Television. How TV rewires our brain and why it's so important to know.

Three years ago I gave up watching television. I didn’t realize how profound a step this was in reclaiming myself from the unaware masses. We are being conditioned. We don’t realize this is happening to us…and it has been happening for a very long time now. Is it too late to save ourselves?

We are being fed opinions, not news. We are being fed pretty pictures that have nothing to do with reality. We are being told not to think…”they” will think for us. ”This is what we should buy… This is what pretty looks like…This is what thin looks like…This is good for you…This is what you need… This is how you should behave… This is what ypuo should think… Let us do it for you…” And it seems to make things so much easier for us…so we allow it. We don’t have to think anymore. And now we’ve lost ourselves.

Hopefully there comes a day when each of us becomes aware that we have lost choices, ideas, dreams, our unique creativity, our unique selves, and instead we are drowning in judgments and opinions not of our making, nor indeed of our thinking.

I hope you can remember a book that you read and enjoyed once upon a time. Reading or listening to an audible book gets our creative juices going….Can you remember that book that gave you that feeling? We see pictures in our mind, we feel the characters come alive.. they are real to us.. we go on an incredible journey with the characters. The whole story lives within us.

When my son, Luke, was 7 years old…we were having breakfast before going to school and he just finished the last page of Peter Pan. I heard a great sob come from him as his head fell into the pages. He had finished a great experience and was distraught. I told him there were so many books that he will find great delight in…and we can always go back and reread them. He is a great reader and writer now.

If I have loved a book, and then a movie of the book comes out, I seldom go to see it as it will always disappoint me. The movie will never match up to what the author and I have created together. I have an IPad now and if I want some new entertainment, I will browse around and see if there is something I would like to watch. It is MY choice. I enjoy Ken Burns’ documentaries. He uses photographs and letters in the most brilliant way to tell stories… and in none of his documentaries do I feel excluded or outside of his work.

Maybe it would be a good time right now to let go of television…. At least only turn it on to see something you have chosen to watch, and if it is special to you. Then, it will be YPU making the choices. When we allow others to lead us through the mire of TV, we often turn off the set feeling somehow used and abused.

Try taking your power back. Find the YOU that you lost along the way. Anyway, it’s a strong first step in reclaiming yourself. Because as you know, we have to be ourselves…everyone else is already taken

by Jill Townsend

Here’s our podcast about TV

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/too-much-television-how-tv-rewires-our-brain-why-its/id1313078549?i=1000430471721&mt=2

Dance like no one is watching, sing like you think you can

I love dancing! Not ordinary dancing, but free wild dancing. Feeling the air swirl around my hands and hair, letting the body just move as it wants.

The Ancient Maters of  Qi Gong knew and made the simpler routines complex...funny isn't it? (See the coming podcast/blog on "the Heart of Qi Gong.) The guidance is much more detailed and structured when we begin. Slowly as Qi Gong becomes a part of you and you get more used to moving with the energy, you can allow the energy to move you. Then there is no structure, it becomes just following the energy of the body and the Universe. Children tend to do this naturally, if they're allowed. Watch them as they twirl, jump and make funny moves, as they're balancing themselves. 

Most of us hold our body in tight patterns of movement, this constricts us and limits our ability to feel the joy and love that we are. 

Sitting in a room with a teacher who beat us, it was like living in a war zone. You never knew when they would attack, so I grew a hyper vigilance, a heightened sense of when danger was present. I taught myself to feel their emotions and find ways to deflect their reactions. I never got hit, but watched many of my friends beaten with rulers of canes. This has actually left me with a gift of sensing peoples emotions. What it also gave me was a fear of being myself, a fear of speaking up and a fear of most people. Dancing, singing, running through nature, up mountains barefoot, enabled the freedom I had known as a child to have a doorway into my life. I would find a place where no one could see and dance and sing freely and joyously. These moments were bridges between the world of fear and the world of joy, light and peace. 

www.earthtriberadio.com

Death, the final frontier: we can do it without fear and with ease, grace.

