Sit quietly and listen to the flow of your heart, to how it slows down and beats calmly when you tell it to go into the flow of life, into the flow of the calm air around you, and how it begins to hold itself in a steady state of persistent peacefulness. Let it be as it is. Without tension or intention, just be with the sound of your heart.
How can you love yourself when you are so imperfect? How can you possibly grow when you fail so often? How can you expect miracles when you are so caught in mundane worldly habits?
Begin by letting go of those questions, those judgments, those ideas of self. You are whole and perfect as you are. You are where you are right now, and that is perfect.
Let your mind be still, your inner critic quiet for just a moment as you reach for something new. Let your mind relax into not doing. Let your heart open and your innocence ask for guidance. In your innocence you are perfect.
In this state of perfect innocence allow your breath to be easy and natural. Let it just do its magic. See how magical you are? Your breath shows you this. Where does it come from and how does it keep on flowing? That is the magic of you.
Allow your eyes to soften their gaze, your muscles to relax, your thoughts to cease. Just be with each calm and slow breath, with each beat of your heart, with each soft puff of air as it enters and leaves your nostrils. Let yourself sit quietly with the calm and perfect self that you are in this moment. Nothing else matters.
As you sit with your perfect self, begin to allow a new idea to enter your mind: I am perfect. I am perfect. I am perfect.
Each day you are the perfect person to live the life you are in, the perfect self for the day. There is no need to be anyone else. Just be yourself. As you wake up each morning state your intention: I am perfect today as I am.
Allow your body, your mind, your spirit to be in the flow of the day as it comes, whatever comes. Without struggle address what comes up, because that is what is perfect for the day. There is no need to resist, to fight or to be angry. Just be with what is. This is the day I am granted and it is perfect.
Let your perfect day be fulfilled in the most perfect way. Accept it with open arms and heart: it is the perfect day for what needs to be done and for what I need to learn. Today is perfect.
Notice how calm you become as you ponder taking this attitude to each day. Come what may, I am okay! Come what may, I am okay!
May you be calm. May you be safe. May you be peaceful. May you be happy.
Up from the depths come pearls of wisdom… -Hudson River Brick wrapping by Maggie R.
In a dream, I am swimming across the Hudson River, beneath the Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge. As I swim along, I reach up and gather thousands of fishing lines, thin filaments that originate from the top of the bridge and hang down to the water. No one is now fishing from above, these are the remnants of past efforts.
When I gather, in one hand, enough entwined lines to form a thick rope, I use it to propel me forward. Then I let go of it and begin gathering new lines. I awaken before reaching the Kingston shore.
Crossing the river is a powerful archetypal symbol of significant Completion, be it with a stage of life, a relationship, a passionate obsession or a dominant attitude. To truly complete, we must be ready to let go of the solid ground we have habitually walked upon, as we venture forward into the unknown of murky waters, replete with powerful tides and undercurrents of emotional uncertainty, before arriving at a new solid ground of knowing. Such is the perennial opus of human life.
Incidentally, the currents of the Hudson River are so powerful that they have claimed the lives of many a seasoned and professional swimmer. I associate those potentially fatal undercurrents with the state of the global energy of our time. We are dealing with volatile, unpredictable currents of energy that can exhaust one’s intent to stay afloat, or simply move forward.
The dream offers a technology to successfully traverse such chaotic times. The suggestion is to grasp and appreciatively weave together the thousands of attempts to spiritually advance. This processing and act of love can now provide the strength for a major advance.
One powerful association, for me personally, with fishing, is the act of remembering and interacting with dreams, messengers from the depths of the unconscious, or infinity, who nourish and share their pearls of wisdom, as they deliver needed guidance to the conscious mind.
As all who fish are well aware, patience and effort are required to successfully reel in the fish that is quite energetically capable of slipping back into the river. In practical terms, this means setting the intent to lucidly remember the dream and then record it immediately upon awakening, before the familiar thought of, “Oh, how could I forget this?” lulls us back into oblivion and lost dreams.
