being has been in my dreams before. I recognized her and yet couldn’t remember from where. Can you ask Jeanne for further guidance on this? I can’t even formulate a question. I feel like something has really changed and am not sure what it means.

Here is what Jeanne responds when I ask her to give Moya some insight into her experiences, real and dreaming. I also include the intent that the guidance that Jeanne offers be helpful to all of her readers.

My Dear Readers, and my Dearest Moya: I must first stress that these two selves, as described in this dream, are totally compatible and appropriate aspects of self. They must meet often throughout life in order for clarity to be gained. The mysteries of life will remain unattainable, unclear and distant if these two selves do not get together to hash out the truths and meanings in life.

That being said, I also pose that this other being that Moya experiences as outside of self awareness, whom she recognizes yet cannot fully grasp, is as much self as the other two beings, one of whom exists with feet and mind planted upon that earth, the other capable of transcending the earthen heaviness—and the power of life upon that earth to keep one bound and attached—to gain clarity.

Consider the self as multifaceted, all knowing, a being capable of understanding and grasping all knowledge. This is the truth of mankind, yet in that world has he been taught to remain solidly planted. Nothing extraordinary is allowed to interfere with that solidity, that final explanation of the world as one of solid objects defined, packaged, and presented. That is one reality, the reality that is acceptable to all human beings. Yet, most human beings have also had experiences that defy reason and the world of solid objects, such as Moya has in this dream sequence.

Man has been taught that he is limited, that he must go outside his meagre self to find explanation. He has been taught to believe in the capabilities of others who are far greater than he, a mere human being, rather than accept his experiences as personal lessons of untapped potential. Man has been taught to let others carry this energy, such as the light being that Moya so graciously shares experience of. In a different world, the world where everything is possible, it is quite acceptable to be energetically multifaceted beings, simultaneously existing in different stages of awareness.

In her dream, Moya is all of these beings. She is earthbound self; aware self who is capable of detachment from that earthen self—all seeing and aware—yet is she also capable of handing herself the cup of truth. In being offered liquid light of awareness, she is being handed knowledge of deeper self, more connected to the flow of all life and all knowledge. And of course she experiences this light being as recognizable: she is self!

The process, as described by Moya, to achieve this dream awareness—recapitulation—whether cognizant of it or not, opened the door to gain greater insight into self. In facing old patterns, old means of coping—and by being dragged into awareness of the repetitiveness of the pain of such recapitulation—the first step to change was not pushed away in fear but faced, and this allowed for a transcendent split to greater awareness. It is only in acceptance of the frailties, fallibilities, and pain of truth about oneself that one will truly be allowed access to deeper aspects of self. For how can one accept the truth of greater awareness if one has not fully understood the self as earthen being first? If one cannot face pain, one cannot transcend pain.

I contend, in offering insight into the many aspects of self, that all beings are offered opportunities to achieve the stages of awareness as described by this evolving being, Moya, but one must simultaneously face the many challenges that accompany such moments of opportunity. One must push the self beyond the norm, beyond the familiar. One must ask the self to trust the process that is presented. One must follow through by facing all the fears that arise, from the most tiny and insignificant to the most astoundingly confrontative. It is only in transcending all fears that one will achieve enlightenment and be okay with being liquid light.

It is the interconnectedness of all things that awaits recognition inside you, My Dear Readers, the mergence of self with all energy. Whether you call it God or any other name, it simply means that you have all you seek within, yet are you nothing; you are simply a sip of infinity. Can you accept that? Can you leave it all behind and become a drop in the vastness of all energy? Can you totally shed your human form, let go of you, all the selves included?

Can you fully own that you are everything and yet nothing? And then can you fully become that nothing, totally detached? This is not only a dream, as Moya experiences it, it is true reality.

Thank you Jeanne, and special thanks to Moya for sharing her experiences!

#766 Body Language

Written by Jan Ketchel with a channeled message from Jeanne Ketchel.

I ask Jeanne for guidance on this day, the birthday of America. Here is what she advises us:

It is time now to pay attention to the signs coming from the body self, for as much as you all look for signs of spirit and pay attention to that which comes from outside to guide you, your body is really your most important guide. Once you begin to pay more attention to it you will know this.

You may think you are already quite body oriented, but most of you have taken on the doctrines and rhetoric of others and, wise and truthful though they may be, only your own body knows what is best for it.

Turn from your outer knowing now and tune into your inner knowing. Simplify your body’s needs. Pare down what you put into it and discover in so doing just how little food it really needs to survive, how little beverage and sweets it really wants, for it runs better than any manmade machine on less fuel. On this most American day, when focus is outside of the self, I ask that you do a most un-American thing and go innerly, to quietude, rather than be the extraverted type today.