10 STEPS TO DYING GRACEFULLY

Sitting there watching my client’s face, so peaceful, so easy as he took his last rattling breaths. I felt a peace coming over me, a knowing again for the umteenth time that death is moving into lightness. I’ve worked with several dying clients to help them find this place of peace at death and so far it’s always the same. So I decided to share a few steps that can help us to find out how to die gracefully, peacefully and without fear.

Most of my life has been about helping people to find a more joyous, peaceful and fulfilling life but almost nothing is as fulfilling as watching someone die with joy and grace.

I’ve seen fear, struggle, almost a hysteria as clients moved towards death, until they discover how to move beyond that. Dying like birth can be a joyous and uplifting experience. Let’s explore how they changed death from being something we fear, into something that is powerful, joyous and transformational. In this blog we share tools, techniques, meditations and ideas that can help you or your loved through this transformational experience.

“For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one.” Khalil Gibran.

Most of us associate death and dying with grief and suffering. We find the subject something we want to avoid or we feel uncomfortable about it. Yet it’s an unavoidable part of life. How can we can help ourselves, or our dying loved ones through this transition when it’s time?

“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.” Steve Jobs

Dying in the end is just dropping our space suit body, yet it’s also so much more. Death and dying gracefully is a podcast series in which we explore and experience these new and ancient ways of dying.

“Death is not the greatest loss in life, the greatest loss is what dies inside us when we are alive.” Norman Cousins

Here are ten steps to dying gracefully:

First let’s look at the five regrets found by Bronnie Ware as she worked with dying people for eight years:

1/ “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.”

2/ I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.

3/ I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

4/ I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5/ I wish that I had let myself be happier.

I’ve found a few other life changing ideas for the living and dying:

6/ Knowing how to find peace

7/ How to find joy in life

8/ How to be okay with who we are

9/ How to be present/mindful in our life

10/ How to love ourselves and others

‘Bronnie Ware has released a full length book titled The Top Five Regrets of the Dying — A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing. It is a memoir of her own life and how it was transformed through the regrets of the dying people she cared for. She says, “For many years I worked in palliative care. My patients were those who had gone home to die. Some incredibly special times were shared. I was with them for the last three to twelve weeks of their lives. People grow a lot when they are faced with their own mortality. I learnt never to underestimate someone’s capacity for growth. Some changes were phenomenal. Each experienced a variety of emotions, as expected, denial, fear, anger, remorse, more denial and eventually acceptance. Every single patient found their peace before they departed though, every one of them.”

Focusing on these five regrets in some form has been transformational even for those of who aren’t dying right now! Asking ourselves each question and taking a few days to keep asking them can give us a huge relief and new view of life.

1. “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

This was the most common regret of all. When people realize that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not honored even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made. It is very important to try and honor at least some of your dreams along the way. From the moment that you lose your health, it is too late. Health brings a freedom very few realize, until they no longer have it.” Bronnie Ware

So many of us are living according to who we feel we should be, rather than what we want or who we really and truly are. This is a great question to ask ourselves a couple of times a year and share it with friends and family. Some get angry at death because of this. I had one woman who had a period swearing at everyone and asking them to ‘leave her alone’, as an Italian mother and grandmother, she never had the ability to speak her mind or do what she wanted.

2. “I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.

This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children’s youth and their partner’s companionship. Women also spoke of this regret. But as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence.

By simplifying your lifestyle and making conscious choices along the way, it is possible to not need the income that you think you do. And by creating more space in your life, you become happier and more open to new opportunities, ones more suited to your new lifestyle.

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result.

We cannot control the reactions of others. However, although people may initially react when you change the way you are by speaking honestly, in the end it raises the relationship to a whole new and healthier level. Either that or it releases the unhealthy relationship from your life. Either way, you win.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying.

It is common for anyone in a busy lifestyle to let friendships slip. But when you are faced with your approaching death, the physical details of life fall away. People do want to get their financial affairs in order if possible. But it is not money or status that holds the true importance for them. They want to get things in order more for the benefit of those they love. Usually though, they are too ill and weary to ever manage this task. It all comes down to love and relationships in the end. That is all that remains in the final weeks, love and relationships.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called ‘comfort’ of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content. When deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in their life again.

