Blog Page

Have you ever had your portrait done?

If so, what did you think of the artist’s representation of you?

Have you ever been questioned or interrogated?

If so, did you find it an easy of a difficult experience…and why so?

If you haven’t had your portrait done or been interrogated, how do you think an artist or an interrogator would characterize, describe or treat you?

Is feedback on how others see or have seen you contrary to how you see yourself? If so, why do you think that is the case?

When questioned, are you able to answer truthfully or do you disguise the truth?

Contrarily, are you the one, who you feel is, usually, the seer, sizing up and/or questioning who or what is in front of you by writing it down or by just viewing/listening and accessing whether it merits acceptance or rejection?

Hopefully, and most probably, you are seeing and being seen. The objective is to be intent with both. In fact, it’s important to be intent even with occasionally “tuning out” both operations.

Ultimately, we have to gain clarity both with how we see and are seen and to what degree we can be honest. If not, we bring a disruptive tension into our lives that can only be temporarily avoided.

So, as we celebrate the Spring Equinox, let Clear Intention be your focus for the balance of this year and beyond.

Clear Intention Painting: Marie Denise Villers

From maggots to MAGA and political putains to Putin, playwright Sean O’Casey’s character Captain Boyle stated it clearly in Juno and the Paycock, when he opined, “Th’ whole worl’s in a terrible state o’ chassis”…i.e. “chaos.”

How do we wend our way through it all, rise above it and find a sense of accomplishment and happiness?

That’s our challenge.

Depending on where we are and who we’re with, that’s going to be more of a challenge for some than it will be for others.

And even the more truly successful…those with heart…will, often, find it difficult to accept their “haves” while others “have not.”

It’s a dilemma.

The trick is to find your “sunrise”…the thought, vision or person that can ignite your spirit even under the most dire circumstances…the one that allows you to soar, even if it’s only for a few precious moments of the day.

So, as we enter the sun sign of Aquarius, I invite you to make your “sunrise” the quest for your personal “Age of Aquarius.”

I think you’ll find that your example will be contagious!

 

While Angels are disembodied spirits, we, of course, are not.  So, these celestial Beings, often, communicate with us on a level we can understand.

That means images from nature like the cryo-volcanic outburst on Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks, producing an angelic figure with a pair of seeming wings, can alert us to an issue we can comprehend.

In this case, the issue is that despite the Trumpian, Putinian and other dictatorial forces trying to subvert the lives and welfare of people who wish to have free and fruitful lives, champions of the Light are emerging to thwart those efforts and bring about a planet on which everyone will have a chance to prosper and fulfill his/her soul’s positive destiny.

So, as we move into the new year, it’s time for all of us to renew our faith in ourselves and humanity, in general, and join with the Angels of the Light to support every positive being from presidents to paupers in this noble quest.

Can I hear an “Amen?”

Photo credit: Igor Smolić, July 2023

In my first year of College, I was fortunate to be selected by some upperclassmen (two of whom went on to have very successful stage and television acting careers), to join their touring production of Samuel Beckett’s famed five-character play Waiting For Godot.

For those of you not familiar with it, Waiting For Godot, first produced in Paris in 1953, concerns the ramblings on life by the two main characters, Vladimir and Estragon, as they await the arrival of a landlord named Godot, who is, supposedly going to hire them…an arrival that never occurs.

For me, it was the lack of clarity over life’s purpose as much as existential futility that was a key issue with which the play was concerned.

Since it had always been one of my favorite plays, several years later, I decided to write a sequel entitled Godot Is Waiting, which deals with a mix-up that has Godot as the main character, well on his way to meet Vladimir and Estragon, though at a similar but, mistakenly, different location.

Over time, it had been confirmed to me that the errors caused by a lack of clarity often created many of life’s problems.

So, as we enter a new season, no matter whether you’re north or south of the equator, my counsel is that, if you want your life to improve, learn to express your wants and needs with more clarity.

While it doesn’t always produce happy-endings, clarity beats confusion, every time.

