– Photo by Jan Ketchel
Dear Readers and Listeners,
Here is today’s channeled message brought to you by the Soul Sisters, Jan and Jeanne. May it offer assistance and guidance as you navigate your life in this world.
Tag Archives: challenges
A Day in a Life: Pathways to Change
to come closer and closer,
coming by several times a day to raid the bird seed!
– Photo by Jan Ketchel
Living a healthy life, for as long as we are here, is all about care of the self, striving to know the self at the deepest level, learning to love and to receive, giving the inner self and the outer self equal attention and importance. It’s about valuing who we are and what we have to offer, because we all have something to offer. It’s about fully embracing the real self—the true self that we all know we are but are often afraid to express—allowing it live to the fullest.
This is not an easy task! We must struggle to maintain balance, both internally and externally, while we simultaneously must wrestle with our human desires and appetites. If we are to succeed, we must pay attention to our bodies, our minds, and our spirits, as well as all the parts of ourselves that constantly vie for our attention. We must learn to be okay with where we are. We must remain fully aware that life itself wishes us to grow and change. We must be okay with what comes to us from outside, knowing that it is there to guide and teach us. I see both negative and positive aspects of life as obstacles because whether they are harsh or difficult challenges and confrontations, diseases and physical impediments, or even if everything comes easily to us, they all challenge us to individuate and mature so that we may reach our fullest potential.
If we can begin to accept that life is more than just a mundane, sad, unfulfilled existence; if we can embrace it as an exciting experience in a most fantastic realm, we open ourselves to something far beyond the norm. In simply deciding that the life we are in is enough, in acknowledging that what we must contend with everyday is our necessary pathway to change, we begin to experience life in a new way.
I create my own reality, and so, if I constantly complain about my life then I will never experience life in a new way. I will only experience what I say and tell myself. But if I shake off the negative speak that runs through me and contaminates my experience, I offer myself the possibility for a new experience. This is what Jeanne speaks of in her messages. Each week she asks us to be open and willing to face life in a new way, not viewing it as a horrible or frightening experience, nor as a tiresome task or depressing situation, but as an exciting adventure. She asks us to be energetically available to life in a new way.
Living a healthy life, and gaining awareness of who we are and where we are really being led in our personal lives, entails constantly seeking balance, paying attention to what our bodies tell us, honing our skills of self-communication and dialogue with the inner self—all parts of that inner self. A good way to begin intending and asserting a new attitude toward life, is to pay attention to our physical bodies. In simply paying attention to our body’s messages, we might just have the first big breakthrough to new life.
Recently, I have been struggling with a lower back ache. It’s due to heavy lifting of 40 pound bags of pellets and the hauling of firewood. I have had to pay attention to it, as it will not let me do otherwise. It’s forcing me to stay in my body. I already know that this is one of my greatest challenges in this lifetime, to be present in my physical body. Through my entire recapitulation, being present in my body meant facing the pain and humiliation of the sexual abuse I suffered as a child. As a child I got really good at leaving my body—it was a means of escape from the pain it carried—so good that for most of my life I was never really in it. My recapitulation taught me that my body was a good place, my vehicle through life, absolutely necessary if I was to evolve. And so I struggle constantly to remain present, to not drift off as I am naturally wont to do.
– Photo by Jan Ketchel
To change a habit that once saved my life has been challenging. And so, I am thankful for the aches and pains of my lower spine, reminding me every day to pay attention to what my body is telling me. I am addressing it constantly in a multitude of healing practices, but my biggest healing has been to let it be present, to work with it, to let it guide me to what I should and should not be doing at this time in my life.
I have always been physically strong, able to do exactly what I wanted, and so I never limited myself in anyway. Now, I must face that I am limited and sometimes, I must admit, it has been a real pain—pun intended! I can’t just do anymore; now I have to think before I do, and that is both a challenge and a contemplative process. I must stay in my body basically all the time, in every moment of the day. If I do not, it reminds me —OUCH!— to come back! And so, I am constantly present, paying attention to what I am doing in each moment. Life has become a constant walking/sitting meditation. I am paying attention to the fact that my back, always so strong and readily available, is now saying: Don’t take on so much for others; don’t give away your energy so easily, protect it, use it for what is most important. You are not allowed to bear so much anymore. You are important—take care of you!
Each morning, Chuck and I begin the day by each pulling a card from our favorite Tarot deck. It’s a way of anchoring ourselves in our intent—the intent to remain balanced, aware, and open to life. Each day we ask the cards to supply us with what we need most to guide us. The answer, whatever it is, always reminds us to pay attention to our internal worlds as well as our external worlds, as they mirror each other perfectly. Each day we both pick the perfect response to where we are individually, and as a loving, growing partnership as well. How could it be otherwise? The universe is always in alignment with us! The challenge is for us to get in alignment with it!