There is no actual waking-life fishing permitted on this bridge of my dream. The fishing lines presented are symbolic of countless attempts to align the efforts of waking life with the spiritual guidance from the depths. These are the many cycles of groundhog days we have endured to inch our way beyond our default habitual patterns.
In Buddhist tradition, this completion is emergence from a path of Avidya, which means ignorance, unwisdom or delusion. By suspending judgment we can see Avidya as a necessary stage of learning, whose cycles accrue to a broader awakening to the true nature of reality. We see the deeper picture and no longer need the support of older scaffolds of attachment. We can let go with love and compassion. The many strands of this journey, when fully entwined and grasped, thrust us forward into new life.
Completion requires us to not turn back. To move forward may require some sacrifice, but energetically we have fully explored and exhausted our attachment to our prior way of being. To look back at this point is to lose our fluidity and turn to stone. We no longer need to go there; it is done.
The many fishing lines also represent the efforts of our ancestors, whose knowledge is there to be grasped and consciously integrated. This is a major feature in the technology of advance in the water. By grasping and intertwining so many threads the strength is gained to propel forward. There is also the suggestion to stay collectively united with resonant beings who strengthen our resolve.
Inwardly, our greatest resource lies in the Divine Intelligence accessed in our subconscious minds. The subconscious is the storehouse of all memory and experience, the many fish brought up from the sea of human history.
As I write this blog, my subconscious immediately responds to my conscious mind’s deliberations with associations to vaster knowledge, both personal and collective. This interactive relationship between conscious thought and subconscious associative memory, personal or collective, is a constant creative interaction within and between our minds and bodies.
My subconscious brings to the surface several memories of frightful encounters with the undercurrents of the mighty Hudson River. I’m reminded of the I Ching, hexagram #63, After Completion, depicting the river being successfully crossed. Psychological references to the island in the ocean as ego, in its relation to the greater collective unconscious of humankind, flood my mind.
Aside from the powerful ability of the subconscious mind to miraculously manifest desired change, is this automatic ability to constantly interact with the conscious mind by presenting a treasure trove of timeless knowledge, accrued through evolutionary history.
Of course, it remains for the conscious mind to weave or process these associations in such a way that they provide the solution to the dilemmas and questions we face.
We can quite directly ask the subconscious a question before sleep that will spin its strands of knowledge into the dream we are invited to participate in.
And finally, we can retrieve those dreams, as I have done here, and deepen our ability to successfully navigate our lives, and the troubled waters of our time.
Embrace yourself a little bit more each day with loving thoughts, with kind words of encouragement and with the knowledge that you are on a most important journey, the journey of a lifetime. This is your opportunity to change, to become, to unfold and to accept who you truly are. Without fear let yourself accept the mission of this lifetime. You may not think you know what that is yet, but inside you do. You’ve just been afraid to truly become who you are meant to be. There are so many things that get in the way of truly becoming, but don’t let that stop you. Let your amazing self shine through, a little bit more each day, and as you get used to who that true self is, it will become easier and easier to fully embrace and fully become.
The Tarot delivered me the 10 of Swords, Ruin, to represent the state of things leading into today, and the 2 of Cups, Love, as the energy of today. How does ruin turn into love?
The culprit of ruin is an undisciplined, warring force seeking complete disruption and failure, a marplot who loves to overthrow the happiness of others by ruining all intellect and moral qualities. This energy is amply being reflected on the outer world plane at this time. Joyce Sequichie Hifler, in A Cherokee Feast Of Days Volume III (p.66), states:
“When someone is angry or hurt or spoiled, they tend to want everyone to pay for it. Don’t… Go on with your life, but be alert. Know in your heart and in your spirit that you cannot be put down. Hold tight to your common sense and know you are spiritually protected always.”
Then of course we must face the inner truth of this outer mirror, reflected so powerfully to us at this time. Who is this inner encroacher, this meddler disrupting our inner true peace? Responsibility, ultimately, resides with the conscious mind, whose thoughts and beliefs are the major source of suggestions to the subconscious mind.
