are you missing your sushmana?

Caduceus, or Rod of Hermes.
Public domain.

In the past few weeks, I have run into a number of cases in which the client was missing part of his or her caduceus/sushmana. I wanted to go into it a little here because I have never found any other resource on handling missing caducei.

What is the Caduceus?

 In Greek mythology, Hermes carries a caduceus. It's also called a "herald's staff." Modern medicine has kind of usurped the symbol by mistake: the Rod of Asclepius, a famed Greek doctor, is similar, but only has one snake and no wings.

Indian spiritual anatomy refers to the sushumna, ida, and pingala--which look startlingly like the caduceus. The sushumna runs along the spine, and then the "snakes" of masculine and feminine energy are the the pingala and ida, respectively.

The Ida is feminine energy and starts in the root chakra and ends in the left nostril. The Pingala is masculine energy and ends in the right nostril.

In the past month, I'd say I've run into four cases where the client did not have at least one of those three crucial things (ida, pingala, sushmana). I frankly hadn't even realized that was possible until I scanned a client and didn't find anything there.

Image here. 

You may be missing your sushmana, ida, or pingala if:

- You have a significant imbalance in your masculine and feminine energies
- You feel you are doing things that should spark a kundalini rise (for example, meditation), but no rise is occurring
- You feel intuitively that you are missing these things
- You muscle test positive for not having them.

Restoring them will allow for the rise of kundalini, as well as increased energy flow throughout the body (and thus improved health).

Restoration can be simple--ask for it to be restored through prayer, or go into the theta state and make the request and witness it going through.

upcoming mentorship program

Announcing an upcoming mentorship program--

I've been putting this off because I haven't really wanted to do pursue it, frankly, but I can't put it off anymore. Every day I've been getting messages about mentoring.

What I feel it will be is four months, from January to April, or possibly six months, until June. It would involve regular (weekly or every-other-weekly) one-on-one checkins mixed with personal sessions meant to clear blocks from your path in this field. And probably 2-hour-long classes every other week involving everyone. It will be similar to the Home Healing Course I taught last year, except way more personalized and more intense--which is to say, more information, more one-on-one time, longer in duration, etc. It would be a commitment of approximately 3 hours a week of class time (including lessons and then one-on-one visits with me for personalized tutoring and energy work) and I would recommend committing to a minimum of 1-2 hours a week of active practice.

I'm feeling like this could be a life changer.

This needs to be offered by invitation only, but I have kept feeling like I have at least one secret blog-reading lurker who needs to see this and ask for the invitation, if that makes sense. Whoever you are, you are important! Reach out! Your helpers have been bothering me to write this post just for you!

I'm still figuring out the details but almost every day right as I'm inspired to think about it, I'll get an email about someone else's energy mentorship program... or someone will ask me to point them to opportunities to finesse their energetic capacities... or someone will ask me if I am meant to be their teacher. Seriously, every day for over a month this has been happening. So, I guess it's a thing!

If you read this and feel like this post is for you, please reach out. awinegarduzett @ gmail . com. You know the drill.

some natural living lifestyle changes

Some of you might know that I have an infrequently-updated other blog about crunchy living. It's called "Crunchy by Accident" because for us it really was an accident that we ended up living a crunchy lifestyle.

But the crunchy lifestyle happens to be awesome and I wanted to take a minute and write about some recent changes you guys might be interested in.

1. Natural Deodorant





I've experimented with DIY natural deodorant before, and have never been too thrilled with it. But this time around, I am a huge fan!! I can't remember my exact recipe... it was something inspired by an internet find but I tweaked it. I believe it was:

4 tbsp coconut oil
4 tbsp baking soda
2 tbsp bentonite clay
2 tbsp cornstarch
10 drops each of spearmint, lemon, orange, and lavender essential oils

Heat it all up on a stove and then add the essential oils.

I keep mine in a jar and just rub some on every morning. This doesn't work like an antiperspirant, so it's been weird getting used to being wetter under the arms. However, the scent is really nice and it lasts through the day and into the following morning.

Here is a good article on armpit detox. I have experienced some detoxing. But I think it's over now. Yay!

2. Handkerchiefs instead of paper tissues

I bought an old king-size flannel sheet from a thrift store and turned it into a few dozen hankies to replace our paper tissues.

I LOVE IT.

I'm used to getting a horrible rash on my philtrum every winter from chronic nose-blowing. Right now we are all sick, though, and... no rash.

I fold up the hankies like cloth tissues and keep them in an empty Kleenex box. They pop up one at a time like a normal tissue. My 4yo can fold them up for me. I bought a PUL-lined wet bag in colors that match my kitchen and that's where used ones go. I just toss them in the normal laundry, wet bag and all. I actually have two wet bags so I can immediately put up the other one while the first washes and then dries on the line.

3. Big Berkey water filter

Big Berkey on my
counter.

I'm in love with my Big Berkey.

I got it a few months ago, the kind with both black and white filters. LOVE IT. A few weeks ago a pipe burst in our neighborhood and all the water became brown sewer water.

Except, my family pretty much didn't even notice because we just drink from the Berkey. Yum.


Conclusion

We've been doing way more crunchy things than that but those are a few things we've been up to lately. Living the crunchy life!

Fortingall Yew's transition to the feminine age

I saw this article on the news a few days ago and made a mental note to blog about it. From the article:

Fortingall Yew. Public domain.

You'd think after thousands of years on earth, the Fortingall Yew wouldn't be up for a major life change. Well, you're wrong. 

This ancient Scottish tree -- estimated to be 5,000 years old and among Europe's oldest living organisms -- is changing sexes from male to female, according to Botanist Max Coleman with the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.

 Basically, an ancient tree is changing genders from male to female, and I saw that and thought immediately of our current transition into what the yogis call "the Aquarian Age."