When you are on your deathbed, what others think of you is a long way from your mind. How wonderful to be able to let go and smile again, long before you are dying.

Life is a choice. It is YOUR life. Choose consciously, choose wisely, choose honestly. Choose happiness.” Bronnie Ware

Here are more ideas and questions we can explore as we’re dying and to help us to live and die gracefully:

6/ Knowing how to find peace within.

“Do not let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace.” Dali Lama

When we rely on how others make us feel we can never find inner peace. We have an inexhaustible reservoir of peace deep within and we need to take time to access this, it never leaves us, we have just left it (and it’s not our fault).

The outside world is like waves washing over the sand of our peace. We can choose to loose our connection to it, or build a bridge and use tools and techniques to remember how to get there. This place has been in us from birth, but we’ve lost access to it. So, what to do? Take a few moments in the morning, before you get up to feel the goodness and appreciation for the small things in your life. Put the corners of your lips up and think of one thing you appreciate, do this all through the day and you’ll begin to feel that peace more and more. You’ll be building a bridge back to your always perfectly peaceful place.

People who die knowing the place of peacefulness die more peaceful, it is the place those of us who’ve had near death experiences found ourselves.

I was eating a Cloppa fruit in the Transvaal with my father and sister. Suddenly I swallowed the huge seed and it blocked my throat. Everyone was busy eating their delicious fruit and no one noticed that I was turning blue, until I began falling to the ground. I was slipping inwards, into a deeply peaceful place and I could see a tunnel of light. Daddy saw me and grabbing me by my feet, he held me upside down and hit my back. The huge seed popped out and I took in a bug rasping breath. I asked, “Daddy, where was I going, what was that place?” “He replied, what place?” “That place that was so quiet?” “I don’t know darling,” he said.

Knowing this place before we begin the death process is important, although we can discover it then too. When we do it makes us less fearful. How do we do that? We take short moments where we stop, put the corners of our lips up and drop into the feelings in our hands, our feet, our body. We watch a raindrop on a leaf and feel how our body feels. We completely experience the apple as we eat it. We are wholly in the hugs we share with someone. We are totally in the present.

Taking these times enables us to feel the place of wellbeing with and as we do this more and more throughout our day, we find it spontaneously happening. Then when we are dying, we can we can practice this and relax into the peacefulness that we are opening into.

7/ How to find joy in life

“Only those who have learned the power of sincere and selfless contribution experience life’s deepest joy: true fulfillment.” Tony Robbins

Joy like love is a state, not an emotion. It’s like a bubbling up of our wellbeing. When we see a sunset, when we hug a loved one, when we see a beautiful flower in nature we slip into a state. This holds us for a little while and then something crosses our mind and it’s gone. How can we grow this state of joy?

“Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.” Thich Nhat Hanh

Find small things to appreciate, like the earth you’re walking on, the road your driving on, the clothes your pulling over your head, the breath your taking. When we appreciate we create a pathway into the state of joy.

“Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.” Thich Nhat Hanh

Even when we are ill or struggling to move beyond life, we can open moments of joy, when we have practiced awhile. Joy like love and peace are states that are always within us behind all of the other stuff.

8/ How to be okay with who we are

This ties into the first regret.

“Who were you before the world told you what you were not?” Bryant McGill

So much of our life is lived believing what others have told us about who we are and who we’re not! Perhaps today ask yourself, who am I without what I do; what I have achieved; what I look like and what I own? We are born unique and yet so often we are covered with words and emotions we or others have placed over who we are. Like post it’s that cover our being, which we can’t see through. We can begin to remove those post it’s by questioning our thoughts and beliefs. Use the Byron Katie’s Work question, “is it true”. When we question our thoughts, we change our life forever.

Here are a few of her powerful quotes.

“It’s not your job to like me — it’s mine”

“A thought is harmless unless we believe it.

“An unquestioned mind is the world of suffering.”

“No one can hurt me — that’s my job.”

