Women and Emerging Futures

This blog has moved!

2008-01-07T14:17:00.000-05:00

In keeping with a desire to make things easier and more accessible, my 'Women and Emerging Futures' blog can now be found at:

louiselebrun.wordpress.com

I look forward to seeing you there!

Major Mystery: what I do for a living

2008-01-05T14:35:00.000-05:00

Mom and I just got back from spending the day together. Man! That woman is a hoot! I sure hope that there is some genetic coding in there, somewhere, that will allow me to look forward to being 83 and as irreverant, outrageous and funny as she is! The drive to the hair stylist's took 40 mintues - and we laughed all the way.

She's really an amazing woman. I don't know anyone who is more generous in spirit than she. Her compassion for others and generosity, at all levels, have touched the lives of so many over the course of her lifetime. Our house was always full of people that she did stuff for; people who found that talking with her made a difference in their lives. I often thought that she had missed her calling. I know that had she been born in another time, she would have been a doctor of some kind... of body, mind or spirit. As full as her life has been and still is, I sometimes look at her and wonder : had she been born in 1950 instead of 1925, who would she be today?

As we were driving home, Lorna starts talking about what I do for a living. After all these years (close to 20, to be more precise) she still does not have a clue what I do! SShe's like something simple, like teacher or doctor or therapist, that would make it easy for her to tell her friends. They would then hear the word and go "RIght! I kow that that is!" and that would be the end of it. She has often suggested that I write what I do on a little card and have it laminated so that she can hand it out to her friends. That way, she wouldn't have to try to figure it out. My older son, when asked what his mother does, tells people that I'm in sales! His reason for that? "It's just easier than trying to explain to people who you are and what you do." At some level, that does make perfect sense.

However, I find it all too puzzling because from where I stand, it's not complicated. I work with people so that they can transform their lives. But I don't think that's the tough part. I think it's HOW I do that that seems to cause the problem.

Last week, when I wrote the article on The Year of Practical Magic and listed the 5 Keys to Making It Happen, I wasn't kidding. I believe, with every cell of my being that those indeed, are the 5 essential requirements to transforming your life. Not making changes at the edges. Not tweaking a little here and there. Not complaining about it but unwilling to engage differently! But profoundly redesigning who we are in the world and, in the process, transforming our world.

Those 5 Keys are:

1. My body is a Quantum Biological Processor (QBP). This simple fact has profound and mind-blowing implications in that it does not add to our description or understanding of what a human being is – it completely redefines it! My body is not who I am – it is an exquisite, organic, profoundly powerful device that allows ‘me’ to express through it, in a physical universe… and it is a device, nonetheless! Like breathing is the key to an open, relaxed body, a soft, open and fully relaxed body is the essential requirement to creating a fully functioning Quantum Biological Processor.

2. Discovering that my body is a Quantum Biological Processor presses for us to consider: what is it processing? Processors have no value, in and of themselves, without having something to process. The Quantum Biological Processor that my body is processes signals/information/intelligence. These signals occur at multiple levels of expression, from the external physical (i.e. food for my lunch) to the internal physical (i.e. my feelings/emotions) to the esoteric (i.e. thoughts, intentions, expressions of the spiritual). The Quantum Biological Processor that my body is, is capable of expressing and processing all of these signals, at the same time. The human body is the epitome of multi-tasking.

3. I am not my body, I am the Signal. The “I” that “I” am, is the Signal that flows through the QBP and manifests in the physical world through body and behaviour. The Signal from Self….the signal that differentiates ‘me’ from my history, my cultural conditioning, my external demands….is in constant flow with those other signals that come from my history (experience/wisdom/knowledge) and the demands/expectations of my outside world. Nonetheless, the Signal from Self offers the clear, direct and internally-driven sensory cues – moment to moment, without fail - that will lead to my body and my Self being in total alignment, if I allow it. In that moment, an Emerging Future becomes possible.

4. Emerging Futures are the key to transforming our world. The alternative to an Emerging Future is to create the future from the past – which we already know how to do. To do otherwise, we must discover HOW ELSE to engage the energetic for expression through the physical.

5. Evolution by Intention is the platform that allows us to move beyond our historical notions of living and stand firm in designing how we live. In that moment, we become willing to let go of all that has been that we may create all that can be. The alternative is to continue to attempt to create the future, shackled by the past.

Here's the condensed version: we are the godforce in expression in a physical universe. We are the very thing that we seek. There is no external god... no guru/master/saviour/guide/mentor/guy-in-charge... that is not already us.

Those are not complicated words. However, those words, spoken that way, pack a punch to the body that most people recoil from. Those words are indeed a great challenge for most of us to process. In a world where we are rigorously trained to externally reference - to always look outside of ourselves for the cues and guideance on how to live the 'right' life - it is indeed heretical to suggest that our capacity for internal sensing (i.e. following an internal truth that is far more accurate and potent) is actually superior and that we're designed for it.

Such notions are a massive challenge to cultures/societies shaped through dogma (and that would be all of them), the tool for controlling organic collectives. The notion that each of us is naturally guided by internal cues to be the unique expression of the godforce in a physical world would render redundant the notions proferred by organized religion. In that moment, we would lose interest in killing each other over whose god is the right one, since it would have become a moot point. Organized religion forms the basis from which our rules about how to live are derived. Our collective beliefs, values and attitudes are fired in the crucible of our willingness to gather 'round an external god who will both reward and punish. The party line is that without that, we would be in chaos.

My experience has been quite contrary to that. The reverse has been more an evident truth: that the dogma of organized religion has become the platform on which we mercilessly judge ourselves and each other, often being judge and executioner to how another chooses to live his/her life; and being willing to make people invisible - or worse - if/when they are non-compliant.

So, maybe my son is on the right track. Used car sales, it is. Nothing too scarey about selling a used car. However, who would we have to become if we were to come face-to-face with the notions that a) we are the very thing we seek; b) no one will save us from ourselves but us; and c) our science - the god of the culture! - has been telling us for at least 10 years that we must redefine what we believe ourselves to be in order for us to get past ourselves.

Maybe Mom's on the right track. She finds humor in everything! What's NOT to laugh about when you've made it to 83 and are still vibrant, sassy, healthy and welcomed everywhere you go! Maybe I'll put those 5 Keys on a small card and laminate it - just for her. :)

Breathing is good...

Today is the first day of the rest of my life

2008-01-01T22:26:00.000-05:00

I wrote The Year of Practical Magic... and The 5 Keys to Making it Happen as a reminder to myself to keep moving forward. It is also the first time I've written this way - about 5 keys to anyting! I have identified the 5 things that I believe are essential to creating a different life. Not just talking about and/or thinking about a different life but actually living it.

I also recognized when I wrote those 5 keys that they are not your standard 'put your left foot in and take your left foot out' kind of keys. They are not about changing behaviours or even strategies - they are about redefining what we define ourselves to be as a human being. Once that switch is flicked, everything changes all by itself. From that, there is no going back.

Today is the first day of the rest of my life. I wonder where my own evolution will take me?

Breathing is good....

Intention - Mindfulness - Magic!

2007-12-31T10:57:00.000-05:00

Once again, the end of one year and the beginning of another. Cycles and rhythms. Inhaling and exhaling. Ceaseless… relentless… harbinger of the mindlessness of repetition and the potential of the hope that is carried in the dawning of a new day.

Closure. Fresh starts. Moments to reflect on completions and things still undone.

If I were to tell the truth of my experience – of myself and the world which I create for myself – it would be a mix of many things, all of which are now shaped by an overwhelming sense of urgency. One thing I know for sure: Gaia will do fine, as she always does. I’m not so sure about human beings. At least, not as we have historically defined human beings to be.

I know that I’m moving toward something. Have been since January 2006. I woke up one day in January and it was as if the lights had been turned on in my head and I could see things that I had not seen before. In that moment, even though I had no sense of the destination, I knew that I had to turn down a different path… move into a different direction… moving toward something that my body knew would not just sustain life but rapidly and profoundly expand it.

And so here I am – almost two years later – and I am still mindful of that presence in my body of urgency, of intensity, as I continue to move along this path. The path still feels like where I need to be. It does feel, however like something is picking up speed. All I need to do is follow where the path leads me.

I look back at the last two years and I marvel at the speed, intensity, outcomes and contagion of this journey. There have been no accidents in taking this path and I know that there are still two years left in this journey. I am mindful that Intention 2009 will have closure in January 2010 – and I know that I will be done. I also know that in January 2010, my path will take a new direction. Whether it will have a resemblance to the one I’m on – or not! – I have no idea. What I do know is that I trust the Signal that I am in the world and that flows through me; and I know that it will all unfold exactly as it should.

In this past year, I have become keenly aware of the degree to which the notion of a holodeck has moved profoundly from thought/notion to expression of reality. The idea that we are energy. The idea that all is energy and that energy never dies; that it simply changes its form of expression. Energy is never lost or wasted. It always IS. I am energy – and I too, will always be IS. The way I move from matter to energy is of my own choosing. And whether or not, and when, I move from matter to energy is also of my own choosing.

That we are Quantum Biological Beings is a massive, profound and extremely potent discovery – if we choose to consider its implications. We are not matter (mechanical beings), we are energy. We are energy with mindfulness of intention. We can choose to be and become, at will. What I am noticing about my world and myself in that world is that what slows down manifestations of energy is energy in ‘conflict’. Thoughts are energy – so conflicting thoughts, conflicting beliefs, a yes/no for the same intention. Like having the foot on the break and the gas at the same time.

I know that the discovery that we are Quantum Biological Beings is a 2005 awareness, persistently perceived through the limitations of a mechanical being. An energy awareness considered through the limitations of a mechanical framework; and in that, the limitations of our thoughts/energy prevent us from allowing the limitations of our mechanical framework to be released and experience energy in flow. In that, I am reminded that it is not that things don’t exit – it is that we are unable to calibrate for their existence.

I have declared for myself that 2008 is The Year of Practical Magic! It is the year that I pay mindful attention to the degree to which I hold on to what is familiar to me… to what feels ‘normal’ or ‘safe’ or ‘real’ and allow myself to let go of each of those thoughts as they come into my awareness. I am energy and in being so, I determine what form I take.

Gaia will not only survive (as she has done for billions of years), she will thrive. And so will I. There will be many who will not, as unsustainable ways of being in the world (i.e. thought in conflict) continue in their death throes and make way for new paths to be carved out. Some talk of a new species of human emerging. I believe it is already here. It is us. It is the Quantum Biological Being in full and mindful expression as energy. And our connection to the Signal of Self is the key.

As I bring 2007 to closure, I am just so delighted by the magic of it all! I am surrounded by amazing women! I am part of a family that is willing to be open, honest, clear and direct. I am loved by and am deeply loving of so many. I am filled with the power of intense curiosity that gives me permission never to have anything be fixed or static or ‘real’ or ‘true’; and that makes every day a new adventure, filled with a combination of letting go of what was and claiming what can become. One foot in front of the other. One conversation preceding the next. Living in the moment. Staying present to myself and what moves inside me. Connecting in voice and word and thought.

Shameless. Fearless. Sometimes raw and jagged, sometimes well-honed and razor sharp. And always, the intention is to honor the sacred Signal that is the ‘I AM’, to honor the Signal that I am that flows through the Quantum Biological Being that moves in this space and time.

The emerging species is already here and it is us. The question is: can we awaken to and claim it before it’s too late? And perhaps more importantly, can it ever be too late?

Breathing is good...

2008: The Year of Practical Magic

2007-12-28T23:35:00.000-05:00

Wow! I can feel things speeding up! In the last couple of days, we've created two new blog sites, one which launched our new Newsletter format and one that created an interactive area on my website; completed a new article on the notion of practical magic for 2008; set up four new radio interviews in the US; created a new digital master for 'Fully Alive - A Corporate Conversatio'; and managed to still find time for the Dog Whisperer - not because we have a dog but because Cesar understands and speaks to the nature of energy and its impact on other living organic systems (dogs!).

AND....let's not overlook that I had to figure out technology for much of this! Am feeling pretty good about it all and very eager to engage!

The Newsletter - ChoicePoints - is now at http://choicepoints.wordpress.com and
the new, interactive 'Women Gathering' is at http://www.LouiseLeBrun.com/WomenGathering

I'm discovering that I am really looking forward to 2008 and really getting myself out there. I believe in magic - and I particularly believe in the kind of magic that is possible for us as Quantum Biological Humans. Time is passing and the need for us to discover the magic in ourselves is pressing hard against the need for us to create change in our lives.

I also spent a couple of hours today watching the tv specials (recorded) offered in remembrance of those who died in the tsunami on Boxing Day on the other side of the world. Even though I've seen those images so many times, I am stunned each time by the power of Gaia and the forces that are a natural part of her expression. Energy in transformation takes many twists and turns.

Tomorrow, I meet with a small group of women (women of intensity!) to catch up and explore where we may guide ourselves to in 2008. This conversation will be different as we'll have a few women who will be there for the first time and who know very little about WEL-Systems. That is always such fun! I get to watch lives transform in such a short period of time. More magic!

For now, I'll call it a day and dream big dreams for the next one.

Breathing is good....

Spontaneously being our essential selves

2007-12-24T09:18:00.000-05:00

It’s Christmas Eve. No matter how it actually unfolds, I am always mindful of a darkened sky, stars blinking through the crisp, cold air; ever-decreasing activity on the road as people reach their destination and settle in for the long-anticipated time with family and loved ones; snow falling softy and quietly, adding to the sparkling cloak that Gaia has wrapped herself in; streets lined with house after house, dressed up for the occasion in brightly colored lights on rooftops, swirling around trees and shrubs, doors welcoming guests with wreaths of pine boughs, red bows and twinkling lights.

This will be my 57th Christmas Eve. The first few have left no memory. For so many others, I can run the movie inside my head and see grandparents long gone; a house full of people talking and laughing; decorated trees nesting in a sea of regally wrapped boxes of magic and surprises. Smells of warming pies mingling with the sound of glasses tinkling as eggnog is poured from the punch bowl into the small handled bowl, topped with whipped cream and nutmeg; Christmas carols playing in the background. And yet, through all those years, there is one memory that never leaves me.

The story is told of Christmas Eve, 1914, and the spontaneous truce that occurred between the German and Allied Troops along the front lines. I know that I was very young when I first heard of this…perhaps 7 or 8 years old. Without the language to describe it, it amazed me that human beings were so instinctively and essentially drawn to love each other. It also profoundly awakened me to the degree to which external drivers – those things outside of us called authority, experts, leaders, guides, etc. – were able to reshape that essential being and the degree to which we allowed it to be so.

Every year at this time, I am reminded of this moment of my own awakening. Each year, I remember and recommit to my own journey of staying awake and awakening those who have the desire to do so. At this time of year, I am reminded why I have become who I am; and the degree to which each of us is so essentially and organically intended to connect and engage with each other.

Mine is not to change the world. Mine is to create the world that I desire. And what I desire is full expression of what I know to be our birthright – our right to love and be loved; our desire to engage with each other in ways that awaken and expand our potential; and our deep and organic pull to move toward each other and not away from each other.

Long gone are those men who first dared to follow their natural instincts and proclaim a truce. Under the most dire conditions and within the context of vicious intentions, they found within themselves what was required to remember who they are and to trust that – no matter what!

Perhaps this Christmas Eve, 2007, will be the one that re-awakens us to the truth of who we are.

Breathing is good……

Staying conscious in a collective coma

2007-12-20T22:45:00.000-05:00

I had breakfast today, with a woman who has become a deeply meaningful part of my life. I would trust her with my life and, perhaps more importantly, I would trust her with the lives of my sons. I do not say that easily or loosely!

My time with her is always a great adventure of discovery, about myself. She and I both know that as we share aspects of our lives, we listen to the other knowing that we are hearing expressed some aspect of our own consciousness, playing itself out in the life of the other. I’ve discovered that sometimes, when I talk to myself, I need to hear the words through the voice of another.

We talked about family. We talked about responsibility and commitment. We shared stories about the Holiday Season…about Christmas past and present…and about the experience relative to the commercial hype. We concluded that it was time for us to create new rituals for ourselves and the people we love, that would better reflect what we have come to hold as valuable.

I left breakfast with a sense of being real. I felt that in the great hypnotic trance that is my cultural conditioning, I had just had an awakened moment. It reminded me of days long gone when I would swim from one end of the pool to the other, holding my breath, and finally breaking through at the far end, gasping for air! In that moment, I could breathe again and knew the essential nature of breathing. There are times when I had taken it for granted and just forgot its place in my existence.

Over our third cup of coffee, we agreed that we created it all! The new directions and the capitulations; the joys and the resentments; the frenzy and the tranquility. None of it belonged to anyone other than each of us, in our own way.

We talked about change and transformation. We explored our experiences in corporate environments, marveling at how robust these constructs of collective agreement are as they continue to unfold, unchecked in their unspoken determination to keep us in line. How else do we feed a collective driven by consumption?

And finally, we agreed: it is not about trying to fix or change the world we have – it is about creating the world we want. When we withdraw ‘energy’ (life force, mana, prana, attention, focus, etc) and we cease to engage with something, that thing begins to fade away and disappear. Nothing can survive without the energy that feeds it. However, when we invest energy in bracing against or fighting something, it gains strength. A wise person once said : "What we resist, persists."

We agreed : we must give ourselves permission to walk away. No arguments, no need to explain, no rants or big investments in getting anyone to understand – just walk away. Sometimes, walking away can be as simple as ‘No, thanks!’. Or, it can sound like ‘No more!’. Or it can be as simple as redirecting my attention to those people, places and things that feed my soul! But no matter how we looked at it, we concluded that the two things that present in all of life’s situations is that a) my life is always about me (just like her life is always about her); and b) there is nothing to struggle with.

I am keenly aware, particularly at this time of year, of how difficult it is to NOT be drawn into the collective consciousness…the collective coma….that causes us to second guess ourselves; to abandon all that is true for us and stumble into the march-step of those around us; to silence ourselves rather than speak when what we have to say causes the conversations around us to pause abruptly! And yet, I know deep inside me, that the future lies in learning how to do just that.

I am so grateful to have, on the holodeck of my experience, those who are willing to come face-to-face with themselves. In those moments, I become more.

Breathing is good……

Is there ever a good time to die?

2007-12-18T15:47:00.000-05:00

I found out, yesterday, that a woman I had come to know from her being a client, has passed on. Since discovering this, I’ve had a couple of phone calls and email exchanges with others who have been touched by her passing and, no doubt, by her having lived.

It has left me wondering: if (as I believe) all things unfold exactly as they should, what is there for me to discover about being human from this having entered my life?

As in all deaths, my thoughts go to those who are left behind. So many things unsaid; so many other things said regrettably…wishing they could be withdrawn. Opportunities lost for completing things, changing things, redefining things. Perhaps the invitation in one’s passing is for the rest of us to pause…and consider….how else might I live? And beyond that, how else might I love?

As someone once said (and I have no idea who it was), living is a lot harder than dying. I believe that. living fully…living a meaningful and authentic life…demands much of who we are and even more of who we might become. Living an authentic life requires that we make choices that may well fly in the face of cultural conditioning and socially accepted conventions of behaviour. Sometimes, choosing one over the other brings challenging consequences either way. Perhaps the invitation in one’s passing is for the rest of us to awaken to a recognition that NOW is the moment! And we can never be sure that there will be another…..

Memories. Reminders. Whispers in the back of our mind….the single and the collective mind. All the things that we are reminded of in one moment that are, in truth, about another moment – often from long ago and hopefully forgotten – that is in some way unfinished…incomplete…not yet ready to be put to rest. Perhaps the invitation in one’s passing is for the rest of us to make peace with ourselves; with our loose ends, unfinished business and unexpressed potential. We may not have a ‘tomorrow’ from which to reconsider it all.

Timing. Can it ever be right? Is it ever wrong? In this, I am clear that I trust the unspoken genius of it all! I believe with every fiber of my being that we do not go until we’re ready to go. In that, I honor the choices made to go. And as I do so, I take a breath and I notice all around me those that can and will make the same choice, when the time is right for them. And in that moment, I will have become the one left behind. Perhaps the invitation in one’s passing is for us to allow ourselves the full measure of our experience – of our sadness, our grief, our longing that it were not so – AND to remember who and what we are. Even in these moments, there is cause to honor and celebrate a Life Force continuing in its expression, even though it may be in a way that we cannot share.

To Robyn Wagner: my thanks for all that you have taught me.

Breathing is good…..

Another Sekhmet Voice....

2007-12-17T11:17:00.000-05:00

I'm very fortunate to have people in my life who find things that they know I would have an interest in. One such discovery recently sent to me is the voice of Danielle Rama Hoffman who also embodies the essence that I know as Sekhmet.

Let Danielle's words flow through you. Her words describe the truth of my experience of this Sekhmet energy in expression in my own life.

As you read Danielle's words, let the vibration they carry flow through you...and discover within yourself, the aspect of Sekhmet that is you.

Breathing is good.....

Cocooning

2007-12-16T15:13:00.000-05:00

I seem to be intimately connected to the weather. When I think a thought, the weather reflects it back to me, in its unique and inimitable way.

I’m sitting by the fire, feeling snug and comfy in my blue leather recliner….feet up and laptop at my finger tips. To my left, the two palladium windows offer me a lens through which to watch the world unfold, a glimmer of colored lights in the distance as the influence of the Holiday Season is seen through the swirling gusts of snow. The drifts are getting higher, piling up against my neighbor’s fence and making back garden ornaments – like the BBQ! – turn into oddly shaped beings in the dimming light.

I like this. I’m happy in this place, family members busy doing their thing and my time is my own. My thoughts are my own, too…except that Gaia seems to be able to read them.

Outside reflects what’s going on inside of me. Great bursts of new thought intermingled with a quiet reflection on those already there. Thoughts taking on strange shapes, some fitting easily into the landscape of their existing context and others struggling to find their place in what feels like a foreign land. Moments of peace and a sense of inner quiet quickly followed by the winds of agitation as old thoughts blend with the new. As I sit in my cozy spot, I wonder: how does all this fit together?

Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe there is no need to fit…no requirement for fitting of any kind. Maybe perfection lies in what feels like the existing chaos of all this swirling, blowing, heaping….then settling and blowing again! Maybe this is what life feels like on any given day and to think otherwise is to fool myself.

I’ve been thinking a lot about 2007 – what it was, what it gave me and what it invited me to consider differently. I am also enlivened, excited and profoundly encourage by 2008 and what it will become. It seems like every year, the angle of the curve gets steeper and the outcomes accelerate to make way for greater potential. As much as I might say that this is too much….it’s not.

The storm that is blowing through today is a welcomed invitation to shake things up….to trust in the shaking….and to discover that what I consider ‘the norm’ can easily be turned upside down and from there, become a platform for something quite different.

I know that 2008 will be the year of the vibration of sound. More voice. More voices! Voices speaking an undeniable truth – that truth of authentic presence – and all that comes with it. Podcasts. CD’s. Internet radio. Room for bigger and more conversations….one-on-one and in small groups. And all of this about women gathering in small groups, talking. Such a potent force and one, sadly, so wasted on the trivia of our lives.

So, I’m going to sit here for a bit, letting the warmth of the fire make me drowsy, and letting myself jot down all the strange, seemingly disconnected thoughts that my body is offering up. If (as I believe) an Emerging Future rides on that Signal from the Self to the physical body, then paying attention is the gateway to accelerating how I manifest my life – not because faster is better, but because living fully is always preferable to just sitting around and thinking about it.

Breathing is good…..

Holiday Season Survival Kit!

2007-12-11T13:57:00.000-05:00

It’s one of those typical ‘Watch out! Winter’s coming!’ kind of days. Sitting in my office, I look to the left and watch traffic moving quickly along the four lanes of what is the main artery from one end of the city to the other. A grey day….damp and cold…thick with moisture from the falling snow….reminiscent of so many other such days in my long and wonderful life!

It’s that time of year again, when we are so easily drawn into eating too much, drinking more than we care to remember and spending money that we don’t have. That time of year when we seem to get caught up in all the things that we swore, last year, we’d never do again. And then – poof!... like magic! – it’s all over and when we look back, we discover that we were barely conscious as we engaged. How does that happen?????

I’ve created a Holiday Season Survival Kit; a simple way for me to remember to stay connected to myself and redesign how I move through this time of year. It’s intended to help me stay real, stay connected and to remember to love myself at least as much as I want others to know I love them. An over-extended Mom, an impatient daughter and an unavailable partner are not what I want to create for memories from Christmas 2007.

My fondest memories were never about the ‘thing’ I got but were about the people I was with; the way we laughed and played cards or Monopoly for hours at a time. I remember shopping with my Mom, the best part of which was always the time we took to have lunch together where Christmas music played in the background and we hummed along. I remember the years when there was someone new at the table because they couldn’t make it home that year; and other times when someone who had always been there, no longer was.

No matter which Christmas it was, it was always about the people. Including people; welcoming people; making time for and spending time with people. Long after the gifts were put aside, the people remained.

This year, my commitment to myself is to remember who I am and what holds meaning for me; and to invite others in my life to do the same. As much as old rituals and habits may remind us of who we have been, the creation of new ones may be the invitation for us to discover who else we can become.

Breathing is good…..

The majesty of being the godforce

2007-12-10T14:11:00.000-05:00

I’m not quite sure where to start in tracking my own thoughts. I’ve had some of the most potent experiences, in the last 10 days, of my entire life.

Women gathering in small groups, talking….began with the Whispers from Within writing retreat. A small group of women….sometimes unsure, sometimes afraid, sometimes confused, angry, resentful….and yet through it all, always courageous and unwilling to give up on themselves. Moments of fear calling up huge amounts of courage. Moments of resentment calling up waves of reclamation of Self. Moments of love and deep caring for others making way for those same experiences of Self. In all of those moments, our world changed.

I am very clear: on the holodeck of my experience, it is all about me. I am equally clear: the genius that I am called into my life the genius of each of these women…and each of them did the same with all of us. Perhaps what made it that much more compelling and provocative; perhaps what took us out, further and further, to the next edge, was the fact that each of us had been here before. In that, there was great trust – of Self and of other – knowing without hesitation the godforce that each of us already is and - no matter what! - we would be just fine! It was with a humbling majesty that I was part of, and bore witness to, the power of this recognition in its capacity to accelerate opening and expansion to the so much MORE that each of us already is. I was indeed, in the company of living expressions of the majesty of being…ourselves.

No conversation cut short; no topic avoided; no moment of truth masked or denied…each of us was more committed to the truth of who we are than to any social convention that might tempt us to diminish ourSelf and, as such, each other. It was an amazing experience for me to bear witness to what it called up in each participant for her to show up – consistently, repeatedly, with great intensity and without apology – as the powerhouse that she is! Gawd! It was breathtaking!

And as if this were not enough, I was moved to tears on Saturday morning when I was invited to offer the opening keynote remarks for the first (of what I know will be many) Ideas Festival. I arrived early and was wandering around, greeting people I knew and meeting others for the first time, when it struck me: this room was filled with women who had found and reclaimed the godforce that they are, and were now expressing themselves in this world through that godforce!

I noticed their creations displayed around the room and on a table at the reception area. I remembered when I first met these women and marveled at who they had allowed themselves not only to become, but now declared themselves to be to the world. Shameless in their own truth, they were living, breathing, walking invitations to the emergence of that truth in others.

The Ideas Festival was Anne’s expression of herself as The Sun…creating a space that is warm, welcoming, inviting and nurturing that others may unfold into, each bringing their own unique gift to share with others. I remember that moment in the Leadership Redefined – Reclaimed pilot when Anne discovered the godforce that she is IS The Sun! And here it was – alive and well and fully expressing in the physical through this Ideas Festival!

There was Carole’s decloaking in the Sekhmet Rising book; Amy’s CD on ‘Health Beyond Nutrition’; Lori’s CD on “Single Moms”, her Huna expression through poem and art, and her drum; Leaona’s CD and her art.

I looked around the room and there was Sarah, filled with the joy of living her own life as the magnificent woman that she has found herself to be! I saw Kim and Scott, sharing a journey of awakening to the magnificence of who each of them is and what they are co-creating together. I watched MJ and her choosing to create the book of her own journey in her birth language and Lucy stepping onto a path untraveled and yet somehow, too compelling for her to deny.

I saw new faces and felt new vibrations of voice as this space called to an awakening from somewhere deeper than possibly revealed and yet too familiar to continue to deny.

As it struck me who each of these women has become, I was flooded with a sensation of sheer joy and amazement! As each of us awakens to and claims the full measure of the godforce that each of us already is, our world responds. Gaia responds! Our families respond! And each of us becomes more as we give ourselves and each other permission for our own magnificence to express, by becoming that in our own lives.

And so it continues. Life is contagious – and I am very clear: I am unwilling ever….EVER!...to be one iota less than the godforce that I am. And I am unwilling ever…EVER!...to see less than that in every other being with whom I share a breath.

My greatest gift to the people I love is to be fully mySelf.

Breathing is good….

True Confessions: If I have to choose, I'll take 'impact' over 'nice' any day!

2007-12-05T14:38:00.000-05:00

Maybe I’m just getting old and crotchety. Or maybe I’ve been having these conversations for so long that I find myself wanting to make quantum leaps and am unwilling to engage in incremental nano-inching as an authentic expression of human potential. And then, maybe it’s none of that – maybe it’s just that my bullshit detector has become so well honed over the last 20 years that I can no longer (doing)….or am no longer willing to (being)… not see what I see, hear what I hear, know what I know…and say what I have to say.

