Un-sticking

To revive or cast off?

It seems there's a bit of a theme to my life (and the life of those close to me) at the moment. The theme is that of staleness. What is the right thing to do when a dream job/marriage/friendship stops working for you and starts working against you?

Do you work twice as hard and try to revisit the things that made you love it in the first place? Or do you move on?

I think there's a general sense in today's day and age that things are inherently transient. Most of my generation would scoff at the notion of working one job for 30 years - and as much as we would love to believe we'll be married until a ripe old age, statistics tell us that half of us won't (at least not with our first spouse).

But just because everything these days seems to be disposable, should it be? Isn't there some good to be gotten from loyalty and hard work? After all, we can't just throw things away every time we hit a snag? Society wouldn't function... would it?

But when is enough enough? When you've been sticking it out so long that you wake up one morning to discover that you are, in fact, just stuck.

Are we doing ourselves any favours trying to cash in on a losing bet?

I'm pretty sure I know my answer... but it's something I struggle with. To stay or not to stay... that is the question.

Spiritual Meme

I looked everywhere for a good Spiritual Meme, but there aren't really any. And since I was just dying to do one, I decided to make one up and tag everyone who reads this to copy and paste and put their own answers so we can share. Then, if you do it, please comment and let us know so we can check it out.

Astrological Sign?
Taurus with Sagittarius moon.

Chinese Astrological Sign?
Metal Rooster

What are you currently setting your intention on or praying for?
Spring! Just kidding... my intention is set on getting my proverbial ducks in a row and attracting the perfect house sometime this summer.

Who do you pray to?
I haven't ever really prayed, but I suppose when I need help or guidance I ask "The Universe".

Do you believe God created humans or humans evolved from primordial goo?
Ha ha. Both. I think it's all connected and that the Source, whatever we call it, is continually creating - and that evolution was part of this creative process. We are not the end of this process either.

What is your mantra?
If I'm being honest, it's probably "what's next?" because I'm always a million miles ahead of myself. But what I would want it to be is "love".

Do you believe in Sin?
I believe in free will - and I believe that although we come into our lives with best intentions, we get caught up in drama, or victimization, or anger or fear and we make bad choices. But I don't think we are punished for it in the hereafter. I think it's part of the learning process.

Do you believe in Evil?
I guess this goes hand in hand with the last question. I think there is a darkness out there that can envelop us if we let it in.  But I see a universal balance - if there is to be good, there likely has to be bad.

What do you do when you see 11:11?
I always either make a wish or give thanks when I can't think of a single thing to wish for because I have all I need.

Do you believe in Angels?
A couple years ago I might have scoffed and equated angels with UFOs. But lately I've been a little more mindful of dismissing something because of the label we've put on it. I believe in bodhisattvas (enlightened beings), and I suppose it would not be impossible for me to believe that there are higher energies, intelligent, guiding energies out there that some might deem to be 'angels'.

Do you believe in God? If so, what does God look like to you?
I believe in an organized, intelligent field of energy that we are born of and return to when we die. I believe we can access this field through meditation and dreams. If I had to give it a "face" I'd say my version of god looks like a mandala of buzzing energies.

Is there an aspect of your religion/belief that you haven't made up your mind about?
There's a lot I'm still mulling over. Not sure what I think about these "new ages" ringing in with crystal kids and indigos and the lot. I certainly want to believe... but haven't had direct experiential proof yet.

Is there a religion that you don't follow, but deeply respect or admire?
I admire a lot of different religions. I admire the Buddhist path, the epicness of Hinduism, the personal power of Wicca, and I'm deeply drawn to the esoteric and mystical branches of Judaism and Christianity.

Who has inspired you the most on your spiritual path?
There have been so many contributors along the way, beautiful clear people who've shared their thoughts and listened to mine with open minds. In the last few years Wayne Dyer has notably been the source of many little epiphanies.

In your opinion, what is the worst mistake we make, as a species?
I know it's the standard response but I'd say getting caught up in material games. I love my iPod, don't get me wrong, but I think we use money and possessions to fill holes that we ought to fill with with love and learning.

What is something you would like to believe, but don't?
Heaven, the way it's depicted in movies.

Do you believe in soul mates?
Yes, but I think we have more than one and they're not always romantic connections. I have several good friends I consider soul mates because being around them makes my heart buzz with happy vibrations.

