The move happened easily–I had lots of help. Professional packers and movers did the heavy lifting.

And everywhere I look, I am surrounded by the love and labor of my son and my friends, who helped me unpack; who moved things around until they found their rightful place here.

It wasn’t until the last cushion rested gently in the crook of the last armchair that my body decided enough was enough. It let me know very clearly that there was no more labor to be had, no more juice to be squeezed from it.

For me, this translates as a deep fatigue-of body, mind and heart. I can’t think. Or write. Or do anything except stop. Enter into the womb of holy rest.

So I did what I always do, when I arrive at the borderlands of Depletion.

Through the magic of synchronicity, I had just two things I absolutely had to do this week.

So I booked the week off. Canceled all plans. Checked to make sure there was plenty of good, nourishing food in the house.

Then, I turned off the ringer on the phone. Turned up the heat in the fireplace. Snuggled into my favorite, silky blanket on the couch in the family room.

And watched movies. And ate. And napped.

I went to bed at eight each night, and read for a while before falling asleep. I woke early, as always, and stayed in bed until I was truly ready to be up.

The first couple of days, I felt emptied out-a shell whose occupant had moved away, leaving its fragile husk to the vagaries of sun and wind.

The first couple of days, I went for my usual morning walk. But my heart didn’t stutter with joy when the sun splashed its radiance on yellow forsythia, on creamy magnolia blossoms quivering in the wind.

So for the next couple of days, I surrendered entirely to my need to live in Flatland, to be horizontal rather than vertical.

Sleep. Eat. Read a little. Watch movies. Nap. Early to bed.

Slowly, the Devas returned. Or, I returned to the Wholeness which they never leave.

The Deva of Love, the Deva of Compassion.

Of Rest. Safety. Home. Belonging.

Surrender. Innocence. Faith.

Forgiveness.

Slowly, the empty shell of my body began filling with their presence, and with mine.

I’m not there yet.

Yesterday, I ventured out for a walk in my neighborhood. And my heart lifted in delight as the air around me shimmered with birdsong, crackled with the screeching of gulls.

The sweet breath of Spring on my cheek. The flush of early morning sunshine on my neck. O, this beautiful , beautiful world!

I had lunch with an old friend at my favorite restaurant downtown. And suddenly, I was exhausted again–a tired child who wanted nothing more than to lay my head down on my pillow and sleep.

So I’m still on mini-sabbatical. For as long as it takes. Or, until I teach my next class on Monday.

When I surrender to the sweetness of rest, it fills me. It nourishes my heart, restores my spirit, soothes my body, relaxes my mind. It restores me to myself.

This spaciousness, which meets me with such love, which requires nothing of me other than my own well-being, is deeply healing.

And the Deva of my business assures me that all is well-that my business is sturdy enough to do without me for a while. That my wonderful Alexandra has things in hand. That the systems and structures I’ve created cradle and hold my business while I sink into sacred rest.

One thing I know for sure: When I surrender to the flow, it carries me when I need to be carried. It carries my business too.

Eventually, this shell will fill up with all that I need. My body will be my sacred home again.

The time to act will come on the current of Divine Flow.

Until then, it’s time to be.

How about you? What do you need most, right now? How do you meet your own need?

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• In the Center of My Ribs…
• A Gift of Devas
• Of Dragons and Queens . . .

She was also the mother that my own mother wasn’t able to be, for my sisters and me.

She was my first model of a truly sovereign woman. She took exquisite care of herself, and of the many people in her life whom she loved.

By any measure, she had a wonderfully successful career. One that didn’t make her rich, but that provided her with a life both independent and comfortable. And that offered daily opportunities to help people grow, learn and become themselves.

She never married, but she mothered thousands of children and young people in the boarding school she founded in the wilds of Western India when she was 21 years old and fresh out of university with a brand-new MEd degree.

She grew up in pre-Independence India, a woman–in many ways–visionary and at least a generation ahead of her time. She was cultured, a historian and lover of literature who read widely, and then traveled widely in her later years.

In a photo of her, taken when she was just 20 years old, she is beautiful–her warrior spirit evident in the fearless way she faced the camera, head-on, unsmiling, her brown eyes determined and bright with dreams.

We called her the Little General. She was less than five feet tall, and fierce, and funny, and very, very intelligent.

She loved gardening, beauty, and nature. She listened to music at deafening volumes, shattering the early morning silence with devotional music loud enough to wake the entire mountain village where she lived and worked.