It is a time of abundance yet is that abundance of inner grace and calm if you look for its silent music within. Outer abundance may now rest and this will be good for all mankind, and the world at large, if this inner awareness is paid attention to.

Happy Spirit Tree! Notice her body language? See how she throws her arms up in openness to life!

The body self, which is the focus of this message today, needs and craves inner quiet, peace, and calm. It will speak volumes to you if you let it, but I realize this may be a scary prospect for many, for in so doing the body will confront you with its truths. These may range from long held secrets and mysteries to certain ideas and thoughts, to the truths of the spirit self that are quite fantastic and unbelievable when first encountered. But I ask that you suspend your judgments, your self-criticisms, your set ideas and self-imposed limitations, and listen without fear or despair to your body self. Allow it to be your guide a little more each day.

In allowing this process of body language, you will invariably discover that you will need very little else to guide you as you make your way through life. Your body is your world, containing all that sustains and creates life, and when in balance its qualities of healing and spirit contact are unparalleled. Your personal channels of communication within and without will be open and ready for daily use as you hone their qualities and recognize their features.

You are all abundant beings. Allow yourselves to accept your abilities. You are all special in this regard, as this woman who channels me, yet is she nothing special, as she well knows. She continues to confront her issues and hone her skills just as she wishes all to do. In acceptance of the abilities available to all, she knows the possibilities are endless. But, first and foremost, she knows that one must lose the ego’s trappings, which include fears and inflations, personal attachments and desires, as well as self-judgments and self-criticisms. She knows that one must be daring to not hold back the spirit self that is trapped within the body self, asking for permission to do what it is so capable of doing.

Can you accept the truth of the body self, that it is your vehicle to everything you wish for in life? Can you release yourself from all that holds you back in life, all the fears that limit your access to your true abilities? These are the questions that one must continually ask the self if one is to evolve.

Remember: You are your body. Your body is your natural world. It asks you to pay attention to it every day. It speaks volumes. Can you hear it?

Thank you Jeanne! I leave my body when I channel her. It sits quietly and calmly, waiting for me to return my awareness to it. I am grateful for this process and thankful that I have indeed dared myself to change, to pay attention to what was going on in my inner world, my body self. Every day I see myself and the world in a far different way than I once did. I am thankful to Jeanne for all of her guidance over the past ten years. Her sound advice and gentle prodding have allowed me to change and live in a new world of greater awareness. I am thankful that I can give these messages to you each week. Thank you for being there to receive them!
Love,
Jan

A Day in a Life: Dreaming in Alignment

On Monday I channeled a message from Jeanne about learning to flow. Using a water metaphor she instructed in how to meet the challenges in life head on rather than allowing them to overtake. That night I had the following dream:

Learning to flow...

I’m with Chuck in a large, sprawling ancient city, Rome perhaps. There is very little vegetation in the city proper; everything is manmade. There are large plazas and stone structures, huge buildings of light colored sandstone, gigantic columns, streets covered in large planks of a similar light colored sandstone. The city is beginning to flood.

We are out walking before dawn, aware of the coming flood. We can actually see it coming from a distance as we stand on an elevated plaza overlooking the city and the valleys beyond. As we walk, the water begins to rise, swirling around our ankles. We see a tidal wave beginning to form, making its way in between the buildings of the city. The tidal wave quickly takes shape and overtakes us.

We begin swimming. I see three people in the water ahead of us, the only other people in this seemingly deserted or still sleeping city. They are dressed in evening clothes; a man in a tuxedo and two women is short black evening dresses. The tidal wave hits them and they go under. I can see from my vantage point that they are not taking the situation seriously. Tired after a night out, they are still in a boisterous mood, unaware of the power and danger of the water.

I take my attention off them as I struggle to swim. For some reason I can only get my left arm out of the water, the right hanging useless beside me. I can barely lift my head out of the water and it’s a struggle to breathe. I’m aware of Chuck swimming strongly behind me and I want to keep up with him, not slow our progress. I can feel his encouraging energy and I want to show him that I can do this, that I’m a strong swimmer too. I lift my heavy left arm out of the water over and over again, trying to swim, flapping like a bird with only one wing. It’s cumbersome and frustrating and I’m not getting anywhere.

I don’t feel panic or fear. I don’t sense imminent danger or death, but I do know that we must flow with the water, that we cannot let it overtake us as the threesome in evening dress are doing. I’m aware that they are still floundering in the water up ahead of us when suddenly I flip over onto my back, without even thinking about it, and now I can swim! Both arms are functioning beautifully. I take long and swift strokes, my chest expanding and opening. I’m breathing easily, deeply, and comfortably by swimming in this manner. Effortlessly I glide along, fast and strong. I can also hear Chuck picking up speed behind me as we take off in the water. I’m amazed at how simple it is, how easily I’m flowing along now, loving it, when a moment before I was struggling to move my arm and take a breath. I am now in totally right alignment with my body and the water.

