There’s an interesting phenomena where we spend a lot of time dealing with our memories and what we did in the past; not necessarily ruminating over our “glory days” if we had those, or past wounds, if we had those.
 
We ruminate over the past, in our minds and memory.

But we often forget to ruminate, (which means ponder, think over, chew on, cogitate,) on our future self. As if we only have the ability to know our past reality, instead of our future.
 
The truth is, we can hitch a ride to our future self, and when we do this: lasso our awareness to the self that we are becoming, instead of the self who we were… that this aspect of intentional energy creates this reality for us.
 
Who in your wildest dreams, is the future self that you would like to become? Hitch a ride to that Self; the self you long to be more than anything.
 
As you attach your energy to that new reality, the Universe creates it for you. 

At least once a week, I’ll guide a meditation and someone in the group will fall asleep.

When we’re working in our small groups on a conference call, it can be common to hear a soft noise in the background, and realize the snuffling and sighing is the sound of a student, gently snoring away.

This falling asleep instead of entering in to Divine vibration is common, but it can mean different things.

The first thing to look at is simply how tired the person is. If you are really tired, you will go to sleep in meditation because this is what you as soul-in-body need most of all: more than a visit with your spirit guide, more than a clairvoyant view of your future, more than a message from the Universe.

The second thing to look at is what experience you have during this sleep state. Sometimes, people conk out because they need to receive a healing or alignment or download or other type of intensive vibrational shifting that can’t take place if the ego/mind is on full alert. You get knocked out, so the Universe can tune you up.

The next time you fall asleep in meditation, look at those two ideas: how much sleep you’re getting, and how much healing you need.

One of those will be your answer.

Sometimes I hear from incredibly sensitive, aware and well-meaning moms who’ve read my book Your Psychic Child, and are starting to work with their child in psychic training.

The only problem is, often the child is only two or three years old.

That’s just too young to start.

At this age, before language has formed fully for a child, it’s very hard to determine spiritual or psychic gifts,  let alone work with them. It’s very hard to not helicopter; we want our children to be amazing and gifted and special, and we think if we just feed them all these ideas and experiences, then certain gifts will open for them.

But it doesn’t work that way.

A psychic child is like a cup; if you pour water in, you can fill it. But if you fill it too full, the water just flows over the brim. It doesn’t stay in.

The best things to do with all kids, psychic and otherwise (and yes, most kids these days are absolutely psychic), is just let them be kids: limited electronics, good food, lots of sleep, plenty of hugs, music and art and nature.

The rest will take care of itself.

For a long time, I had really crummy cars (a late 70s Pinto that didn’t turn off when you turned it off… it kept backfiring and shuddering and belching for minutes afterwards.

Also, a Mitsubishi Galant I affectionately called “Old Smokey”.
And a Nissan Sentra, old school, that was like driving around in a tuna can.

Over time, I got a nice car, a (used) Volvo sedan that I’d wanted for ages, and when I first drove it, I was in bliss: such a smooth ride! Such powerful pickup! Such safety! Such leather interiors!

Until a few years later, $200 of monthly repairs started kicking in, and then one day it rained particularly hard and I opened the driver’s side door to find the car floor submerged in four inches of water.

You know the rest of the story…. that fancy car I’d been so excited to possess, to own to have as a symbol of the mildest form of success? Well, it turned out to be just a big headache. Another thing to deal with. Something else to distract and worry about.

For too long, cars have been trap(pings) of success that drain our financial and spiritual bank accounts in a serious way.

Now, I just want something practical and reliable, so I can get where I’m going. 

​Yes. The car is a metaphor.

We think that celebrities are the lucky ones, that they have all the perks and fame and glory.

But in reality, celebrities hold a great deal of energy for the soul collective, as archetypes and as projections for group thought.

For example, when you view someone like Kim Kardashian, you can see that she is playing some kind of archetype for society: the whore/Madonna/mother. Other women have held this space, many times before her.

At the time of this writing, Kim Kardashian is preparing to give birth to her second child, and tens of millions of people are “following” her every move. That is an incredible amount of group thought to handle.

