Spirit | Bonnie Barnard - Part 2

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Renewal in the Woods

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms.” Henry David Thoreau, Walden For the better part of a week I have been hanging out in the woods, hugging trees and drinking in freshly-released oxygen. Standing on a trail surrounded by moss-laden rocks and trees while three feet from the river, I intentionally stood still and invited...

Playing With Sidewalk Oracles

Have you had those synchronistic moments when you know Spirit is whispering to you in your ear? It can be a literal whisper, or maybe it is more symbolic. Possibly you overhear a conversation in the cafe’ and the answer to the question you’ve been pondering all weeks seems to spill out of a stranger’s mouth? Maybe you walk by the television and hear a piece of information that shifts your business direction. Or, possibly you are guided to see something like a street sign that somehow resonates with you and you have a knowing? After my father passed away, I began to receive messages from him that started with him entering into my dreams. I could tell from the content of the conversation that he was visiting me, and it was not my subconscious mind at work. Then I started seeing him out of the corner of my eye and once when walking my dog I saw him as a full-bodied apparition standing in front of me. “Dad,” I...

How to Have the Holiday of Your Dreams

I have a confession to make. I LOVE the holidays. I mean LOVE the holidays. So much so that I celebrated the New Year with my Jewish friends in September; I hosted an early Thanksgiving dinner last week; I listened to my first Christmas music in August and I put up my bubble gum pink Christmas tree with Starbuck cup ornaments in the center of my living room picture window in mid-October. I just couldn’t and can’t wait for the season to begin. As a culture, we are given permission to celebrate and be corny during the holidays. We are subject to lights, decorations, mushy music of love, redemption, a fat man in a red suit, and opportunities to give and receive. This year, more than any year, my Soul has yearned for the holidays to arrive and to be blatantly, openly, grateful for the life I have and the people I love (Thanksgiving). I crave the celebration of birth, newness, miracles and light in the midst of what appears...

Exploring Truth and Lies

I have received the message three times. Now it’s time to pay attention. Message #1: My spiritual advisor suggested I re-read The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck. I embraced and then devoured it like a conversation with a friend I haven’t seen in way too long. I wanted to read more of his work so I ordered the only book of his I haven’t read — Glimpses of The Devil. This book chronicles two demonic exorcisms that Peck participated in as a psychiatrist. Peck claims that the devil gains possession of good people when they choose to override their internal discerning ability and choose to believe a lie over the Truth. Most religions, including Christianity, use the word Truth as a synonym for God. This book boiled down to colluding with lies as the impetus for evil. Hmmm. Message #2: Today’s CBS This Morning, has a wonderful segment on the creation of Wonder Woman. Her super power is the ability to wrap her golden lasso around someone who then must tell...

In the Name of God

I took my Groupon or Living Social, one of my online coupons, to a neighborhood salon to get my hair done. I brought book Going Clear, an expose’ about the Church of Scientology, along with me to read. The hair dresser introduced himself and then walked me to his station. He asked me what I was reading and I told him adding my friend’s comment on the book “when you think it can’t get weirder, it does.” With his interest peaked, he asked me what made it weird and I proceeded to tell him about L. Ron Hubbard taking his followers to sea and for punishment when they didn’t “obey him” he’d throw them overboard, as one of the many examples. My stylist then confided in me that he had been in what he referred to as a Christian cult. At age 18 he was part of a year long internship program for youth where he was pushed to do strenuous labor like carrying logs from one part of a camp with another. The...

Watching the Seahawks Play and Thinking About Meditation

The Seahawks game just started in Minnesota as the third coldest game to be played in history. With ten seconds into the game, watching the signs of cold evidenced through exhalation clouds, I am grateful. Grateful for meditation. The Seahawks meditate. There are many fabulous articles written about how Pete Carroll, the coach, has created a different culture with the team by introducing meditation, yoga, mental health services, and holistic practices. As I sit in my warm living room grateful for meditation, I think of the monks who through meditation are able to raise their body temperature. From the Harvard Gazette in 2002, “In a monastery in northern India, thinly clad Tibetan monks sat quietly in a room where the temperature was a chilly 40 degrees Fahrenheit. Using a yoga technique known as g Tum-mo, they entered a state of deep meditation. Other monks soaked 3-by-6-foot sheets in cold water (49 degrees) and placed them over the meditators’ shoulders. For untrained people, such frigid wrappings would produce uncontrolled shivering. If body temperatures...