Visionary Vegan or Praying Carnivore?

Diet seems to encourage conversation easier than many other topics. I notice this when I post a status update on Facebook that’s about food, and immediately the responses start pouring in, whereas if I post a prayer I might get one or two responses over time. Not everyone prays, but I think it’s safe to say that every one of us eats. Vegetarianism, veganism, and raw-ism are some controversial topics in today's world. We heard a sermon, believe it or not, on veganism yesterday and it was conversationally stimulating, to say the least. In fact, we are still talking about it, reacting to it, and in wonder about it. It caused such intense reactions in the audience that the minister received some anonymous hate mail on her windshield. I'd say that if one can elicit this type of reaction, then they are making some waves that cause growth one way or another. A vegetarian for 21 years, a vegan for 3 years, and two different month long forays into a raw diet, I have some things to say on the topic. I feel that I’ve explored different diets and the lifestyles that go with them. I’ve even encountered health afflictions created by some of them. My sweetheart reminds me that we visited veganism together twenty years ago and gave it our full monty…and have lived to tell the story, too. My personal journey into vegetarianism first as a spiritual choice and then a health choice was not so difficult. My Higher Power made it abundantly clear to steer from cows by downloading an intense vision of a live cow being forced through a meat grinder as I bit into a Big Mac one day at a drive-thru. That first bite was spit out vehemently and was the last bite of red meat I was to take for the next 23 years I was religious about it. My poor mother tried to make my fiancé and I some vegetable soup one day and thought she could get away with a beef broth base without my noticing. Wrong. The soup ended up in the toilet. I forced her to sit thru a Tofurkey at Thanksgiving against her will, and when she brought home what used to be my favorite dish ever, a live lobster that was a gift from a friend, I was mortified. I begged and pleaded, tear streaming down my face, not to boil that lobster. She finally relented and handed it to me, and I drove to the canal and sent it home in front of a fisherman at the dock who stood there with a strange look on his face. My day of reckoning came when I became so ill I couldn’t eat. My stomach was on fire, and my skin had broken out. A plague of symptoms too terrible and personal to list had befallen me, and the doctor couldn’t help. Nothing helped. As a final attempt at relief, I sought out a holistic nutritional doctor that a friend recommended, and they determined that my body had developed severe sensitivities to every substance foundational to my diet. What was left to eat now? Bark? Trees? Dirt? It was indeed a big dilemma. For a year or so I lived on meager fixin’s where no meat, no gluten, no soy, no wheat, no tomatoes and no yeast or dairy passed my lips. It was impossible to eat at a restaurant, and it was painfully boring, but at least I wasn’t suffering from the horrible food reactions anymore. Then I became pregnant and a new lesson was in store for me. Five months in I could not stay awake, falling asleep even standing up. I was exhausted, depleted, and unwell. The doctor announced severe anemia, and no amount of pills or Floradix, or prune juice could fix it. I was actually craving steak in my dreams. And so, with great trepidation and deep concern, we went to a restaurant to order the first steak in well over two decades. I couldn’t even bear to cook it myself, nor did I even know how. That was a rough meal for me and for my beloved, who had to cut the meat for me because I couldn’t bear to. The lifting of the fork was a push/pull, wanting to eat and not wanting to eat. My baby’s life depended on it, though, and so eat I did. I made peace with what was, in my own way. Having a strong background in spiritual studies, my intention was pure and I prayed over that cow, chicken, fish hard and long before partaking. Heck, I had been practicing praying over vegetables before chopping them for decades as well. This was the full circle of my experience with extreme diets, and it’s not even touching on weight loss diets I’ve tried. The message was very clear after this, that I had no right to judge anyone who ate meat or didn’t eat meat, nor did I have a right to presume that I knew best what they should be eating or whether they were ignorant or enlightened about food. Even judging someone who is beginning to find their consciousness in what they eat is entitled to their experience without judgment. I was that person who was zealous in my newfound passion for saving the lives of animals, cleaning up the planet, and honoring life the best I could. I was also that person that had to eat things I would rather not have eaten, for survival and health purposes. Nowadays, I practice conscious choices and prayer, raising the vibration of whatever I consume, and forgiving myself when I forget or when I choose things I know aren’t good for me. My current path is one of love and healing towards that which I consume, praying with deep gratitude for whatever gave of itself so that I could live. I make the best choices that I can in terms of whether to purchase leather or cloth, natural or synthetic. There are arguments in every direction for what is best or worst and it seems that evidence can be found in every direction according to one’s intention. My mantra is balance in all things. Balance is a good place to seek and a beautiful place to land.

