Faith and Fear

Fear is the opposite of faith. You cannot be in fear and faith at the same time. Fear is taking ownership and control while faith is surrender. Fear tells you that you have to do something or not do something to keep yourself safe. Faith is knowing that safety is an illusion created to appease our ego-self that it has some sense of control. I know people who are very poor and people who are financially stable and both can be as afraid of homelessness as the other. Neither has safety, though they are trying to create it. Our minds are always looking for what will keep us safe. What choice is the right choice? The “safe” choice can even be a self-destructive one. That's because what is known and familiar feels safe. Even when this is actually abusive or hurtful.

So if safety is an illusion, then we must make the right choices to be good people, right? Good people is the goal? I would say no to this also. Kindness is often my goal, but what I see as kind might not seem kind to another person. Good, kind, safe, and stable are all subjective. Each can be defined many different ways depending on the person defining it. When we want to be good and kind or we strive for perfection, this is still an act of ego. Ego is not a bad thing, nor is striving to be good and kind. Just don't confuse that with your purpose or let it hold you back in life.

I have often found there are two kinds of scary in my life. There are the things, people, and situations that scare me out of self-preservation; they are harmful in some way. These can just be a gut feeling of danger and I steer clear. Example: I'm not about to jump in front of a bus. That fear protects me and has its purpose. Then there is the fear of the unknown, the fear of making a change by doing something different. My toes and feet get tingly whenever I'm about to take that risk. There are times I freeze up and get stopped in my tracks. It's when I get in alignment with faith that I can move forward.

For me, faith is trusting in a high knowing, that I'm walking a path that might at times be painful and feel hard, but it's exactly what my soul needs for its evolution. That I am Divine and the Divine is experiencing me, too. The fact that we are all The One and, no matter what, that never stops, and trusting all that energy is always shifting towards love, even when I act out in my dysfunction or try to sabotage myself or feel pain or try to hurt myself. Every moment, I am Divine, and so is everyone else. When we live in that acceptance, it allows us to be present with ourselves and surroundings and clearly see the guidance forward. It's an act of stepping out of judgment and into experiencing, being, and feeling. That is when wisdom and clarity comes. This is a dance and I only know a few that can maintain that way of being. I'm not one of them, but I do know I can choose it at any moment, and that gives me hope.

Rise Above the Fear

I recently was doing a reading for a client when the Fairies spoke this nugget of wisdom: “Humans who are not empowered use fear and crazy behavior to try and control those around them. When you rise above that energy, out of the fear, they cannot control you.”

In my experience, when you start setting boundaries, the people who have been benefiting from you not having boundaries will start to act out. This can be conscious, but it also happens subconsciously. We humans have trouble with change. So, it can be difficult to make the decision to create a boundary in the first place. Once you do, those around you will try old and new tactics to gain a sense of control. Generally, this is because they feel unsafe in the new dynamic. You can be compassionate and still hold your boundary.

When you create a boundary, make sure it is set knowing what you are willing and not willing to do. It is not about changing the other person's behavior, just your participation in their behavior. You must know what you will do if someone does not respect that boundary. Look for the best path to detach yourself from the situation. This can be easy to do when dealing with someone who is well-meaning, but unconscious or unaware of their behavior. This is harder to do with someone who is narcissistic, controlling, or manipulative.

These types of people are not interested in your best interest no matter how much they may say or even think they are. These types are merely looking to take care of their own feelings, wants, and desires at the cost of everyone around them. They may suffer from addiction or other mental disorders that exacerbate the situation. Often, it is our own fear that drives us to keep engaging in codependent behavior with them. I don't mean to demonize anyone who is like this. They, too, are suffering and it is why they are acting out in this way. You can have compassion for their suffering without enabling toxic behavior.

To rise above the fear, as the Fairies said, is really the only way out of those dynamics. Do you fear being punished by their anger or behavior? Do you think you cannot live without them financially, emotionally, or spiritually? Do you think you can't survive in the world alone? I would like to point out that rarely is anyone truly alone. Most people have jobs, family, friends, neighbors, that even if they are distant, could be called upon if needed. Also, if you were alone for a while, you might start to find like-minded people.

Even the most peaceful, spiritually-centered people can fall victim to codependency. In fact, I find it is often the people who are not trying to judge and love the world unconditionally that fall into these situations. It is good and generous to want to help and care for others. I'm not suggesting that you cut people off that need help or to stop being kind. You have to look honestly at your relationships. If you are honestly helping someone, then they are as invested in it getting better or reaching their goal as you. If you are being kind you shouldn't feel like you have been slapped in the face when you are done. Compassion and kindness have to start with yourself. You have to respect yourself enough to know your value. If someone does not value you and continues to take from you while also putting you down or making you feel shame, there is no kindness in that situation.

You deserve peace, love, kindness, and compassion. When you rise above the fear, you can see the Divine meaning behind the situation or relationship. You open yourself to guidance from the Universe of your next highest and best step. You gain clarity about what you want and deserve. It is freedom in surrender and peace within the chaos. You may not be able to change it all immediately, but you can start to shift gently forward, and soon you will find your way out.

