Jan's Blog

A Day in a Life: From the Archives

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Jan is taking a few days off. We found something from the archives that is in alignment with recent topics. From Jan’s blog, A Day in a Life, originally posted on February 4, 2010, here is What is Fear?:

Dear Readers,

I thought this portion of a message that I received from Jeanne today might be interesting and perhaps helpful as you do your inner work. She says the following:

As fears pop up to challenge you, take a look at them and know that they are just that, fears, and nothing more. And what is fear but an old habit of emotional baggage. But if you look into that bag you will see that it is empty because fear is invisible! It does not exist unless you attach to it and make it be important. The process of letting go is taking away the importance of that which has conjured itself before you. These can be many things that, in reality, do not exist unless you attach meaning and significance to them.

She went on to say that by letting go of fears and detaching from the conjuring mind, you free your energy to understand why you had the fears to begin with, and that the mind itself cannot fully achieve clarity because its habit is to focus on what it has conjured. She says:

As you learn to detach, to really let go of the conjuring mind, you will discover what has always been present in your life and in your self and in your destiny. But such clarity only truly comes when you are ready for it.

Messages from Jeanne

#716 A Moment With Jeanne

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Jan Ketchel channeling Jeanne Marie Ketchel

Dear Jeanne,
Early this morning I lay awake in bed and asked you for a brief message of guidance. This is what you said:

“Why do you have so many thoughts in your mind when thoughts do not even exist?”

At that moment I was in fact churning over a lot of useless thoughts. Jeanne’s response to my question came barging through all of them, very clearly heard, knocking them down as if they were dominoes. The effect was immediately releasing. I let the thoughts go and her question became a mantra, playing repeatedly as I drifted back to sleep.

I wonder did I just replace one set of incessant thoughts for another? From a shamanic and Buddhist perspective thoughts are illusions, manifested by the mind to keep us from our true reason for existence, which is to evolve, to reach enlightenment and release from all that holds us tied to the illusions of this world. There is however another mind that speaks only truth, which seeks to guide us and show us the means to change; this mind is within us and beyond us. I accepted Jeanne’s question as a means of shift from my usual thoughts that come in the night, the worries and conjuring ideas that do not in fact exist. Her mantra allowed me to shift away from that mind.

As I take a few days respite from work and routine I practice staying in the moment, asking myself to slow down, be patient, and above all else allow for release of old thoughts, habits, and voices. In each moment I ask myself to remain aware of just this moment, to notice something in my environment, in my body, in my unconscious, the other mind that opens the door to new experiences.

Today, I take a break from the usual channeling session with Jeanne and offer the question she gave me. It holds within it all that she normally speaks of, all that Chuck and I seek to impart in our writings: that we are all captivated by the incessant ruminations of the conjuring mind and we must constantly grant ourselves permission to depart from those illusions.

By allowing ourselves to change, to find a new way of seeing, to release ourselves from attachments, thoughts, and old habits, we allow ourselves entry into other worlds. Access to other worlds lies deep inside each of us. We can have access to them by trusting and allowing them to become part of our lives, by allowing for a new acceptance of many realities, and by constantly pushing away the illusions of the concrete world we live in, as it attempts to intrude into out “moments.”

What appears so fixed and real is but illusion. This is the true message that Jeanne gave me this morning. As I write this, in this moment, I let it go, for it is already gone. A new moment has arrived and I am open to what this new moment offers me. Staying with it, I am open to what it offers, but first I must let my illusions evaporate, my thoughts empty, my mind be open and my heart too.

Stay in the moment.

Chuck's Blog

Chuck’s Place: Into the Archives

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Chuck is taking a break so we offer the following blog essay from the Chuck’s Place archives. Have a great weekend!

From 12/20/2008 here is #420 Death, Impermanence & Evolution:

My name is Chuck Ketchel, and I am a being who is going to die. In the shamanic world of Carlos Castaneda, practitioners introduce themselves in this manner, reminding themselves, each day, of their limited time in this world. With awareness fixed on the reality of death, shamans approach each moment knowing full well it might be their last. This gaze opens the door to heightened awareness, seeing beyond the veils of illusion. Shamans constantly condition their energy bodies for their definitive journey into infinity, transcending reincarnation.