Making Time For Pleasure

When everything is just too overwhelming and life seems to be racing in a zillion directions, how do you handle it? Do you drink more coffee, try to do more, stay up later, get up earlier, or break down? Do you let stress build and ignore it? Do you just stuff your face with sugar like I do? It's a huge challenge to stay focused and prioritized, and to make the time for rest and balance in these times. We have so many mediums of communication all vying for our attention, not to mention careers to work, families to tend to, functions to attend, plans to make, appointments to keep. The list goes on and the stress seems to mount, until we find ourselves either sick or in breakdown somehow. I see many people who seem to wait until they're sick for a small break, and then they jump back up before they're even ready to go back into the ring for more. It's scary to watch. I can't help but wonder if they are truly happy, or just afraid to stop. For some, I'm sure that staying in the game full frontal brings them joy, but this isn't not true for everyone. The perfect antidote for stress is pleasure. Nothing gives us more of an "ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" feeling. It doesn't really take much if we learn to breathe and center our attention on our hearts, get present with the moment, and then feel into it. I don't believe that pleasure can happen when our minds are racing in the opposite direction. Ever tried to completely relax while running? Doesn't work that well, does it? You have to get the mind to stop, drag it back to where your body is and sync your system up with the now. Only then can you really be with whatever pleasure you're offering yourself. One of the more advanced routes to pleasure is associated with our sexuality, and in a pinch our sexuality can be channeled into any activity and then it becomes sensuality, which is highly pleasurable. Pleasure in eating something delicious, feeling the sun on your face, getting a shoulder rub, stretching, looking at beautiful art or photos, listening to gorgeous music...these are all so pleasurable. If we focus on feeling our bodies respond as we enjoy these activities, we are officially having a sensual experience. This is where the pleasure we are feeling can light up our brains, our groins, our whole physiology, and we are healing, opening, and receiving the relaxation and rejuvenation we crave. In the book, The Pleasure Zone, Resnick lists the 8 fundamental pleasures as being primal, pain relief, play, mental, emotional, sensual, sexual, and spiritual. The last three can "be thought of as the consummate realms for reaching your pleasure potential", she says. Take some time out for pleasure today and if it feels good try it daily for a while

. I would love to hear back from you how it affects your life.

Painful Bliss

I've been thinking alot about pain lately, as I've been in some pretty intense pain for about five months. What goes through my mind, given the work I do, is primarily the questions about what this pain means, what my body it trying to communicate to me, where I might be blocked in my relationships or how I move through the world, and whether it really means anything or nothing. My mind likes to keep itself quite busy with all of the possibilities that might make my pain meaningful to it's greatness, and I say that tongue in cheek.

As I meditate and pray, process and dream, I begin to see patterns of thought I hold in mind that don't serve me. I also get "hits" or intuitive aha moments of seeing a way that I may have operated in my life that is obviously undermining what I intend for myself. I'm open to looking at these things because I hold myself gently with compassion. The more compassionate I am with myself, the more I am able to release old habitual ways of being that hold me back.

