Acknowledging Everything

Acknowledging Everything
and living without subtext

We all do it. Hell, I just did a 25-year stint of it. It can be called a lot of things:
• Chosen ignorance
• A commitment to stupidity 
• Putting your head in the sand

What it boils down to is this. You know. You don't not know. The problem is that awareness comes in a variety of ways.
• we'll get a whisper in our ears
• flashes of insight that come and go as fast as lightning
• our bodies scream at us with one problem or another

Hell, I've had scenes from childhood that randomly pop into my awareness at semi-regular intervals. Only later did I put together that that was a pivot point of childhood trauma. Those "random" popping scenes were my body’s way of saying, hey could you spare a minute for me?

If left unattended, all of these bits and bobs of awareness become like a garbage barge floating through your consciousness. And the little bits of detritus that make it off that barge? Say hello to your disease: depression, anxiety, cancer, and so so much more! 

But you know what we all do. We distract. We've got responsibilities to attend to. We're off and running and the avenue to self-understanding closes, till next time. So we keep busy. Sometimes busy for entire lifetimes to avoid the pain of knowing. 

You know, that I know all about that.

More big picture, we've been trained out of listening, looking, and trusting. Literally conditioned by this reality to trust family, friends, and the government before believing in ourselves. Now I'm not a big conspiracy theorist, but given what I know now, it is concerning. The forces that would rather us not know, to not keep our own council, are immense. 

But the antidote isn't to try to change family, friends, or government. Trust me I've attended enough manipulative and dare I say abusive family therapy sessions and social protests to know how futile those efforts are [not that all protest and therapy is ineffective!]. The more effective route for self-trust is to ignore all the noise and center you. Can you believe you? Can you trust you above all else? 

I hope you can.

What I Don’t Care About

What I Don’t Care About
your thoughts, feelings & emotions

And I’ll also add: your points of view, I don’t much care for any of those either. 

Does this feel like it hits a little hard? Let me clarify. Last week I slipped a phrase in my newsletter, the term “infinite being”. It’s the best language I have to capture what you and I actually are. You, are consciousness, and as such you have no beginning or end. In the space of consciousness, everything - absolutely everything - exists. It’s soup to nuts rainbows all the way to pedophiles! I know, I know, that’s something you don’t want to consider, but when you wrap your mind around the fact that we live in a polarized, everything-exists (like it or not) world, it gets a little bit easier to navigate. Then true choice can come from a space of total awareness. We can also choose where we want to show up within this reality system – or decide whether or not we show up at all.

Now begin to contemplate what being an infinite being might actually mean to you. In my world, it means I’m basically a walking, talking weather system. I am aware of most everything I need to be aware of. I am free to be who I am. I trust my perceptions and I can receive absolutely everything – even what I conclude as “good” and everything I conclude as “bad”. 

Acknowledging myself as an infinite being also means I’ve had to get really real with myself about my own pontifying mind. Becoming an excellent observer of thought has lightened my load considerably (thank you meditation). And from there I came to the realization that once my own mind was managed, my ability to perceive what other people were thinking, feeling and emoting skyrocketed. And of course, as an empath, I also became subject to what was going on in their physical bodies. It wasn’t but a short leap to the conclusion that our thoughts, feelings and emotions are just noise. That’s right – I am disrespecting your thoughts, feelings and emotions. And I’ll challenge you to consider that 1) The thoughts, feelings and emotions that you hold dear aren’t yours at all. An antidote? Ask, Is this mine? And 2) Your thoughts, feelings and emotions are not your identity nor are they important to your being. In fact, without your thoughts feelings and emotions, who could you be? What could you accomplish? The possibilities are endless.

So, what do I care about? I care about what lights you up. I care about what you are creating. I care about what you are grateful for. I care about your art. I care about your pets and loved ones, I care about what you’re exploring. I care about what and who you actually are, underneath the heaviness of your thoughts, feelings and emotions. 

There, take that thoughts, feelings and emotions. xo

A Little Bit Broken

A Little Bit Broken
a story about all of us

Shadow work is all the crap you’ve decided is too hard to metabolize, look at, deal with or change. Or if you’re like me, you’re in such deep denial, you don’t even hold the slightest idea or awareness of what needs to change. And why are we reaching for change? So that we can get everything we want?! Am I right?

This phrase: A little bit broken, used to bang around in my head over the last ten years. I joked that it would be the title of my memoir. But who wants to identify as broken? Not me, not any more at least. And if you’ve ever visited me, that’s something you’ve likely been trying to change too.

Being broken, feeling broken, identifying as broken – is a lie. We may experience sensations such as having been throttled, cracked, burned, poked and prodded. We may be or have been legitimately abused. But is it true that we’re broken? Do infinite beings ever break? Nope, not in my experience, not ever.

So, what is the antidote? We begin to uncover some over arching, gleaming and transcendent qualities that we possess. Better yet, we begin to make dynamic lists of these attributes. 

What is unbreakable about me? 

How muthafucking special am I - really? 

What is so unique about the quality of my very being?

Universe, what is great about me?

We make these questions our starting point. If nothing comes and you can’t fill the page, fear not. Simply stick with asking the questions daily. When you ask a question the entire universe is chomping at the bit to answer you. Conversely, when you come to a conclusion (I’m a little bit broken), nothing that doesn’t match that conclusion can surface.

Can you give yourself the grace and patience to hang tight while it readies itself for you? Can you be kind to you? I do hope so. You loving and appreciating you is the gift we’ve all been waiting for.

How to Facilitate Your Own Miracles

How to Facilitate Your Own Miracles
the fast track version

Good people, it took me a solid 10 years to get to the root of my own health issues. To my credit, I was tenacious. I knew intuitively not to stop at whatever the doctors were saying. I knew it didn’t make sense that I’d been healthy for the first half  of my life and that turning 40 should not have completely upended me. So, I began to dig and I’ve shared with you, in the last 6 weeks or so, the evolution of what transpired.