Buddha spoke of impermanence in much the same way that the shamans speak of death. For Buddha, our greatest challenge in this world is to free ourselves of attachment to illusions. What he meant by this is our incessant wish for things to stay the same, our grasping to hold onto permanence in our lives. We cherish our families, our homes, our loved ones, our possessions. We cherish youth. We don’t want anything to change. We desperately seek to hold onto life in this world. Our obsessions with health, disease, and cures, reflect our deepest wish to cling to life in our bodies in an unchanging world. For Buddha, this is why we suffer. We cling to an illusion of permanence, which shields us from entry into the greater reality of enlightenment. Hence, we must reincarnate until fully prepared to let go of our illusory props.

In her messages, Jeanne focuses on evolution. In fact, death, impermanence, and evolution are all equivalents. She has us focus on the subtle, as well as the dramatic events in our current lives. Whether it be an ice storm, a snow storm, a change of season, the collapse of a financial system, or entry into a new stage of life, we are constantly being prompted to awaken to change, and to evolve with full awareness.

Each day, we are challenged, by changes that offer us the opportunity to let go, to detach, to die of an old way, and enter a new world. This is how we condition our energetic beings to develop fluidity, the ability to travel in infinity, without attachment to illusions. With fluidity, detachment becomes the ultimate expression of love. To allow oneself to be fully open to another, but equally willing to flow with the changes, unburdened of needy requirements, is living in free-flowing truth.

When Jeanne left this world, she invited me to continue to travel with her, in infinity. Since that time, I have entered and left several worlds. My capacity to experience deeper love has required me, and continues to challenge me, to let go of everything familiar, with an unattached heart, completely open.

If we allow ourselves to evolve in this world, we are already in alignment with the flow of infinity, flowing with death, into new life, each day.

If you wish to correspond, please feel free to post a comment below.

Until we meet again,
Chuck

Jan's Blog

A Day in a Life: Recapitulation & Breathing

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During the process of recapitulation it helps to have support. This support can come in many forms. During my own recapitulation, not only did I work closely with Chuck as teacher and guide, but I also did a lot of yoga and meditation. Specific breathing practices and gentle, self-caring yoga helped immensely as I recapitulated a lot of old and unpleasant stuff. I also did Embodyment Therapy to aid in the physical release of memory. These practices were extremely helpful and right, fitting my personality. In the beginning I also used physical exertion as a means of countering the mental and physical stresses that arose as a result of recapitulating, running and walking off a lot of the onslaughts of infinity, and doing specific magical passes to aid in bearing the tension. However, the deeper I went into my recapitulation the more important it became to allow for and find support for long buried feelings and emotions that needed not only release but to become acceptable. There also comes a point where compassion for the self and others, including the petty tyrants in our lives, becomes necessary for true evolution to take place.

The shamanic sweeping breath, a magical pass, was one of the most helpful of all breathing exercises during recapitulation. Breathing in fresh positive energy and expelling old negative energy belonging to specific memories, people, and places was one of the most important parts of my recapitulation process. This breath not only stirs up memories but vivifies them as well, bringing details of experiences to fuller clarity. As we breathe out we release energy that does not belong to us, replacing it, on each in-breath, with new energy for ourselves alone.

Yoga breathing supports and brings clarity to deep inner work, aiding what is happening in the unconscious and in the physical body. Learning to breathe into specific areas enhances and clarifies where our deepest needs, vulnerabilities, and issues lie. Breathing into the chakras can lead to encounters with our unknown selves, unlocking the mysteries of why we feel bruised or pain in certain areas of our bodies, releasing long buried memories physically buried in our very muscles, sinews, and bones. There are yoga breaths to open passageways into the body for fuller release, but there are equally as many breathing practices to slow down the onslaughts of infinity, bringing stability and calm, so that balance can be restored and maintained. Healing and self-caring breaths are as important as releasing breaths during recapitulation.

Tonglen breathing during meditation, or at anytime, is another supportive and life-changing process, leading to a level of enlightenment that gradually allows us to experience the world as energetically interconnected. As we breathe in the negative energy of guilts, fears, emotions, etc. and breathe out compassion, fearlessness, happiness, lightness, etc., we energetically send that positive intent out into the world. As we turn compassion for others into compassion for ourselves we learn how to let go of our ego’s needs and desires and replace them with loving kindness for ourselves and all sentient beings.