Where, yogically and astrologically speaking, we have been in the so-called Piscean Age for several thousand years, in 2012 we made the shift into the Aquarian Age, and we are still kind of transitioning into it. While the Piscean Age was masculine, the Aquarian Age is feminine in nature. And we see this transition happening, apparently, even in nature, with the Fortingall Yew.

spirit rips

I recently discovered a thing called "spirit rips." I've never heard of it before, so I thought I would write about it.

The first thing that came up when I Google-imaged "energy
leakage." Similar to a house, there are lots of ways human
energy can leak! Image here.

I was working with someone whose energy had chronically felt "leaky." Like, no matter what she did, it felt like she was leaking energy all over the place. 

Typically when that happens, it can be solved with a couple of different techniques. Often, leaking energy involves holes in the aura or arcline, which are easily healed. Sometimes you might find an energetic shunt, a type of energetic weapon meant to drain a person's energy, and then you could just pull out the shunt and heal the affected area. Sometimes the drain is a literal drain that you can plug. Sometimes there's a hole in a chakra that needs to be healed up and shielded.

So I was working with this person for leaking energy, and I couldn't figure out why she kept leaking. Finally I thought to ask God about it (duh) and got the answer: a spirit rip.

I called up the image of the rip, and saw a close up of it. It looked like a piece of silky, ethereal white shiny fabric had been ripped, and the rip was seeping kind of star-like, sparkly dust. Like glitter, but more star-shaped.

I commanded for the rip to heal, and the person I was working on said that it felt like mud or a mask or something had been placed on her nose and third eye, sort of patching up the hole.

The mud over the eyes reference reminded me of this story from the Bible.

Image here.

Anyway, sealing up the rip seemed to solve the problem. After the session, I scanned myself for spirit rips and found two of them which I subsequently patched back together. I haven't noticed a giant difference in myself yet, but clearly they weren't very significant problems to me or else I would have noticed the rips sooner.

You may have a spirit rip if:

A. You muscle test positive for one

B. You see one with your spiritual eyes

C. You intuitively feel that you have one.

These can be healed through theta healing or probably just by praying in faith that the rips will be healed immediately.

confronting the inner saboteur

Lately I've gotten to witness a lot of self-sabotage--fortunately, mostly not from myself! Everyone has an inner Saboteur that works hard to keep them from progressing. This post is just an introduction to the concept of the Saboteur.

Archetypally Speaking

Image here.

Archetypes are basically psychological patterns that form the basis of the personality. A brief intro to archetypes can be found here.

Every person has twelve primary archetypes--eight that differ from person to person, and four that are found in everyone. The Common Four are: the Inner Child, the Victim, the Sell-Out (or Prostitute, but I prefer Sell-Out for its wider connotations), and the Saboteur. Today I want to talk about the Saboteur.

The Saboteur

The Saboteur. The one who sabotages. This archetype is about self-sabotage, the part of us that actively works against our happiness and higher good. Typically the Saboteur goes unrecognized--unless a person becomes intentionally aware of its influence.

Caroline Myss writes:

The Saboteur archetype is made up of the fears and issues related to low self-esteem that cause you to make choices in life that block your own empowerment and success. As with the Victim and Prostitute, you need to face this powerful archetype that we all possess and make it an ally. When you do, you will find that it calls your attention to situations in which you are in danger of being sabotaged, or of sabotaging yourself. Once you are comfortable with the Saboteur, you learn to hear and heed these warnings, saving yourself untold grief from making the same mistakes over and over. Ignore it, and the shadow Saboteur will manifest in the form of self-destructive behavior or the desire to undermine others.

Like all archetypes, the Saboteur is neither inherently good or inherently bad. It all depends on how we allow it to work in our lives. Being aware of the inner Saboteur turns it from an enemy into an ally; when we realize how we are in danger of being sabotaged, we can prevent said sabotage. Particularly if we are the ones behind our own sabotage.

Recognizing the Saboteur

Image here.

For me, it was helpful to run my own archetype chart. Essentially, all 12 archetypes fall into "houses." I was not surprised to discover when I ran my chart that my Saboteur fell in the House of Good Fortune--the house of creativity and making money. I am a very creative person--buy my novel The Body Electric here--but I routinely failed to meet my own expectations for myself. Once I realized my Saboteur was there, I was able to see the ways I had sabotaged my own success. Being aware of my self-destructive tendencies when it came to finances helped me prevent future sabotage. My life now looks very different than it did when I was allowing my Saboteur to rule me.

Again, from Caroline Myss, the 12 Houses of the archetype wheel:

Personality, Ego: the face you present to the outside world

Life Values: ownership, finances, your relationship to earthly power

Self-expression, Siblings: the power of choice

Home: establishing your emotional foundation

Creativity, Good Fortune: erotic energies, including creativity, sexuality, and synchronicity/chance

Occupation and Health: seeking security in the physical world

Relationships: marriage and partnerships

Other People's Resources: stocks, inheritance, death and closure

Spirituality: wisdom, publishing, travel

Highest Potential: completing the integration of the self

Interaction with the World: relating your creativity to humanity

The Unconscious

Where does your Saboteur fall? This is something you can pray about or muscle test on.

Conclusion

We all have an inborn tendency to sabotage our own success. Being aware of this tendency helps us proactively avoid self-sabotage.

stop, look, and listen: warning signs, and raising frequency

Feeling like you might be on the wrong path?

Our trials are our friends: they show us in which ways we are walking the wrong path. They are our warning signs, inviting us to make course corrections.

I just came across an article entitled 10 Warning Signs From the Universe. The list from the article includes things like stubbing your toe, arguments, injuries, and unexpected bills. The article avers that these are "an indication that you need to center yourself and adjust your frequency."