It’s been a lot.

So, to distill it all down, let’s look at how this process may apply to you. How many of us are legitimately looking to make change? We say we want it, but secretly we avoid taking the action or doing the work necessary to facilitate the change we so desperately desire. Now, I know, for folks reading this, many of you are willing to do the necessary shadow work. And more then a few of us are less then jazzed at the prospect of looking under those shadowey covers. I have no judgment either way. We’ll all get where we’re going in due time.

But, if time is of the essence, I suggest following these steps below. You can focus on one line per week. That should be enough. Repeat the question or statement of kindness to yourself every morning and let it work on you. Feel free to rephrase them so they make sense for you and your life circumstances. You’re not looking for a cognitive responses, but rather you’re inviting new awarenesses as they come. Most importantly, remember to not judge you in any thing that bubbles up. The simple act of observing is valuable enough to facilitate change in most cases. And when necessary to facilitate your miracle, you’ll also get impulses for new choices to make.

Finally, have courage. All change, even the change we so desperately want, usually comes at a price. And, more often then not, the price, be it the beginning or ending of something, is shrouded in fear. Once we traverse the fear and not give it more power then its worth, we gain momentum and inch closer to our miracle. As always, I’m here if you need me.

Ask: What have I been avoiding knowing that if I knew it would facilitate a miracle? 

Ask: What have I been avoiding being that if I were to be it would facilitate a miracle? 

Ask: What have I been avoiding perceiving that if I were to allow for the perception would facilitate a miracle? 

Ask: What have I been not allowing that if I were to receive it would facilitate a miracle? 

Ask: As a compassionate observer, befriend your disease, abusive relationship or environment. Then, ask: What is this experience keeping you from? What do you get out of this?

Kindness to you: Release the need for timing

Kindness to you: Release the need for knowing how it’s all going to turn out.

Kindness to you and others: Release all judgments of yourself and others. Destroy all tallies and records of wrongs that you are keeping.

Kindness to you: Be 1000% willing to lose absolutely everything (yes, including your kids, your spouse and your home)

Bitch I’ve been trying to tell you!

Bitch I’ve been trying to tell you
my body’s voice to me

As a child empath, I was the family healer and peacemaker. In this role, you’re simultaneously loved and hated for it. It’s the ultimate catch-22. The thing about being an empath is that you experience every ding dang thing that those close to you are experiencing, both psychologically and physically. It may be blunted a bit, and not as intense as how the originally afflicted person is feeling it, but trust me when I tell you – my body is AWARE and mirroring. 

An easy peasy example of this? Last fall my husband was complaining about a knee pain that had been plaguing him for months. His progress reports repeated for a few days. In the midst of this, I noticed that my right knee started to ache when I walked downstairs. This continued for 3 days till I had the presence to ask: “Is this knee pain mine?”. With that, my husband flashed before my internal eye, and magically and instantly the pain disappeared. Viola. (please try this at home!)

Now, how does this square with the unfolding trauma of my marriage and separation? Well, this is where the rubber meets the proverbial road. This is where generational trauma and adult onset trauma meet, meld and become symptoms.

As I mentioned in the past, I did not have an even-steven, smooth, safe, and drama-free early development phase. Filling out the ACE test, was key to figuring out that some of my physical symptoms tracked with childhood trauma. On a scale of 5, I score a 4, which pretty much guaranteed that I’d have some form of lagging physical illness that correlated to said trauma.

But here’s the kicker. The ACE score only reflects what we consciously know about our histories. And what I’ve learned the hard way is that I’ve been molded, in ways large and small, by silence. It’s not what we see and hear that shapes us, it's everything implicit – everything silent that determines our life course. It shapes our physical bodies and to whom we choose to have relationships and so much more.

This shaping includes all the secrets, lies, closeted sexualities, and addictions we think are hidden, the infidelities, the children out of wedlock and never acknowledged, the secret families, it’s the shame of domestic violence, sexual assaults never mentioned nor investigated, it’s the forced births – the babies – held in our bodies – and never acknowledged because the disassociation between body and mind was so complete. And ALL OF THIS is what we call family, held together by the viscous glue of fear, shame, and unconsciousness.

As we mature, we then choose partners based on this familiarity. The familiarity of what’s conscious and unconscious unite to create a powder keg. As a next-level empath, it meant that by 40 years old I had a raging, five-alarm fire in my body, with no clear means of putting it out.

It meant that I was guaranteed to pick a mate that modeled ALL of the secrets, lies, and addictions that afflict my father. It meant that my family's commitment to silence, commitment to their shame, and unconsciousness showed up, as circumstantial evidence, in my body. And it’s that unconsciousness that’s particularly dynamic. Because when someone, in this case, me, attempts to set out to save their own lives, by tipping over every table of shame and lies, we’re met with heaps of gaslighting, rejection, judgment, distorted intimacy, projection, psychological abuse, control, and so much more! 

Ain’t family fun?!

And now here’s the kicker…the last remaining “symptoms” I’d been managing for 10 solid years: hypothyroidism, adrenal insufficiency and tanked sex hormones suddenly and with little fanfare, came to a conclusion. In the days just after my husband's broad, long-standing infidelities came to light, I got super effing manic. I was practically vibrating and speaking in tongues. At first, I thought I was having a very strange stress reaction. Then it occurred to me that these manic symptoms were evidence of overmedication. And, just like that, I stopped taking my thyroid and adrenal medication. My body, with a few more weeks into this unfolding, is doing fantastically. And as you can imagine, I am OVER THE MOON to be in complete and total health and well-being. And more importantly, I am so damn proud of myself for facilitating my body's second sudden remission.

