Category: Thought Provoking

DOING GRIEF DIFFERENTLY

On By thinkcarebelieveIn Healing & Empowerment, Thought ProvokingLeave a comment

This is a post written by my  friend Sara Kujawa about experiencing the holidays after a loved one has crossed over.  I try to post it every year around this time.  No matter our circumstances, we can always choose to do grief differently.

NORMANROCKWELLIt was not until my son Adam’s sudden passing in 2014 that I truly understood resisting change. How was I going to be able to bear having a family Thanksgiving, let alone a family Christmas ever again without Adam these traditions were so engrained in me and so important that I never thought it would change, and that they would always be “picture perfect”. I remember stating to my family weeks after Adam passed that I did not know how I was to be able to ever have another holiday without him being present and that I wanted to just skip over them from now on.

Little did I know what a journey I was about to embark on just months into my grief. I always believed in heaven and the afterlife growing up. As an adult, I gained a greater understanding about heaven and the knowing that our loved ones will give us signs to let us know they are there. I knew and accepted that they could send a message through, songs, animals, feathers, and of course pennies from heaven for I had my own experiences after my parents passed. A few months into my journey through grief I learned of energy healing which led me on the path of learning the importance of how not to resist change, and to have faith, and trust that God will only give us what we can handle. As I learned to lessen the resistance and accept that I could not change the past nor control the future, I was able to look forward with a bit more ease.

As I did more doors began to appear for me to open. I could sense and see my life’s path in front of me as the grief began to lessen. Forgiving those involved in my son’s accident, and forgiving myself for any hurts I felt I had caused, or any hurts that others had caused me or my family…that was the key. This opened me up, and my heart began filling with gratitude and grace for what I had endured.

As I began to accept the change, I was able to see how I could do grief differently during the holidays. You see I began communicating with my son firstly through signs and synchronicites, and also with the help of spirit translators (mediumship). My granddaughter had already been hearing her father, my son, since his passing. I had to let go of how my holidays used to be, and create new ways to celebrate, new traditions to help enjoy the holidays with the knowing that my son was right there with us in spirit. My perception of that Norman Rockwell holiday meal has changed. What is normal, what is picture perfect anyways?

Our loved ones in spirit check in on us all the time, in fact we are never alone, and they want us to recall happy memories and silly stories. I encourage you all to do grief differently during the holidays by thinking about your loved ones and reminiscing and writing letters to them, by making their special dish, putting photos out of them. Anything that will uplift you. Remember we are emotional beings so be kind to yourself. Respect your feelings and take special care of what you put into your body. Light exercise, plenty of water and getting out in nature as much as possible will help keep your body in balance. Surround yourself with positive people who uplift you. Honor your feelings and feel free to be able to express them verbally or by journaling them. Try to stay more present in your thoughts. Write out a mantra or an affirmation to help you to be more present. I modified the Reiki Principles as my go to mantra.

~Just for this hour I will not worry.

~Just for this hour I will not anger.

~Just for this hour I will be grateful.

~Just for this hour I will show kindness to all.

Please know that their is no right or wrong way to do grief but there is certainly a freer, more peaceful way.

Blessings to you all this holiday season…..

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Editor’s note:  Sara is available for readings and coaching sessions.

Her website is:  https://www.sarakujawa.com/

National Human Trafficking Awareness Day

On By thinkcarebelieveIn The Shift, Thought ProvokingLeave a comment

Today is National Human Trafficking Awareness Day.

The statistics on human trafficking are horrendous. If you are unaware, you need to educate yourself. I wish we didn’t need to have this conversation either, but we do. We gotta be responsible, compassionate adults and make others aware so we can fight the problem together.