Dying is often filled with thoughts of, “what it”, “if only,” “Why didn’t I,” “why didn’t they.” When we discover how to question these thoughts, they so often just go away and leave us slipping into the joy, peace and love that we are under all of the other ‘stuff.’

9/ How to be present/mindful in our life

Mindfulness brings us here now and enables us to feel who we are. It is a mental state found through focusing our awareness on the present moment, as we calmly acknowledge and accept our feelings, thoughts and what’s going on in our body.

“The little things? The little moments? They aren’t little.” — Jon Kabat-Zinn

Take the time today, now to just be here and notice everything, the trees, the grass, the expression on someone’s face (without judging). When we do this we find a quiet within, a presence that brings us to who we are.

“Mindfulness is a way of befriending ourselves and our experience.” — Jon Kabat-Zinn

Right now take a second to really be here with everything that is in your experience now, how your body feels, the sounds around (how does the fridge sound?), the smells, the thoughts, the colors. Mindfulness brings us home and is powerful tool when we are ill or dying, as it keep us here and moves us gently away from emotional suffering.

10/ How to love

Love is a state, a sensation, not an emotion, it can’t be given or taken, only felt. Right now as you look out of your eyes, appreciate something in your eyesight.

“Appreciation and self-love are the most important tools that you could ever nurture. Appreciation of others, and the appreciation of yourself is the closest vibrational match to your Source Energy of anything that we’ve ever witnessed anywhere in the Universe. -Abraham/Hicks”

Love is the same energy as appreciation. When we spend time each morning, each day, appreciating something about us, we are loving us! Appreciate our hands that do so much for us, appreciate our bed, water, tea, coffee, the mug we drink them from and as we do this we are in the same energetic state of love.

Many of us have asked, “Who am I?” We are this expansive feeling, we are this feeling of love.

When we take time to appreciate, we begin to uncover true love for ourselves. This is something we feel, we uncover the energy of who we truly are and then we are in love with ourselves and others. In love without needing anything from them, because we are totally fulfilled, we are totally in this state of love.

When we are in this place, we can return to it, even when we are pulled out by pain or the threat of losing loved ones as we die. We are love, we’ve realized before and now with a pathway well built, we can travel back along this and find it behind the suffering, behind the impending leaving this life and these loved ones. Love is a state, a state we slip into when we are in a flow with or connected to someone or something. We are love!

“And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because death is very likely the single best invention of life. It is life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true. Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” Steve Jobs speaking to students at a graduation. Stanford University.

“No matter where you go, there you are” Confucius 479 BC

Freedom through mindfulness, how to still the mind and find inner peace

I love tea! Every morning I take time to mix teas, add a squeezed lemon and stevia for sweetness, gather the dogs and head outside.   A comfy couch awaits, with soft blankets and light that is just rising. On cold days we don jackets and snuggle, as we watch the sun rise. There is such a wonderful symphony of song as the birds begin their day.

Mindfulness if being conscious of how the tea tastes, how the birds sound, how warm I feel, how it feels when the dogs snuggle close. This brings me into an easy place of peacefulness that sets up my day.

Mindfulness is bringing our attention to experiences, feelings and thoughts that occur in the present moment.  We can grow this in us by  bringing our attention into anything we're doing, feeling or experiencing. Just stopping in what we're are doing, bringing our attention to how it feels and what is going on for us, can give us incredible ease in life. Mindfulness is part of Buddhist traditions, where it's utilized to grow self-knowledge, consciousness and to access to our natural wisdom. 

When we stop and bring attention to what we are doing, our mind stops! When our mind stops, we have an instant moment of peace. Then off we go again, do this often and slowly, slowly we find greater ease and peace in our lives. So, when you're having your tea or coffee do it mindfully and it can bring a moment of meditation. 

Here are a few steps to help:

• Bring awareness to what you're doing...like drinking tea or coffee. Feel the warmth or cool, feel it slipping down your throat.
• Every so often stop and become aware of your breath. Notice how it feels as it goes in and out.
• Walking can a wonderful mindfulness exercise. Be aware of your feet and how they feel as you move them; how your breath feels as you walk. 
• Just bringing awareness to any moment is so helpful.

