Rain, How I Love Thee :)

Rain is my favorite weather event. It would take me all day to tell you all of the things I love about the rain, so I will just give a synopses.

I love that I can tell the rain is coming. I love that I can smell wet pavement an hour before the rain comes. The clouds roll in, announcing something very exciting is about to happen.

Rain is the universe's sweetest of lullabies. It rocks me gently to sleep and makes me want to stay under the covers in the morning.

Rain fills up all of our physical senses; the feel of the water falling softly on my skin and the wet grass between between my toes, the smell of wet grass, wet dirt, wet pavement; seeing the water washing away and making new; the sound of raindrops hitting the leaves, the roof, the sidewalk; and the taste of the raindrops on my tongue.

Rain is a spiritual event.  When was the last time you danced in the rain or splashed in a puddle?

What do you see when you look in the mirror?

Last summer, I had a vision of 'me' as the person I wanted to be.  She was beautiful, radiant, glowing, and she was being who she wanted to be.  I held onto that vision since then and thought of myself as being that person who I saw.   Last Saturday morning, I woke up to get ready for a weekend workshop that I have been excited about for a while.  I took my shower, got dressed and started working on my hair and makeup.  That's when I looked into the mirror.  There she was....beautiful, radiant, glowing, just like in the vision only now manifest in physical.  I stared back at her, somewhat shocked.  Wow, I thought...I am actually becoming who I set out be over a year ago.  I took a picture, and it pretty well captured how I was feeling that morning (my new profile pic).  I normally shy away from the camera, but I just needed to see if what I saw in the mirror was a mirage.

It does make me a bit sad that I have spent so much of my time not liking who I saw in the mirror for so many years, but I plan to not dwell on that too much and keep moving forward.

Letting go and taking a leap of faith

A little over a year ago, I began this very transformational period in my life.  It had been knocking on my door so to speak for a much longer time, but it was just over a year ago that I feel I really began to 'wake up.'  Much has happened in both my physical life and spiritual life--too much to even begin to put in my little blog.  I have learned more about myself these past several months that I have in my entire life.

For the past couple months, I feel I am being called to act on this, called to actually do something with my new-found knowledge.  What exactly it will look like in the end, I do not know.  I have had the presence of Leopard and Black Panther who came to help me reclaim my power.  Now, my animus has been clearly come to me in my dreams to drive me to action.

I have had visions of myself doing the work I came here to do, but, as I said earlier, the exact nature of that work is still a bit foggy; so I asked that I be shown my open doors.  What came to me were a couple of paths to healing and energy work.  I selected the one that that I was most drawn too.  I am attending a shamanism workshop this weekend.

I really want to learn how to control my experiences more and have them last longer.  However, as I was reading the book that was recommended and what the class is based on, I began to wonder if this was such a good idea.  It mentioned having participants 'dance their power animal' and make up songs and sing them...plus a whole lot of other ritual.  Being a person who is not known for 'letting go' in front of others and also, in general, doing anything in front of a group of people, this scares the pants off of me.  I briefly thought about not showing up even though I have already paid my money (that would be the rabbit in me).  I began to think I had clearly made a mistake and should have selected the other workshop.

Then, I looked back at my life and all of the opportunities I had wasted and all of the challenges I had backed down from all because of this fear of worrying about what others think, and there is a sadness in that.  To not follow through would give me momentary relief of my anxieties but would also carry with it a much longer period of  regret of not following through.

So, I take up this challenge with a light heart (sorta) and a leap of faith.

Ghosts of Christmases Past, Present, and Future

12/17/2010

I’ve been reflecting on everything my family has been through over the past few years.  Things have changed so much, I hardly recognize myself. 

We tend to gravitate toward the familiar traditions around this time of year.  For instance, when I was growing up, Santa always came some night around Christmas (but not necessarily on Christmas) while our family went out to eat.  We kept this tradition with our own children, and, at least for this year, that won’t change. 

Of course, throughout our lives, we experience changes.  Things never remain the same, and that is just life.  Most of the changes (at least for me) have been happy ones such as additions to our family. 

Starting about 2 years ago, Christmas has seemed to come with a loss in our family.   The first was my father-in-law who passed away right before Christmas, and that is a Christmas that is even difficult for me to remember.  My own father passed away about 1-1/2 years ago.  Now, this year, my husband of 14 years and I have decided to part ways.  The family seems to be shrinking; and yet, I am not sad.  I think it is because I now know that anytime I need to talk to Chuck or dad, I know they are right here.  They haven’t really gone anywhere.  They have just made a transition.  And, even though my family is now split into 2 homes, I am at peace, and I am a happier person and have a lot more to offer the kids. 