Stoplight courtesy of clipart.

When we experience negative events, it is often a reminder that we need to change up what we're doing--and more importantly, how we're thinking.

Coming from a low-frequency mindset attracts negativity into life. The more "off" the frequency, the more negative life becomes.

Do you know anyone like that? They don't just have a negative mindset--they also have major health problems, un- or underemployment problems, relationship problems, reputation problems. All of these problems are signals that are really only trying to help. Every external problem stems from an internal frequency problem, and the external results are there to help us realize what we need to change. An easy example would be, perhaps, obesity: overweight is a signal that we may not be treating our bodies appropriately. The course correction might involve a more healthful diet, more exercise, more sleep, or more love and self-acceptance.

Everything in the world works together for our good if we let it, and that means allowing our trials to act as our sentinels.

What trials are showing up in your life right now? What changes do they indicate may need to be made for you to be happy, healthy, wealthy, glad? I invite you to set aside some time to truly ponder these things and write them down.

Raising your frequency

If you have a lot of problems going on in your life right now, it might seem overwhelming to pinpoint specifics and start the course corrections. The good news is that generally raising your vibration will help clear these issues.

There are plenty of ways to raise your vibrational frequency, but here are just a few:

1. Meditate daily.
2. Ground yourself regularly (this may mean multiple times in a day).
3. Read your scriptures, go to the temple, pray.
4. Hydrate--drink up!
5. Commit to nourishing yourself with healthful foods.
6. Use the "Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up" to help you clear your home of things that do not spark joy.
7. Forgive. Forgive people especially when they don't deserve it.
8. Eliminate blame from your life.
9. Spend time in nature.
10. Exercise.

Conclusion

The negative things that happen in life are helpful signals to us that something needs to change--either our choices or our thinking patterns. You have control over your own vibration. You can control your thoughts and you can control your choices. If you feel like you can't, it's time to raise your vibration by taking better care of your body and your spirit. Meeting with someone who works with subconscious programs can also make a big difference in your life.

on approaching life as your experiment

For a significant portion of my life, I was overweight.

Me in high school, age 16. Eek!

I remember feeling elated when I fit into a size 8. EIGHT.

For all the time that I, at about 5'4, hovered around 150-160 lbs, I didn't love my weight and I didn't love how I looked. But being that weight was comfortable and familiar to me. Getting in shape--eating differently, exercising--ah! It was so intimidating. Overwhelming. Easier to just keep on keeping on the way I was.


One day, though, I had a thought.

I thought: this is the youngest I will ever be. This is the prime of my life. And wouldn't it be a shame to live and die and never know what it feels like to be fit? To be thin and in shape and actually healthy?

And so, that day, I committed: I was going to experiment with being healthy.

No pressure, I told myself. I'll only commit to being healthy for a few months. I'll get down to my body's ideal weight and then see what happens. If I love it, I can keep on being healthy. If I don't, well, no one ever complains about how hard it is to get fat! I can always come back to this weight, no problem. I already have all the clothes in this size that I'd need.

Me in college, age 18. Size 10.

By framing my weight loss as a temporary experiment, I took the pressure off myself. When things got hard, I told myself: I can always go back to being unhealthy tomorrow. Today is just one day. This experiment is just a few months. This is not a big deal.

And the weight came off. I didn't take good records at the time but as I recall I went from about 160+ lbs down to 126 lbs in maybe a few months. I was shocked and thrilled when I got down to smaller than a size 2. And I did it all by altering my perspective: giving myself permission to make my life changes temporary, and additionally by realizing that I was only at 160 lbs because I was living the lifestyle of someone who weighs 160 lbs. Once I realized this and committed to temporarily assume the lifestyle of someone who weighs 120 lbs, things just changed.

I share this story because I feel there is so much power in giving yourself permission to try things out. I feel that so many people shy away from things that would really bless their lives, because they're afraid that once they make a choice to try something out, it has to be FOREVER.

Well, not true!

You can agree to try losing weight for six months and get into the best shape of your life. You can always choose to be fat again later.

Me in college, during
one experimental health
stint. Size 8-10.

You can try sacrificing to save a relationship that matters to you. You can sacrifice today and not have to sacrifice tomorrow.

You can experiment with how you look: cut your hair. It'll grow back. Try a new shade of lipstick. You never need to wear it again. Talk to a stranger in the grocery store. They don't know who you are and you may never meet again anyway.

You can try reading the Book of Mormon and meeting with the missionaries. Reading a book doesn't have to mean a permanent life change.

And that's just it: none of our choices mandate a permanent life change. None of them do. Some of them theoretically do--when we make covenants we really should plan on keeping them forever. But let's face it: some people just don't keep their covenants.

People change every day. You change every day. I change every day. It is a folly to expect to be the same person next year as you are today.

But if you can count on the fact that you'll be a different person next year--what does that mean?

Me 13 months ago, prior to
pregnancy! Size < 2. A result of
a health stint.

It means that you can influence who that person next year will be. And you influence your future self by experimenting today.

"Experimentation" has a connotation that I don't mean to endorse. Please don't think I'm advocating for sexual experimentation in any way, or experimentation with drugs or alcohol or anything like that. I'm focused on the kind of experiments that could have a lasting positive effect on your life.

Experiment with a 40-day kundalini meditation.

Experiment with diet and exercise: experiment ingesting the typical daily caloric intake of someone the size you want to be.

Experiment with studying the scriptures every day.

Experiment with studying other people's scriptures too: In my normal life, I study the Book of Mormon and the Holy Bible every day, and then the Tao Te Ching regularly and I just picked up a copy of the Bhagavad Gita a week or two ago. A few years back I read the Koran and recently I started the Analects of Confucius, although I still need to finish. So many people seem terrified to read other people's religious texts but I don't understand why. What if there's a nugget in there that will bless your life? Why would you intentionally avoid that?