My journey with the struggle of depression and coming back to the light I had in my childhood

Okay we all know that really it's not about suddenly finding enlightenment, we're all there. It's just about remembering how to access it in our day and night. It's finding the moments in our life where we can use spiritual keys, techniques and meditations that open our bridge to this natural state.  A client once asked my, "Are you enlightened?" "Sometimes," I said, "Like everyone else." 

How I found my way into and out of depression

ON THE FARM I LIVED EACH DAY IN A STATE OF JOY, DELIGHT AND AWE OF LIFE

My family lived on a farm deep in the bush of South Africa. My father wrote for the London Times on nature, Mom was a homemaker and artist and they both were very active in anti apartheid activities, as were my much older sisters. 

Even though we lived in a torn, dangerous and  struggling country, most of my childhood was lived in an inner place of comfort, joy, light and happiness. I danced, sang, played with  on our land and went to political rallies with my parents. There was a knowing that I was good and right and accepted in both the white and black communities. I was who I was and that was enough, without question in my mind.  Although I didn't consciously know, (like a fish in water)I just felt easy and comfy in my life. 

My parents and me in Africa

LEAVING AFRICA LEAVING ME

 When I was eight, my parents felt that it had become too dangerous because of their anti apartheid activities and we left. They sold and packed up what they could and we headed to Australia with only a small portion of their money. The government would't let them take the rest. I had no idea that things would be changing , it was just a trip to me. Even though everyone was sad, we were together as a family and they were my home. 

The journey was for me amazing, so many new sights, new people, new tastes and new feelings. My family was with me and even though I could feel that they were sad sometimes, we were still together. I sat on the deck of the ship and watched the ocean, it was so beautiful and made me feel very light and happy. They served ice cream on the decks each afternoon and I ate it slowly, we didn't have ice cream often on the farm. After a trip from Perth to Adelaide in a train, my parents purchased camping gear and a car and we drove around Australia. We sang and told stories as we travelled the east coast looking at towns, to see which one suited us.

I was acutely aware that this was hard for them, even thought they tried to hide it from us.  When I cut my hand on a glass, I kept it form them, I held it closed and packed it with a handkerchief and peroxide. They were struggling and I didn't want to add to their worry. No one noticed and I was just eight.

There wasn't much money for buying decorations, so Mom got some colored papers and we made chains and used glitter to make other things for our tree. We had fun and it didn't matter that there were weren't many presents. Jasemin my sister made home made candies and we enjoyed them together. 

After  a few months of traveling and a short time living in Toowoomba, Queensland they finally deciding to settle in Adelaide. Our parents purchased an old stone house, with a wonderful almond tree that grew over a leaky septic. There was a huge fig tree in the back and a field of oxalis or sour sobs as we called them. The pretty yellow flowers danced in the wind and my sister and I lay in them watching them dance above our heads.

FROM HEAVEN TO HELL - SCHOOL

Relatives told my parents to send us to a private school, so my sister and I excitedly went to school for the first time. She was 13 and I was still 8, for a bit neither of us understood what was happening. We had never been spoken to like this before, had never seen people hitting children before and it terrified me. My sister became very rebellious, I was just terrified. There was nothing I could do, I had no way to know how to deal with treatment like this.

Our family was splintering, my parents had to work and start a new life and career at over 50. My other sisters 11 and 13 years older also needed to work. I began sinking inside to escape the violence and loss of family cohesion. For awhile in the beginning I could still find the place of happiness and ease inside pretty easily. Then it got covered up completely, with a deep impenetrable mud of depression, which slowly slipped over my light and covered all of me.

SCHOOL CHANGED MY LIFE AND I BEGAN TO LOOSE ACCESS TO WHO I WAS

  I can remember sitting behind my desk making up stories in my mind and watching flies crawl around the ceiling. "Fiona, what is your answer?" I realized I'd missed a question and felt the heat rising in my face. " I don't know." I said.  Would she hit me? She screamed " Will you pay attention." So often I couldn't. I jumped up into the isle and looked at her, it was hard to be there in the classroom and so much safer to be in a dream world in my head.