Whatever it is, I am aware that I am being drawn to equally hone what I do with my life : where I spend my time, who I spend it with and what kind of experiences I am willing/not willing to be part of. This is, after all, my life and no one else can have it!

My perspective on the world – my world – has been changing over the last two years. It started in January 2006 and it continues to flesh itself out with more density and intensity of color, form and content. I am electric with what I sense to be an escalating awakening as living, organic, planetary systems move and shift in themselves and in the way they interact with each other. The changes we are already living are not/will not be incremental, linear and unfolding over time. Like us, they will be unpredictable, interactive and magnificent in their potential; and they will present in orders of magnitude beyond our expectations in their capacity to reshape our world and our lives.

This awareness permeates everything I have become and so, permeates all that I am and do. This results in a corresponding sense of urgency and intensity to create, on the holodeck of my experience, people/events/conversations that are compelling and deeply meaningful for my own evolution, as I believe that my evolution – like that of every other living, organic system – will profoundly connect with and ultimately shape that of the living planet of which I am an integral part. If I am not enlivened, nurtured and urged into aliveness by my own existence, how can I be part of creating that anywhere else?

It is interesting to me that lately, I find more and more people who can ‘hear’ the planet. It is a communication that cannot be explained through language that we know. And yet, in my experience of it, it is an undeniable phenomenon. We are beginning to hear Gaia, from the inside, out as we become unable to not see Gaia from the outside, in.

Compelling and meaningful – these are the essential elements to designing my life worth living. These qualify as those ‘can’t-live-without-them’ ingredients that go into shaping my life in a way that lights me up and leaves me more present, more awake and more enlivened by every breath I take! Not only is this MY life, this life of mine is an essential cell in the evolving life of the planet. Like Gaia, I am unwilling to have it just go on, day after day, through habit and by default, slowly grinding to a halt under the unbearable burden of my/our own individual and collective mindlessness. No life to live is far better than a life not worth living.

More and more, I am discovering how unwilling I am becoming to be in conversations that don’t matter; that don’t make a difference; that are intended to mindlessly fill dead air time and have no other purpose than to put the vibration of sound into what feels like the immense weight of silence.

No longer am I willing or able to NOT see what percentage of my conversations are repetitive…are saying nothing of any consequence…and are a pale reflection of the truth of who I am and my own potential. And no longer am I willing to collude with anyone else because to not do so results in discomfort and chaos.

Every conversation is an invitation for me to choose. Do I choose a bigger or smaller life? Do I choose to tell my truth or to deceive? Do I actually consider a question or mindlessly offer the polite or politically required response? Do I choose to discover something new about myself or do I just push the button and run the ‘me’ that I and everyone else has come to expect? Do I draw back, tone down and hold out on the full force of who I am in the world or do I allow myself to be unleashed into my own potential? Do I edit or do I reveal, unfiltered, what courses through my awareness? None of this need be in aggression or anger, and yet what I am aware of is that an individual truth is often so long denied that when it is finally revealed, it feels like that to so many. It need not be so. It is not the expressed truth that causes this outcome; it is the increasing pressure from decades of its denial that hardens and sharpens the edges of its eventual delivery.

As I pay attention to the vibration of this in my own body, I am beginning to see my world differently. I am noticing and being drawn to those others – wherever they are and whatever their interests happen to be – who are prepared to be outrageous in their commitment to their own vibrancy! I’m finding people to play with who are massive in their potential, strong in voice and shameless in their willingness to wrap their hands around what they want and engage. I am discovering that on the holodeck of my experience, the genius of who I am has created the genius of who they are that I might have others for me to play with.

Long ago in a program experience, someone said to me – in great earnest and with equally great sincerity – “I want things to be different but I don’t want my life to change.” As much as I find this to be wonderfully funny, there appeared to be no awareness on the part of the speaker, of any discord in this statement.

Today, what I know is that, s/he does not stand alone. I have found many in my experience over the last 20 years who have shared this mantra: “I want things to be different…(.i, e. I want other people to change, to stop asking, to be nicer/kinder/more understanding, to finally understand, to leave me alone, to get on with their lives, etc….) but I don’t want my life to change (i.e. I’m comfortable, things in my life are familiar, I don’t want the things I like to be disturbed, I don’t want people to think less of me for wanting what I don’t have, I can’t stand conflict/dissention/chaos, etc….)”. The world is full of people who believe that in order for them to have what they want, they have to wait until someone else changes in order for them to have it; who believe that it’s rude/selfish/unkind for them to insist on their own needs/desires; who are more committed to their powerlessness than they are to their own potential.

Today, what I also know about ME is that I’m not interested in playing that game anymore. We…us…all of us….are running out of time.

It’s like watching nations come together to discuss climate change, behaving as if their lack of willingness/desire/ability to engage and actually DO something different, is not seen for what it is; and that we’re still going to be polite and trust that they know better than we do what’s good for us. They prefer to continue their limp efforts at being seen to be doing something useful than to actually do anything that will make a difference. They also continue to lie to themselves and insist that they have lots of time. Were it not so dangerous, it would be comical in its pathetic irrelevance.

And so, I’m coming to a place inside myself where I’m discovering that I’m losing interest in the conversations that are about wanting to without being willing to. Being able to follows the latter. I’m interested in engaging with those who are clear that: “I’m taking back my life! I’m willing to do what it takes; I’m up for the tough conversations with myself and with the people I love; I’m not willing to look back…and let the chips fall where they may – I know I’ll be just fine.”

That takes courage and a boundless curiosity about our own lives. Ready, willing and able – whether they know how or not – these folks step up to the plate, pick up the bat and are eager to learn how to swing joyously and play this game of life, full tilt! Unwilling to be sacrificed on the alter of good manners (i.e. wait your turn, you can’t say that, don’t interrupt, etc.) ; with a sense of hope and possibility, they are sometimes motivated by a keen awareness that they’re no longer willing to live puny lives. “Enough! I’m getting on with living regardless of what you do!” seems to be what oozes from every pore. Count me in on those conversations!

Far too many of us have already bored ourselves to death – and everyone else we come in contact with – in the name of our so-called love for others, be they our parents, children, spouses, friends, colleagues, etc. When I think of the people I care about, I can think of nothing more powerful in their lives than my willingness to be a living expression of permission to be powerful in my own. My notion of ‘love’ is not based in sacrifice, self-denial and personal limitation. It is driven by the godforce that I AM in recognition of the godforce that each of them is. In that, we share abundance, immensity and great joy for being true to ourselves in the presence of each other. “This is my life and you can’t have it!” becomes a new mantra that defines direction and outlines the power of the responsibility I carry for myself, my evolution and its contribution to the overall evolution of that larger, living system that is Gaia. Accelerated evolution is highly contagious!

So there it is – and I feel so much more connected to myself again. The truth is out: I’m not interested in being ‘nice’! I want to play the big game, for the big scores. I WANT to engage with the people who have been written off by everyone else and yet persist because instinctively, they know there is more. I WANT to be in those raw, prickly, edgy conversations that make people uncomfortable and unsure, that no one else wants to be in because they dredge up their own secrets and self-betrayals. I WANT to engage with those who have given up hope of finding someone to stand with as they move through the dark of their own undiscovered pathways through the chaos of their own potential. I know that the godforce that I AM is a formidable presence and I am willing to engage.

Breathing is good….

Update from Oceanstone

2007-12-03T20:07:00.000-05:00

Day 1 of Whispers from Within and already, the outside world is reflecting what we’re discovering inside ourselves.

It started to snow…that soft, silent kind of snow…and by the time we were ready to call it a day, it was beginning to transform itself into an equally lightly falling rain. The weather man says tomorrow will bring rain, high winds and a storm surge. I must remember to find a comfy chair higher up the hill. And, I must also remember to stay awake to the escalation that is sure to come in the conversations. The inside and the outside go together.

This small gathering of awake, aware and willing women did not just begin today, they launched! From the first opening moments, each was fully in the game of personal discovery – knowing that all they had to lose were their own limitations.

I know that all I have to lose are my limitations. I am aware that as I ponder the coming decade, all that I have lived – that tells me that I think I know how to live! – will not serve me. As much as I know that my world is changing, and I have no idea how else to live, I know that how I’ve lived will no longer cut it. How willing am I to let it all go?

Today, it became clear that it’s always about relationships, with self and other. And it’s equally clear that my relationship with myself determines all the others.

In the world of being inspired and inspiring others, if I cannot inspire myself, I am lost to all outside of me. In a world that is rapidly getting smaller, that is not a good thing for me!

I am willing to be my own inspiration. I am willing to not know….until I know. And I am willing to trust that how I’ll know will have nothing to do with knowledge.

Breathing is good…..

Child Abuse....ENOUGH!

2007-11-25T12:03:00.000-05:00

I read Sarah’s blog today. I stand with her as she chooses to stand alone, claiming the truth of her own experience.

There are those among us who have been victims. There are those among us who are perpetrators. There are those among us who would prefer to think that neither exist; that we are over-reacting, or blowing things out of proportion or imagining it all. And to them I would say, “WAKE UP!”

Beneath the veneer of the myth of the intact family lies a seething mass of deception, betrayal, lies, dirty secrets, open wounds, mind-numbing emotional and physical pain…all of which add up to danger, despair and hopelessness for those too small to defend and protect themselves; with voices too quiet to be heard.

I’ve been working with people since 1990. I’ve had the opportunity to engage with thousands of people over those years – face-to-face in program experiences, in telephone conversations and through email. Before that, I spent almost 20 years in treatment programs for families of alcoholics; talked myself silly with a wide range of therapists and counselors; and invested hundreds of hours and tens of thousands of dollars as a participant in educational/developmental/certification experiences with some of the best minds in the world. Through it all, I talked with people. I told my story and listened to theirs. I declare, without hesitation or a nano-second of doubt, we are a species that cannibalizes its young.

We are the monsters that brutalize our children and create more monsters! I have worked with people who, as children, experienced such horrific treatment at the hands of those whose care they were in (not strangers or paid care-givers or pedophiles on-the-run, but family members) that I would marvel that they were able to function at all!; that they, themselves, had not become the monsters in some other child’s nightmares.

I have been with both men and women as their bodies shook uncontrollably with the terror still filling their cells from things done to them – in the powerlessness and helplessness of their size, age and innocence – that to that day, kept them from living their own lives. I have watched their bodies become paralyzed and rigid, trapped in the memories that were still in their flesh, seeking to be witnessed, honored and released that they might begin to grow up. Their adult bodies masked the four-year-old that still ran their lives.

My life is filled people who have discovered that if they are to take back their lives, they must first find inside themselves the truth of their own experience, and lay undeniable claim to it all. You can’t give away what does not belong to you. And before they can move beyond their history, they must claim it to be theirs, recognize that the shame does not belong to them, and walk away. For that, they must dig deep inside themselves and find the courage to stand alone.

We do not make it easy for anyone to stand alone. We are a species that has become highly adept at using physical and emotional terror, shame, ridicule, abandonment, isolation…and a wide variety of other tactics to make sure not only that our children are never heard but that we become unable to hear ourselves. Not only do we fear what our children have to say, we are terrified of the truth we carry inside ourselves. It is not our children who must find their voices. It is the adults we have become, carrying the scars and the often still-open wounds from our own experiences, who must find voice.

Child abuse is not a child’s problem – it is an adult’s problem! The situation has become so intense that our children are now battering, brutalizing and killing each other! Your voice, my voice and that of the millions of others who know, deep in their bodies the truth of their experience, are the ones who must become willing to decloak and take a stand.

It is not that we are without laws – it is that the laws are not enough. It is not that we without experts, officials, agents, professionals who are paid to stand guard – it is that they are not enough. NO ONE is more capable and adept at this than those of us who know…deep in our own bellies…and who have become willing to trust what we know. NO ONE is more able to protect our children than we are, IF we have claimed our own truth and can trust our own body. Without that, we continue to avoid and deny the alarm that our own body signals - screaming at us to pay attention to the truth of what we know! - becoming victim (this time) to ourselves.

We take from our children what has been taken from us. Innocence lost - through neglect, abandonment and isolation - breeds depression, invisibility and a desire to disconnect from our world. Innocence taken - through violation, terror and assault - breeds rage and the desire to take back what was taken from us. Without a capacity to reclaim the truth of our own experience, we look outside ourselves to satisfy this relentless hunger. And yet, the hunger we carry that craves a return to what we were will never be fed by denying what we have become.

It does not matter where it started. What matters is where it ends. And in my life, it ends with me. Clearly, in Sarah’s life, it is ending with her. In your life, it must end with you. It is not that each of us must draw the line in the sand, it is that each of us must BECOME the line in the sand. If what I must do is put my body between my children and their grandparents, uncles, cousins, babysitters, teachers, coaches, ministers, priests…whatever!....then so be it. I have learned to trust the truth of my body and leave behind the bullshit that we toss at each other to keep sacred our unwillingness to say or do something that might potentially embarrass someone, or have someone feel badly, or have others be upset at our stand. Silence will not take us to where we want to go.

‘Child porn’….’kiddie porn’….are not about pornography. In our savvy, worldly, clever society, we have come to associate porn/pornography with so-called consenting (which I believe to be a lie in the vast majority of cases) adults and therefore, a completely acceptable experience to engage in as participant, witness or voyeur. Children do not consent! This is not ‘child pornography’ – this is child abuse. This is rape of the most horrific kind. This is use of force in ways that you and I cannot even imagine. This is violation, degradation and terror. This is brutality. And worse, this is a collective. It is not about one person….it is recognizing that there are many, many persons who engage in this process as a collective…who share these children with each other, passed around from one to the other…. That this could be considered, in any way, entertainment or ‘natural’ is beyond my comprehension.

We live in a world where men travel to foreign lands to rape the children who live there. This is not a secret – this is done openly! Who have we become as a species that we are capable of such horror?

I, for one, stand with Sarah. I do not for a moment fool myself into believing that I can change that world or ‘solve’ that problem or make it go away. Even Oprah, who has the capacity to profoundly affect her world, cannot stop this. I am however, very clear: NOT MY CHILDREN! Nor my grandchildren…nor my nieces. When I stand for myself and claim the truth of my own history, I become able to stand for my children. When I reclaim MY voice for MYSELF, I have voice for another. I cannot speak for my children if/when I cannot speak for myself. I cannot protect my children when I cannot protect myself. I am too vulnerable…too easily fooled…too easily silenced. Such is no longer the case. My voice is strong and it is loud – and it speaks with Sarah’s to say: “ENOUGH!”

Find your voice! Share this with others and become the invitation for others to WAKE UP to what their body already knows. BECOME the line in the sand in your own life. We are all contagious...the question is : What are we spreading?
Breathing is good….

Other things I’ve written that say more:

• From Victim to Victorious Voice -
• Parenting: The Other Gift that Keeps on Giving
• Women’s Voices – Women’s Choices
• Thoughts On….Commitment
• Living Life with an Edge

Monochromatic World

2007-11-22T14:50:00.000-05:00

It’s one of those days that those of us who know snow, know well. It’s been snowing for almost 18 hours and the world has become the page that this monochromatic message is written on.

Last night, I lay in bed and watched tiny snow flakes fall like a wall of frozen rain. Against the night sky, the background was lit by street lamps, making everything appear to be a variation on that one color : that soft, metallic grey that can only be seen when Winter creeps in and transforms ‘weather’ into ‘season’.

I love this! I remember so many times, sitting quietly in the dark hidden from the street light’s glow on the carpet at my feet….watching snow flakes the size of quarters waft like feathers on a soft breeze. I could hear the silence on the wind, broken only from time-to-time by a passing car. That sound often startled me, as I had gone somewhere where cars did not exist – and yet, there was one, now.

I wonder…..where else in my life do I experience my world as monochromatic and, perhaps, have not yet remembered to discover its beauty? How else might I move through those times in my life when it appears that color has drained from my existence and become an expression of shades of the same thing?

Perhaps this day is to remind me to notice rather than expect…to welcome the difference rather than long for the same…and perhaps to find within myself the genius that has created it all! It is, after all, my holodeck.

Breathing is good…..

Completions and Fresh Starts

2007-11-21T20:13:00.000-05:00

I blinked - and almost 10 days went by. I wonder how that happens....

I've been spending my 'time' in the future....considering, wondering, pondering, exploring, discovering....getting a 'sense' of what it will take for Intention 2009 to manifest.

Since January 2006, elements have been falling into place; and clarity has emerged about those essential elements. Since then, it has become clear that engaging with women is one of those essential elements; WEL-Systems is another and the compressed timeframe is a third. Three elements. There are many such triads in my life.

When I wrote 'Women's Voices, Women's Choices', it was very clear to me: women gathering in small groups, talking is an essential part of who we are. It is also much more than conversations - it is a force for generative change in our networks of human beings.

The future...MY future...lies in women gathering in small groups, talking....about what is meaninful; telling the truth of their experience; saying 'no' to what they don't want and asking for what they do. No more secrets. No more story-telling to pretend that all is well when we know it is not.

Women gathering in small groups, talking....will change our world. It will also change THE world.

Imagine! Such a simple thing and yet, such a potent process. Like all things truly great, it's simplicity masks its impact. We have yet to notice how women gathering in small groups, talking...and hiding their truth from themselves and each other...has already shaped the world we have.

Intention 2009 will manifest by December 31, 2009. By then, the potential of the paradigm shift that a WEL-Systems perspective invites and allows for, will be in the minds of a collective at critical mass. From there, it is all up to each of us...and the outcome will define the collective we become.

Things are changing. I thought the changes in my life from January 2006 to January 2007 were fast. I wrote in the December Newsletter of what had unfolded. January 2007 to now has pressed the edges of an Emerging Futures perspective, resulting in the need to capture what has presented so that I might move forward. This has led to extensive recorded material for The CODE Model, CODE Model Coaching, Leadership REdefined - REclaimed, Manifestation, and many, many more. These will soon be in production to mark the journey that 2007 made room for. And then, with history ready to tell its own tale, the future continues to emerge.

I wonder what my world will be in December 2008......

Breathing is good......

The CODE Model...and more

2007-11-12T15:36:00.001-05:00

I am exhilarated! I just spent two days in amazing, wonderful, weird, compelling, provocative, evocative conversations with a small group of women, discovering all that I have to say about The CODE Model™ and CODE Model Coaching™. I surprised myself!

These things – The CODE Model and CODE Model Coaching – are not anything that I learned or worked at or created. These are frameworks and models that came from the very pores of my being…that were birthed as a by-product of my own engaging, living, discovering, growing and becoming…and then were offered to the world as my way of inviting others into these discoveries for themselves.

During the course of the last two days, I discovered:

• This great and intense need to say what I have to say about these, as they become more accessible and present in the larger world. As much as The CODE Model can be an effective diagnostic, that is not what the wisdom of my own living intended for it.
• That I want the world to know the magic of what these offer…that they go far beyond what we have ever considered possible in the domain of one human being engaging with themselves or with another.
• Great clarity with regard to the point where I stand in my own life; that I am ready to let go of what I already know and make room for me to discover what has yet to flow into my awareness. And I know there is so much more!
• That as I looked around the Program Room in Kanata and I followed the flow of the posters on the wall displaying the sequence of the WEL-Systems models, it was so clear to me why the sequence matters. It is a journey…and like I cannot get to Vancouver from Ottawa without going past Manitoba, nor can I connect to the incredible, awe-inspiring Quantum Biological Being that I am…to the godforce that I am…without going past who I have been and how I got to be that.
• That the Quantum Biological Being model IS the choice-point….it is the place where the paradigm leap takes place….and I either stay in the existing paradigm of the Newtonian world and continue to have access to what I already have access to or I make the leap and claim the new paradigm of the Quantum world AS THAT QUANTUM BIOLOGICAL BEING and all that it awakens me to. BioBaby™, Signals Dancing™, Quantum TLC™ and The CODE Model™ are all offerings on that side of the great divide.
• There is so much more! As I recognize the journey and declare the possible and how it is achieved, I realize that I am ready to move on.

It is a journey. It has a beginning…and a new beginning! Perhaps that is the thing of greatest interest to me: it really never ends and it just keeps getting better.

This two-day conversation about The CODE Model and CODE Model Coaching has been recorded and will become the state-of-the-art reference material for both. Combined with Quantum TLC™, these are the gateways for us to rediscover and reclaim the godforce that each of us is. CODE Model Coaching is never about fixing something or solving a problem, although both of these experiences occur. It is about stepping into the journey home to the godforce that we are.

I am deeply grateful to those who were with me during these two days. I feel complete; I feel free; and I feel that soon, as other conversations make their way to CD, more will be in flow. I know that the ‘more’ will be about Evolution by Intention™ and an EmergingFutures perspective and all that it offers.

Women gathering in small groups…talking…..and the world changes.

Breathing is good…..

Courage in action

2007-11-07T07:50:00.000-05:00

Last night, I had an opportunity to spend time in conversation with Sarah. It became evident very quickly how much clarity she had; how willing she is to do what it takes; and how able she has become to identify what is deeply meaningful to her and do what it takes to live it.

Sarah has done what it takes. She has reached out to people who can work with her in ways that will move her forward rather than lock her into position. She has stayed present to that inner truth that will not leave her and has discovered how else to engage with it. She has stayed with her fear as an invitation for discovery. She has felt hesitation - and engaged anyway. She has taken a breath...put one foot in front of the other...and walked forward into a very different quality of life.

Many others would have given up long ago, seeking to find ways to absolve them of responsibility for the quality of their own lives. Others would have just surrendered to the advice of outside experts and proceeded to fill yet one more prescription wit the intent of stopping the pain. But not Sarah! I was there when, with great courage and determination, she has stayed with what presented, even when doing so would cause a wave of terror to lock her body into rigid position. And yet, here she is : larger than life and completely unwilling to NOT live fully!

As we spoke, I was often left speechless (and that's not an easy thing to do with me!) by this incredible transformation. The depth of her clarity; the sense of having arrived in her own body, a woman and no longer a child. Her strength. Her courage. And perhaps more than anything else, her capacity to relax into and trust herself. Sarah is awake! For far too many of us, THAT is the greatest challenge. To let go of our deeply entrenched belief that someone else knows; that someone else can fix it for us; that someone else will make it all better. Sarah knows that only she can do that for her own life - and she's up to it!

Thank you, Sarah....you give me hope. That little stone in your pocket today will help you remember who you already are. Doing so, will help you trust who you can become.

Breathing is good....

Cleaning house

2007-11-04T17:39:00.000-05:00

For the last few months, I have been aware of this pressure, this need, to cleanse…or empty…or clean out.

I am mindful of how full my closets are, my shelves are, my house is, my life is, my body is with ‘stuff’ that has accumulated over my lifetime. It is not that these things did not serve their purpose or, in their time, did not bring me great joy. Nor is it that they are broken, damaged, useless or in any way ‘undesirable’ or unwanted. It is more that they are no longer who I am and are now slowing expression of who I might become.

Letting go. No need to push or force or actually do anything. It is much more about stopping all this – and doing nothing. In that empty space, direction comes for my next step and it becomes a step with significantly less weight attached to it. The weight of habit. The 'drag' of history. The distraction of proven results and outcomes.

I look around my house/work/life, and I notice so many beautiful things that continue to be beautiful and I have no desire to have them in my life. Some of these I am ready to put into boxes and give away. Others, will likely move more slowly, going into boxes and taking that half-measure of finding a cozy corner in the basement…until I’m ready to let go completely.

The domain of my thinking is no different. In my thinking, there are thoughts that have long been there. Maybe too long. Although they have served me well; have made a difference in my life and in the lives of many others, it is time for them to go. To let them just fall away, quietly wondering what that empty space will make room for.

It is not that there is anything wrong with these thoughts. Or that they are worn out or irrelevant. It is that I am no longer, as the thinker, who I was when I first thought them. To become the ‘more’ that I know I am, I must be willing to let go of who I have been, even when being so has filled my life with great joy.

I know that things will change – quickly! I am committed to Intention 2009 – to doing all that I can to ensure that by the end of 2009, there will be a global awareness of a WEL-Systems® perspective and access for those who choose to engage. Whether through books, audio products or program experiences, those who are seeking to awaken to a different way of moving through their world, will have the opportunity to do so.

In the next few months, there will be new audio products available on a number of things. CD’s of guided mediations; CD’s on the issue of weight/body image/personal power; on The CODE Model and CODE Model Coaching; on a home-study program for a WEL-Systems approach to living. I’ll be launching a new internet radio open-line show, encouraging listeners to engage directly to find out how a WEL-Systems approach can make a difference in their lives.

In the soon-to-be-released November ChoicePoints Newsletter, the Spotlight On piece will be on my observations from the process engaged during the Whispers from Within women's writing retreats. Those 'Layers of Discovery' only serve to strengthen my commitment to recognizing that the vibrations of voice are the songs we sing to awaken ourselves and each other.

Moving faster….going deeper…finding transformation.

Breathing is good…..

Women and self-silencing: ENOUGH!

2007-11-02T10:11:00.000-04:00

I read Lori's latest blog entry on 'Speaking Up....Speaking Out'.

There are far too many places in the world where women are legitimately in grave danger when they give voice to their own thoughts. Making a simple request or declining to engage in some way will get you killed. Fortunately, for most of us, this country is not one of those places.

Perhaps my greatest sadness comes from years of working with women who have self-silenced and held someone else to blame. Our seeming commitment to be seen NOT to be irritating or annoying; to be liked by everyone; to be considered 'low maintenance' for the men in our lives; to be spoken of as 'kind' or 'helpful' or 'no trouble' are often the things that keep us dead to our own potential.

Years ago, the very first topic developed for the Women and Power cd series was just that - Speaking Up and Speaking Out. They are different things. Speaking Up is about ensuring that our voice has resonnance...that its vibration is felt as a ripple through the bodies of those who hear what we're saying. It's about moving the conversation that - like a hamster in a cage - goes 'round and 'round in our heads and presses to be freed from the physical body and released into the outside world. It's about coming to grips with the fact that no matter how much I am convinced that my needs/wants are legitimate or reasonable, they will not be met in any way as I keep them secret inside myself.

Speaking Out is about saying the things that we believe no one wants to hear. The things that we engage with each other in secret conversation; the things that we whisper to our confidant but dare not say out loud in polite company; the things that we bear witness to and know, deep in our bellies, are wrong and sometimes dangerous! But we silence ourselves by telling ourselves that it's not our business...or not our concern...or no one will listen, anyway.

Until we open our mouths and let what is inside us make its way into our larger world, we have no one to blame for our miserable lives but ourselves. I, for one, am done with that.

Lori made a choice. A simple choice to move the conversation from inside her to outside her, where it could make a difference in her life. In doing so, she discovered that people want her to have what she wants. In my years and years of working with women, I know this to be so far more often than not.

Thank you, Lori...for being unwilling to continue to move silently through your own frustration, anger and eventual exhaustion and likely collapse. As much as you could have been the instrument of ensuring your own miserable life, you chose otherwise. Hallelujah!

Breathing is good.....

How my world works

2007-11-01T01:50:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, I got a call from the woman in New York who is our publicist. She had an opportunity to offer me: a journalist for major print media was looking for someone with children (that would be me) to comment on how to get children to wash their hands in light of the (latest) wave of medical concern called MRSA - a staph infection that is highly resistant to known courses of antibiotics.

I was unsure, since it has been many years since I've had any concerns about getting my children to wash their hands. Most of them are now old enough to have children of their own! Nonetheless, she and I agreed that I did have things to say; that she would contact the journalist, and in the meantime I'd prepare for the conversation. Time was of the essence.

Our telephone conversation ended and I went online to explore MRSA. Given that I grew up with a mother who is a nurse (which makes me almost a doctor!), such things are always of interest to me. Several thoughts came to mind as I read what Google offered on this new infection.

Protecting our children and hand-washing:

* The most powerful form of teaching is modeling. Children do what we do - not what we tell them to do. When parents engage the behaviours they want their children to replicate, their success rate if much higher.

* Hand-washing is just one in a series of connected behaviours that provide an overall way of moving through the world. Bathing, brushing their teeth, washing their hair, wearing clean clothes...all these are notes that come together to create the song of wellbeing that we want our children to be able to sing. You can't have the song without the notes.

* For me, the larger question is: if all bacteria and viruses exist in the body and can only proliferate in hospitable ground, how are we creating children who are susceptible to such proliferations? This begs the much more important question (to me)of exploring how our current perspective on our children (their value in our culture) and our existing parenting practices (parents shape the lives of their children) are affecting the internal states of our children such that hospitable ground prevails. For example, to what degree do our children feel stress; feel connected or disconnected from their environments and the people in them (i.e. two working parents); are angry and/or fearful (i.e. bullying at school). These internal states create vulnerability that allows for hospitable ground for these 'outside' infections to take hold.

So far, not much out of the ordinary...and here's where it got interesting.

As I read through the pages, I came across one particular page that while reading, the image of one client kept coming to mind. This is a woman who has had breast cancer and its surgery; and who has been challenged over the last few months with what the medical professionals were insisting was a return of the cancer and yet, she knew that it was not so. Increasing frustration and discouragement ensued, as the medical professionals insisted on a continuing course of chemo with no other conversations available. Although this woman did not know what her body was experiencing, she knew it was not cancer. At the mercy of the 'system', she did what was required of her.

