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Latest Daily Words
Fasting from the Negative – Feasting on the Positive
Fasting isn’t just for the body. Ramadan, which comes from the Arabic and means scorching heat or dryness, is a time for deepening spiritual connection with Allah and reflecting on one’s life. During the ninth month of the Islamic calendar, Ramadan is a time of intensive worship and generosity, a time to purify one’s behavior and express selfless acts of good. Ramadan is not merely a holiday, but an opportunity to gain by giving up, to prosper by going without, and to grow stronger by enduring weakness. It is a time of grace and forgiveness.
There is an unseen sweetness in the stomach’s emptiness. We are lutes. When the sound box is filled, no music can come forth. When the brain and the belly burn from fasting, every moment a new song rises out of the fire. The mists clear, and a new vitality makes you spring up the steps before you. Rumi
One of the pillars of Islam is fasting in order to help develop self-control beyond the demands of the body. This ability to resist earthly desires creates an unparalleled closeness with Allah. This fasting is not merely of the body, but also of the soul. As you progress through the month-long fasting from sunrise to sunset, you intensify the awareness of Spirit in your life, taking you to a higher spiritual experience. Part of the intention of this fasting is to align you with the pain of others and walk in their shoes as a reminder of the blessings in your life that you take for granted, thus opening you to a greater expression of generosity.
Spiritual Contemplation: If you were to do a daylight fast, what human desires other than food would come to your awareness, asking for you to look at them with greater clarity? In noticing the pangs of hunger what blessings do you realize you have in your life that you’ve been taking for granted? Where are you being called to express greater generosity?
Affirmation: I fast from negative and respond to the call of Spirit in my life.
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Moving Life – Evolving Your Self
You must be the change you wish to see in the world. Mahatma Gandhi
A passionate youth, ready to take on the world, once said, “Lord, give me the strength to change the world.” At middle age he realized he hadn’t transformed the world, or even a single soul, and he changed his prayer to “God, give me the grace to change all those who come in contact with me and I shall be happy.” But then as an old man, he realized how foolish he had been, and his one prayer became “Lord give me the blessings to transform myself. If this had been my prayer from the beginning, I would not have wasted my life.” When you realize the difficulty in transforming your own life, then you understand the challenge in attempting to change another’s.
The more you evolve, the more you become an instrument for the evolutionary process to unfold. If you want to be an agent of change, you must be the change you are looking for. If you want to lead, you must continue to evolve. If you become stuck, even though you may be a success, the world will pass you by. You must remain receptive to new ideas that seek to birth themselves through open-mindedness to what is next for your life’s expression. You either grow—or die—because the world you live in doesn’t stand still.
Spiritual Contemplation: Where in your life have you evolved lately? Are you ambiguous or explicit with this answer? Where would you like to see some change in your world? Is your answer general or precise?
Affirmation: I am courageous in my ever-evolving life!
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Perfect, Whole and Complete – Conscious and Aware of Oneness
How do we truly understand Oneness when we’ll seem so separate? Oneness begins with what we have been taught – that the whole is greater than its parts. But have you ever stopped to think about your importance in that equation? Have you ever realized that you are part of the whole and without you it would be incomplete? You are necessary, important, and valuable in order for the Divine to be fully expressed. So stop searching outside yourself—get quiet and listen to what’s going on inside. As you come to recognize your true identity, judgment and criticism will fall from your world because what you see is a projection of you. You’ll be freed from your bondage and join in leading the world away from restrictions and limitation and toward joy in abundant expression.
Individuality is only possible if it unfolds from wholeness. David Bohm
Conscious unity with the Whole puts you in the effortless flow of Oneness. Being a conduit for life enriches and awakens you to the Now Moment as you realize wholeness is not your next stop. That’s right, wholeness is not where you are going. It can only be experienced where you are because there can never be anything missing in Wholeness. All your love, wealth, health, blessing, dharma calling, and success are already available to you where you are right now. Whatever challenges you might be facing, remember that you are part of Oneness and nothing can be missing. Everything is already perfect, whole, and complete, and your only responsibility is to realize that in every situation to support your abundant life.