Today I invite you to take the pressure off yourself. Read a new book. Study something new. Try a new lifestyle when it comes to diet and exercise. Give yourself parameters (ex: this will only last 2 weeks! or This will only last 6 months!) and just give something a try. Experiment with something you've thought about that could make your life better.

Be open. Expand. If you don't try something new, you'll never know how it could have blessed your life. If it doesn't bless your life, at least you won't have to wonder if it would have.

explaining soul fragmentation

Image here.

One thing I run across with some frequency in my energy work is soul fragmentation. I know: even the name of it is weird.

Doctrine and Soul Fragmentation

A lot of times in energy work, there are things like this that pop up and seem weird--don't automatically fit into our preset ideas about doctrine. When this kind of thing pops up with a client, I just explain: this is the framework that we're working in. You don't need to believe any of it, but if working from that paradigm clears up the problem, that's the important thing.

So I want to explain soul fragmentation with the mutual understanding that the important thing here is that approaching certain issues from this perspective can make a positive difference in people's lives. To me, that's the important thing. There's a ton about the nature of souls that we don't understand. There is not a lot of official Church doctrine about the precise nature of souls, besides the verse in D&C 88:15:

And the spirit and the body are the soul of man.

That's kind of a definition, but it doesn't explain anything such as what souls are precisely made of, atomically speaking, or how they unite a body, or anything like that.

The issue of soul fragmentation is emphatically not outlined in official Church doctrine, but it is also emphatically not against Church doctrine. There is just a lot we don't know. The doctrine we have is the stuff necessary to eternal salvation. What I'm talking about is just not something that has outlined doctrinally.

The scriptures have to do with the spirit and the soul--but they are not an anatomy textbook of the soul or spirit. Just as the scriptures talk a lot about our bodies--who created them, why, what we're supposed to do and not do with them--but are not physical anatomy textbooks. The Bible doesn't explain how the body digests food, but it does explain kosher law, and the D&C explains the Word of Wisdom even though it doesn't explain the physical workings of the body it affects. Similarly, the scriptures teach us the do's and don't's for a healthy spirit, but don't explain how the spirit works exactly.  You wouldn't turn to the scriptures for instructions on how to set a broken bone, probably, but that doesn't mean understanding broken bones and how to set them is wrong. The scriptures exist to provide knowledge essential to our salvation. Anatomical knowledge, for either spirit or body, is just not essential to salvation.

Recap: I'm not making any doctrinal claims here, and I'm not making any anti-doctrinal claims here. I'm writing about something our doctrine does not really cover--which means it's not necessarily correct, but also means it's not necessarily incorrect, either.

For me, I use it as a useful paradigm. If, in a session, it comes up for a person, addressing the issue typically results in physical, felt changes, as well as changes in mindset and emotion and temperament. For me it is a tool. Whether or not soul fragmentation is "true"or doctrinal is, to me, secondary to the fact that when it seems to come up, fixing it causes a noticeable, beneficial change in those I work with.

So: Soul Fragmentation. What is it?

Image here.

Soul fragmentation can happen in times of trauma. Essentially, an event is so traumatic, the spirit itself fractures somehow and becomes kind of separate from the body.

If that happens, a typical person would experience some of these sensations:
- not feeling "all there"

- inability to get grounded or stay grounded
- feeling chronically empty or unable to be filled--both spiritually and even physically. This inability to feel filled can lead to overeating and obesity as the body attempts to compensate for feelings of not being close to the ground.
- feelings of missing something, an undefined something
- chronically reliving the same traumatic experience over and over
- lots of anger, feeling like you have given your power away to a person or experience

Often, in cases where we say or think things like, "S/he took a part of my heart with her/him when..." or "part of me died that day" or something like that, that is a verbal acknowledgement of the subconsciously understood case of soul fragmentation that happened as a result of a particular event.

How do you discover it?

You might discover a soul fragmentation through intuition. If, right now, you are reading this and you have a sudden insight or knowledge, "this is me!! My soul is fragmented!!," I would trust that as an indication that you are dealing with soul fragmentation.

Muscle testing is an easy and accurate way to determine soul fragmentation. You can muscle test:

- Is my soul intact? (If no, you have fragmentation.)
- Do I have more than half my soul united with my body? (After confirming fragmentation, it can be helpful to discover a percentage that has fragmented. You can muscle test to find out how much soul is unconnected to the body.)
- Did this happen more than X units ago? (Ten days, four years, etc. Narrow it down to a time frame if desired or necessary.)

You can ask how many pieces the soul has fragmented into, as well.

Finally, sometimes I can see if someone is fragmented because their spirit looks more transparent to me than it should. Healing the soul fixes that. So those are three ways to identify soul fragmentation.

Healing the Soul

To recover from this, you need to do a soul retrieval. This can be done in a theta state. This writer writes about experience with soul retrieval, and it looks like that person is pretty slow at it. I can usually witness a complete soul retrieval in maybe ten minutes or so. Often shorter, occasionally longer.

Important steps when retrieving soul fragments:

1. Call 100% of the person's soul fragments to one place. 

2. Clean them thoroughly and kick out any imposters--negative entities posing as soul fragments in the hopes of getting into the person. 

Image here.

3. Grow all the fragments into the current age of the person--if a fragment broke off 10 years ago, it will look like the person looked 10 years ago. Grow all the pieces into the person's current age, so they all look the same. 

4. Unite them all into one single fragment.  

5. Upload to that fragment all the lessons and wisdom the person has learned up until this point. I like to go ahead and add any information God wants placed there. I just ask for God to add whatever else is important to be added at the time. 

