DISCIPLINE of LAUGHING at YOURSELF

LAUGHing is a birthRIGHT.  We all know how to do it.  We don't even have to think about it.  Something tickles our funny bone and it just comes out.  A great big HA HA HA. Over the years, certain factors might have prevented us from developing our HA HA superPowers.   In fact, some of us have stopped laughing.  Too stressed to let it out and laugh at ourselves.  Taking ourselves a little too seriously. That is why WE practice.  We build our HA HA muscle one baby step at a time - slowly and consistently.   Our HA HA discipline includes showing up to HA HA with WE three times (3x)  a week.  So we can easily laugh at ourselves.  Why do we HAHA?   To reduce our stress - to release any negative thoughts that might be circulating - to relax our bodies and minds - to breathe deeper. And of course, for my stubborn peeps who need the scientific PROOF - check it out below - LAUGHing at yourself is GOOD for you.  We know it's Very Good, Very Good, Yay. The British Psychological Society shares more about this first ever experimental research into laughing at oneself.  Click HERE to read what they found.  Or read Time Magazine's article HERE on this study(thank you SG Funs).

UNITY

This week's prayer emerged from last week's prayer - OPPORTUNITY became UNITY.  It felt really important to me to put this intention out into the Universe.  This weekend with a Full Moon and a lunar eclipse and now going into Mercury Retrograde (10-21 through 10-27-13), I am rethinking my relationships to others and how I can make a difference in my life at this time on our planet.

Over the last 12 years, I changed my lifestyle, my diet, my habits, my beliefs.  I researched how my body works and what my input and output is.  I let go and surrendered any layers of skin which no longer served me. I built ma HAHA muscle and created an attitude of gratitude which permeates my life.  More specifically, what kind of vibrational energy I emit and how that attracts people and opportunities into my life.

At this moment, when I dig deep within, what I find is residue.   Like stripping an onion to its core, layer after layer after layer, until we reach the heart, the sweetest part.   It is the same with ME.  As I progressed inward in my understanding of myself, I went from surface issues (weight, addictions, beliefs) to deeper truths (feelings, imprints, values).   Getting to the bottom of what lays hidden - reaching deep into the mud where the lotus grows her roots.

Getting in touch with my darker side.  Bringing it to the light so I can liberate the parts of myself that got buried with unacceptable feelings.  Exposing that which is shielded from view.  Getting INtense and aligned.  Revealing to ME that my understanding of WE was simply incomplete.  Unlearning what I thought was truth and tenet.  Like all the people who believed the world was flat and had to let that belief go and embrace that the world is round. 

As I explore this place in my life, a saying rolls around in my head - "a chain is only as strong as its a chain is only as strong as its weakest link."  

No matter how peaceFULL and powerFULL I become, I am still connected to the collective.   A quote from the lovely SisterGoddess Marion Anderson says it clearly and concisely:

“No matter how big a nation is, it is no stronger that its weakest people, and as long as you keep a person down, some part of you has to be down there to hold him down, so it means you cannot soar as you might otherwise”.     

We cannot soar when we are weighed down.  And misery loves company.  As we let go of our layers and shine, we allow others to do the same.  As we let go of our cultural "truths" that destroy our wellbeing, we reclaim our power, our health and our abunDANCE.   

I am finding deep emotional understanding - compassion and empathy for me and you and we.    I am releasing and dropping the weight of the stories I carry around.  I am writing the book my soul has been yearning to shaHAhare.  I am ready to surrender these stories and reclaim my power - as a child of God, as a WOman, as a link on the chain, as part of the WE are all ONE.   As I release these HIStories I feel the matriarchal magic embracing me and reMINDing me of HERstories - a new reality - a peaceful planet.

Collaborating in community and Sisterhood and Brotherhood with peeps willing to consciously create as a species another way of BEing.   Each lesson we learn, each new aHA MOMent, each choice for the Highest Good transforms the darkness to light, and makes it easier for those who follow on my path.

My prayer today is for UNITY - may I surrender ME for WE , May I seek the highest good for all ♥, may I reMEMBER we are all ONE 

Imagine there is no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky

Imagine all the people
Living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, too

Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

You, you may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you will join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

You, you may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you will join us
And the world will live as one

Read more: John Lennon - Imagine Lyrics | MetroLyrics

Opportunity

 

"You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves."
- an excerpt from Wild Geese by Mary Oliver

I love these words. I love how they resonate in my heart and make me feel. I love the thought of "SOFT ANIMAL OF MY BODY " loving what it loves.

I was first introduced to the words of SisterGoddess Mary Oliver by a wonderful SisterGoddess named Dr. Jane Miner who I met at the Green Valley Spa in Utah. She shared with me Mary Oliver's The Journey.

The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice--
though the whole house began to tremble
and you felt the old tug at your ankles.