I am now sparkling and whole, no trace of chronic illness left. The cost of a complete and total understanding of how my body and I work, in this reality system, was a very high price to pay. But in the words of the inimitable Maya Angelou, I “Wouldn't take nothing for my journey now.” And here's the thing about bodies. THEY ARE NEVER WRONG. They are the very avatar that points to the truth within all the lies that you are steeped. Should you find yourself dealing with any similar traumas and dramas, please check out these resources.

Find out your ACE score:
https://americanspcc.org/take-the-aces-quiz/

Are you the family or friend of someone struggling with sex and or porn addiction?
https://sanon.org/

Are you yourself struggling with sex and or porn addiction?
https://saa-recovery.org/

My broken picker

My broken picker
my part, my responsibility, the hard truths

(TW: this weeks newsletter discusses rape and sexual violence.)

Last week I unpacked the “evidence” that spelled the end of my marriage. I exposed how getting honest with myself, about what I knew and what I didn’t has helped me be clear eyed. But having clarity isn’t the only aim. My aim is to see, own and metabolize my part in all this. After all, a marriage is made of two people. And as tempting as it is to blame the end of a marriage entirely on a cheating spouse, it’s simply not accurate, truthful or fair.

Next week I’ll unpack in greater detail how a person’s “picker” gets broken. The picker being what you use to determine the biggest decision of your life – to whom will you marry? It’s super loaded and complicated, but in the days after all of this came to light, I did another reflection on all of the relationships and traumatic experiences I could recall. Here goes:

At 15 years old I was in a coercive relationship with my first boyfriend. He told me that he had cancer in an effort to get me to sleep with him.

At 16, I fell in love hard. I came to learn, over the course of our 2.5 year relationship, that he made a play for my best friend while I was out of town. I was so “in love” I stayed with him – without confronting, without so much as getting mad. I also strongly suspected him of being closeted and bisexual – but I had no “proof”.

In the summer of my 16th year, my two girlfriends and I went to a party. There were five boys, to the three of us and there was Everclear. When one of my best friends disappeared for a bit I later found her, completely blacked out, with one of the boys next to her, sexually assaulting her. I stopped him. She went to the hospital the next day and got a rape kit. I lost my voice but not before I gave a grand jury testimony as to what happened that night. He was never held accountable. 

In college I met a bad boy. He partied too hard – he was an addict who came from a lot of abuse. He did 12 hits of acid in one night and took more then six months to regulate from that experience, he got kicked out. I housed him on campus where he ramped up his crazy, his addiction and then pivoted to both verbal and physical abuse of me and my room mates. 

And then I got married.

So, I’ve been with liars and cheats my entire life. So, why did I choose them? Well apparently being surrounded by secrets, lies and closeted addiction created the blueprint for the shaping of my broken “picker”. Now, I know that I am in no way responsible for my husbands fidelity, nor am I responsible for the lack of safety I experienced as a child. But I was and am responsible for cleaning up how I was shaped then and how that affects my relationships moving forward. 

Due to the childhood trauma I became hard wired to fear sex. Of course I loved intimacy, closeness and also loved physical sex, but I had a metric ton of fear. I knew all too well that the secrets and lies which rotted so much of my family could potentially rot me too, and those were just the ones I knew about. And if I could simply keep sex, the exploration, any kink and most certainly all the sexual empowerment at bay – maybe – just maybe, I’d be safe. 

So, there it is, I cut myself off. And in relationship, all of the self exploration I should have had, could have done, got shuttled to my husband’s column of responsibility. No, not fair to him, or to either of us.

Next week I talk about the MASSIVE breakthrough my body has had in the midst of this, it’s really good stuff. Stay tuned.

The 10 year trial Conclusion

The 10 year trial Conclusion
how could I not know? (I’m psychic ffs!)

Two years ago we went to Puerto Rico. It was our first trip post-pandemic. I let the kids know by buying each of them a new piece of carry-on luggage. We’d all lugged through the pandemic and this was just what the doctor ordered. Lots of sun, fun, good food, and rest.

I’d hoped, my husband and I were in step. I’d hoped this was a re-kindling of sorts. We kissed a lot. We took lots of cute pictures, creating hope-filled images. We were intimate in a way that I always longed for and asked for. I continued to hope that this surge of intimate energy would pervade our bedroom and our lives in the time to come. After years of 24/7 relentless parenting, and care of neighbors and friends through the pandemic, the gruel that is chronic illness…this could be it, this could be Our Time.

But, alas, hope is not reality. Hope is what we do to stay in a self-constructed fantasy. Hope is what we create so we can ignore our awareness of what actually is. I was completely, totally, and irrevocably invested in this fantasy. I didn’t know, cognitively, that it wasn’t the truth. I didn’t know to acknowledge what wasn’t working. I didn’t know to acknowledge that a one-off vacation would not make up for decades of a dead bedroom. I was so feverishly caring for others, for years, that I had no idea to acknowledge me.

In the two weeks after the truth of my husband's lies, secrets, and double life were revealed I pivoted pretty quickly to myself. What did I know and when did I know it? I sat myself down for a thorough accounting. It was not comfortable. What I could acknowledge is that I had about 4 pieces of hard evidence: out-of-character behavior, videos, photographs, and sex toys that I found that never seemed to make it into our bedroom. My discovery of the toys didn’t show up till the very end gratefully. He temperamental behavior? He was above self-reflection. And the hard evidence, when confronted, he unsurprisingly lied about their origin. And when you’ve got a home, three kids, chronic illness, and are financially dependent upon your spouse for shelter and healthcare, you chose belief over awareness and carry on, naturally.

But the mental accounting exercise didn’t end there. 