6. Ask if there is anything else that needs to be done. If yes, do that thing. If no, move on and: 

7. Unite the fragment to the remnant of the soul still in the person's body. 

I don't recommend trying this yourself unless you are very skilled at entering and maintaining a theta state. But you could try just praying for this process to be done and it could very well go through.

Everyone's situation is different. No two soul retrievals are alike. If you suspect a need for soul retrieval and reintegration, I recommend seeking a skilled and experienced soul retrieval practitioner.

Conclusion

Feeling not all there? Like something is missing? Can't help reliving the same experiences over and over again? You may be dealing with a case of soul fragmentation. Call someone who knows how to handle it and get reintegrated once again for greater feelings of peace and togetherness.

shielding against negative energy

People give and send energy all the time. Every interaction you have with someone else is an energetic transaction--but even more than that, just thinking of someone creates an energetic transaction. This is one reason why it is so important to guard our thoughts.

Thinking negative thoughts about people actually sends them negative energy (often via etheric cords). This can manifest in a lot of ways, from physical injuries to depression to things just going wrong.

In my opinion, this is one reason why so many Hollywood people are so messed up--particularly young women. Female chakras are more absorbent than male chakras--the female energy body is receptive while the male energy body is emanating. So when a bunch of people hate an actresses's body of work, or even just her body, those negative thoughts and that negative energy are projected to her and absorbed by her, in a way completely different from how a man's energy would react. These young women become train wrecks. The effect of negative energy projections are far more pronounced in women than in men.

Thanks to spooky action at a distance, negative (and positive!) thoughts about others and objects don't just exist in our energy fields; a mirror of them is created in the other person's field as well. It's kind of like every negative thought exists twice--once in your space, and once in their space (or once in their space, once in yours, if they are the ones thinking about you). Reducing negative energy in your life involves reducing negative thoughts about others, and additionally shielding yourself against the power of other people's negative thoughts about you.

Shielding

Shield! Image here.

One of the best things a person can do for themselves every day is pray for a shield against the negativity of others. Ask and ye shall receive. If you have trouble absorbing other people's negative energy, this is the number one place to start. Shield yourself through prayer and putting on the armor of God through scripture study, faith, and acting on the Spirit, as outlined in Ephesians 6.

Participating in a daily kundalini meditation practice will also help shield you by strengthening the energetic body and making it more resistant to attack.

When things come through the shield

First off: if you're not shielding and meditating, you are partially responsible for it when other people's negative energies get through to you.

However, sometimes things come through the shield even when you are on top of shielding and meditation. One person has been remarkably consistent in sending me personally vast amounts of hate energy, and every time I find myself thinking something unkind about this person, I know now it's because that person is busy thinking about me. I have to cut the energetic cord that this person created to me, and then redirect it and shield again. An effective form of shield is one with the properties of a mirror--the mirror bounces the energy off you. You need to be clear about where the bounced-off energy goes, though--it can bounce off you and lodge just about anywhere without direction. For me, I program my mirror-shield to "return to sender" with a message of, "that's not very nice!" The intention is that the sender will pay greater attention to the effects of their negative thinking.

Engaging with negative thoughts about others just strengthens the negative energetic cords that have formed. It is best to let those types of thoughts go if you can, rather than entertain them. Take a deep breath and let them go.

Sometimes even strong shields are not effective when the other person involved is someone you actively love. At some level, the subconscious is invested in helping those you love, and so is receptive to even negative cords being formed with them (a cord is a cord, right?). Set the intention to stay free and clear of negative energetic cords and follow up with a refusal to engage in negative thinking of others... no matter how much you may feel they deserve it!

Conclusion

If you find yourself thinking negative thoughts, you are generating negative energy. Time to nix it and shield! Whenever a negative thought is thought, it exists in the space of everything that the thought is about. Shielding with a mirror-shield can be very effective.

earth shift!!

Earth shifts yesterday and today! If you are feeling moody, hang in there!

That is all for now!

movies and keeping the arcline safe

On Friday my husband and I went to see The Martian.

I think that was the first movie we've seen in theaters at least this calendar year. One thing I've learned about seeing movies in theaters... it is an energetic overload!

You sit in the dark, exposed to the energies not only of the dozens of people right in your space, but also of the movie itself--and not just the movie, but all the people whose work and thoughts and efforts went into the movie.

Lots of energy!

However, even knowing all that, I was still shocked at how difficult it was to keep my arcline and energy safe during the movie. I don't know that I will be going back to the theaters anytime soon.

The previews alone were horrific. When I say horrific, I really mean it--they were ALL for horror movies. Since our new baby isn't old enough to be without me, we'd brought him along, and I felt like I had to make the choice of covering his ears or my ears during the previews. I chose his ears, and put myself into a theta state to try and block it all out and keep my shields up. Very difficult. I prayed during it all, and felt God say: "Allie, you KNEW movie theaters weren't safe! What were you thinking??"

And when I asked if it would ever be safe, or if any movies were coming out that would be safe, I got a very solid NO.

So, I'll admit I'm a little bummed about that because there are a few coming out that I have wanted to see. But it will not be worth it.

The Martian was a very "good" movie--I have to put it in quotation marks because of what it means to be a good movie these days. It was a good movie in that it was exciting, had characters to get invested in, had funny moments, tense moments, emotional moments. You really feel like you're living the situation. It has Troy in it from Community. So obviously: awesome.

But there is bad language in it, and for myself, I found myself tensing up pretty severely during a significant portion of the movie, because it is SO tense. My back and neck and shoulders and jaw actually hurt afterwards because I'd been unknowingly clenching them so hard.

I was talking to a friend yesterday about her energetic health and she said that she'd been in the mood to read some novels by a particular author--novels that, like The Martian, were "good" in that they were exciting and fun to engage in, but not good in that they have strong potential to damage the energy and the arcline. She opted to not read the novels, and that was a very, very wise choice.