Spiritual Contemplation: Where in your life do you feel something is missing? Sit down, get still, and contemplate what it means to be part of the whole.
Affirmation: I am perfect, whole and complete, part of the Oneness, right now!
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Beached like a Whale or Expanding Awareness
Human Intelligence is like a Blue Whale. Both are powerful though nowadays almost extinct. Anonymous
There are all sorts of theories to explain why whales beach themselves. One of the reasons, other than sickness, is that they become disoriented while chasing food. Whales eat extremely small food, large amounts of it, but small nonetheless. These giants of the sea can be lured to their death by something very small comparative to their size. They are left stranded on the sand to die because they’ve sacrificed their vast power by chasing something so small.
Be careful not to become disoriented by chasing something so insignificant that it sidetracks you and you find yourself marooned on a barren beach gasping for breath. It’s often the little things that trip us up. When those little things demand too much of our attention, big challenges can surface because we have withdrawn our awareness from the fuller picture of our purpose and have lasered in on the microscopic. We need to bring our awareness back from the energy drains so we’re not lured out of our element.
Spiritual Contemplation: What little things pull you off track and drain the energy from your life’s purpose, leading you toward the possibility of being marooned?
Affirmation: My pursuits expand my awareness!
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Spiritual Balance Reframes Failure into Learning and Growing
Failure is good. It’s fertilizer. Everything I’ve learned about coaching; I’ve learned from making mistakes. Rick Pitino
Each and every person is a perfect spiritual being! This is profound Truth. It is equally true that we are all uniquely imperfect in the way we express our perfection. There is not one person who has it all together or will never make a mistake or experience failure. Relaxing into this truth makes us better friends, partners, employees, and leaders. When we don’t expect perfection in outcome but see perfection as the truth in each other, then a powerful, creative, and open space is made in which it is a joy to work and live together.
Spiritual Balance means living in harmony with your inner perfection and your outer imperfection. It is seeing your wholeness, while having compassion for your failures and mistakes. It is seeing this same truth in every person we work with or live with. Spiritual Balance is knowing that the Divine is breaking through the human, bringing Heaven on Earth, right here every person’s life!
Spiritual Contemplation: In what areas of your life do you expect perfection from yourself? Hoe do you hold your failure and mistakes? How have you inflicted this on others? What would be another way you could look at this?
Affirmation: I learn and grow from every experience. I nurture others as they learn and grow. I no longer try to be perfect nor do I expect perfection. I am authentic and do my best instead.
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Every Step Is a Miracle – Celebrate the Present Moment
I ask not for a lighter burden, but for broader shoulders. Jewish Proverb
When you start a new adventure, whether it’s launching a new business venture, going off to college, or taking the trip of a lifetime, there’s often a celebration at both the beginning and the completion. Congratulations are in order for the business, the college degree, and your safe passage from travel. And rightfully so! Where the celebration is often overlooked is all the steps in between those two milestones. You live your life between those two bookends, and every step you take is significant yet hardly noticed. Why wait until it’s all over to celebrate life when every minute of every day is a miracle in action.
Spiritual Contemplation: Where in your life would it be good to take a moment to celebrate your steps? Then celebrate yourself now!
Affirmation: I honor every step I take as significant!
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The Divine Feminine – Trust Intuition
Love risks everything, and asks for nothing. Rumi
The Divine Feminine appears to be awakening in the collective consciousness once again. There is a rising in the understanding of the interconnectedness and sacredness of all life. It’s out-picturing in the birthing of new technologies that will save the earth, a growing understanding of the importance of harmonious resolution, and a higher understanding of equality for all life. The feminine brings a healing, nurturing, creative balance to the issues of life.