According to safehorizon.org:

Statistics and Facts

National Human Trafficking Statistics

  • 24.9 million people are victims of forced labor. (ILO, 2017)
    • 16 million people are trafficked for forced labor in the private economy. (Private economy includes: private individuals, groups, or companies in all sectors except the commercial sex industry). (ILO, 2017)
    • 4.8 million people are trafficked for forced sexual exploitation. (ILO, 2017)
    • 4.1 million people are trafficked for forced labor in state-imposed forced labor.It is estimated that 20.9 million people are trafficked worldwide. (ILO, 2017)
  • Women and girls are disproportionately affected by human trafficking, accounting for 71% of all victims. (ILO, 2017)

Labor Trafficking Statistics

  • Forced labor in the private economy generates an estimated $150 billion in illegal profits per year. (ILO, 2012)
    • The largest share of labor trafficked adults are domestic workers (24%) followed by construction (18%), manufacturing (15%), and agriculture and fishing (11%) sectors. (ILO, 2017)
    • Migrant workers and indigenous people are particularly vulnerable to forced labor. (ILO, 2017)

Sex Trafficking Statistics

  • 3.8 million adults are trafficked for forced sexual exploitation and 1.0 million children are trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation. (ILO, 2017)

Human trafficking victims are often forced, through sexual, physical and/or psychological violence, to perform work under slavery-like conditions.

Tactics used by groomers, recruiters, traffickers and their associates are often the same tactics used by batterers and can mirror dynamics of domestic violence.

Traffickers use a variety of coercive methods to control their victims including:

  • Luring their victims with false promises of economic opportunity
  • Withholding identification, work authorization, or travel documents
  • Demanding repayment for a real or alleged debt
  • Using or threatening to use violence
  • Monitoring and surveillance activities
  • Paying very little or not paying at all for work

Trafficked victims may:

  • Be forced to live in subpar conditions (living in the same place as they work; living in a space that does not have heat, running water, or electricity; living with many people sharing the same, small space)
  • Not be allowed to talk to anyone alone or without supervision
  • Be coached on how to respond to inquiries from others including police and other authority figures

Regardless of immigration status, all people that work in the United States have the right to:

  • Be paid at least a minimum wage
  • A safe and healthy workplace
  • Not be held in a job against their will
  • Keep their passport and other identification documents in their possession
  • Report abuse without retaliation
  • Leave an abusive employment situation
  • Get help from unions, immigrant and labor rights groups, and other organizations

Be aware.
Make others aware.
Fight the problem.

–N-E-E-D- -H-E-L-P-?- –

US:

NCMEC Urgent victim help 24-Hour Hotline: 1-800-843-5678

NCMEC Cybertiplines: https://report.cybertip.org/ or https://www.missingkids.org/gethelpnow/cybertipline or call 1-800-THE-LOST
National Human Trafficking Hotline: 888-373-7888 or humantraffickinghotline.org

HSI/ICE toll-free hotline: 1-866-DHS-2ICE | Anonymous toll-free ICE Tip Line: (866) 347-2423 Tip Form: https://www.ice.gov/webform/ice-tip-form#wcm-survey-target-id

We must not stop until every child is safe and has care.

Stairway to Heaven

On By thinkcarebelieveIn Healing & Empowerment, Thought ProvokingLeave a comment

Jurgen Ziewe is a traveler. He has been meditating for over 40 years and kept detailed notes documenting his experiences astral traveling and lucid dreaming. He has written several books describing his experiences. Jurgen is also an artist and has made several YouTube videos depicting the realms he has visited. This is his latest and in my opinion, his best. Stairway to Heaven.

If you have ever wondered what heaven might be like, here is your chance for a peek. Be sure to read Jurgen’s description of the video. He continually says that words do not describe the realms he’s visited, although he does a brilliant job of finding words enough to convey the utter beauty. If you have someone in your life who has crossed over, this is a sample of the wonders they are probably experiencing. Extremely comforting. I feel it is worth sharing here with you.

So here is the video… enjoy!

Oh… extra treat… Jurgen’s video is interactive virtual reality- so move your phone or drag the screen around and you can see all around everywhere as if you are there!