Conclusion

It is so important to keep our energies healthy--be wise as you select your holiday entertainments!

tingling in the crown and third eye

Have you ever experienced a curious tingling in the forehead or the crown of your head? One that caught your attention but maybe didn't make sense?

The sensation I'm referring to is emphatically not a painful one--it's just a tingly one. An energetic one. It can feel like something is happening to the crown or forehead region, even if you can't explain exactly what that something is.

When I run into people who are new to kundalini awakening, this is a common question: what is this forehead tingling business about?

Kundalini rise and receiving messages

This past week, as I've been upping my daily amount of kundalini yoga and meditation, I've been feeling WAY more head tingles than usual, typically during my KYM practice (or sadhana). In my experience, the tingling has to do with two things: kundalini rise, and divine messages.

Kundalini energy typically resides at the base of the spine, and is usually channeled as sexual energy. When a kundalini rise is sparked, that energy travels up the spine, hopefully all the way up into the crown chakra, where it is used for spiritual enlightenment instead of sensual pleasure. Kundalini rises are accompanied with a wide variety of symptoms, not all of them pleasant. But one such side effect is the tingling sensation in the crown.

Sometimes the tingling sensations in the crown are not just related to kundalini rising--they are a side effect of spiritual messages being downloaded into your space. You can tell if this is the case by praying about it, listening to your intuition, or muscle testing (assuming your polarity is proper and you are properly hydrated and muscle testing accurately).

In my experience, I can usually tell the difference between kundalini-related tingles and message-related tingles by asking my body.

What are the messages? Who are they from?

In my experience, the messages are from the Holy Ghost, or else from our angels, per 2 Nephi 32:3:

3 Angels speak by the power of the Holy Ghost; wherefore, they speak the words of Christ. Wherefore, I said unto you, feast upon the words of Christ; for behold, the words of Christ will tell you all things what ye should do.

If you read through the Book of Mormon, you will find that it is actually very common for the prophets to assert that an angel told them what they are supposed to be writing about. In your scripture study, I recommend taking a mental note of it when the prophets say they received their information from the Spirit versus angels--you will find that angelic communication is very normal and definitely an approved way to receive divine information.

The times I have felt "the tingles" and known they were messages, I have rarely known what the messages where. Sometimes I have been privileged to understand the main topic; for example, in the weeks leading up to my most recent birth, I got a lot of tingles, and was given to understand that I was downloading spiritual information my body would need in regards to birthing. And so forth. Our conscious minds don't need to understand these messages; these messages aren't for our conscious minds anyway. Our conscious minds get specific messages from the scriptures more than anything else (again, see 2 Nephi 32:3). But our subconscious minds and superconscious minds benefit from these messages, and since their roles in our lives are extremely influential, it still makes a difference.

Feeling the tingles

This sensation is one processed by the nervous system, so the more healthy your nervous system is, the more likely you are to feel it. A lot of times people start feeling these sensations after beginning a daily meditation practice. Other people who feel them may include empaths and highly sensitive people (HSPs). If your kundalini is rising, you are likely to experience this sensation.

If your nervous system is damaged, kundalini yoga and meditation will start healing it. You can also pray for a nervous system reset. The more developed your nervous system is, the more it will allow you to feel it when your kundalini is riding and when divine light graces your crown.

Conclusion

Feeling head tingles as you pursue enlightenment? No worries, it's normal.

beautiful moment

I had to run some errands today, and in the parking lot at the store, a disabled young man was walking with either an aide or his father. He was pushing his face around as he moaned.

Even though I grew up with a severely disabled brother, I still feel like I don't know how to handle situations like that. I try to make eye contact and smile at either the person or their helper, but this time neither of them would look at me.

They passed our car.

I put my kids in their seats.

I thought to look back at the young man, still moaning, his back to us as he continued his way across the parking lot. This time I viewed him with my spiritual eyes, and saw: he was surrounded by angels.

I sent them a silent thank you for all their hard work in protecting that young man.

And that very moment, the young man stopped mid-stride, turned around, and started pointing at me and laughing from across the parking lot. Mine was the only car on that side of the parking lot and I was the only person there (we do our shopping EARLY!) so I know he was pointing at me specifically.

The older man with him, I think, felt very embarrassed by this, and they were way too far away for me to say anything to make him feel better.

I just looked back at the guy and smiled. I'm sure he couldn't see my smile from how far away he was, but maybe he felt it. It was a beautiful moment.

needs, wants, and good intentions

"Nothing bad has ever happened on a road paved with good intentions!" - a quote from a show I watched recently

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions." - aphorism

Recently I blogged about the importance of obtaining permission to serve. Today I wanted to talk about something related--needs, and wants, and good intentions that backfire.

Image here.

My family has always been very service-oriented... at least in our own minds. We do a lot to help people--or at least, we think we do.

When a well-meant service project backfired, my mom came to me and asked: what do we do to help now?

