BLOGS

Little Bug

It’s nice to be back in touch with you all. Thank you for opening my newsletter and for being a valuable part of my life and career. It has been an unusual summer and it’s happenings are why I have not been actively writing. Yet, it is the very happenings in life that open us to the greater aspects of life. Let me share…

After 12 years of companionship, I lost my pug, Little Bug, tragically and unexpectedly. Then 6 weeks later, exactly, I lost my adopted dog, Miss Jiff. She too was a sudden loss and unexpected. Between those two deaths, I lost my Aunt, my mother’s sister. Crazy right??! I had 3 very close friends who, in those same weeks, lost their animals. Little Bug and Miss Jiff offered me many gifts in their lives with me. Consequently, in their deaths, they offered me gifts as well. Animals are here to serve us and to reflect to us what we need to heal. They are an integral part of our purpose on this plane. Death and loss are also integral to our purposes. We lose relationships from break up, divorce, and death. Each ending opens us to something new in our Self and in our life. (In order for one minute to exist the previous minute must die.)

Many, who feel loss as painful, deal with it by diverting their attentions so that they do not think about the loss or death. On the morning after Little Bug died, I was with a friend who was talking about pictures he had taken in the Everglades. Periodically, I would look out onto my patio and think of Little Bug and feel the need to cry. Then I would reconnect to what he was saying and I would feel the emotion push down while I attended externally to the story. Finally, I looked at my friend and said:
I can’t wait until you leave so I can cry! Not that I want you to go, but I can feel the need to be alone and allow this to be released. I am amazed how I look outside the window and feel the resurgence of the sadness and then when I listen to you it is pushed back down. I can only imagine that this is how the majority of people choose to “cope” with the hurt of their losses — they stay externally focused so that they do not have to “feel”!!!

For many with grief, it may appear that time helps us move through the stages and come to a comfort of some sort. But time does not necessarily heal. Our release of the pain and that which causes it does. If we stay away from the crying and the release and wait for time to pass, we do not have the opportunity to heal. That is why so often years down the road, you may find yourself crying with the very grief you felt at the time of loss.

Miss Jiff

Many people have asked me how I am doing so well with the losses I have experienced in such short succession. There are several reasons. One is because I live In a state of acceptance and because I have healed a large part of my fears of loss. I still feel the sadness but not the devastation. Consequently, the sadness heals quickly and allows for me to move into a place of enjoying the lives gifted me. Those who cross over do not want you to suffer. That is not, ultimately, why they passed in the way they did and at the time they did. Second, their deaths were in the natural order of things. Our pets and older relatives usually pass before we do. Third, I took the time to understand why. Why they passed when they did and how they did. What the gifts in their passing are and will be. Fourth, my genuine feeling they are in a great place and that their time here was complete. I am then able to let them go. They are on their journey and I am in a place where I do not want to hold them back.

There are several more magical teachings that came out of this time in my life. I will share those at another time. I have enjoyed the unfolding of life that has occurred as a result of my experiences. Yet, it feels great to be back on a “normal” schedule and to be writing again. I thank you all for joining me in my weekly ponderings.

Acknowledgements: I would like to personally thank, Dr. Nancy Keller and Dr. Ayla Akbulut for their magnificent teamwork in the treatment of my animals – those who passed and those who are still with me. I would also like to thank Dr. Kim Simons and Lap of Love for the in-home euthanasia. And finally, with all my heart, I would like to thank my family (Mom and Sister) and friends: Deborah Paiva, John Chervenak and Sue Singer, Pat Price, Michael Lynch, Mary Sol Gonzales, Melissa Knight, Milagros Castro, Michelle Worthington, and John Morales.

Healing through artistic expression can be truly beneficial to move through the blocks holding you back in life. Listen, as I speak with Mary Delaney, a local artist who has overcome obstacles in her life by reflecting on her past and expressing herself through her paintings.

The Akashic Records are a body of knowledge that records every thought, word, feeling and action of all beings that ever lived. There is no question too big or too small to gain entry into this divine, quantum field where all understanding is present.

Join me as I discuss life mastery and finding spirituality with Akashic Records reader, Kelly S. Jones.