The Ten Minute Moment

Multi-Dimensional Man

Vistas of Infinity

Standing For Assange

On By thinkcarebelieveIn Julian Assange, Thought ProvokingLeave a comment

We may all have different reasons for which we feel strongly impassioned. A better future for our children, a longer healthier life for our pets, healthier bodies, environmental conditions that create longevity for ourselves and our loved ones, better stewardship for our dear Mother Earth, a stronger healed country that shines because it is loved, a happier peaceful world, equality, the end of corruption… We may be standing for different reasons, and that’s okay, as long as we are all standing up and standing together.

If there was one linchpin opening the bridge that takes us to our future, it is Julian Assange. Without him free, we do not have accountability in our system, and that means more wars, higher taxes, more health scares, energy crises, worsening inflation and a media that has been scared and intimidated into keeping silent about the truth. With Julian Assange imprisoned for publishing proof of bad things our government did, crimes, he is being held to send a message to all journalists, everywhere… to keep quiet, or else. He is a family man with a wife and 2 young boys. He could be your brother, your cousin, your friend, your son…

Please call your elected officials and tell them you want them to support freeing #Assange.

US Directory Here. UK MP Directory Here Australian Directory Here

Call them #FreeAssangeNOW
DOJ Comment Line:
(+1) 202-353-1555

DOJ Main Switchboard:
(+1) 202-514-2000

Eastern District of Virginia:
(directly handles Assange case)
(+1) 703-299-3700

White House Comment Line:
(+1) 202-456-6213

Assange in the News

Unless we were looking for it, we would not know what is happening with Julian Assange because it is being kept quiet by the media. The truth about Assange needs to be told. Please see the following News Articles:

Minister ‘misled parliament’ on Foreign Office role in secret Assange operation
British Parliamentarian Kenny MacAskill, a former Scottish justice secretary, is officially pressing the UK government for answers around “Operation Pelican”, the secret plot to kill Julian Assange.

Anthony Albanese, The Prime Minister of Australia, has just officially gone on record pressing the US gov. for Assange’s release directly.

Interview with Julian’s brother Gabriel: https://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it/in-edicola/articoli/2022/12/03/gabriel-shipton-julian-assange-my-brother/6894559/

The Guardian should retract all falsities about Assange: https://johnmenadue.com/the-guardian-could-help-assange-by-retracting-all-the-lies-it-published-about-him/

December 10th is Human Rights Day- Initiatives and Actions for Julian Assange Map: https://www.pressenza.com/2022/12/10-december-10th-human-rights-day-international-mobilization-for-julian-assange/

New Award Winning Movie about the Julian Assange Story

Home
The movie Ithaka is the poignant story of Julian Assange’s family desperately fighting to see him free. It is incredibly well done, has already won numerous awards, and explains the whole situation.

#FreeAssange #FreeAssangeNow

Article: December 10th is Human Rights Day with Initiatives and Actions for Julian Assange

Our Hearts Go Out

On By thinkcarebelieveIn Thought Provoking, ToolsLeave a comment

This morning’s quiet contemplation seems to have been all about opening the heart and letting love out into the world to go where it is needed most. When we think of those we love, that wonderful feeling we get is the energy from our heart flowing outward to them. It’s potent. It radiates. We can think of those who need our forgiveness and extend that heart energy out to them. We do it through prayer.

The holidays bring us together with loved ones who may carry grudges and unresolved pain. We may have tried everything in the book to help and now it frustrates us to see the same thing continue with no visible improvement. When we whittle down our issues to their root base, most stem from the universal desire to love and feel loved. God is Love. Darkness stems from the idea that something or someone has become separated from God in some way. Insecurities and triggers have caused behaviors that have moved us away from the love that is our center. If we can summon our compassion, we can radiate it out with the intention of healing the situation.