As I read, this woman's image would not go away. I kept seeing her face, in the situation in which she and I had last engaged together. I chose to send the link to this page to a colleague who had been working with her in a coaching situation and offered it for their consideration.

Today, I get an email from the woman who had read the page, printed it up and taken it to her doctor earlier today. It turns out that she does not have cancer: she has MRSA and is now being treated for it.

Who would have thought that the original call was really about creating a pathway to this information for a woman who was losing hope? And here I thought it was about a public communication event.....

I love the way it works! It never fails me. I can trust that when I allow myself to engage; when I pay attention and trust what moves through me; and when I am willing to act, regardless of how bizarre it may appear in the moment, magic happens!

Given that we are all the godforce in expression in a physical universe, how could it be otherwise?

Breathing is good.....

It's not enough....

2007-10-28T17:42:00.000-04:00

It’s not enough:
• for me to breathe once a day….and hope that for the remainder of my day, someone else will breathe for me.
• to say ‘no’ only when I’ve run out of reasons not to say ‘yes’, knowing all along that ‘no’ was my truth.
• to be silent to avoid being irritating or annoying or shunned when the absence of my voice ensures the slow but steady advance of a lie.
• to disappear into myself, curl up into a ball, hold my breath and remain motionless, terrified that if seen, I’ll have to take a stand for something!
• to only find my courage now and then, when I know that courage is what it takes to change my world.
• to hide, when being seen is what will make the difference.
• to be mindful once a week when mindfulness is the essence of a meaningful life.

Yesterday, in rich, meaty, satisfying conversation with a small group of women (you know how it goes – women gathering in small groups, talking….The Force that will change the world!), one was heard to say “It’s hard to change.” In that moment, I wondered: if the word ‘hard’, disappeared from our vocabulary, what truth would we discover about ourselves as we searched for the word that would capture what was under the ‘hard’ of change. “It’s frightening…”? “It’s frustrating…”? “It’s lonely….”? When we let go of ‘hard’, the next layer finds room to rise up and present another piece of the puzzle.

We also talked of trust. As we did, I realized that I have come to make the distinction between trusting others (external referencing) and trusting myself. And even in that, there is trusting my Self (that direct line to the signal that flows through the body that lives in this physical world) and there is trusting myself (the natural intelligence of the organic being that I am…the one that does the dance of the signals 2 and 3). When I relax and trust my Self, life is easy.

At the end of November, we will gather again. And once again, I’ll discover more of who I can become.

Breathing is good…..

Sometimes, you have to stir the pot....

2007-10-23T16:48:00.001-04:00

...to discover the tasty morsels that have slowly sunk to the bottom in the great stew of life!

Today, I'm exhilerated and exhausted - both at the same time. I am just buzzing with the potential that we all are - ready to rock and roll! - and in the same instant, am ready for a nap. It occurs to me that this is another real-life, real-time example of how two distinct experiences can occupy the same space at the same time. We really are quite magnificent! Wherever did we learn to think of ourselves as puny?

The Huna Retreat was yet another unique experience for me (see my Huna Blog for more). This was the 4th Annual Huna Retreat at Oceanstone, and I know there will be many more. As I engaged, watched and listened, I was filled with such deep love for our shared humanity. It is never about anything but each of the unique beings that we are.

It is never about technique or ritual, intended only to remind us of who we are. When we remember, they become irrelevant.

It is never about any 'other', as we are not separate. In that realization, there is no 'other'.

When I breathe, and allow myself to relax into the breath, I am carried effortlessly into the much larger life that awaits my living of it. All I have to do is be willing to show up and get out of my own way. The rest takes care of itself.

This time, I was so mindful of the elements. The warmth of the sun. The rain. The winds relationship with the water. The movement of the trees. The birds. Sounds and sensations all 'round. Enlivened elements all around! This time, as requested, we had the clear evidence of the presence of the elements, without the drama! No doubt, Carole appreciated that one. :)

This time, it is as if the elements came out to play! With a gentle fury and an unmistakable presence, the elements flowed their energy through all that we created. As we approached the Higher Self Connection on Saturday night, late afternoon brought a calming of the winds and a light but dense fog (really! both at the same time!) wrapped itself around Oceanstone so that we were cocooned. Later that night, as we walked in the dark to our cabin just up the hill, I could hear the unbelievable roar of the ocean...and for a moment, was deeply grateful that I could not see what it was up to! No doubt, I slept much better for it.

This year, the experience of the Higher Self Connection was a collective one. The effect was that of a 'pattern enhancer' effect for each of us. I wonder what called to me to engage that way...

I know that next year, for the 5th Annual Huna Retreat at Oceanstone, it will shape itself differently and yet, in some way, its elements will be the same. I am always delighted and surprised by it all.

One thought that stayed with me through the three days, just kept tugging at my soul. I was very aware of the gift to the world by the Hawaiian people of the Aloha Spirit. At great cost to themselves, they showed us that it was possible to live from that state of 'invite and allow'. I continue to believe it to be possible AND that we do not have to lose ourselves because of it.

Aloha with edges. Fire, Water, Earth and Air - all present. In that, I too can become all present.

Breathing is good.....

Small groups - big impact

2007-10-18T21:19:00.000-04:00

Day 4 of Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed is over. This small group of women covered more ground in four days than most of us cover in four years.

It wasn't always easy and it wasn't always fun - and it was worth every second. Today, they look and sound different. They are more awake..more present...more connected to themselves. They have clarity. They have a willingness to engage. They have the desire to continue to discover more about themselves.

I continue to believe that women are the key. Each of these women is going home today, more aware of themselves and their potential to have an impact on their world - for no reason other than their willingness to be authentic.

Thirty seconds of authenticity can undo decades of cultural conditioning. No wonder so many are terrified of it and committed to preventing it.

Before we can find its meaningful expression, we must redefine leadership so that we can live it in ways that do not destroy us and the people we love.

I'm tired and know that it has been worth every second. I know there will be many, many more Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed experiences. As women gather in small groups, I'll be there to open doors, identify pathways and gateways, and invite and allow. In those moments, it will all unfold exactly as it should.

Breathing is good....

Leadership as a result

2007-10-18T13:17:00.000-04:00

Day 4 - and we're almost done. Bellies full from yet another great meal at Oceanstone; a few off to shop at Peggy's Cove; and we return to complete the cycle of this experience in readiness for the next. Beginnings and endings and new beginnings - all standing in the same space, at a different time.

Who would have thought that we could pack so much living into such a short period of time! Time invested is irrelevant to transformation. It happens in a breath.

So far, it has become abundantly clear that leadership is only a process at lower levels of thinking...at operational levels and below. At higher levels of thinking, leadership becomes an outcome, sourced by an experience of authenticity that becomes the invitation for that in others.

In the industrial model, leadership is a set of behaviours. In a quantum world, leadership is an experience that is the byproduct of something else. That 'something else' can and will create a new world for us all.

I'll be back later....and breathing IS good.

Leadership is a state of mind....

2007-10-17T22:34:00.000-04:00

Day 3 of the 'Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed' women's retreat. More than any other time, today it is very clear to me: leadership is a state of mind. It has nothing to do with credentials, positional leverage, social status, etc....it has to do with who we are.

LIke charity begins at home, leadership begins in creating our own lives. We lead the same way we live. How can it be otherwise? What is leadership without the leader? Am I a living expression of that which I seek from/demand of others?

Does 'leadership' require 'follower-ship'? Our current models of and philosophies about leadership are profoundly out-of-step with all that we know of a quantum world. I wonder what it is that continues to have us believe that we can move forward in the discovery of a quantum world and continue to be who we have already been...and lead as we have always led? Just how silly are we.....

Leadership is personal....highly personal...perhaps even an experience and/or expression that is intimate. Intimacy with 'self'. Leadership as 'being' rather than 'doing'. We talk about it as a philosophy...but do we have what it takes to live it?

It's been a long day.

Breathing is good....

The ragged edge of intensity

2007-10-16T22:24:00.000-04:00

Day 2 of the Emerging Futures: Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed. Metaphors are wonderful things. Today's was that of smoke leaving the fireplace and wafting into the room. It was not the only smoke there.

Through the day, I was aware of the degree to which women have become habituated to being nice; to staying in the conversations at the level of the veneer and not straying too close to the wood. As I sit and listen, another conversation forms itself inside me - the one that speaks to lives in a box...or lives existing and not lived...or lives on 'pause' while waiting for something to make living it more interesting. In those moments, clear that what it will take to disturb the deep sleep of habituation and complacency is something robust and rugged enough to stand the mind-and-body numbing effects of coma; and ragged and jagged enough to penetrate the thick calous that has formed over this successful, reasonable and moderate life. I wonder sometimes, if the coma is better or worse than the shock of waking up.

It's not up to me to decide which is better. It is up to me to trust them - and myself - and recognize that if they have chosen to put themselves into these conversations, they are doing so because they're ready for the acceleration that comes with it.

Day 2 and it feels like we've been here for weeks! And, as much as I know how that feels, I also know that when Thursday rolls around to 4:30 and it's time to leave, it will all have passed in the blink of an eye.

Were I to identify what I believe is the most detrimental of the multitude of ways that women keep themselves small, it would be to presume that other women can't take it...can't handle it...are not up to the task of engaging in ways that are clear, open, honest and direct. Women do this with each other and presuppose that to demonstrate any authentic expression of that which is raw and ragged is somehow going to overwhelm the 'other'. In all the years that I've been working with women, I can count on one hand those who have been overwhelmed by an authentic expression by another - even when accompanied by intensity and noise. On one hand! That's not bad. I've been doing this for 20 years.

Today, as our day came to a close, I asked all of the women to ponder this question: what comes to mind when you think of being alone? When you consider that taking a stand for something that is deeply meaningful to you may result in others moving away from you, what is it like to consider being alone? What is the relationship between leadership and standing alone?

Tomorrow, we move to a smaller space that is closer to the edge of the water. A stiff wind, and the Atlantic will be lapping at the door! In much closer physical contact and in conversations that will cut closer to the bone, the intensity will increase yet again. I have no idea where the exploration of leadership will go AND I do know that it will be compelling and riveting! These leadership conversations are not about redefining leadership 'out there' but are about redefining and reshaping leadership as an expression of the authentic and unique presence that each of these women happens to be.

There is no leadership 'out there'. There is only each of us, living an awakened life or running habits. Who we are as 'leader' will replicate that in the lives of others.

Breathing is good....

Women, breast cancer, food...and men

2007-10-16T04:57:00.000-04:00

I sit here, in the dark, feeling the need to write yet unsure about what seems to need saying such that my body has been awake since 4:30 a.m. Again, a restlessness that prods me to consciousness of body and mind, pushing for connection to my fingers and the keyboard. And so, here I am, not quite knowing where to start and ready to engage nonetheless.

I know the entangled threads of my own thoughts include notions of women and leadership; women and breast cancer; the need women seem to have to apologize when not agreeing or finding something lacking; food and its stranglehold on women and their bodies; and last, but most definitely not least, men. Were these neatly laid out in some pattern or framework, it would be much easier for me to collect my thoughts, one leading nicely to the next, formed in reason and supported by an obvious logic…..but such is not the case.

It is so much easier inside myself when that neat, logical pathway is there. I can feel confident and comfortable in the tidiness that logic seems to bring to a natural organization of information. However, what moves inside me does not feel like it will lead to answers. It feels much more like pieces of questions that, if asked, will somehow peel away to reveal the much larger, far more important question that is the underpinning of the chaos in my own mind – and THAT will bring some kind of relief by allowing a ‘truth’ to become identifiable so that t I can say ‘Ah, yes! There it is! That’s what it’s about!”

I have no idea what any of it is. I just know that it sits there….like a large meal taking far too long to complete its journey.

Women. We are an interesting specimen, indeed. We know we are more…we know we want more…and yet we seem so unwilling to just TAKE. We want, but even more we want to be invited to take. Permission given by other than self, that we may be our self..

Add to that the need to include everybody. The need to make sure that others are ok with our desire/need/want to take…even when permission is granted…unable to be/have more than anyone else without ensuring that we have at least, invited and tended to.

Women and men. Our apparent need to find ways to ensure that we do not imply that (how dare we!) we must move forward on our own. That at this time in the world, the vast majority of men will not engage differently because they cannot engage differently! In this moment, far more than not have been taken hostage by their own history and their genetics and over time, they have created eyes that can no longer see. Even though women can see, it is as if we feel the need to apologize for that and be sure to hold tight to the arm of men and insist that so can they.

Breast cancer. It’s not going away. Not only is it not going away, it’s spreading around the world. Glancing through the latest issue of Time magazine (which I bought to read on the plane and managed to leave on the floor of the media room at home, along with a couple of books….), it’s clear that there is much more to say about it – and I guess I’ll have to come back to this one next week. However, MY body tells me that there is an urgent need to pay attention. I don’t need anyone else to tell me that.

Women and their bodies. Food. Body. Connected and yet, one not really having much to do with the other. Body shape. Body size. Body mass – or lack thereof. Food as salve. Food as punishment. Food as temporary memory loss. Food as distraction. Food as a way of purging us of the truth of our own lives. Food as the cork in the bottle of our own outpouring of rage. Just how much of it has nothing to do with staying alive…staying well….and has so much more to do with acting out what we dare not engage directly?

And how are they all connected???? Because I know they are.

I know that women and our willingness to lead has something to do with men.

I know that women and our need to apologize when we see what they do not, has something to do with men.

I know that women and breast cancer has something to do with men.

I know that women and food and our bodies has something to do with men.

Is it about men? It can be – and much more, it’s about women. About how we abandon ourselves. How we pull in and make ourselves small. How we hold our breath so that we cannot be found. How we make ourselves crazy by knowing we are so much more and yet can’t seem to bring ourselves up to our full measure in the event that we tower over another. How we shuffle along, carrying on our backs the myths of the obligations and responsibilities that have long defined our purpose in the culture, crippling ourselves in the process and exhausting ourselves on the journey when we have barely begun.

Although it feels like a paradox, here’s what I believe: men don’t need me to take care of them or tend to them or make excuses for them. What men need from me is for me to be real; to claim what I see and engage; to move in the direction and with the speed that is who I am and not be less in my misguided need to coddle them. They don’t need it! They are very much up to reclaiming their own lost territory of Self! And when I do make myself less from my desire to be ‘caring’ and ‘compassionate’ and ‘considerate’, I sabotage it all by losing momentum and focus, and getting stuck in the morass of what is when all that could be fades into my habits of being. Perhaps we need to redefine caring, compassionate and considerate so that we can give without being consumed.

Women are dying. And men are dying, too. In body and in spirit. Losing interest in living the lives that we have because we cannot give ourselves permission to create the lives that we want.

If women do not break free from the very habits of culture that have taught them to be grateful for their bondage, there is no hope for the men, either. Women MUST make this journey alone and in the company of each other. I walk my path alone – no one can walk it for me – and when I look right and left, I see other women walking their path, alone.

On this trek, there is neither time nor place to carry another. It is up to women to find a new place to stand and take on the shaping and the creating. We must leave base camp and head up the mountain, becoming willing to make the climb on our own, facing its treacherous terrain and inclement weather. Are we up to it?

This is not an easy thing to do since we know that men have been making this climb for generations. “They know so much more about it! They have maps and signposts and tools! Maybe we can bring them with us so that we don’t get lost!” And in doing so, we will only go where they have already gone – and that will not serve any of us.

I have sons. I have a life partner. I have a brother. I have a father. I love them all – and I am responsible for none of them. My sons are their own unique presence and will shape their lives as they see fit. So will my partner and my brother and my father. Regardless of what I think they can be or should be, they define their lives. And the lives they define, I take no responsibility for. It is THIS approach that keeps us all vibrant and strong – and not necessarily in agreement! Individuals choosing to be in a collective, rather than a collective that demands surrender to its lowest common denominator.

The men in my life – the ones I live with and the ones that I have worked with – know that I do not look to them to save me, or carry me or fix it for me or guide me. What they do know is that I am both willing and able to stand alone; and I am also both willing and able to stand beside them and with them as they engage their own journey. I am formidable and do not apologize for it.

Sometimes, it is not about being equal. It is not about more or less. It is about emerging into the unique expression of who I am without self-imposed limitations. After all, if there are no ‘others’ handicapping my creations, my outcomes are truly my own. Lost to me is the possibility of making someone else responsible for what I create and I am left to face myself.

Breathing is good….

Rapid, profound and generative change

2007-10-15T22:12:00.000-04:00

Day 1 of 'Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed'. Although our day has been a leisurely one (3 hours in the morning and 3 hours in the afternoon), it feels as if we've been here for days! Insights, discoveries and instant change are not a function of time invested. They are the natural by-product of our willingness to be present, to be aware and to engage.

I watch...I listen...and in each voice, I hear the determination to have their choices be greater than their fear. I hear a willingness to stay in the tough conversations, particularly when those conversations are a direct threat to all that they know to be 'true' and 'real' and 'right'. This willingness leads to soon discovering that all these are maleable and can be redesigned to transform their lives.

Over dinner, we shared stories about our lives and the people in them. We laughed a lot! But then, seems to me that laughter is a given in so many conversations that I'm in. If we can't laugh at ourselves, the remaining choices are often those that make our lives so much smaller, very quickly.

The women in this experience are not ready to settle for less than who they know themselves to be capable of becoming, in their private and public lives. I have a lot of time for that; and I'm willing to do what it takes to move forward.

Tomorrow is another day and one that I know will be filled with surprises for us all.

Breathing is good.....

The power of contagion

2007-10-14T09:47:00.001-04:00

Human beings are contagious, of that there is no doubt. For me, the more important question has always been: what am I spreading?

Mindless contagion (the spread of a thought, behaviour or intention from one deeply habituated/sleeping being to another) will occur, whether I want it to or not. It's called enculturation. It is an essential part of who we are as living, organic systems. Far more potent are the implications of contagion of an awakened collective.

I just got a note from Frankie Picasso - host of Mission Unstoppable blogtalk radio. To date, there have been more than 190 downloads of our Thursday evening radio conversation that included Amy, Lori and Anne.

To me, this is what it's all about. Passing it on. People being willing to share with others an experience that has been meaningful for them. Being willing to declare themselves and be seen by others to have been drawn to and/or moved by something....anything!...that has awakened meaning in their day-to-day life.

When we are 'private' and 'secret' about what we are moved by, we end up stuck with what we've got. How could anyone know the potential we carry? How could the vision ... the dream that could shape our lives .... ever take hold when we are unwilling to do other than just dream?

Intention 2009 will happen - and it will happen because there is a new wave already moving. In this moment, I know that there are now 190 more awakened expressions of that wave....

Breathing is good....

Retreats and new projects

2007-10-14T09:31:00.001-04:00

Today, I leave for Oceanstone for a week. The first four days will be spent in the company of women, engaging in one of the most potent conversations I know of: that of 'Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed'....in an Emerging Futures context. This is the third such retreat, of which I know there will be many, many more.

This time, I had the opportunity to engage with each of the women in a one-hour conversation to explore what their interests/issues/concerns are, which was recorded for their personal use. Two weeks after the program, we'll do it again. Each woman will then have a record of her own journey and evolution, to be revisited in those moments when it seems that there is nothing they can do about their own lives. What I've learned over the years is that as we grow and evolve, re-listening offers new insights since we are not who we once were.

This trip also opens the door for me to another Huna Retreat. This, I do for me. Every year, in the company of 'ohana' (or family of choice), I get to relax into the Huna that has so profoundly shaped my life and just let it flow. I never know where it will go - and I am always suprised and delighted by the experience and its outcomes. This year, the experience is calling to and shaping itself around the notion of Connections....to Self, to each other and to our world. Given Intention 2009, this feels important and will carry through to the April 2008 Mauna Lani Experience and Huna Retreat. There are many big and life-altering changes coming and I know that for me, these are the stepping stones to moving easily through and to the other side.

Not exactly a hardshp! Seven nights at a 4-star, oceanfront retreat with great company, potent conversations, great food.....and at least one massage to ease my body into making sure that I stay open to it all! The people I love are all taken care of and it's a great day to travel. Life is good!

Lori will be joining me for Huna this year. Her recent posting to her second blog 'A Whole Healthy Me' has led to a project that will see Lori and I working together in a process to explore our relationship to food....and all of the things that eating represents that have nothing to do with hunger! Lori's courage and willingness to contribute has resulted in her agreement to record our conversations with the potential to share this process with others who may be experiencing the same kind of challenges. That's one project that I'm very eager to begin. Lori is fearless when it comes to her own evolution - and so am I.

Time to get on with packing. There is always much to bring to these experiences, including all the things that have to get squeezed into my suitcase!

Breathing is good.....

Radio interview now available

2007-10-12T12:42:00.000-04:00

Well, that was fun! Frankie Picasso created great space for Amy McNaughton, Lori Walton and Anne Thibeault-Berube and myself to talk about the things that are meaningful to each of us. Without exception, the four of us found that the time just flew by. Imagine...four women running out of chat time.... Who would have thought....

The link to the radio interview is:

http://BlogTalkRadio.com/missionunstoppable/2007/10/11/The-the-Company-of-Genius-In-the-Company-of-Women

(Other links to Frankie, Amy, Lori and Anne in posting of Thursday, October 9th, below.)

My hope is that many will go, listen, find something meaningful and pass this link along to others they feel would be awakened to somthing meaningful by listening to the interview. I know it will require that each of us turn up the volume on our own voice in order for a different sound to be heard above the defeaning roar of the white noise of our lives.

It occurred to me when the interview was over : what a great idea! What a great way to create yet another Space within which Intention 2009 can come to life! I'm about to look into creating an interactive process that will invite listeners from around the world to engage in conversations about the evolution of the species; and how each of us is a unique and critical part of that process. (Without the individual,there is no potential for a collective.) This is a conversation that focuses on the global outcome through the individual awakening. I think of it as an application of 'Think globally - act locally' to human behaviour and its impact on the collective. I can't change the collective. What I can do is change myself and naturally infect the collectinve just be being that changed Self.

Amy, Lori and Anne were terrific! As I listened to them interact with Frankie, I felt so grateful to be me, with each of them in my life. I remember them all when we first met; and I heard in their voices so much more the truth of who they have already become in the world. As much as they each have already made profound changes in their lives and the lives of those around them, I know that each of them is destined to have an impact on the world. They are willing to see and be seen, to have their voices ring out loud and clear AND they have valuable and important wisdom to share with us all - each in her own, unique way. Life is good!

Last night reminded me of days gone by when I was part of several radio and tv live, call-in, hour-long shows. I loved it! No...not strong enough...I LOVED IT!! For me, there is this wonderful, intense, dynamic, creative tension in those live experiences. Real people, real life....real potential waiting to awaken. I'm up for that.

I'd love to talk with people from around the world on what's meaningful for them in the whole personal/global transformation conversation. Over my lifetime, I've known of so much transformation promised and so little delivered. I know, without a doubt, that it is not about US. It is not that we are not up to it or willing. It is that the process that we are already stuck in, with our humanity as we've been taught to believe it to be, is not BIG ENOUGH to make room for us to be able to find what we seek.

I know transformation - in an instant! - is possible and available and accessible to us all. I've seen it - over and over again - for the last 20 years. I know how it works and I know that every single one of us is up to it. I also know that if we don't know HOW, we end up frustrated, angry, resentful and bitter that our great efforts go unrewarded and without the benefit of the outcomes we desire. Life ceases to be an adventure and becomes a sentence to be served. Not pretty.

I learned long ago: I cannot experience a paradigm shift (i.e. transformation) from the paridigm that I'm in. The trick is how to move from the paradigm I'm alread in to the one that will allow for what I want. My intellect hasn't a clue. My body knows the way, if I will only allow it to take me there.

Stay tuned...literally! There is much more to come.

Breathing is good.....

New Awards Dinner for Women

2007-10-11T12:32:00.001-04:00

I recently got an email from a woman in BC requesting nominations for women considered worthy of recognition for having done something/created something/given something/made something happen/etc.... It struck me that without exception (at least, in my awareness of how it works), all is premised on the need for someone else to say that you are worthy/deserving/etc.

Women are particularly bad at this. Although many men are able to stand and tell the world how wonderful they are and what great things they've accomplished, most women I've come in contact with are very uneasy about doing just that. We hang back...waiting to be seen, to be invited, to be acknowledge, to be given permission to speak/do/act by someone outside of us. We've become very adept at only allowing ourselves to be what we think other people see us as. We hide so much of who we are.

So, it struck me : it's time for an Awards Banquet for Women (men can be guests) called 'Toot Your Own Horn Awards' (TYOH awards). At these awards, women get to stand up and declare to the world what they want to the world to know about what they've created/designed/manifested/etc. that has profoundly changed their lives and holds the potential to have an impact on the world.

None of this waiting for someone else, in their finite wisdom, to point the finger in your direction and cast a light into the shadows in which you stand! We'll have no more of that!

Picture this: women who are ready for a TYOH award purchase a table of 8 and invite 7 people that they want to share their lives with. Each woman who purchases a table gets to speak for 15 uninterrupted minutes, in whatever way works best for her, about what she has created, what difference it makes and why it's important to her. Imagine what wonders will unfold!

Great and powerful voices, speaking to manifestations that are unique and highly personal! The only criteria for consideration is that you care enough to take a stand for what is meaningful to you.

Count me in on that one! I've already got 7 people in my life that I want to share this evening with. And you can be sure that it will be in a beautiful place, with great food and great service, and we'll be treated with the great consideration we desire....and are willing to create for ourselves.

Hmmm...I must get to work on that one.....

Breathing is good!

Upcoming Radio Show

2007-10-09T20:48:00.001-04:00

This Thursday, from 5:00 to 6:00 pm Ottawa time, I'll be a guest on the internet radio show Mission Unstoppable with Coach Frankie Picasso. The conversation will focus on the new four-day women's retreat called Emerging Futures: Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed.

I'll be joined by Lori Walton, Amy McNaughton and Anne Thibeault-Berube, all of whom were in the original pilot in June. In their own words, we'll discover the difference that this women's retreat has made in their lives.

I'll be leaving for Halifax on Sunday for the next offering of this women's retreat. I know that the June program propelled me and others present into taking action NOW rather than 6 weeks or 6 months from now. As a result, lives have already been changed. I know that Amy, Lori and Anne all have compelling and important stories to tell of the impact, for each of them.

My colleague and friend Sheila sent me a note yesterday, mentioning that she had just noticed that 2009 is the date on the Institute's Declaration of Evolution by Intention. Her comment was: "When I first read about the 2009 goal on Evolution by Intention, I thought it was a lofty undertaking. Now, I KNOW that it is imperative that it get out there, so others can even consider it as a choice. I am totally amazed by the sheer ease of it, and the SIMPLICITY of it, and the ALOHA of it, and, yet, the incredible depth and breadth of it. Genius!"

I know that the WEL-Systems body of knowledge, Quantum TLC, The CODE Model, Evolution by Intention and Emerging Futures change lives - quickly, profoundly, generatively and effortlessly. After almost 20 years of results, there is no question about that. It is not that I believe everyone should engage in this experience; it is that I want everyone to have access that they might choose for themselves.

I, for one, am unwilling to struggle through my life when I know there are other ways.

Breathing is good.....

Giving thanks....

2007-10-08T10:39:00.001-04:00

I’ve been pondering this notion of ‘thanksgiving’…of giving thanks. I was wondering to whom I am giving thanks?

It may well be that many give thanks to their god for their lives. Others don’t have anyone to thank in that there is no god in their lives. And still others feel that they have nothing to give thanks for. If anything, they’re angry, resentful and filled with fear.

For me, I am mindful less of giving thanks and much more of taking this time to pause and take an extended look at my life. In this pause is an awareness that I have created it all – the ‘good’ and the ‘bad’ – and in that awareness, I am mindful of the opportunities for discovery, growth, evolution and potential that my life is a living invitation to consider.

In the moment of this pause, perhaps more than anything else, I am aware that I am loved. I have surrounded myself with people who welcome me into their lives, who value my presence in it and who both welcome and accept me as I am.

I am aware that those who I call family are healthy, well, vibrant, playful and full of potential! Each is their own unique person, with their unique way of moving through their world. The measure of my appreciation of them in this uniqueness means that there are times when their lives include me and other times when their lives are unfolding on a holodeck that does not overlap with mine. It is these streams of new life that make my own that much more interesting.

I am aware that my life and that of the people I love is big, expansive and ever-changing. In this constant flow and flux, there is great joy for me! There are times when the content of that flow and flux can bring me tears, and there are far more times that it brings me a great sense of adventure. In this immense Space, potential unfolds..and as I face into it, I always become more.

I am aware that I have created my life from my choices: from my willingness to listen and to reveal; from my vulnerability and my strength; from my courage and my fear. And it is all mine! Not one moment do I hold as anyone else’s responsibility or creation. Not one breath do I take that I believe anyone else has forced me to breathe…or prevented me from doing so.

I am aware that I choose and then choose again, trusting that each choice is the ‘right’ one for that moment. I have discovered that to be bold in living from one breath to the next; to be unwilling to be bound by who I was yesterday or five minutes ago, is to be constantly in the invitation to be fully alive. As much as this can have its challenges for us all, I am also aware that those who are in my life soon give themselves permission to claim this for themselves. And in that choice, they too become more.

I am aware that my life is full of rich, powerful, compelling and life-enhancing conversations. Conversations with people with whom I am deeply intimate. Conversations with strangers who quickly become so much more. Conversations with those new to my life and those long present. Conversations with individuals and with those who gather in small groups. Conversations that provoke and those that heal. Face-to-face, by email, on the phone….each one crackles with its immediate potential for life to be lived – fully and NOW.