There is an emergence going on in the holistic field of the body/mind and sacred physical practices for integration of soul into form. A union of apparent opposites seems to be taking place between the inner and the outer, scientific and mystical, matter and form, intuition and knowledge. This sacred marriage is activating the global heart of humanity, which feels justice and equality will unite this world better than domination, exploitation and the implementation of “my-way over-yours.”
You are being called to use your intuitive self to feel the truth beyond what is being pumped through the corporate media outlets of one-sided perspectives. You are being invited to know a greater picture that only the aware observer can truly see. Be careful not to give your power away to the storyteller when there is always so much more not being told. Stop the inane chattering in your head and listen with the heart that can understand more than words can describe. It’s said, “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” When you are free enough to open to a higher wisdom, it will interpret itself at the level of the experience in which you find yourself. It will appear in ways you would never expect.
Spiritual Contemplation: What stories, where you don’t perceive a harmonious way out, are you getting caught up in? Sit, be quiet, invite a greater picture to emerge, and remain open to the unexpected.
Affirmation: I trust my intuitive sense!
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Memorial Day – Remembering War and Peace
Regardless of the circumstances of the battlefield, the cry of the soldier remains the same—God help me. Anonymous
Memorial Day is a time to remember those men and woman who have died serving our country. Although decorating the graves of the fallen has long been a part of the rituals of war, Memorial Day officially began during the Civil War when Congress established it as a day of tribute to America’s fallen as well as a day of national prayer for lasting peace. Today in the busyness of life, we still pause to remember and appreciate those who gave their life for what they believed would bring us a better way of living.
During this Memorial Day, as you and your friends and family enjoy the beginning of summer with cookouts at the beach, park, or backyard, remember those families who have an empty seat at their table. Remember those young men and women who once occupied those seats and gave the ultimate sacrifice so you could enjoy this moment in your life. Remember—and in the silence of your heart, pray for lasting peace.
Spiritual Contemplation: Make sure to pause today and open your heart to those who gave the ultimate sacrifice. Send out some love and say a prayer for lasting peace.
Affirmation: I know peace prevails on this planet in my lifetime.
It’s All About Awareness – Meditation and Daily Spiritual Practice
When you learn to trust the Higher Power, you realize your thinking is not what makes it reality. You can struggle with this realization or relax into it, but thus it has always been. Before time was, Spirit was and is, and always has been I am. Your thought is not the power; it’s not what makes something true. It’s an avenue of awareness. You can see that someone is wearing purple or turquoise, but your thought isn’t going to change what they have on because it’s just an avenue of your perception. You don’t make Spirit so—it’s your awareness of what is so that allows the power to flow through your life.
Whatever may be the tensions and the stresses of a particular day, there is always lurking close at hand the trailing beauty of forgotten joy or unremembered peace. Howard Thurman
Make sure you start your day with a conscious realization of your oneness with your Higher Power, your Abundant Good. If you can’t bring Spirit into your awareness at the first waking moment before being bombarded by the rest of the day, when will you get around to it? Do you not want to be aware of Spirit walking with you every step of the way throughout your day? It is in proportion to your mindfulness of the Presence that Spirit is available every moment of every day and when you feel the Presence, you are never alone.
Spiritual Contemplation: Where are you missing the perception of the Divine Presence in your life? How could a clearer thought be an avenue for an enhanced awareness of an out of balance issue of your day? Remember to start your day with a Divine connection.
Affirmation: I start each day with Spirit on my mind!
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Stopping to Remember It’s Cumulative – Meditation as Spiritual Practice
Meditation is about your connection with The Infinite. There is tremendous value in stopping many times throughout the day for the purpose of remembering. During meditation you open yourself to a state of receptivity; and then just as simply as you opened up, you come back to the present and go about your life. Often it is not until sometime later when, zap, an insight drops into your awareness as if from the sky. It seems magical—almost as if all the meditations from the past week have accumulated, and when you’re relaxed and surrendering, contact is realized. You might start your day with meditation, and it serves as nothing more than a pleasant, peaceful moment. Then hours later, when you’re focused on the activities of the day, you find you’re in the midst of Spirit. What meditation teaches us is that the harder we grasp at an answer, the further we push it away. Contact doesn’t seem to come when we strain.
