A look inside :)

“I love your description of fear from today’s daily spark. Are you inspired in one fell swoop on a particular night, or do you save up tidbits throughout the month? Or a little of both?” – GS

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‘ello!

Hehe, thanks! *beam*

It varies… Sometimes it’s the night of, and I just sit there staring at the blank screen. When that happens, I go back to my audio notes, and pick one at random. I have over 4k hours worth of notes from my audio recorder that I’ve recorded about my own journey, starting from … when I was 27! I use it a few times every single day, any time I figure something out, or have a dream, or an interesting experience

Often times, though, I’ll be inspired by something that happens the week before… A learning or an experience, and I’ll think, ‘Oh, that’s the one!’ and on Sunday when it’s quiet I’ll sit and write the whole week’s worth all at once. And, other times, I’ll sit there staring at the blank page and a whole series will blossom in my mind… Those are usually the ones that speak to me, and serve me during the week that follows, as I read them. Really though, most of them tend to. I like to write them ahead of time when I can so I can ‘forget’ them and experience them anew when they arrive

This particular week’s worth of sparks was inspired by me, and by my husband, last week! I was talking to him about how I was irritated that I couldn’t push faster with my expression, my business. I want it all now (speaking engagements and such)… And he talked to me about Track Days.

Track days is go-kart racing or motor bike racing. You do it to improve your performance on the road, and for the rush. He did it a while back, before I met. He told me what his coach person told him.

“Drive at 80% max speed so you can see what you’re doing and learn from the experience. If you’re going at 100% max speed and running on pure adrenaline, all you’re doing is reacting. With that, at best, you’ll learn after it’s all over. If you even really remember it clearly.”

I liked this very much, and wrote it down in my Quotes to Live By for April (I have a list for every month going back a few years now – stuff I save ), and then asked him if I could use it for some sparkage

*hugs!*
- Dawn

Guidance: When in doubt, Pause and ask for more info

Intuition, guidance, comes from a space beyond our usual realm of consciousness. It draws upon that which we do not know, to bring us into awareness of stuff it would be really great for us to know. Sometimes we just simply don’t have enough information to make sense of what we’re getting – so we just steamroller over our intuitive gut instinct and follow our logic. We think we should do what makes sense even though we feel we should do something else.

The best thing to do in this situation is to pause, and ask for more information. If your guidance can bring you a little info, it’s certainly strong enough to bring you even more – sometimes you just have to open up a bit wider for it.

I give myself an injection once a week for rheumatoid arthritis. It’s not too bad – unpleasant but not awful. Anyway, I felt this total sense of dread come over me last time. This sense of Please don’t do it! but it was all garbled, I couldn’t figure it out.

I actually ended up crying because I was so divided inside – the shots are doing great things for me and they work based on building up in your system, so missing a week is a big deal. But I couldn’t figure out what my intuition was saying other than Don’t Do It! So I decided to do a quick reading on it!

(You can go to http://www.worldoffroud.com/www/faeries/oracle/index.cfm and scroll down a bit, then click on Faerie’s Oracle Online – that’s what I did for this one because I was too upset to read for myself)

The reading basically said ‘pay attention, you’re missing something’ but, I couldn’t figure out what! So I sat there quietly – very quietly – and promised myself I wouldn’t move forward until I felt better, one way or the other. I calmed down at that, and then I saw the needle I had set up for myself (I had drawn it a few weeks before, just like the others – this was the last one) and I noticed some air in the tube.

I had been assured it didn’t matter, it just goes in the muscle, so less air is better but it won’t hurt you since it’s not in a vein. Anyway, I decided, hm, I should get that air out of there. It can’t be an extra good thing to have it that way… So I flicked the needle to get all the air to the top and then pushed the plunger and…nothing. I pushed harder. Nothing…

It had dried inside the needle (insulin needle so, really thin)! I felt this ginormous wave of relief come over me and all fear subsided as I realized what trauma I would have done to myself if I had used that needle! Stuck it in and then *shivers* Ugh. I resolved not to use that particular one, and I suddenly felt 100% better. I got up, got a different one, and used that no problem. As if I was a different person.

My intuition was trying to talk to me but I didn’t have enough info to understand it… waiting until I could understand was key for me. I was able to pinpoint the exact thing I wasn’t to do (use the needle) but I didn’t have any idea why. So I was going to do it anyway. That’s when I started crying.