In those rare and brief moments when I forget who I am…when I am lost in the fog of my unwillingness to own my life...a simple sound inside me becomes the pathway home. It is the sound of my own breath, moving in and out of my body. I surrender to it. I fall back into it, like welcoming arms ready to hold me and guide me and do for me what I cannot seem to do for myself. This sound fills my body, soothes my mind and lifts my spirit so that I am able to see beyond my own limitations. In that moment, I am above all that seems to bind me to what I am not, and I can find my way.

I am deeply appreciative of my life and all that graces its expression: the people, the events, the moments in time that linger and become the platform for more. I love and am loved. I am awake. I am willing and able. I expect my life to be a reflection of the rhythm of who I am…of the strength of my beating heart; of the pulse that guides all that flows through me; and most of all, of the connection that I am a living expression of - that connection to the essence of my being that allows it all to be as it is.

I am aware of and deeply value the godforce that I am in the world. I am also aware of the godforce that each of the others who surround me, in my life, also is in the world. I call. Some answer and some do not. And in it all, the godforce that I AM honors that in each of them.

I know that choosing, creates. I know that how I choose, creates my life. In this moment, I choose to recognize all that I have created and be at peace. What I now seek for myself in my world is to create a collective of others who recognize this in themselves and create a collective that is at peace with its own creations. In this, a new world unfolds. It is not about doing anything to the world that we have – it is about manifesting the one we desire.

Breathing is good….

Diving deep and surfacing

2007-10-01T17:57:00.000-04:00

Where does the time go? I'm beginning to notice that on the holodeck of my experience, time is doing some interesting things.

Two weeks ago, I had my first experience of Manifesting a Meaningful Life . All I can say is WOW! - what an incredible ride! I'm happy to say that given all that is emerging in my life, I recorded the full six days. I know there were many times when things were coming out of my mouth and I had no idea what they were about. Only when completed, had another slice of life fallen into place. I look forward to listening to the recordings. I know that there is much there for me to discover.

That's a strange feeling. KNowing that the words that came out of my mouth are somehow new to me....and hold new information of which I was not aware when the words were actually spoken. I wonder what that is - and at the same time, I trust it completely.

2008 is lining up to be a year that manifests new gateways. Gateways that allow for acceleration. Gateways that invite new ways to experience my world. I'm eager for it all to continue to unfold and know that all I have to do is continue to trust the truth of my experience, from one breath to the next.

Last week was equally busy and spent more in play. Took a few days to spend time with my Mom who - for those who know her! - is no hardship to be with. I can't remember the last time I laughed that hard. My mother is one of the most irreverant, sassy and enlivened people I know! This is one time that I sure hope it's genetic.....

This week is already full of exciting and compelling invitations for discovery. Amy has a new office in Dartmouth! Lori is visiting in Ottawa and making her way through the Nation's capital - on foot. Others from the Manifesting experience are taking off like a shot, moving with the force of intention into manifesting their lives in ways that are meaningful to them. And that is really what it's all about. Without meaning, manifesting becomes a force on the loose, kind of like a hose left lying on the ground with water gushing through it. It goes this way and then that, guided only by the force itself with no framework of meaning. I know the women who were here two weeks ago are indeed, a force to be reckoned with.

There is always more. More discovery. More creation. More people to play with. More growth and evolution. My world is an amazing place in which to live and I am grateful for every moment. As I consider the months to come - the time at Oceanstone for the Women's Leadership Retreat, the Huna Retreat; as I consider the coming November experiences for CODE Model Guide certifications; as I look forward to stepping boldly into the next book; and as I breathe a sigh of peace as I know Kona approaches, I know my life is magical. I also know that a magical life is a choice.

One last thing: I was blown away by the magnificence of the space created by Carole and Peter in Knowlton. Grace...immense space....beauty...and a welcoming that melts my heart. Carole and I have been friends since grade 9. Am I that old???? To this day, I have never heard her say an unkind word about another soul. Is there a category for that for the NObel Prize?

Breathing is good....

Manifestation, Meaning, Spirals and Essential Being

2007-09-25T11:38:00.000-04:00

I’m back from an intense journey into Manifesting a Meaningful Life. Seven of us chose to engage and stay with some of the most intense, provocative, compelling and sometimes most difficult conversations that I’ve had the honor of being part of, for some time.

When I think about the life that I’ve created for myself…the life that I’ve manifested from what holds meaning for me, from the essence of who I am in the world….I am mindful that my life really is magic. Every now and then, in the midst of what was unfolding in the room, I would become aware of this ‘mindfulness’ in the background…this sense of being absolutely delighted at it all! This is my life! Every day, filled with conversations that have meaning in my life and in the life of others. Every day, filled with big belly laughs, big tears, lots of hugs and a willingness to live large. Every day, discovering more about myself in a way that makes it impossible for me to NOT see the ‘more’ in everyone around me. I like my life. I am truly blessed.

Surrounded by people who are awake and willing to engage; people of courage and stamina and depth on all fronts; people who are willing to laugh at themselves and have the courage to challenge their own ‘truths’ and ‘reality’, my week has left me filled with great hope for us all. Although my body needs to just hang out and do nothing for a couple of days (maybe doing some of that ‘nothing’ by worshipping at the Temple of Tim’s), I feel gratified, fulfilled and ready for the next wave of my own evolution. I know there is always more.

The notion of ‘Emerging Futures’ is a powerful one! With the gracious support and permission of those others in the experience with me, the entire six days were recorded, from beginning to end. I have become aware of how so much of what comes out of my mouth is impossible for me to repeat. I have moments when in the flow of the words themselves, some other part of me is startled by the statement and excited by the discovery. This time, it’s all recorded.

I know there were some incredible waves of information on manifestation, meaning and the link between the two. Information on the connection between ‘essential being’ and our experience of ‘meaning’. There were also waves and waves of information on Manifestation Spirals – how they work and how to engage with them, with intention. There was some great new information/insights on The Great Cosmic Tit (yes, I know…some would prefer that I find another way to express this…and it is what it is!). And all of it has been captured and recorded.

Each of us in this process will no longer be the same – and we will forever be becoming more. Of that, in me, there is no doubt. From this last experience will come another manifestation/meaning experience that will weave itself through the new ‘Emerging’ five-day. I now know where it can go…how far it can go…and how powerfully it can unfold. We really are up to it.

As much as I sometimes wonder why I’m here, these are the experiences that remind me of what sources it all. There is a fundamental truth that underlies everything that I am…that I do…that I engage – and that is: I AM the godforce…and so is everyone else. Imagine who we will have become when we free ourselves of an external god and make room for us to discover it in each other. Imagine what creations await when we re-awaken to the truth of that inside the ‘I’ that I am. In that single breath, the world will redefine itself.

Breathing is good…..

Manifesting....Meaning

2007-09-19T12:38:00.000-04:00

Day 3 of 'Manifesting a Meaningful Life' is half-way through. As much as I am a full participant in this process in one way, I am also separate from it in other ways.

What it says to me is that I can chanage my life - completely! - in the blink of an eye.

It tells me that manifestation shaped by meaning creates a magical life.

It tells me that it's easy and can produce results in less than 3 days.

Wow! My life...their lives...and all of it a template for living - period.

And now, I dive back into exploring and discovering the rest of my life.

Breathing is good....

Women's Voices - Women's Choices

2007-09-13T10:11:00.000-04:00

Kofi Annan has said that the future of the world is in the hands of women. Others have said similar things. Inside - where I live - I know this to be true.

Women are unbelievably powerful! Not when we strive to be like men but when we choose to be the woman that we are. We are still the gender that gives birth. We are still the hand that rocks the cradle - and shapes the future. When we forget that - not because of its function but because of the form from which it emanates - we become complacent and silent partners to our own demise.

The September Newsletter carries a piece that I wrote because it is meaningful to me. I've included it below.

Women's Voices - Women's Choices

Women talk. It’s what we do. It’s also one of the things we do best.

We come together in small clusters and we talk about the things that matter to us. We talk about the people we care about. We talk about our dreams and the things that get in the way. We talk about what we love and what we hate. We talk about our children, and their children, and how their worlds are working or not.

So essential to who we are is our desire to talk that it has long been the butt of jokes, held up for scorn and ridicule, and made fun of in sitcoms, cartoons and the movies. So compelling is its impact on all of our lives that the simple act of choosing NOT to speak, in and of itself, wreaks havoc and causes great distress to the people around us. In our stony silence, the absence of what we do so naturally becomes the punishment that others must endure.

We are not just talking to hear the sound of our own voice – we are shaping our worlds.

Conversations. Conversations that connect us. Conversations that allow us to move closer together or push apart. Conversations that redirect focus and attention, the nature of which will feed or starve an issue, an event or an intention. Conversations designed to soothe or disrupt; to create space or collapse it; to build relationships or to destroy them.

Conversations. Conversations filled with tears of joy, of fear or of rage! Conversations that forgive and others that let us get even. Conversations that are designed to make us forget. Conversations all, fueled by the words that flow up and through us, carried by the sound of our unique voice and tumbling out of our mouths. Without exception, they end up designing our lives and that of the people we care about. They invite or force change; or they keep us locked into the patterns that are already shaping our lives.

This is not to be messed with! These conversations can make or break a person or a process; build an empire or destroy one; lift spirits – ours and that of others – or cause hope to come crashing to the ground. They can shape an outcome or make it disappear entirely from our reality. The ‘slip of a tongue’ can transform lives faster than any great plan or strategy ever could. Small wonder that so many, for so long, have made fun of it. Were we to recognize in ourselves the power of this force that so many others fear, we would end our commitment to living small, colorless lives.

Women are the world’s masters at gathering in small groups and having conversations. Effortlessly masterful.

Women are also the world’s best hope for a living, organic collective that supports life.

Gather this force mindfully and direct it with intention. Gather the force of what comes naturally to us; determine that this world and its future are up to us; and begin the conversations that offer hope, evoke potential and define new ways of being. The ones that free us from the secrets that keep our world small and dark. The ones that keep us bound to the 'truth' of the dogma that our bodies know to be lies. The ones that reveal to the world who we are, what we care about and that we are no longer willing to hide behind the veil of our history, our cultural conditioning or the shame, long carried, that does not belong to us.

What we talk about with each other can change our world! Many among us have already chosen to awaken from the cultural slumber that has allowed us to lie still and silent while our lives have been determined for us by others. . These voices now carry the quality of an aware and unique presence, given strength by their discoveries from Fully Alive….or Sekhmet Rising or the Horses book….or the Women and Power cd’s….and they are awake! The alternative is to continue to keep our voices small and tinny that we may tolerate the drivel that consumes our lives.

As we harness the power of that at which we are effortlessly masterful; as we become determined to engage in conversations worthy of the sound of our own voices and the magnitude of our own potential; as we gather the women in small groups and bring voice to the deeper truth we all carry, we have begun to declare: we are this world’s best hope.

Louise

I have chosen to share it with others in the event that something...some small vibration of remembrance...will awaken in other women. A vibration that will grow in density and intensity and strength that will allow us to be who we are naturally, to do what we do naturally and to engage it all for a deeper truth that will allow the force that we are - particularly as a collective! - to emerge.

Women's Voices - Women's Choices is, in some way, my declaration of what I believe it will take to profoundly change our world - quickly! Women sitting around the kitchen table. Women in conversations over lunch. Women chairing staff meetings, board meetings and family disputes. Women chatting while they tend to their children, at home or at the park. Women talking about designs, of buildings and clothing and people's lives. Women - on telephones, in letters, on email - with other women talking about themselves. Not about the stories they tell of what was or what could have been but about their truths long hidden and now revealed.

Breathing is good.....

Inevitable destination

2007-09-10T18:14:00.000-04:00

I'm noticing how easy it is to slide back into the status quo....to let the steady hum of habit take over living moment-to-moment, resulting in what was becoming our only choice for what can become.

It takes effort - of body, mind and spirit - to stay awake. Why? Not because sleep is the essence of our being. On the contrary, I believe being awake is our essential nature. However, I am also mindful of how the dense mass that surrounds us applauds and rewards, encourages and welcomes that coma of habituation. Perhaps the greatest challenge to us all and the greatest leverage that the culture of coma has, is that we hate to play alone. We would prefer to play a game that is not of our choosing than to find ourselves alone and without playmates.

We are more willing to surrend ourselves to the mindless game than we are to create one for ourselves...than we are to playing alone.

We more easily slip into pretending who we are not than we are able to stay true to who we are if doing so demands that we be the only light in the perceived dark.

We are more willing to lie to be wanted by others than we are to risk standing alone in a truth that might result in solitude and copious amounts of our own company.

All that, and we are still mangificent! It just goes to prove that our inevitable destination is the truth of who we are. I guess the only real choice we have to make is how long we want it to take for us to get there.

Breathing is good.....

The Turtle is back!

2007-09-09T16:57:00.000-04:00

Years ago, on my second trip to Kona, Hawaii, I was drawn to a ring. A silver ‘shield’ that covers the finger from knuckle to knuckle, it carries a carved silver turtle on its back and two sea shells, with an amethyst nestled between the sea shells. I wore it constantly for many years, such that the band took the shape of my finger; never taking it off except to clean it and even then, for only very brief periods of time. And then one day, I could no longer find it.

I searched everywhere I could think of for that ring! Every box, drawer, nook and cranny; every purse and suitcase; home, office, floor of the car…and no ring to be found. I learned to not think about it (much!), trusting that it was still on my holodeck somewhere and in my universe and that when the time was ‘right’ (whatever that meant) it would come back into my life.

And it’s back! Turns out it was indeed sitting in a bag…in a box…in a bigger box….in a drawer that I had long ceased to think of as my own. Hmmmm….I wonder what those are all metaphors for….

The moment I found it, it went back on to my finger. Ever since, things have been moving at mach speed. Ideas coming fast and furious. Events unfolding effortlessly and with grace. Others coming into my life in ways that invite huge growth on my part and, quite likely, theirs too. Although I’ve been told (likely by the woman who sold me the ring!) that turtles are symbols of prosperity and abundance, I took a moment to revisit what is said about turtles.

“The turtle is a creature of two elements, Earth and water. The people of the Turtle Clan share an affinity with both. They enjoy helping things grow, both plants and people, yet require freedom to do their own things, as the turtle has its freedom in the water. “

That had a resonance and somehow, felt familiar. Funny part is, I’ve never been drawn to Earth and Water, and have long felt at home with Fire and Air. What occurs to me is that Fire and Air, without Water and Earth, are an incomplete expression of the potential of Ether or I’o in my world. I’ll have to think more about that one.

I moved to another web page to look specifically for a Hawaiian perspective.

“Honu means turtle in Hawaiian. The honu is considered a symbol of the island (the word for land is 'Aina honua). The Sea Turtle Is A Sacred Spiritual Guide Known As An Aumakua. Honu Is The Symbol Of Peace, Good Luck And Long Life.”

All of that feels ‘right’ for me, too. Something has changed since I rediscovered my turtle and have melded myself with it. It is not by accident that the ring re-surfaced shortly after my explorations of Hawaii, its history and its people had been rekindled. I know that the months between now and April when I am at the Mauna Lani for the Emerging Futures: Huna experience, will deepen, widen and expand in ways that will further stretch who I might become.

Soon, I will turn much of my attention to completing the new Huna book. I know that it will now be different. How do I know that? The turtle is back.

Breathing is good…..

I AM...and what more can there be?

2007-09-07T15:00:00.000-04:00

Wow! Where have I been??? It feels as if space and time have compressed and I went to bed on August 29th and woke up on September 7th! How kool is that! Louise-Van-Winkle….

Looking back, it feels as if I’ve come through some kind of maze….have maneuvered myself through experiences and conversations and discoveries that churned and turned and twisted themselves in ways that were invitations for me to look much deeper into myself. I must say, I am delighted with what I’ve found.

I’ve been ‘doing this’ for a long time. More than 25 years of my life have been lived in pressing the edges of what I knew ‘myself’ to be. In those years, I’ve grown; have found new things and let go of old ones; have felt amazingly connected and terrifyingly alone. And through it all, I have become MORE than I ever imagined possible. The interesting part for me is that THAT was the process that took me where I needed to go. No good/bad; no right/wrong, just living and engaging and being….and becoming.

I’ve discovered that this ‘more’ does not need to take a long time, nor does it need to be a struggle. What it does seem to require and demand is that I be completely and (what some might call) brutally honest – with myself. No room in there to fool myself or tell myself the stories that I would like to have be true – about myself. Far more potent has been my willingness to allow myself to see what I know – deep inside, where I live – is the truth of who I am. Sometimes, I discover it to be beautiful. Other times, it feels ugly and nasty and cruel. And truth be told, it's all me.

In the years that I’ve been experiencing, creating and living what has come to be known as the ‘WEL-Systems body of knowledge’, I am aware that some have found me to be a delight – and others have held me as the devil herself! Over the years, I’ve gotten hundreds of ‘love letters’ from those whose lives have been powerfully transformed and I’ve gotten a sprinkling of not-so-much-love letters from those whose lives have been equally powerfully touched…and held in check by their commitment to their own truth. Either way, I am grateful for each has been the invitation for me to see myself through the eyes of another. And yet…I wonder…in a holographic universe (which I hold to), is there ever really ‘another’?

When I look back on the last week or so, I have no idea where I’ve been and I am very clear of where I am. I AM. I AM all of it…the perceived good and the bad; the creation and the destruction; the expansion and the collapse. I AM the joys and the sorrows; the delights and the fears; the questions and the answers. In that moment of awareness of it all, there is nothing that I do not already know. The more important question becomes: am I both willing and able to live it? And am I both willing and able to live it FULLY?

Today, I am clear that the answer to that is a resounding, compelling, powerful, profoundly and deeply vibrating YES! Wherever my life leads me, and however it takes me there, I choose to go with the full measure of who I AM. And for me, there is nothing other worth investing my time, my thoughts, my energy or my life in.

Breathing is good….

Inventing fields

2007-08-29T12:53:00.000-04:00

I've been watching the moon out of my bedroom window. These last few nights, it's reminded me of my trip to Mauna Kea and the observatories on the Big Island. The night I was there, the moon was so full and bright that we could not look at it through the telescope. Blinding! That was the same night I saw a 'moonbow'....a rainbow but from the moon....a breathtakingly beautiful arc in the sky, pearl-white and shimmering. Wow....that was worth the trip....

That moon slowly drifting across the clear, crisp night sky has been causing me to notice how much longer it's been here than I have. I wonder how many civilizations this same moon has borne witness to, both in their beginnings and their endings? And do they really end, or do they just get mushy at the edges and a new one forms itself from what's left of the old. Kind of like those biscuits that are perpetually grown from the same yeast mixture. Endless. No beginnings and no endings. Just a constant ebbing and flowing.

In that thought, another emerged...the thought of life/culture/civilization as a huge, extensive game of Monopoly. I remember playing Monopoly, always eager to engage and then often finding myself tiring of the game and wondering 'When will this end???'. The game went back and forth, with some players falling away, and with two strong players remaining. It became Monopoly-ad-nauseaum. And boring. Just how long can we keep doing the same things, over and over again, and stay with it?

I wondered....how many times have we (energy beings that we are) played this same game? How many times have we come to the brink because we were unable to get past the existing game's rules and give ourselves permission to invent a new game? Like the Phoenix rising from the ashes of the old. Maybe ashes are a critical part of life.

So many years spent, by so many people, wondering what field of practice to go into and how to 'rise to the top' of that field when, quite possibly, the far more powerful question is: what field of practice shall I invent today? How the WEL-Systems community came into being was from noticing one day that I no longer wanted to be part of the existing way of moving through the world so I invented a new one - and invited others to play. Today, I am always in great company!

If I were to just allow myself to 'become', what might the impact be on 'becoming' as a process, itself? Bringing into expression that which does not yet exist and, in its creation, will reshape what does exist. A new game!

This '6 days to live' thing has certainly caused me to focus. I seem to be happiest when I don't have a clue! :) I wonder how I got that way....and even more, where it will take me.

As I was driving to the office, I caught snippets of a conversation on CBC about how varying labs around the world are working on teleportation. That appeals to me...and I know it's real. Just where do I want to go?

Breathing is good.....

More on intensity

2007-08-28T21:02:00.000-04:00

It's another one of those moments that just showed up...in the middle of nothing even remotely connected to the notion/topic/idea...and caught me by surprise.

Years ago, when I was about to turn 40, I was in a good job, doing my thing and not thinking about any of it too much. I can't say that I was unhappy. It was more that I was busy living and hadn't really noticed too much of any of it.

As I approached that 'big day', my then-husband said to me: "Just think - only 25 more years to go." I froze! I was stunned at the truth of it. having gone completely unnoticed by me. In that nanosecond, I knew that if I kept doing what I was doing, I would be a drunk or a junkie (prescription meds are no less an addiction) or dead. In that single breath, I knew that I had to go.

Today, it was that same moment only now I'm older and wiser. And the same thought holds court: only 8 more years to go. How do I want to make those 8 years most meaningful to ME?

I know why and how I started all this in 1990. I also know how incredible this journey has been for me and for so many others. And still...I wonder...what is the next quantum leap that I know is there for me to take? As with all Emerging Futures, I have no content for what it is/will be. I only know that it's moving and the question is always "Do I have what it takes to trust it and allow myself to be carried?"

A small group is gathering soon in Ottawa. As with my instincts of January 2006, this same need is the attractor. The image that comes to mind is the gathering of dark storm clouds on the horizon. Not dangerous...not scary...and symbols of powerful energy gathering. When I see those coming, I know things are about to change.

Breathing is good....

Blink: different world!

2007-08-27T18:13:00.000-04:00

My world is changing - fast! My world - the world my sons will inherit from me as one of its architects - is in dire need of change.

Change will come, inevitably. What I care about is whether that change comes from a state of awakened, mindful choice or from the peristaltic movement of my history forcing its way through the tight, narrow tubular structures of my own way of thinking. This is not unique to me. We have all been encouraged to surrender ourselves to this movement, as we have encouraged our children to surrender themselves. Fractals...

I am becoming more and more clear on how I choose to live, galvinized by the thought of having only those 6 days left to live. Big, bold, beautiful conversations with others hungry for the same - that's what I want! Sacred spaces within which our individual truth comes into flow. Exchanges. Explorations. Discoveries. Adventures of thought!

Themes, yes...on things that matter to me, like leadership, relationship, decloaking, engaging, manifesting. Agendas - not a one. Small gatherings of others equally hungry to WAKE UP to what calls to them from somewhere deep in the belly....or from behind the sternum, fully aware that it is not the heart. The time is NOW...and it will not go on forever.

Intensity. The kind of intensity that we might all 'normally' be tempted to shy away from; the kind that messes with my neat and tidy life; the kind that ensures I break a sweat as I ponder other than what I have always pondered before. Provocative. Evocative! Compelling.

Density. Thick, murky...not the cake-walk of my 'usual' daily requirements of work, family and friends. Truth. Not as an absolute but as it exits for me - the individual - discovering that there is no singular truth; and discovering how to be excited by that instead of afraid.

Results! Awakened people. Changed lives. Each ending, in that unique truth, a beginning and a platform for something else. No answers but immensely powerful questions. Courage to pursue ourselves into those wonderful murky places we have for so long frightened ourselves out of visiting! In MY truth, I have always found more of myself in that murky-ness than any other place/way.

Bold. Raw. Jagged. I'm so tired of the sappy, pappy stuff that passes as cutting-edge. So fed up with the same crap dressed up in new garb. Long gone is my capacity to be delicate about my thoughts, my life and my potential.

Once again, I am aware of the pressure in my body to ENGAGE - just as I did in January 2006. I have no idea where it will take me and what I know without a doubt is that as I engage in those big, bold, intense, dense, provocative, evocative, compelling conversations, my Emerging Future will present for me to inhale and from which to breathe life into the next wave of showing up for my own life.

I am emerging....and I am looking for people to play with.

Breathing is good....

My Emerging Future....emerging

2007-08-26T14:27:00.000-04:00

There was a time when I looked to others to define who I was to become. Not because I believed it to be the thing to do, but because I knew nothing else. No alternative existed in the structure of my reality. It just was.

As a child, it never occurred to me to NOT seek approval and applause from my parents, my teachers, my elders….from all those others who ran my world, not by mindful invitation but by an accident of birth. I could just as easily have been born on the other side of the world – and my world would have been very different. It did, indeed shape who I became. It served me well for a very long time, until one day, it didn’t serve me anymore.

There was a time when I felt like I was falling apart; a time when the scream inside me could no longer be ignored or silenced with striving, achieving and succeeding; with booze and food and sex. A time when I desperately needed to look elsewhere for who I was to become and had no sense of anything else being ‘out there’ that could have meaning for me.

All that had made sense to me, no longer did. What I had relied on no longer served me, and I had no idea what to do instead. So, not knowing where else to go or what else to do, I did what I needed to do to make it possible for me to stay where I was. The alternative was…nothing.

That worked for a while until the tension between the scream inside me and the pretense outside of me were no longer a match for each other – and the scream won. I collapsed into my own rage and my world inside me, collapsed.

The time had come when I let go of all that I knew, not because I knew anything else but because knowing what I did was now killing me. So I just stopped. Stopped striving. Stopped looking. Stopped doing all that I had been doing to just stand still in a place where I knew I no longer wanted to be. I stopped….and did nothing.

In that nothing, I found something different. I did not find answers, I found different questions. I did not find clear images; I found the capacity to see in the dark…in murky water. Sharp lines and distinct shapes gave way to fuzzy edges and overlapping notions – and I discovered that I loved it! I discovered that I loved the murky-ness of it all…..

That time grew and I wanted to find others who would also delight in the joy of the murky-ness…the joy of not knowing….of wandering…of discovering….and of exploring who else and, more importantly, what else we might all be, and so I shared my discoveries with others.

Discoveries spawned new thoughts; new thoughts invited new ways to see and hear and express; and all of these became the WEL-Systems body of knowledge. Others discovered and explored and expanded…and murky-ness became a pathway to clarity. Who would have thought…..

My life became full with those seeking to discover more about themselves. Full with men and women who were willing to open themselves to the possibility that what they knew, what they believe and what they thought themselves to be may indeed, be nothing more than habits of thinking – and they were much more! And so, community grew, as one person’s discoveries and insights became the invitation to another to consider their own evolution. From that, today, there are many. This community is growing by itself. It no longer needs me to infuse it or enliven it or to keep it alive. It now has a life of its own.

And now….in this time…..I am ready for the next wave of who I can become. In this time, I am not seeking to free myself from anything; or seeking new knowledge or information that I do not yet have. I have come to know and trust that I am already all that I require. In this time, I am ready to ENGAGE!

I am awake and present. I am ready for the ‘more’ that I know awaits me, to be engaged when I say it is time. And I say it is time, now.

The body of knowledge of WEL-Systems has grown and expanded with the growth and expansion of those who live it and not those who talk about living it. It has been the breeding ground for discovery – not just discovery of who else we are, but of what else we are. There are now many, many articles and blogs, written by myself and others, to invite consideration of a different way of moving through the world. I have written three books that offer perceptual models through which to reconsider our lives; and there are at least two more to come in the next six months. I’ve recorded alone and with others, hours of thoughts and notions and invitations, that offer enough variety for those who are seeking, to find. There are others who are adept at and with all of this material, as evidenced by the living of their own lives. And that is the key: how do they LIVE?

My Emerging Future pulls me to find others with whom to ENGAGE. Others who have the desire to LIVE awake, mindful and meaningful lives. This does not require knowledge – it requires the courage to connect to what we already know to be the truth of who we are…that lives inside of us. We may not know what that inner truth is but we know – without a doubt – that it is there.

Connection. I am mindful that how I stay connected to myself is through those deep, powerful, rich conversations with others. The ones that sometimes are scary because they come out of nowhere…out of the murky-ness….and pull us into their depths. The ones that are magnetic in their hold on our curiosity and draw us in a direction without knowing the destination – and we learn to love the ride!

Connection. To mySelf, my world and to others. Connection to the density and intensity with which I care – deeply and powerfully and in ways that vibrate and shape my world – and for which I am completely unapologetic.

My Emerging Future is taking shape by calling to me and engaging with those who want these conversations….who are seeking to engage and no longer think about engaging….and who are present to this pull within themselves. Big, bold conversations. Conversations in quiet places and sacred spaces. Conversations that promise nothing and lead to redefined lives. Conversations of five hours or five days – whatever it takes! Conversations that are wide open to explore the topics that hold meaning for those who choose to show up. I trust that as I shape my world, they will shape theirs, and it will be a world to which I have the desire to belong.

There is a god – and we are all it. No one else will rescue us from ourselves. No other force will reward or punish us with greater rigor than we do ourselves. Nothing other than our own hand will be responsible for the writing on the wall of our lives.

I have no idea where this will go – and I welcome the murky-ness.

Breathing is good…..

Thought made flesh

2007-08-25T00:51:00.000-04:00

I had lunch today with a friend whose company I thoroughly enjoy. I always come away from our ‘quarterly meetings’ with new notions to ponder and a great sense of being loved, supported and valued. I walk away from our time together focusing my attention on such huge and expansive thoughts…such potential and possibilities….all of which result in my feeling encouraged to stay true to myself and create those opportunities that are intended to rapidly and profoundly accelerate my own evolution, and invite others into them with me. After all, it is my holodeck.

