Never Never Give In

Posted on November 3, 2010 by

Take to time reflect on what you want.

There were a lot of laughs a week ago when Jon Stewart had Barack Obama revise his famous “yes we can” mantra by adding the word “but.”

Today, the laugh is more like a whimper.

Mid-term elections being what they now are, the president, and those that continue to support him, could choose to feel defeated.

And that would be the first mistake.

Defeat takes place first in our thoughts. People voted in Obama because they wanted to see positive change from health care reform to the closure of the Guantanamo. It hasn’t happened as fast as the public would like, and it hasn’t happened as fast as Obama would like.

That’s the way it works sometimes in all our lives.

The challenge, as Winston Churchill told a class of young students in 1941, is to “never give in”.

Churchill went even further. “Never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never given in except to convictions of honour and good sense.”

In other words – hold the vision, until such time as the vision no longer holds the essence of you.

As we uncover the truth for ourselves, we see that what we held dear at one point may not be true later. Then we are not giving in. We are evolving.

To never give in means to stand by our convictions. To have faith in ourselves, and in that higher power that is always within us that knows the truth of who we are.

In this place, we dissipate all fear, and make room for more light to come in.

Posted in Column, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

We are Family

Posted on August 12, 2010 by

Love doesn't discriminate

This weekend, the Okanagan Pride Festival makes a bold statement – we are all family.

Sounds pretty obvious, doesn’t it? But according to one young person I spoke with this week, there are some people here in the Okanagan who believe it’s inappropriate to mix young people with any kind of public event that openly welcomes peoples of diverse sexualities.

When she told me this, I was somewhat surprised. Who wouldn’t want to attend a festival that offered up sunshine, great music, a walk in the park with our pooches, and a generally creative loving supportive environment?

But then I realized that yes, there are people that are afraid. Afraid that we don’t know ourselves well enough to maintain our own boundaries in the midst of diversity. Some of us are afraid of bending the sexuality line because we don’t know where we will stand once we’re done with it.

Yet, whenever I’ve spoken to anyone about their sexual awakening, every one of them – straight or gay, bi or transgendered – had a pretty strong inkling who they were long before puberty set in. In our society, that makes life easy for those who are straight – much harder for those who aren’t and have to spend what can amount to a lifetime either denying that truth and making sexual pretzels of ourselves, or running the risk of being trashed and bashed on the road to self-acceptance.

I believe that making Okanagan Pride a family-friendly affair does a number of things that moves us past the days of open cross-dressing and bra-burning. What it does is go deeper. It takes us into our homes – reminding us that for each LGBTQ out there, there is a mother and a father, and increasingly, a child or two as well, and a community of allies ready to embrace them.

“Exposing” ourselves to people who embrace different sexualities does not threaten who we are as individuals. What is does is expand our understanding and appreciation for our diversity, and allows us to see that we are – at depth – all One.

When we can accept who we are, we are more capable of accepting those around us. When we deny ourselves, or judge others, we limit our world and throw up a false veil that prevents us from seeing the unity between us.

This is a spiritual truth. Just as skin colour doesn’t define us, neither does our inner sexual being. God/Spirit/Energy – whatever you want to call it – only creates goodness, and just as there are flowers of many sizes, shapes and colours, so it is that we humans express that infinite idea as well through our very diversity.

Love is at the core of this festival, and that can never be wrong.

So celebrate your family in all its diversity and give yourself the gift of an expanded and complete sexual awareness. It too is a gift.

Posted in Column | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Towers of Strength

Posted on August 4, 2010 by

The outer reflects the inner.

I’ve just returned from an inspiring visit to Chicago where I attended a spiritual conference intended to uplift and enlighten me – and it accomplished exactly that, but not quite in the way I imagined.

My intent going in was to shift gears in myself, and I set aside these nine days to accomplish that task. My expectation was that the shift would occur through the experience of the conference itself, and then I surrendered to the experience.

I spent some time searching for the answers through the speakers who came before us – including media darling Michael Beckwith and the powerhouse that presents herself as August Gold. But in truth, the answers came through much more humble means.

While riding the CT on the way to a Frank Lloyd Wright house, I spotted a transit sign posted on the wall. The sign referred to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and reminded all passengers that the local transit authority doesn’t discriminate on the basis of race, colour or religion. The implication, to me at least, was that I would be wise to follow suit.