If God is your world, what have you to fear? Emma Curtis Hopkins
Spirit can show Itself only when mental activity subsides. The more often you pause and ponder your true nature, the more you practice the presence, and something that doesn’t come from your rational mind will enter into your consciousness from the mystical realm. You’ll find the word of Spirit being placed into your awareness and through that you’ll begin to live by grace. These impartations will carry a harmonizing effect to your world without effort on your part.
Spiritual Contemplation: Stop at least once an hour to contemplate the Presence of Spirit. Then notice how the buildup delivers a sense of peace and clarity to you later on or even while you sleep.
Affirmation: I remember and see Spirit throughout my day!
Prayer Has Nothing to Do with Getting – Behold the Truth and Manifest It
Prayer is not asking. Prayer is putting oneself in the hands of God, at God’s disposition, and listening to God’s voice in the depth of our hearts. Mother Teresa
Contrary to popular belief, prayer is not about getting your Higher Power to do something for you. It’s a state of becoming receptive to a greater wisdom than you presently perceive as your reality. When you quiet the concern chattering in your brain, in the stillness Grace can enter your awareness. Allow your prayer to be a time when you silence your mind and commune with the All Knowing and receive that transference so all that proceeds from the mouth of Spirit become your words of expression.
It’s in proportion to your relationship with the Omniscience that Truth imparts itself through you. This is not an activity of your memory but something that emerges from within, lifting you above your desire to change things and speaking from a divine seeing. Your personal sense of “I” dissolves, and you become a beholder of the truth. In this realization, you understand that Spirit hasn’t withheld anything from you and that what you’re looking for is already established for the awareness of the one praying. Your abundant good has already been given because that which is Infinite cannot withhold anything. Give up the need to get and allow your sense of Oneness with the Absolute to be your prayer of manifestation.
Spiritual Contemplation: Give up your need to get and connect for no other purpose but to establish your awareness as part of the Infinite expression.
Affirmation: I am the Infinite expressing! All that the Infinite is, is already mine!
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To Egypt and Back Before Breakfast = The Power of Imagination
Everything you can imagine is real. Pablo Picasso
Sipping your morning coffee while checking your emails, you might notice an invitation on your screen to look at other places on the planet. So you click on the earth map and find yourself zooming in on the great pyramids of Giza. Suddenly it’s as if you are standing on the apex of the greatest archeological find on the planet, rubbing sand from your eyes as you tour this ancient and exotic land, all before breakfast. What an adventure technology now offers: the ability to open your eyes and see the world as you’ve never before had the opportunity to.
Something even more marvelous than technology is your ability to turn within and travel in your awareness to these mythical lands. In your meditative states you can return to a time when the pharaohs ruled those lands and Karnack’s temple of pillars was bustling with life. You can climb the passage to the king’s chamber, lie down in his sarcophagus and be initiated into the high priesthood. The mystery of the Sphinx can be revealed to you. What an adventure, indeed! Often we forget that this is a possibility, that meditation can open our eyes to see the universe like never before. The beauty of inner dimensional travel is that we don’t need an Internet provider because we are always connected.
Spiritual Contemplation: Where on the planet would you like to visit? Take a trip there on the earth map. Then close your eyes, open your heart, and see if your subjective can deliver you into the energetic activities of a heightened time for that location.
Affirmation: I am boundless!
Beyond 3-D – Meditation and Multidimensions
There is a sense of excitement when you go to a 3-D movie and experience muitldemensions. The moment you’re given the special glasses to wear, you know you’re in for a different kind of adventure. The minute the movie begins, the images on the screen pop and leap out at you, creating an intensity of surprise as if you were experience it in multididemsions. As you become immersed in the visual and audio experience, the illusion feels real.