I think we tend to get stuck in holding patterns of negative circumstance when we judge and criticize ourselves, because the internal prosecutor is in charge and has us in a corner where there's a frozen standoff. If we realize that we can tell the prosecutor to shut up and sit down, we can replace him with a loving witness who remembers our humanity and our heart's innate goodness. The loving witness is a soothing balm and a kind ally who opens gateways of tremendous growth and enlightenment, melting the standoff in an instant. My own internal loving witness took years of meditation and hard work for me to locate. Hopefully by reading this, you'll hear yours sooner.

Yoga at the master level teaches us about mass consciousness mind that is just chatter that flows through all of us randomly, and once we realize this, we can see the innocence of everyone in this beautiful drama of life. We can see that our physical symptoms are an experience we chose before time, and hopefully allow ourselves to sink into a surrendered agreement of what is in this present moment.

In the present moment, I find bliss in the sensations of this pain I have held for these many months. I find that I can love that pain with an open heart, and hold it with compassion and gratitude. My pain brings more gifts than I can list here, but the biggest one is the gift of remembering the Infinite Presence that lives in every cell of my being.

Willingness

The very first step towards having what you want is to learn the act of willingness. It takes a high level of intention to be a conscious creatrix of your reality. While on the path of learning to master your thoughts, your words, your actions, and your visualizations, it's important to learn how to navigate towards something better when you feel stuck.

I have seen people so firmly rooted in a fixed pattern at times that they cannot begin to see any possibility of change. They can't imagine anything better, or that the crisis they are in at that moment could have any solution whatsoever. It's as if they are so entrenched in the small, narrow view they're holding that they cannot see the forest for the trees.
The best course of action I have found to help is to introduce some "give" in their perspective. To relax a tiny bit, to allow a glimmer of light into the dark forest, or to have some small amount of slack in the rope that is binding them into knots of anxiety and stress...is the very best way to unravel the knot.

The question to ask is, "Would you be WILLING to have a solution present itself?" And of course, this willingness is usually just enough to give the universe an opening to work with. Simultaneously, it is harmless enough for someone to agree to be willing, rather than to commit to finding a solution. If you have to find it yourself, and you can't even imagine it ever getting better, how could you agree to that? You couldn't. BUT...you might be WILLING to agree that there MIGHT be a possibility that you don't know of.

Willingness is a crucial step in bringing possibilities of a brand new creation that our little minds cannot conceive of, but that the Divine Mind is aligning in perfect and elegant timing.

I leave you with today's lesson to consider. If you are stuck in a challenge, or you desire something so seemingly out of your realm of imagination, use the tool of willingness. Say to yourself, "I am willing to be open to a new possibility."

Connection As The New Trend

Women tend to seek intimacy in relationships because it’s how we are wired biologically. One of the most common complaints I hear from women is that they can’t seem to connect with their partners at a deep level that satisfies this longing enough. They tell me that all men want is sex, but they want the romance, the love, and the sensitivity to come first.
It all makes perfect sense that they are telling me this! Nature sure has a sense of humor when it comes to males and females. Men are wired to procreate first, find intimacy second. They will visually seek the hardiest, most physically appealing mate because it assures that our race will endure. Women actually have this instinct as well, but because they’re the ones who raise the offspring, historically, they are wired for relationship and bonding to ensure the community will assist them in this daunting endeavor. It really does take a village.
The tides are turning, however, and the age of a strong and healthy feminine essence is at hand. All over the world, women are beginning to feel a pull, an often uncanny urge towards the earth, their sisters, and their finally true purpose. Men are feeling it too, and my intuition tells me that it’s the feminine side of themselves they are hearing tap, tap, tap on their heart’s inner knowing.
The good news for all of us is that intimate connection is the newest and latest longing. Women may have always desired it, but in our age of screens, commercialism, domestication gone haywire, and media conditioning to violence as normal…it is the holes in our souls that everyone is longing to fill now. The crazy fear frenzy of the news channels, the overly caricatured hyped up sitcoms, and the fast and furious onslaught of material overload has proven not to fill this void. People are longing for one thing above all others, and that one thing is meaningful connection. It can be translated into spiritual fulfillment, a deep purpose that serves the higher good of humanity, and many other great words, but in my opinion it boils down to basic human connection.
We can find it by turning off the screens, sitting still in the quiet, refusing to answer the phone every single time it rings, and active listening, for starters. The gift of true connection is one that is unforgettable, and that impacts in a way that ripples in its healing effect. How many times have you felt truly and deeply heard? I venture to say that you remember those few times vividly as precious in your life.
A relationship is its own being, a unique energy body that needs feeding, attention, and love. To be in service to this relationship energy body is the best way that I know of to hone the art of commitment and growth…not very romantic stuff, but crucial to the creation of romance. In other words, we must build a foundation of connection, deep listening, commitment to growth, and commitment to the entity of the relationship to even begin to expect the next level of true and lasting romance to enter the picture.