It got me thinking deeply about the impact such a statement has on its people. And it gave me a context to what I had already noticed – a city where the perceived boundaries between these three things appeared to be no thicker than a veil, where people were consistently respectful, and courteous to the point hat it left me feeling like they actually cared. Where people looked each other in the eye, and as they say in Avatar, really saw each other.

I’d catch clusters of friend standing laughing together – white, black, Latino, Asian. Mixed race couples that were clearly comfortable with each other and failed to attract any attention from others.

I started to see too that each of these groups were made up of people born around 1964 or later. And I started to imagine what it would be like back then when a growing number of people set into mind that they wanted to do this societal thing in a completely different way. That they wanted to show that we are all One, and we’re experiencing this world as a collection of human experiences.

I know when I mindfully treat others with love, with kindness, with an open heart, my experience widens, my fear lessens, and my faith and trust in myself grows. And the more I practice this part of my daily expression, the more embedded it becomes to the point where I no longer need to think about it. I simply practice the art of seeing rightly.

To sum up, I’ll borrow a line I spied while grooving to the music at the House of Blues – “unity in diversity”.  When we live from a place of unity, we create a new vision for the world, and a new expression. It feels good, and it is good.

This city of skyscrapers may be an architectural dream, but what those buildings now symbolize to me is the towering strength of the spirit that moved so deeply among so many that they changed their way of being in the world in order to create a new one.

We can all do that, any time any where.

I invite you to join in.

Peace.

Posted in Column | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Disabling the Panic Button

Posted on July 20, 2010 by

In the Central Okanagan we like being “on alert”.

Of course no one ever admits to that, but in a way it gives us a sense of purpose – especially in the summer when the days are long and we run the risk of becoming idle. Never ones to embrace the siesta, even in 40C heat, we’d rather enjoy the thrill of running from forest fire to forest fire, or spend our afternoons sipping a cool one and reminiscing about our most recent escape.

Ahh, summer.

There is something to be said for responding to emergencies, and it can become an addiction of sorts.

We become experts at tackling what appears to be the impossible – responding faster, more efficiently, and even with greater sense of ease. We pat ourselves on the back that we have accomplished something important.

But there is a downside. Whether the “emergency” is a fire on the ground or in our personal lives, it also narrows our focus. Peripheral ideas and influences are left on the sidelines. We lose our ability to see the big picture in our attempt to determine whether we should be fighting or fleeing.

The result is, we literally can’t see the forest for the trees. We don’t see that our world is changing in an even bigger way than we have so far imagined. In responding continually to what appears to be urgent, we ignore the signs that could have prevented the emergency in the first place.

The trees are beautiful, but the forest, in all its complexity, is truly amazing.

Breathe easy.

Posted in Column | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Finding Hopefulness in Haiti

Posted on July 7, 2010 by

A friend of mine returned from a trip to Haiti recently. She was there doing humanitarian work and I couldn’t help but reflect on what it means to offer help.

When the earthquake unleashed its devastation six months ago, agencies poured into the region. The media flooded with stories about how agencies struggled to reach the people (sometimes even unable to get on shore) because the infrastructure was in such a shambles. Literally, there was no access for a time.

The situation in Haiti struck a chord with governments around the world – many of them struggling with the recent global financial meltdown – and yet countries, individuals and agencies dipped into their collective pockets and came up with the funds to inject billions of dollars into saving and feeding the people, and re-building the country.

My friend says today it’s hard to see where the money is. Haitian workers are still using hammers, shovels and wheelbarrows to tear down condemned buildings and re-build roads. Heavy duty modern equipment appears to be nowhere in sight. Parents continue to abandon their children to orphanages because they can’t afford to feed them, while those who can dig into their almost bare pockets to feed hundreds.

It’s hard to see the spiritual truth in a situation like this. But what my friend brought back with her were two things – the Haitian people are resilient, and they’re intently focused on the present, where all the power is located.

It’s the delicate balance of the relative with the absolute – how do we live in a spiritual world of absolute power, absolute truth, absolute abundance, when we see all around us evidence of things that appear to be so other than.

The challenge lies in maintaining that level of hope, and resilience. The exhaustion, for my friend, and perhaps for the Haitian people themselves, is holding onto hope. And here perhaps hope can only rest with the children – with maintaining the next generation and somehow preserving that bud of creativity which has the infinite ability to see a different way, a better way.