A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions. Oliver Wendell Holmes
The key to growth is the introduction of higher dimensions of consciousness into our awareness. Lao Tzu
Meditation can be like putting on those 3-D glasses. Life becomes clearer and more real and pulls you beyond the three-dimensional world. You are immersed in a new way of multidimensional seeing. You are given access to understanding the interconnectedness of what is before you and unfoldment is slowed down for a richer comprehension. This meditative lens needs to be kept clean the same way that greasy, buttery-popcorn fingerprints must be wiped from 3-D glasses. It’s necessary to keep your filters of consciousness cleansed so you’re seeing through pure, unadulterated awareness. It’s common to attempt to make sense of what pops out from the meditative screen into present perceptions, but sometimes this new dimensional adventure is just meant to rest in your boundless soul without explanation. You don’t always have to know why or how—just notice what’s playing out before you. It will be interesting as to how that gets integrated into your consciousness.
Spiritual Contemplation: Where would it be beneficial to clean the lenses through which you look at the world? What insights do you perceive about a particular situation that would be best to keep to yourself and just notice more that is being communicated?
Affirmation: My meditations reveal to me multi-dimensional insights to my world!
Living in Answered Prayer
Working on the side of a mountain, cutting a path, and moving rocks and trees can leave you parched and thirsty by midafternoon. Your mind and body become hyper-focused on something wet to quench your dryness. How delightful when your beloved shows up with a bottle of water for you. You wouldn’t tell her that you’d prefer lemonade, and would she please take the water back, would you? She’d probably throw it in your face and tell you to get your own. No, you’d be filled with joy and relief, filled with a gratitude for an answered prayer for something cool to drink.
When you thirst for Spirit as much as you do for a glass of water on a hot summer afternoon, you stop quantifying how Spirit is supposed to show up in your life. You become available to how Spirit does show up in your life. Too often people send back the answer to their prayer because they don’t think it looks like what they want. Stop telling Spirit how to show up in your life and recognize how Spirit is showing up. Life supports you wherever you are on your journey, whether in the wilderness or a temple. All you need is ever available if you can give up quantifying how it’s supposed to be and instead be aware of how it is showing up.
Spiritual Contemplation: When have you turned down the gifts of Life and missed life’s answers to your prayers? When have you said yes to life’s offering that didn’t look like what you were looking for and it turned out far better than you had imagined? Is there something in your world right now that is presenting itself to you to say yes to?
Affirmation: I am grateful for Life’s gifts!
Mind Over Matter, Mind influences Body
How can you believe mind over matter? Mind is the substance of matter and as strange as it might seem, it expresses as your body. Your consciousness is the invisible action appearing as your body, your organs, and your movements. For instance, your mind sends a message to your hand to wave and it waves. Your mind says shake hands and you watch as your hand reaches out and shakes another’s hand. Grasp and it grasps, let go and it opens up. How does it do that? Is the hand intelligent? No, but it has intelligence just as every cell of your body has intelligence that responds to mind.
You can outdistance that which is running after you but not what is running inside you. Rwandan Proverb
What’s the difference between the cells of your hand and the cells of your liver, your thyroid, your lymph nodes, or your heart? They’re all different parts of the same body operated by the same cellular intelligence under the same operating system. Don’t let these guys pull mutiny on you and tell you how to act and feel. You’re in charge of your body! Tell it how to behave and don’t let it talk back to you.
Spiritual Contemplation: Where do those little cells of your body gang up on you as they attempt to tell you how it should be? Reclaim authority over your body and tell the intelligence operating at the cellular level what your expectations are. Move your hand a few times and see how it responds to your mind’s direction. Rotate your foot around a bit and see how it responds to the direction you give it. Now take that same kind of authority and tell your body what to do.
Affirmation: I now reclaim the authority over my body!