The practice of connection in our intimate relationships requires complete and full attention to each other. It requires distraction free space, and a commitment to set aside our own agendas for the larger entity of the relationship. The best place to begin is with the tried and true exercise of taking turns being heard and listening, repeating back what you heard to each other verbatim. Eye gazing is another fabulous way to build intimacy and connection, and specifically gazing at each other’s left eyes works best, according to behavior specialists. Another thing to keep in mind is that women need romance first to feel a deep and romantic connection, and men need oxytocin from sex to feel a loving bond. This is a quandary indeed! I suggest some give and take here, and especially for women to begin to speak to what they need, find ways to relieve stress, and nurture themselves before trying to give more. Exquisite self care is crucial before a woman can relax into all that a man has to give her. Connection is multi-faceted, but it’s the foundation of what will heal our world, our relationships, and our lives. Of this I am convinced.

Is Turning Heads An Outside or Inside Job?

Magazine covers would have us believe that beauty is an outside job, and yet our spiritual leaders tell us it all comes from within. I don’t know about you, but it leaves my head in a tizzy! I’ve tried every hair color, every type of makeup, dressed myself in every fashion to hit the runways…and unlike the majority, I’ve also studied spirituality from Christianity to paganism and everything in between.

As they say in Maine, ya can’t get they-ya from hee-ya. What I mean is that as women, we search constantly for a way to attract attention from that special one or many and end up either beautifying ourselves to exhaustion, or giving up completely and neglecting ourselves. Does this sound familiar?

I dare say I have untangled the confusing information, which I am downright elated to clarify with you here. It’s something so obvious and simple that I’m flushed that it hadn’t dawned on me earlier. The truth is that it’s not just an outside job and it’s not just an inside job…it is BOTH

My personal background includes modeling and cosmetology which are outside jobs. For twenty years I spent most of my time looking in mirrors, primping myself or someone else, expertly assessing my client’s features, taking clothes on and off, strutting down runways and posing for photographers. I listened to a multitude of women commiserate about their hair, their looks, their boyfriends, husbands, their sex lives, their weight, and their careers. They told me secrets reserved for therapists, and then some. The amazing thing is that without exception, after an hour in my chair of being professionally coiffed and primped, they would leave feeling more beautiful. They sat down, got inner and outer attention and acknowledgment, and left feeling wonderful and radiating more beauty.

The noticeable thing about a woman who feels beautiful is that she carries herself differently. She smiles more, is conscious of her body and how she’s holding herself, and looks others in the eye with confidence. A woman can take herself from invisible to queen in minutes just by carrying herself with poise.

Sometimes a woman would come in with her hair an absolute mess, and the transformational mix of hair color, cut and styling would be stunning. Seeing her transformed physical appearance would shift her emotions about herself and then her self esteem would soar. At other times a woman whose physicality was breathtakingly beautiful would sit down for me to work on her, and inside of ten minutes her negative attitude would literally change my perception of her and she would appear considerably less attractive bordering on ugly.

