Blog — Contented Moment

Hey thanks for reading the first sentence of my first Contented Moment blog! This first blog entry is going to be a bit about why this blog, why me, why now but the rest of my posts will just dig into the good stuff. Think of this entry as the first episode of This Is Us where you get introduced to Jack and Rebecca to set the stage for everything that happens to their kids from that point on.

To save you a bit of time reading the “About Me” section on the Contented Moment website, here’s the cliff notes version of why I’m writing this blog: A lot of folks are struggling right now, and I feel like I might be able to help some people get on a better feeling path just by sharing the stuff I have learned. I also have really good intuition or as I prefer to say, a knack for reading situations that comes in handy when talking about things as lofty as the meaning of life. I like the word ‘read' better than ‘intuition’ because it’s less mental. Having a deep read is just a fabulous thing with no ooga booga connotations. Anyone can improve their reading ability with practice and I encourage everyone to give it a try. Some people are better at tennis than others right off the bat but anyone can learn. Anyone can improve their intuition as well.

I was born with a gift for reading situations that was so loud and uncontrollable as a young child that it shocked me and everyone around me, particularly my mother. Then my teens were marked with enough stress and tragedy that I used my read primarily as a crisis control system.

When I was 21 I got really mad at God for letting my mom die and I rebelled by shutting down my read and throwing myself into purely logical and physical pursuits. I managed to get my PhD by the time I was 26 and in my late 20s I was in the best shape of my life, fitness-wise. Despite my best efforts to reject spirituality during that period of time, my deep dive into physical and logical activities were actually very instrumental in shaping my now deeper understanding of how the brain functions on both the physical and spiritual levels, as well as enhancing my respect for my physical body as a toolkit for my spirit to play with. More to come on the role of the brain in spiritual pursuits and the function of a body as a toolkit in future blog posts, but for now, I’ll go back to getting the ‘why me, why now’ questions out of the way.

My focus on physical fitness led to a dedication to running for a few decades. I was never fast or competitive, just dedicated. When I was 29, I ran regularly with some colleagues after work and we had a rule of entertaining each other with conversation about anything and everything except for how tired or out of breath we were. One day, one of my running buddies entertained us by talking about this great book he was reading by Carolyn Myss. He explained in detail how impressed he was with her no nonsense and practical approach to spirituality. He mentioned that she grew up Catholic, believed in God but also had great talent as a medical intuitive. His description of her resonated with me. My mother had made me feel ashamed of my intuition because it didn’t seem godly to her but here was another woman who was able to embrace her intuition and maintain her faith in God. It sounded hopeful to me. So I went home and ordered one of Carolyn’s books. Within a year I had consumed everything she wrote. A few years later I was even able to go see her in person. Being introduced to Carolyn felt like I was being given permission to be myself.

That reawakening set me off on a learning adventure that included mountains of literature on religion, spirituality, intuition, physics, metaphysics, psychic energy, medical intuition and clairvoyance. My current understanding of the meaning of life and our spiritual purpose is also shaped in equal measure by science and facts. It’s all related. There is a divine spirit in everything but everything is still made up of cells and molecules. The science of how to physically heal the planet is in harmony with how to spiritually heal the planet. That is in essence what this blog will be about.

So why start this blog now? The Irish have a saying - “may you be cursed to live in interesting times.” This is certainly an interesting time to be alive. It seems that just about everyone is feeling something that they’d rather not right now - depression, anxiety, fear, stress, anger, sadness or all of the above, sometimes all at the same time. It is possible to create change through use of these uncomfortable feelings but it will always produce suboptimal results compared to going toward the situation with an open and fluffy spirit to fuel a playful approach to creating a better situation.