Neville Goddard, in his book The Art of Believing, describes how we can affect healing for someone else by going deeply into the subjective mind, the imagination, as if one was in a hypnotic state. In this state one would believe as if the person, our subject, had already done what we were wishing for them and the healing had already happened. In this successful prayer state, we believe so intently that we mentally speak to that person and congratulate them as we see them in their healed state, affirming the miracle has occurred. “Bold assertion by you, while you are in a partly subjective state awakens what you affirm. Self-confidence on your part and the thorough belief in the truth of your mental assertion are all that is needed to produce results. Visualize the subject and imagine that you hear his voice. This establishes contact with his subjective mind. Then imagine that he is telling you what you want to hear. If you want to send him words of health and wealth, then imagine that he is telling you ‘I have never felt better and I have never had more,’ and mentally tell him of your joy in witnessing his good fortune. Imagine that you see and hear his joy.”

“What things soever you desire, when ye pray, believe that ye have received them, and ye shall have them”

Mark 11:24

Scientific investigators, Glen Rein, Rollin McCraty and Mike Atkinson and Dana Tomasino spent two decades looking into how and why prayer works (see their published papers below.) They used highly calibrated medical and laboratory equipment to measure heart rhythms and brainwaves so they could determine if one’s intentions and emotions had any effect on others. The heart was center because it produces the strongest electromagnetic field in the body. The heart actually acts as an oscillator, producing coherent and incoherent signals that register on an ECG, and ring throughout the entire body. Thus, the entire heart field is felt by every cell, tissue and organ. Their conclusions were such that the heart radiated coherent frequencies when feeling love, care and appreciation and when the subject felt emotions such as anger, frustration and worry, the heart radiated incoherence. Over time, positive changes in EEG as well as ECG improved when subjects practiced emotional self management. One of the most surprising effects was that individuals generating focused feelings of deep love were able to cause a change in the conformation of DNA, either their own or that of another, with effects observed over long distances. They discovered that a combination of heart-centered energy (love) and mind-centered energy (focused mental attention) produced the greatest results. They wrote, “Human intentionality produces effects which defy conventional laws of electromagnetism with respect to their independence of space and time. The long distance effects observed here support these observations and indicate that coherent heart energy may be a carrier for such non local effects.”

Their findings indicated that: Heart Energy + Imagery + Intent = Results

Love itself is a resonance. The frequency of love oscillates, like entrained tuning forks, creating positive effects of harmonization on people, animals, minerals, plants, etc. It builds a bridge of energy between people and is an essential ingredient in healing. By opening up our hearts, we intensify the overall frequencies further into the positive. With the creative force of Goddard’s imagination and faith, we can be empowered with the tools of focused control of our subconscious, the love in our hearts and our beliefs. We all knew about the power of prayer, but now we have even more reason to rest in the strength of our faith, which in turn gives us hope.

Don’t give up. Don’t ever give up.

References

Modulation of DNA by Coherent Heart Frequencies, McCraty et al, 2002

Local and Non-Local Effects of Coherent Heart Frequencies on Conformational Changes of DNA, R. McCraty 2001

Effect of Conscious Intention on Human DNA, G. Rein 2002

https://www.heartmath.org/articles-of-the-heart/personal-development/you-can-change-your-dna/

Natural Gratitude

On By thinkcarebelieveIn Inspirational, Thought ProvokingLeave a comment

Nature exists in an interconnected web of balance. When something is affected in nature, the whole system adjusts to recapture balance. Let that be a nugget of wisdom for all of us to tuck under our hats for a rainy day.

A reminder that nature is our truest reality. All else is man made.

When we connect with the natural world, without all the noise and limitation of man’s world, we realize how truly limitless we in fact are. The correction comes in with a loving energetic flow. It has an intelligence and knows just where to go to achieve balance and harmony again. Everything in nature communicates on the subtlest levels and works in a synchronistic flow that only an ever-present loving guidance could achieve. That is our Mother Earth, and she is the commonality between everything and every person and system that exists in our realm, whether it is realized or not.

There is more light every day. Expect change. Expect Love to be involved to bring things back to balance. Expect miracles.

