In October I began the job of Spiritual Leader at Unity Spiritual Center, Spokane. Each month there is a theme for the talks I give and each Sunday talk falls under that theme. In June I spoke of musical artists and their expression/relationship with God, The Flow, The Eternal, The Muse…whatever is both beyond and within that finds Itself in the cross section of the two. In July our Center watched movies together and looked at the spiritual messaging within the movies. Our summer finale focuses on inventors and innovators OR activating the Genius available to all of us. This Sunday I am going to talk about George...
I listen to Rev. Michael’s Take Back Your Mind Podcast this morning on my walk. During the interview he shares a recent 7 Day training he took to deepen his meditation practice through BioCybernaut Institute. I knew this was something I want to do. I want to work with a science team to guide me in sharpening my ability to deepen and expand. I rushed to their website to discover the 7 Day Program cost $70,000. At first I took a mighty big breath. $10,000 a day for training. Then I thought I am going to own the ease of investing $70,000 for a training that would serve...
Definition of the word give: “Freely transfer the possession of something to someone; to hand over.” Spiritual practices often don’t make logical sense and are paradoxical. Giving is one of these non-sensical practices. In the realm of Spirit, we can only give what we have. So, if we experience lack in any area of our life, we are taught to give or hand over that which we fear is lacking in order to experience more. Giving, then, becomes the plug that unleashes a stuck energy. I just moved. I don’t have friends where I currently live. If I want to have them, what do I do? I practice giving...
Happy Saturday. From my prayer chair to yours, I see you as Whole, Perfect, Complete, and a Divine Light in this world. I realize it doesn’t always feel this way, yet feelings can’t change what is True. I can sit in my prayer chair feeling broken and yet the Spiritual Truth is I am Whole. I can sit in my prayer chair and feel flawed beyond belief. And yet the Spiritual Truth is the flaws and all that I am is Perfect. And, I can sit in my prayer chair and feel as though I am not enough; something is missing and the Spiritual Truth is I am Complete....
There are five practices recognized by all major religions as essential toward living a spiritual life: meditation, prayer, tithing/giving, spiritual community, and study. In my last post I wrote about my evolving experience with prayer. Today I want to talk about one of my most FAVORITE things in the world: meditation. My most practiced form of meditation is silence. Each morning for the past twenty five plus years I have “sat” in silence bathing myself in meditation. I begin by closing my eyes, taking a big deep breath and then placing my attention on my feet. I acknowledge and feel the ground beneath my feet as a form...
Although I have a regular spiritual practice, there are times when I “hunker down” returning to the basics. With all of the noise in the collective field I found myself recently requiring a renewed discipline to go deeper into the I Am Field that lives within me. All religions teach five basic spiritual practices: 1. prayer, 2. meditation, 3. study, 4. giving, and 5. spiritual community. The more “practiced” I become, the less rigid and open my heart is, I acknowledge other forms of spiritual food for me that exist outside of these five primary ones. I now add a. being outside and drinking in the fresh air, b....
I have loved the pro-Ukraine sentiment in my part of the world. I have seen Ukraine flags hang in front of homes. I listen to the news that shares in large part the strength of the Ukrainian people. I attended church a few weeks ago and the program had a Ukrainian folk singer singing his heart out for his people. As I walked into the sanctuary I was handed a Ukrainian flag to pin on my lapel. We prayed for the Ukranians. I continue to ask myself what about praying for the Russians and the Russian leaders? In my professional practice I work with individuals identifying in large parts...
Happy 2022. I feel now more than ever that we are in This Thing Called Life together. Responsible to our own Spirit Self for our unfolding AND co-creating with The Only Thing That Is to bring forth the world we imagine. I don’t need to tell you that our systems are falling part, we are two years into a pandemic looking at what and who we consider to be “essential” in our lives, and the collective invitation for NEW sits in our laps this month. Now, more than ever, my Faith drives the car. It must. In the midst of incredible change, Faith is what I hold onto and...
Merry Christmas. Really. From my heart to yours, Merry Christmas. A metaphysician looks at sacred teachings differently than a literalist. A metaphysician sees the stories and parables as instruction for revealing the Presence of God. We also see it as an internal journey, not a historical reality. I invite you to take ten to twenty minutes, before or after your meditation, to journal the Christmas story as it pertains to your life. I will give you a few examples to get you started. Jesus symbolizes Pure Love. His birth, then, is the birth of Love. What did it take for him to be born? Let’s look at Mary. Mary...
Does your curiosity ever become so dogged that like a dog with a bone you just won’t let it go? I have two of those going on right now. One is The Flow. I can’t stop reading about, meditating on, feeling into, and celebrating The Flow. It is as though it is new to me. My response to it is consumption. I want to linger around it, take it in, read about it, talk about it. It is a fixation of sorts. The second is my curiosity about my nervous system. My nervous system seems to be how I organize my life nowadays. I am obsessed with looking at...
Happy Thanks-Giving week!! And, the beginning of our Holiday Season. I have an invitation for you. I am going to practice Thanks-Giving (or flipped around Giving-Thanks) this entire season through January 1st. Yep. This is my commitment to myself. An experiment of epic proportion. No matter what, at the end of the day I will sit and give thanks. (Note: given the pandemic fear and anxiety in the world, this effort/practice seems even more important for the collective). YOU ARE INVITED TO JOIN ME. How this works. Gratitude, or Giving Thanks isn’t selective. It is for EVERYTHING. Yep. All of it. It is the guy or gal who flips...