Full of curiosity about the world around her, she was of the generation who believed in doing the right thing without making a fuss about it. She cared for her parents until they died, then for both of her sisters as well. And for various nephews and nieces, kids whose parents were in trouble, or who were trouble for their parents.

She did all this without a whiff of martyrdom or resentment.

She was demanding, impatient, imperious, and dictatorial. And she kept a stash of candy and goodies for the littlest ones-the kindergarten kids-who would flock into her room after school each afternoon for a snack, a hug and a visit. They adored her. So did my sisters and I.

She left the world more radiant for her passage through it.

I will miss her.

Her gifts to me were many–chief among them, the model of a life well-lived. A life in which caring for others was a natural extension of caring for herself.

Her giving flowed from a full, creative heart and an unwavering sense of inner freedom.

I wish this for all of us.

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• 4th Chakra: The dance of sovereignty and love
• How To Rule Your World From The Inside Out
• The Gifts of Retreat, the Comforts of Home

I am not someone who has a career (I’m a full time mom and wife). It’s always been my dream to have a creative way of helping support my family…. something that’s in spiritual alignment with myself and the greater good of the earth and humanity.

From the time I was a child I’ve wanted to know my calling, so I could know which direction to proceed. I know I have a gift to share with the world in there somewhere. Do you think you could help me find it? I just don’t even know where to begin….

Stephanie, your calling arises from the whole of yourself…from your gifts and talents, your love, your sense of rightness, from that which brings you joy.

Start with a spirit of exploration and curiosity, and look at your life as it is right now. What brings you into that feeling of rightness, of flow and love and joy? When do you feel most fully alive? What challenges you? What returns you to yourself?

You may want to make a list of the things you loved to do when you were a child, and build on that. Often, in childhood, we’re in closer touch with our inner beings, our genius. As grownups, we may find ourselves drifting away from center and then it’s more difficult to know whether what you do arises from love or responsibility or something else altogether.

Next, consider how your gifts and talents, your love and joy, intersect with the needs of the world. What do people need, that links you to them, and that lets you serve in a joyful, heart-full way? What can you offer, that you love to do, that would meet the needs in your world?

These are places to begin to explore what calls to you.

Consider, too, what matters most to you right now, what fits into the flow of your life. If you’ve always wanted to sing opera, and you have young children at home, you may not want to choose a career as an opera singer just yet. But you may choose to pursue that passion in other ways, until the timing is right for a fuller engagement with it.

Set a clear intention, and ask for what you want. Ask the Universe, or the Sacred, or whatever you call that spirit that holds all creation in wholeness, for insight and guidance about your calling. Then pay attention to whatever crosses your path, and consider all of it to be a response to your prayer.

Find ways to step into the flow of your creative genius each day. Through writing, art, dance, song, cooking, gardening, washing the dishes–whatever brings you to a state of presence, love, joy and grace.

Your calling lives in the same realm as these qualities, so invoking and cultivating them will take you to the heart of what you’re here to do.

If you’d like to learn more about sovereignty–what it is, and how to practice it–please join us for Sovereignty Kindergarten. Starting July 14th, we’ll spend six weeks together learning skills to help you discover your inner sovereignty and apply it in your daily life. Early bird discount of $100 until July 7th.

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• There’s Wholeness in Holes
• Who’s wearing your crown?
• Can you wear your crown when you’re ill or in pain?

What do you suggest when someone is not at all sure of her grounds to assert her sovereignty? Like when the opposing forces are trying to trump her ace with the threat of hellfire and damnation? Maybe she mostly doesn’t believe in these things, but a tiny little bit of her thinks they might be possible, and so she is cowed?

Amna, to develop sovereignty you have to begin by knowing yourself. This means sorting through and clearing out the assumptions and beliefs you’ve inherited from your culture, your family, your religion, schools, media, society. And also sorting through and uncovering your own biases and unexamined points of view.

These assumptions and beliefs are forms of energy.

Once you’ve cleared them, you’re left with your own inner truth, which is the bedrock on which you can build a sustainable life.

Threats of hellfire and damnation are forms of energy intended to frighten you into obeying someone else’s rules, or buying into someone else’s version of reality. Fundamentalism is always prescriptive. It claims to know The Truth, and attempts to define reality for you. It does not honor your soul’s knowing or respect your sovereign right to choose your own path.

