Intuitive Illuminations from an Inspired Mystic… Opening a Soulful Connection: Recognizing the Sun Inside You This August finds many of us anxious to explore new ways to connect with our growing power and creative energy as we honour a life that, every day, is asking us to live more courageously, more clearly, and more intuitively. If many of you are feeling these stirrings inside, don’t be surprised! These feelings are triggered by the powerful Leo energy growing in Jupiter for most of this year. (Jupiter is the planet of expansion and luck) The Leo Sun and Moon have been building in recent weeks as well, making this a wonderful time to state your wishes and desires clearly to our presently, incredibly, attentive universe. If many of you are feeling a need to be more heart focused, open and playful in your daily life, it is due to these warming astrological aspects. This new perspective is helping us all to view ourselves and our calling in a new, increasingly more joyful way. For me, this opening connection with spirit was amplified by a theme I have been experiencing in many client sessions recently. The energy of new beginnings is a palpable theme in client work lately. Embracing these energies in our own unique way as we leave behind what is known and move toward new vistas in ourselves has been a central thread in both inner and outer work lately. I have found that chakra balancing facilitates this deeper felt-sense connection with the Soul Self so beautifully! It is tangibly present after a session in surprising and heart-stirring ways. I have seen a client’s inner light shine buoyantly by a sessions end. In many cases, one can almost see it suffusing their core. Because of how quickly chakra balancing shifts energy, it is excellent work to embark upon whenever we are attempting to explore a previously unknown part of ourselves, or embrace a newly emerging aspect. This theme, which I see so many energetically expressing now, also reminds me of a time in my own life when I was reaching toward new horizon’s and exploring what I could be. Ten years ago, practically to the date, I was getting ready to travel across the country to start my graduate education. I was just like my clients, ready to embrace newness in myself in previously uncharted territory. I see so many who struggle to understand the feelings that toning their chakras brings up for them. Many are concerned with whether the feelings they experience in the meditations are real, normal, and repeatable. They wish to know if these feelings, what I call shifts and lifts, are able to be accessed when they need a boost in mood, or want to experience deeper healing and inner connectedness. I assure everyone that these feelings are a part of their birth right. They are the inner tools they possess in their own self-care toolbox. And they are divinely given. They not only help us to balance our moods, they also help us handle energies that before may have felt scary or unreliable. And they can help us experience greater joy and renewal than we had felt previously possible in our everyday lives. Lately too, I have found myself sharing with clients this feeling of ever deepening joy. Have you felt this as well? This often accompanies the growing realization that we can connect with this powerful feeling of joy, and embrace this deep transformational self-care strategy for ourselves. I have come to see it as a jumping off place, and as a bridge between our imagination and the doorway to much deeper feelings of connectedness, abundance and healing in ourselves. Often, as practitioners, we can find ourselves on auto pilot. As our businesses and case-loads build and the demands on our time and level of attention increase, staying in a joyful open and intentional space can be a balancing act.  Sometimes it is hard to fully take in our wisest recommendations from spirit for ourselves. I am sure many of you have experienced this push me pull me in your own lives as well. It is so wonderful to know that these tools are indeed here and easily accessed by everyone. Recently I have noticed that my clients desire to more deeply embrace this heart-centered journey has also opened my heart up that much more fully. I am noticing the divine takeaway’s my clients offer me in a way that is sticking on a core level and changing me deeply. On some level, these clients undoubtedly remind me of my own tenderness toward my younger seeking self. Regardless, I feel now is the right time to open up more fully. This is what we sometimes call divine timing. I am experiencing a deep sense of renewal and it couldn’t have come more clearly or beautifully, even a moment earlier. This time astrologically and cosmically offers a radiantly open doorway for us all. Lately, I have found myself sharing with clients, suggestions about the role the imagination plays in our spiritual awakening. Sadly, our Western culture has come to over value the things that happen in our 3D world and in the same breath, devalue the deep felt-senses, intuitive impressions and feelings we have. It is these that can truly change the way we feel about ourselves, as well as the way we feel about our purpose in life. Sometimes these deeply felt experiences, not visible outside the self at all, can change our whole life’s direction at a moment’s notice.  I believe, it is these deeper a-ha’s more than the dictates of culture, family or group that shape an intuitive life. Recently, I was sharing this with a client, as I was simultaneously envisioning the tarot card, the seven of cups. This card was a perfect metaphor for the discussion. It shows a young woman standing and looking out at seven cups filled with symbolic images of things (often feeling states) she would like to draw into her world. As I was sharing these insights with my client, I was remembering that I would need to pull a card for the one card pull that my Facebook working group does and offhandedly saw this seven of cups image in my mind. I felt a sense of pure love and deep admiration for the intention setting this feeling young woman took in, picking out the symbols and dreams suggested by the filled cups. In many ways, she was so like my younger self, so pure in her intention setting, so clear in her choices. At this stage in her journey and mine, it seemed her selections were unfettered by the need to make money, pay ones bills, or prove oneself to the world in any way. They were, instead, simply about the joy of discovering, for the first time, that you can clearly and easily manifest what you want just by seeing it. I forgot about the encounter and session entirely as I was called to the other tasks of the day. Much later that afternoon, I went into the kitchen, got out my tarot deck and promptly pulled the 7 of cups. Often, we think of tarot reading and the full range of intuitive arts as being primarily predictive or divinatory. That is, we see the outcome as being a fixed known that we just have to have someone divine for us to make it clear. While this can be an exciting way to stumble upon the cards for a first time encounter, this reductionist approach has some clear limitations. If you want to deepen your relationship with your own intuition this way of working with the cards can actually disempower you from trusting your own intuition, intention setting and manifestation abilities. This can happen if and when we project our needs for a certain outcome onto the cards or onto the reader. In these situations, we can often give away our creative power.  Or we can withdraw from the power of our own blossoming intuitive connection, or simply cease to develop it at all. In these cases we can compromise the magical alchemy of our own deepening awareness. Sadly, in these situations, we can leave the experience knowing less about how the magic of manifestation works in our own lives. When manifestation works most easily it is an inspiring and co-creative process. It is either developed between you and the universe and your guides; or it is cultivated by you and another trusted witness, guide, friend or teacher. It always helps you feel more empowered and connected to a deeper richer understanding of yourself and your place in the cosmos. It replenishes and grows your own sense of connectedness with the divine, and it recognizes the wisdom and ways of your own intuitive flow. Conditions that help manifestation flow most easily are cultivated when we find ourselves in a place of receptivity, joyousness, and playfulness with regards to outcome. Having an unbridled curiosity about where we hope to find ourselves on the journey is often the brightest and boldest indicator of how our journey will transpire. True manifestation grows stronger in an environment where need is not present. It is nurtured in an environment, instead, where playfulness and curiosity and enjoyment shape our longings and fill our heart. August’s gem of the month is Chrysoprase.  This stone helps one to connect with the heart and spirit of the Self. This stone is of great assistance in allowing yourself to begin anew. It lends great psychic awareness when working to heal our energies and bring us back to a younger, simpler clearer connection in ourselves.  Meditating outdoors with this stone will bring a new vitality to your spirit and align your chakras toward new experiences. Chrysoprase helps the light of compassion grow stronger toward both the self and others. August’s affirmation gem is: “See your new vision growing simpler, clearer, and leading you toward more joyful living daily. Feel this new connection taking root.  You’ve got this!” Views:]]>