There was more, a great deal more. By the end of it, I forced myself to reckon with 44 other suspicions. They didn’t all track to: Your Husband is a Lying, Cheating Piece of Shit. No, these were much more subtle and insidious. These were the types of suspicions that have you doubting you. Suspicions that take you out of your own knowing. It’s these suspicions that I seemed to tolerate so well. I suspect it’s because the thinking mind never holds more than three suspicions at a time, thereby making it much easier to deny the rest. Ah yes, the mind of the abused is a wicked co-conspirator of the abuser.

So, could I have put it all together if I’d had the courage to do so? Sure, I suppose. But I know in my heart how incredibly unlikely that was. I was a true believer! I had hope! Ultimately though, what I was all too willing to ignore was my own sex and intimacy needs. And that is the hardest most tender and vulnerable truth, that I abandoned me.

Next week I’ll begin to unpack the reasons why.

The 10 Year Trial Build Up

The 10 Year Trial Build Up
began nearly 25 years ago

About 4 months before I met my husband to be I was forlorned. I wanted so badly to be partnered with an amazing spouse. To have kids. To build a home and get on with my life. In that dark hour, feeling so lonely and sad, I got a premonition (which simply sounded like my own voice in my head) that I wanted to find a guy that would bring me flowers every week. I remember feeling a mental hiccup with this, as I had never much cared for romantic gestures before. 

Fast forward, those four months and we were introduced by a mutual friend. When I locked eyes with him, over the cafeteria lunch table (so sexy!), a bolt of lightening ran through my body. It wasn’t a comfortable feeling, but it was a cascade of energy that I’d never experienced before or since. Sadly I didn’t have the tools to ask questions of that energy at the time.

So, at 28 years old, I naturally trusted and followed whatever magic I thought that was. I bought the premonition too, that he would bring flowers – which he did, and we were well on our way to matrimony. We were family planning (three kids!) by our third date. It must be destiny, right?

I met his family. I spilled a glass of water, I was so nervous. As we left his family home, his mother and a neighbor sang old Neapolitan tunes on the front stoop. And that was it – I was a goner. What fantasy story adapted for the silver screen had I just entered? 

He bought me a beautiful engagement ring, platinum with a yellow gold accent. We went to Italy for vacation and bought our wedding bands abroad. They didn’t have bands that matched my engagement ring exactly, so we bought an alternative. A white gold band with a yellow gold accent. Our jeweler cautioned us though. He told us that these were intended to be anniversary bands, and not for newlyweds. Bah humbug I thought – who needs to conform to convention?

Then about a year ago I looked at my husband while he was sleeping. I finally allowed myself to wonder what he might have to do with all the health problems I’d experienced over the last 10 years. I was finally willing to ask THAT question. 

We had made it, by the skin of our teeth, through the pandemic, which seemed a miracle. But our post pandemic recovery wasn’t what I’d hoped it would be. We’d had two cataclysmic, totally out of character, fights, these were two strikes on him. He literally appeared as a different, vicious, mean-spirited person in these moments. I wondered, what and with whom was I dealing? 

In the weeks leading up to this last trial I had been on a business call with a couple of friends. We were strategizing how we could propagate the world (or at least NYC) with consciousness. In the middle of making a point, I gesticulated with my hands, flinging them outward. With that whip of a gesture, my wedding band flew from my left hand and onto the floor. That’s awfully curious I thought, knowing full well that it was an ominous sign.

Then our kids, despite making it through covid home schooling for two tortuous years, were back in school. And while they had some good days, all three of them seemed to be struggling through this winter. One of our kids in particular, was in a level of trouble and trauma that needed us, as parents, to be SUPER conscious and present. Such is the business of saving your kids life.

It was in the midst of this parental nightmare that the third strike occurred. My husband made the very last flip and hurtful comment that I was willing to receive. And with that I delivered a letter to him, outlining my separation. In it I referenced what I’d known to be true. The feeling that I no longer knew him. The out of character fights. And finally, I confronted the sexual secrets I knew he was keeping, based on the scant evidence I discovered over the previous year.

What unfolded from there, was the completely predictable and unremarkable truth. My husband had not for one minute, hour or day ever been faithful to me over our 25 year relationship. The revelations were eye popping and stomach churning. It wasn’t the simple porn addiction I'd hoped it might be. It was a tale, sordid, tortuous, self hating and painful beyond measure. He admitted that he was a sex addict.

And so I left.

More next week.

(correction: last week I mentioned we were married 25 yrs. Incorrect, we dated and were engaged for 2 years and married for 23 this coming May)

The beginning of the 10-year trial

The beginning of the 10-year trial
a knock on the head

March 19, 2011, was a supermoon. It’s called a supermoon when it’s at perigee, the closest point to Earth in its orbit. It’s also the date that I gave birth to my youngest child. His arrival came on the heels of premonitions I had about his name which means moon. Despite having this premonition, this kid came with his own POVs and oooh so much attitude! All I could muster as an exhausted new again parent was the lament: why couldn’t the third baby be my easiest baby?  I soldiered on. 

In a sweet moment, that first year, I was breastfeeding him, snuggled on our big master bed. The room was quiet and filled with beautiful light. After feeding him we both drifted off. Then, out of nowhere, I felt a rap on my head. It was the kind of heavy-handed thud a friend who knows you well (and can get away with) would do as they crept up from behind you. My eyes snapped open. My eyes darted around the room, where did that come from? Who did that?

There was no answer.

I thought, HEY now - maybe this means I’m enlightened! But that idea was quickly dislodged by the sinking feeling that I, in no way, felt any more unburdened or wise than I had the previous 5 minutes. (as if experiencing enlightenment is the equivalent of instant wisdom and unburdened life circumstance - but that’s for another newsletter!).

Sadly, what unfolded from that point on is what I call the trial. 

The trial picked up significant steam in 2013 and since then I managed a cascade of relentless health problems. My sex hormones tanked, my thyroid & adrenals crashed, and seemingly overnight I became super sensitive to light, sound, drink and foods that I’d once enjoyed. 