I was lost in the crawling depression, only nature, singing and dancing could bring back the access to the light space that had been my home as a young child.  I began to feel as if I wasn't acceptable, too chubby, not able to concentrate, not smart enough and worst of all I was not Australian. They kids made fun of my 'toffee' (English) accent and called me 'hippopotamus'. During the time or stress before we left, I had become heavy. I began for the first time in my life to feel 'not good enough.' This had never been a thought before. 

Dad said, " Don't worry, school is only for one kind of brain and you have a one that is different." This was in the fifties, he was a unique, smart and wise man. His words didn't stop the slow devolving into depression, but it helped me to feel that there was someone who understood me.  He studied with me each night and presented things in different ways, so I could remember and understand them.

I LIVED IN THE MUD OF DEPRESSION FEELING HOPELESS AND INCOMPLETE

It became harder to remember that feeling or state I had in Africa. I didn't feel safe here, in a place that was so much safer than where I had grown. No dangerous animals, no snakes that chased and attacked you and no conflict on our doorstep. I began to feel that I needed something to fill me up, complete myself. There began to be an emptiness inside, a feeling of aloneness, I wasn't whole and thought I could find something or someone out there to make me better.    

This depression lasted for over twenty years. I searched and quested, looking for a way back, but I only found glimpses of that feeling of lightness and ease, that Africa feeling. After college I back packed around the world searching. In the Himalayas of Nepal, I waited for a teacher to come down and say, “Aha at last I’ve found you.” Someone who could show me the way back, but no one came. I even felt alone in my relationships and chose men who criticized me, wanted me to be different, or who abused me. 

MY QUEST TO RETURN HOME TO ME

A quest began, a search, to discover how to return to me. Traveling all over the world, I searched, looking for teachers who could lead me, looking for ways to remember. Depression still hung over my mind and filled it with tornados of emotions that I couldn’t get through. Nature was a haven, for a little while I could touch the place of light inside and then the tornado returned and the light was gone.

Finally after twenty years of searching, trying all sorts of techniques and studying with many spiritual and Qi Gong teachers, I realized the depression was gone. When did it go? What date had it left, I couldn’t remember.  What I found was that it wasn’t through trying, understanding, expressing, sharing or struggling, 'cause I tried all of these.

Here are a few ways I discovered, a few keys or pathways that really helped. In the next blog, I’ll go into them in more detail and share a bit more of the story.

MY TOOLS FOR GOING "HOME"

MEDITATION: didn’t help when I did it for long periods. In fact it made the separation between the inner and outer world a chasm. This worsened the depression. I discovered that I cold build a bridge between the inner place of light and the outside world of reality  with moments of mediation. I'd stop, put the corners of my lips up, drop my eyes to half mast and feel my body. When I did this I could access that inner enlightenment.  I began to lift out more and more.

NATURE: Has always been a key for me. Taking time to be with nature first thing in the morning, a cloud outside an apartment, a little flower growing in the cement, a tree an animal. These bring me for a little while.

QUESTIONING MY THOUGHTS: We think thoughts are real…did you know that you change your thought each time you return to it, as Dr Hansen, in “Hardwiring Happiness” tells us. Byron Katie came out of massive depression through just questioning her thoughts. www.thework.com. I discovered that thoughts are just thoughts and I began questioning them.

MINDFULNESS: I took time each day to be with everything I did. When we remember and are present in what we do, it brings us away from our thoughts and into a moment of meditation and light. I feel the water on my hands when I wash them, feel the tea slipping down my throat as i drink it and I just took time to be with moments of life.

SETTING UP MY DAY: Before you getting out of bed I'd decide how I wanted to feel today, then remember a time when I felt this way and feel it through my body. I sit outside with the dogs and watch the sun rise each morning. When I set up the day, it usually goes well, or better and it's easier to access the bridge to light. 

In the next blog I’ll explore how to navigate relationships. Listen to our podcasts on itunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/earth-tribe-radio/id1313078549?mt=2 and check out our website www.earthtriberadio.com.

In one moment we lost everything.Our house and everything in it burnt in the Californian wildfires

The fire was for us all a powerful and transformational experience. 