If you grew up in an environment that implanted such belief systems in you, the energy of those beliefs is still inside you. It’s not enough to know, intellectually, that they aren’t true. You have to actually remove that energetic implant, and replace it with your soul’s presence. With what your soul knows to be true.

There are a variety of ways to do this. When I’m working individually with clients, I look clairvoyantly at the beliefs and patterns that are embedded in their energy bodies, and use clairvoyant healing techniques to remove them. Then I help them fill up the spaces we’ve cleared out, with their own soul, and with the qualities that their soul brings.

If you’d like to learn more about sovereignty–what it is, and how to practice it–please join us for Sovereignty Kindergarten. Starting July 14th, we’ll spend six weeks together learning skills to help you discover your inner sovereignty and apply it in your daily life. Early bird discount of $100 until July 7th.

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• Can you wear your crown when you’re ill or in pain?
• There’s Wholeness in Holes
• Who or what calls your name?

Confusing? Sometimes.

Yet learning to dress for emotional weather is an essential skill, both for understanding our selves and for being in right relationship with the world around us.

So why does it sometimes feel like you’re slogging through a rain forest without an umbrella? Why do we spend so much time obsessing about feelings, resisting them, or drowning in them?

Feelings are the language of your body. This is how your body tells you about how it experiences situations in your life, how it responds to the places and people you encounter, the choices you make. Feelings keep you connected with your body, when you listen to them, when you let yourself experience them fully.

All feelings are energy. Energy is vibration–in its natural state, it moves freely. When feelings are stifled or suppressed, or when you cling to them or make up stories in your head about them, you run into problems. (Emotions are feelings with a thought or thoughts attached.)

So let’s explore the world of feelings today.

Which feelings do you allow yourself to feel fully? (Start with the basic four: sad, mad, glad, and scared.)

Which feelings make you cringe? Which ones do you judge or push away?

Which feelings do you cling to? Which ones do you make up stories about?

Playing the Feelings Game

Ground and center yourself. Identify a feeling you’re feeling right now. You may experience it as a sensation, or as a feeling.

Close your eyes, and explore the cavity of your body, as though you were looking down inside it. Take your awareness inside your chest and belly, your back and buttocks, your hips and legs and feet.

Notice where this feeling is located, in your body. What is its texture? Its flavor or color, its density, its shape? Does it feel prickly or cold? Small, hard, lukewarm? Like a jelly bean? Is it sour or dry, juicy or squishy?

Notice the qualities of this feeling, meeting it with curiosity and openness, exploring it as though it were a life-form from another planet. Set aside, for now, your beliefs or stories about it and simply discover it as if for the first time.

All energy–including feeling energy–consists of vibrating particles. And the spaces between those particles are almost entirely empty. Even an atom is an energy eco-system of protons, neutrons and electrons held together by an electromagnetic force within mostly empty space.

Bring your awareness–your soul’s vibration–into the empty spaces inside the feeling in your body. Expand your consciousness into it.

Notice if any part of this feeling isn’t yours. The part that isn’t yours may feel dramatic or hysterical, over-the-top. Or you may experience it as a dullness or numbness–an inability to access your own feeling-vibration.

It may be someone else’s feeling that you’ve absorbed, or a larger energy field of feeling that’s floating around in the world.

Your body and your energy field are your personal space. No-one else belongs here, except by invitation.

Ask the feeling-energy that is not yours to leave right now. Move it all the way out beyond the boundary of your energy field, and release it there. You can also release it down your grounding and into the earth, asking the earth to take care of it.

Then tune in, once again, to the feeling itself. Invite it to move in any way that it wants to. Simply keep your awareness in the empty spaces inside the feeling-energy, and follow the trajectory of its movement with your attention and awareness.

Notice if the feeling wants to move upward or downward or sideways. Diagonally, or in a parabolic arc or in a spiral. Notice if it moves quickly through some areas of your body, if it slows down in other areas.

When the movement feels complete, check to see if there’s any more of that feeling-energy left in any other part of your body. Repeat the process described here.

If the energy gets stuck somewhere, and doesn’t move, breathe into the place where it’s stuck. Bring your consciousness into the empty spaces inside it.

Ask if the energy in this feeling is yours. If there’s any part of it that isn’t yours, move it outside the boundary of your energy field.

If the energy still remains immobile or stuck, talk with it. Ask it to tell you or to show you what it needs in order to flow naturally, to move in whatever way it wants to. Let the flow of the feeling itself dissolve any blocks to its free passage.

