​When I work with people to discover their spirit guides, there’s often a lot of expectation that we will encounter a particular kind of guide: a tall, wise guide, for example, or a beautiful woman guide in lovely gowns, or a devout monk, and so on.

And yet, often… in fact very often, people have tiny guides show up in one or more of the guide positions: earth guide, spiritual teacher, mystic guide.

The tiny guide might be a fairy, or a leprechaun, or something like Tinkerbell. And often when people see these tiny guides, they laugh at first, because the guides are so delightful. But, then they get worried, that they don’t have “big” enough or powerful enough guides.

Don’t be confused by the way a guide first shows up. In all cases, the tiniest guide is not tiny at all: they are just showing themselves to you in this way, so that it will be easier for you to receive them.

Guides use humor and friendliness in the same way. They show themselves in non-powerful, non-aggressive ways, so that we are not afraid, so that we let our guard down, so that our childlike Self sees clearly.

Underneath the tiny aspect, the guides have other ways of representing themselves: they are incredibly powerful and wise. If you think you are ready to see this, ask your tiny guide to show you the other aspect of themselves, and watch them shape shift into something different.

The power will be astounding. You will see how big they are: ascended masters of tremendous wisdom and energetic ability. You may prefer them tiny, after all!

​We use chakras a lot in spiritual intuition, because they are so quick and easy to read.

Usually, the way chakras present most often is in color. In other words, the vibrational energy of the chakra shows up in meditation as a vibrational frequency, which we see or recognize as color.

The colors are very simple and easy to remember:

Red: first or root chakra, security, stability, survival, money, fear.
Orange: second chakra, reproductive system, sexuality, creativity.
Yellow: third chakra, solar plexus, personal power.
Green: fourth chakra, heart, heart opening.
Blue: fifth chakra, throat, voice, self-expression.
Indigo: sixth chakra, third eye, clairvoyant seeing.
White: seventh chakra, crown of your head, divine knowing.

Sometimes we see brilliant dazzling gold, which is often about radiant healing, above the crown chakra. We often also see a beautiful pale or bright pink, which is often about love.

And of course, there are more negative or low vibration colors, such as grey, black, sickly yellow, sickly green, muddy brown. These usually show stagnant energy, illness, grief, and so forth.

When you are working in spiritual intuition and a color shows up, any color, you can trust that it has symbolic meaning.

This is one of the easiest ways to work with the information you receive; you don’t have to over think it, you can just look at the color, and know the message is about that particular chakra.

For example, if you received a meditation of a red self being discarded, you would understand that your old Self, based in the fear of first chakra, is being let go. If you received a meditation of yourself and a lot of yellow, you would know that this is about personal power. If you received a meditation of yourself dipping in a pool of indigo, you would understand that you are being immersed in the higher vibration of intuitive and spiritual understanding.

The Universe works very hard to make the information we receive easy for us to translate: color is one of the main ways we understand, and it is a clear and consistent tool.

​Chakras are energy vortexes or portals in the body.

Most people can’t see them, but you easily sense if they are open, or closed, and if you meditate on them, you can notice that they are swirling in one direction or another, and you will probably be able to open or expand the swirl of your chakra, in meditation.

Thus, if you notice a chakra that is closed very tight, blocked or still, you can unlock it and allow it to swirl in a circle of energy, and even to expand to a size that is as big or bigger than your body.

Energy healers, such as hands healers, also work in this way, using the energy that comes from their hands, or the way that they use their intention, to unblock or open your chakras.

If you are feeling kind of yucky or sad or sub-par, it is a great idea to check your chakras. Just go up from the first or root chakra, to your second chakra in your reproductive system, to your third chakra in your solar plexus, to your fourth chakra which is your heart, to your fifth chakra which is your throat, to your sixth chakra which is your third eye, to your seventh chakra which is at the crown of your head.

Just notice what the energy feels like in each area. If it’s tight, small, locked, imagine or meditate on this chakra until you have the sense that is swirled open.

​We spend a lot of our lives, maybe even most of the years of our lives, trying to figure out who we are.

When we’re kids, we absorb what others say about us: our parents, our teachers, our friends. As we get older, we take on what a more adult group says: our lovers, our colleagues, our bosses.

And yet still, we may have no idea of who we really are, because we have not defined it for ourselves.

When you get to that place, finally, where you stop letting other people define who you are, and you stop defining yourself as a category such as: mother, husband, accountant, dancer, whatever it is for you…. And just define yourself as worthy without those roles and identities…

This is where it starts to get interesting.

When you can throw all the stories and roles and past and identities and ego attachments away and just say, “Here I am, Universe. Ready to show up to what is.”

You discover when you show up this way, without an identity, the Universe tends to expand very quickly, bringing to you all manner of brilliance and enjoyment.

Your identities aren’t who you really are.

Consider if you can release them all, and just be a Soul in the world.

​If you’ve ever been to an amateur recital, you’ve had the great joy of watching people sing. It’s especially amazing to watch people who are not professionals, because their whole Self shows up.

It’s not just about the struggle to remember it all: how to hit the notes, how to keep the rhythm, what the lyrics are, how to stand without clenching their fists or swaying their body.

It’s about the struggle to be absolutely vulnerable, and to show up inhabiting a piece of music, a vibrational experience over time, that comes through the body, and is presented like a prayer, a gift, an offering.

I went to a recital recently where one singer had a pretty terrible voice. And she owned that voice! She sang, and she let the music sing through her, and the gift of that openness, to show up to what happened, was astounding.

When you sing, by yourself, or with others, in private or on a stage, it’s a miracle. Long ago when I was in choir, they used to call it praying with the voice, and if you have ever sung, well or badly or somewhere in between, you know this to be true.

Every relationship you’re in is a direct reflection of your spiritual understanding.

Depending on where you are, this can be an okay truth to look at. It can also be one of the most terrifying statements you’ve heard.

Like it or not, we attract those we have karma with.
We attract those we have lessons with.
Everyone we meet is our teacher, and we are theirs.

When you look at the people you are most struggling with, look immediately to your own self as a mirror of them.

If you are having trouble with someone who is negative, look to your own negativity.
If you are having conflict with someone who won’t keep their word, look to your own ability to show up.
If you are having issues with someone who keeps thinking small, look at your own relationship to thinking small.

We meet our match, over and over and over again.
Until we learn our lesson, and move on.

This is how karma—soul lessons learned over time—works. We meet our teachers, over and over again, until we master the lesson.

It might take an hour.
It might take this lifetime.
It might take many lifetimes.

And when we have completed that particular lesson? There’s always more soul growth, in this graduate practicum called life.