My little back ache is asking me to pull back from too much experience in the outer world, to hone my skills in my inner world in a new way. And so I have been daring myself—as you know, if you’ve been listening to my weekly channeled messages—to deepen my experience as an energetic being. Yes, I must live life fully in my body, accept my strong physical self, but equally my strong spiritual self as well. And that is why I have a backache!
I see this as part of my process of growth and change, in alignment with my spirit’s intent to constantly grow. I don’t believe we are here to just grow once and then plunk down and say, “Okay, I did it, I changed.” No, the challenge is to keep growing. Likewise, if all I do is moan about my aching back, nothing will shift for me at all, all I’ll have is a painful back and a depressing life. But, if I elect to use this challenge, then I am doing something to shift myself, to change my perception of life, and hone my awareness. In fact, I create a new reality for myself.
– Photo by Jan Ketchel
I hope you all find out what your little or big aches, pains and challenges are trying to alert you to. Mostly, they ask us to confront something, to get to the bottom of who we are, to make amends, and move on to the next challenge. We just have to be ready to face and accept the truth of that challenge, and act upon it in a positive, healing way. Acting upon it is often the greatest challenge. Many times I have had to feel the searing pain in my lower back to remind me of just how I am being asked to act upon the messages I receive.
Good luck! And be careful out there if you are shoveling all that snow today!
Jan
A Day in a Life: Who Are You?
When my children were first born I stared at them intently as they lay in my arms, wondering who they would become.
“Who are you?” I asked. “Where have you come from? Why are you here? Why did I get you? Where are you going? Who are you going to be?”
I was fascinated by those tiny, helpless creatures who seemed to know everything, yet who could do nothing for themselves. I sensed they held all the mysteries of life, yet it was my responsibility to teach them about life. How could I teach those complete little beings anything! I could only offer them utter respect and love, knowing they held memories of things I had long ago lost touch with. New to the world, I saw them as fully in touch with all knowledge, so recently coming from the wellspring of all life.
From the moment of birth, I saw them as miniature adults, intelligent, intuitive, beautiful beings that I was charged with launching into life. While preparing them for whatever life held in store for them, I rarely stopped to think about the daunting task that it really was. With my intent already set, I plowed ahead, carrying them forward, aware most of the time that I was challenging them; that I was doing what they needed me to do. Now they’re both freshly graduated from college, looking for jobs, and they are indeed those intelligent, intuitive, beautiful beings I always saw them as. And yet, I still look at them with awe and wonder who they will become in the future.
Why did I get them? Why does anyone get the children they get? I no longer wonder why.
I believe our children are our opportunities to transform. We are constantly asked by them to face our fears while at the same time we are challenged to free them of us. We are challenged to free them of everything we hold onto, both that which we hold sacred and that which we fear, so they can become thoughtful, aware, evolving beings. We are charged with unburdening them so they can move on, totally free, unencumbered by our darkest secrets, our inhibitions, our rules, our agreements, and yes, our fears. I was conscious of this from the very minute I first set eyes on my children. Even if we don’t have children we are asked to face these challenges in all of our relationships, whether with partners, parents, siblings, co-workers, etc. We are all offered opportunities to transform.
When I whispered to them that I would do the best I could, I was promising them that I too would transform. Perhaps that was the moment when I set my intent to do a shamanic recapitulation. I don’t know for sure, because I was far from embarking on that journey, but something inside me knew that I must not burden those kids with me. I knew my biggest challenge was going to be setting them free of me, so they could become the beings they had the potential to become and the only way to do that was to face who I was. And I have indeed had to face my own fears as I raised my children.
My two children don’t even know it, but they have always been the impetus behind my own healing journey. I see them now for what they truly are: they are beings of recapitulation, having brought me to this point in my life, for they have constantly challenged me as much as I challenged them, and as much as I challenge myself.
When I worry about them, I know I must turn my eyes inward and work on my own reasons for that worry. I know I must ask myself to take the worry off them and use it to cleanse myself, sending them off with the freedom from me that they deserve. I refuse to burden them with me. Even so I know they will have to do their own work on shedding the mother they got, and in the meantime I give them permission to do so, to go out into the world and truly become who they are.
In continually facing who I am, in reflecting back onto myself what I project onto them, I ask myself to become who I truly have the potential to become as well. We are all here for many purposes, for many reasons, and for many challenges. We are all imbued with the potential that I first realized in my infants, when I first allowed that they did not really belong to me, but only to themselves. I knew my job was to bring them into life in the best way I could. I chose to do that with awareness.