And I suddenly had this moment of clarity: we should do nothing. Sometimes charity is tough love.

~~~

For years I'd sent some friends all my birthday and Christmas money, and virtually all my disposable income, because I understood that they were in financial need. Did it help them? Maybe in the short term, but it ended up making them feel entitled to my personal wealth ("wealth") and belongings. I learned the hard way that sometimes giving money to people in financial straits is really not a service at all.

Same goes with food and shelter. Sometimes feeding, clothing, and sheltering people blesses their lives and makes them grateful. Sometimes it ends up making people, again, entitled.

In my post on permission, I talked about the idea of unwanted service. Having been the recipient of unwanted "service" for years, it never occurred to me that I could be participating in the same thing. Isn't there a difference between someone "serving" by "reorganizing" your kid's toys, versus giving someone a nice meal when you know they have trouble affording food?

In my head, I was being uselessly "served" because no one needs organized toys and the "organization" was not just unneeded, it was unwanted. In my head, I was serving usefully because people do need to eat.

But it turns out the picture is more complex than that. Part of it goes back to marketing psychology.

How many life-sustaining needs are on this list?
Image here.

Needs, Wants, and the Human Mind

You can't market to people's needs.

Yes, people need this and that--they need to take better care of their bodies, they need to get out of debt, and so on. But people don't care about what they need as much as they care about what they want. Are you more likely to buy an information product with a slogan of "Get a Six-Pack Fast!" or "Eat Food With More Nutrition!" People might need to eat more nutritionally-dense food, but they are unlikely to pay for a service that markets itself that way. What they actually want is a hot body with six-pack abs.

In business, you need to focus on giving people what they want. Their actual needs are just not as important to them. Or rather, perhaps it's really that people are just plain not the best at deciphering the difference between what is a need and what is a want. But regardless, people respond most to their own desires,--even more so than to their own needs.

That's why if you are selling weight loss materials, it's smarter to focus on making people look better than on making them healthier. Most people know they need to be healthier, but in real life many people are more motivated by increasing their sex appeal than by saving their health.

This is why service based on needs can backfire so easily: People might need this or that, but if it's not in alignment with what they want, the "service" provided will backfire. The people being "served" will not be grateful (and might even be offended) and the people providing the "service" will be hurt and confused. Service cannot be determined only by our perception of people's "needs;" people don't care about their needs nearly as much as they care about their wants. If a service meets a need but conflicts in any way with what a person wants, it will not be perceived as service.

We all know what we NEED, but that doesn't always match
up with what we WANT. Wants win. Image here. 

In my article on obtaining permission, I used the analogy of my "broken" fence: I'd taken apart the fence around my garden to amend the soil. A friend saw that my fence "needed" fixing and took it upon herself to kindly fix it for me. It was a sweet gesture but emphatically not what I wanted or needed for my garden. That "service" was not a service at all--except to the extent that "it's the thought that counts."

But I think most of us would rather have our service count, rather than merely our good intentions.

God gets it


I have always found it fascinating that when lecturing us on service, God makes it clear that service is to be determined by both needs and wants.

Here is a link to a topical guide search of "needs" and "wants." Examine the following (emphasis mine):

Doctrine and Covenants 82:1717 And you are to be equal, or in other words, you are to have equal claims on the properties, for the benefit of managing the concerns of your stewardships, every man according to his wants and his needs, inasmuch as his wants are just— 

Mosiah 18:2929 And this he said unto them, having been commanded of God; and they did walk uprightly before God, imparting to one another both temporally and spiritually according to their needs and their wants. 

Doctrine and Covenants 51:33 Wherefore, let my servant Edward Partridge, and those whom he has chosen, in whom I am well pleased, appoint unto this people their portions, every man equal according to his family, according to his circumstances and his wants and needs. 

Doctrine and Covenants 42:3333 And again, if there shall be properties in the hands of the church, or any individuals of it, more than is necessary for their support after this first consecration, which is a residue to be consecrated unto the bishop, it shall be kept to administer to those who have not, from time to time, that every man who has need may be amply supplied and receive according to his wants.

For a long time that really bothered me--as I think it can bother anyone who has a clear understanding of the difference between needs and wants. In my head I guess I was thinking of, you know, the situation where you get people who take advantage of the system based on their wants, rather than limiting their requests to their actual needs.

Image here.

But now I see these concepts in a different light. God knows everything and so of course He knows that people value what they want more than what they need. Part of the gospel, according to these scriptures, anyway, is developing the wisdom to serve people in that light: taking into consideration not just obvious needs but the desires of people's hearts. If a "service" doesn't match a person's wants, it's just. Not. Service.

Application

The practical application of all of this goes back to my post on obtaining permission to serve. It's the idea that "observe, then serve" is fundamentally incorrect unless it takes into account the served person's desires for service. The Golden Rule is good--but the Platinum Rule might be even better.

Image here.

Conclusion

Good intentions are not enough. It is unwise to think of yourself as giving service if the people you are serving do not agree. Service needs to be based not just on people's needs, but on their wants, too.

own it. own all of it.

The other day, someone in a Facebook group I belong to posted a link to a video you can watch here. The video is about attracting money when your husband won't--basically, the situation where a wife has "good" money beliefs and the husband has "bad" beliefs, and the wife just wants to change her husband's beliefs so they can attract more money.

In the video, she points out that as long as there is an emotional reaction to another person's belief system, as long as there is that emotional connection to, "How can I get that person to change? How can that person change??" you are giving your power away. You are the one, as Tuttle says, "copping out" on the notion of yourself as the one that generates your own reality.

Own it. Image here.

So what is the answer?

The answer is to own it all. Every time you have an emotional reaction to another person's limiting belief, that is a sign that the belief is still a part of you. As long as it still triggers you in some way, it is a part of you.

So the answer is not to blame the other people in your life for their limiting beliefs; the answer is to look within yourself for the aspect of the limiting belief that is still there.

Own it all.

Own it all.

Own it all.

You are the creator of your reality. You decide how you respond to situations. My aunt always says, pain is necessary, but suffering is optional. When we change who we are on the inside, the outsides of our lives change too.

You create your reality.