Gratitude for our abundant life-giving natural world.

The Dream Awakened

On By thinkcarebelieveIn The Shift, Thought ProvokingLeave a comment

Typically called the “between times,” dawn and dusk are magical. Not just because of the extraordinary quality of the light, but because it is an experience of miraculous change. The metamorphosis of shades of gray to a full-on color spectrum. Autumn has that same flavor of change. It is all about the dissipation of the green chlorophyll that camouflages the true underlying color of the leaf. It was always there, but we couldn’t see it unless we knew.

As I sat outside, coffee in hand, trying to wake up, I mused about how a time of change is at its heart, symbolic of the maya, the dream. We are told that we are living in a matrix, that the Great Awakening is all about us, waking up from the dream. Shirking off the conditioning and programming that keeps us fearful and afraid to color outside the lines. As we take in more and more Light, we bust those illusionary limitations, and emerge as a beautiful and unique fruit, perfect in the NOW.

I looked up and noticed that clouds had quickly rolled in, covering the stars with a blanketed sky. They moved rapidly and then I noticed they seemed to be rotating. Honestly, it looked like a storm swirling around, but from my perspective I was in the eye of that storm safely tucked in my chair sipping my coffee. I got the distinct impression that it was our reality morphing, as if all the building blocks of our reality became untethered and are whirling around us. Then I just had the knowing that when those Lego pieces come back down, they’re going to be reassembled in a different order and our world will be different.

Something caught my attention and I suddenly noticed a large Red Fox standing less than 10 yards away from me in my driveway. I was honestly so surprised that it all felt a bit like my world had become a magical unreality. I pulled out my book Animal Speak by Ted Andrews and looked up fox. According to Ted, fox is a sign that a new world is opening up and the process of creation is beginning. It reflects that the world is changing and shapeshifting itself into new patterns that will be beneficial. It is a creature associated with magic and the “Between Times and Places” and can be a guide to the fairy realm.

Well to me, the times we are in do feel like something we could call a Between Time. But this morning felt like something significant happened. I’m utterly convinced that there is much more to our experience than we realize, and to me it feels like it is getting closer and is about to look us straight in the eye.

The flexible are preserved unbroken.

The bent become straight. The empty are filled.

The exhausted become renewed.

The poor are enriched. The rich are confounded.

Therefore the sage embraces the one.

Because he does not display himself, people can see his light.

Because he has nothing to prove, people can trust his words.

Because he does not know who he is, people recognize themselves in him.

Because he has no goal in mind, everything he does succeeds.

The old saying that the flexible are preserved unbroken is surely right!

If you have truly attained wholeness, everything will flock to you.

Lao-tzu, The Tao, Verse 22

The Hero’s Journey

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It’s a theme that is as old as the written story. Our main character, the hero, sets out upon a quest to find something, regain something or right a terrible wrong. His journey inevitably leads him through a treacherous path where he evades plight and peril. He must come face to face with the thing(s) he dreads the most. There is an ego-death of sorts. He loses his naivete and gains wisdom. He grows. His quest is eventually and finally ended with a return to where he began, but now a master of both the spiritual and material worlds. He is now in a state of always becoming, always growing, which usually is just the beginning of our hero’s life now having the ability to live freely.

The Hero’s Journey is really a story of resurrection. It is something to which we can probably all relate in this process of becoming. It is the template of Star Wars, Moby Dick, and Jane Eyre and is found in the works of Ernest Hemmingway, CS Lewis, JRR Tolkein, WB Yeats, JD Salinger, William Faulkner and Charles Dickens. The quest is arduous and by going on the journey with that hero, we are also going through the transformation process that by experiencing the world outside ourselves, we are discovering the world within ourselves. When the hoops have been leapt and the dragons slayed and the treasure found, we come to breathe a sigh of relief as we become masters of both the inner and outer worlds alongside our hero. It is the triumphant moment of the phoenix rising from the ashes that draws us. It is the sense of freedom that allows us to live in the now moment, unbound by our fears and empowered with our freedom to choose.