When I got home, I scanned the WEL-Systems Blogging Community entries for the day and found the latest one by Anita. I have such great respect for Anita; for her sense of play, her courage and compassion; and for her unwavering commitment to her own unfolding. Her capacity for honesty sizzles, like a great steak on a BBQ, with a searing quality and a delicious outcome! Today, her words left me feeling such love and appreciation for the godforce that I know her to be. As always, I am deeply moved by her talent and her tenacity to ensure its survival – and her own. Her words were also an invitation to me to pay attention to what moved inside me as I read. .

These two events (lunch and the blog) and the corresponding internal cues they awakened brought my life into my awareness along a continuum. At one end – thought. At the other end – flesh. Put differently, at one end – energy. At the other end – matter.

I know only too well of what Anita speaks so eloquently. I could not even begin to estimate how many hours/days/years of my life have been consumed by the issue of my flesh. Is there too much of it? (I’ve noticed that rare is the woman who believes she has not enough of it!) Is it ‘properly’ distributed? Do I package it well enough for it to be experienced as and considered ‘attractive’ by others? Does it hang the way it’s supposed’ to, with the big chunks where they are most valued and the slender parts displayed for best results?

Rarely did I consider if I was vibrant, healthy and strong. Rarely did I ponder my flexibility or stamina. The demands of and on my flesh were not for my own benefit but for the benefits accrued to me indirectly because of the benefits of my flesh perceived by others and for others (i.e. stamina so that I could work longer and harder; vibrancy so that I would charm the clients and encourage their commitment to my employer, etc.) The value to me of my own flesh was not even worthy of my own consideration. What mattered most was how my flesh was rated by….by…..eveyone other than ME.

Today, my life is different and becoming more so from one day to the next. I am strong, vibrant and flexible. My flesh is healthy and well! I am delighted at the thought that I will be 60 in 2010. Sixty! 60!!! Wow! There is something about what is to come that leaves me feeling beautiful, powerful and immensely potent. To date, my life is a magical one. A charmed life with such incredible, amazing and powerful people in it! Just how much more magnificent will I have become by 2010?!? I know there is so much more of me that I will discover in the next three years.

I have come to notice that throughout my lifetime, as my attention shifted from my flesh to my energy….from by body to my thoughts….my world expanded. And so did the size of my ass! Not because I worked at it but because I paid no attention to it! I have recently become aware of the statues of women from eons ago and how round and full they are. How ever did we (women) get to become the stick figures (literally!) of the 21st century? Two-dimentional beings that if looked at from just the right angle, completely disappear.

And maybe all of that is a metaphor for something. For giving myself permission to BE large in the world. To think BIG thoughts! To take up space…spread out…expand into…and apologize for none of it. My flesh is a reflection of MY internal state…MY interests and needs and desires…and MY measure of what does and does not ‘feel’ good or right for ME.

My flesh is here for one reason and one reason only: without it, the expression of the godforce that I am would be so much more difficult in a physical world and would go undetected by most. I have no desire to be invisible – at least, not anymore. I could not always have said that.

My thoughts belong to me. My flesh belongs to me. They are connected, with my flesh on the outside a reflection of my thoughts/energy on the inside.

In this moment, I wonder: if I had daughters, what would I have lived with them that they might know their flesh, differently? How might I have moved through the world with them that they might have focused their attention on the presence of their voice expressing in the world rather than the presence of their flesh? On the sound that defines them rather than the flesh by which they are defined. I guess I’ll never know. What I do know is that as I was growing up and becoming a woman, my voice was often the most unwelcomed and irritating part of me.

As I write and consider Anita's words, I am reminded of what it was for me to be pregnant. I loved being pregnant! My flesh redesigned itself with round lines, softness and a great sense of relaxation into its natural expansion. What a surprise that was to me, having spent so much of my life struggling for straight lines and sharp angles; all things tight and immovable. Two sons later, I have learned that many wonderful things come in large, loose packages! J

I am finally…finally!...coming to a deep appreciation that what anyone else thinks of my flesh is none of my business. Perhaps, for me, that is the last frontier of freeing myself of external referencing. As a woman, that has been a long, rugged and sometimes deadly road to travel. Today, I know my flesh is a reflection of the strength, flexibility and vibrancy of what moves inside me.

Today was a good day. My life expanded because of these two women – each for different reasons and in different ways, each doing nothing more than authentically being herself - and their willingness to share the truth of who they authentically are in the moment. And maybe that’s what it’s all about.

Breathing is good…..

Do It NOW!

2007-08-23T23:04:00.000-04:00

I’m noticing how life just goes on. This feels connected to that idea of pondering what I might say (what different things might I say, and how might I say them differently, etc.) if I knew that I had 6 months…6 weeks…6 days to live.

I take so much for granted. Things like….my sons will always come home from their last outing; that my Dad will be there on Sunday for me to visit; or my Mom will be there on Saturday for us to go shopping. I take for granted that there will be another Alaska cruise with my family or that the Big Island will be there to welcome me back in April!

I am very mindful that every time my older son goes to his job in security, the he does not leave the house without my declaring that he have a safe night, and telling him that I love him. In that instance, I am very mindful that I just never really know…. Perhaps I am different in that instance because I feel the intensity attached to how he moves through his world, and match it with my own. “Do it now!’ pulses in my head, fills my heart and vibrates in my voice. I just never know….

How often have I put off doing what I care about, believing that I can do it another time? How often have I felt such strength of connection to another and not shared it? How often have I not taken the time to share the conversation I’m having with myself with the person or persons who seeded the thoughts? Being alive is in this moment. Everything else is just thinking about living

So much of how we live has become habit. Habits of thought. Habits of behaviour. Habits of belief. Words that we speak because we always have and not because they’re true or meaningful. And perhaps more profoundly, habits of intention. No wonder we keep getting what we’ve got when it never occurs to us to mindfully choose what we want! We just go about our business on automatic, allowing habits of intention to simply keep pumping out more of what’s already there. Until it’s not there anymore.

I am becoming very awake to this intensity. I’m noticing it in my self, my family, my clients…and my world. I’m noticing it in Alaska. I’m noticing it in the increasing movement of Gaia in her earthquakes, torrential rains and howling winds. I’m noticing it in the awakening volcanoes that rumble and spew ash and flow lava.

I’m noticing it in the ever-escalating presence of violence in our families, our schools, our neighborhoods and our streets. And perhaps, most of all, I’m noticing the violence that is spawned by our fights to the death to prove that my god is better than yours. Such viciousness and brutality in the name of any god!

This quiet thought sits at the back of my mind, as I watch the three-part series on CNN on 'God's Warriors': what would happen to it all if we were to discover that 'god' does not exist? What if the notion of a god - one that is not us - all started eons ago and is a story that just keeps getting told, without challenge. That we discover the only god that exists is the one that we all, already, are. We are the god we seek.

Wow…what would all the zealots do? All that investment in misery for nothing.

From all that I’ve learned in the last 30 years, I know – without a doubt – that I am god. And so is everyone else. The really important thing to pay attention to is: how does the god that I am choose to live?

Breathing is good…..

Bearing Witness

2007-08-22T08:02:00.001-04:00

It’s good to be home! As much as I enjoyed my experience of rest, relaxation and no laptop, I’m ready to re-engage.

As I lived it and as I reflect upon it, it’s clear that my experience of Alaska is a metaphor. This was my fourth cruise to this magnificent place and it was clear to me how things were ‘the same but different’, as the Hawaiians would say. The same crisp, clean air. The same vast, seemingly endless expanse of space. The same immensity, difficult to calibrate for depth or distance or mass. It was very difficult to get a sense of scale, with brown bears along the shoreline appearing like ants even with binoculars!

Much was different. Bright sun in a cloudless sky. Temperatures in the high 70’s and low 80’s. Not a drop of rain to be found in a place known for its precipitation. As I sat on the back deck, in jeans and a t-shirt, soaking up the sun, I was sure that I was in Hawaii. The weather of Hawaii in the vast spaces of Alaska. Things are changing.

We spent hours slowly circling in Glacier Bay. As recently as two years ago, when the glacier would ‘calve’, it would release a chunk of ice the size of a small car. This time, when it calved, the sharp crack of the ‘white lightening’ preceded a long, thick slice of the glacier crashing into the blue waters of the Pacific. A cheer would go up amongst the passengers on the ship, stunned by the beauty and the power of Nature. And as they cheered, I cried. How much longer would this be here? In that moment of awareness, I decided that I needed to be here, every year. I need to be present…to bear witness….to the changes as they unfold. I need to feel it…hear it…smell it…even if only in this small way.

During Influencing with Intention, there comes a time when each of the participants has the opportunity to tell their story…all of it, without interruption or interrogation; without advice or prodding or poking….a space to step into, to claim and to declare what they know their lives to have been. Those of us present commit to only one thing: to be there, silent and fully present, no matter how long it goes and no matter what it takes, to bear witness. It is one of the most sacred experiences I have ever lived.

In that moment – when the sheet of ice slid into the water – I felt that I was listening to a story; a story being told about something changing profoundly – and I need to bear witness to it.

Things are not as they were. I am not who I have been. The changes are neither small nor incremental. I am mindful that I will be 60 in three years; that I no longer wear the cloak of my culture; no longer think the thoughts of my culture or speak the words that are attached to it. I keep looking for an image to represent who I am becoming and nothing comes to me. And so I wait….

I have become aware that words escape me. And then I wonder: perhaps it is not so much that words escape me. Perhaps it is more that the words that come to me are different in both meaning and intensity than those I’ve used so easily in the past. And the thought comes to me that perhaps it is time for me to write as I would if I knew that I had only six months to live. Or six weeks. Or six days. To pay attention to what it is that is most meaningful to me and to allow it to be in flow. I wonder where that would take me.

Breathing is good…..

Alaska Bound

2007-08-07T23:52:00.000-04:00

I'm off to Alaska on a cruise - and I"m ready for the rest. This will be my 4th cruise to Alaska and already, in anticipation of this trip, I am experiencing flashes of memory from the other trips. Like my first trip, stepping out onto the balcony of the suite around 10:00 pm and being amazed as I looked toward the bow of the ship and watched the fog rolling in on itself like a giant roll of cotton candy, slowing enveloping the ship....and us, with it! It was an incredible sight; nothing I had ever seen before. That memory is right up there with the one and only time I saw a moonbow - a rainbow of pearly white light across the sky as the full moon reflects off moisture in the air - as I was returning from my trip to the summit of Mauna Kea. Amazing!

I look forward to boarding the ship and finding my stateroom. To settling in. To wandering the halls of the ship, checking out the paintings and other 'objets d'art' that line the walkways. Finding the casino ( remember that I won $900 on my first cruise and that was FUN! ) picking out the $1 slot for my next visit. :)

Three books in my bag, two of which are the story of the last Queen of the Kingdom of Hawaii - one written by her and one written about her. These really call to me...feel important to me...to digest.

My plans are...no plans! Sleeping in, maybe having breakfast on the balcony on my first awakeing. Reading. Walking the decks for my 'daily constitutional'. Spending time with my family; getting to know my step-daughters. Maybe journaling when the spirit moves me (as I'm sure it will since it always does).

Whale watching in Juneau. Walking tour in Ketchikan. Cruising in Glacier Bay and through the fjord. And shopping! Surely, there must be things that I absolutely cannot live without! The trick will be to find something weird enough for my sons and elegant enough for my mother.

I am ready to take this time for myself. I am blessed to know that I can go to Alaska, trusting that my parents are in good hands and in the loving care of my sons, Sheila and Koreen. I could not do this without all of them.

And so, I've learned - I don't have to do it alone. And because of that, I am Alaska bound!

Breathing is good....and I'll be back August 20th.

Aloha!

Buffet of thoughts

2007-08-04T16:58:00.000-04:00

I’m not even thinking in complete thoughts, these days. It feels more like thought ‘blips’ or perhaps sound bytes in my head. Things like:

* We need new language for the ‘energy’ conversation. We talk about ‘energy’ the same way that we talk about emotions/feelings, etc. – in the language of good/bad, right/wrong; in the language of ‘broken’ (i.e. holes in my aura) or victim (i.e. someone is sending me negative energy). How can this be??? How can something that is not a ‘thing’ be treated like a thing? As a nominalization, ‘energy’ can only exist as an experience in my body. To denominalize ‘energy’ demands that we return to the experience of the body. And in that place, there only ‘is’ intelligence/information. What we DO with it - i.e. how we engage it - determines the quality of our lives. NOTE TO SELF: write an article about how we have taken a quantum expression (energy) and squeezed it into a Newtonian box so that we can feel safe by making it familiar. What else can we do with it?

* Manifestation Spirals – the process for creating outside of us what lives inside of us. They are not separate – they are expressions along a continuum of existence/experience. We are always manifesting. The more potent question is: can we stay awake sufficiently to manifest what we intend? Manifestation, as a process of expression of the godforce that we are, NEVER sleeps. It is never that I am not manifesting – it is that I get distracted and manifest the outcome of that distraction, ie. my intention minus the degree of distraction (length of time and degree of intensity) = my life.

* Acceleration. Things keep moving faster and faster. As much as there are many for whom coma continues to be the most appealing state, there are many others who are awakening to discover that they are not who they have been taught to me. In that moment, it is as if you can hear the cascading sound of locks opening in sequence, and the creaky hinges swinging open the doors to a different reality. In an instant, life changes.

* Women. Women don’t hold the key – women are the key. Not because of anything they have to learn or discover but because when they simply choose to be themselves and refuse to be anything else, life changes. No matter what the profession; no matter what the circumstances (and I am very aware that these circumstances are, in far too many ways and places, deadly and dire), it is the essence of our being that transforms. We are, after all, the gender that creates life. Without us, the survival of the species comes to an end.

* Puzzles. My life seems to be full of puzzle pieces. Over here, a piece about my family’s needs. Over there, a piece about the new Huna book. Up on that shelf, yet another piece about the size of my own intention and its implications. Next to it, a large piece that reminds me that my sons are all grown up and will soon be gone. Yet another piece, offering the opportunity to engage more provocatively…more extensively and visibly….to invite discovery – for me and for others. All pieces of a puzzle that I cannot see in its entirety to describe. It is less about putting these pieces together to some known outcome, and much more about watching them as they fall into place, my attention drawn to the spaces between the pieces. What else is to come?

* Entrepreneurial Women. Women in conversation, creating organic collectives that are designed for Manifestation Spirals. No rules. No fees/dues. A gathering of women who carry the desire to shape their world…to shape the world…in anticipation of a new way of defining our humanity. It is not about creating and/or designing/developing a business. It is much about discovering what business will shape itself when we have clarity and the power of intention behind the desire to Manifest? Sounds like fun to me!

Soon, I will be going away for a couple of weeks to allow myself the Space to bear witness to my own life. Nothing to do. Nothing to create. Nothing to write. And yet, I know that in that Space, Movement will occur that will defy description and definition – and my life will expand. And through it all, my greatest challenge will be to pay attention to the sun setting behind the mountains as I sail to Alaska….

Breathing is good…..

Roots of god-lessness

2007-08-01T21:11:00.000-04:00

For whatever reason, several people have asked me lately (at different times), just how far back we have to go to know the roots of the Androgynous Baby(TM) experiece. My feeling about that is that it does not really matter - what matters is how we live from this moment on. Where it began does not matter - where it ends, does...and it ends with me, in my life; and with you, in yours. Si?

One last thought: I have come to the conclusion that its roots began in the very first moment that we were taught to believe that each of us is NOT the godforce expressing in a physical universe. In that instant, we must rely on external cues to guide us through our lives. The next book - the one on Huna as a Gateway to the Godforce within - will offer much more about that.

Breathing is good.....

Taking a breath....

2007-07-30T19:28:00.000-04:00

I am mindful that it has been a while since I've been here. So much has happened and I have not a clue where to begin.

IWI was an intense and powerful experience. As I took a few days to just live my life, from one day to the next, intensity found me again on Thursday. I've been spending the last four days tending to a family emergency, wondering all the while: what is there for me to learn about myself from this experience? To this moment, discovery eludes me.

My life is about to change immensely. I know that. I even know that what awaits is incredible...and potent...and carries in its belly the possibility of inviting massive change in my world as I know it. And I am also aware that I stand at some kind of major crossroad in my life. It is not just a matter of changing speed - it is one of changing direction.

No doubt, what is currently unfolding in my life is in some way connected. (After all, isn't it all connected?) Likely as a metaphor for what is possible. Nothing is ever really broken - it is only in the process of reforming itself to a higher level of expression. I know this...and I trust this...like I know that my life is mine to shape.

I miss being here and, as I was reading earlier in Lucy's words, my life is moving faster than I can track and translate into words. Nevertheless, I know that it is meaningful for me to be here and I will be back. Preferably, sooner rather than later....

In the meantime, I welcome the Space within which to experience my life; the Movement that comes with knowing the time for change is NOW; and the Flow that awakens me to my own potential and that of all who unfold in my life - regardless of age or state of being.

I remind myself....breathing is good.....

The Next Wave

2007-07-22T22:16:00.000-04:00

Today was the last day of Influencing with Intention. This one went further, faster and with greater intensity than any that I've experienced before. This one is testimony to the degree to which people are both willing and able to engage for their own evolution.

There were some incredible moments of compelling discovery and creative thinking. There were many, many moments of raw and jagged truths - the kind that we spend most of our lives moving away from, burying them deeper and deeper in the recesses of our own thoughts, only to discover that they are the very thing that we've been seeking all our lives to open the portal to a better life. Funny how that happens.....

We laughed a lot! Out loud and frequently! Not the polite chuckles and giggles of the sedate classmates but the big, deep belly laughs that show up when people who trust and care about each other gather 'round the table to catch up with each other.

Yesterday was 'story telling' day - the day that each participant has the opportunity to tell their story (completely and without interruption - no matter how long it takes). As always, it was an incredible experience to simply bear witness as another human being finds and defines their truth; and in that moment, is forever freed of its burdens. It is both humbling and uplifting to be given such a gift; to be able to bear witness to an awakening soul as the eyes are beginning to open and we discover ourselves.

I am grateful to each who was there. I don't know what 2008 holds and if this is indeed, my last pass at IWI, I have been honored with an expression of this process that has awakened something new in me.

Breathing is good.....

Mom and Pop Talk

2007-07-17T23:32:00.000-04:00

The conversations about the family are always the tough ones. We've learned well how to deny the truth of our experience and hold to the party line on how it all went down. The problem with that is that the body never lies. NEVER!

Although today was only Day 2 of IWI, we're already into the conversation about the roles we took on in our early family system; and the strategies these became in our lives as adults. Without thinking, or mindfully considering anything other than what we know, our lives run on 'automatic pilot' for most of what we do. The people we choose to spend time with. The work we do. How and where we live. It is frequently startling and sometimes stunning when we discover that we have not really been choosing at all but just running what is familiar to us.

But, without exception, the toughest conversation to give ourselves permission to have is the one that lets us know that Mom and Dad aren't perfect. Our lives have been shaped by forces we pretend not to notice, finding ourselves buffeted by self-denigrating habits of thought and behaviour that do not serve us well...and yet, it never occurs to us to consider that somewhere in there, the genius lies waiting to be found. And sometimes, to find it, we have let go of our pretty stories about our not-so-pretty lives.

It often feels raw and jagged. The secrets that the body keeps begin to awaken and flow and reveal themselves. Our stories start to fray at the edges and we find ourselves coming face-to-face with our own self-deception for self-preservation. In that moment, eyelids get heavy and the entire room seems to be desperate for a deep sleep. The funny thing is that we have already been in a deep sleep and what is happening is the awakening that comes when mixed with our last feeble efforts to hold the truth of our experience in check. Once out, there is no turning back.

I've heard things that have made me weep for days. After more than 20 years, I am no longer surprised by what adults of capable of inflicting on children - particularly their own. When we own them, we can with them as we please. At least, it would seem that such a thought process prevailed for so many, for far too long.

And yet, the determination of that essence of who we are to LIVE AUTHENTIC LIVES is stronger, deeper and prevails - no matter what! - even if it finally means that we have to reveal a new truth to ourselves. In that moment, we seem to grow up and become the adult we have so longed for, for so long.

I remember writing From Victim to Victorious Voice after having spent time with a group in a conversation not unlike the one that unfolded today. I am clear that keeping the secrets - from ourselves and/or anyone else - does not stop the harm that adults do to children. The alternative is to find within ourselves that voice that keeps the secrets and be willing to hear that truth ourselves. Sometimes it comes in dreams. Sometimes, it will flow through our fingers and onto the page or screen. And sometimes, the small quiet voice in which it speaks whispers its secrets to a single soul that feels safe. Only then do we become willing to tell the world what is long overdue to be heard.

Some parents are monsters! Some parents are wounded children trying desperately to raise children. And some parents are detached and numb by necessity as they, too, try to ignore the secrets their bodies carry. In my time, I've come to believe that the vast majority of parents love their children AND are profoundly disconnected to the truth of their own childhood experience, incapable of noticing an internal cue and desperately seeking external ones to make up for it. It's not about good/bad, right/wrong - it's about awake/coma. And coma will kill us.

If I were to identify the one thing that keeps getting in the way it would be the degree to which we really, desperately want to love our parents. We turn ourselves inside-out to find ways to explain it away, make excuses for it and dismiss as irrelevant or trivial what has often crippled our ability to live the lives we want. We would prefer to live a smaller life, hoping for the best, rather than tell ourselves the truth and risk damaging the uneasy peace we've made with our aging parents. It leaves me wondering : what our children will do with us?

Breathing is good.....

Acceleration

2007-07-15T23:13:00.000-04:00

Once again, my life was filled with magic and miracles! As I moved from one day to the next through ITS and RIA, I found myself marvelling at my life.

I have created a life that calls to me the people who desire to discover the 'more' that they instinctively know they are.

My life is filled with men and women who have courage befitting the size of their curiosity.

Every day, I get to wonder - in the good company of others on a similar journey - just how good my life can become.

And to think I've been living like this for almost 20 years.....

I don't know what tomorrow brings but I do know this: I wake up every day and remind myself that I am the godforce expressing in a physical world - and how does that godforce want to live today? The answer always comes and when I engage it, my life expands. It really is that simple.

In this, my last experience of ITS and RIA, the Emerging Futures conversation was very present and intense. It has become very clear to me that is where my future lies. These last 10 days have shown me, yet again, the acceleration that comes with just stepping into this conversation and trusting that we are all 'up to it'. I believe that without exception, every one in the ITS/RIA intensives was propelled forward for having done so.

More will be coming on Evolution by Intention and Emerging Futures. More is already beginning to take shape for my experience of Huna relative to both these notions. I have already begun to re-organize my material for the Huna book and will begin work to complete it in September.

During the ITS experience, new guided mediations came into being. Poof! Just like that! I will be spending much of the month of August recording (guided meditations, a CD series for ITS, etc.) except for the week that I'll be spending in Alaska. That will be an interesting time for me for many reasons, not the least of which is that I have promised myself that I will leave my laptop at home. YIKES! Did I say that?!?!?!?! No email! No writing! Just me and time to do nothing. Hmmm.....

Tomorrow, IWI begins. Will this, too, be my last one? I'm not sure and won't really know until closer to the time of the next one. This I do know for sure: those who are gathering will be what is required to raise the bar on the next one...and so on. Whatever it brings, I'm not only ready but most willing to engage.

One stray thought: today, I turned on CBC just long enough to hear a short piece on a study done on journalists and reporting. Long story - short version : no wonder we feel like we're nuts! Almost 90% (89.9 to be exact) of what appears in major print, tv and radio is shaped by the appropriate spin doctors and regurgitated by media. Is there any wonder that in the face of what is often presented to us as 'answers' our bodies are screaming at us that we're asking the wrong questions???

Should be an incredible week!

Breathing is good....

Bits and Pieces

2007-07-10T22:02:00.000-04:00

Day 2 of ITS. Day 4 of RIA. By noon yesterday, I was amazed at how quickly this group had come together! The check-ins were open, honest, direct and clear. They were also filled with laughter and irreverance, with the familiar scent of potential filling the air. In its weird and wonderful way, the experience shapes itself - weaving one seemingly disconnected conversation into the next, ending in a cascading wave of discovery for one or all of us in the room. I love it when the plan comes together....except there is no plan!

This time, I have a long time and dear friend in the room. I have always known this woman to be smart, compassionate, caring and deeply committed to contributing to others. My wish for her in these experiences is that she will take the space for herself to receive what she has so generously offered others for so long. Today, for the first time in a long time, I saw a glimpse of awakening in a new way. And it came from a little thing, like choosing to not rush and take the time that she needed/wanted. Such a simple little thing.....

My new book arrives on Thursday! This one I can feel. It vibrates! I know that it offers something much stronger and more alive. And I wait...in the excitement inside myself....knowing that this is different. Leaves me wondering how my life will change because of it. I don't know how - I just know that it will.

Every day, I make the time to visit the WEL-Systems Blogging Community. Such great stuff! Amy...Lori...Lucy...and all the others who are decloaking and inviting us into their lives. I read...I experience...and I am encouraged to dig deeper into myself and trust what I find. My life is indeed, magical! I am impressed with the company I choose to keep. :)

I am enjoying Koreen's presence in the room. Great strength. Courage. Ease. Fearlessness. Palpable playfulness. I look forward to each day and know that at the end of everyone, I get to do it again the next day.

For now, I'm tired and ready to call it a day.

Breathing is good....

First day of my last pass

2007-07-07T22:30:00.000-04:00

Today was the first day of my last pass in RIA. A strange feeling - knowing that in the future, it will be Koreen who walks with these folks who are stepping up to create bigger lives for themselves.

When folks arrive on Monday for ITS, their return will be welcomed by Koreen. I'll not be part of this process again after July 23rd.

I've been in the program room for these certifications for more than 10 years - first through my original company (Partners in Renewal Inc.) and for the last five years, through the WEL-Systems Institute. I have watched and listened and welcomed hundreds as they stepped into the process of their own evolution. As they grew, so did I. I'll miss it all! And having said that, I know in every cell in my body that it's time; and I know that Koreen will bring the strength, compassion and skill that it takes to be willing to 'go the distance' with those who choose to engage.

Day 1 of RIA set the bar for the next 6 days. The conversations welcomed and allowed for the 'unspeakable' to be said out loud, making it possible for us all to notice that it's never the conversation that causes us pain - it's the fact that we hold it as a secret. It's amazing how quickly life expands when we just get honest with ourselves and tell the truth of our own experience.

I wonder how much easier life would be if we were never conditioned into the process of 'shame'.

Breathing is good....

Questions for living a meaningful life

2007-07-05T20:21:00.000-04:00

Every now and then, I stop and wonder : am I living the life that lights me up? Am I living the life that reflects the majesty of who I know myself to be capable of being? Am I moving through my days in a way that honors the potential of who I already am? And perhaps the biggest of them all : if I am indeed the godforce in expression in a physical world, how does this godforce choose to live?

In those moments, I stop...and take a moment to consider the following questions - not like this is a complete list but more as a way of getting my own attention! It is so easy to fall into a rhythm of repetition, even when to others that repetition may appear immensely different from the habits of their own lives. They are habits, nonetheless.

Am I awake?! Or am I living from the deep coma of habituation and mindless repetition?

I take a moment and I sit quietly....taking a few long, slow, deep Water breaths...and I let these questions wash through my body. Like the Meta Model III questions, these are not for me to answer but much more for my body to 'digest'. All I have to do is keep my breathing deep and easy, my belly soft and my body relaxed - and let my body do the rest ! That is, after all, what Quantum TLC is all about.

* Do I pause to mindfully respond to questions or do I just say what I always say?
(Is my life desigining me or am I desiging my life?)

* Do I often find myself holding my breath?
(on the inhale - bracing against; or on the exhale - surrendering/hopelessness)

* Does my mind race ahead of my body, focusing on where I'm going next rather than on where I am right now?
(past/future with no 'now' - so no connection to my body)

* Do I wish my life were different - and then do nothing to make it so?
(the limp lament of the 'lost soul' or 'victim')

* Am I frequently angry that others don't see the world the way I do?
(in that moment, my holodeck reminds me of its presence!)

* Do I spend more time paying attention to what other people are doing than I do to what I'm doing with my life?
(external referencing)

* Do I feel safe in my world?
(at all levels - physical, financial, love, friends, value of work, value of presence, etc.)

Am I awake? It's hard to tell unless I pay attention and ask.

Each of these becomes a thought that I focus on for a day. Not like an obligation or a command, but much more like an invitation - allowing the question to sit at the back of my mind and pop into my awareness as I move from one thing to the next in a busy day. The question becomes the context within which my day unfolds, making it possible for me to notice what might otherwise just slide silently into the file of 'life passing me by' that so rarely gets revisited.

I am a profoundly fortunate woman. I live a magical life in so many ways. My life IS about these questions, filled with others who are on a similar journey of discovery. My life unfolds, from one day to the next, with courageous and curious people who are willing to journey with me, carving out their own paths as I carve out mine. What incredible company I keep! And in this moment of deep gratitude for the life I live; and in this moment of great appreciation for and to all those who share this life with me, I am mindful: it is indeed, my holodeck. And I create it all.

Breathing is good....

Cries in the dark

2007-07-04T23:10:00.000-04:00

Here I was... wandering through my day, thinking that it was going to be an easy ride… and two things happen in quick succession.

