Moving Consciously
Living the Truth of Who I AmArchive for Love
The Sensation of Being Alive
Day 39 of 52 Days: Red Cosmic Skywalker
Today is the Fall Equinox. A new season begins. A time for transcending old paradigms and limitations. A time to align ourselves with heaven and earth.
We begin to Dance Through Life simply by choosing to be alive in our own body, rather than being divorced from it. As we become more in touch with the sensations of our body, mind, heart and spirit, we experience the sensation of wholeness.
What has been my experience of wholeness up to this point in time? The paradigm shifts almost daily. What I once thought was a state of wholeness is replaced by a new experience of wholeness…the shift is imperceptible…but it is a turning point. Recently, I’ve come to know this shift as “crisis and transformation.”
Currently several of my friends, as well as myself, have been dealing with extreme physical pain. Crisis. How it transforms is based on my relationship with both my spirit and my physical body.
I am a Sensation Scientist. My body is my laboratory. I am alive in my body…I do not seek wholeness…I AM wholeness. My entire being vibrates with the frequency of the world and with the frequency of spirit — is it any wonder that I feel physical pain? I am grateful to be consciously aware of the truth of who I am. I am energy. I am spirit in form. Now I Am transformation.
Nothing Ordinary
Day 38 of 52 Days: Yellow Crystal Human
“To be fully human means to know myself first as an essence of divinity and then as a player in this huge dream called life.” — Initiana
Learning to trust divine guidance can be challenging. It comes in so many different forms and some of those forms are not at all what we expected.
My spiritual journey started when I was born 60 1/2 years ago. However, I became conscious of the journey at the age of 30. I’ve met some pretty remarkable people and have had some pretty remarkable experiences through unexpected circumstances since that time. I’ve also become aware that I’m a pretty remarkable person, too — I say that with the utmost humility. It is only through the grace of Spirit that I am conscious of the gifts I bring to the world. I am living a fairly ordinary life in an extraordinary way. I am eternally grateful for this wonderous and magical life.
I can honestly say that I have these experiences daily…there is nothing ordinary about them and yet that is exactly what they are…ordinary…with just a splash of magic, making the ordinary extraordinary. Divine guidance comes unexpectedly most times…a bullfrog; a piece of music; a bird crashing into the sliding glass door; a stranger’s smile; an exchange of money at the grocery store; a glance in the mirror; a stray kitty; a Nia student; my husband.
Have you had unexpected meetings with remarkable people or have you been part of an event or circumstance that brought divine guidance? My invitation to you today is to consider a person, an event, or a circumstance that magically turned out to be divine guidance.
Just consider it. Divine.
Creating Magic
Day 37 of 52 Days: Blue Spectral Monkey
Your challenge: To laugh and smile in the face of stress, transforming it into an adventure of wonder and magic.
What can appear as destruction or chaos may actually be the necessary forces of liberation evoking a release from rigid structure and format. Releasing what no longer serves us makes space for new opportunities and understandings to emerge. Break out of routine today. Release yourself into a full spectrum of possibilities. Dissolve fixed concepts, fears, and habitual patterns.
Unleash the magnificence of who you are…step into your greatness…
the Blue Monkey experience awaits…
Compassionate
Day 36 of 52 Days: White Planetary Dog
I love “White Dog” days — the energy is all about Love — not the kind of love found in romance novels, although that love is certainly included, but the big “L” Love — the all encompassing, spirit-invoking, all-curing-medicine-of-compassion Love.
I’ve blogged about this before: my personal thoughts around the difference between ComPASSIONATE and SymPATHETIC. Just look at how the two are spelled. PASSION is the key to one, while the other is sickenly PATHETIC. When we feel something toward a certain cause — i.e. Breast Cancer, World Hunger, Save the Whales — our hearts open and we want to DO something about it…and many would call that being sympathetic toward the cause. Sympathy plays on the emotions…it has nothing to do with Love — it draws out the pathetic response of guilt and shame. As I mentioned earlier, these are my personal thoughts on the choice of sympathy or compassion. Sympathy is not in my vocabulary. If you want sympathy, you know where to find it in the dictionary.