When I see them sad, I ask myself: what is it in me that is sad? When I see them angry at the world, I ask myself: where is my anger? When I feel their disappointments, I must ask myself where my own disappointments are. I know I must resolve those issues in myself so we can all be free.
I ask only that they go into life and embrace it as their own, for life is ready to embrace them in return. I ask that they let me go, accepting me as a separate being on a separate journey, as much as I accept this truth about them.
As Jeanne suggested in Monday’s message, I use heart-centered breathing to send them on their journeys into the next stages of life—I use heart-center breathing and Tonglen too. I breathe in my worries and breathe out their full potential. I breathe in my fears and breathe out fearlessness for them. I breathe in my maternal instincts and breathe out their own maternal instincts and abilities to care for themselves.
I unburden them of me. I feel it is my greatest duty as their mother, to set them free, of me especially. I don’t own them. I love them and cherish them for who they are. I watch with awe as they launch into the world, as I once watched with awe as they first learned to roll over, to sit up, and as they stumbled through their first walking steps.
When people tell me I have great kids, I know they speak the truth.
“Yes, they are great kids,” I say, “because they are themselves!”
I still whisper the same words to them each day that I once whispered when they were infants: “Be yourself, be who you are. I can’t wait to see who you will be!”
I’m still fascinated as I watch them take their next steps—I’m just as fascinated by all the people I know and meet. I wonder: Who are you going to be?
Love to you all,
Jan
#717 The Pulse of the Universe Inside You
Jan Ketchel channeling Jeanne Marie Ketchel
Dear Jeanne,
Today feels like the day we have all been waiting for, the culmination of a long and serious transition time. This morning I pulled a Tarot card and received The Chariot, a fine affirmation of all my personal intentions to live, work, and be within the flow of nature, both calm and flowing but also in motion, constantly daring myself to go beyond my limitations. This card is perfectly in alignment with where I am at this moment in time.
Drawing this Tarot card struck at the heart of change as I personally enact it in my life, setting my intent from a calm place of heart, yet remaining fully aware that I must push myself and sometimes even force myself to stick with my well-laid and well-intentioned plans. While I feel a shift today I also know that challenges will arise because that is the nature of the universe and it is how we are shown where our path lies. I know that I must stay connected to my intentions and on my path, but that I must also be alert, aware, and prepared for anything.
Perhaps many of your readers are starting this week in a similar state of calm determination, feeling the shift in energy as I am. Can you offer us advice for the week ahead as we set our intentions to flow, while at the same time we know full well that there will be challenges ahead?
My Dear Jan and All My Readers, find your heart center as you begin each day, taking but a few moments to locate and feel the intensity of this calm place that lies within each of you. This is nature at the core of each of you, the pulse of the universe inside you. This universe you speak of is not outside of you, but deeply embedded inside you.
This is the first thing to note: Your challenges come from within. Even though you may notice them being mirrored outside in the world and the people around you, and in your daily lives unfolding, note that they originate inside you, conjured by your spirit urging you to confront that which holds you back. The universe and all of nature lie at your heart center. Visiting this place daily will set you on your path and invite openness to that which comes, for you will, in your openheartedness, recognize your challenges as perfectly matched to where you are in your life. There will always be something to get beyond, to work through—and it will always be something personally important or it would not be there confronting you each day—until you have solved the riddle of it to your heart’s content.
The second thing to note is: Each day you must also make note of the energy outside of you, for it will also show you how your inner process must be conducted. You must learn to read the energy outside of you, in the atmosphere, in nature, but foremost in the people you come in contact with. You must learn to assess what is happening for others in your proximity and adjust your expectations and your own energetic output to both accommodate and challenge this outer energy. You must find balance between your self and your outer world without compromising your intentions to change and grow.
It is a good idea to consider the self as a separate being with a separate inner process that must be attended to. But remember that the inner self is not the ego self. It is not one of the archetypal personality functions of the psyche, but the spiritual self who adjusts and flows without attachments, without demands, without really revealing itself, but simply flowing with what comes, even though it is absolutely in the fore, in charge so to speak.
In directing your inner and outer worlds from your heart-centered inner spirit self, using your knowledge of how change needs time to unfold, to present challenges, and to be worked through, you will both maintain good balance and forward movement toward not only culmination, as you mention Jan, but transformation, so that you go beyond it to a new level.
And, of course, when you reach that new level you start all over again, challenging the self to change and grow some more, for that is life. But also, at each level, you are more aware, more firmly heart-centered, flowing more easily, and more firmly grounded in who you are, why you are there, and what you are meant to do with your life.
Good Luck. Ask for guidance in the form of balance, in the form of inner calm, and in the form of daring, so that you might push through all that appears before you.