Feelings: The Musical

Feelings are like musical notes: each one has a unique tone and frequency to it. You can make more complex, interesting music when you use all of the notes in the musical scale. (Unless you’re Phillip Glass or John Cage, in which case, call me and we’ll talk!)

You’ll have a richer, more creative inner life when you allow yourself to feel the whole range of your feelings fully and freely.

Since feelings are energy, they are fluid; they change. Once you let them flow, and feel them fully–without hanging onto them or chasing them away or running from them–they change to some other form of energy.

So let’s play with the energy of feelings.

We

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• Sovereignty and Feelings
• Chasing The Next Shiny Thing
• Dreaming in the Dark

Healing Internet Hangover? Slaying the ice-cream dragon? Wha…?

Maybe you’re one of those folks who aren’t susceptible to ice-cream. Or dragons. Or the internet. If so, please click away. You don’t need to read the rest of this post.

For the rest of us, being on the internet can become an ice-cream slide down a slithery slope. Sweetly deadly, in a hundred flavors. Chocolate and chili; persimmon and praline.

It starts out innocently enough. Check email, Twitter, Google stats on your website. Read and comment on your favorite blogs.

Ignore the bitter breath of the ice-cream beast so deliciously cold on the back of your neck.

Or it starts out virtuously: Research for that article, for that blog post, for that presentation that’s due tomorrow. Not ice-cream! Spinach!

Next thing you know, the morning’s been swallowed whole. It’s lunch time. You’ve forgotten to eat. Or pee. Except for that giant bowl of ice-cream. You feel sick.

Your body is wa-a-ay down the-e-re somewhere; your head is swimming in clouds of sugar.

You’ve forgotten what you came here for. Or why you’ve been clicking links for the past hour. You’re a zombie looking for your ice-cream fix.

Your shoulders are hunched, your eyes squinty and glazed. You feel stunned stupid.

And…there goes the rest of the day.

You WANT to write that article, work on your book, create that genius product that’ll change your world.

But the folds of your brain have melted into a chocolate puddle. Any creative ideas you once had have long since slithered away.

You feel guilty, ashamed, weak of will. You swear to do better next time.

You promise yourself: No more ice-cream! At least, not until after dinner. Work first, then a visit to Ice-Cream InternetLand.

You vow to ice-cream in moderation: Just one cone, ten minutes, no more. You set a timer.

Your inner ice-cream freak rebels. Want. Ice-cream. Now!

You get in a fight with yourself. And emerge bowed, bloody, covered in creamy chocolate-chocolate-chip.

Is there another way? (I’ll whisper the answer to this in your ear…come closer…yes!)

Healing Internet Hangover: The Class.

May 12th, 19th, and June 2nd.

Early bird price of $48 ends Saturday.

Slay the ice-cream dragon! Discover your inner sugar-free superhero! Do join us. :-)

You’ll find details and registration here.

I’d love to hear your stories about those Internet Ice-Cream Hangovers. What gets you started down the ice-cream slope? How do you make your way back? What’s the worst ice-cream hangover you’ve ever had?

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• Growing the House of Your Business
• Chasing The Next Shiny Thing
• To Change a Pattern, Create a New Story

I’m moving house again.

And even though the move is still a couple of months away, I’ve begun the process of withdrawing my energy from this place that’s been the home of my heart for the past three years.

My ancestors made the perilous journey across the Arabian Sea from Persia to India nearly 1300 years ago. Something of their peregrine spirit must live in me, because I’ve moved so many times during my life.

First, from India to North America, when I was just 21 years old.

The shadow of that first leave-taking is imprinted in my body. These past few weeks, I’ve dreamed repeatedly of my childhood home. And woken confused by the chitter-chrreee of eagles instead of the caw-caw-caww of crows.

The spirit of transformation is my guiding star.

This means that I choose life at the tideline. Right there, on the shifting shore. Welcoming the incoming waves. Knowing I’ll soon wave goodbye to the outgoing ones.

A rhythm as constant as my breath.

There’s a reassuring constancy to the rhythms of change. And an art to living improvisationally, responding to the tides without being swept away.

Surfers know this in their bodies.

For me, transformation happens most effortlessly, with the least amount of resistance, when I give myself safety, stability and support.

This is not the safety of a battleship or an aircraft carrier. It’s the safety of a sail boat. Or a surfboard. Something small and light and responsive enough to ride the waves without capsizing. Something as fragile as the coracles in which my ancestors sailed east, to India and freedom.