Miracles

I have had people ask why I don't have testimonies on my site or talk about what has happened for others through my healing work. The truth, is I want every experience to be your experience. It doesn't matter what happens for another, only what happens for you. I have experienced miracles in healing sessions. I have had clients, friends, and family that have healed broken bones, headaches, migraines, insomnia, heart problems, allergies, rashes, and many emotional crisis. I also have had clients, friends, and family work on those issues and still struggle with them. I get to be a witness to the healing and help direct it some, but it is that person and God making it happen. Not me.

The biggest miracle I have witnessed was when my mother fell. She had a brain bleed. We rushed her to the hospital and while there, she had a grand mal seizure. She was air lifted to a hospital in Seattle. They did emergency brain surgery and took a half a cup of blood off her brain. After the surgery, they had her in a drug-induced coma because she was having constant nonclinical seizures. My dad had stayed with her the first night. The second night, I went to relieve him. I brought her big quartz crystal and laid it next to her in the bed. I contacted multiple healing circles I knew and asked for prayers and light sent. I spent the whole night doing Reiki and ThetaHealing. I didn't care if any nurses or doctors saw me and wondered what I was doing. The seizures stopped and they stopped the drug-induced coma. The doctors told us the outlook was grim and they were not sure if she would live. If she did, they weren't sure when she would be able to talk or use her limbs, if ever. They didn't know how much brain damage she had experienced. They didn't want us to be surprised if she was stuck in the hospital for a long time. I kept going. I just went into full healer mode. The next day she woke up, confused about why she was tied down and why there were tubes in her. I started talking to her and explaining what had been happening. She understood. She was totally conscious. Within a day, she had total control of her arms and legs. She had a lot that needed to heal, but within a couple months, she was completely back. Every doctor that had her as a patient has told her she was a miracle.

This is also why I talk about using both western medicine and alternative measures. I don't know that I could have stopped the brain bleed. Anything is possible, but I'm not willing to take that gamble. Also, the body is able to heal itself miraculously. When we hold space for God and witness it and trust, healing can happen.

Physical Weight is Connected to Emotional Weight

I have never considered myself a binge eater. I have never sat down and polished off a whole container of cookies or ice cream. I think the closest is almost eating a whole bag of chips once or twice. I also wasn't one to be sad and shovel food into my face. I'm sure my food consumption was effected by my emotions, but usually it was that I would get stressed or depressed and not eat all day. I have seen these behaviors in my family, as well as extreme dieting and yo-yo dieting, so I have tried to be conscious about my relationship with food.

After my first marriage and two pregnancies, I was overweight. Once I left him and started living my life the way I wanted to, I quickly dropped all the weight. No diets or exercise or any conscious choices. I remarried and had another child and easily lost that pregnancy weight. About a year after my daughter was born, I started having several issues that would take me years to figure out were Adenomyosis. One of these issues was weird weight gain. Over the course of several years, I gained a little over fifty pounds! I tried many things to shift the weight but nothing was working. January 29th 2018, I had a hysterectomy and assumed that once I had healed some, the weight would fall off. By June, it was pretty clear that was not happening. At that same time, the company I had been an independent consultant for was bought by another company and they had some weight loss supplements. I decided to try one called Burn since I obviously needed help. Amazingly to me, it worked.

I became more active and have had bouts of exercise, mostly Yoga, and only in the last couple weeks have I adjusted my diet at all. This was to help with a gallbladder issue. Still the weight came off and as of right now, I am 20 pounds lighter than I was in June, which is nice. Also healthier and stronger from the Yoga. So, I should be on cloud 9, right? Instead, I am angry and sad. As the weight comes off, its like layers of emotions rise to the surface.

A lot has happened in my life over the last 8 years and it feels like I am having to relive the emotional impact of them again. My mother had two brain surgeries and I became her full-time caregiver. Stress about my three children and all that comes with being a mother. Family issues since my husband, children, and I moved into my parent’s house where my two younger brothers live (they were only teenagers at the time). Heartache around friends and family I have had to let go from my life. Layer after layer. I have been angry at family, myself, God, The Fairies, and this spiritual path. I have felt sad and lost. Instead of feeling it at the time, I was in survival mode. I was pushing over those feelings and trying to keep my head out of water, and when that didn't work anymore, I was just learning to breathe underwater.

I once heard a powerful mother talk about taking care of her fatally ill child and doing everything possible to keep her alive a little longer. She said when the diagnosis came in and all the information about care, it was like trying to drink from a fire hose. It was the best description I had heard of my own life. I feel like I repeatedly have had to try to drink from a fire hose while it's pointed right at my face. I think many of you reading have your own version of drinking from a fire hose. The trauma, stress, and pain we feel that is so overwhelming we just shut down and do what we need to do to survive. Then we blame ourselves and beat ourselves up for not being thin enough, healthy enough, or successful enough. We forget to give ourselves credit for doing the hard things. The hard thing might be just getting up in the morning when all you want to do is break down and cry. Sometimes basic functioning is a success and you should give yourself credit for it.