The collection of illnesses I was now managing presented a string of devastating symptoms. Heart palpitations, shortness of breath, inability to cope with minor stresses, nervousness and anxiety were constant, night sweats, panic attacks, substantial weight gain, flushing or the inability to retain fluids, low blood pressure, blackouts, fatigue, depression, multiple skin cancer leisions and of course, my dear friend, insomnia. As you can imagine, I did not leave the house much.

A huge kick in the teeth was that, along the way, I broke down and asked my doctor for something ANYTHING to help me sleep. They prescribed a benzodiazepine. And thus began a 2.5-year dependence on that helluva drug. Which was then followed by protracted withdrawal symptoms – which were way worse than the original symptoms I was attempting to eliminate. 

The best way I can capture the trial with words is that I felt like an orchestra conductor. But I was a conductor thrust into a spotlight – having never picked up a musical instrument in my life. Doctors (so many doctors!) were at a total loss, as was I.

Simply existing became a chore. Ironically, I thought, I’ll get all this symptom stuff figured out in 6 months, ha!

By 2018 I had found my way to a brain training program that helped me calm down the reactivity of my nervous system. I worked this program as if my entire life depended on it. In two and a half years, I would say I made a 70% improvement. Ah! Now I was finally cooking!

But what about that other 30%? Why was I still carrying around these symptoms like an albatross? Finally, I zeroed in on the skin cancer I’d been managing. And with the tools of Access Consciousness, I experienced a spontaneous remission. Like the recovery with the brain training program, it felt like a miracle. So I kept working the tools. For the most part, though, I felt like I was flying completely blind.

Then 2 things happened in the last year. First, I attended an Access class last spring. When I got up to ask a question about my relationship with my husband, I waxed on about him. What a great guy he is! My facilitator replied: What is it about your partner that you are making so perfect, that if you were not doing ‘perfection’ and were willing to actually know everything, would change all future probabilities and outcomes? Whoah, she gave me a monster of a mental wedgie. But, I must know everything about him, right? We’ve been married for 25 years right? I AM psychic, right?

A few months after that class, I was having yet another bad night, I looked over at my sleeping husband and tought...Huh, I wonder if he’s connected to my insomnia? This was the first time I pivoted in his direction and asked a question related to all the suffering of the last ten years.

What other questions could I ask that would facilitate my awareness? (hint – a lot) More next week.

My 10-year Trial

My 10-year Trial
and the conclusion of a cycle

Oh, dear reader. I hardly know where to begin.
As you know by now I use my own life, my fodder, to turn the wheels of this newsletter. I do so because the discoveries I’ve made, my hard-won truths and realizations, and the wisdom I’ve gained appear universal in their application. I hope that, in sharing, I can spare you at least an eighth of the traumas and dramas I’ve experienced. I do so, also, to dispel any notion that I am somehow apart from you. I bleed. I hurt. I know physical and emotional pain quite viscerally. 

The last ten years of my life have been nothing short of devastating, yet also miraculous. As for miracles, in my work with clients, we have achieved the impossible. I’ve known things about your lives that I should not know and hopefully given you valuable insight. I’ve facilitated miracles for your bodies, that as the rules of this reality dictate, I should not have had the capacity to perform.

Concurrent with the miracles has been an undeniable energy of “stripping away” in my personal life. A not so gentle removal of people, places, and things that have not been for my highest good. 

Ten years ago this journey began when I dared to know that my 17-year corporate career had come to an end. I was terrified. What would become of me? How would I support my 3 kids, the 2 mortgages, 5 cats, and my 20-year-old car? I’ve often referred to this time in my life as stepping out onto thin air. It seems the only appropriate metaphor.

After that season I came to terms with the fact that my “friends” were not friends so much as they were people who wanted me to affirm things about them. Or worse, they were out-and-out liars, folks who pretended not to remember I was psychic and gaslighted me to my face. I let them all go.

Then there is the tangled web of generational trauma. At root were lies, addictions, and secrets in which my very young life was shaped. It’s these weights, that my body has carried most heavily via long-term chronic illness, depression, anxiety, and poor decision-making. This all culminated in 2018 when a season of adult-onset trauma began. My relentless pursuit of physical healing and my commitment to being me (no matter what!) brought a conclusion to some of my closest familial relationships. To say I was rattled would be an understatement. But my body – my guide brought me out of that fire with renewed vigor.

And now another chapter of change is upon me. It will take me some time to unpack it all over the coming weeks. Baby steps and walking gingerly are the order of the day. And roller skating. Lots and lots of rollerskating. In the meantime, I’m taking some time off. It’s time to be quiet for a bit. I’ll get back to doing readings sometime in May and I’m available for energy work and classes in the meantime.

Wishing you all a beautiful spring.

A Fool on wheels

A Fool on wheels
Skating into joy

So now that you are better acquainted with your being, knowing, receiving and perceiving – I need to let you in on a very big secret. Drumroll: your body has an awful lot to do with your being, knowing, receiving, and perceiving. 

Before I deep dive, let's first decipher what I mean by You. The “you” we generally think of as us is our mind. Mind is the sum total of the thoughts, feelings and emotions we experience. 

Now I invite you to consider that your body is a whole other entity. Your body is imprinted by the sum total of these thoughts, feelings, and emotions. Science calls this neuroplasticity. 

Now, let's dive into the stand-alone, wholly miraculous awareness that is your sensate body. Given the journey I've been on with my body I know viscerally how my body is impacted by thoughts, feelings, and emotions. What was more of a mystery to me was acknowledging that my body as a whole organ, had its own POV. 

Here's an example…a friend gave me some financial advice about a year ago. Initially, I got very excited by it. I attended a seminar on the subject and it's safe to say I was titillated. Then I proceeded to open about 15 browser windows so I could do further research. Weeks went by and I could never seem to open my wallet and put money into it. Eventually, the titillation gave way and my excitement fizzled out. Conversely, a different investment opportunity came up, and I observed myself getting my wallet, pulling my plastic, and with complete ease, making a large purchase. It's as if my body carried out the actions before my thinking mind could hem-haw and object.