Painting segment
Julius von Leopold
Wanderer in the Storm

The times are demanding a greater amount of courage than most of us have previously needed.

It takes persistence to develop that courage. It starts by facing, not fleeing from whatever obstacles are put in our way.

That’s why I love this image!

If this little bird can weather the storm by putting its head down and standing resolute without flinching or flying off, then why can’t any one of us be as courageous?

Perhaps facing and then completing some small tasks that have been constantly postponed or been put aside might be a good starting point.

A sense of accomplishment is a tonic for moving to larger issues.

And even if there are some things that don’t work out, the fact they were faced and not fled from is an achievement in itself.

Keep the image of the little bird in mind and, as you move forward, it may morph into an eagle or a condor.

And you will move forward as long as you realize your “storms” are opportunities for cleansing.

What’s more, even if you have a storm that doesn’t seem to end, you can defeat it by keeping sunshine in your heart.

Remember…  If you’re reading this, know I am on your side.  But it’s even more important you realize that you must be on your side!

Persist!

 

“There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy,” Shakespeare’s Prince Hamlet said to his friend Horatio.

When I, recently, saw this beautiful painting at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, it brought me back to memories of the beginnings of my work in spiritual healing and triggered a desire to include Frederic Lord Leighton’s “Flaming June” in my monthly blog.

A lucid dream is one in which one becomes aware that they are dreaming and may gain some amount of control over what transpires in the dream.  Yet, the visions all transpire in one’s head.  However, there is a realm beyond lucid dreams that can be the visitation to a new reality.

While employed in one of my first jobs in New York City, a young colleague of mine was found dead, sitting on a park bench.  However, there appeared to be nothing physically wrong with him.  His wife claimed that he would “travel” to other places while asleep and, to her way of thinking, he had found somewhere else that he preferred to be.

Needless to say, I found that shocking and, initially, unbelievable.

However, a short while later, I was at a party where there were visitors from some of the Caribbean islands and one of them claimed to have “traveled” while asleep in Grenada to a street in Greenwich Village (which he vividly described and on which I was, coincidently, living) where he had found his wife romantically engaged with another man.

Intrigued, I took a course in astral travel and was, eventually, able to “float” from my body and see my sleeping self from the 11-foot ceiling level of my apartment with an awareness of the night sounds and activities totally independent from those being experienced by my dormant self.

This prepared me for my soon-awakened ability to take people into their past lives, which is an entirely different voyage beyond their mere dream or current life level.

In any case, that is why I am so taken with Leighton’s “Flaming June.”  Art evokes feelings and I feel a kinship with both the painter and his model.  Perhaps, in a past life,  I even knew one or both of them.  Even stranger things have happened to me!

So, as we enter the Libra sign of the Zodiac, I wish you pleasant dreams and, if you dare, exciting astral travels!

Flaming June by Frederic Lord Leighton

 

 

 

Inspiration is the ability to blend disparate ideas and create new forms and operations, with the highest forms generating the planet’s betterment and beauty.

Inspiration is what elevates humanity above the mere beingness of everything that exists and the instinct of plants and animals.

But, where does inspiration come from?

I believe it starts with being open to change and allowing yourself to investigate ideas and forms other than what currently exists.

That can be a hurdle some cannot surmount, especially if it means stepping away from the conventions into which one has been born or is currently immersed.

So, I suggest that it would help to spur yourself on by focusing on efforts that will aid the betterment of all rather than just yourself.

In a previous blog, I pointed out the fact that Earth’s population jump means there are several million more “first-life souls” on the planet at a time when technologies that could destroy all life exist.  Witness what the population jump from the 1800s did with the creation of the last century’s “world” wars!

So, it behooves all the older souls (and I suggest you wouldn’t be reading this unless you are one) to become inspired to help re-create the planet with ideas and technologies that will bring about a renaissance in peaceful endeavors.

NOW may be the last opportunity to help the planet survive.  So, I urge you to help by focusing your mind toward ensuring that happens!

Allow yourself to nurture your talents and abilities, so your inspirations can come forward and be expressed!