Reincarnation or heaven?
Reincarnation, or rejoining of the field, depending on your energy's goals.

Best "ah ha!" moment/epiphany?
When my good friend, who had passed away months earlier, contacted me through my dreams - it really was a big moment for me. I woke up knowing things I had only theorized about before.

Required spiritual reading?
2150 A.D. My dad had a beaten up paperback copy of it and lent it to me. It's the best of spiritual idealism and has a lot of great thinking in it. I think the Celestine Prophecy also helped me at the right time.

If you could pick, in your final moments, what would your last words be?
"See you soon. Love you."

Advice for a lost soul?
Follow your bliss. Trust yourself.

A song that encapsulates your beliefs?
"All You Need Is Love" by the Beatles.


TAG! Your turn. Copy and paste - can't wait to read.

Who's Out There?

Exobiology is an interesting scientific pursuit. The crux of the research lies in finding life on other planets. But the life we're looking for is only physical - amino acids, building blocks, a fluid-based entity, carbon-based preferred?? It's all intriguing and arguably a noble cause.

But in a world where we don't even know the nature of our own existence, how can we possibly learn about others? And are there indeed forms of life we haven't allowed for?

I understand that this is where most staunch scientific types will start to roll their eyes or shake their heads (but who am I kidding, they don't read this blog!) - but what if we could prove, physically prove, life after death, or the limitless, undying energy or entities that occupy a different dimensional universe...

These are not beings that are based in the physical world. They aren't sacks of fluid. They don't reproduce (as far as I know)...

I know it doesn't count for much - but I had a very interesting dream back in January (you UFO fans might like this one).

I was in some kind of spaceship - "they" told me I had to go out "there" (meaning space) and handed me a breathing apparatus.

The minute I began breathing through it I was in space. Surrounded by blackness, except that I seemed to be traveling at light speed to a destination.

I approached a large planet - and surrounding the planet, TONS of spacecraft. I internally thought, wow, okay, I believe now (in E.Ts). It was an alien tailgate party of sorts. Weird.

But I quickly moved on - zooming through the universe, approaching and passing through huge, brilliantly colourful nebulae and clusters. And as I was zooming through space I got a little freaked out, because I kind of realized what was happening and I asked to go home. I asked for it to stop.

I HEARD (not just like you hear thoughts but a LOUD VOICE) saying something like 'deinitializing' and I couldn't wake up. I wanted to, but I was frozen. And suddenly in my head my mind was running through images of every bedroom I've ever had, like it was searching for the one I was currently in. It found it and I awoke.

And when I did - I considered for the first time maybe, that there really might be an entire community of physical beings out there who have achieved what we have not - interplanetary travel.

What do you think about the search for E.T.? Are we too limited in our definitions of "life"?

Where Is The Internet?

Above: A visualization of the various routes through a portion of the Internet.


John Edward said something when he was on Oprah that has really stuck with me lately, been ringing in my ears and making me think.

John Edward is best known as a medium - who achieved notoriety doing "live readings" as part of a TV show "Crossing Over with John Edward". But I know him mostly as a teacher, one who has taught me, through his Audio Book Set how to contact my spirit guides and speak with my loved ones who have "crossed".

But the thing that has stayed with me is what he said when Oprah asked him where the other side was - where the spirits were that he communicated with. He laughed and said he had asked his guides the same question and their reply had been this: where is the internet?

Where is the internet.

I love it. To me, that's a way cooler (and more accessible) koan than "what is the sound of one hand clapping?"

What a perfect metaphor, with energy exchange, instant communication and the connection of all people - the internet as a representation of our limitless existence in this life and beyond.

Making Lemonade

I was listening to CBC's radio program Tapestry this morning (via podcast) - it was about Harold Kushner's book Overcoming Life's Disappointments. In it, he discusses what happens to people whose dreams die or aren't fulfilled.

He's a rabbi, and so comes from a place of faith - which almost brings me back to my last post about the connection between faith and happiness, and how people of faith (any faith) tend to deal better with life's little upsets... but I will try to stick to what I really wanted to talk about.

There was a particularly insightful point he made about expectations. Just because you psych yourself up for something, doesn't mean it's meant to be. And sure, it might sting for a bit when it doesn't come to pass but, as he said - would you really want a life free of rejection?