In another realm, I'm learning to apply this to how I move my body. I recently took up roller skating and I'm in love. It's fluid, it's fun, the disco music makes my whole body hum, what could be better?! Welp, as I've practiced I've had a few injuries. Each and every time I went down it was preceded by a ping, a flare, a “knowing” that I should stop, pause or not practice that day. Did I listen? Nope. Has not listening kept me apart from what I really love doing? Yup. Am I committed to being a better listener of me? You betcha.

Now I’m beginning to understand that if I really want to achieve whatever it is that I'm going for I would be well advised to ask my body for its input. It's as simple as Hey body, what do you know about this opportunity? Hey body, how would you like to move? What would you like to wear? What would you like to eat? And on and on. If you start to play with this (and play is best), I wonder what you could learn from your sweet body?

No Right, no wrong

No Right, no wrong
choose, then choose again

I had a meeting with someone recently that was stuck. The rock and a hard place they'd created for themselves was becoming a vice grip and decisions needed to be made. 

I'm very deliberate when I say “they created” because a thousand other choices could have been made along the way so as not to end up in that tight grip, but they let the clock run out. They refused their own knowing and awareness to the point that they were up to their necks. And the water was rising.

It's a cute trick that I know from personal experience. The thing is, we usually do this when we've abandoned ourselves. We've made someone, something, or someplace greater than us. We do this to not upset the apple cart. We do this because we’re committed to remaining small. And we mostly do this to entertain ourselves with trauma and drama. Getting freaked out makes life worth living, am I right?

What they were most concerned about was not making the “wrong” decision. And what defines wrong? 

• Causing other people pain and discomfort, (the antidote: make yourself wrong continually so they feel comfort)

• Knowing and perceiving more than you “should” know, (the antidote: dumbing yourself down, ignoring precious information, and generally denying your knowing/perceiving) 

• Being genuinely happy (antidote: make yourself do as everyone else does: suffer, judge, and delight in misery, then you’ll fit in!)

So they were functioning on a tightrope. So practiced was their self-denial that they genuinely had no idea how to satisfy themselves, much less navigate the mess they’d created. In a situation like this, there's only one thing you can do. Make a choice. When making a choice I always suggest going for whatever makes you perceive space and lightness over heaviness. “Right” and “wrong” are lies of this reality that help keep us locked into the looping outlined above. And heavy choices create more heaviness in the world. 

The only problem is, we’re so programmed by the fear of getting it wrong, we let the clock run out and then blame the clock. Aren’t we cute? So, do you need help with some of this de-programming of rightness and wrongness? You know where to find me.

Elusive Courage

Elusive Courage
and the infinity loop of sameness

That’s it. That’s the fractional equation. On the top is Courage. On the bottom, is the drudgery of getting what you always get: sameness. 

And do you remember 8th grade? They taught us to divide the bottom of the equation into the top. Ultimately, the only way to solve the equation is to have the courage to do something different. Choosing you is different. Going against the grain is different. Being outspoken in a quiet room is different.  And that folks, is about all that I math. 

It’s important to note: the courage to be different DOES NOT feel comfortable. Are you ready to give that up? Your precious comfort? But what is comfort anyway? More sameness. More streaming Netflix instead of writing your own story. More idol worship of your favorite musicians, but never penning your song. More numbing in the myriad of ways that we choose to numb and more of what you’ve always gotten.

I had a wild client a while back. They were convinced that they were an artist of extraordinary measure, they just hadn’t put pen to paper yet. I was a bit mystified, but, the gist seemed familiar to me. They were a fellow intuitive. They had a sense of their destiny, they knew the greatness of the story that could unfold for them. Yet they hadn’t dared take a leap. They were stuck between the rocks of Potential & Ego.

See, they wanted a guarantee, and they had already developed a Picasso-sized ego that prevented their momentum. The guarantee they wanted was their assured success. They wanted receipts of wild success before the journey even began. And while I did see talent and sparkling promise – I could also see their rigidity, inability to allow for vulnerability and soul-sucking pride. All of which would keep them firmly where they were.

So how about you? Are you stuck in a circling flight pattern of sameness? Can I encourage you to say fuck all to your demons and do it (whatever ‘it’ is for you) anyway? I hope so. I am living proof that it gets wildly & wonderfully better.

Personal Allowance

Personal Allowance
professional allowance

I waxed on last week about personal allowance. How I didn’t have all of me till I learned to allow for myself. For years I celebrated others and thought I allowed and made way for myself, but it was a lie. I kept myself small and danced to the beat of other drums. I did this to maintain jobs, friendships, and relationships with family. At great cost to me, I would later learn. All of this falls under the umbrella of personal allowance, or in my case, lack of allowance.

Professional allowance, a silly phrase I coined, is everything outside of that. It’s the crazy president of the moment that we can’t allow for. It’s the co-worker we gossip about. It’s the monetary system we know is “wrong” but somehow we’re living within the confines of it. Basically, it’s everything we complain about that we have no control over.

I had a client a while back who wanted more information about an offer I had. As our email correspondence grew I got the sense that she was looking to make the “right” decision. Where had I been schooled? To whom or what system or lineage was I from? My gut told me that she was paralyzed by identity politics and wanted to ensure her further education fit her worldview of rightness and wrongness. Oy. 

Needless to say, I disappointed her without regret.

And herein lies the challenge. Can you co-exist within a system that you disagree with? Or will you use it to bludgeon and distract yourself and never allow your creations to bear fruit because the environment is unfriendly? That is the rub.

Can I throw you a line?

