All posts tagged: awaken

What Ananda Taught Us

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A great Buddhist story from a book I’m reading (Awakening The Buddha Within) beautifully describes the balance between effort and effortlessness. It goes like this: “By the time Buddha became ill and died, he had been teaching for 45 years and many of his disciples had become enlightened. One who had not was Buddha’s ever-present attendant, Ananda. This might be seem strange because of all the disciples, Ananda had heard every word that the Buddha taught and memorised them all. But, due to his busy schedule, Ananda had little time for his own solitary meditation practice. Several months after the Buddha’s death, it became imperative for Ananda to become enlightened. The First Council was to take place in order to recite and codify all the teachings spoken by Buddha. Ananda was essential to this meeting, however, because he wasnt enlightened, he wasnt qualified to attend. Ananda did the only thing he could do under the circumstances: he went into retreat, a meditation marathon, striving round-the- clock for enlightenment. Finally it was the morning of the …

Are You Ready?

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“When we least expect it, life sets us a challenge to test our courage and willingness to change; at such a moment, there is no point in pretending that nothing has happened or in saying that we are not yet ready. The challenge will not wait. Life does not look back.    A week is more than enough time for us to decide whether or not to accept our destiny.” ― Paulo Coelho, The Devil and Miss Prym

Feeling exhilarated?

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LOVE this message from Abraham. “You just wanna remember, what is it all about… the only reason that you’ve come into this experience, to explore this contrast, to give birth to that new desire is because it is so much fun to move from wherever you are in the direction of that new desire. The whole point is for the exhilaration of moulding it into place. Nothing is ever wrong, it’s just on its way to feeling better.”  

My Inentions for 2013 & beyond

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Another year is upon us and I have high hopes for this one.  I can just feel it’s going to be a great year… a year of change, adventure and excitement. Now is a good time to reflect upon the previous year and so below are my 2012 Intentions. I prefer to set intentions rather than resolutions because everything starts with an intention. As Deepak Chopra explains, “Intention is the starting point of every spiritual path. It is the force that fulfills all of our needs, whether for money, relationships, spiritual awakening, or love. Intention generates all the activities in the universe. Everything that we can see – and even the things we cannot – are an expression of intention’s infinite organizing power.” I most certainly did not achieve all my intentions from last year :(  I didn’t do the 5 Tibetans daily or dance enough (actually hardly at all!). But I do feel like I explored the others… and I think that’s the whole point of intentions, the result/desire unfolds naturally as it should according to universal law – sometimes …

Feel Good Regardless

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A major lesson I’ve had to learn is that you really can’t change people. Even though you really want to help them and hate to see them in pain and deep down you ‘know’ that they’d be happier if they did such and such. But who are we to make this decision? And who are we to rob them of their experience? After all isn’t that what we’ve come here to do… live, learn, grow and hopefully evolve to a higher consciousness. Sometimes I feel like I get caught up in stuff that’s just really not worth getting caught up over… other people’s stuff that I can’t control. I want to reach a place of not needing the condition to change to feel good: “I want to enjoy the benefit of unconditional love. I want the benefit of not needing a condition to change at all. I want the benefit of my focus to be so good that I can focus so clearly, so precisely, so deliberately, that I can feel good, only good about this …

I’m a falcon, let me fly!

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My amazing homeopath, Dr Wayne Saul has been treating me for the last few months trying to find a cure for my glandular fever (which is essentially an outer projection of some deep-seated condition). We seem to have finally found the right remedy.. it appears that I’m a raptor, the falcon tinnunculus! According to Dr Jonathan Hardy, “Bird remedies are very new in homeopathy, they have only been proved in the last few years. Medicines are prepared from the feather, claw or blood of the bird since any part contains the essence of the whole.” General themes of Bird Remedies include (some/all of these can be found in cases requiring bird remedies): Lightness – being light, immaterial, out of the body. Patients can be light in the sense of being free of psychological baggage, they are people who let go of past problems and antagonisms. Freedom – there can be a strong sense of being free or on the other hand  a deep feeling of being trapped by their circumstances and a very great desire …

Give love & more love

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“Appreciation and love, and alignment to that which is Source, is the ultimate “giving back,” so to speak, for in your pain or struggle, you have nothing to give back. What you are living is always an exact replication of your vibrational patterns of thought. Nothing could be more fair than life as you are living it, for as you are thinking, you are vibrating, and as you are vibrating, you are attracting—and so you are always getting back the essence of what you are giving.“  – Abraham

Day 7: A new beginning?