It’s up to us how we use the power we have in our hands as women. We don’t have to wait for someone to tell us how gorgeous we are (although it never hurts!). We can do it ourselves. Also, we have the choice of whether to slip into something sexy, touch up our lipstick, and dab on some perfume or simply carry ourselves as if we own the room with the magnetic secret between our thighs. Beauty is not an either/or proposition…it is an exciting blend of both that we have access to at any time.

Dishing Up Some Exquisite Self Care

What will it take, I ask you, to get you to slow down and put the oxygen mask to your own face? Why is it that we, as women, tend to leave ourselves last? I know, I know. You have a million reasons ranging from fear that ‘they’ won’t be able to care for themselves, to the belief that no one else could possibly take care of this situation as well as you do, to the ultimate one, that if you do let go and allow them to do it themselves, they’ll inevitably mess it up and you’ll have to then work twice as hard picking up the pieces!

Well, I have news for you, my cupcakes. I am eating shrimp with brown rice and veggies right now, sautéed lightly in safflower oil, known for its health giving benefits. What on earth does this have to do with it? Everything. It is a lunch prepared with love, some deep relaxed breathing, and a whole lotta will power. It took immense will power for me to stop what I was doing, walk into the kitchen, and take the time to prepare a healthy meal for myself. I didn’t want to. I would have preferred to continue working and unconsciously slam down a microwaved, salt laden, chemically preserved tv dinner. And I would have liked to follow it with a chocolate bar, a diet coke, and perhaps some potato chips. Sister, I have deadlines, you know.

My preferred lunch would have me high, working away, feeling productive and like the world loved me because I was keeping up with my commitments in a timely fashion…at least in my mind. The aching need to feel loved would be satiated with sugar, fat, salt, and caffeine. We are all aware though, that the preferred lunch would also have me crashing in no time and reaching for more potato chips, some ice cream, or another aspartame riddled adult black poison bubbly juice (diet coke). All of this for what? For more production, more people pleasing, more feelings like I am in control of my world…for these illusions I sacrifice my poor body.

I am telling you that it is not just food, but so many other reasons, excuses and ideas we have that all boil down to one thing. Programming. Women in general are programmed to be pleasing, to put others first, to sacrifice, to continue to hold others higher, to delay or even forsake gratification, and to stay smaller so that we are liked.
Time and time again I see women who are magnificent, spectacular, and brilliant, and they’re running ragged trying to keep up with what is accepted in our society as norm…hiding their light, passion and hotness under a mountain of pressure.

So here I have the flashing red lights and the sirens to get your attention. It is only by caring for ourselves exquisitely that we can truly serve the world. You know that old cliché about mommy using the oxygen mask first so that she can then be alive to put the oxygen mask over baby’s face? True. Perfect. It is absolutely imperative. You need to put yourself first, first, first, first, first. Let me repeat that. You need to put yourself first. And that baby? It’s your inner infant.

This brings me to our topic today of exquisite self care. It begins with a scoop of willingness to believe that it is possible. Dripped over that is some soothing, delicious and warm attention such as a list of what you might enjoy. I enjoy resting with a good book and a hot cup of tea, a walk in the sunshine, massaging some lotion onto my feet, or meditating. This is a great start and with a pen, the list of possibilities begins.

The sprinkling of friends who are on the same mission is an added extra, and it’s free. You can engage a few willing sisters to join you in this journey and ante up the beauty and joy factor on the planet by doing so. And then the ultimate dollop of whipped up pleasure on the fun is an outing of your desire. These could be made up of whatever turns you on.

Self care is fine by itself, but when you add exquisiteness to it, it becomes the thing of which goddesses, courtesans, and women of sparkling charisma are made. To reach exquisiteness, you must stretch. Stretching into purchasing silky luxuries to wear against your skin, treating yourself to a full body massage, or attending a ballet…whatever brings you into a place of pleasure. The cherry on the top, my loves, is that when you have been willing to care for yourself, the world begins to adore you, respect you, want you, desire your company, and is willing to do anything for you. Please don’t take my word for it…pick up your spoon and try some.