Emotions like fear and anger narrow your view and focus your resources. When we are in a scary situation, all of our energy becomes a laser beam shining on the thing we don’t want in an effort to push it away. In the animal kingdom, a zebra being chased by a lion will use all of its resources to run and survive but when the chase is over, if the zebra survives, it will soon be back to grazing in the sun and enjoying the day. We are not zebras though and there are a number of high stress, high stakes scenarios playing out right now that keep us in a constant state of feeling the emotions that keep our energy tight like a laser beam instead of open and fluffy like a sunbeam. Because we are in a constant state of feeling uncomfortable, we are damaging our bodies and souls, each other and the planet.

The good news, however, is that many believe that the reason we are experiencing so much chaos at the moment is because there is in fact a spiritual awakening taking place. I subscribe to that theory as well. It would be nice if moving into enlightenment were all sunshine and rainbows, puppies and ice cream but change is uncomfortable, especially if you push against it and we humans tend to like our routines and patterns. A routine makes us feel safe simply by virtue of the fact that it is repetition of the familiar. Something that threatens our habits and patterns sets off alarm bells that make us want to rebel.

The more energy we put into pushing against what we don’t want, the less energy we have available to create what we do want. Eckhart Tolle covers this perfectly - “that which we resist persists.” Abraham Hicks also addresses this beautifully in the Law of Attraction. It’s also important to note that what you attract is not the same thing as what you deserve. We are all born perfect seeds of light and deserve to be contented if not downright joyful in every moment but we attract something other than contentment when we respond to a situation by pushing against it. In fact we attract the very thing we are resisting. Over, and over, and over again.

There is also a big difference between being open, present and aware in a situation and liking or accepting the situation. If you are in a situation that you do not like and you narrow your view to just pushing against it then you don’t have the use of all of your human capabilities to create an alternative. Plus it’s just easier to see something you don’t like and push against it than it is to identify an alternative but it’s a lot more pleasant to create something positive than to push against something unwanted. For example, no one wants to be on lock down in 2020. We could spend the entire time sulking about it, being cranky, drinking too much, arguing with each other and adding to the chaos However, I know lots of people who have used lock down to create positive changes in their lives. A lot of people who went from office jobs to telecommuting have started using their commuting time to take up a new form of exercise, meditate, spend more time with their family or otherwise enhance their lives I also know a lot of people who started the lock down with an increased consumption of alcohol who drink even less now than they did before the lockdown, just by making the choice to be more present in the moment. I know parents who now have a closer relationship with their kids. These are all positive changes that started with being open to new ideas about how to cope with an uncomfortable situation.

So to wrap up this introductory blog, I’ll reiterate that my intention is for this to be the last post about me. There are lots of incredibly talented thinkers and writers taking on the meaning of life and/or how to get your own life together. I do not pretend to know more or know something different but I do have my own voice, good intuition, good intentions and after 20 years of teaching, I have developed decent skills for communicating. I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out concepts that I thought were difficult to grasp and I feel like if I can add anything new to the mix, it’s that I have a knack for simplifying complex ideas and I also have ideas on how to cross pollinate different concepts from different gurus to create new recipes for making change more comfortable.

In addition to the future blog ideas listed to the right, I also intend to introduce lessons learned from chance moments and encounters that made me stop and think differently and I hope to keep the conversation light and entertaining because that will make it a lot more fun for all of us. I would love it if these posts lead to a community of like-minded friends doing great things in the world together but for now, baby steps. One post at a time. If you made it this far, thanks for reading the last sentence in my first blog post and I hope to see you next time.

In the coming weeks, I will post about:

The relationship between your breath, your spirit and your physical energy centers
Getting your low frequency body/human suit pulsating with your high frequency spirit in every nook and cranny of your being
The importance of deeply feeling your emotions without acting on them
Introducing different spiritual leaders that I admire so that you can admire them too (if you don’t already)
Different ways to meditate and what you can get out of it if you aren’t doing it already (it doesn’t have to be time consuming or difficult)
Art but probably not in the way you expect.
Masculine vs. Feminine energy and why balance is important
The power of music.
How to notice where in your body you get blocked
Lots of ways you can get unblocked