To learn more visit KellySJones.net.

Why are you attached to seeing what isn’t good enough? Or, maybe you find your Self feeling like everyone is against you in some way, e.g., cannot be trusted, take from you, rip you off, talk behind your back? These are signs of living in a state of misery or fear.

If you are familiar with my writings you know that all emotions can be categorized as either love-based or fear-based. So, let’s simplify the addiction-to-misery philosophy. If misery/depression is a fear-based experience then it is going to need to create a fear-based environment to thrive. Make sense? Consequently, it is not just the feeling but the context within which it thrives.

So, if you know someone or are someone who is constantly sad, worried, or depressed, how might it serve them or you to be in that fear-based state of existence? Don’t say it doesn’t!! Don’t judge the answer!! Just listen to your inner voice as it starts to answer the question: How does it serve me to stay focused on the negative? The question feels like: what am I hoping to see happen as a result of this pattern or behavior or what is the wish behind the pattern or behavior?

Oftentimes, people find that they are feeling lonely and as if no one cares. They may then find that it serves them to be in misery because people try to help them or pull them out — or more! They get to the point where they feel “comfortable” in their discomfort and don’t know why. That is precisely why we ask our Self at that time, “How does it serve me?”.

We live in a fear-driven society. So, initially, people attend to the misery, pain, suffering of others. Life, however, is not experienced in the suffering but in the joy and happiness of living. Consequently, after time, people begin to pull away or create limited relationships with those who stay in their misery or pain. It is at this point of others pulling away that the pained person feels the futility of hoping for happiness and feels as if they have a right to be depressed or negative.

There is yet another level of kick from this pattern. If you or the person you know is in a state of believing others are “always” against you in some way, then you have probably developed a defensive stance that is not trusting. If someone is in a world of not trusting, how do they know trust? They don’t. Consequently, they find themselves picking the contractor, employee, or life-partner who is limited in their ability to be trusted. The outcome is again feeling the futility that there is anyone out there worth trusting.

To heal, you must be ready to feel happy. Then it is a matter of becoming aware of how pervasive the pattern is in your life. Once you have a solid awareness, you find your answers to how it serves you. Then you work on the needs that come out of that answer. Your Soulful Self or True Self is nothing but love. There is nothing to fear about love. Going toward the truth of who you are begins opening the doors to love and fulfillment. It is an expansive experience that never stops expanding. The fear that consumes you when you are living in pain, limits you and makes you feel small, insignificant. Which would you rather experience? Take the plunge. Dive into your Self and learn the experiences you truly wish to have in this life and go for it!!

Everyone is in relationship with self and others. Do you find even one of these relationships to be truly fulfilling? Do these relationships allow you to live the life you wish to share with that other? If not, let’s look at one way you can begin to create positive change in your relationships.

In this life, “we judge others in the way we are fearful of being judged”. In our closest relationships our challenges are continually illuminated. What that means is that if you are not comfortable, or aware of those challenges it can be a setup to judge your partner, friend, and/or family member as not good enough in some way. Does judgment of another help you reach the type of relationship you are looking to have? Does judgement bring you fulfillment and love? Is the judgment of the other teaching them what you need and/or who you are? Would you like to be judged rather than understood?

Judgment fragments relationships. It feeds the fear. Fear is suffering. Fear is the absence of love. If we have judgments within us, we can become aware of that which we are afraid of having judged by others.

Okay, let’s move to the relationship. If you judge the other without awareness to what your own fears are, that fear within you is being fed in the relationship. If that fear is there, no matter how the relationship grows or goes, the fear remains. Therefore, you cannot perceive change in the relationship or change in the other. The very fear that causes the judgments have been fed within you and continue to thrive. Therefore, they will continue to force judgment. Not pretty. Certainly not fulfilling. So, how do we turn this around?

The absence of fear is love. We must be willing to love our Self. It is in that love of self that we begin to heal the very fears that propagate the judgment. While doing that, there is something else you can do. Begin each day with love and compassion for the other. Shift your view of them from not good enough to a human with challenges and approach the relationship with a warmth, caring and compassion that allows you to explore the other. What is happening in the other when they do the things they do? More importantly, why do those things have an affect on you? From where do those reactions come? What did you buy into that allows those behaviors, thoughts, experiences to trigger fear-based emotion and judgment within you?