So, if you are struggling with weight, I would suggest looking at the feelings you are stuffing even if you don't fit that stereotypical emotional binge eater. You can find the Burn in the store page on this site if you are interested in that. I have had two aunts that also have had success with it. Mostly, be gentle with yourself. It can be hard to find your sparkle, and every time you love yourself, you get a little more shimmer.

The Blessing in Pain

My cousin was murdered. It's a weird sentence to say or write. She didn't just die. It wasn't illness or an accident that took her from us. It was the decision of another person to end her life. She was murdered a week ago. I have had a whole week to try to process this information and I still am having trouble getting my brain to accept it. No matter the amount of spiritual and self-help work you do, you can't always accept everything that happens.

I could make this post about my anger. It could be about how angry I am that our country has not done enough to stop this kind of thing from happening. I am angry about the state of gun laws, of violence against women, about the lack of support and protection for women in dangerous circumstances, the lack of mental health opportunities, and how voices are silenced. I am angry at the man who took her life and then his own. I have even been angry at God and all the powers of the Universe. Being spiritual doesn't stop you from being angry at times.

I could make this post about grief. How, no matter who you are, you will have versions of the stages of grief when you experience loss. That grief is not just feeling sad but feeling everything. You cycle through anger, sadness, numbness, peace, joy, and then back again. In fact, it's like being bounced around from emotion to emotion with no sort of order to follow. Grief is an experience that you move through and just keep moving through and it keeps changing. No amount of guidance or meditation will stop this.

Instead, I want to talk about pain. We try to stop the pain in ourselves and in others all the time. If we see someone crying or expressing discomfort, we ask how we can make it stop. We try to stop our own pain. We use drugs (prescription or not), alcohol, food, entertainment, sex, and whatever will shift our mood for a moment to escape it. We want to numb out and tune out. This is a natural response. Pain often means danger or death or a sign that something is wrong. Of course the natural response is to avoid it. Pain is also a doorway for us to walk through. Every painful experience has led me to new growth with my soul, deeper meaning in my life, a new understanding of myself and the world around me, and the birth of something new.

Pain brings truth, clarity, and brings us right into the present moment. That can sometimes be the cause of the pain. If we are in denial and avoiding, then we don't even realize what the pain is about. We might blame others or pretend to be happy when inside we feel like we our drowning. When we allow ourselves to sit with the pain, we can start to release and find peace. It is often our resistance and fighting or shoving the pain down that causes the pain to be so harsh. Emotional pain and physical pain can be better if you can relax into it. Let the tears flow. Let yourself wail if you need to. Open yourself to release the pain and birth forward something new.

The pain is a blessing, too. It means we are alive! It means we are experiencing life at its fullest. It means we are being honest with ourselves and living in alignment with our true feelings. The pain is only temporary when we feel it. This allows it to morph and change. It is holding onto pain and trying not to feel it that keeps it around forever. That said, there are some pains that will never fully leave, but we can embrace them as part of ourselves and make peace still. So, please feel your pain, embrace it, make peace with it, and watch it transform you.

Finding Myself

There are dark times on every path. These last few years seem to be heavy with the dark moments. I feel like I have lost a bit of myself and my soul over the last few years. My mother had two brain surgeries, one planned and one emergency. Don't get me wrong, we experienced miracles in the last few years. She almost died multiple times. We weren't sure she would be able to even talk again after her fall and brain bleed. A lot of healing was done by many healers, myself, and doctors and nurses. But in all of that, there were a lot of nights sleeping for only a few hours in a chair or on a lumpy cot. Nights of no sleep due to worry or due to keeping mom calm while dealing with hallucinations. Nights of being on call in case she needed help or something happened. Nights away from my husband and children. The medical procedures all had new things for me to learn for care at home. It seemed like there was always a new stress or condition or procedure to prepare for. I recently heard this described as trying to drink from a fire house. I think that describes it well.

Finally mom got sable. She still needs constant care due to poor eyesight and inability to walk, but she is stable. So, in February, I had a hysterectomy to deal with Adenomyosis. I couldn't take the physical pain of that anymore. Going through that recovery process, I realized that I did not have much support. I also realized that I had lost me along the way. Between my own pain and the stress of my mother's health, I had become less me. I liked to have fun and be social, but instead I was isolating and stressed all the time. My kids had lost that mom. My daughter even made comments about how I was grumpy or sad or serious all the time.

I can sit here and blame situations or people, but it was my doing. I stopped fighting for me. I kept giving away bits of myself and not asking for anything in return. I knew I had to shift. I'm still in this shift. I'm slowly reclaiming myself back, but I am allowing myself space to grow into more. This last week, I went to a Conference for my direct sales business. It was powerful and fun. The most important part was I felt like my old self. I was being silly, loud, dancing, singing, and having a good time.

Yes, we all have the dark times that make us want to give up or sell our souls. It's easy to let go of hope and cave in to the darkness. Instead, I invite you to rest. This can be sleep or just letting your soul rest. Don't let anyone define this for you. Whatever brings you joy and eases your soul, embrace it! Then start reprogramming your brain. Question everything if you have to. What are your motives? Why do you react the way you do? What do you really want? Help yourself believe once again in yourself. Find your sparkle!