My sail boat is made of sturdy, durable materials. Daily rituals and routines that sustain me.

Lighting a candle each morning to welcome the spirit of my home. Invoking the spirit of grace. Invoking the qualities that add buoyancy to my life.

Paying attention to my feelings.

Eating consciously. Going to bed early.

Choosing presence and nourishment. Choosing connection, soul, heart.

Choosing what I truly love.

These practices are a boat when I’m on the sea. And when I return to shore, they form a lap.

A lap formed by the simple act of sitting cross-legged on the sand.

A lap that is an invitation to be held for a while, in safety and comfort. A lap doesn’t impose or insist–it’s just there, an available and loving support.

The cat or child who visits a lap curls up in it easily, with no thought of “should” or “ought”. The familiar warmth of the lap offers comfort, a place where we’re loved, accepted, restored to our selves.

It is, by its very nature, a temporary resting place, not a permanent dwelling.

When the refuge of the lap has worked its magic, the cat stalks off to chase seagulls across the beach; the child runs out to play in the shallows.

The lap reminds us that we are held; we are loved; we are safe. Visiting a lap restores us to the essential friendliness of our world.

So I’ve been contemplating laps. And turbulent tides. And how I can–simply by sitting with conscious intent–make a lap. Right here on the shore of the restless sea.

A lap for each of you to visit for a while. To restore yourself to your Self, whenever you choose.

How about you? What are some of the ways you make a lap for others? What are the laps that shelter you?

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• The Deva of Safety
• Chasing The Next Shiny Thing
• Dreaming in the Dark

I’d emerge from these retreats feeling deeply connected to my inner world. Peaceful, quiet, as still as a mountain. Unshakeable. Until I disembarked into the neon wild of JFK airport and my breath became ragged, my heartbeat uneven and jangled by the sight of security guards with guns, by the clamor of lights bouncing off shiny stainless steel surfaces.

I realized then that I needed to find a way to be present, open, loving and peaceful in my daily life.

Back home in Canada, I experimented with ways to keep the gifts of retreat alive in my everyday world of work, friends and play. Sundays were retreat days for me.

I’d follow the rhythm of a silent retreat. Up before dawn. Meditation. Yoga. A light breakfast. More meditation. One-hour sessions of sitting with my mind, with my breath. Followed by mindful walking in my back yard.

Sitting. Walking. Being. No phones, no reading or music, no distractions of any kind. Just me, my body, my mind, my breath. And the vast universe behind my closed eyes.

By the end of the day I’d feel restored to my self. Slip into bed feeling deeply rested. Sink into dreamless sleep. Wake the next morning, ready for my week. Which unfolded with a greater sense of calm well-being because I’d taken the time to return home to myself.

Once I had children, Sundays became family days. I still sat in meditation each morning for an hour or two, but anything more than that was an unimaginable luxury.

Now, my life has come full-circle. My children are grown and off living their lives. My time is my own. And technology has changed the face of retreats, as it has changed so much else.

Next month, Jen Louden–author of The Woman’s Comfort Book, The Life Organizer and several others–is holding a virtual retreat. One you can participate in from home, in your pajamas.

It starts on Friday, February 12th, and continues throughout the weekend, with sessions led by several wonderful teachers. Jen has created and taught retreats for women for over twenty years. She brings her lovely, down-to-earth presence and an array of processes to help each of us settle more deeply into our bodies, into our hearts. Into connection, peace and openness to the truth of our inner being.

I will be teaching a session on Opening to the Sacred, along with my sound-healer friend, Fabeku. Patti Digh, Christina Baldwin and Julie Ann Turner are some of the other wise women who’ll help you get in touch with your creative essence, restore your heart and spirit, and find your true voice.

Won’t you join us? You can take part in as many or as few sessions as you have time for. The cost is $108. You can register here.

The gifts of retreat have never been more necessary. Or more accessible than they are now, thanks to the magic of technology and the world-wide web. I look forward to meeting you there!

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• Life Unfolding
• Tsunamis In the House of Wholeness
• After the Retreat Is Over: Energy Alchemy for Teachers

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about inner wholeness. What makes us who we are? There are many selves inside me. They encompass every age I’ve ever been, or ever will be. They include my most tender, vulnerable, wounded selves as well as my most powerful, radiant, creative selves, and everything in between. Between them, my selves carry all of my life’s experiences, as well as the experiences of my ancestors, my culture, and my species.