In decades past, Michael Jackson and Princess Diana also held space as archetype: the boy would wouldn’t grow up, the princess with the loving heart. They also received group thought; millions of people thought about them every day.

I don’t know about you, but I find the idea of millions of people thinking about me pretty difficult; the soul intrustion, the energy intrusion, the continual receiving of other people’s thoughts and needs and pain.

And this... love them or hate them, there is great service that celebrities do for the collective. They hold our emotion, they hold our need, they hold our projection. 

They hold this in service, whether they know this or not. 

When I was a kid, my dad used to drive me to school in the mornings, and sometimes we’d get stuck in traffic.

I’d always be fuming, panicked in the car, watching the minutes tick off the clock knowing that I’d never make it in time. And my dad would simply turn of the volume on his cassette player (!), which was always some kind of jazz, and he’d drum his fingers on the steering wheel in time to the music, and he’s say to me “Can you get there any faster than you’re going right now?”

And I’d realize no, I couldn’t.

I could only get there as fast as I got there.

Not a minute sooner. Not a minute later.

My dad already knew the art of hurrying slowly: of shifting vibration so that time shifts with you, of slowing down in the middle of rushing, to listen to music fully, and keep time to the beat.

When we hurry slowly, with full presence, time bends on itself, and we find that we have all the time we need, all the time we want, all the time we require.

When we hurry slowly, we are fully present in Now, and thus time is always perfectly as it should be. 

We are continually directed by dominant culture to go big.
​To accomplish more, to do more, to earn more, to be more.

As if a small life wasn’t worthy. As if small experiences weren’t valid.

I say: the small stuff is usually the best stuff. 

We believe the myth of more, more, more until we get to a place where we taste some of that more that They and Them have told us we want. And we find out… it’s not as satisfying as we thought.

A human being having a spiritual experience on this planet will soon find that having more stuff, or more money, or more fame, or more power, isn’t particular satisfying.

When it comes down to it, we each have to figure out how to get through the same 24 hours in a day. And often, in fact usually, it’s the small things that make us happiest. A warm bed with someone you love beside you. Watching geese fly across a winter’s sky. The way the light glints on the wet road, and rain mists up from the earth. Doing work that you love, simply and clearly. Caring for people you’re responsible for.

The modern day version of chop wood, carry water.

If you’re hung up on more, or think “oh, if I had more it would be different for me”, take a slow deep breath, and then another, and ask the Universe to help you experience the grace of going small. 

I sometimes find myself listening to Garrison Keillor; I’ll be out driving on a Sunday, which is something I often do, and the show will come on and I’ll listen to it.

In a recent show, there was a funny skit about how we needed to not allow merging; we needed to keep our separate identities, for the strength of the American way: a country founded on the idea of independence and individualism.
​
It’s interesting, isn’t it? That this whole country is founded on the idea of the right to do what we want.

And yet the reality is, that we mostly act like sheep.

We continually look for a new shepherd to follow: the celebrity, the politician, the fashion trend, the popular YouTsube, or whatever is the hot thing at the moment.

This Oneness thing; it’s not something you can fight against. It just is.

The boundaries between you and me and everyone else, are really just something we’ve made up in collective mind.As long as we think we’re separate, we are.

But there will come a time, when we don’t believe the myth of separation any more. 

One of the things that’s happened with global society, is that our design sensibilities have gotten all swirled around and mixed up with each other.

Whereas it used to be, that each region or part of the world would have a particular look and style, nowadays it’s common to have fashion or décor or design that borrows heavily from all kinds of ancient tradition, ethnic tradition. We live now in world with many influences.

You might have a Buddha statue, and Nordic pattern plates, and a basket from Africa, and a vintage sign from the American 50s, all in your living room.

It’s all mixed up together.

Or in your closet you might find an American jean jacket and Japanese slippers and fisherman pants from Thailand and boots from England and beads from Bali, all mixed in as part of your wardrobe.  

World influences, becoming part of your everyday. Ancient symbols and patterns and even color combinations, becoming part of the global consciousness.