The inner child and the intuition are often very well connected. As kids we’re tuned in on a level we tend to get out of touch with as we grow up – but that part of us never forgets. Upon crying, I returned to the one thing that was clear, and then requested to be keyed in to more info – to find a way forward that made sense to Big Dawn.

That was key – listening even though it made no sense, pausing, then asking for more info to come to me so I could take action that made sense and was good for me on all levels.

(As pulled from a response to someone who had commented about a class on tarot I had given the other day. I love answering questions, so feel free to write – I learn and get to share with others, as I open up to and share my response!)

Life is about living

Optimism without action (even if that action is just using your imagination to envision a better day) can be an out of balance version of faith.

We are here, alive today on this planet, to become master creators. Faith that all is well, that the grand tapestry of life is spectacularly and beautifully perfect, is intended to offer stability – not stagnation. In order to fulfill our purpose here on earth, we must move and dance with the lines of force all around us, and add our own song to the beautiful music of all that is. In doing so, we learn how powerful we really are.

By living our lives, really living in and creating our world, we learn through our own experience what it is to be glorious, divine sparks of the creator’s essence. To pull from two different sources, one from Wayne Dyer and the other from Stranger in a Strange Land, “Thou art God. Don’t die with your music still inside of you.”

Here’s the basic premise and the realization I had that led to it

When I was growing up, my mom was all about having NO power. Her life really sucked, seriously, and she never did a thing about it because she always said, ‘Oh, this is meant to be, there’s a higher meaning in this – we’ll see it when we’re ready.’ …

Long story short, she died, sick, alone and lonely, her book unpublished and nothing really ever done. And she passed that idea along to me. It’s an out of balance version of faith – faith that being disempowered is okay. Truth was, she was scared of being rejected so made a reason for it to be okay not to move. Ever.

And so she died with her music still inside, of rheumatoid arthritis/lupus and asthmatic complications. The energy it took to hold everything rigid and to not sing eventually drained the life right out of her, and she did it because she was afraid and was totally invested in the idea that ‘if you have enough faith, it’ll all be okay’.

Well…it was. She didn’t move and it was okay with her but…she never created anything that she actually shared with anyone. And that’s what she felt her life’s mission was! To show the world her music through art and word! She knew this! She just kept waiting for life to show her the way, to do it for her, to pick her up and move her hands. She was SURE this would happen – one day – until the day she died. o.O And then there were no more days.

Now I do believe that all is well – everything is unfolding perfectly, on a cosmic level. But kind of like the weather systems where you have empty space on the outside, perfectly calm air just below it, and a storm below that – there are layers. We are on the storm level, you might say – the movers and shakers of the universe.

For us, with our necessarily limited perception and limited lifespans, we need to be the ones doing the moving. It’s all well and good to know that all is well, but it’s out of balance when we believe that to such a degree that we give up our powers of creation on the finite level – that’s what we’re here to do! Create!

Getting to know yourself

It may sound like a no-brainer, the idea that we would of course follow our own core values…but in truth, it can be harder than it sounds. Friends, family, peers, the media – it’s surprisingly easy to be swayed from acting in accordance with who we really are. Especially when we aren’t clear on exactly who that is!

Each of us is an individual spark of the Creator’s essence. An individual spark. A focused point of consciousness, exploring all that is. We’re talking about the You of you, here and now. Who is that? Who is that wonderful person? What makes you so beautifully, individually You, here and now?

Because, it’s worth noting – that changes over time. You change over time. As you have experiences, your awareness and depth of consciousness change and grow. And yet at any given moment, there is a particular you that you are.

We’ve been taught that being selfless is important. Words such as ‘oh, you’re just full of yourSelf’ and ‘that’s so Selfish!’ point toward the idea that having a healthy sense of Self is actually shameful! Yet, how are we to know our own strengths and what we can offer the world when we don’t know who we are, and what we’re capable of? We’re not just a body, each of us is an individual. We’re individuals for a reason.

So, how is that done? How do we come to know ourselves, especially when we’re ever-changing?

A great beginning is to figure out what your values are, at the moment. Steve Pavlina has a great article on doing just that He also offers a huge list of words to choose from, common value words (like 400 or so of them) to get you started.

Here’s the list I came up with, of things that are most important to me, most me, at this time Some lines have more than one word when I found it necessary in order to convey what I really meant to say.