Please consider:

• That everything you rail about isn’t your reality, nor your creation, and furthermore, you can’t fix this reality (trust me, I’ve tried). 

• That you are here to create a different reality and we’re all depending on you, so get craken’!

• That you can’t save anyone or anything, but yourself. Really, you can’t, so please stop trying and just save yourself, k?

It was only when I got that this isn’t my reality, did I feel entirely free to betray it. So, I encourage you to do the same. Betray this reality of polarity and division – rightness and wrongness. Be the artist that you are, with reckless abandon. Don’t apologize for your splendor and color. Give it to us, we’re waiting for you, only somewhat patiently.

What’s Required to Receive

What’s Required to Receive
the Art of Allowance

I heard a quote not long ago that went something like, ‘In order for anything in your life to not be going well, you’ve likely been unwilling to be, know, perceive or receive.’

Oof, that hit me right in the gut as I resonated with the hammer of truth in it.

In my own experience, I spent a large chunk of my life wallowing in depression and the tunnel of chronic illness. I lamented that I couldn’t ‘get better’ till I felt better. But I knew, fundamentally, that this betrayed a ‘knowing’ I had at that time. I had hints of knowing that I was using depression and chronic illness to hide. 

Ouch, it’s hard to be vulnerable and admit that.

Now that I have the 20/20 vision of hindsight I can see that this ‘knowing’ would pop into my mind every now and then. It wasn’t a thought that I dwelled on and conjured. It was definitely a knowing which rose into my consciousness, without judgment or scorn. It just appeared, like a cloud, which I quickly and repeatedly batted away.

This insistent knowing continued to flair over those years. It pointed to something I was unwilling to “be”. I was unwilling to be Me. Weird, intuitive, kind, hyper-sensitive, vulnerable, and courageous me - in hiding. It’s no wonder I was sick! 

Becoming myself has been a journey. It required a lot more courage than I ever could have imagined. But critically – it required allowance. Allowance to let myself be the total freak of nature that I am. Allowance to lose everything I thought was crucial to my survival and happiness: my career, friends, and family. 

Poof gone.

Now I am in a beautiful state of sublime receiving. It’s as if every debt owed to me by this glorious universe is coming due. Everything I thought I lost has been backfilled with authentic joy. Joy in my body. Joy in my relationships. Joy emanates from my very being. It’s good to be me.

I wish all those years ago I had asked for help. I honestly didn’t know how. But so many of you - my clients and friends, inspire me with the support you choose for yourself. So, keep on keeping on – allowing for you. And if you need some help connecting the dots – like I had to do for me, give me a holler.

The Space Created

Now That We’re Less Stupid

In the last few weeks I’ve unpacked Knowing, Being, and Perceiving. To sum up, when you know you know, you don’t need outside confirmation for you to trust yourself. When you relax into yourself you have more access to Being – congrats if you’ve reclaimed some of yourself from the programming of doing. And when you pay attention you Perceive. Perception is a fundamental step to being less dumb and owning what we notice. These attributes combined, create a sweet space. This is the space of receiving. 

What the hell is receiving? It’s our ability to be totally present to life. To receive absolutely everything without judgment. A lot of people will reject this. Who wants a head cold? Or for their car to break down? We all want the roses without the thorns, I get it. But if we parse out what we’re receiving we inevitably cut ourselves off from what we want or what could expand our world and delight us.

This looks like:

• Me, really wanting a lap cat, but not willing to receive the stray cat outside, only to discover, he’s a lovebug lap cat extraordinaire.

• A client, resisting making more money, avoiding growth, to avoid receiving a larger tax bill.

• Another client, so full of judgments of their body they won’t allow themselves to receive love.

• And another, so in fear of receiving their family’s judgment, they won’t come out of the closet.

We all do this, in ways large and small. We modulate, bend and contort ourselves so as to not receive. And when the damn breaks, as it does, the pent-up energy behind not receiving can be a destructive clarifying force. This is not comfortable or easy. But what rushes into the sweet space created when we’re willing to receive? In my case a sweet lap cat, in my client’s cases, hot juicy sex, loving connection & relationship, and larger sums of money. And that folks, is the magic of receiving. 

Getting Less Stupid

Makes Room for Wisdom

About a thousand years ago, when I was a wee lass my mother gave me a great gift. She observed me and told me that I was “very perceptive”. Even though I was very young, I took this as a great compliment. Surprisingly, given my age, I knew what it meant.

What she and I didn’t know at the time was that I was perceptive due to the trauma and drama to which I was exposed. See, my parents had a contentious relationship, a contentious divorce, and a contentious co-parenting relationship. Many of us now know that living without a sense of ease puts you and your body in a constant state of fight/flight. I developed the skill of perception to order to adapt to my environment. 

Now, please don’t assume I’m making a rightness or wrongness out of my parents and their parenting skills. It was a different time and culturally speaking, they weren’t supposed to get a divorce, much less do it with finesse. There was exactly zero support back then for parents in the midst of dissolving their relationship. So, it was what it was and gratefully they shaped who I am today.

Given what I’ve learned and how far I’ve come I now know perceiving is like an unlocked level of the video game of life. The dictionary tells us that perception is: awareness of something through the senses, i.e., the body’s ability to see, feel, hear, taste, and touch. I would add that it’s all of that, your percolating senses –  plus the context of what you’re experiencing at the moment. For example, perception is crucial to quickly get a beat on the environment you’re in, the relationship you’re considering, and the thing you’re thinking of adding to your life. 

Where things go sideways is when we confuse what we perceive with our feelings. This happens A LOT because, in this reality, feelings are our prized possessions! Who would we be without our precious feelings? We create identity out of our feelings. We judge others by our feelings. We start wars over who is or isn’t in alignment with our feelings. And on and on, it's exhausting.