We didn’t use to see design like this; we were really separate, regionalized before.
It’s just another way we’re merging, becoming One. 

Several days a week I go to the gym to lift weights.

After years of aerobics and group fitness and ecstatic dance, it’s finally come to this: I need to push against something.

I need to go up against the Universe in some kind of arm wrestling match, and see who wins. (Well, of course it's the Universe!)

When you lift weights, there’s the idea of going to failure: you lift a weight that’s right on the edge of being too heavy for you, and then you lift that weight until you can’t lift it any more.Maybe you lift it eight times.
And the first and fourth times are easy; but by the time you’re at the eight rep, you really can’t lift it any more.

In other words, you go to failure.

And thus weightlifting becomes an incredibly humbling experience, a kind of meditation in which you fail and fail again, every time you show up.

And in this process you learn to fail better. 

You can’t fight gravity, can you? It’s an unwinnable battle.So in this process of getting used to what it feels like to fail, over and over and over, you lose your fear of failure.

You trust that you’re going to arm wrestle the Universe with all the might of your ego and your personality and your body, and the Universe is going to win. 

You lose your fear of failure, over and over again. 

Years ago I went to a training session, and we did a lot of interesting exercises. One of them, and you may have done this yourself, was about being outside of a circle, and then stepping into the circle.

The idea was that you were outside of a possibility, and experience, a way of being, and then with full intention and commitment, you would step into the circle.

It seems really simple.

But what happened was not simple at all; it was pretty astounding to be on the outside of the perimeter, and then to step all in: in full commitment, fully engaged, into the circle.

The circle could be anything you want: a goal, a plan, an experience.

You get to choose. 

And then, when you’re ready, you get to commit, simply by moving from the place of being outside of that reality, to the place of being in that reality.

All manifestation works this way, really. We hold our intention, and then we step into it, “as if.” And over time “as if,” becomes “as.”

Maybe there’s something you want to go all in with in your life.

You can just step into now, and let that reality begin. 

For the past few months, I’ve been waking up every night around 2:30 or 3:30 or 4 am, and I’m unable to get back to sleep.

This is very unusual for me, as most of my life I’ve slept like the proverbial rock.

At first this waking in the middle of the night was very disturbing to me; I was afraid in the dark, and I would like in bed tossing and turning.

One night, I decide to simply get up, and meditate and write, and use this time in the way our ancestors did: it was common in generations past to have a first sleep, and then wake up for several hours to read, write, meditate, visit friends, and then go back to be for a second sleep.

To my amazement, I found that this time in the dark, quiet of night has become one of my favorite times of day. It is the time of the Amrit Vela, the time of the sacred veil between the worlds becoming thin, so it is easiest for us to access Divine guidance in prayer and meditation. For me, it is the perfect time for Sahadana, my personal spiritual practice, where I can write and meditate in the beautiful stillness of the night.

In this experience I have become detached from the old idea, that it is important to sleep all night, or to get a “good night’s sleep.” I understand that I get all the sleep I need, and that it doesn’t have to happen a certain way.

It’s very freeing, to get up this early. It is new to me, to experience this time of day, when much of the world is dreaming, quiet, resting.

I’m glad I’m not sleeping through it. 

I sometimes get stuck in the trap of believing what everyone believes, or thinking what everything one thinks, even though in my heart I know it’s wrong.

The other day I needed to drive my son to the airport for his flight, after a long holiday weekend.

Everyone knows the traffic is going to be terrible on a Sunday after a holiday, and parking will be difficult, and the airport security lines will be long, right?

Except, none of that was true.

The weather was perfect, and the traffic was simple; many times I found myself in those pockets of space where even on a crowded freeway like I-5, there wasn’t another car even near us for long stretches.

We found a parking space right next to the airport overpass, within seconds.

The lines were so minimal at security, we had time to wander around and look at the shops for fun.

I have the feeling, that if I had allowed myself to be in the expectation of group thought, my experience would have been very different: stressed, angry, tired.