First, I get an email from a client in great distress because their young teenage grandchild has been taken by police into psychiatric assessment for trying to stab the mother. The question put to me was: why do our children carry so much rage????

In part, my response went something like:

Our children are full of rage because we hurt them...we lie to them....we use them to gratify our own needs and serve our own purposes....and we pretend that none of this is happening. We have a social network that says: "I won't notice what you're doing to children if you won't notice what I'm doing." That way, when any children speak the truth of their shitty lives, we can all pretend that there's something wrong with the child because, after all, adults would never do such things to helpless, vulnerable children that they are supposed to protect; and that they want to continue to be seen to be doing so, even though these same adults are the very perpetrators of the misery in their children's lives.

Our kids are full of rage because they have good reason to be full of rage! They are tired of being used and lied to. Tired of being unheard and crying into their pillows in the dark. They are tired of being shut-up through drugs and shut down by physical punishment/assault. They’re tired of being spoken to and about by 'experts' who insist that there is something wrong with them - because the experts aren't willing or don't know how to turn to the adults and ask: what are you doing to this child????

The rage our children carry is a measure of the misery they live with and in. The alternative to their rage is depression. When they have become completely without hope that their lives will ever change; when they have completely lost faith in anything or anyone else to make their lives better; and when in that moment, they recognize that they feel powerless to do this for themselves, depression ensues. In my book, the rage is a sign of hope. It is a sign of an unwillingness to give up, to completely surrender and to go quietly into the night.

We medicate our children to silence our children. We treat them with disrespect and disinterest for the things that matter to them; and worse, with disdain for being the child that they are. Our deepest and deadliest wound is that we seem to need to devour their innocence…almost with a rigor that speaks to our need to press back any memory of our own.

Our children are fighting back! They are fighting each other and they are killing each other. When they become unwilling to be silenced anymore; when the drugs no longer can be imposed, they don’t begin to speak – they roar with rage! A raw, ragged rage that has been building for years. And when it moves, it takes on a life of its own.

Our children are drugged into silence or numbed into silence or shamed into silence. They’re fighting it and won't give up. .And a large part of it is that the ugly truth must come to light - whatever it may be.”

Shortly after that note came another from a colleague who spends much time working with adults, assessing their parenting capability with their children. Truly compassionate, caring, competent and skilled in her field, I was surprised when I read, “In a weak moment I might say there are a lot of ineffective parents out there!” And I wondered: why are we so afraid to come to that conclusion? Seems to be that the evidence is pretty compelling! Are we so afraid to offend that we can no longer trust the truth of our own experience?

Today has reminded me of why I do what I do. It is never about 'what's wrong with the children – it is always about the adults who design their lives and their experiences of living. It is always about us…about those of us who ‘do to’ and the rest of us who stand by and ‘do nothing’. Given we create the problems, we're the only ones who can do anything about them.

Breathing is good……

New voices - more choices

2007-07-01T23:12:00.000-04:00

In the last months, I've had the real pleasure of interviewing three people to capture their wisdom, insight and vision on a range of topics. From a conversation about addiction (with Ray Landry) to one about finding the courage to decloak and show up for our own lives (with Amy McNaughton) to one about life beyond eating disorders (with Koreen Kimakowich), I complete this process with more respect and appreciation for their passion, compassion and willingness to do what it takes to make a difference.

Each of these talented and compelling people has something very special and unique to offer the world. Our recorded conversations draw on the truth of who they are in that moment, as they welcome and embrace the opportunity to speak from the heart on the things that matter most to them. Unscripted and unrehearsed, the recording captures what shows up from moment to moment. There are moments of uncertainty; others that reflect powerful revelations from lessons learned; and then, those that let us know how human, how vulnerable and how courageous they are. They are living expressions of the things they talk about, spending their days pressing for their own evolution through the work they do with others.

The conversation that Koreen and I had about eating disorders - including both anorexia and bulimia - is not like anything out there. Several times through the conversation, I was awakened to a new thought stream that I know will open doors for so many. There are new insights and explorations that surfaced just in the moment of that discussion. There are so many provocative ideas to consider that we discovered when we were finished that we had more than two hours of conversation for a 60-minute CD program! I've tried twice to cut it back to meet the 'framework' and both times, could not bring myself to leave out the explorations. And so - bonus! - this one will be longer than the others. And so be it.

Given the damage done by 'eating disorders', if this conversation makes it possible for one person to find themselves again in the chaos of their inner lives, it will be worth it.

These new CD's are now in the production process and will be available in the next two to three weeks. Already, there are other voices with the desire to speak on depression, cancer, chronic anxiety - and how they have learned to live differently and life has profoundly changed for them. Those are yet to come. It's going to be a busy year!

Breathing is good....

Elements of a Catalyst

2007-06-29T23:02:00.000-04:00

It’s been a great day!

I had lunch by the water with a woman whose company I thoroughly enjoy. We concluded today that the only way you can really know how you’ll do at the deep end of the pool is to venture in to the deep end of the pool! Until that happens, it’s all philosophy, hearsay, wishing and hope. It‘s all story without wisdom. We concluded that now is as good a time as any to start living large and just dive in!

After great conversation, great company and great food, I headed for home and checked in to see what was new on email. There, I found a note from a woman who shared her admiration and respect for her friend who has become a WEL-Systems Master Facilitator over the last 18 months. As I read, it occurred to me that what makes her so different is that she LIVES what she has learned/discovered. Every conversation, every problem, every person, every email, every choice point is an invitation for her to stand in the ‘now’ and live her life differently. Her way of being is a living model of what it takes to profoundly shape her world. She does not apologize for who she is, what she holds to be true and how she moves through the world.

Most of us live secret lives. There is the one that maps to what we think the world wants/expects of us and then there is the one that lives inside of us. Many times in our day-to-day living, the conversation that goes on inside of us does not match the one that is going on outside of us. Living authentically requires the simple act of decloaking and being true to ourselves, no matter where we are, who we’re with or what we’re doing. Our secrets kill us and keep us locked into living much smaller lives of habituation.

And it’s not an easy thing to do. It takes courage to let the world see the truth of who we are. It takes courage to take our safe and comfortable conversations in small groups of aligned and supportive people out into the much larger, and unpredictable, domain of clients, colleagues, neighbors, partners, parents and offspring. It’s easy to be brave when we’re by ourselves; to be bold when we are preaching to the converted. It’s much harder when there is a chance that there will be disagreement, challenges to our model of the world….and worse, ridicule and embarrassment.

In a recent conversation with a WEL-Systems Catalyst, we concluded that the catalytic properties of a catalyst only find expression when the catalyst is inserted into another context, i.e. a solution or medium. In that moment, the catalyst activates and its medium is transformed by its presence. Likewise, WEL-Systems Catalysts cannot be effective by themselves in a closet! If there is no willingness to enter into organic collectives (i.e. families, work, friends, clients, colleagues, etc.) and engage, there is no catalysis. Plain and simple.

There are a number of definitions for the word ‘catalyst’ with all of them in agreement that a catalyst engages with something else; and that the catalyst precipitates change in that something else, without losing itself.

Back to the young woman and her WEL-Systems Master Facilitator friend…. The difference is the willingness to engage in a decloaked and authentic way as a way of ‘being’ and not as a technique of ‘doing’. She is who she is and she can no longer be otherwise – and it goes with her everywhere in her life. Every conversation. Every person. Every breath, from one day to the next. And that is what makes a difference.

Breathing is good…..

Entrepreneurial Women

2007-06-28T22:55:00.001-04:00

It's been a busy day on the outside but a quiet one on the inside. As much as there is always a barrage of emails and phone calls, my inner state is one of quiet watching. What am I watching for? I wonder.....

I feel such longing for....something! Something new and different. Something stunning and outstanding! Something compelling and provocative that punches through the repetitive and the mundane. No matter how brilliant a thought might be, thinking it over and over again; living it every day and feeling caught in its brilliance leaves me flat and lifeless. I can appreciate why people who spend their lives achieving wealth and success are also the ones who end it all. It's never about the destination, it's always about the adventure of the trip.

I'm aware of so much repetition in our world. The details of the story change and yet, it is the same story. Fill in the blanks and nonetheless, the outcome is always the same: stuck in what we know and who we believe ourselves to be.

Today, what emerged into my future is the framework for a new four-day retreat experience with and for entrepreneurial women. We are not like others. The very things that often leave others finding us annoying or unrealistic or pig-headed are at the very core of our capacity to create and manifest what we want.

The capacity to stand alone. The capacity to see what others cannot yet distinguish. The willingness to invest all of who we are into what we do. The desire to have what we do be a reflection of who we are, rather than a collection of tasks that produce a result. The capacity to hold to the dream and allow it to be in flow, even when others have long lost hope. The capacity to pay attention to many things at once - and not let go. The ability to have every experience stand as a marker of our own evolution, no matter what the outcome. These are the things we move toward.

We are drawn to the impossible, the improbable and the unlikely. We look beyond what attracts and seek what lies beneath and holds the attraction in place. We think and move in leaps and bounds; move through things in chunks; and when the dust settles, look back to notice how we did it. As much as we often find ourselves doing it, waiting for others is not what we do best. And yet, without a capacity for inclusion, what's the point of it all?

Emerging Futures: Entrepreneurial Women is coming. It is forming itself, even as I write this. From claiming the truth of my own experience, I know that it will nourish, replenish, provoke....it will invite and allow....and it will welcome my unrest and that of others as it takes on a life of its own. Those are the best moments! The ones that begin to rise out of seeming banality and become a wave that takes us all to new shores, new ideas, new ways of engaging. And it happens in the blink of an eye. And to think that it all started because someone noticed the way the light was hitting the water....

I, for one, am ready for much more, much faster. I'm ready for that next great leap of expanding and acceleration; that next expression/conversation that will be welcoming. And 'welcoming' seems to be a very important aspect of this process. Nothing to brace against; nothing to prove; no races, competitions, challenges; no winners or losers. Rather, the Space to relax, consider, ponder, explore....all with eyes wide open and expectations big enough for a much larger life to flow into. In these moments, none of the rules apply.

It will happen sooner rather than later.

Breathing is good.....

Quickening

2007-06-26T22:48:00.001-04:00

Today, in every conversation and email, I could feel the quickening. The effects of last week's Emerging Futures: Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed continues to reverberate through all that I think and say and do. It is as if I am vibrating at a different frequency.

When I read Anne's post on her blog re 'Redefining Education', I got goose bumps. My goose bumps never lie! When they move, I know that I've touched something (an idea, a person, a random thought, etc) that is very potent for the future to emerge differently.

Any nominalization in our language can be redefined. Success. Love. Parenting. Work. It doesn't matter what it is, recognizing that nominalizations are nothing more than code words for habituated ways of thinking and being, redefining them is a great place to start! I wonder what my life might become if I were to pick one a day - one that I hold as important and/or 'fact' - and just consider how else I might 'define' that for myself; and how those who move through their world differently, define it for themselves. Kind of like blowing the cob webs out of the attic.

This just popped to mind (and I wonder how they're related since I know they have to be or they would not have connected): the notion that history is irrelevant for creating the future. History is not intended to be a guide to the future - it's intended to be digested so that we might become 'more' as a result of it. Discover more about ourselves so that we need not hang on to how we've been. That was really driven home tonight while my mother and I watched the CBC DVD on the re dedication of the monument at Vimy Ridge.

Perhaps war and our experience of those who fight them is the greatest challenge for us to move beyond who we have been. As I watch and listen, I experience a deep and genuine grief, and sadness and profound gratitude and appreciation for all those whose courage and sacrifice have made it possible for me to live the life I live today. My father was on the beaches at Normandy on D-Day plus 1 - wading through bodies - and was never the same again. He went there a boy and came back stunned by his experience.

And yet, even as the tears flow down my cheeks, I know deep in my being that this is insane! In our grief and appreciation, we build monumental myths about the valor of war. There is no valor in war - there is only death, destruction and the devastation of the human mind and spirit.

Who would we be without our willingness to kill? Who would we become without our myths and mythos of warrior cultures...brave and strong and true...ready to take a life and lay down their own for the cause. As I watched the Vimy Ridge documentary, all I could see were thousands of men in the ancient garb of European peasants, whacking at each other, brutalizing each other....and for what! We're still at it....and not much has changed.

Perhaps 'war' is a nominalization that we need to redefine. Like there was a time when it was 'kool' to drink and drive, all of which has been redefined in our cultural psyche - maybe 'war' is not kool anymore and we need to reconsider what the real consequence of it is.

It's been a long day...and a great day....

And breathing is good....

The Next Wave

2007-06-25T16:23:00.000-04:00

If, as the fabric from which the WEL-Systems material emerged, I am the first wave, then those who discovered from me would be the second; and those who discovered from them would be the third. During the last few days, I became greatly awakened to what has been birthed. The Third Wave is moving much faster and further than the first two and has already birthed a fourth that I know of...and likely more!

Life is never neat and tidy and predictable. As I consider this, I am mindful of the degree to which I have been aware of water - BIG WATER! - over the last two years. If I live in a holographic universe (which I believe I do) then it may well be that the big water I am mindful of is not at the Environment level but much higher up levels of thinking. It may be the deepening and accelerating waves of a shifting world view, one that is highly contagious and one that is showing itself to have become highly contagious. That Third Wave is moving fast....

As I listened and watched these women in this Third Wave, I was so aware of how they spent little if any time at all looking back and trying to understand and figure stuff out, and so much more of them focused on where they are going. Good advice for us all to consider! They are shameless in their willingness to engage and be seen to be engaging! They are shameless in coming face-to-face with their fear, declaring it to be so - and getting on with it! They spend very little time and effort considering what others will think; worrying about whether they're going to look foolish or sound weird. They're far too busy engaging!

As I consider this Third Wave and what is being created, I find myself feeling uplifted and carried ever further into my own journey! I am delighted by this combination of Fire and Water - and things sizzle!

Breathing is good....

Flatlining Life

2007-06-24T22:46:00.000-04:00

I was reading a note from one of the Emerging Futures participants....one that spoke of her sense of excitement and enthusiasm, followed by the well-intentioned efforts of a loved one to encourage her to 'calm down'.

I was immediately transported back to a time in my own life, so very long ago, when my brother and I were having a grand time at the dinner table on Christmas Day. My mother was exhausted from a late night and many guests for a meal that she alone was preparing; my father was feeling no pain from his noon-day buzz; and my mutually-despising paternal grandmother and maternal grandfather had already stiffened into their battle positions before the first 'Pass the gravy, please' had been uttered.

My brother and I were in our own little world, finding something funny in everything and allowing ourselves to feel the full force of a good belly laugh. We weren't even being that loud - we were just being that happy.

My mother repeatedly advised us to stop laughing so hard because we would end up crying. Hmmm....go figure! What was that supposed to mean???? Even though I could not make sense of it at the age of 8, today I am clear that it was not about my or my brother's happyness - it was about her unhappyness. It was not about our glee - it was about her misery and stress.

Today, I wonder....when we are excited and enthusiastic about something, how often are those who encourage us to be 'reasonable' and 'level headed', themselves, still feeling the sting of their own disappointment? How often are we motivated to make someone else's world smaller because we feel so caught in the small world of our own?

I, for one, am unwilling to flatline my life. My life is to be lived - not weighed, measured, labelled and assessed.

Breathing is good.....

Afterthought....

2007-06-24T17:43:00.000-04:00

I realize that I am no longer seeking. In this and every moment, I am mindful of fully living what unfolds in me - from one breath to the next. And THAT is what keeps my heart beating.

Breathing is good.....

New dawn - new day

2007-06-24T10:51:00.000-04:00

I woke up this morning with such a sense of the dawning of a new day. As if, from a fresh start, anything is possible for me to be....to do...to create.

From that place, I made my way to my computer and checked out the WEL-Systems Blogging Community links to see what the folks are up to today - and I found Anne's blog. I felt such joy to read of her discovery of herself; of her vision and potential and to feel her joy at this huge sense of awakening. In the moment of her discovery, I know a pulse went through the field as evidence of her awakening. In my world, this is the pulse that is essential to creating a new world.

I think of Anne and in that thought, I know that we are all 'Anne' in our own way. We are so much more than we have been taught to believe we are....and that we have been taught to believe we can become. Our presence is so HUGE - and yet, our intentions are often whittled down to a sliver of what we might be...do...create. In this moment, Anne is unwilling to be less that who she is.

And who she is IS the Sun! It flows through her and from her and shapes all that she creates and experiences. When she allows herself to be so bold as to claim that for herself, her world - and all that who step into it - will be touched by the Sun that she is...and their lives will change.

Each of us IS that signal - that unique expression of the essence of our being in this world. When we can find that, and claim that for ourselves, we are unstoppable in manifesting what we desire. And that's not about more money, a better job, a faster car or a bigger house! It's about manifesting a world of abundance in which none of those is any longer relevant.

In the puzzle that is the universe, each of us is a unique piece. Without the expression of that piece that we are, the puzzle is never complete. EAch of us is essential to the whole - and when we do not show up, there is an empty space that waits...and waits...for us to show up.

Amy, Lori, Pat, Lucy, Carole, MaDonna, Anne, me, you.....we are not the sum total of our accomplishments. We are the conduit for our magnificence - if we allow it to be in flow. That means that we have to get past what was, stand in the 'now' of mindful awareness and step boldly and without apology into the future! Our futures are not planned or strategized - they just EMERGE from the strength of our connection to ourselves, and from there, manifest a new and different and life-sustaining world.

As much as we were together, we each know that it demands standing alone. Being willing to get over ourselves and our habits of self-denegration and self-deprecation to stand in the full measure of who we are. Whatever that may be. From there, all is possible.

Women are the key. Not because women are more than men but because women are profoundly restless in the coma of their deep sleep. Agitation is an invitation to engage!

Breathing is good.....

Emerging from women and leadership

2007-06-23T22:55:00.000-04:00

Wow! I can't believe how fast that went! Seems like I just got to Oceanstone and before I knew it, I was at the airport in Halifax, waiting for my flight home.

Not a moment dragged. Not a conversation took place that was not full of discovery, potential, insights and ideas. Every woman who participated left this new Emerging Futures and Women: Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed experience - including me! - in awe of the majesty of who they are and who they can become. I'll look forward to their own words when they offer up what it was for them to engage this process.

There were many moments of intense emotional expression. Lots of tears and lots of laughs. Our day had a leisurely start, a rich and compelling middle, and an easy end of conversation among friends. It was very clear to me that we are far more connected and creative when we are relaxed and in flow with the physical and human environment around us. No doubt, anyone watching us would have seen nothing other than a group of women in animated conversation, clearly enjoying each other's company. Little would they know we were in the process of shaping our worlds.

Conscious choosing. Choosing to stand in the 'now' and move forward. Choosing to notice the fear and relax into it rather than pressing it away. Choosing to allow a new thought, or a new behaviour, and engage rather than allowing cynicism to dismiss the potential. Choosing to risk and say what was present. Choosing to say out loud the conversation that was in flow in the privacy of their own mind. And every single one of these choices made it possible for all of us - each in our own way - to grow and awaken to so much more of our own potential.

It was interesting to me to note how goals expanded into visions; how plans relaxed into intentions; and how small and predictable became the platform to imagine the unimaginable! "Who, ME????? I can do THAT??????"

We determined that 'leadership' was a word/nominalization that was too small for what was possible for us all. So, 'leadership' became a word that reflected a result or an outcome, with far more powerful words like 'creator' and 'manifestor' evoking much greater potential. Standing in the NOW and choosing to move forward into that which does not yet exist. So much of 'leadership' and all that of its associations are tied to the past. Our attention was turned away from the past, grounded in the present and unfolded into the future.

Perhaps one of the greatest moments was in the discovery that there is nothing to fight against; nothing to break down or tear apart. As we withdraw our energy/focus/attention from what 'is' and redirect to what we choose, we create what we desire. Without the power of our attention to sustain it, what 'is' collapses.

I've been working with a WEL-Systems perspective for a very long time. What I discovered from these few days is that as powerful as it has all been, this process of Evolution by Intention and Emerging Futures accelerates it all. And as exciting as this is for me, I am also very clear: there is more. Every idea - no matter what it is - will always have a higher order context within which it rests. Right now, the body of knowledge of WEL-Systems sits in the higher order context of Evolution by Intention, which sits in the higher order context of Emerging Futures. And I know that there is a higher order context for Emerging Furtures - and I'm in the search.

Life is magical!

Breathing is good.....

Choosing to trust

2007-06-20T19:59:00.000-04:00

The end of our first full day and we are all different. More awake. More open. More curious. And perhaps most important, more willing to engage - whether we know how to or not.

As we went through the day and I listened to these women discover their dreams and share their lives, I found myself wondering what the essential element for accelerated evolution was/is. Courage? Determination? Curiosity? As much as these made sense to me, I was mindful that without the simple act of choosing - the act of declaration that it is so - those other experiences are not sufficient in and of themselves to change the course of a life from one being lived to one worth living.

Choosing. Declaring. The act of making visible what far too often remains hidden inside us. The act of choosing/declaring reveals to the world the intention that we carry in the privacy of our own minds. Once we choose, the choice itself becomes the marker for the road we travel.

An Emerging Future demands that we trust the sensory cues in our own body. Doing that is a choice - and nothing more. It may well be THE one that profoundly changes the quality of our lives.

Breathing is good....

Doors opening - thoughts flowing

2007-06-19T23:38:00.000-04:00

Our first conversation took us long into the night. It's almost 1:00 a.m. and I am wide awake and ready for more!

Those who have gathered here are ready, willing and up to the task. It is not by accident that they have gathered; and it is by design that each will be a critical part in my own evolution...in the appearance of the next wave.

Oceanstone fills the senses and in so doing, awakens the body. Since an Emerging Future cannot be 'known' in the intellect, and only exists in the body, our senses are a crucial component of exploring how to live as an expression of that Emerging Future. 'Sensing' our way through from the 'now' to what can be...allowing 'instinct' to lead the way.... these are the skills to engage and hone. We have relied on the intellect for far too long, and it has gotten us what we have. Methinks we're long overdue for a change....

Each of the women here is deeply and intricately connected to the other. Even if how, exactly, is not yet clear, the truth of it has already begun to surface in the things we talk about. It makes me wonder: where else in my life are these connections already present and I am not noticing them? How else might I engage with others beyond that which is familiar to me; and if so, what might I discover about myself?

Perhaps the most pressing awareness for me today is the degree to which women manifest incrementally; the degree to which caution is required to ensure that we do not look 'foolish' or 'fool hardy' in our thoughts and/or intentions; the degree to which we edit what moves inside us before we make it available outside of us, sure that if offered in its immensity, it will be dismissed, ridiculed or disregarded.

Tomorrow begins another conversation - and I wonder where it will lead.

It has been a good day! It's late...I'm tired....and

Breathing is good.....

Anticipation and excitement

2007-06-17T21:51:00.000-04:00

Things are stirring as I get ready to spend my week in conversation with women, about women and leadership. Leadership redefined - leadership reclaimed.

I have no idea what to expect - and isn't that the point of an emerging future! I'm very ready for this; am very willing to step into it; and am very able to engage it all. Those who will be with me bring very unique and 'unpractised' lives. They do now 'know' from the outside but know deeply from the inside. This week, we will all discover what we know.

The days are always so full. The conversations are rich and potent; thick and juicy with potential. My intention is to write at the end of every day, that I might capture more of the threads of the tapestry as it is weaving itself. I know that I will surprise even myself with what I am drawn to pay attention to. This week will reveal itself to me in ways that I know will open my eyes to the 'more' that awaits.

For now, it's time to pack......

Breathing is good.....

Leadership and manifestation

2007-06-15T07:48:00.000-04:00

I'm in Quebec City for a few days, hanging out with my mother and shopping. I had no idea she could move that fast. It would seem that to her, the sound of doors opening at 9:00 a.m. is akin to that of a starter pistol.

Although it's only been three days, I feel somehow rekindled and ready for more! Who would have thought that treking through shopping centers would be the space I needed to allow new thoughts to flow. Me...who hates shopping! Somewhere between the last t-shirt and the red leather travel bag, it occurred to me that, in some way, this is the enlargening (is that a word???) space into which next week will flow. And all I've done is play.

Next week, I am at Oceanstone for a small gathering of women to explore what redefining and reclaiming 'leadership' might look and sound like. These women have been drawn to this small collective from an unspoken yet shared personal experience of knowing that their lives do not match the immensity of their presence, their intention and their longing for more. Each unique and talented in her own way (and aren't we all!), I enter into an exploration with them fully aware that I have no idea where it will end up; no idea what conclusions we may come to. And yet, what I am also very aware of is that the discovery is there for us to step into and wear as how we choose to live.

Like January 2006 saw an awakening of a pressure for me to engage, so does this coming week offer that same kind of pressure to engage....a pressure to step outside the traditional conversation about the good ship 'leader-ship' and consider the implications of all the barnacles that have come to attach themselves over time and distance travelled; of the impact of having sailed the same waters far too many times and forgotten or overlooked what it is to be in the vast unexplored and undiscovered. We think we know what leadership is. I believe that we know what it is, relative to what we think we are. However, as the new biology redefines what we are, have we stopped to consider the implications of this new knowledge relative to our capacity to manifest? And what is leadership if not a capacity to manifest!

This week has been filled with fun and play. Next week will be filled with fun and play of a different kind...of a higher order of impact and potential. Perhaps next week's conversation will take us beyond noticing that the Emperor has no clothes and create the space for us to shop for new ones!

Breathing is good......

Before healing comes awakening

2007-06-11T16:25:00.000-04:00

For days, now, this phrase has been going through my mind: "Before healing comes awakening". Over and over again, this same thought repeating itself, obviously intent on staying in my awareness until I do something with it!

Today is the day.

It makes sense to me. What it says to me is that dis-ease or illness is an indication of a being in a deep sleep or, more in alignment with what I believe is occurring today, a coma. Dis-ease is the way that the Signal that we are lets us know where we are asleep, how we have gone to sleep and what we need to pay attention to in order to awaken.

What it also says to me is that health/wellness, vitality and life force are present when we are awake to the truth of who we are and our own potential.

Dis-ease = asleep/coma. Wellness = awake! Simple.

Take breast cancer, as an example. An indication of sleep in the area of culturally conditioned self (heart centre – 4th chakra). What it says to me is that the ‘sick’ person has gone into a deep sleep in the area of culturally conditioned self, allowing what others think and believe and say; what others expect and demand; and what others will or won’t do as being more important – more relevant and more powerful in guiding the choices made – than the sleeping being herself.

I then get curious about how did she get that way and what does she need to do to wake up? The trajectory of the dis-ease, meaning how it developed from its first manifestations of sensations in the body, to its current expression help me to pay attention to how they went to sleep. This is important because it can also help me figure out how they can wake up. And if indeed, awake = well, then awake is what we’re looking for!

The CODE Model is my framework for exploring that trajectory of awake to sleep/coma and back again.

In this moment, it is so clear to me. When I think back to all the people I’ve worked with, it has all been there.

When my hand goes to sleep, it tells me that I am restricting something in some way. I did something in a certain way that led to the natural result of my hand ‘going to sleep’. If I do something else instead, my hand will wake up. Why should it be any different with cancer? Or Crohn’s? Or brain tumors?

I wonder if we’re ready – as a species – to recognize that we create it all. The hand going to sleep and the brain tumor. It’s all part of the same process. Perhaps if we could ‘get’ that, we’d all be healthier, much faster.

Breathing is good….

Incomplete/not-yet-completely-cooked thoughts

2007-06-05T22:40:00.000-04:00

It is one of those days when my outside clock tells me that it’s been a long day and I need to sleep but my inside clock tells me that it’s time to write. I look around me and still see the movement of others in the house, and out on the street below and yet, inside – where I live – I am feeling pulled into that dense, timeless fog that is one of the gifts that comes from being awake at 3:00 a.m.

I love that time of day and I love that sense of being in a world far removed from the one my body occupies. Totally separate and alone and yet in some way connected to everything. Every breath feels like wispy tentacles of air reaching through the ether to connect. Every thought feels like it streams behind it and from it, at least a million more, none of which require detail or content but are full and rich and complete by virtue of their very existence.

Things flow, without the need for direction or intention, carried on an inner vibration that grows and expands and…what’s the word…emanates from my being. Like the sound a whisper makes when it’s heard. What we notice is the whisper… the sensation in the body that the whisper awakens…and forget all about the content. The sound of the whisper IS the content that is most meaningful!

I wonder why we think we need to know. The best nano-seconds of my life have unfolded with huge ramifications when I did not have a clue. I did not know; I did not seek to know; and knowing or not knowing never entered my awareness. The result was a rush of genius through the body – all without any particular content and yet racing with images and sounds and sensations in my body, capturing thousands of ideas in a single heartbeat - knowing deeply without having to know what I knew. I just knew.

In this moment, things are moving faster than my willingness or ability to attempt to capture them. In this moment, I wonder if my body knows that it is not yet 3:00 a.m. and is somehow holding back. What might that be, I wonder……

And so, I wait. I occupy my thoughts and my fingers by allowing what is there to fall out the ends of my fingers and make way for the ‘more’ that is close behind. I wander across the keyboard, restless and unable to settle, and yet clear in the recognition that what awaits has not yet completed gestation. When the moment presents, the next layer will birth itself. Nothing for me to do but wait….

It’s not what I do best. Waiting. There is a passive quality to it and yet, this waiting feels different. It’s not passive – it’s more like the deep inhale before the sigh is released. Can you have one without the other?