Start today, right now! Feel love and compassion for at least an aspect of your partner or a person in your life who can frustrate you. Now, think about them only with thoughts of caring, love. See them through eyes of acceptance, speak to them with words of compassion. If you do this for one hour you will see a difference. Then build upon what you learn in that hour!

Compassion breeds compassion. Judgment breeds judgment. Love breeds love. Fear breeds fear.
Love is the absence of fear and fear is the absence of love. Go forth into your relationships with the qualities that you wish to experience. Plant the seeds of compassion, fertilize them with your heart.

“You don’t remember because you don’t care!!” “I know exactly how she is going to respond if I ask her that!” “That’s not what you meant! And you know that!”

Those statements and any like them are assumptions. Assumptions breakdown communication and relationships insidiously! How would it feel to not be invited to an event because the other person assumed you wouldn’t want to go and, so, didn’t even extend the invite? Another breakdown this time having significant affect on emotions. I could give numerous examples all would show the quiet, sometimes unknown destruction of the relationship every time an assumption is made and quietly believed.

Step 1: BECOME AWARE OF ASSUMPTIONS
It is critical to become aware of your assumptions. They can quietly slip into your thinking unnoticed! They can be so sneaky as to have you skip over a thought or request because your assumption says it isn’t going to happen or isn’t necessary or will be upsetting or whatever! The more you actively learn to be aware of where you are assuming, the more affective you can be in your communication.

Step 2: ASK A QUESTION FROM THE ASSUMPTION
Once you hear an assumption inside of you, e.g., “she won’t like it,” make that thought into a question to the other person. Using the example, you would ask, “would you like to ….” Then you listen to the answer! Your assumption may have been correct but by asking the other to answer the question you are opening them to their Self and to you. That makes for a much healthier communication!! Furthermore, you never know what the other may say or do following the answer! If they continue reflecting, you have received a great opportunity to learn about the other!

Step 3: ACCEPT THE OTHER AS THEY WISH TO BE KNOWN
Let the words spoken by another be their truth. Then you can hold them to their word. If you are assuming their meaning they do not have to take responsibility for that. Therefore, they are not responsible for their communication because it is not what they said. If you find yourself wanting to go against what the other just said about their Self, ask them the question that your assumptions are screaming inside.

Enjoy these 3 simple steps to a better communication! Happiness comes from freedom in your relationships with self and others. That freedom must begin with the communication!

Shame! Public Shame! It has driven many to suicide. Yet, not too many know the pain of it like Monica Lewinsky. Tomorrow her story breaks through Vanity Fair. I hope we will all read it to understand what the media, the internet, and gossip can do to destroy a life. None of us would want our mistakes to be made a public laughing stock.

Every person knows shame. When you feel the ick inside it feels intolerable. You can’t imagine anyone accepting that part of you. You try to keep it inside, secret. You fear severe rejection as a result of the shame and then the loneliness is felt. For many, it is a wave of loneliness in which you feel you are drowning. It is in this lonely emotional place that the suicidal thoughts become eminent and the possibility of suicide can become a probability. Why would you ever wish that experience on another human being? If someone has made a poor decision, they are already experiencing and living with the shame. To make it public is an atrocity that is murderous. Many of our students, athletes, entertainers, and more have had to endure, or have not been able to endure, the public shaming of their indiscretions.

It is a formula or blend of the media, the internet, and the people. The American public seems to have found themselves entertained by others’ suffering and so the media feeds off of that interest. Why? Because people “Judge the way they are fearful of being judged”. That means that because a person fears the shame within their Self they judge the other person for their shameful behaviors. Suffering begets suffering. The more people suffer, the more they live in fear. The more people live in fear, the more they follow. The more they follow, the more they do not think on their own. The media figured this out a long time ago. Now, we have exponentially exploded this with the internet.

I ask all my readers to think twice before ever engaging in the gossip that it takes to propagate the public shaming. Think, inside your Self, that each time you share the shame of another you have harmed another person, whether indirectly or directly. Gossip destroys others. As you read the stories of others’ sufferings, ask your Self what you would need if this happened to you. May you all move one step closer to happiness by clearing your thoughts of others that are destructive or negative.