Although these changes have been really difficult, they offer growth and can show us how much strength we really have.

Sure, this Christmas will feel very different (again), but I am going to try to embrace all of the changes and find all of the blessings surrounding me.

Have a beautiful Christmas and holiday season.

Love,

Angie

and God spoke

Actually, this is a post from June 9, 2010

It’s been a very long time since I’ve blogged. I’ve going through the difficult process of being torn down to be built back up again whole. It’s made me a bit reclusive. I’ve never understood what it meant to surrender to something bigger than yourself. What does that mean anyway?

Through my new growth and spiritual quest, I have had to take a look at many areas of my life and figure out what needed changing.

It came to my attention also that there was something my life that was not what it should be. I’ve actually known this for many years but to face it again made feel just so tired. I meditated on this. I prayed for guidance. The guidance I received was very confusing to me. I heard ‘yes’ and ‘no’ and ‘maybe’. I was so frustrated and confused and felt like I wasn’t being given the guidance that I ‘wanted’. I found myself on a roller coaster of emotions culminating with me sobbing on the floor of my closet not understanding which way to go.

Very early before dawn this morning, I discovered something that was not altogether shocking but made things even worse. I’ve known this thing for a very long time but did not want to face it, did not want to acknowledge it…again, because I had grown very weary of it and quite ambivalent. I had become quite good at ignoring the 800-pound gorilla if you know what I mean. It’s ugly, but the truth needed to be faced.

Again, I found myself changing my mind over and over.

I went through my morning routine and work in a fog. I was tired. I felt broken. I couldn’t do this anymore. I felt like there were pieces of me scattered around.

After I was done working, I went and sat in my room and prayed. I asked God to please take this. I told God that my will was to do his will but that I need to know what that is. I started to say “I won’t ask why”…but I stopped myself and said, “okay, I will probably ask why, but I will do whatever you ask of me. Please take the wheel.” I didn’t expect an answer. But suddenly my whole being was filled up with a presence, and a soft firm voice in my head said to me “I will lead you.” And tears streamed down my face, because I realized that this was the Big Guy, the Universe, the Everything (or whatever you call it), God. It was a beautiful voice and presence so loving and powerful, I cannot put into words. And the miracle is that it was inside me, part of me…I’m still processing.

I still do not understand it all. I do know that the process of breaking me down was to bring me to this moment in time where I would finally allow God back into my life.

Spiritual clarity....

I had a very eye-opening weekend almost a week ago, and I’m having a difficult time putting it in words. I guess the best way I can word is to say that I felt totally connected with spirit, and I have an awareness that I had not previously known before.

I have been on the precipice of a fairly big decision for a while now, and it’s something that has been very difficult, because it will affect not only myself, but also my family a great deal. I went back and forth, “knowing” what it is I need to do, but doubting my ability and resolve to do it. I also have most of my family and friends behind me on this decision. Not only that, but my schedule just fell into place that would greatly help me with this. Many other signals that what was happening now was very negative and that I need to move forward for the benefit of my family. Everything just seems to be falling into place for that decision. It felt right.

Despite all this, I had ‘fear’ about this decision. Most of this fear revolves around what “other people” might think or say. How do I explain to them? Try as I might, I do still care what other people think (sometimes)…something I am working on.

Then, something very powerful happened on Saturday. I’m not going to go into I this venue, but I finally got it loud and clear what it is I need to do. It came from within me and outside of me. Total clarity. My friends who understand spirituality the way I do will maybe understand what I am saying. I know this is right with my whole being and that whatever self-doubt I have I need to brush aside for this along with any of the outside influence that might object. I feel I have to listen to this.

In fact, just the other day, someone asked me if maybe I should hold off on this for a while. I told them how can I deny that this anymore? The message is so clear. I can no longer ignore this.

This experience has opened up a whole new spiritual awareness for me, and I feel energized and very connected at this moment. Listening to my intuition has always been difficult for me, but I think this is a huge step forward for me in recognizing the difference between intuition and fear.  I thank my friends and family for holding my hand along the way :)

Hard day

Today marks 3 months since dad passed away. I woke at about 1 a.m. with a feeling of dread. Today has been really hard. The weather today is cold and rainy, and I realized that I don’t remember what the weather was like July 21. I don’t remember a lot about that time. I spent much of the day fighting back the sadness that is threatening to take over. I would like to write much more in depth, but this is all I have in me today. I miss you dad.