I recently had a personal experience of Tonglen breathing, experiencing it ultimately as the power of the energetic network that we are all hooked into whether we are aware of it or not. I was about to encounter a person with a lot of negative energy, a person I admittedly do not enjoy being with, one of my petty tyrants. Normally I gear up for such encounters by asking for help, guidance and accompanying good energy, by breathing and calming my own energy, and by continually reminding myself, while I am in the presence of this person, that I am just like this person, that I am the same, and that in order to truly heal myself I must achieve true compassion for this person.

As I was preparing to meet up with this person I decided to shift myself, to allow the possibility for this encounter to be different by practicing Tonglen breathing. I started as I left the house, first breathing in, one at a time, the fears, judgments, criticisms, negative attitudes, depressed energy, etc. of this person and breathing out compassion. Then I breathed in my own fears of this person, my own judgments, dislikes, uncomfortability, negative attitudes, etc. towards this person and breathing out compassion. I did this while I drove, a trip of perhaps fifteen minutes at the most. Upon arriving at my destination I continued to meditate upon compassionate loving kindness for this person, holding this uppermost in my thoughts, wanting to stay connected to this intent. This was all I carried with me at that point, feeling immensely lighter and relieved of my normal agita because of the breathing I had done.

Upon my arrival I was greatly surprised by the energetic lightness of this normally dark and negative person. It was immediately clear that this person had energy, and not just nervous or agitated energy, but actual calm and clear energy. The normal judgments and critical language, the depressed thoughts and oblivious actions that I associate with this person were overridden by this new energy. The lightness and clarity of this person’s energy lasted through most of our time together, waning only towards the end. My own energy, while I was with this person and even later, remained soft and compassionate, kind and open.

It was not until I was back in my car that it dawned on me that the Tonglen breathing I had done actually worked on an energetic level, as I have never experienced it before. It worked on behalf of the energy of another person, with quite dramatic results and it certainly worked on me, for I have no doubts about my own energetic experiences of that day. I walked in a new world with this person that day, in a world that had energetically shifted, in which we were freed of our normal business, relieved of old energy and old patterns of behavior. And it all happened on an energetic level without one word being spoken between us. It just was.

I am humbly grateful for the petty tyrants in my life, for the people who challenge me to confront my feelings and my normal means of coping, for the people who have hurt me, rejected me, abandoned me, for the people who criticize, judge, and dismiss me, for they are the ones who greet me on the path to enlightenment and ask me to change. At each encounter with a petty tyrant I am offered the opportunity to practice loving kindness and compassion, to energetically let go of what holds me bound and turn it into fresh, new, positive energy that really does make a difference, as I experienced.

Recapitulation is a many-faceted process. As we encounter memories we discover that they carry more than just the recall of an event. We encounter old energy, thoughts, feelings, emotions, judgments, criticisms, guilt, envy, pain, etc. We may also encounter many positive aspects of ourselves at other times in our lives. What we are also offered is the possibility to transform our perception of ourselves and others, as well as our view of the world. Finding support in even the most natural of life giving energy, in breathing, which we all do, is a practical and kind step to offer the self as the journey continues.

If you wish, feel free to share or comment in the Post Comment section below.

Sending you all love and good wishes, and good breathing too!
Jan

NOTE: A definition of Tonglen breathing can be found here or in Pema Chödrön’s book When Things Fall Apart.

Messages from Jeanne

#715 Are You Being Urged to Awaken Now?

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Jan Ketchel channeling Jeanne Marie Ketchel

Dear Jeanne,
This seems to be a time of transition for many. Whether by choice or fate it seems that many of us who now reside upon this earth are being asked to confront deep issues, to become unanchored from our habitual tendencies, to flow without resorting to the familiar, to choose to be groundless. I see this time as not only transitional but transformative. I feel we are being asked to change, though not to simply settle down again into new habits but to keep changing.

If we are indeed to transform we must accept that transformation never ends, that it is an ongoing, eternal process. I feel that this is a time when most of us are being asked to choose acquiescence to our truths and face the unbending intent of nature, which is infinite in its evolutionary tactics.

Can you offer guidance as we struggle with disciplining ourselves to bear the tension of our choices to change, as we struggle with still wanting the familiar while we know full well that we are going on this ride of transformation?