One of my daily practices is to call a circle of selves into my heart and to make room for the necessary conversations between them. These conversations explore different ways of being and belonging. They deepen my commitment to being all of who I am, leaving no part of my self behind.

We don’t attempt to resolve differences so much as articulate them. The truth of each aspect of my inner being, when it’s fully expressed, listened to and respected, brings my disparate selves into harmony with each other. Or at least, holds them in a space of love and safety, where they can be at peace with each other.

Like a family gathering that may start out with loudly stated or silent discontent, but that ends in convivial laughter (and sometimes tears) around the dinner table, these conversations deepen the relationships between my selves.

When every part of myself supports and contributes to the life I’m shaping, that life becomes infinitely richer. Creating it becomes a coherent activity, rather than one in which my selves are pulling in different directions. The result is simplicity, wholeness, ease. From this place, I can contribute to my world by the quality of my being, rather than simply through the things I do.

How about you? Which selves are you most comfortable with? Which ones need your love and attention at this time? What healing conversations await you?

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• Sunday Poem #6
• Your Perfect Offering: The Deva of Truth
• Beyond the Garden Gate: The Deva of Willingness

Here’s part of what she said about it:

“I keep thinking about failure. And patterns. And lessons. . . I’m trying to figure out where along the lines I am sabotaging myself. Because this is a pattern. Stuff I’ve largely dealt with but certain circumstances (like big exams) can bring back to the surface. . . I get this anxiety and stop thinking . . . my brain literally stops functioning.”

She went on to describe all the helpful, practical things she was doing to shift her pattern. Like taking really good care of herself. And putting everything else aside to focus on her studies.

She asked for suggestions on how to manage her anxiety during the exam. She kindly agreed to let me share her question and my response here on this blog, because we can all use some help in dealing with stressful situations.

Here’s my response to her:

It’s wonderful to hear all the realizations you’ve already had about this pattern you describe, and the very concrete steps you’re taking to shift it.

Lovely that you’re focused on doing what it takes to prepare for this exam, and saying No to everything else until it’s done. Also brilliant that your prep time includes taking loving care of yourself, meeting your anxiety with compassion, and doing the inner and outer work that you have to do.

The energy in the exam room isn’t really set by anyone–there’s no-one actively holding and containing a particular energy field in there. So the strongest energy ends up prevailing, by default. If that is the students’ fear, or the proctors’ judgment, then you and everyone in that exam room will be sitting in a giant pool of scary energy.

You can change this by setting a clear intention for yourself, for the room, and for the exam process itself. Do this ahead of time, in whatever way works for you–through prayer, or ritual, or simply clear intent.

Ask for what you need. Connect with your soul, and with your spiritual allies, and ask for safety, protection, clarity, knowledge, certainty–all the Divine qualities that are yours by virtue of the fact that you are a living expression of the Divine.

Fill yourself with these qualities each day between now and the day of your exam, so that when the time comes, you are fully nourished before you ever set foot in the place.

Once you’re there, take a few minutes to ground and center yourself. Ground and cleanse the energy in the room, and ask your allies to hold and contain that energy field as you write your exam.

I have specific ways that I do this, but you can use whatever works for you. Just know that you are a powerful spiritual being, and that in any situation, the clearest, strongest energy always prevails. So set that energy for yourself, and it will benefit everyone in the room.

It will also help you to attune to the soul of the exam and the proctors, and to ask for their help and support ahead of time. They can be your allies, rather than obstacles on your path.

Then, when you enter that exam room, you will enter a container of blessing and support. One that you have invoked and helped to create. And you yourself will be a blessing and support to everyone there, so that each of you can bring your whole selves into that room.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

You don’t have to wait for a stressful situation to practise these simple ways of taking care of yourself.

When you wake up in the morning, before you get out of bed, take a few moments to review the day ahead.

Set the energy for each interaction, each situation, each thing you want to accomplish that day.

Ask for help. Fill your heart with the qualities you need to fully nourish yourself.

Then take that energy of fullness and nourishment as blessings into your day.

Be a source of blessing.

Kiss the Screaming Meemies, and they’ll blush and kiss you back.

(Many thanks to my brilliant friend Havi Brooks, who suggested this post. :-))

If this post spoke to you, you might like these as well:

• Chasing The Next Shiny Thing
• Playing With Time
• Dreaming in the Dark