Breathing is good….

Work-in-progress

2007-06-04T18:42:00.000-04:00

I am a work-in-progress….perhaps more now than ever before. Even I am surprised by what flows in and out of my thoughts, and the degree to which I am different from one day to the next.

I am surprised by my own impatience – eager to get on with it!

I am excited by my sense of what the future holds – for me and for others.

I am sometimes fearful – and most times, hopeful – of the powerful beings that we are and what we might create.

I am drawn to meaning, seeking it in all things, all places, all people; in all conversations and experiences; watching and listening for it in every seemingly random act I engage in.

In all things, my future emerges. The question is never whether or not it’s present. The question always is: am I paying attention sufficiently to notice? It does not pass me by. When I choose to look away to what is more familiar to me, it does not leave me. It finds another way to slide into my awareness – invitation to choose again.

The big changes in my life are already in flow, long put in motion and with intended outcomes now peeking out from behind the effects of my own long-held habits.

That restlessness has been growing for more than a year. Begun in January 2006 (having awakened one morning to find it just sitting there… vibrating… somewhere in my chest) and followed by so many new discoveries, the lull of the past few months is giving way to the urge to engage. I can tell what to pursue and what to let go of by the vibration in my own body. When it is there, it is a signal to me to engage. When it is nowhere to be sensed, it is my signal to let go and move on. Even in its absence, its message is unquestionable.

I’m not used to that… to the notion of unquestionable. There is nothing in my life that I don’t question. And yet, for whatever reason, I am clear that the ‘me’ that I am in this physical world trusts easily and completely the ‘ME’ that is calling to my attention.

In the near future, it will be time for me to write of Evolution by Intention and Emerging Futures and how they are connected. They are the front and back of the same hand. When I am willing to relax into one, the other simply becomes. There is no effort. There is no struggle. And, as Yoda would say, there is no ‘try’ – there is only ‘do or not do’. I choose to do.

I feel others around me waking up. My life has been fed by my desire to share with others the process of awakening. It has never been my interest or intention to impose what it is that they awaken to. That is the domain of the single soul and its expression in this world. And I am clear that I know well the process of awakening. So many talk of it and long for it and yet, never find it. So many talk of awakening while they stumble around in the dark. Today, in conversation with a colleague and friend, I was again reminded of the distinction between conversations about awakening, and the experience of being awake. They are not the same.

And so, one more day goes by and I find myself more present than the last. Today, in conversation with the Mauna Lani, it struck me: this is real! On the holodeck of my experience, April will be felt through Huna in Hawaii. Wow…and this is my life. Who would have thought?

Breathing is good…..

The fog of forgetting....

2007-05-29T14:40:00.000-04:00

….who I have been, that I might remember who I am.

… the words that are familiar to me that I might discover new ones that awaken me

… what it feels like to know that I might experience the joy of not knowing with grace.

Things continue to move so fast. In those moments, I wonder… am I in a fog or is this just a blur from watching things go by? And if so, what am I not seeing?

I really don’t have a clue – and I stay with it. Sometimes, words come out the ends of my fingers and fill the screen. I have no sense of what is there until I re-read. And then I wonder: who wrote that?

I don’t believe that I channel or that another speaks through me. I do believe that the stronger my connection to that godforce that moves through me – that IS me – the more I can know what it is to delight in discovering more of the truth of who I can be.

In this moment, I am aware of how long it’s been since I was last here. It is not that I don’t ponder things… or wonder about things…but more that I seem to be without the desire to somehow capture them and make them ‘real’ in my world. It feels more like watching it all flow by, noticing it all and seeing nothing in particular.

And yet, from time to time, something will catch my attention and stay with me for more than a nano-second. In those bytes of awareness, I am wondering what is meaningful to me about having noticed those particular things to wonder about!

Like Al Gore – watching him on The Daily Show with John Stewart as they discuss Al’s new book “An Assault on Reason” and noticing that the one thing they do not speak about is the great desire that people have to believe their leaders; to believe that those who are in power – those who have such great leverage in the quality of their lives – particularly those they have chosen and elect will, indeed, take care of them… not deceive them… have their best interests at heart. To me, the assault on reason has less to do with media manipulation and much more to do with the innate desire we carry to love; and to show this love by investing ourselves in others as our way of ensuring that they will love us back.

As I listened to them, I was struck by the parallels (yet again!) between what they were talking about and the bond between parent and child. No surprises there. Given that we are all fractals of a root organic system called ‘family’, why would we be surprised when we discover that we have replicated that core system in all that we do….everywhere in our lives! (Side bar: leaves me wondering - if we were not 'taught' how to love, I wonder what we would make up for ourselves that would be less about history and habit and much more about instinct and intuition....)

And then Hillary Clinton – listening to a radio interview with a woman from some prestigious leadership institute in the US speak to Hillary’s problem in her run at the White House being her seeming inability to be perceived as both strong and feminine…and finding myself wondering: what I would be looking for from a ‘leader’ – any leader! – would not be their ability to charm me with their male/female presence but VISION! What do these people want to manifest???? I know that whatever that is, my life will be profoundly affected by it.

And then, in noticing what I’ve been paying attention to, I wonder: how are these experiences of Al Gore and Hillary Clinton metaphors for my own life? What is there for me to notice about myself through these expressions that I perceive as being ‘out there’? What am I trying to say to myself by speaking to Al and Hillary as ‘not me’ and yet, in some profound and powerful way, most definitely are ‘me’?

What pops to mind in this moment is the complexity that surrounds engaging from a coma with others in a coma; the contortions of trying to shape and mold – self and other – while intending to manifest a particular outcome.

I wonder how Al would have reacted if John had said : “You know, Al… what it’s really about is the degree to which we like to pretend we care and that we’re willing to step up to the plate but the truth is, we don’t and we aren't. Even when it affects us directly, we don’t really care. We’re too busy working at getting comfortable with being numb, and don’t want to do anything that will remind us that ‘not numb’ is a possibility.”

Or if the woman who spoke about Hillary had said: “In my opinion, I don’t think Hillary should give a rat’s ass about whether or not people think she’s Butch or Betty. What matters to me is: has she got what it takes to manifest the future of one of the most powerful nations in the world in such a way that we don’t destroy ourselves entirely? And given that we’re a nation of people not willing to take responsibility for ourselves, is she going to be able to stay awake when the rest of us go back into a deep, collective sleep until the next election?”

I re-read what I just wrote. Hmmm…seems to come with attitude. What I notice about myself is that on the holodeck of my experience, does it matter whether or not I share what I have discovered with anyone else? Is doing so going to make a difference in the world? My world?

Am I willing to go it alone? Am I willing to not fit; to not care whether anyone else is awake or asleep? Am I willing to be true to myself and honor what is meaningful for me/to me without feeling the need to make it meaningful to others as a way of getting validation to myself that I’m on the right track?

So here I sit. Caring. Wanting to engage with others and share what is deeply meaningful to me because I believe that it is also what others seek – and cannot find. Do I believe I have the answer to their awakening? I think my answer to that one would be the question: at what logical level of thinking? Does it matter to me that they know that? What I need to do is keep living what I teach others. What matters is for me to BE … to allow… and to have my very life be an invitation…to whom? For what? I’m not really sure….

And then, let the chips fall where they may.

Breathing is good….

…

Faster than a speeding bullet...

2007-05-23T15:04:00.000-04:00

I was in conversation today with Lori and found myself describing my life this way….

Imagine the image of a train speeding down a track and hanging on to the railing of the caboose for dear life by one hand….is me! The most interesting part for me is that in that image, I am blinded by the intensity of my own smile. It seems that I enjoy the experience of being pulled at mach speed into my destination!

And so it is with my ‘emerging future’. It is unfolding, moving, flowing… whatever the word!... far faster than I had thought possible. Things are happening all by themselves. And isn’t that the way it should be?

The new edition of Fully Alive is almost complete. We’re finalizing the cover and into the nitty gritty of pre-production details. Funny….I’ve really been dragging my feet on this one and wondering how come. I kept getting distracted by other things…

In conversation with a colleague and client today, who was sharing his thoughts with me about his read of the manuscript for the new Fully Alive, I got goose bumps as he spoke. For him, he was clear that even though I hold this edition as having about 40% new material, he experienced it as a much more powerful and profoundly different book. We concluded that the new context is likely what has made the difference. I’m not holding back a thing.

As I write these words, I am mindful of how I have missed being here. This place that is for me; for my thoughts; for wandering through what is sometimes the wilderness of my own mind and letting myself be surprised by what is revealed to me. I know that there is a ripple in the Force. And I know that there is much more to come in 2007.

Breathing is good…..

A passing thought....

2007-05-15T15:35:00.000-04:00

We complain about the current status of our world... but we do not complain about who we have been to create such a result.

Perhaps, if we were to focus our attention on the source of our havoc (us!), we would create something very different. However, to do this, we would each have to recognize the part we play in its ongoing manifestation, rather than stand back and point at the behaviours of others.

Consciousness....the great wave of our own unfolding....cannot be denied. That we are consciousness in action means that if we are to act otherwise, our consciousness must flow diffierently. But first, we must find it and claim it as our own.

Breathing is good.....

Silence Inside

2007-05-14T17:25:00.000-04:00

I’m noticing that things inside me have an ebb and flow. As much as there can be wave after wave of insight, discovery and new possibilities, I am also mindful that sometimes... and not always with warning… it all stops. Inside myself, I become aware of an immense stillness. The image that comes to mind is that of a tall-masted ship, sails sagging as it stands motionless on a sea of liquid silver under the full moon of a clear night sky,.

Inside the sea of potential that I am, all has been still.

But things are stirring. I can feel a breeze as I begin to capture new ideas… new possibilities. Paying attention not to what I have always done, or even what I think I should do, but much more to what calls to me to do. Noticing my willingness and ability to allow my future to emerge; and noticing also my willingness and ability to be led by it. Intellect aside, my need to ‘know’ suspended, the stillness is disturbed by my desire to grow.

Growth is a biological imperative. It is also my core value. If I woke up tomorrow and knew that I would never again grow, I would have no interest in being alive. For me, growth is what gives my life meaning.

I am growing – in leaps and bounds! I’m mindful that when that happens… inside me, where I live… I am not always adept at making my growth immediately accessible to others. I seem to need Space to allow myself to relish and rejoice in my own growth. I need to allow the Movement that accompanies that growth to first, transform me. Once I have absorbed it… digested it…become it!... then there is Space for me to share it with others and it begins to Flow through me and into the expression of who I am to become.

My life is changing. I am discovering that I need more and bigger Space in order for me to both trust and love who I am already becoming. The voice that speaks for the essence of my being, and the voice that speaks for the organic presence that I am, are no longer fighting. They have become still – inside, where I live.

Funny, isn’t it. When those voices are engaging with great flurry and intensity (which is when I might think that there would be chaos), nothing inside me moves. When those voices have found their path to becoming one and have ceased to move inside me, my world and my desire to be in it pick up speed and I am propelled forward, into my own life. It is just so freakin’ amazing!

And so, it begins. Things pouring out the ends of my fingers. New programs falling effortlessly into place. New retreats. More without structure and form. Vast, empty spaces of potential and possibility – and all I have to do is breathe, follow the impulse, let myself know the truth of my own experience… and ENGAGE!

I know my days in the program room for ITS and RIA are coming to an end. It is quite likely that my last time in the program room for these will be this July. It is time for me to create a much larger space for myself to expand into and, in so doing, create space for others to flow into.

I wonder if I’ll miss it. I know that the magic of ITS has always been in being witness to the Sacred that awakened, flowed and filled the room with the LifeForce that we all are. Impossible to ignore! In those moments, I could always remember who I am; and I could trust who I would become. I know that the journey will continue in the gentle presence of others who will follow – each to lead in her/his own way.

My future lies in working with women. It lies in the Women and WEL-Systems series; and in the Whispers from Within women’s writing retreat; and now, more than ever before, in the EmergingFutures retreats for women and leadership. My future is not out there, in front of me…it is already in here, rushing through and filling up every cell in the tissue of my being. With every breath I take, it has already become ‘real’.

Breathing is good…..

Engaging...NOW!

2007-05-07T12:14:00.001-04:00

I am aware that I’m different.

I don’t sit around and think about things a lot. When something feels right to me and for me, I engage.

When I have a conversation with someone and through that conversation things call to me, I hang up and engage. It may mean that I make another call, or send an email to connect a couple of people, but whatever it is, I do it NOW. Once the connection is made, I let go. It will go wherever it is meaningful for it to go.

I think back to how I used to live, oh-so-long-ago. I would have a thought. Then, I would have a conversation with myself about that thought, exploring its merits to be revealed to another. Then, I would have conversations with others about my thought, exploring whether or not that thought was a good/meaningful/relevant/important thought, and thought to be so by others. Once it was established with someone else (external reference) that it was indeed, an intelligent thought, I would then give great consideration to how I would proceed in sharing that thought with others. Never mind taking action! I was still far from being able to do that!

And, strangely enough, what I would often discover is that by the time I was actually ready to engage that thought, it was no longer relevant. Life had passed me by.

I recall, years ago, facilitating an in-house corporate group of about 25 managers. During the course of the four-day process, one woman spoke of how she was never permitted to speak at their meetings, and that she felt no one really cared what her ideas were. We spent some time exploring that, with this woman finally realizing that she was doing what I had so often done. Rather than risk feeling embarrassed, or moving forward while feeling unsure, she would take such precautions to be sure that her idea was a good one. She would run through, in her head, a conversation with each of the others at the table, anticipating how they would respond and what they would say, and would adjust her thought/idea accordingly. By the time this process was complete, the conversation had moved on; or worse, when she did actually open her mouth and speak, her initial thought/idea had been edited into a pale version of anything meaningful. The roar of who she was had become a squeak.

No more! What are we waiting for????

Since January 2006, I have felt this great acceleration and the need/desire to move forward. I am unwilling to be cautious or replay my own thoughts 30 times before sharing them with another. It is not about running out of time, it is about recognizing that I am manifesting, from one second to the next – and I am no longer willing to NOT manifest what I want! That means that when that thought/idea/notion moves, I engage! In that nano-second of engaging, manifestation occurs.

I don’t always know exactly what it is that will result. (But then, that’s what an Emerging Future™ is all about.) But I do know this: if I don’t’ engage, I’ll get more of what I’ve already got. And I’ve already got that! J

When I do engage, I know that life moves. The Life Force that I am, moves. When my LifeForce moves and touches yours, yours moves too. It is what Life is designed to do.

“Be bold!” That’s what I tell myself, from one breath to the next. “Live fully!” That’s what I know is the outcome when I do. “Don’t edit – engage!” And when I do, my life explodes with potential and possibility and is full of wonderful surprises.

Sometimes, my doing so startles others. It would seem that my actions defy convention on how it is supposed to be. Oh well…so be it!

Yes, there are times when others might have their opinions about that. Might frown upon moving so quickly, holding my actions as unconsidered or impulsive. And to that, I say “Absolutely!” And I would not have it any other way. My life is ALIVE!

Breathing is good…..

Woman - Conduit - The Sacred

2007-05-05T13:43:00.000-04:00

It’s getting clearer to me, now. I know why women are dying in such huge numbers. In so many different ways, so many different cultures, so many different environments and contexts and geographies.

Hiding is killing us. Silencing ourselves is killing us. Being small and puny is killing us. Forcing ourselves to be less than who we are so that others will not harm us (physically, emotionally, socially, etc) is killing us. Were I to allow it to be released, the scream in my body would shake the ground on which I stand!

If we are dying in our silence anyway, why would we not choose to at least explore living in the sound of who we are?

My morning was spent with yet another powerful, incredible woman. That which is sacred within her WILL NOT ALLOW her to be silent anymore. As we talked, it was clear that the body vibration that accompanies the immensity of who she is, is unfamiliar and in some ways uncomfortable for her. And yet, she cannot stop herself! It is a glorious moment to bear witness to the Sacred pressing through the concrete of cultural habituation. I am moved and honored to have witnessed it.

We hide the sacred within us that we might not be discovered for the charlatans we are! We are NOT inept! We are NOT incremental in how we move through the world! Our sins….our crime…our secret… is not in what we do or don’t do - it is in what we do not allow ourselves to be seen to already be! We know what lives inside us, and we inch through our lives in fear that if we’re found out, we’ll be harmed. And so we wait… often in the darkness of our own thoughts… until we find another who ‘feels’ safe to us. In that moment of safety, we are freed to find ourselves.

How many of us lock down on the wave of the Sacred that moves through us as we speak of creating what is meaningful to us? How many of us hold back… pull back and hold our breath, our joy, our magnificence… and do not allow others to see us in the moment of being so powerfully moved… so compelled to be alive!... as the awakened, sentient expressive beings that we are? We retract and press down the full measure of who we are that we might not frighten ourselves.

We are dying – in vast numbers – at the hands of others. We are also dying at our own hand because we will not choose LIFE! We stand firm… no, not quite true… we stand STUCK in the histories shaped by others and allow them to become the prisons that take our futures.

We are dying of breast cancer in epidemic proportions because we can’t breathe! We don’t know how to let the breath of who we are be inhaled… how to take that huge, gulping gasp that will awaken us to a different world… and so, our Life Force leaves. There is no room for it to engage within the small, tight chambers we’ve created that we call our lives.

We have thyroid problems in record numbers because we have kept our voices small and tight for so long, we’ve forgotten what it sounds like. Do we even recognize the sound of who we are when we hear ourselves? Can that small, tinny sound be me??? When we listen to the sound of our own voice, does it betray us in what it says and how it says it? Or do we even believe we have anything left to say that matters to anyone – especially to ourselves.

Today, as I spent my morning with yet another powerful, amazing woman, I found hope inside myself, in the sound of her voice. The truth of who she is seeps out of her pores. And even she can no longer pretend that it is not so! In this moment, I am filled with hope for us all.

Breathing is good…..

Tension as a way of knowing I'm alive?

2007-05-04T12:23:00.000-04:00

I’m restless again. It’s not that I don’t have enough to do! I could make calls, send emails, talk with/see people, write articles/books; record and edit for 18 hours a day and still have more to do – but that’s not it.

It’s not about getting things done or even making a difference. It’s not about what we do or the outcome we get. It’s about how we go about it.

Again, this morning on CBC (I seem to be doing that a lot lately), I heard an interview with a doctor from Winnipeg who is serving with the Canadian Forces in Kandahar. It occurred to me as I listened to this compassionate and courageous man speak that he makes a difference. A life-and-death difference. And despite the hardships, the danger, the ever-present threat of losing his life, this was his second tour of duty and he’s committed to returning whenever they need him. Every time he goes, he leaves behind a woman he loves and who loves him, and two very young children. And yet, he goes.

I listened and I pondered how different my life is from his. The only death that I’ve know in my life is the passing of three, very aged family elders long ago when I was in my early teens. It seems that I live and have lived a charmed life in so many ways! I’ve wanted for nothing; I’ve been/done/gone what called to me to be/do/go – always with ease and without complication.

My thoughts come easily and flow abundantly and seem to bring an expansion of life when I share them with others. I know that over the years, thousands have been profoundly touched by their interaction with me and/or with the body of knowledge that I have created. All of which is wonderful, and yet……

Something about this radio conversation speaks to me of meaning in a different way. As this doctor spoke of his commitment to heal – regardless of his personal judgments/opinions/interpretations/etc about the person before him – I could see the faces of the others in the stories that he told. Young children severely wounded, caught in the crossfire of a battle with terror as its only outcome. Locals – friend and foe alike – all bleeding with the same result of an ebbing life force as his efforts are unable to stem the flow. Comrades engaging in various play – watching movies, coffee at Tim Horton’s and conversation about what’s going on ‘back home’, hip-hop lessons and samba classes – all efforts to bring a sense of ‘life goes on’ into the midst of such insanity. And all the while, just outside the edges of the cocoon they find themselves in, danger waits.

There is nothing dangerous about what I do. I am always safe. I am always at ease in my environment. I am always close to people I love and who love me. Things feel easy and effortless.

In this moment, I wonder: is that because my world is that way? Or is because I create my world that way?

Lately, I have been wondering about who we are as human beings. Do we need war and danger and pain in order for us to feel ‘alive’ and ‘meaningful’? As those Spiritual Beings having a human experience, do we need to design pain/danger/loss as a pathway to discovering something about ourselves and our humanity? Are these the things that call us to find valor, courage, strength within ourselves? Do we need to be self-less in order to find our Self?

What comes to mind is the part in ‘The Matrix’ where the agent is questioning Morpheus, and tells of the original programs for the sleeping ‘battery’ of humans – and how its easy and comfortable content left the sleeping captives restless and uneasy. The program had to be changed to allow for strife and conflict and struggle in order for them to sleep easy and well.

Do we have to push up against the edges of who we think we are in order to find out who we might become? And in doing so, do we need to kill ourselves and each other?

I don’t know – and I wonder….

Breathing is good……

Cascading potential

2007-05-02T13:38:00.000-04:00

In my usual fashion, my attention has been moving sprightly across a broad range of attractors. Like little flashing lights of potential, my gaze wanders (not over but) through a range of sounds and images that in some way, all call to me to engage.

I’m noticing that this is occurring far more quickly than I can calibrate for with my intellect. I’m discovering within myself a new and as yet unproven capacity to notice without knowing what I notice; to see/hear/sense without having to have content; and to allow so many things on such varying topics to converge without my needing to do anything with them, to make sense of any of them or, in some way, to have closure on any of them. And yet, I instinctively recognize the 'truth' of a possible emerging future in each.

These things just ‘are’ and I follow where and when they lead me.

This morning, I was driving to the office and listening to CBC. I turned on the radio to catch the last half of a sentence by a woman who was clearly distressed by her experience of ‘infertility’ and IVF. In a nano-second, a cascading torrent of impressions flowed from….somewhere! In that instant, I completely remembered lengthy, extensive conversations with a woman who was then a friend, about her struggles with getting pregnant. I became very tuned in to what, to me, feels like the insanity of attempting to conceive under such stress and duress. I kept seeing this image of a tiny, struggling zygote desperately trying to grow where there was no space in the body for it to settle. That notion of ‘Space, Movement and Flow’ came to mind, reminding me that conception requires Space, within which movement can occur and produce the flow that results in gestation.

Streamed with that was the metaphor of infertility and its application to our global, organic collective ‘family’; and how we keep trying to create something new in the world without the Space in our thoughts and habits to allow for any of it.

The next strand related to time….how the past continues to shape the future; and how difficulty with conception is addressed in the ‘now’ when in all likelihood, the past is in some way recreating itself for us to notice, learn from it, grow (Space) and move(ment0 on!

All that, from less than five seconds of sound byte on CBC. And that’s only what I can bring to awareness in this moment of recalling it – because I know there was so much more in flow at the time, much of it content free yet very ‘real’ in the sensations in my body..

What difference does any of this make? It tells me that I can process huge amounts of information in nano-seconds…pieces of seconds…that I have ignored for most of my life. It tells me that there is so much more beyond what I can recall – all of it relevant and meaningful in some way, and accessible in ways I’ve not trusted in the past.

Why is this important to me? Because in the domain of manifestation – in the domain of creating matter from thought – and compressing space/time for an instantaneous response, I must learn to trust that the key is NOT knowing and engaging anyway. And not engaging because I know how to make it happen but engaging because I know that when I let go, it does happen.

Hmmm….I can see that today is going to be an interesting day.

Breathing is good…..

Manifestation

2007-04-30T10:01:00.000-04:00

Breathe
Follow the impulse
Let yourself know the truth of your own experience

The impulse is equivalent to the point of the particle formation potential in the void. The impulse is the body's way of letting us know that we are in a moment of the possibility of creation. We choose to act... or not.

Those situations where there is an impulse, occur when there is an opportunity to grow and expand our 'being'. If it is important, it will repeat and intensify, particularly if fear has caused us to pull away from it, meaning we know it's important but are afraid. There is an initial recognition and a moving away.

It's the moving away from the impulse that makes life complicated. The body never lies.

Breathing is good.....

Remembering who I am

2007-04-28T16:17:00.000-04:00

I’m cleaning stuff out, today. Getting rid of things that take up space in my life and yet, given who I’ve become, have no place in my life.

I found journals, from as far back as 19990 – when I began my first business. And there I was, reading journals instead of doing what I’d set out to do, yet realizing that there are no accidents in the universe.

I read words written in my own handwriting and I wonder who that woman was! As I read, I can see/hear/feel the thread that ties her to who I have become today and yet, feel somehow distant and removed in some way. There are entries about every aspect of my life, including my thoughts as I moved through my pregnancy with my first child as a single mother. In those, each word is cherished and felt as if I am living it now. Oh, that I could live it all again....such magic!

I did find something that I can still relate to, all this time past. A journal entry dated October 23, 1995. I do remember that around that time, I was about to create six-week group experiences with women that would become the Women and Power material. All there is on the page is that date and the information below in point form:

“
- to be present, calm and centered
- to breathe
- to trust that they will be/do who and what is required for them to express
- to listen; to hear the deep structure
- to be respectful
- to honor my process as well as the process of each of the other 7 women in the room
- to take my time
- to be honest
- to trust in a force higher than myself
- to trust in a Higher Self – a greater self – one that knows the larger plan. “

That was 12 years ago and it is still how I choose to live. In life, there are things that do not need to be remembered when they have become who we are.

Breathing is good…..

My Emerging Future

2007-04-26T19:00:00.000-04:00

My last few days have been spent finalizing the 3rd Edition of Fully Alive, getting the manuscript ready for production. I’m also continuing to work on my Huna book; and have finally completed the list of material to record in the next few weeks. The list is long, having decided to exhaust all that I have to say (is that ever possible???) about all of the WEL-Systems models, including The CODE Model, CODE Model Coaching, Evolution by Intention and Emerging Futures.

My own future is emerging rapidly and I’m engaging to keep pace – and make room for the next wave. I have no idea what it will look/feel like, and I know that it will be an important time for my own evolution.

My need to complete what feels like unfinished business is strong. Like putting all the ITS material on CD, from beginning to end. Having my books on CD. Recording all that I can think of to say on The CODE Model and its unique chakra correlations, CODE Model Coaching and Quantum TLC. Recording all the meditations that form part of the ITS process. It is as if doing so will in some way complete something for me and I can…..what??!?!?!?

It feels like pressure… pressure in the area of my ears…with much activity in the eyes. It is as if I am getting ready to see through things and to see what’s not yet here….to hear where there is no sound….and to have nothing to say. For so many years, it seems that I’ve had so much to say.

I’m also becoming aware of my pull to move toward retreat experiences; destinations that invite the body to let go and relax, making way for so much more to be in flow. I believe we are greatly in need of this capacity for flow.

And so, some part of me sits back and watches the rest of me go! I seem to be able to do so many things at once. It also feels like I’m moving toward some kind of deadline or finish line…on what? Not quite sure, but it sure makes my life interesting.

Emerging Futures is my future. The implications for the coming decade are immense – and I already know that. Emerging Futures is (I believe) essential to carving out new ways of moving through the world that are far beyond what we know. It is not what we know that will make the difference. It’s what we don’t know and are willing nonetheless to trust. It’s what we are willing to allow ourselves to become. Not WHO but WHAT. We are not what we think we are. We are so much more.

Emerging Futures was birthed from Huna as a gateway. Without the Three Selves of Huna, it is not complete. Time and space are elements of the NOW and are not relevant for an emerging future. Compression of time permits manifestation to occur instantly. An apple in my hand appears when I intend for it to do so. Of what value are the things we’ve been taught to hold dear when each of us can do that? Makes life as we know it meaningless in so many ways.

My Spirit is restless, hearing the call to a new way of being. It is like January 2006 all over again…but much more intense. I wonder how many others are restless, too?

Breathing is good…..

Back in the saddle....

2007-04-23T17:06:00.000-04:00

Another week of Igniting the Self has completed itself and, as always, I am not now who I was when I began, this time last week. It is amazing to me how easy it can be and how far/fast we can move without effort. It’s never about effort – it’s always about Intention, Attention and the willingness to engage.

Like everything else in my life since January 2006, this (ITS) too is rapidly redesigning itself. The acceleration touches us all and all that we engage. None of us is spared the inevitable and profound transformation that follows in its wake.

This last time, my own transformation came in the form of an awareness attached to this notion of helping/rescuing/saving/guiding/etc. As I went from one day to the next, larger and larger conversations coming to life about WHAT we are (Quantum Biological Organic Processors), it occurred to me that there is nothing to help/save/rescue/etc. The very act of trying to do so locks each of us into being NOT the amazing presence that we are.

The awakening of the quantum biological organic presence that I am is tied to discovering my own presence….my own power….my own unique expression of the godforce that I already am in the world. What I discovered for myself is that the more I try to encourage/support/assist/guide/etc, the more difficult it becomes for the ‘other’ to discover themselves.

The more I am willing to just be present to another in their sometimes incredibly painful struggle to find themselves, the more quickly they can do so. Like life emerging from a shell, strength and capacity to thrive is compromised if the shell is broken for them. Perhaps this is much more akin to being a midwife. In these processes, I do indeed, get to be present to and bear witness to a natural birth of some kind. The less I put my hands into the mix, the more potent the result.