You are always in this position, My Dears. You are always being asked to evolve, though through much of life the moment of awakening leads to naught. For many people now upon that earth, for those who are ready to gather their energy in a new way, acquiescence is a tenable process. For others it is not so easy. And for yet others it will not be the goal of this lifetime.

If you are being pushed in a new direction and you choose to allow the energy of that direction to guide you, you will be well placed for growth. Keep in mind, however, that you must allow yourself to be guided as much as possible. You must allow your path to appear before you each day. In some manner you must allow your world to open up before you without your say so, without your control or your decision making to factor in. In other words, you must allow yourself to be led.

This will of course not be easy. Your fears will arise to caution you, to hold you in place, to convince you that you must maintain the status quo. Just remember, the status quo will still exist even if you depart from it for a moment or two.

Your world will change if you want it to—and it may change even if you don’t want it to—if you are in a position of transformation, if you are at a juncture in your personal life, consciously so or not. You may be presented with a life changing choice at this very moment. You may be frightened of taking the first step that will change your world. You may be wondering if you are crazy to dare such a step.

Keep in mind that the world outside of you will still exist. It will go on as it always has. But the difference will be you. If you choose to acquiesce, to allow yourself to flow with the changes being presented, you will not only be different in the world, but you will enter a parallel world that will exist alongside the status quo, the old world. You will be riding upon a new vehicle of energy that will allow you to perceive differently. This is when you will notice that, although you still live in that known world, you are also in quite another.

The first step is the most difficult to take. This is when the pull to return to safety and complacency will attempt to overshadow your awakening moment. This is when you will have to fight the old comforts. This is when you will have to keep throwing the old blankets aside that will be tossed at you in an attempt to bed you down again with your old fears.

Remember that fears are just that, fears existing only in your mind and ready at all times to sabotage your awakening. You must be in a strong position to face them. You must not do anything foolhardy. You must choose wisely, intelligently, and pragmatically, even while you must choose daringly to change. You must remain focused on changing the self, taking your attention off others, asking the self to allow for growth that will transform you and unite you with your spirit.

It is now a time of spirit, of creativity, and unbridled energy of evolutionary potential. This means many different things to many different people. If you are restless in your work, it may mean it is time to finally change your job, your work environment, your office, or even simply to change your desk and chair.

If you are struggling in your marriage, partnership or relationship, it may mean that you must look to your inner self for the truthful answers to what to do to change your situation, for how to make it better, for how to make it work or for how to transition with grace, patience, loving kindness, and compassion for yourself and your partner.

If you are facing a great challenge or life threatening situation the energy of now asks you to slow down, to feel your way through your situation with quiet mind and quiet heart, to listen calmly to your truths, to not act hastily but to allow for right action to come from your heart-centered self, to allow your inner awareness to guide you.

To bear the tension of transition is what life is always about. You could not have even entered life if you were not well prepared to undertake the tension of the moment of birth, for you would not have survived that initial onslaught. One must accept the journey as it comes, in little awakenings and big ones as well.

Are you being urged to awaken now? If you feel the push, the pull, the needle pricking you, if you hear the knock on the door, the call from the outer world or the call from the inner world, it is a good time to slow down and pay attention to what you are being shown or asked to do.

Is it right for you to take this step, to make this change at this time? If you choose not to, when will you have this choice again? What does your spirit want to do? What do your fears want to do? And who do you want to listen to this time?

Your question, My Dear Jan, proposes that positive energy is available now and this I advise is so. But I also advise patience, thoughtfulness, practicality, and planning, knowing full well that change will institute a whole host of other changes, many of which will not be known and this is when you will be confronted with the old fears and desires to return to the comforts of the old self and the old way of life.

If you elect to glibly step out into a changing world be ready for the turmoil that is sure to come, for change does not happen easily or lightly. It comes with force and it asks you to stick with it, to, yes, bear the tension, to be patient, to be wise, to be focused and disciplined in action, thought, and deed. It also asks you to thoroughly commit to the path that leads you into the unknown, for that is what is ahead. And what is the unknown but the vastness of potential, of possibility, and of self. This is where you are all headed in the end anyway, into the unknown.

Chuck Ketchel, LCSWR