Next, in a second dream, we go to a friend’s house. Her ceiling is leaking. She has had someone come and look at it and the diagnosis is that nothing is wrong with the roof. I ask her if she trusts the guy because to me it’s very obvious that something is seriously wrong. We stand in her kitchen while the water pours down. It’s as if we’re standing outside in a heavy downpour.

I turn to Chuck and whisper: “I think she just doesn’t want to face the truth that there is a problem. Tired of having so much to deal with, she’s electing to ignore what’s so obvious. She’s almost insisting that her roof is not leaking.”

“People can ignore things for a long time. Eventually they get there. She’ll get there,” he says, as we leave her to resolve her issues in her own manner and in her own time.

My dreams ended there, but meanwhile, Chuck was dreaming right beside me, of slipping on a steep icy mountain slope. On the eve of the summer solstice and cusp of the water sign of Cancer—the night after Jeanne had guided us to learn to flow, using a water metaphor—we both dreamed of water. My dreams were of water in liquid form, feminine energy, as I see it; while Chuck dreamed of water in its solid form, ice, masculine energy. In his dream he too did not feel fear or danger, only the process of trying to figure out how best to navigate the slippery slope. We both had to figure out how to flow with what we were presented with, all in keeping with Jeanne’s message of learning to flow rather than float, taking charge rather than being overwhelmed, overtaken, or simply ignoring the truth of what is happening.

I see, in my own dream, the struggle of my ego, wanting to keep up with Chuck, and wanting to show off. For a long time I have envisioned my right side as my ego self. I’ve had many experiences of this, a true fact as I now see it. In this first dream, this right side, my human earthly self, is compromised. My left side, which I consider my spirit self is struggling. I am dreaming and in my energy body so my ego, my right side, does not function properly, yet my ego is making the decisions. Suddenly spirit, my energy body, usurps ego. It flips over and it is only then that I am in total sync, dream and energy body in alignment. This was a moment of enlightenment for me, when Jeanne’s message made even deeper sense, showing me the greater meaning of spirit in alignment with circumstances that are beyond our control.

These dreams were dreams of awareness, yet there was also another part of the deeper self in operation, offering guidance: the ancient deserted city perhaps suggesting this ancient self in my dream and the mountain in Chuck’s dream implying the same. Both Chuck and I did not struggle with the circumstances, either with worry or attachment, but we dealt only with the immediate process of how best to navigate the situation, how best to flow.

This attitude of flowing was contrasted by the second dream I had, of my friend, indicative of the tired ego self not wanting to deal with yet another catastrophe, another problem. In choosing to ignore the water pouring into her house, she offers us the same insight that the three partiers from my first dream suggest, that we can get overtaken and swept under by the force of nature taking its natural course. How long do we really want to do that? How long do we want to allow the ego, tired or inflated, to be in control? How long are we going to struggle before we shift ourselves into a more comfortable swimming stroke? For as long as we need to, as Chuck suggests, but eventually, as he also suggests, people get where they need to get.

I think it’s funny that Chuck and I lay side by side and dreamed a balanced sort of composite dream, the masculine and feminine actually in sync, attempting to get it right, both equally focused on seeking the means of flowing, in alignment with what we were presented with by Mother Nature.

Happy dreaming, happy flowing,
Jan

A Day in a Life: Moles of Recapitulation

On my morning walk today I noticed several dead moles. I’ve been seeing them for days now, always at the same places in the road, at what I now call The Mole Crossings. I imagine many moles making the trek across the road each night and the cars that come upon them. Invariably one or two moles lose their lives each night. I find their tiny, silent remains when I walk. They look so peaceful, eyes closed, their long sharp claws turned slightly under, done with digging.

Why am I seeing so many dead moles? What is the significance? I can’t help but ask myself these questions because I know that everything is meaningful. The immediate answer to my questions is, as I see it, glaringly right: Recapitulation. Well, you might ask, how did you get that answer and why is it so right?

I see the mole as the perfect totem for doing a recapitulation, the one who goes underground, into the earth. Blind to the trappings of this world it is drawn into the energy of the underworld, where it picks apart, digging and gnawing its way through every tiny morsel of dirt and sand, pushing aside blockages of stone and gravel, working its way around and through stumps and roots on its quest for a place of deep inner solitude. That is very much the same kind of work that a recapitulation entails and the end result is a place of quiet calmness deep within the self. If you want to take a shamanic journey there is none like it.

