©skydancer

One of the primary purposes of counseling is a tool of self-awareness, and out of self-awareness comes power. It is that of which you have awareness of that you begin to have power over rather than it having power over you. There is a lot of glamour in us and in this world. If you don't recognize it for what it is then it has power over you. I want to know those worms underneath that rock, they're my worms and I want to name them. That's power. They may still be there but by God I know them by name. Why do you think there is magical words? Words of Power? When we name something we begin to have power over it. It is the beginning; it is not the end of the process of freeing ourselves. Eventually we begin to have power over that within our self that has held us in its distortion. When you consider this self awareness in relation to the Tree of Life it becomes even clearer - that's the power of recognizing and experiencing both the Pillars of Severity and Mercy. Because you experience it, you don't identify it, because guess what you really are? You're not either of those things, you're all of those things. Paradox, that's the key to transmutation

I was told that I would not be able to think sequentially. And my life certainly reflected someone who was not thinking sequentially. But I didn't believe it. I refused to accept it as reality. It was my experience, no doubt about that. My experience was that I couldn't think sequentially. But I didn't identify myself with it. It didn't become my label. It was my experience, nothing more, nothing less. Think about that. And when the experience was done, the experience was done, and there was nothing in my reality that said, I had to continue this experience, because it wasn't my identity. It was the neurologist's identity for me, but it wasn't mine. That's alchemy. That's spiritual alchemy. You have this experience and you move on, nothing more, nothing less. And then the big bang happens. Then you take those experiences, and what do you do? Beauty, Tiphereth and The Christ consciousness, they're all beautiful. We're not talking about a human definition of beauty here; we're talking about the beauty of Spirit, Spirit that is becoming itself, and greater still. Yet be aware that the tendency is to judge. For example, you know someone who is constantly ill. You may find yourself saying, well it is their identity otherwise they would not be sick. Their ultimate identity is Spirit regardless and it is not within our wisdom to lay claim or judgment over someone else's experience.

The personality, which is in form, eventually reaches that state in which there is a deeper longing for union, for that which is held in the formless. The challenge and the opportunity is, that most of the time our attention is not focused on spirit, on the Higher Self. If my energy is focused on my experience of the form world and my identification is with form and the me that I call my personality then even if there is desire for contact, the capacity is not there. The contact must be strengthened and developed. For the contact to the Higher Self that is in place without development is that of which will sustain the life force. Further abilities must be brought about not only by the desire but also by the focused intent. We bring in to this life experience also a level of development from our other lives.

One of the gifts I have had is to work with the victims of rape, and I have been raped myself. Rape is an atrocious thing; there's no doubt about it. But let me tell you something - when you're free, you recognize the golden thread, because there is no experience, no matter how horrific it is that doesn't have a thread of light. And when you can see that, and identify with that thread of light, guess where you are? Not the experience! You experience the experience and then you have to take it the next step up. That's the big thing. The next step up is that you take the experience and you move it into the consciousness of perfection, of beauty, of harmony. That's alchemy, that's how you do it! Having said that it does not mean that you are able to achieve this by going into denial, suppression or projection. You have to work through it all, including the emotions. But it is still experience, not the core of who you are. It is not that the experience does not profoundly effect us. But we have the power to choose that effect by turning that experience into wisdom.

The heart chakra is the great transmuter. Unfortunately, most of us when we think of the heart chakra are really experiencing the solar plexus, where we have the emotional content. There's nothing wrong with the solar plexus, it's a wonderful thing, but it's fuel, and if you identify with the fuel guess what happens? Burn, baby, burn! You're not your solar plexus. The identification is Tiphareth, which is in the heart. Again, the fuel from emotions is feeding the cauldron of the heart. And the heart is the place of the great transmutation. And then as you take these transmuted emotions into a different level, you take them into the throat. Some see the throat as corresponding with Daath. It is said that Daath was originally Malkuth before it fell.

How do we keep our identification with Spirit in this world? What are practical ways to do that? Meditation, visualization, what you put into your mind consciousness, it's the focus of consciousness. It is making conscious choices. It's making a conscious choice not to watch a horror show. We are talking vibrations. That's all we're talking. The other side of it is that if I choose to do that, one thing I will also choose, is before I go to bed I'll do a banishing ritual. Not because of something that came in through the TV, but because of what it has conjured up in my subconscious content. I'm banishing that. That is my ritualistic way. When we make a choice to participate in any kind of energy, there is a consequence. You don't have to put all the emotional load on it. You do have to take responsibility for the choice but you don't have to put the emotional load on it.

The point is what do you do to keep your consciousness focused: you do all of those things, and you do what I call your daily disciplines: your meditation, your inspirational reading, your daily review. The elementals that make up our bodies have their own agenda. There're on their own path, and we as Spirit, are responsible for lovingly disciplining the body. Later, if you have a choice you may find that you also feel called to do more studies, where you expose yourself to things like ceremony and ritual. These touch upon ancient chords both in your conscious and in your subconscious and you vibrate those chords.