But because we just went with the idea of being; of just showing up to the experience, whatever it was, with a sense of full involvement, it was easy.

What everyone else thinks usually leads you astray.

What you desire and hope for and want, even if it’s something as simple as an easy trip to the airport, is what almost always happens. 

If you get to a place of abundance and peace in your life, you know two things.

One: your situation could shift at any time, and this is okay and you’re okay with it.
If you get to abundance and peace, you’ve moved beyond the understanding that we can ever be truly “safe” or “secure."
Life just isn’t like that, everything is always changing.

Two: you’re going to be asked for things by victims.

To be a victim is to think that the world owes you something, or that other people can have it but you can’t, or that you can’t create it on your own.

It’s being a victim of your own mental state, regardless of the particular situation you’re in.

When you’re dealing with victims, there are a few things to consider.
If the victim is a child, or a person who is hungry or abused or mentally ill, of course you’re going to help. This is basic human compassion.

But if the victim is a regular person with regular opportunities, who’s decided to be a victim because it’s less scary that trying to make his/her own way, you might decide to not help.
Depending on the situation, this can also be a compassionate response.

We cannot fix another person.
We cannot help another person see the Light. 
Each soul must walk the path of their own awakening. 

Sometimes we have to get out of the way, so the Universe can do its work.

You probably know the old wive’s tale that if you hang garlic around a baby’s neck, that vampires, or illness, or whatever kind of evil, won’t bother it?

It feels like much of the time, we’re still holding on to a lot of old superstitions and misbeliefs, today.

The 60s and 70s were times of great expansion for the new age movement, but much of what was touted as real during those decades, was over simplified, or just plain wrong. A lot of it was just plain superstition, created by people where were coming out of the 50s into a more free era, and needed something to hold on to.

If you’re still reading or following folks who were popular in the 60s, 70s and so forth, you might check those belief systems, and see if that’s what you really think, now. We’ve been evolving pretty fast.

There are lots of new voices, and new ways of thinking that are well beyond Law of Attraction, the Secret and so forth. There are lots of new ways of thinking that aren’t fear based, or based on a need for protection from evils spirits.

Take a look at what you’re reading and following, and just seek the fear: of there’s fear there, of doing it wrong, of being in lack, of succumbing to mysterious forces… you might want to let that belief system go.

We’re in a different place now. The old rules, the archaic superstitions of the early new age, useful as they were for that time… they no longer apply.

We’ve moved beyond. 

I read a lot of surf magazines; I always have. I did a lot of boogie boarding as a kid, and I love to read about the ocean, and waves, and I love the way surf culture is so fearless in this very humble way.

One of the companies that runs ads in the magazines is Outerknown; it’s run by Kelly Slater, and it’s about creating men’s fashion in a truly sustainable. Kelly talks about how he didn’t know how hard it would be when he started; this true sustainability.

It’s about doing something that’s not at outer limits, or that pushes a known edge, but that’s at our outer known limits: the limits we don’t even know we have yet. And pushing that boundary.

I like to think of working in spiritual intuition that way, or working in creativity, or working in invention, or all the ways that we can be original, and see things in a new way.

We’re working in the outerknown: that place where we’re pioneers not just heading out west, but pointing our wagons to the west that’s beyond the west; the destination haven’t even dreamed of yet, and maybe doesn’t even exist.

We don’t know we’re headed. And yet we’re still going. 

When I was a kid, we lived in Hawaii every summer. My dad worked there. At one of the places we lived, there was a group of elders who met every morning in the park by the ocean, and did exercises in a big circle.

I could see them from our lanai, and to my young eyes, they were the most leathery group of old people I’d ever seen. Most of them were over 70, a lot were over 80 and they did this exercise circle that involved stretching and clapping and singing and shouting, and something that looked like the hokey pokey, but it probably wasn’t.

At the end of the hour, they all whooped and hollered and took off their workout clothes and ran into the ocean. I’d like to say that they were wearing bathing suits, but I’m not sure they were. Some of them wore their underwear, and lots of them wore nothing at all. So it was, in Hawaii in that decade.