Looking at the process we are all going through during this shift, because these changes are inevitable, something has probably been torn down or torn out of our lives in the past couple years. We had to let go and in turn, that made room for something new to come into our lives. Something that was more appropriate, for we have grown more than we know. Now we get to level up and live as true creators… and we get to choose what will bring happiness and joy. We give the Universe our order form and follow up with visualizations and affirmations. By raising our vibration and keeping it there we hook it and by living as if we are already there, we attract our destiny to us like a powerful magnet. We can give thanks now to seal it. This is still being in service to God. God did not intend for us to suffer.

“and as He spoke He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.”

Author CS Lewis
The Last Battle
“Farewell to the Shadowlands”

The Tao

On By thinkcarebelieveIn Inspirational, Our Country, The Shift, Thought ProvokingLeave a comment

The Tao that can be spoken of
Is not the Everlasting Tao
The name that can be named
Is not the Everlasting name
The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth

–Tao Te Ching, Lao Zi

The Tao belief is about living a simple and balanced life in harmony with nature. The word Tao in Chinese means “the path” or “the way.” The belief is that it resides at the origin of the Universe, and is the basis of all existing things. The benefit of exploring the Tao is that one can gain a sense of everlasting peace and happiness by becoming one with the Dao. The holy text of Taoism is the Tao Te Ching written by Lao Zi. It is focused on optimizing the Chi or the flow of life force energy that surrounds us at all times and affects health, wealth and happiness. In Chinese the word ch’i means “air” or “breath.” Some of the concepts are simplicity, wisdom, balance, humility, non-violence and conservation of action.

Dr. Wayne Dyer was a follower of the Tao and based many of his teachings on it as well as writing the book, Living the Wisdom of the Tao. Regarding the Tao Te Ching, he writes, “His lessons have helped me behave in less ego-directed ways, practice more selfless humility, live softer and with a kind of detached contentment. I learned the value of listening more and speaking less, and I notice nature’s inherent wisdom so much more.”

CS Lewis, author of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe writes in his book, The Abolition of Man, “It is Nature, it is the Way, the Road. It is the Way in which the Universe goes on, the Way in which things everlasting emerge, stilly and tranquilly, into space and time. It is also the Way in which every man should tread in imitation of that cosmic supercosmic progression, conforming all activities to that great exemplar.” Lewis also associated The Tao with Natural Law and writes, “The Tao, which others may call Natural Law or Traditional Morality or the First Principles of Practical Reason or the First Platitudes, is not one among a series of possible systems of value. It is the sole source of all value judgments. If it is rejected, all value is rejected. If any value is retained, it is retained. The effort to refute it and raise a new system of value in its place is self-contradictory. There has never been, and never will be, a radically new judgment of value in the history of the world. What purport to be new systems or…ideologies…all consist of fragments from the Tao itself, arbitrarily wrenched from their context in the whole and then swollen to madness in their isolation, yet still owing to the Tao and to it alone such validity as they possess.”

Brittanica Encyclopedia gives the definition of natural law as “a system of right or justice held to be common to all humans and derived from nature rather than from the rules of society, or positive law.” The concept was contemplated in ancient times by philosophers such as Aristotle, St. Augustine of Hippo and St. Thomas Acquinas. Natural Law was debated throughout the Enlightenment and Modern eras and then evaporated in the early 19th century with a strong skepticism about evoking nature. It was revived again in the 20th century after the war with Nazi Germany. The need to challenge unjust laws inspired the desire to call on rules of right and justice held to be natural and given by God. And our country? Several of our founding fathers, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Quincy Adams, Samuel Adams and John Hancock wrote about the existance of natural law and natural rights. While they might not have all admitted that those laws stemmed from God, they all believed that natural rights came from those laws. What has changed so much in our society that has taken us so far from our roots? Changed so much that it totally departed from the original principles that it was built upon, based on natural law and natural rights? I’ll let you ponder that for yourself. I will close with one last quote from author CS Lewis, “Only the Tao provides a common human law of action which can overarch rulers and ruled alike.” And that is truly something of value in today’s world.