I look at this often, and change the order around as I move through life – sometimes certain things are more important to me for a time, as I shift my goals around and work on different things. Knowing where I stand helps a great deal in making decisions and choosing where I want to put my energy.

Knowing who you are at a core level, and coming into closer alignment with that person in all that you do, brings a whole lot more happiness, ease, fulfillment and health right along with it. 

1. Impact / Making a difference / Service

2. Appreciation / Gratitude

3. Love

4. Integrity

5. Clarity / Focus / Inspiration / Motivation / Passion // Perseverance

6. Awareness / Connection / Consciousness / Intuition / Insightfulness

7. Experience / Growth / Learning

8. Calmness / Peace / Relaxation / Serenity

9. Flexibility / Fitness / Vitality / Energy

10. Approachability / Cheerfulness / Friendliness / Presence / Warmth // Compassion / Kindness

11. Acknowledgment / Accomplishment / Recognition

12. Humor / Playfulness / Spontaneity

13. Enjoyment / Fun / Joy / Recreation

14. Stability / Support

15. Sensuality / Sexuality

16. Creativity / Imagination

17. Camaraderie / Synergy

18. Abundance / Prosperity

19. Balance

20. Capability

21. Curiosity

22. Self Discipline

23. Flow

24. Freedom

25. Humility / Wonder

The tender inner child

Each of us holds within our heart the child that we once were. Tender and trusting, this part of ourselves relies on us to keep it safe so that we can realize our potential in one piece, all of our core values intact.

I’m bringing this up, now, because I recently had a bit of an altercation with my inner child – that was finally resolved last night after a week or two’s worth of both physical and emotional discomfort.

There was too much going on in my life. By too much, I mean that everything had number one priority and in order to accomplish it all I had to stretch myself thin. I totally shut out anything coming at me that was saying, ‘this is too much!’ because first of all I didn’t have time, and secondly – I didn’t want to hear it!

This was, in retrospect, a big mistake. I’m sure there were ways I could have gone about things and done them differently that would have made things go smoother and less traumatizing. But I didn’t have time for me time, I was way too busy living my life. I finally reached a point, though, where I had gone too far.

Last night I finally put together the pattern that had been going on for two weeks. Better late than never, though I would have saved myself a whole lot of discomfort if I had just stopped long enough to listen… This is what was going on:

• I was cranky
  
• didn’t want to exercise
  
• wanted to sleep all day
  
• didn’t want to be creative at all, just wanted to lose myself in games or movies
  
• felt like crying at the drop of a hat

And it had all been getting progressively stronger over time until it recently reached ridiculous proportions and I finally paused and got quiet and checked in with myself.

I was surprised at the wave of upset and emotion I felt! I had unwittingly shoved my inner child and her deep, gentle knowing self into a closet! She was angry and upset and pretty much threw a tantrum.

She also flooded me with memories of the last couple weeks and how I could have done things better if I’d been open to listening. So, I listened…

I acknowledged her and what she had gone through – that was a big part of this, a big part in any altercation you’re having with anyone is to let them know you actually hear them – and I asked (I mean that quite literally) what I could do to make things better for her.

The first thing she said was to not just shut her out when things got hectic. I agreed. And then, to my total surprised, she answered that my giving myself injections into the fatty area of the tummy of the new drug I’m taking for joint relief was totally unacceptable. I must do it somewhere else. Even though I don’t know why she feels this way, I promised to either do the injections in the arm or the leg instead, from then on.

As soon as I promised this, I felt her entirely return to her normal happy self. I felt a muscle relax in my stomach – the muscle that apparently had been causing the nausea and cramps I’ve been feeling for the last two weeks. I boggled at her and she just smiled smugly right back at me. Powerful inner kid!

I woke up the next day and all of the symptoms I comment on above were totally gone. I feel like I’ve come back into sync with myself. I remember who I am, not leaving any part of myself behind, and I’m listening. Listening to guidance not just from my guides and intuition but from my own inner being, including my inner child.

The subtle voice of guidance

The difference between being prompted to do something by your spirit and being prompted to do something by your ego is subtle, and can be hard to recognize at first. As a general rule, spirit is relaxed and unattached to the whole thing. Ego is anything but; its all about urgency and immediate action being required.

Your spirit, and guidance from your spirit is passionate, yet relaxed. Engaged, yet detached. From a deep, connected to all that is point of view, your soul knows that all is really well. There’s some struggle that yields learning, it’s all good. It’s guidance, its promptings, come with what you might almost consider as a detached point of view.