Compassion on the other hand has a sense of personal power — it contains the word “passion” which, for me, is not an emotion. In Nia, we invite students to find the “joy” in any situation or circumstance — joy being an attitude, not an emotion. I would offer that passion is also an attitude that can be imbued into anything. Passion has a connection to purpose. My purpose is to be the living expression of God in action (God to me is not dressed in white with a long flowing beard sitting on a throne in heaven). God is Source — the animating force behind this physical body, brain and heart.
So when I offer compassion it is from a place outside of an emotional response. Yes, I see hunger and abuse in the world, I see disease and death. Those are all things of the world. To become sympathetic toward these things would make me part of them. I am in the world, but I am not of it. I am human AND I am divine. Offering compassion is offering the essence of Love through the heart which is both earthly and divine, a medium between spirit and matter. Love is always present but it is not always the choice that is made. Love can change the world. We must embody Love, express Love and be Love for that to happen. The simplicity of a vibrational compassionate response is powerful beyond definition.
I have heard the terms “bleeding heart” and “hardened heart”. Neither of those beckons an embrace from me. My heart embraces the dance of possibility.
The Lip of Insanity
Day 35 of 52 Days: Red Solar Moon
The poet Rumi once wrote: “I have lived on the lip of insanity looking for answers, knocking on a door. It opens. I have been knocking from the inside.”
There was a gentle rain last night. It was dark, I flipped on the deck light and looked out the window which faces the deck stairway. On the second step was a giant bullfrog…looking right at me. I had my husband come to the window to confirm what I was seeing. We both laughed a little and went back to watching the Sunday night football game. I kept hearing a “thump, thump, thump” on the deck. Normally I would think it was raccoons, but this sounded a bit different. We both went to the door, flipped on the light again, and there was the frog at the door, leaping up and hitting the sliding glass door. We both knew that this was not something to take lightly. He was there as a messenger. What was the message? He wanted to come in. We were certain that if we opened the door, he would indeed hop inside. Instead we decided to sit at the door and have a conversation with it.
Is it insanity to sit and talk to a frog? I immediately retrieved my Medicine Cards. “Frog” is indicative of purification or cleansing. As we sat together, talking to this frog we actually sensed it was listening. We shared with him…I’ve named him Jeremiah…that we understood his message. There is much to be purified and cleansed in our own living…individually and as a couple, as business managers, as a Nia teacher, as friends. We assured him that we understood the invitation to clarify our intention and purpose and that we would do our best to make it so.
We walked back to the couch — the football game seemed rather unimportant at the moment. And just to make sure we weren’t actually insane, we both went to the door again, flipped the light on…no frog. We opened the door and looked all around the deck. It had been less than 30 seconds, yet he had disappeared.
The lip of insanity. A knocking at the door. An opportunity…perhaps to forgive…perhaps to offer gratitude…
The portal to purification comes from acknowledging the truth of who I am…identity with Source and not with the things of this world.
I do not believe that Jeremiah was a figment of our imagination. He did come knocking at the door. And we were there to acknowledge the invitation to wake up, to clarify, to purify, to cleanse.
And today it’s raining…a soft, gentle, cleansing rain.
I Love My Body, I Love My Life
Day 34 of 52 Days: Yellow Galactic Star
Purpose is an intention and/or a desired outcome that directs my life force energy. My purpose is connected to living an ordinary life in an extraordinary way. Purpose is like a north star. It guides me to live into my greatness, bringing my unique gifts to fruition.
My name is Jill and I am sacred. My body is a gift. I recognize the important of living into my greatness. Knowing my purpose and sharing my gifts is a sacred birthright. I bring my uniqueness to all I do. I express passion and love for my body and life. Nia (www.nianow.com) invites me to love my body and love my life. Nia awakens my consciousness and reveals a movement journey of self-discovery, self-healing and self-mastery. It is my pleasure and my honor to be teaching and sharing Nia.
“Dear Body, I commit to love and to nurture you. I promise to treat you kindly, to pamper you, to caress you, to tell you how beautiful you are to me. I promise to feed you well and give you plenty of pure, clean water. I promise to allow you to have the rest and down time you need to enjoy the greatest amount of energy and splendor. I wish to offer you, dear Body, all of this wonderfulness because I love my life and I love you.” — Grace Scarborough, Massage Therapist
Today, write a love letter to your body. It is the gift you’ve been given through which to express your greatness — your Life As Art.