Here is a beautiful reading of the Tao Te Ching by Dr. Wayne Dyer. It is only a little over an hour long.

Worth Listening

Solving

On By thinkcarebelieveIn Inspirational, Thought Provoking, ToolsLeave a comment

The answer is love. No matter the question, or the problem that needs solving, the real answer is always love.

At this time of truly being honest with ourselves, we step off the flat page into 5D living, to become a true authentic expression of ourselves. We cannot buy into any messages of separation or judgment in any form now. If we can rise up to see things from an eagle’s eye view, perhaps we could see that we are entering a new phase with a bigger, brighter perspective that allows us to navigate quite a bit better. Yes, we are still clearing out old emotional stuff and absorbing more and more light like a sponge. If you really feel into the light right now, you will begin to feel the bliss energies. This is part of the change that is going on within us, that broadens our outlook so that we may affect changes on a larger scale. The way we solve problems will undoubtedly change toward working together with a common aim.

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break, our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature. -Abraham Lincoln

Systematic change happens when people form bonds over a common cause that they feel strongly enough to stand up for what is right. This all starts on a person to person level though. Usually problem solving has become a competition over whose solution is better and who gets the credit. But when the people who have skin in the game demand change, there can be no more fooling around. Problem solvers must join forces and see things from the same side and take aim at the problem together, instead of eachother. There may need to be some acknowledgment of how the problem got that way and some personal responsibility taken. Shifting to a common ground basis for problem solving requires that the better angels of our nature take over. When we can cease to take things personally and approach things with compassion, then compromise can occur and getting to the root cause of the problem becomes entirely possible. The key is understanding the other person while maintaining our own self-respect and keeping healthy boundaries.

When I became a Shamballa Reiki Master over 20 years ago, I was given the five principles of Reiki. I have tried to live my life by them. I’m not sure they have anything to do with problem solving, but I just thought I would share them.

1. JUST FOR TODAY I WILL TRUST. All things happen in accordance with divine will. I will listen to my I AM presence, my Higher Self, and allow my life and work to unfold within God’s plan.

2. JUST FOR TODAY I SHALL WORK HONESTLY. I love myself enough to know that my actions affect others. Doing one’s work honestly means being truthful to one’s self. If we create harmony in ourselves, we help to create harmony in the world. If we co-create love and balance, we will have it in our own lives. Mastery comes from honest effort in our daily lives.

3. JUST FOR TODAY I SHALL ACCEPT MY BLESSINGS. This means that I will look at my life and see what I really have. We are the light of God on the planet, allow it to manifest through you in truth, beauty, harmony, love and abundance.

4. JUST FOR TODAY I WILL BE AT PEACE. To be angry is to be controlled. Anger is limiting and brings imbalance. It must be transmuted into love and balance. Smile and receive a smile. Love will radiate love in return.

5. JUST FOR TODAY I WILL RESPECT ALL LIFE. We have been given everything we need to live in harmony and respect. Until we respect and love ourselves, we cannot respect and love others and be in harmony with the divine plan. Realizing all living things are really our brothers and sisters, we as healers are instruments of the divine plan, and must show others the way forward in love and compassion. The Earth is a living, loving being. By facilitating Mother Earth’s healing and wholeness, we ourselves become whole.

I don’t know if today’s musings are helpful or not. But I hope they inform and/or inspire. Your presence here on the planet during this time is no accident. You are needed and you are appreciated for every way you tip the scales of Light into the positive. I’m so glad you are here. The kindness you share, the love that is in your heart, the good work done by your hands. You are loved beyond measure. You ARE love. If everyone truly knew this, there would be very little blockages to solving problems together and perhaps less problems being created in the first place.