Sometimes, things get messy. Sobs....sounds...snotty noses are all part of the process. Rage, also, can be part of this process. And without a doubt, I discovered last week that being this way (my unwillingness to insert myself into their ‘birthing’ process to help and facilitate, etc) does not always make me popular! Nor does it leave others feeling warm and fuzzy about me. Nonetheless, each leaves the process more fully awake, aware and present to themselves and their own potential. Is that not what it’s all about?

I discovered last week that safety does not reside in my taking care of anyone. Safety resides in each discovering that they can take care of themselves. Sometimes, given the world we live in, the only way that can happen is to find yourself in the deep end of the pool and discover that you can breathe under water.

New information. The marvels of the science of today are impressive when we consider the impact on our technology and all that it implies. However, nothing (to me) is more potent that what today’s science allows us to begin to notice about ourselves. We are not what we have been taught to believe we are. When we begin to ponder what this science means in terms of how we define ourselves, more becomes available than we had ever imagined possible. And until each of us can engage that discovery, we are stuck with grieving the past and longing for future, oblivious to the power point that is the NOW – because we don’t know what to do with it!

The sacred is what we are. Without an ability to touch it…to breathe it…to feel it in every cell…we wander in a place of being lost to ourselves. No one can give me back the sacred being that I AM. I must find that – alone and often in the dark. And yet, when I am willing to allow, the sense of this sacred comes to me and carries me into the light.

It is not about seeking but about stopping long enough to be found.

It is not about working at it but letting go.

It is not about bracing against but softening, inviting and allowing.

Last week was, yet again, a journey of my own discovery in the company of others. I am grateful to each of them for having welcomed me into their lives. Without that, I might still be searching. With it, I am more awake than ever!

Breathing is good…..

Gaia and Spring Cleaning

2007-04-15T02:12:00.000-04:00

Long day – and I’m wide awake. The wee hours of the morning once again wrap me in a most welcomed stillness. The house is quiet, some sleeping soundly, others not yet home from their evening of time spent with friends.

I sink effortlessly into my own thoughts, staccato sound of my fingers across the keys drifting into the background, each letter an invitation to go deeper into those thoughts and allow them to lead. I wonder where this particular journey will take me tonight.

My best thoughts happen when I make no effort to think them. It is much more that they find me and think me.

I relax...take a breath...and in a flash, thought comes alive and awakens me to its presence. It leads - I follow. In the truly great moments, I am blind to its destination and am really just along for the ride.

Sometimes in whispers, thought looses itself gently and easily, like leaves off a tree in the curling whisp of a crisp fall breeze. Other times, there are vibrations in my body that agitate and cause me to move, foot swinging with impatience as I try to keep up and find the torrent that sources each stream and tributary. Too many...too fast...exhausted by the side-trips, I am unable to keep up and thought has escaped me, regardless of how quickly I move.

I’m aware that I’ve not written for a few days. My thoughts have been abundant yet my desire to express them has not. Like an anorexic, the food is there and I seem unwilling to eat. Perhaps I’ll nibble at the edges and see what appetite emerges.

Each thought has a life of its own. It has a beginning and an end. It is a thread that draws to itself other threads of different colors and textures and lengths and strengths, all combining to create new endings for old stories. It has its own rightful place in my model of the world and yet sometimes, does not seem to slide easily into someone else’s model of the world. I wonder: are these different models or, quite possibly, different worlds?

The thought of spring cleaning comes to mind. Getting the windows washed, inside and out, to remove the veil of winter that distorts my view of the world.

Donning old clothes and rubber gloves to really dig in and get at what has built up in corners and along edges and ledges since the first blasts of winter’s cold made sure that what could be sealed, would be. Anticipation of the cycle that once again brings warmer temperatures, bright sun and the desire to be outside. I think I’ll start with the BBQ…..

Maybe this is the year that I’ll finally let go of the ‘stuff’ that seems to take root in the basement… the stuff that follows me from the old house to the new… from one size to the next… and through it all carries the often unfulfilled promise of ‘I’d better hang on to this. I’m sure that it will come in handy some day.” The days have long come and gone, and ‘handy’ still has not happened! Maybe it’s time to let it go. And if it won’t go away on its own, to help it on its way to a garage sale, the Salvation Army or the dump. Whatever its destiny, it no longer includes sitting lifelessly in my basement.

I wonder if that’s not just what Gaia’s up to, as well. The environment that houses our humanity has become overrun with things that no longer support life. Like an astute homeowner who recognizes the task at hand, Gaia knows that it is time to let things go… to move them along if/when they will not move themselves… and to do what must be done to make the environment hospitable, once again.

In the great scheme of things, when Gaia spring cleans, we may well find ourselves by the curb. It’s a big job (spring cleaning the planet) but someone’s got to do it.

I do my best to find suitable homes for what once were treasures and, for whatever reason, over time have become albatrosses. They may well be treasures for someone else….but who??? And just how much of my life am I willing to devote to finding him/her/them? Sometimes, it just has to go – even if it's a shame and it still has life/value in it! - because I can no longer breathe. I am unwilling to suffocate on the dust of my own past. Maybe Gaia feels the same about her house.

These three years will be pivotal. I sometimes wonder when I look at my world in 2010 through eyes no longer veiled by the habits of my history… with perception no longer distorted by my own disbelief… what my view will be. In a holographic universe, the future will unfold as I determine it to be. In this moment, the one thing I know for sure is that spring cleaning awaits! That’s not a good thing or a bad thing, it’s just time.

Random thoughts on the game of living

2007-04-12T08:10:00.000-04:00

It’s tough to get moving after not having moved for a while. It’s equally tough to start living after not having lived for a while.

Watching other people live is not living. Wanting, wishing, hoping for….these are the indications of a view from the bleachers and not from the playing field. Telling ourselves how other people should live (i.e. what plays they should engage) does not in any way indicate that we know how to live our own lives.

When we’ve been sitting in the bleachers for most of our lives, we fool ourselves into believing that this IS our life – watching, wishing, hoping – and feeling pumped or pounded depending on what we’ve observed. I can’t even bring myself to use the word ‘witness’ since it carries too great a sense of enlivenment relative to ‘observe’.

Wherever did we learn that the best thing to do…the right thing to do…was to do nothing? How did we come to be so passive in our own lives….so tied to the flow of the wave that we have lost ourselves as the unique droplet of water that we are? Are we not still water without the wave?

It takes a lot to get moving after having been still for so long. It takes a lot to be ‘water’ when we have held ourselves for so long to be only part of the ‘wave’. It takes a lot to engage… to step up to the plate of the game of our own lives... when we’ve spent so much of that life sitting in the bleachers, watching life go by. And yet, if we don’t find inside ourselves what it takes for us to ENGAGE, we will wonder where our life went – and the time that longing relies on will have run out.

There’s a big difference between being on the field and being in the bleachers. We can get hurt. We’ll likely get dirty and gritty. We may even get sweaty and smell bad! But in the end, is that not what the game demands of its best?

One last thought: it’s tough to keep playing when we don’t win. Yet, it is in those moments that we determine the degree to which we love the game, for its own sake. Do we define the game or are we defined by it?

Breathing is good…..

A Wave of Sadness

2007-04-07T22:27:00.000-04:00

My sons are now 18 and 20. Over the years, I’ve met many of their friends, some of whom have been in our lives for almost 10 years. Yesterday, one of them dropped by and the three of them headed out to a movie.

Although my chat with him was brief, I was really glad to see this young man again. He had not been to the house for some time and although I often heard what he was up to, I’d not seen him for almost a year. It was great to see his smiling face, evidence of his good nature and easy-going disposition.

We had a quick chat as I was coming home with groceries and they were headed out, quickly engaging as we passed each other like ships on the high seas. In those few moments, we talked long enough for me to learn that his intention was to head to the US as soon as he was cleared to go and join the military there. In that moment, my heart sank in my chest. I could feel the tears welling up.

I’ve always liked this young man. Quirky as some might consider him to be, I’ve always thought of him as having a good soul and a big heart. Over the years, I’ve come to know him as a person who really just wants his life to matter; to know that he is living a life of caring and compassion; and that he has been born to a life that has some meaning to it. Having sought out work in security, his intention is to ‘serve and protect’; to have his life be meaningful in some way in contributing to others. I cannot get the thought out of my head that this will be the last time I see him alive.

Is it the time we live in? Is it about our video games, movies and the glorification of violence? Is it about the call to defend and protect what we have created and hold dear? Is it the ‘nobility’ that we’ve attached to laying one’s life down for another? I don’t have a clue. I only know that this feeling of grief and sadness makes no distinction between the sons that I’ve birthed and the ones that I’ve just come to cherish.

Today, I am saddened by it all.

Breathing is good…..

Honey, I'm home! ( or Re-entry from Ste. Anne's...)

2007-04-06T12:23:00.000-04:00

Ah yes…Tim’s in hand, somehow comforted by having worshipped at the temple even if, yet again, I am left only with the coffee and without the invitation to lay claim to the Camry hybrid. “Maybe next time”, I think to myself… and breathe a deep sigh of the comfort of the familiar as I settle into position at my beloved keyboard. I have been away from my laptop for three days!

For me, that must be some kind of record. It takes a lot for me to stay away from my laptop and, even more, to be without the desire to write. And yet, there it is - three days without writing.

Three glorious days away, with my most pressing decisions shaped by my need to choose from a series of spa treatments competing for my attention; and whether or not to have High Tea so soon after lunch and so close to dinner. Surrounded by comfort and luxury; a tranquil context within which to reconsider myself, my life and what sparks my desire to engage my life fully!

Ste. Anne’s became a metaphor for a quiet mind….for carving out a space within which movement became mindful, meaningful and served up in slender slices of experience that allowed me to see/hear/engage mySelf in every morsel of my ‘now’ as the invitation that I am to my own unique ‘emerging future’. A gentle reminder that grace and elegance, like safety, are an inside job that then reflects itself in my outside ‘reality’; and that I need only pause long enough to consider its presence in my every breath – and so it becomes.

I discovered nooks and crannies of my own curiosity about what I’m doing, why I’m doing it – and to what degree I am still all of who I have been and yet am no longer, in my physical world. I am already so much more!

There were moments…whispers of time that carried memories, past and future…when I experienced mySelf - the Emerging Self – as being no longer that, and yet my body was somehow still completing a cycle of habituation of the familiar. At another time and in another place, I may well have become impatient with myself, forging ahead to seek the more attuned Self rather than waiting to be found by it. All in its own time – and that time, for me, is not yet. In this most welcoming of spaces, I let go and allowed it all to just unfold.

I wandered the buildings of Ste. Anne’s – hands bumping over the fortress walls of stones of many sizes, shapes and types. I’m told that there is quartz in the walls, part of the healing experience that Ste. Anne’s offers. Touching these walls brought a sense of feeling safe and solid in my own world. Protected. Surrounded in a way that I felt complete freedom within the walls and yet, sheltered from any outside interference.

The weather ensured that I stayed inside, having wisely chosen accommodation that eliminated my need to ever be outside of the temple of temptations…wondrous combinations of wraps, pummelings, concoctions of lotions and oils…all intended to bring me more completely into my own senses…encouraging time to fall away and be replaced with a deeper sense of mySelf in the moment.

Robes the order of the day, no matter what time or location or event unfolding! That was an interesting experience for me – stepping into a robe, fresh out of the shower, and drifting easily through my day of spa treatments, naps, snack and meals, all without the fanfare of ‘What shall I wear????” No need to ponder such things, leaving much space and time to ponder so many other things of much greater import in my life.

As I tested every room – the sunshine flooded garden room where we all wait effortlessly to be claimed, one after the other, by one of the many willing and able Sorcerers of the Senses for our next treatment; the quiet salon tucked at the back of the original manor where silence and stillness come naturally in this space filled with cozy couches, comfy chairs, plush carpet and crackling fire; the grotto of whirlpool, plunge and exercise pool, all in the bitter cold and rain, yet amazingly exhilarating with body wrapped in heat while what became crisp, awakening air surrounded my head, neck and shoulders; eucalyptus steam room on my way outside, leaving me longing for the cold and yet on my way back in, wrapping me in the comfort of its heat as the winter air left ice crystals in my hair; - all of it just as it should be for me to be more awake to mySelf. Glorious!

Not a moment went by that I did not have an image come to mind of being in these spaces and places… sheltered within these walls of stone… with other women – women seeking to be well, women seeking to create space for their own thoughts to expand and become more, women seeking to escape – but for a few days – into a sacred time with themselves, women seeking to stop/ponder and redesign a life more meaningful. Everything about this space breathed life into being the woman that I am; encouraged me to unfold more of mySelf into this cocoon of stillness and safety, and was most welcoming of my every request for what I needed. All I had to do was ask.

I’m ready, now. I’m ready for the MORE that my life can always be counted on to offer! I’m ready for new thoughts, new notions, new ways of engaging with others. My mind is clear, my body is rested and my imagination is filled with the potential that I am in the world and my commitment to engaging with other women to discover and expand that potential in themselves.

No doubt, my future will include experiences with small groups of women, at Ste. Anne’s. Experiences of rest and relaxation, recognizing my own need to just stop…and be. Experiences of healing and growth and evolution. Experiences of body, mind and spirit – each a denser, thicker expression of the other.

I know there is more of mySelf to be found through Ste. Anne’s. And I know that it will be found in the magnificent company of other women seeking the Sacred that pulses within.

Breathing is good…..

Authenticism and Emerging Intention

2007-04-02T12:46:00.000-04:00

This notion of 'authenticism' (a nominalization) won't let me go!

If someone practices sexism, can they also practice authenticism? If I am a racist, can I also be an authenticist?

Is authenticity a function of the past (history, experience, cultural conditioning, etc.)? Does the fact that I habituate mean that that which is habituated is authentic to me? Or is it just that - habit...and a mindless repetition of what I have long forgotten to think about, let alone consider with any presence of mind, body or intention?

As a nominalization, for me, authenticism lives low in the body. In my first awareness of that, I find it surprising, since I might have thought that it would live much higher. And yet, as I ponder it, I am mindful that when my Environment experience has become the result of my moment-to-moment Choice from Intention (Spirituality and Identity), then I know that I am living large, living well and living fully, deeply grounded in a sense of my own unique presence in the world. The Signal that I am…..

I visited the dictionary today.

I looked up ‘ism’ – and here’s what I found in the American Heritage Stedman’s Medical Dictionary (believe it or not – the simplest expression!):
ismsuff.
1. Action, process; practice: vegetarianism.
2. Characteristic behavior or quality: puerilism.
3. State; condition; quality: senilism.
4. State or condition resulting from an excess of something specified: strychninism.
5. Doctrine; theory; system of principles: Darwinism.
What attracted me to this one is that none of what is written feels like a judgment of anything – it just ‘is’.

What also attracted me to this one – having learned how to live my life with a mindfulness of Logical Levels of Thinking – is that each of these descriptors could equate to a logical level. For example,

1. State or Condition (result) – Environment
2. Characteristic behavior – Behaviour
3. Action, Process; Practice – Capability
4. Doctrine; theory; system of Principles – Beliefs/Values/Attitudes

‘Authenticism’ has all of these attached to it: B/V/A’s that drive us in a direction; Strategies that allow us to engage the Behaviours that produce the result (Environment) of being authentic. Moment to moment to moment….one breath to the next.

However, what is unfamiliar about this ‘ism’ is that the nature of authenticity has no relevance to the past and is driven by the future…by the unknown, potential of who we might become. In the process of Choice, authenticism requires that we engage mindfully rather than simply repeat habituation. Authenticism has no relation to the past, since that produces repetition and habituation rather than a real-time, real-life Choice in this moment. Each moment has none other quite like it.

Authenticism, from a perspective of Logical Levels of Thinking, lives from the level of Choice, driven from the levels above it. The power of authenticism lies in that its drive comes from Spirituality (Connection to Self) and Identity (Perpetually Unfolding Identity) down to Choice, resulting in our choices constantly changing; rather than from B/V/A’s up to Choice, resulting in repeating the familiar.

Authenticism feels right for me. It is an ‘ism’ that I can trust, in this moment, to unfold something meaningful in my life…something new, as yet unexperienced…holding the potential to completely redefine who I might become.

Perhaps a global tsunami of thought to mindfully choose authenticism as a way of being can transform who we are as a species. I can live with that.

In this moment, I am mindful that I am getting stranger by the day. :) Perhaps I am missing Hawaii?

Breathing is good…..

More on Authenticism....

2007-03-31T11:42:00.000-04:00

We’re taught to honor our mother and our father.

We’re taught to honor ‘God’ – however that is defined to us and for us.

We’re taught to honor our teachers, elders, coaches, priests/ministers/etc., often regardless of their behaviour and only for the position they occupy.

We’re taught to honor our work ethic.

We’re taught to honor our nation’s flag, agendas, missions, etc.

We’re taught to believe that in honoring all else, we will have become honorable in how we live. And yet, who have we become?

Where in all of this are we taught to honor ourselves? Where in all of this are we ever encouraged to even wonder who that is?

In all of this, where does the truth of what is meaningful to each of us, go?

Perhaps we do not lose that which is authentic to us – it is never discovered to be lost!

Imagine a world where we teach our children how to discover that which is unique and authentic to them. We cannot do this when we are still lost to ourselves.

Breathing is good….

Authenticism - the new 'ism' for the 21st Century

2007-03-29T12:47:00.000-04:00

Having just spent almost two weeks at Oceanstone, I am filled with the mixed feelings of leaving there and being here. As much as I am soothed by being welcomed into this village of consideration and support; by the beauty of days at the edge of the Atlantic… sun gleaming off the water, winds blowing through the trees…. I am also soothed by being home with my family. I am noticing that my desire to be away is now more readily gratified by frequent and shorter trips.

My time at Oceanstone was first with a group of (yet again) incredible women in the ‘Whispers from Within: Women’s Writing Retreat', as well as a couple of days in conversation with a small, corporate community. As different as these two frameworks were, the content is always the same: it’s about being authentic and present to the truth of our own experience.

During this time, someone asked me what I thought were the most important things for a powerful life. What came to mind for me was: tell the truth (not as an absolute but the truth of your experience), say ‘no’ when that’s what feels right and ask for what you want. How difficult can that be? Plenty! Such simple things and yet such huge turmoil around living them!

Throughout our days of conversation that included just those things (tell the truth, etc), I noticed that I would frequently hear the comment of how ‘intense’ this process was… of how much ‘intensity’ there was in this five-day retreat. After repeated expressions of this notion, I took the opportunity to step directly into the ‘intensity’ conversation and take a look at what was really going on.

In fact, it was not complicated or complex. What we were doing was having conversations that were NOT the usual habituated drivel that fills our day… the kind of conversations that are about the weather, about last night’s sports scores, about a new restaurant, etc. Our days were filled with conversations that required that we show up for our own lives; that we stay awake and that we engage. They demanded that we pay attention to what was being said, not only outside of us but inside of us. And there were constant invitations for us to check in with what was real for us, true for us and meaningful for us.

We encouraged and were encouraged to take all the time and space that we needed to say what was on our minds and in our hearts. We sat quietly until someone finished what they had to say. We gave neither advice nor did we take responsibility for someone else’s problem, challenge or uncertainty. We had few answers and many enormous questions! We told the truth, as it existed for each of us; we said ‘no’ to what we were unwilling to engage and we asked for what we wanted. And when the tears flowed, we sat and were present as that wave of new life moved through and envlivened us all.

Every day became an invitation to discover more about ourselves through our connection with each other – right then and there, in the moment that we were in – and not put off or put aside the things that pressed up against us inside ourselves for the easier and more convenient story about someone else. We left out stories behind and in their place, became open to who else we might discover ourselves to be.

Through it all, what kept coming to mind for me is that this was about ‘authenticism’. It was not about ‘feminism’ or ‘not masculine-ism’ – but was about being willing to be seen and heard for the truth of who we are/were in that moment. One breath to the next.

Perhaps we live in a world that is starved for AUTHENTICISM! Women and men – being authentic in their thoughts, conversations, expressions; being present and whole; being willing to engage without having to know where it will all end up. We are all too familiar with the culture of pretense, external referencing and approved expectations. It is the culture that has given us what we have today. It may well be that the time has come for the wave of ‘authenticism’ – the Authenticism Movement! – to come into our awareness.

Prepare for intense! Prepare for what it feels like to be alive, present and engaged in the living of our own lives! That is what ‘authenticism’ brings into our lives. The alternative to all of this – to this ‘intensity’ – is a life of habituation, repetition and nibbles at the edges of our own potential.

I, for one, am ready for the full meal deal!

Breathing is good…..

Men as wounded - women as balm

2007-03-24T15:01:00.000-04:00

I wonder how many men will die today because they can’t be real…authentic….present, to themselves or anyone else…vulnerable…fragile. How many men will die because they are unwilling or unable to cry…ask for help…let go…surrender to themselves…break free of their history…live their life in a meaningful way?

Having spent the last week awash in compelling conversations, I am mindful of my commitment to work primarily with women through to the end of 2009. It is not that men are unwelcome – it is more that they choose not to show up. It is not that I do not find them worthy – it is that they do not find themselves worthy. Fear often stops them from discovering who they are: fear that they are not what they try to pretend to be and equally fearful that they are. It is not an easy place for them to stand.

When I read Ray’s blog entry of March 22nd, I felt great hope. I thought of a world filled with men who were willing to ‘go deep’ into themselves…into their own lives…and do so without hiding. I imagined a world where these men become the fathers who guide their young sons to do the same, teaching not by telling but by becoming it themselves. I thought of a world filled with men and women willing to see and be seen, hear and be heard, invite and be welcomed.

I wondered about the world we’ve created and what else we might create. Just how many generations thick IS the way of the so-called dominant male? For how many decades have men been teaching their sons not to cry, not to feel, not to let go, using whatever form of physical and/or emotional aggression that got the job done? For how long have men brutalized their sons in the name of discipline and ‘teaching him to be a man’ without once stopping to consider: what am I creating here? What have I become from these same things in my own life from so long ago? Do I even like who I am? To know these things, we must all ‘go deep’ and remember….even when we don’t want to.

As I write, these thoughts rumble through:
* We can’t give what we haven’t got. I cannot teach my children to be who I myself am not. It all begins with me.

* We can’t change the world unless and until we change ourselves. As I change myself, and you change yourself, etc. our global community becomes a reflection of all those changes. That’s the order in which it occurs. So, to think that I can will or wish the world to change while I insist on being the same, is a fools’ game.

* The link between the generation that I am and the next one to come (or between the NOW and the FUTURE) is called parenting. How I ‘parent’ (meaning influence the world view of) the children in my presence (mine or anyone else’s) will determine who they become. And who they become will determine MY future.

The world is in desperate need of being changed. Not the world we live ON (the planet) but the world we live FROM (the inventions of our own making) which have deeply wounded the planet. We cannot change the planet, we can only change how we live on the planet. We do not own this space – we are just camping out. Gaia has already demonstrated that she will take care of herself, even if it means that many of us will die as she does so. She has been here far longer than any of us can even imagine – and she will be here long after we have disappeared as a species.

If we want to change the world, the one we are responsible for is the one we live FROM that profoundly damages the one we live ON. To change the world, we must become the change we seek. Then, in so doing, we have something different from how it has been to offer the next generation that they might shape that world differently.

Thank you, Ray. In your words, I see hope. I see the pathway for men to awaken to themselves and cease mindlessly forming lives that do not feed the soul. I see the invitation for men not just to teach their young sons but to learn from their young sons how to remember the young son they once were – and free themselves.

Women can neither free nor save men from themselves. Nor can they devote their lives to being the soothing balm that is spread on their festering wounds. That is something that men must do for themselves.

Women can only awaken to their own potential, and move on.

Breathing is good…..

Leadership as a result

2007-03-23T23:01:00.000-04:00

Today is Day 5 of the ‘Whispers from Within’ women’s writing retreat, and we’re done. Given that I do not hold myself as separate from the experience, I am mindful that I am not who I was when I arrived on Monday, and I’m wondering how I’m different. In this moment, even when the details escape me (it’s been a very intense week!), I am clear that I am more than I was five days ago.

I live a magical life! I get paid to engage in vibrant, creative, soul-sourcing, life expanding conversations with others that are designed to be invitations to our own evolution. I get to be open, honest, clear, simple and direct in being present with others and in turn, witness the powerful results when we all discover how to engage in this way. In the blink of an eye, we collectively create in moments that it would take months to create in our usual fashion of hinting, hedging, negotiating, mediating and trying to manipulate what we want. This week, we all discovered what the results can look like from those 60-seconds of authentic presence.

Part of this five-day process included watching Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth’. This time what popped out for me was the Al Gore enquiry (AGE) of ‘How should I spend my time on this earth?’ following the near-death of his son. Intensity has a way of helping us focus.

This week has been intense – and the clarity of focus that comes with it is life-changing. In that intensity, when I ponder the AGE, I am clear that what fills my soul is engaging with others in conversations that awaken us all to a more potent way to live. And in that exploration, I am drawn to the courage and sense of irreverence that women bring to it.

As I listened to these women engage and interact over the last five days, the notion of ‘leadership’ flashed into my awareness at several different times. It was so clear to me and so simple: leadership is not a verb… it’s not a behaviour but a result that unfolds naturally from our willingness to engage! The alternative is to sit on the sidelines of life and tell stories about how it could have or should have been – and these women tired of their stories and moved on to something else that profoundly changed their lives in five short days.

Breathing is good…..

Water in the cracks....

2007-03-22T13:41:00.000-04:00

A new world-view is like water seeping into the cracks. It may not look like much and yet, the implications can be profoundly transformative!

Many who have come through a WEL-Systems stream of experiences have also discovered how to bring their awakening into their existing world. They become the long-overdue bright light shining into dark corners. Their depth of knowledge of and experience in their system of choice, combined with a potent new perspective, allows them not only to speak of what they see differently but to also take their colleagues and clients far beyond just the ‘rant’ of how it could/should be. They can actually show them how to see differently, experience differently and engage differently. The result? Hope and possibility begin to replace a sense of resignation to an entrenched ‘system’, untouched and untouchable.

Whether it’s professional sports coaching, physiotherapy, mediation, education, addiction recovery or corporate leadership; whether it’s about the individual or a collective that presents as family, friends or colleagues/community, etc, more and more people who have allowed their WEL-Systems experiences to transform their perspectives and their lives are stepping back into what has been familiar to them and bringing new potential into what they might just as easily have left behind.

I remember long ago, in my WEL-Systems:NLP days, having lunch with a wonderful woman from Montreal. Sitting in the sun by the Rideau Canal on a bright and breezy May day, we talked about growing and discovering; about expanding and becoming and about how differently we might live our lives. Her questions of me seemed to revolve around her interest in leaving her field of business and passion for more than 20 years (Real Estate development) and becoming an NLP Trainer. As I listened, I wondered: seems to me that there are lots of folks in the field of real estate development who would greatly benefit from getting their lives back! And yet, it had not occurred to her to bring her new knowledge into a community that she knew well, that she (at least at one time) greatly valued and had been her passion, and with which she was intimately familiar, greatly knowledgeable and densely interwoven. Who better to offer new hope in what had become a closed-loop system?

It takes courage to take a new perspective and enter an existing collective that is deeply committed to its own world view and often hardened for its own self-preservation. It takes particular courage to do so in a system like healthcare/medicine, education or – the big one! – family systems that have big teeth and bite back! To become one of the growing number of small voices in the wilderness that proffer a different perspective is an act of personal integrity. Doing so holds the potential to change the world.

It’s not always easy to move through the world choosing to be authentic in what we say and do. And yet, to do otherwise is a betrayal of who we know ourselves to be capable of becoming. In that moment of betrayal, all that is left is what we already have – and our drive to create results in getting more of what we’ve already got. Maybe we’re the one who’ll break that cycle.

Breathing is good…..

The complexity is in the undoing

2007-03-21T13:43:00.000-04:00

I was recently in conversation with a consultant who is creating a new Media Center for the WEL-Systems Institute/Louise LeBrun websites. As we worked together to determine what would be meaningful in helping those who are seeking to find the information they require, in a way that is easy for them to access.

After a couple of weeks of email exchanges as well as phone calls, I was struck by one conversation on a Friday afternoon. Her comment to me was: ‘Before we begin (our meeting), I want you to know that I am astounded by the depth and scope of the body of knowledge that you’ve created; by the extensive presence on the internet and by the diversity and quality of material that you’ve written. However, this material is highly complex and will be a challenge to help people understand.”

As I listened, I found myself feeling good about all that has unfolded over the last 20 years and also feeling ‘off’ somehow by her comment about the complexity of the work because, in my experience of it, the complexity does not lie in the WEL-Systems material/models/body of knowledge/articles.

After a moment of pondering, I said to her: “I think that’s an interesting observation. And, in my experience of it, the complexity does not lie in what constitutes a WEL-Systems approach to living. That cannot be more simple and consists of:

* Breathe
* Follow the impulse
* Let yourself know the truth of your own experience
* Stay in the tough conversations
* Be willing to stand alone
* Shape or be shaped by your world

However, there is complexity in all that it takes to penetrate and break through the decades of cultural conditioning and intergenerational insistence that we NOT DO those very things. Complexity exists in what is required for us to UNLEARN what has been pounded into our very being for decades; and to find the willingness and the ability to move beyond the fear of ‘straying too far’ and allowing ourselves to live differently.”

For me, it’s simple, it’s easy and it’s profoundly life-altering. We are all born with the natural, instinctive ability and willingness to live large, live openly and honestly, and live meaningfully. All we have to do is remember who we are…..

Breathing is good…..