Now, if we pull the lens out, we can use perception to prevent us from even falling into the feelings trap. A short and sweet example might look like this…you have a friend who’s offered to help you move. You’ve experienced their inability to return a phone call or text. You’ve seen them get fired from their job. And you know they owe another friend a good sum of money and are avoiding said friend. Now, what are the chances you can actually depend on this friend in your hour of need? In this scenario, it may seem kind of obvious. But still, folks will engage the friend in the task. This friend may say Yes – they’ll help you, and have the very best of intentions too! And when the plan goes to shit - ooh do we get mad (queue the feelings!). So how to cultivate your perceptiveness? Some ideas below…

• Be quiet and observe. Know that what you observe will be different from what someone else witnessing the same person/place or thing will observe. Know that there is no right or wrong in anyones perceptions.

• Take notes. I keep an Awareness Journal. It captures my Knowings (as discussed at the start of the month) as well as my Perceptions. Over time, I’ll see how seemingly abstract knowings & perceptions dovetail with each other.

• Stop gaslighting you. Like the example above, when there is ample evidence to support a working conclusion (that the friend will bail on you) then that is an invitation to begin to listen to what we perceive. Our feelings will tell us that we should prioritize the friend and their good intentions. But folks, that is not going to get your couch to the new apartment!

Have fun with all of this. If you begin to practice with your perceptions you’ll feel less stupid over time. Get less irritated with yourself and be wiser. What could be better than that?

My Favorite 5-Star review

From One of My Biggest Critics

I don’t talk much in my newsletters about being a parent. There’s an awful lot to say. Mostly from the POV of how I’m winging it and don’t really know what I’m doing. Well, maybe 18 years in, that’s not entirely true, I may know a little. 

An understanding that brought so much ease in parenting has been that I can't control my kid - much as I've tried. Nor can I control their life experience and the hard knocks they may receive. I’ve definitely tried, like most mothers, to prevent my kids from experiencing pain. Side note: it doesn’t work in the long run and it’s exhausting.

What I can give them is something great and even more precious than the avoidance of pain. I can encourage their ability to Be, Know, Perceive and Receive. I’ll spend time in future emails unpacking each of these attributes. But for today I’ll focus on their ability to Know.

I spent years telling my kids that when they ride the train alone, without us chaperoning, they need to listen to their gut. That if something enters their awareness and they sense it is off, IT IS OFF, and they should follow that knowing to a place of safety. Now that they’re older I’ve expanded it to apply to absolutely everything (and yes, I should have encouraged this earlier). When something like this occurs, where we tend to get stuck, is that we look around and see what others are doing. Perhaps they’re not reacting, or they’re avoiding, and what you get stuck in is the Thinking. It’s really important to distinguish between Knowing and Thinking. Knowing is instantaneous. Thinking requires an assessment of what’s going on outside of you + time. The ability to listen and ultimately follow your own knowing is a rare gift called agency.

My oldest is in college now. She’s had a front-row seat to my total implosion and resurrection. I would not have chosen that for her. But, alas, here we are. During her winter break, she shared with me an essay she wrote about her role model. I was honored and struck that she chose me. Here are some highlights of my favorite 5 star review. Enjoy – and follow your knowing…

When someone asks me who my role model is, I always say it's my mom. She has always proven to be there when I needed her the most. And she pushes me to do the things that make me happy.

After my mom decided to quit her corporate job, It was a struggle for a while. It was hard seeing my mom face backlash from her family, and not get the respect that she deserves. But ultimately her hard work paid off. Because of her, I know to stick with what is going to make me happy, and that it may be hard at first but it will always pay off. 

I have seen my mom make mistakes because no matter who your role model is, no one is perfect. But I’m grateful that I’ve been able to see when she messes up, because I don't want the person I look up to put on a facade, and she is the most honest person I know. Her honesty has allowed me to see that there is always a brighter side to the things that happen in life, and that you can only move forward. 

When I think of her I think of a woman who through ups and downs has never given up, and it gives me the motivation to keep pushing no matter what I encounter. 

Total Freedom

The willingness to be wrong 

I think we've all had a circumstance where we're on the spot. Someone, who's important, expects an answer from us. And we're paralyzed with fear. The fear is complex, perhaps we generally don't know the answer. Or perhaps we know what's true for us, and the truth of that will put us in conflict with that important person. So we make ourselves small. We shy away from our truth. We avoid being "wrong".

Or you're like a client of mine. A lovely person in a long-term relationship - a relationship that is barreling toward marriage. But there are folks close to them, disparaging the one they love. They're petrified to marry the person deemed "wrong" by their family. 

This reality has done a bang-up job on us. We're such perfect little sheep. By the time we're 18, we're fully trained to march to the beat of someone else's drum. They tell us what parameters we can play within. They tell us who is acceptable and who isn't. Often they determine what we will study. I think the clinical word for all of this is co-dependence. It's rampant and it's heartbreaking.

What locks us in is the sheer terror of being wrong and its cascading effects. In the case of my client, it was abundantly clear to me that this relationship was paramount and foundational. They were the moon and she was the ocean. They belonged together. 

For years she had barely been able to keep the family judgment of her beloved at bay. And now, nearing the biggest commitment of her life, the naysayers had taken over her mind. She was ready to abandon not only her beloved - but herself.

It's an awful spot to know you will go against your family by choosing the one you love. But, such is the problem with judgment and families. Judgment is always a tool of control. This situation is also not likely the only area of her life they are controlling her.

I saw kindness and a connection to her beloved. I saw them as more powerful together than apart. It's important to note, I did not "see" her in a 50-year marriage. Nor did I see a future full of joy and charm. Those are not a given, those are a choice that couples endeavor together. But the prospects looked good.

Perhaps in 2023, you'll check in with you. Are you reeling from the control and judgment of family, friends, religion, or culture? There's a way out. You simply choose yourself, again and again. I’m here to encourage you if need be.