Welcome to the new 30-Day challenge. This month is about how communication begins with you.

Week 4

Speaking From and About Self

Using a scale of 1 through 7 (where 1 is not at all, 4 is neutral and 7 is always) please rate the following questions.

• I teach others who I am and how I feel. I feel understood.

• When communicating about something important to me, others do not feel the defensiveness.

• I am aware of what I am experiencing and what I need at all times and then able to clearly be understood and supported by others as I communicate that.

A score of 3 through 8 means:
You are struggling with feelings of being understood and appreciated. it may seem like no one really listens to you or understands you. your communication style still feels like it’s a struggle for you. You’re not knowing how to be heard and understood.

A score of 9 through 15 means:
You may be feeling frustrated with others. It may seem like no matter how hard you “try” they just don’t get it! Your style of communicating still includes reading others and trying to get a particular response. You are still speaking through them but you’re learning to say more about who you are and what you need. Keep up the good work!

A score of 16 to 21 means:
You’re feeling a sense of freedom and great support from others understanding and supportive of you and your needs your style of communicating is clearly about you and you’re able to state who UR without reference to what the others have done. Your style of communicating opens you up and opens up others. Good for you!

Why do you watch the news? Why? To be informed… Wherever you are sitting at this moment, turn off any TV or radios that may be on. Ask your Self, “How does everything I gather from the news affect me at this moment?” Is your mind going to: “Well it allows me to stay safe; or it allows me to know what is going on in our government; or it tells me about the strife in Venezuela…” Stay right here in this moment. How does it affect you right now!? The people who are in the tragedy are not in your experience. How is it affecting your minute, your now?

Lets move away from that and look at something else. Some of what happens are important facts. We are a free country and are able to vote, so some of what we could gather could be factual information. Then, when we do need to make a choice, it is in our best interest. But that is not what we gather from the news. The news preys upon the fear. They have researched the tone of the news to be sure it catches your fight or flight response and, consequently, your attention. So lets back away. The issue isn’t factual information because we all know we can gather our facts from reliable sources via the internet, readings, etc. The news we watch, or the biased newspaper we read, are a gathering of opinions! So how does all of that affect your moment right now!? If you are sitting in a park and looking out over trees and a pond, how does it affect that experience? If you are sharing a beautiful evening with the one you love, how does it affect that experience? If we take those beautiful experiences and we find ourselves talking about the news, have we lost the moment?

In conclusion, I hope you all think twice before allowing your Self to be seduced into the fear-based news shows and newspapers. They are not always factual. They eliminate those blocks of time from you experiencing your life. Be sure of the truth of why you watch the news. The news and media can sensationalize, so it important to do your own research. What are you truly gaining from the information? Does it truly better your life? Take one week. Turn off any news media and gather your information from factual sources. Watch how you start to see more roses on your path of life!

Welcome to the new 30-Day challenge. This month is about how communication begins with you.

Week 3

Listening To and Observing Self

Using a scale of 1 through 7 (where 1 is not at all, 4 is neutral and 7 is always) please rate the following questions.

• I listen to what I am saying to others, especially if I am angry or upset.

• I am not avoidant of others’ criticisms of me — constructive or otherwise.

• I do not take personally others’ remarks or behaviors.

• I am aware of my pet peeves in traffic and how it speaks to me about me.

A score of 4 through 8 means:
You may feel weary from judgments and misunderstandings. You may still be attached to how the world sees you. Your style of communicating may include trying to defend what you’re trying to say about you and yet never feeling heard or understood.

A score of 9 through 22 means:
You’re beginning to see your self as separate and see communication has not always going against who you are. Your style of communicating may include a hesitant or simple expression of self to those with whom you feel safe. You’re still slow to trust everyone with your spontaneous thoughts and dreams.

A score of 23 through 28 means:
You’re able to be in an observing stance so communication is about you and others distinctly. Your style of communication is an absence of most offensiveness and does not create defensiveness and others. Your style is spontaneous and centered on teaching others about you and asking others about them.