Painting by Max Ernst…Gala Éluard, 1924

With the “Lovers” Padlocks” having been made illegal and, subsequently, removed from the famed Paris Pont des Arts (due to the danger to boats traveling down the River Seine their weight was proving to be), I found it wonderful to discover a Cherub Angel on the nearby Pont Alexander III, holding some padlocks, while, potentially, listening to a higher Angel’s approval of those couples smart enough (or worthy enough?) to have placed them there.

Now, as the Zodiac sign of Gemini follows the “Flower Moon” of early May, I ask that you find a way to say to or do something special for those whom you love, whether they be mates, potential mates, friends or familial loved ones.

Sometimes it feels difficult to reach out to those for whom you care, but that is the best time to express your feelings.  You’ll find that is when the expression of your feelings is most needed.

Just ask the Cherub Angel and you’ll find the way!

This message is mostly for those of you who have come to realize there is a difference between your Mind and what some term your True Self and others term your Soul.

Let’s begin with the fact that the Mind consists of an Ego which seeks self-realization in the here and now.  It is trying to figure out its whys and wherefores within the limits of the present.

However, for a Mind who does not accept the existence of a True Self/Soul, it can easily be caught in a lonely quandary of doubts that may prevent its development.

That may be okay if one’s goals are limited only to present needs.  However, the resulting short-term planning is usually filled either with anxiety, emptiness or both.

Accepting the existence of the True Self/Soul provides one with a more expanded vision, knowing one’s “now” is part of a past that is an accumulation of a variety of potential learning experiences that will be ongoing in the future.

These past experiences can be tapped into simply with one’s acknowledgment of the True Self/Soul’s beingness and/or the help of past life regressions, which can be facilitated, if a person has an open mind to it.

It’s often been the case, when I have taken a client through a past death in such a session, that it has been difficult to move them forward to another life because they so enjoyed the absolute freedom they were experiencing in that “in between.”

It’s my contention that this dimension and this planet are meant to be joyful abodes with each lifetime bringing in a clearer perception of one’s ability to cope with the challenges presented.  When one patiently prepares for his/her goals, angst and uneasiness dissipates and focus is enhanced.

That may hold true even for those who believe “this” is it.  But, for those who see life as an ongoing epic, one’s present existence becomes another exciting chapter, leading to ultimate divinity.

Accepting that your “here and now” is only a limited phase of your beingness, your present life will be less stressful and allow for a clearer focus on your preparation for the ultimate You with the “waiting” becoming a more perfect experience.

May your light and talent be a shining beacon to your True Self/Soul and the rest of our world.

Photo Credit: Liyu Wu

 

 

I come from a culture where being in balance is thought to be a primary goal.  However, I’ve always thought it’s equally important to decide with whom or with what one wishes to be in balance.

This model of a dove and a raven was created to become a hologram that appeared on the jacket of a thriller novel I wrote, several years ago, when holograms were quite new

The idea was to depict the delicate balance between good and evil. 

Recently noticing this creation as we enter our seasonal time of equal light and darkness, I wondered what would happen if the rod were extended, so the dove could move farther away from the influence of the raven without disrupting the balance. 

The rod, itself, then became a consideration in terms of its composition, so as to allow for that.

Then, of course, there would be the point at which the dove would have to substitute its own weight before flying away, freely, leaving an undisturbed (outwitted?) raven on its own. 

So, the answer would require substitution, as well as quick and delicate moves. 

I don’t suggest it would be easy.  But this is the dilemma I leave with you to ponder at our seasonal time of balance. *

 First, decide what it is that you wish to pursue, reverse or abandon.

Then, be sure to be quick and delicate in your actions, even leaving behind a substitution, so the change can occur before any opposition notices. 

You’ll find it worth the effort, because the choice of where you’ll next land will be, if not precisely, then, at least, significantly closer to where you’re supposed to be.

 Of course…  Repeat, when necessary.  😊

                                                            * Contact me, if you wish to know a possible answer.