Image here.

An experience that comes to mind involves a very close relationship. I could tell that something was deeply wrong about it, but I couldn't tell what. I would blame the other person sometimes, blame myself other times, but since I wasn't sure exactly what was going on, it was hard to know what was accurate.

Then I got led to a bunch of information that radically altered my worldview. When I went to the temple about it, I had a series of incredible experiences that showed me that I really needed to change myself to bring my own self and actions into alignment with actual reality. This was a huge, horrible undertaking. But even though it was the hardest thing I'd ever done, I started working to change myself from the inside out in order to conform with some doctrine that I had previously assumed didn't apply to me.

Image here.

And lo and behold, once I had mastered the bulk of the necessary changes, the other person involved in this situation spontaneously changed. My personal changes had, to the other person, thrown into relief the changes this other person needed to make, and all of a sudden, literally overnight, everything was different. There was honesty. There were major lifestyle changes taking place. Me owning my own failings and addressing them somehow led to this other person recognizing their own failings and addressing those. I didn't even have to think about the other person's issues; just focusing on my own issues was enough to bring both of us into a whole new stage of the relationship.

Own it all.

If you are feeling emotionally triggered by something, that is the time to ask yourself: what limiting beliefs am I embracing right now? What core assumptions do I need to change about my life in order to be happy again? What lessons should I be learning from this?

Image here.

Once we learn the right lessons, once we make the right changes to our own hearts, the situations around us spontaneously change to accommodate the changes we have made. This is because life is a series of lessons. We all have so much to learn in order to become more like God, God's not going to waste our time continuing a lesson that we've already learned. If a situation perpetuates, it's because we haven't learned from it sufficiently.

So take a look at the people around you, and take a look at yourself. Instead of allowing yourself to feel boxed in by the beliefs and actions of others, examine yourself closely with the question: what about the actions of others is triggering me? What is it in my heart that allows that to be a trigger? Inevitably, there will be something in you that is allowing you to respond to triggers that way. Once you discover it, with God's help you can eradicate it--but first you have to own it.

Own it all. You are responsible for your life. You are responsible for your actions. No one else's beliefs or choices can influence how you feel unless you let them.


So own it all and change your life. The light at the other end of the tunnel is calling you!

energetic markings

When you google "energetic markings," you don't get anything relevant to what I'm going to write about today. I could have sworn I'd blogged about it before, but I guess I haven't--though I have taught about it in at least one of my classes (the one on Opening the Mind's Eye, I believe).

What are they?

Image here.

Energetic markings, as I call them, are basically symbols that float above the head. They come in shapes and words. While most people can't see them consciously with the physical eyes, we all are aware of each others' markings on a subconscious level and we react accordingly.

Energetic Shapes

So far I have observed five different energetic shapes associated with people. Pyramids, spheres, cubes, rectangle prisms, and cylinders. I'm not sure what they all mean. I know that the pyramid indicates essentially psychic/spiritual ability--if you are the sort of person who spends a lot of time with ancestors visiting them for whatever reason (requesting temple work, passing on messages, etc), you likely have a pyramid in your aura above the head.

Muscle testing and looking into my own energetic shapes, it looks like the cube is associated with precognition, the sphere is related to awareness of others' thoughts, and the rectangular prism seems to be associated with the ability to manipulate the spiritual energy field through the power of intention.

 Most people don't have any shapes over their heads. It seems that these markings turn on when a person reaches some sort of level of ability in whatever area. Some people are born very gifted and have shapes from the beginning; some people are not and their shapes only appear after a kind of awakening moment.

Energetic words

The words thing fascinates me. Basically, everyone seems to have between one and four phrases written above their heads that seem to act as instructions for how other people should treat them. As an example, one person I know has a very strong "INTERRUPT ME" marking over his head. I'm assuming most people can't see it like I can, but everyone acts on it. This poor person can barely get through a sentence in a conversation without being interrupted!

Don't own this name tag? You might still be projecting
the message. Image here.

Other examples:

A sign saying "VICTIMIZE ME" or "I AM A VICTIM; TREAT ME ACCORDINGLY." One person I know in particular has this thing going on and everywhere this person goes, they feel completely victimized.

One friend had a sign basically inviting creepy men to come up to her and try to take advantage of her. We recently experimented with removing that marking and replacing it with one that attracted marriageable type men instead.

In my own self, a month or so ago I discovered that one of my markings is "MISINTERPRET MY MOTIVES." This explains so much! Ever since I was a kid I've felt like my motives were completely misunderstood. In high school people thought I was aloof and self-absorbed when I was really terribly shy. One person thought I was faking a severe illness to get attention (in real life, I had chronic bronchitis that was completely out of control--no faking!). Once a friend accused me of going out of my way to make her feel bad about herself when my intention was the actual exact opposite (of course, she had a major victim program and marking going on as well--so our markings kind of intensified the negativity of the situation).

Energetic words: language?

The thing about these energetic words is that I don't know what language they are in. It is not English. So I can't just read them. That's one reason it took me so long to realize what my own marker said. I've had to pray about it and really ponder it out and so on--the answer came in a flash but it wasn't because I read the words.

With clients, I can sometimes understand the meanings of the phrases just intuitively. But I've never had a client where I was privileged to understand all their energetic markings. It seems that the information is made available as needed. When the energy pattern is ready to be identified or changed, it can become available to the practitioner as appropriate.

We all have them

Everyone has at least one energetic marking over their head. Most people don't have shapes but everyone seems to have words. You can find out how many phrases you have in your energetic signature by praying about it or muscle testing.

Changing energetic markings

It is possible to change energetic markings. Recently I pulled my MISINTERPRET MY MOTIVES sign and replaced it with something better that felt appropriate. I haven't noticed major changes in my life yet, but it looks like and muscle tests that the change went through. It took me decades to realize I had that sign up in the first place, so it might take some time before I realize how much of a difference the alteration makes.

Conclusion

We all have energetic markings that signal to the world how we should be treated. Energetic shapes and words help other people's subconscious minds know how to treat us. If your energetic markings are not satisfactory to you, they can be changed.