I walked off the plane in Lihue after a long day. I took a flight from Seattle to San Jose then San Jose to Lihue, Kauai. The flights were full yet pleasant. No crying babies. No angry passengers. No heavy turbulence. No barf bags used. It was good. To catch the first flight, though, I am up at 3:45 am. By the time I arrive at my hotel it is fifteen hours later. Both flights sit on the tarmac for a long time before deplaning. I (luckily) make my transferring flight although there was no time available to use the restroom or purchase some food. Once I deplane at...
My one BIG take away from Covid was the practice of looking at my life, my relationships, my work, and my home as a “fit.” I often ask myself, “is this mine to do?” when it comes to an invitation, idea or an ask. I added the question, “is this a fit?” “Does this relationship, idea, food I’m about to eat, (fill in the blank) fit with my Soul?” Is there a resonance? I took a hiatus from the blog, social media, my work, friendships, and feeding the external structures of my life during the pandemic. I now return to picking up the forms of communication I put down...
My house is for sale. I have lived in my Phoenix home for twelve years, with a brief period of rental in the middle while I moved about the country. I love my home. It fits me. And, I know it is time to move. My life went from abundant and succulent to dried up. My work was being requested in other States, not Arizona, and the heat began to make my body sick instead of expectant like it once did. My social circle, for a large part, moved away. I didn’t want to pay attention to my life calling me elsewhere and I continued to delay the inevitable....
I started 2020 off with a HUGE gift. I was really sick. I spent the month of November in Bali. On the way home I had a layover day in downtown Hong Kong amidst many people wearing masks. I thought it was due to the air quality; I now know it was probably Covid. Once home, I was in bed for most of December, January and February. During this time of incapacity I was able to reflect upon the many of gifts The Spirit bestowed upon me the previous year. In early 2019 I took and retook a course on herbal medicine at Southwest Herb Shop. The first sentence...
I woke up this morning with the desire to scream across the computer WE HAVE THE STRENGTH of God within us!!! And I wanted to remind everyone I knew of our immense inner power that comes straight from the Presence of God that lives, moves and has Its being within us and as us. We are strong. We are made of God stuff. Stop for a moment and do an inventory of your perception right now. Where do you feel powerless, victimized, weak, doubtful? Are you concerned about work? Are you dancing with a health issue? Do you have strained relationships? Are you less tolerating of others and irritated...
I bought some products from Aveda yesterday. I had tried to order my foundation throughout the pandemic and they were sold out. The supply had been replenished and I received an email offering me 25% off my purchase and routing me to the website. I ordered. I paid. I checked out. Then I took a survey. The survey asked for my feedback. My feedback was I am disappointed that I had to wait for the inventory. Then the follow up question was … get this … it is BIG … Was your feedback positive, negative, or both. That question woke up a trained habit within myself that said, “feedback...
Sunday night I had a friend over for dinner and at 9:30 pm as we were sitting on the couch listening to jazz on the local public radio station, the phone rang. It was his parents informing him that he would have to spend the night wherever he was as there was a curfew in place. We couldn’t believe it. We turned on my computer to see that Phoenix was ablaze with conflict, anger, and firey objects. My body seized up a bit. I had many different sensations running through it and if I gave them emotional names I’d call them fear, sadness, concern, consternation, loss, and much more....
I knew my intention was more God/Bonnie as me and less fear-based living. At the end of February the conversation of the pandemic began to overtake the television news channels. I received many phone calls from Seattle friends warning me of the sweep to come in Arizona’s direction and what I would need to have and do in order to be prepared for this health concern. “No good crisis should be wasted,” and I made the decision that I would be a different person coming out of the stay-at-home-order than the woman entering it. More God/Me, less scaredy-cat. A pandemic is a perfect container for this intention. Decisions sculpt...
In Thursday’s press briefing to his state, NY Governor Cuomo said three things in dealing with Covid-19 that caught my attention: 1. One person cannot fight the pandemic. It takes all of us. 2. When there is a disruption in your life; you look for how you can “make better,” not “make the same.” 3. Improvement requires change. All change comes with opposition. Take a moment to think about this. Any major life shift can be substituted for the word pandemic. “Starting a business,” “healing from an illness,” “reuniting a family,” “getting married or divorced,” “buying a house, etc.” Allow this to be a template lesson. A successful elimination...
I opened an email survey from my health provider a few weeks ago. It was about fifteen screens in length and asked Covid-19 related questions. Questions such as, what would make it safe for you to return to our office? And it listed some options with a bubble in front of each. Choices included “everyone wears a mask.” “Only people without coughs can be in the waiting room.” You get it. About half way through the survey a question read, “How soon do you think it will take to get back to normal?” And the answers ranged from weeks to one year. I sat and stared at the question....
May your Easter reveal the message of resurrection within your Soul and may you become made new. Our Jewish brothers and sisters celebrated Passover this week. During the seder meal they asked the question: “What makes this night different from all nights?” This question is one of one renewal. We could stop at any moment of our day to ask “what makes this moment unique, alive, vibrant?” We could ask where life is at this moment in the context of our circumstances. Life is ALWAYS present. This practice is what many of us are doing at this moment of quarantine. Quantum physics would have us ponder the questions,...