Of course, we receive countless hetero-suggestions each day, meaning the conscious and unconscious taking in of suggestions from outside influences. Nonetheless, responsibility for raising these suggestions to conscious scrutiny rests with the conscious mind.
The royal couple who govern our inner and outer selves represent the conscious and subconscious minds. The true divine abilities of this couple has been known for centuries. In the 16th century, Paracelsus stated, “Whether the object of your faith be real or false, you will nevertheless obtain the same effects.”
This translates today as, “you manifest what you believe.” The subconscious mind will generate your mood, state of health, and your position in life based upon the thoughts and beliefs of your conscious mind. This is at the heart of the paradigm shift awakening within us.
We possess the ultimate power over our lives. And that power initiates from what we think, believe, and intend. Even Victor Frankl, while incarcerated in Auschwitz, could sustain his life based upon his attitude and imagination, both strong sources of suggestion to the subconscious mind. The times we are living in ask us to wisely exercise this truth.
Whether we are aware of it or not, our conscious minds are in a very intimate relationship with our subconscious minds, determining the course of our earthly existence. In truth, we exist in constant trance, manifesting our innermost thoughts. When we practice responsible autosuggestion, we are bringing conscious intent to the construction of our lives.
Love—Thoth Tarot Deck
We arrive at responsible autosuggestion at the heart center, where we learn the truth from the High Self. Modesty is the requirement of the ego in this communication. If the ego can surrender its narcissism, its willfulness, and its bad temper it will be granted the necessary clarity to know what to intend.
This acquiescence to the truth is the ego’s expression of love to its subconscious, as it delivers suggestions to grow and advance the overall needs of the Self. This royal union of selfless truth, with its creative manifestation in physical form, is how that which was once ruinous becomes love.
Let your heart be still as you allow truth to speak through you. All beings are capable of reaching inside and opening to words of wisdom, knowledge and truth.
Nothing is happenstance or accidental. The times you live in are indeed indicative of great change, that which has long been foretold. The period of waiting is over, for you are in the midst of the changing times you have long anticipated.
Get in alignment with the fact that the unfolding has begun, but also get in alignment with the fact that as each new day comes you have the opportunity to take things in a new and better direction. Every person living on the planet has free will and can decide how to act and react. Everyone. Is it best to pull inward? Or is it best to engage outwardly?
Everyone is different and every personality type must make a decision regarding what to do based on who they know themselves to be. Some people are a perfect fit for quiet work, for sitting still in prayer, setting intentions and making compassionate contributions, while others have the energy and personality to be physically and vocally engaged in outer ways, such as in political and social arenas. Decide for yourself what you are best suited for. Quiet private work? Or extraverted public work?
This time of rapid change will last for several years, and unfortunately much damage will be done, but that doesn’t mean all will be lost, for behind the scenes are many supportive energies offering new aids to humanity.
All progress leaves ruin in its wake. All that is good rises from the ashes of old. All transformation happens through sacrifice. All breakthrough leaves something shattered behind it.
Great good deeds are to come. Good will is stirred into action in hearts and minds, and those hearts and minds hold a vision of a new and just future where all human beings live in peace. True Peace has not been a part of life on earth yet, though True Peace has been a longterm goal.
Keep the phrase True Peace as a mantra. Let it sink into mind and heart as to its meaning, and make it the motto behind the changes you are now weathering through.
True Peace requires commitment and certainty as to its probability. True Peace is possible. True Peace is on the agenda. True Peace is underlying all the current changes.
Sometimes the bringers of change are not who you want, but they bring the much needed momentum that is sorely needed so that True Peace may become a household saying, rather than Home Sweet Home.
True Peace will arise from the destruction. It is in the contrast between chaos and destruction and the absence of chaos and destruction that True Peace will be experienced and understood. It has always existed and always will.
Are you, the human race, collectively ready to bring it down to earth? Is it time now for True Peace?