There have been studies about people, who win the lottery, live the high life, yet eventually the money runs out and they return to their previous lifestyle.

I’m not suggesting for a moment that the Haitian people won the lottery – far from it. But the lottery winner experience illustrates how difficult it is for us to change our consciousness – whether that is the consciousness of the humanitarian agencies, the countries that offer help, or the people themselves.

There is a creative spark in each one of us – and that’s what my friend saw time and time again. It refuses to be extinguished, no matter what we do. It’s there in the people in Haiti, and it’s there in each and every one of us as we struggle to reveal the truth of who we know ourselves to be.

My friend said what was so difficult to see was that while we know Canada is not immune to the problems of homelessness and extreme poverty, it’s not the norm. The challenge with Haiti is that an entire country is currently living in this place, and having to use its collective consciousness to rise above it all. It’s a heavy load to carry.

And yet, here is what I know to be true. There is always hope. Every day people turn the corner on poverty, on disease, on seemingly unimaginable challenges. Every day individuals rise up. Helping them to see the way – by giving them to the tools to re-build a new vision for themselves – one that honours and reflects all of who they are – would be our greatest gift.

We can know this is true for Haiti, this is true for our friends, this is true for our family. This is true for ourselves. Our job is to recognize it, and water and nurture what grows from within. Continue reading →

Posted in Column | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Morning Song

Posted on July 4, 2010 by

I spend my mornings in what I call “quiet time”.

This wasn’t a choice – it was forced upon me sometime during my only pregnancy.

Around 2 a.m. I would be forced into wakefulness. Friends would laugh and say this was preparation for all those early morning feedings, and it would pass. I would later learn it actually forged a personal pathway for me to access Spirit.

So, I’ve now spent 15 years allowing Spirit to have its way with me, and in the process I’ve read a lot of books about how this Thing works and spent a lot of time pondering even more how it works for me.

One thing I do know that works for me is a meditation technique known to many as affirmative prayer. This is a way of calling to myself (and reminding myself) of the bigger truth that is always happening in my life.

Here’s what I know today. Take these words as your own, if you choose.

There is One – one heart, one mind, one energy that runs in and through this Universe. It knows and expresses only good, and I recognize that good with ease because it is Truth.

As this Good is the only thing happening, then I know that it operates through me as well. It is my Good, and it comes to me and works through my life with grace and with ease.

All my relationships reflect that Good. My speech reflects that good. My heart reflects that good. All my thoughts are prayers of Good. I see Good in every one I meet, and create and express that Good right here and now. It is safe to be me, safe to share who I am, safe to be a light for Good.

My heart is filled with this sense of peace and recognition. I accept the truth of this, and release these words, this truth, allowing it to create more Good in my world and the world around me.

And so it is.

Posted in Affirmations | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Letting Go

Posted on July 1, 2010 by

A number of years ago I was doing one of those “let’s get closer” exercises in some semi-professional setting.

You know the workshops I mean – a facilitator comes in from outside and certain employees get the day off to play “team-building”.

So, there I was, a semi-reluctant participant trying to convince myself that on some level I really wanted to “be” with these people.

I think I managed to make it through most of it without giving up my true position, but even so, I wasn’t prepared for the final lesson.

The facilitator had everyone find a partner – someone preferably that they had not connected with up to this point. She then instructed one person to turn their back on the other. And – you know what’s coming now right? – oh, just fall backwards into their arms.

Yeah, right. It was so obvious that it was all about trust, and now my true self gave me away. I couldn’t do it. Every time I felt I was almost there, I pulled back and tried to catch myself. The truth was out – I wasn’t a true team player.

Flash forward two weeks ago. There I was with my spiritual community of choice, when I decided to open my arms at my side, palms outward during the affirmative prayer. I was seated near the front of the congregation, and suddenly the power, the energy, of all those behind me pressed in on me.

In that moment, I realized what real surrender means. And I realized too how hard it is to truly let go.

There is an energy that surrounds us, supports us, and carries us. It can be found in the arms of that co-worker who won’t let you fall, in the smile of a neighbour for no particular reason. When we fall, there is always someone, something, to catch us.

Best of all – we are always lifted up.

Posted in Column | Tagged , | 1 Comment