I’d like to suggest that those “old” people were a whole lot younger than I was then, or than most of us are now.

Age isn’t a limitation; it’s the gift of the time we need, to learn how to live without self consciousness.  

If you live with others, either in a family, extended family, with roommates or a partner, you know that there is a delicate dance between independence and expectations.

It’s interesting to take stock now and then, at how things are set up: what the group expects, what the group likes or doesn’t like, what individuals in the group are more similar in personality style, or more different.

Looking at everything, not just the division of chorse or expenses, but everything, right down to who’s inhabits what room and how the furniture is arranged, can be eye-opening. Sometimes there is more private space for people who need private space, just by shifting the way your space is organized. Often getting rid of things that don’t work, opens up possibilities for living in a new way.

Especially if you’ve lived in a space for a long time, it’s easy to get habitual about things; but if you start by looking at your house or apartment as a new space, a fresh slate to work with, then you begin to see new possibilities.

Take a look at your living space, and imagine how you might do it differently, if you were just moving in.

Think about how you want to live, not about how you’ve been living out of routine. 

If you think you need to make a certain amount of money, or have a certain amount of material items, or have your home or wardrobe be a certain way, or eat certain foods, look at this.

Sometimes, the gift of having choice, becomes a curse of having too much choice.

When you go to bigger cities, where there is a lot of money, it is shocking and obscene to go to a grocery store, or a retail store or a big shopping mall, and see the absolute excess of overabundance that is laid out before us, like a treasure chest spilling riches.

The thing is: all of this stuff is great. But it’s also incredibly confusing.

We want something, we get it… or maybe we don’t get it. And all around us, people are literally, truly, really starving.

Take a look at how you live, and see if you really need more.

Maybe more of what you really need, is less.

If you have experienced bullying and abuse, you know there is a fine line between being a victim, and being afraid to stand up for yourself.

Now, if you are a child being victimized, when you have no power and no way out, that is one thing. And if you are a disenfranchised person being victimized, that is another way out: you may have children to protect, or you may have no other way to survive at the moment.

However. If you are being bullied in your life, and you have choices that are you aren’t taking: leaving a job, leaving a relationship, ending a friendship, breaking it off with a family member…. you need to look at your own role as a victim.

Sometimes we are victimized and we have no ability to defend ourselves, at the moment. Over time, we will grow up, grow in power, or things will change and we will have that moment, where we can stand up for ourselves and stop being bullied.

Sometimes, we are victimized and we stay as victims, because we are afraid to change. If you are experiencing bullying or abuse in your life right now, take a long hard look at your willingness to stay in victim role.

You can be free, if you desire. It is not easy, but you can do it. 

There is the statement “Be the change you want to see in the world,” which is a very good statement, and it applies to how we can help elevate the whole world.

But there is also the idea that you can be the change you want to be, in your world. That’s right: in your personal reality.

If things aren’t working for you, change them. If you’ve been doing things the same way for a long time, make a change. If you’re in relationships that are excruciatingly stuck, change them.

It’s not about walking away from things, or giving up, or failing to see things through. It’s about being hyper aware of where the Flow is in your life.

The Universe is always changing: expanding and contracting infinitely. This includes you as a being: you’re always expanding and contracting and expanding and contracting, over and over. Y

You’re not here to be stuck, static, only being one way.

Be the change, in your own life. This is how you grow. 

If you think you aren’t making progress toward your goals and dreams fast enough, you might be wrong.

The incremental moments from where we are at this moment, to where we will be in three years, or five years, or ten years, are pretty subtle.

​The Universe is a grand machine of synchronicities and layers and levels, and a whole lot of things have to come into place in order to set you, as a soul, onto this journey that you think you want.

The other thing is: when we have a big goal, like being an author, or starting a business, or becoming a rock star, or getting really fit… we need the time between start and result, so we can integrate what’s happening.

If you shift your body from chubby to skinny in a month, you don’t always know who you are. If you become a rock star overnight, same thing happens.

The joy is in the journey. That’s where we learn and feel and integrate everything.

Relax today. Everything is going as it should.