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Today was the 12/12/2012, and at 12 minutes past 12 my mom and I were meditating on the sand at Ballito beach. There was a phenomenal group energy present and it was an awesome experience to have the waves crashing in the background. So what was so special about today? There’s been a lot of conspiracies going around that the world is ending this December, and this is not entirely untrue. I believe that the date 12.12.2012 represents a window of possibility for an evolutionary leap into a new earth, an earth operating on a higher spiritual vibration. And because the whole planet and every thing on it is energy, including ourselves, there will be energetic shifts happening within us too, whether we accept it or not. It also represents the closing of a chapter. Interestingly, in numerology 12 signifies completion, the Divine Mother/Feminine, creative capacity, cosmic harmony and spiritual order. It’s really about releasing old patterns and beliefs that are no longer serving us – things like unworthiness, guilt, resentment, etc. Anything that’s holding you back …

Day 5: Our body cells are consciousness

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“When you think a thought you offer a vibration that is emphatically influential to the vibration of your body. But your body isn’t listening and rejecting, your body is just in the proximity of it and benefiting by the vibration or not. Being lifted and buoyed by it; being allowed by it or being hindered by it.” I understand the interconnectedness of body and mind but until now I hadn’t fully grasped the fact that as we are thinking we are manifesting, automatically, whether we like it or not. But it makes perfect sense – my body is a reflection of my emotional and mental state and even though right now it’s under a bit of stress and strain, I have the power through my thoughts and visualisation to change this reality. How amazing is that! I think the key is to start thinking of ourselves as vibrational beings, instead of stuck physical mass. Just think what fun we can have in our lives as we co-create with our ever-abundant, beautiful universe. “My cells are vibrational …

Day 4: Releasing tightness

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It feels so good to just sit in meditation and actually feel your body relax completely. That feeling of letting go and surrendering into the moment. Just sitting, focusing on your breath with nothing else to do except be present. We carry around so much tension in our bodies, day in and day out, the least we can do is give ourselves 15 minutes a day to just let go. As we release tightness in the body, we release tightness in the mind. I reckon that’s something worth making time for.

Day 2: Accepting what is

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Today I really wanted to go to tai chi, I mean REALLY wanted to go. But I couldn’t – I’ve had glandular fever for the past few months and symptoms seem to vary dramatically day-to-day. I was so excited because I haven’t been able to do any exercise at all and the idea of some movement was super appealing. Anyway, one thing I have learnt through this ordeal is the value in accepting what is, which doesn’t mean giving up and wallowing in negativity. It simply means “ok I feel like this today but it is going to pass and I will feel better soon”. I can reach for a better feeling place (even if that’s just a feeling of hope) and I can remember what it feels like to be well and healthy and energetic. I can imagine myself doing cartwheels on the sand and swimming in the ocean and having fun with my friends… I can almost feel it. It’s about finding that place of non-resistance instead of fighting against my body and …

Day 1: Letting go of S

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S has been a part of my life ‘on and off’ for the past few months, until I finally decided last Monday that there’ll be no more on time for us. What have I learnt through this experience? I’ve learnt that when you feel like someone is making more withdrawals than deposits into your life, you’ll be out of balance and in the negative before you know it. (Ref: 10 signs it’s time to let go) I’ve learnt that whatever relationships I’ve attracted into my life at this moment are exactly what I need for my evolvement through this life journey, and I’m grateful for every one of them. I’ve learnt that people’s actions really do speak louder than words and their depth can never be overvalued. I’ve learnt that the most important thing that you can do for yourself in any given moment is to feel good, and if a situation is leaving you feeling bad then you’ve gotta reach for a better feeling place. (thanks Abraham Hicks!) I’ve learnt that we attract what we think …

Find your ‘zero place’

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“Be a fool in the Taoist sense, in the Zen sense. Don´t try to create a wall of knowledge around you. Whatsoever experience comes to you, let it happen, and then go on dropping it. Go on cleaning your mind continuously; go on dying to the past so you remain in the present, herenow, as if just born, just a babe.” – Osho Zen Tarot

“Do you ever let yourself laugh completely…?

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You always seem to stop just before letting go all the way.” This is what a friend said to me last night over a cup of lemon ginger tea. Something that I’d never considered and yet something that’s so reflective of a certain part of me. It’s all too familiar. I just didn’t realise how it had manifested in certain areas of my life. And yet it almost seems contradictory as outwardly I’m a free, adventurous spirit but inside there’s a tiny little bit of resistance. I’m one of those people that have always wished they could dance like no-one’s watching, but I never can. Well not yet atleast. So thank you friend for that observation, it’s made some things alot clearer for me :) I say YES to more full belly laughs, skinny dips in the ocean, travel adventures and dancing under the stars with special friends.

A sensory weekend at the Buddhist Retreat

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I just got back from an awesome weekend at the Buddhist Retreat Centre (BRC) in the sleepy village of Ixopo, Western Midlands in the KwaZulu-Natal region. A friend and I ventured up with no idea what to expect, just super keen to escape into the wilderness for the weekend.  The retreat was held by the lovely Yasmin Lambat, a pilates instructor and Wellness Coach who is passionate about the Body Sensing technique. Body Sensing is a a somatic therapy that uses a body centered approach to heal. It recognises the inexplicable link between our emotions (how we feel) and our physical wellbeing. “Our biography becomes our biology” – Caroline Myss As Yasmin explains on her website, “It works on influencing our fascia, the largest sensory organ in the body and our sixth sense. Fascia is a web of connective tissue that not only influences posture and alignment, but responds to mood, softening when we’re relaxed and tensing when we’re stressing. It forms part of our body’s intelligent network of communication, often responding subconsciously. Under physical and emotional stress, our …