As Nelson Mandela said, “There is no passion to be found in playing small, in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.”
Form and Freedom
Day 32 of 52 Days: White Rhythmic Worldbridger
There is freedom in form and form within freedom. Invoke the visionary within you…experience a Living Meditation. Stop the inner dialogue in your mind. Take a walk in nature. Listen to the music of the cosmos. Breathe in the moment and be ready to witness and participate in the manifestation of your world.
See what has not yet manifested…and allow the spirit of life to begin to fill in the form. It doesn’t happen all at once…embrace the beauty of every little gift that manifests.
Life is in process…make it a dance.
Rhythms of the Earth
Day 31 of 52 Days: Red Overtone Serpent
“I have learned that the body listens to rhythms that the mind can’t even hear.” — John Lee
Rhythm — some folks have it, some don’t. I was born with an innate sense of rhythm for which I have am deeply grateful. My body listens to rhythms that my mind doesn’t hear. Wisdom, intuition, instinct, sensuality, creativity, passion — these things I feel through my body.
In the 10 years that I’ve been teaching Nia, I have found that my body is able to give me information that is useful for making decisions on how to move through life. Nia is a body-centered practice. A cardiovascular fitness and lifestyle practice that has changed my body and changed my life.
When I’m dancing — either teaching Nia or being a student in a Nia class — my body is in tune with the earth’s rhythm. I can feel it. I can sense it. The earth beckons me to dance my passion, to dance my sensuality, to dance my creativity and my passion. Nia gives me the tools (the 13 basic principles — there are a total of 52 with the 4 different Belts: White, Blue, Brown and Black) — to allow me to transform what may seem like an ordinary life into an extraordinary living experience.
Listen to the rhythms of the earth…they beckon you to dance…
Tilling the Earth
Day 30 of 52 Days: Yellow Self-Existing Seed
My garden is designed with awareness. The seeds of peace, love, acceptance and right action have been planted. What will be my harvest?
Abundance
Day 29 of 52 Days: Blue Electric Night
“Acknowledge the abundance in our life; it creates waves of grace on which to move in the world. Generosity means giving, and it begins in the heart by affirming confidence in the abundance of the Universe…” — Venerable Dhyani Ywahoo
Many people dream of abundance…wishing for more of whatever it is they want. Life gives abundantly…not just some of the time…not just to a certain few…but ALL of the time and for everyone. It is when we are in a place of receiving what comes to us that we are able to acknowledge the gifts we are given.
Picture a waterwheel and all of life’s gifts come flowing to us from this waterwheel. We see something that we want, so we stop the waterwheel so that we can enjoy it or get more of it …OR…we see something coming that we don’t want and we stop the waterwheel. In either case what happens to the water’s circulation? It stops. The water becomes stagnant. We begin to complain that we’re in a rut and that Life has foresaken us. And who is it that stopped the flow of the water? Certainly not Life. Such an arrogant lot are we humans.
Thankfulness in all things. Life is sacred AND impermanent. Enjoy life’s abundance NOW.
The temptation is always present to judge what comes to me. I remember as a child being disappointed with some of the gifts I would receive from my family. “What am I supposed to do with this? This isn’t what I wanted.” Arrogance…
Over the years (and now at the age of 60), I’ve become more consciously aware of Life’s gifts when they land in my lap. It might be in the form of a person who is looking for some guidance — or perhaps a person who is offering some guidance to me. It might be in the form of more responsbility at the office — this is my current area of receiving Life’s gifts. In the throes of our office manager leaving somewhat unexpectedly, many of her responsibilities now lie with me. Where my days used to be creating and enjoying putting together Nia routines for my classes, my days are now spent enjoying more time at the office. My Nia practice time is more limited which means less time surfing Facebook and Twitter. My social networking time is now face to face time with my co-workers. Life finds its way of bringing people together…we were not meant to be sitting isolated at our computers — social networking has a whole different meaning for me now.
Receiving life’s abundance. Reaping the abundance of the love we’ve sown.
I do believe I’ve just set my focus for tonight’s Nia class at 5:30 p.m.: A-Bun-Dance.