As far as your spirit is concerned, if you do something or don’t do something, it’s okay – this particular thing might lead down some amazing avenues for you, and allow you to coast downhill enjoying life while also learning and growing, whereas the choosing a different path could lead to some pretty uncomfortable realizations… of equal value.

The ego, on the other hand, is anything but relaxed. It has been built by you, for you, to protect you and keep you safe. It, however, doesn’t have the heightened awareness or distanced perspective of your spirit. It is keyed into your physical body, the flight or fight mechanism, as well as every trauma you’ve ever experienced in this lifetime.

The ego’s voice is pushy and demanding and immediate. It wants your action now, or else you’ll face the consequences of failing to act. When it prompts you there is a thrill of excitement that runs through you – of the adrenaline kind. It is born of avoidance of some kind, and comes with it the sense that you’ll lose everything if you don’t move now.

Here’s a test I’ve developed for myself. If you feel a huge wave of energy come through you and get the idea to do something…pause. Spirit won’t mind. If the prompting is from your ego, however, it will start going nuts, and your heartrate will go up. It’ll start putting on the ‘act now or you’ll lose your chance!’ pressure. Pretty simple test…for me, it’s worked every time.

If you can pause for a minute, an hour, a day, whatever the situation may suggest…and you still feel that wave of possibility knocking at your door without any sense of fear or life or death urgency…then it’s highly likely that the prompting you’re getting is from your spirit, your guides. A legit opportunity directly from the part of you that’s plugged in and really knows what’s going on.

What makes you feel most alive? :)

If you’re feeling despair, there’s very likely a different way to be looking at things that will be a whole lot more comfortable and productive for you. Despair is the absence of the flow of life moving through you.

When you feel despair you’re feeling a literal translation of what happens when you’ve stemmed the flow of life force through you to such a degree that it’s barely a trickle.

Flowers wilt when they don’t get enough water. You do the same thing when you don’t get enough life force. But! Good news is, you can come back from it. Just like one of those really hearty ivy plants that can get to the point of water starvation and then spring back immediately when you remember to water them. (ahem)

We are the same way when it comes to life flow. All it takes to begin to shift that valve open a bit is to consciously, purposefully take up the reigns and start shifting our focus, one thought at a time.

I am familiar with despair. Working a job I hated for a couple years, I died slowly. After my parents both died suddenly I died real fast, launched full out into despair and rolled around in it for a while.You could say, perhaps, that I stopped breathing, because I sure stopped living. I almost literally died from the whole experience, and I’m still coming back from it, physically! (This was 6 years ago)

Now my life is a total 180 degree shift. I know of what I speak. You open that valve a little, a little more, you take some action to see it’s real, begin to trust, to create a new foundation for yourself. You step up onto that and then have access to even wider valve opening beliefs, thoughts and possibilities for action…

But it takes that first step – the choice to take responsibility for the direction of your thoughts, and to keep doing it. (I feel a bit of a cranky toddler grump in me as I say this to you, her face all screwed up into an angry pout, hands curled into fists and a big NO! about to come out of her mouth. You know the look *chuckle* I’m still working on this, myself, can you tell? )

It gets easier the longer you do it – it gains momentum and becomes a habit. You falter and wonder what in the world happened, why does everything look so awful? And eventually you remember that whole focusing then and you start the process of watching your thoughts again. (despair/negativity can become a habit, too)

And surprisingly quickly you’re back in the saddle again, every time learning something new about yourself – a new way of how you can slide backwards (won’t do it that particular way again! Or maybe just once more… okay yeah, that doesn’t work and isn’t worth it) and a new confirmation that you can slide forward, too.

I wanted to take the time to say all of this to you today because times are changing and the road is not going to be all nice and straight and smoothly laid out for us. But it can be – we just have to lay it out that way for ourselves, one section at a time.

And you know what? We can. We can do it together. You can’t get a whif of this and not keep on going – and the awesome part is, it’s contagious! You have it, people around you catch the scent too and wonder what’s up because they want it more than they want anything else. Because from there – you can do and be anything.

I’m learning more about all of this every day, and I plan to share it with you in a variety of ways in the time to come, because that’s what makes me feel most alive.

What makes you feel most alive?

*hugs!*
- Dawn