"Mend my life!" each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried with its stiff fingers at the very foundations,

though their melancholy was terrible.
It was already late enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen branches and stones.
But little by little, as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice which you slowly recognized as your own,
that kept you company as you strode deeper and deeper into the world,

determined to do the only thing you could do--
determined to save the only life you could save .

These words started me on my journey to find the soft animal within and finally be FREE. It gave me an OPPORTUNITY to question and explore different paths then what I felt was the "WAY" dictated by our society and enforced by the media and movies and magazines. It made me reassess what I really thought I had to do.

Sister Goddess Mary's words and Sister Goddess Jane's life coaching (her prodding and wonderful questions) gave me permission to listen to that one quiet voice within and turn off all the other voices (within and outside of me) who were directing me how and who to be.

Slowly, slowly, one baby step at a time, I shed the trappings of who I thought I was a

and what I thought I had to do. I let go of what I thought was aesthetically pleasing and let my true ANIMAL nature come out.

I let my hair grow long, I stopped making it lighter or darker depending on the season and let my natural color and glow return.

No more heels - tee hee!!! and no more back-aches, head-aches, bunions. Finally letting my spine realign itself for comfort and ease of body rather than "having to do" sexy.

No more make-up. No more layers of color to make myself look better or enhance my self. Just me the way Nature intended me to be.

No more perfumes to give me a scent that is not my own. My true scent, my soft animal scent is so very appealing it seems to be attracting all sorts of interesting people & Meows and Bow Wows into my life. Tee hee!!!

And the funny thing is letting go of all these things that I thought I had to do has given me permission to be real. Not having to do any thing has freed up so much energy and time. It gave me the OPPORTUNITY to find out about ME - what I am passionate about, what revs up my juices, what I truly love. It freed me to BE instead of do - back to being a HUMAN BEAN instead of a human doing.

GUMPTION

Sometimes the truth hurts.

That's when I most need to hear it.

I have to find the courage to face up to things.

Even if it's not what I want to hear.

The other day I threatened Loverboy. It was meant to be humorous. It just popped out over my lips and exhaled right out of my mouth as I put my forearm on the table and made a fist with my left hand .

"You see my fist?" I told him.

I was frustrated, crampy, tired, irritated, feeling mucho uncomfortable and not honoring myself and doing something about it. It's that time of the month when I am flowing. We both know that on these days it is best for me to exercise gently (walk and swim) and rest ( alot of napping and lolling about). 

I chose to do differently. So many things to DO. Nervous about the whole family coming over and having my sacred space ready to welcome all.   Running around in every direction to get things ready when what my body needed was rest.  Finally, the stress on my body took its toll. 

We were sitting having lunch, Loverboy and Mom (the witness) and me.  Whatever he was saying was aggravating me.  Rather then face up to myself and breathe, I took the road very much traveled in my unconscious years - force.  I made a fist with my right hand and said:  "Do you see this?"

He made me laugh. "Your fist? Is that a threat?" He told Mom and me how some of the hairs on his forearm jumped up in fear when they saw my fist rise.  He mentioned that this would be seen as Assault in some places.  We all started to laugh at the ridiculousness of the situation.  Then I was crying and laughing - the emotional brouhaHAha released.  My feeling valve loosened, the tears began to flow.

What a blessing this man is, always defusing a situation. Being my mirror and helping me see all facets of me.   Thahahank you Universe for putting us together and giving us fifteen fabulous years together.   Thahahank you LoverBoy for helping me laugh.

Thahahank Goddess for my Mom, the witness.  She pointed out - you wouldn't like it if someone said that to you and showed your their fist.   She's right, I would feel intimidated.  Then she added - "Is that what you're going to do when you have kids?"  Of course, LoverBoy and Mom started laughing again - at me, with me, for me. 

Sobering thought.   How do we beHAVE when under stress?   Is it the softer side that appears or the reflex of habits of years of imprints that rises to the surface?   As a child, a raised eyebrow would send me into submission and to my room.  What was I thinking by raising my fist?   

Iconically, in our society, it is Rosie the Riveter, a propaganda campaign created by the US Government to convince women we had a patriotic duty to enter the workforce during World War II.  She is the image of the raised fist and the strong woman.

Sometimes it's hard to swallow your own medicine - see yourself as reflected by those who surround you.   Then you learn to breathe through the lump of EGO and laugh.  And do whatever it takes to come from LOVE.

For me, that is GUMPTION - breaking through my fears and doing what I am meant to do - with LOVE.   It's the purrpose of my life.  Being vulnerable and turning my struggles into ART.   Being a LOVECat and shaHAharing my story so that I can heal myself and help others in the process.

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Here's another kind of Gumption:

Gumption from 12Stone Church on Vimeo.