At first glance you might think yes... but...

(I'm paraphrasing here but...) Would you want to be married to someone who was only married to you because they couldn't say no? Would you really want to be in the first job you ever interviewed for? Or still dating the first person you ever dated because they couldn't reject you?

For most of us, I'm guessing, the answer is clear. Thinking back, I can't imagine the horrible way my life would have worked out if I was still dating my first boyfriend, or working the first job I ever interviewed for coming out of school... I mean, yikes.

And in this light, I think the point is that as hard as things may be to understand in the moment, time illuminates the cosmic rationale behind all things.

I try (TRY) to have faith in those moments of rejection and disappointment, to remember that I am here for a reason and a purpose and that purpose will find me. And those rejections are nothing more than roadsigns pointing you back to your purpose, back to your path - because there is always something better coming around the corner.

So I dedicate this to a good friend who is going through a trying period at the moment and facing a lot of uncertainty. Be patient... the best is yet to come.

Delusional or Just Happy?

I get along just fine with atheists. I spend a large part of my life conversing with them. My mother is an atheist. My boss is an atheist. A lot of my friends don't believe in anything in particular and are unknowingly "agnostic".

Because I don't believe in proselytizing, I am always conscious and aware of how I talk when I'm talking to an atheist. It can be draining sometimes, the lack of belief in anything seems to me to be a very negative, cynical view.

This article came out yesterday addressing what I have been long sensing - That those of us who have faith in a greater order, a purpose-driven existance, are generally happier for it.

Using data from Britain and Europe, the study found believers enjoyed higher levels of satisfaction and suffered less psychological damage from unemployment, divorce or the death of a partner.

When I was little and I used to ask my mother what she believed in, she used to always say "I believe in myself". That is, she didn't want to believe that there was anyone else pulling the strings - it made her feel powerless.

And I have to thank her for sharing her empowerment. Because of it, I also refused to believe that "something else" was pulling my strings - and opted for a much more inclusive kind of spirituality, where free will ruled and I was a creative contributor, a valued member of a collective of powerful energies creating itself as goes along.

But even now, in the face of all of my "spiritual experiences" with precognition, the afterlife and psychic phenomena, my mom remains cautiously curious. She'd never outright admit to being intrigued, but she did sneak a peek at a few chapters of my Holographic Universe book while I napped on the plane the other day. I relish in piquing her curiosity. I would at least like to get her back to a point of asking questions again. I think she lost that thirst along the way...

I have no qualm with those who don't believe. Maybe it's not their purpose in this lifetime to believe. But I do wish that the religious and the atheists would stop quarreling about who is more delusional.

What is it about us that we so desperately want everyone to have the exact same human experience we do? Can't we accept the possibility that there is no absolute truth - or that there are perhaps multiple truths - all equally valid?

What do you think? Am I delusional?

Clap If You Believe...

I'm happily in a bubble of learning at the moment, experiencing a kind of spiritual growth-spurt - as I do once or twice a year. This usually involves a lot of reading, a lot of listening and if I'm lucky, a lot of learning.

My favourite part of the process is when two separate sources or pieces of information start overlapping to form a new insight. This is starting to happen.

I'm reading Mysticism and The New Physics and the author Michael Talbot was talking about the role of the observer, and discussing how they've found that reality is actually defined by the expectations of the observer - to the point that they should really be considered "participant", because there is no way to observe without changing the outcome of the experiment. This is similar to Lynne McTaggart's findings in The Intention Experiment

Taking this line of thought further, Talbot explores the multi-dimensional quantum universe, where it seems there is a great possibility that everything that can happen DOES happen. In a mind-breakingly bizarre twist, we not only create our own reality, but are constantly creating hundred of billions of other universes. Sounds like science fiction, sure, but knowing what I know so far about the quantum universe, 'there are more things, in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamed of in our philosophy.'

This all comes back to another insight I received, during a meditation, wherein I was asking my guide questions of all kinds. One question I asked was "what religion has it right" - and I suppose I was asking for guidance on which path I should personally follow. The answer was two-fold.

1) Religion doesn't matter - faith is the only thing that matters. What it is that you have faith in is of little consequence. That leap, that trust, is the cord that connects us to the divine.

2) Faith is love. To trust, to believe, whatever it is that you believe in, is seen as a cosmic act of love.