There are many shamanic practitioners who, acting as seers, will journey on behalf of another and return with insight and information that is meaningful and significant for that other. This is similar to what I do when I channel for other people, seeking insight beyond this world that is specific to that person. I also act as a guide when people come to me for hypnosis, becoming the facilitator to accessing an inherent process rarely made available or even acceptable until it’s been experienced. Once a journey has been experienced, an opening has been created and the spirit wants more. I usually end a session by saying that anyone can do a journey anytime, they just have to learn to let go of their fears—both inbred fears and fears of the great unknown.

I’m not special and I don’t do anything to anyone, I simply offer a means to that opening. The fact that I can go outside of my conscious self and gain insight from sources beyond this realm is in fact a universal human potential. Innate though it may be, this ability is often first encountered and utilized during a traumatic event, as the impact of sudden trauma or intense fear allows it to naturally emerge in a superb act of survival. It steps in and acts as a protective measure but is actually, as I see it, a highly evolved spiritual self who knows immediately how to transcend this reality and thus the event that triggered its emergence.

During an out-of-body or near-death experience people discover that they can indeed leave the physical world, have incredible experiences and safely return to their bodies victorious and triumphant—this is the essence of a shamanic journey. Once undertaken, such an experience remains implanted in the psyche. Whether kept alive and utilized or allowed to sink into memory it nonetheless leaves an imprint and has an impact. It can play out over and over again, consciously or unconsciously, known and strikingly familiar or unknown and completely foreign. It is, nonetheless, alerting the journeyer that at one time an experience was had that was like no other.

Having once gained a shift in perception there is often increased interest in finding a means back to that moment of bliss and insight. This too may be a conscious or unconscious longing on the part of the journeyer. The truth is that once the spirit has awoken—made itself know in whatever transcendent way it needs to use—it tenaciously attempts to remind us of its full potential.

During a recapitulation one revisits the moments of trauma, fear, or even mystical experience that originally gave insight into true spirit potential, relives them, discovering this time around the true meaning of why they were had, what they meant, and what they mean for the future. When our journeying self ventures into recapitulation in full awareness, we are ready to encounter what our past holds for us. Our ability to dig like the mole is also simultaneously awoken, ready to be activated. If we so choose we can become the mole and tenaciously and voraciously eat our way through the muck of the shadowland inside us, the very earthen self who keeps everything buried. If we are prepared to once again transcend this reality and, with our claws of intent, dig in and through our visceral present-day selves we will eventually reach the wide-open land of our spiritual selves.

In our world, to take a shamanic journey may be seen as a strange or unique way to tackle the problems in life, highly suspect in some circles and highly valued in others. But, having gone on many shamanic journeys myself in many different ways, I know that it’s just another description of our innate human potential, offering us access to our ancient selves and the ability to perceive and experience many realities simultaneously. A shamanic journey lets us experience ourselves as energy beings, freed of the fears that bind us to this one-sided, flatly defined world that we live in most of our lives, obediently doing the things that are expected of us.

Electing to take a recapitulation journey, a shamanic journey, must become a conscious choice at some point, for if we are to reach our full potential we must keep our awareness about us at all times. If we continue to fight our spirit, if we refuse the journey it prompts us to take, we will be reminded of it throughout our present life. We are supreme students of denial. We learn how to suppress, repress, and push away access to the knowledge of this potential self for decades, but eventually it will get to us in one way or another.

We may fall into illness. We may suffer broken hearts, literally and figuratively. We may never achieve the peace and calm we know is possible. We may live angry, resentful, regretful lives, always certain that someone else is to blame for our misery. We may stubbornly refuse to face our fears and decide that we just don’t want to do the work of fulfillment in this lifetime. And all of that is okay, because even our spirit is part of that decision making.

But, having faced many of the above symptoms and many more besides, I can say that there is nothing like what we experience as we go through the tunnels of our psyches, our conscious and unconscious minds, and our bodies. Having become like the mole, having dug my way into my darkness, having wallowed in the muck inside myself in a transformative recapitulation process, I can finally say that I live a most fulfilling life, no longer burdened, sad, fearful, traumatized, or afraid to love. I have emerged on the other side of the tunnel of recapitulation, victorious and triumphant indeed, in a new land. It is what I wish for all.

I return to work on my book, the first year of The Recapitulation Diaries, soon to be published, hoping that my journey will inspire others to take a shamanic journey into the self, volitionally, with awareness and intent, allowing the spirit self to lead the way. A recapitulation journey is really a lifetime shamanic journey, for we are always offered moments of insight, like trying to figure out why there are so many dead moles on the road. What we encounter as we walk in this world is meaningful.

I’m always wondering what will appear next to guide me.
Until next time,
Jan