Here you can see them knocking the chimney down of our home that burnt in the Californian wildfires. We had around 20 minutes to get the animals into the car, grab a few things and leave. The winds were swirling and sometimes going horizontal at 70 or 80 miles an hour. What your seeing is our living room. The fire burnt at about 1800 degrees. 

It was amazing to see the over 200'  wall of fire smoke and ash coming towards us as we left with most others on our street. Horses and a donkey were being led up the street to a rescue area at the school. Floats were pouring up the hill to help rescue animals as we were going down. 

We heard at about 5am that our house was gone. The only area that survived was our meditation area. There all of the trees and plants survived.

Going up the coast and then to LA we went, until just before Xmas when we moved to the house across the street, which Heather had offered for us to rent.  The community came with food and gifts. I don't think we had to cook for a week! 

It's not always been easy, we decided not to speak about what we lost. Although every so often we'd think oh no, I lost 25 years of Qi Gong notes....or all of our mementos. 

We have had a several miracles happening. Bob lost both his pianos, which was heartbreaking for him. One day we went to the HELp of Ojai Fire relief store....where we can take anything that people have donated....and there was a piano all covered in stuff.  He played it, it had a good sound and we asked if we could take it. Jayne at first thought no and then she said "Yes." So I called our piano tuner and his son gave us a movers name. He was going to charge us 200, the next morning the piano tuner called to say that he was moving it for free himself. It arrived two hours after the pieces of the burnt piano were loaded onto the dump truck. It's a beautiful piano and he loves it.  We've had several amazing things happen like this. 

We also realized that many of the things we have been affirming have happened because of the fire. We still have moments where it's harder, but we've created places for our meditation and almost never miss our affirmations together.

Through the ashes are rising little growing things and everything seems to be breathing better. We all seem to be coming back into balance more and so thankful for all the help and love we've been given. 

After the clean up...tons of ash and rubble removed....new beginnings

Our home....

Be yourself everyone else is taken

So often we are trying to pour ourselves into a mold someone else has given us. Not to say they knew that they were doing that ...but lets today become aware of how we truly want to be. Let's make today the day we speak and act form our heart, from who we are and if we don't know who we are? Then focus on the heart and move through the day from there. It's amazing how we find things and people changing when we do that. Heart Math has done some serious research about the heart (heartmath.org and heartmath.com) and how powerful it is to move from our heart. 

You know most of us are operating from an idea of who we are that was given to us by someone who didn't know who they were. We can change that by operating from our heart. We can change that by stopping throughout the day and asking, " What is really true for me right now?"

So often we are moving and living form a robotic place, push a button and I'll react from old patters, but in the same way each time. We are broken records, but we can change that. We can stop in our day and ask," What am I thinking, or what am I doing? Also do I want to be doing this?" Just stopping, can give us the consciousness to change that reaction to an action. Try it and you'll be surprised. 

Why are relationships so hard

We all have relationships, some close, some passing, yet for most people they are the most challenging part of life. Why is that? 

Relationships are our playground for transformation and light gathering. In relationships all of our buttons are pushed and the energies that we've chosen to transform and expand emerge. During our struggles with our partner, we expand energies and find greater light. Even when it doesn't feel like it. In our relationship program, we give tools and techniques to help you to make life easier. 

Tools to Communicate with the Spirit of Plants

Plant Communication and plant spirit are powerful shows that can help us all unwind who we think we are and return to who we truly are.

We are surrounded by plants, even when we are in the city or desert (provided we aren't in the Sahara). Plants are a touchstone to who we are, they can help to bring us back into a place of joy,peace and love. They hold clear access to the oneness, their source. The other day someone said, "I just want to find out who I am before I die." I suggested that they close their eyes, put the corners of their lips up and tell me how they felt. "I feel good, she said. "Well, that's who you are. That's you." She stopped for a second and smiled, "Wow, thanks me?" "Yes that's you, it just gets more vast, the more you do it."  We are all fully enlightened, we often think it's something huge to struggle to find, it's not. It's simple and easy and amazingly vast.