And then, the final piece of the puzzle - the Abraham-Hicks folks and their message that we are all creators. That our purpose in this life is quite simply to create. That through our thoughts we are unfolding the universe.

And then it hit me - with the power of a ton of bricks - that we are all right. Every interpretation of God, every believed prophet, every faith... it's all correct. It's all "creative" in the sense that we are creating God, perhaps in the same way that some believe God created us.

Our unique gift, as humans, is our gift of interpretation - our ability to shape ideas, to create that which feels right to us. Everyone does it - from the scientist who plays with established "rules" and discovers new wonders, to the poet, prophet who takes creed and makes it new again.

What if we are all creating God through our faith?

His head almost filled the fourth wall of her little room as he knelt near her in distress. Every moment her light was growing fainter; and he knew that if it went out she would be no more. She liked his tears so much that she put out her beautiful finger and let them run over it.

Her voice was so low that at first he could not make out what she said. Then he made it out. She was saying that she thought she could get well again if children believed in fairies.

Peter flung out his arms. There were no children there, and it was night-time; but he addressed all who might be dreaming of the Neverland, and who were therefore nearer to him than you think; boys and girls in their nighties, and naked papooses in their baskets hung from trees.

‘Do you believe?’ he cried.

Tink sat up in bed almost briskly to listen to her fate.

She fancied she heard answers in the affirmative, and then again she wasn’t sure.

‘What do you think?’ she asked Peter.

‘If you believe,’ he shouted to them, ‘clap your hands; don’t let Tink die.’

Many clapped.

Some didn’t.

A few little beasts hissed

Channeled Information

I've just recently started listening to the Abraham-Hicks people, interested in what all the hullabaloo was surrounding their Law of Attraction stuff. It's nothing I haven't heard before (but always a nice refresher).

What interests me most is the fact that the information is channeled.

This notion of channeling is strange to me. Not sure why. It isn't because I don't believe in non-physical entities, or that I think they can't communicate with us. It isn't because I don't believe that human beings can access those worlds in altered states of consciousness.

Edgar Cayce, Jane Roberts, Esther Hicks -  all people with great messages for us. Should we care about the medium (no pun intended)? Should we care whether or not they are in fact channeling the information? If we are all divine, which I believe we are, then we (as humans) are no less valuable as a source of information.

And if it's good information, should we really care whether or not their source is genuine? If the information helps us, transforms our lives... does it matter which side of the beyond it came from?

It should also be explained (for the uninitiated), that when Hicks channels the entity she calls Abraham, that she takes on a very bizarre Transylvanian accent. This presents a problem for me because I believe accents are of this world, not the other. Do I sincerely think that a Texan, after his or her soul leaves this earth will still retain his or her Southern drawl? No. I don't. This is partially why I take issue with Hicks' channeling of an Eastern European entity (especially considering that this is also a collective of non-physical entities, not a singular one).

The cynic in me can't help but want to scream out and tell her to cut it out. Like Britney slipping in and out of her British accent. It rings false. But another part of me feels a sort of compassion - perhaps she needs to put on this accent in order to access the part of herself that wants to teach, that wants to enlighten. If that is the case then who am I to question it? And what purpose would it serve to expose such a thing?

For those of you who are reading this but have never heard the Abraham-Hicks materials - it's worth looking into. Lots of interesting bits to chew on. That is, of course, if you can get past the accent..

Dreams in Technicolour

Had some lovely dreams last night - one: a musical.

I was in a large room filled with red plush couches and college-aged students. I was sitting with some friends and, bored, decided to stand up, put on a polka-dotted hat and start singing about stuff that was going on. Before I knew it, a friend stood up and started singing too - and then the whole of the room broke out into choreographed song and dance.

The second dream was maybe less theatrical, but very cool also. I was a student, living in a dorm. Between the dorm and the school was a forest one had to walk through. It was a dangerous forest. People had gone missing in that forest. A student I knew (or might have been me) had gone to the school initially for some subject, but had found her true calling instead. There was an aquarium on campus, and as she sat staring through the underground glass at an electric eel of sorts swimming through the crystal blue water she showed me what she was studying. It was the communication of all things through vibration. I witnessed as a sort of sonic boom rippled through the water like a cosmic fart from the eel. It was communicating.

What about you? Got a good dream to share? Please do!