How do I deal with distraction?

/in , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

We had a request from a reader to talk about the subject of distraction. What is meant by distraction? We could say that distraction is something that pulls you away from your focus on awakening. You have your intention or your awareness placed on one thing and something draws your attention in a different direction; you are distracted. To begin with, as with everything else, you are not a victim of distraction. In fact, it might be more truthful to say that you welcome distraction because it brings you back into safer territory. There is a fear that surfaces when you look deeply within yourself, a terror of releasing the lies and illusions you have lived with as well as seeing the things inside of you that you don’t want to admit are there. So, the distraction may be a very welcomed event. This is all part of the awakening process.

One type of distraction consists of things that happen in the outer world, and these events are constant. There is information coming to you from your cell phone, from television, from people that you meet, from world events, from governments and politics, as well as from wars, pollution and pandemics; all these things grab your attention and instill fear or other emotions. Am I saying that you should not pay attention to any of these things from the world? No, in fact I would say, “Good luck with that.” To try not to pay attention to them creates a conflict. You will bounce back and forth between the two in an unending dualistic fashion. Peace cannot come to you through conflict. We are coming from a basic assumption that you wish to experience your awakened state and that you don’t want to be torn by the craziness of the world. We have to admit that it is a pretty insane place. You could spend all of your time and energy noticing the craziness, mulling it over in your mind as you search for solutions. All of these efforts to fight it and to make changes are nothing but a fool’s quest. You will not succeed. The world is as it is. However, you can make use of the world’s distractions.

First of all, you can choose to pay less attention to them. Short of going to sit on a mountaintop, you won’t be able to escape the world totally. You can choose to not let your mind dwell on these distractions, to notice when you are, and to let it go and let the next thought come in. Secondly, as these thoughts do come into your mind, notice where your judgments arise, whether toward the world as a whole, a group, or an individual. As you find yourself upset and in judgment over what you perceive, I want to remind you that this is all projection. You cannot possibly judge others for something that you do not hold within yourself. You judge yourself for this, though you may be in denial, necessitating the projection. The ego mind wants to argue and say that you are not like that. As long as you hold on to denial, you will go on through your life, projecting, being incapable of doing anything about your projections, and experiencing sorrow, pain, and suffering. You will feel hopeless, until you finally just give up.

For instance, you see an example of violence in the world. You may feel sadness for those you see as victims of the violence and anger toward those you see as perpetrators. You might also feel anger directed toward those who differ in opinion from you about who is at fault. All of this you see as external to yourself in your thinking. You are righteous in your feelings. This is denial. Its opposite is acceptance, which might look like acknowledging that you are violent. This is the critical point. The ego mind does not want to take responsibility for its projections. This keeps you stuck. This is how distraction works. You are distracted from the truth of your own violence by the actions of others. Because you have little or no hope of changing anyone else or the world, you are helplessly stuck in a violent world. But, you do have full power to accept the violence within yourself. You can accept it without judgment, without labeling it as right or wrong. This is not about changing anything, including you. It is just noticing, just acknowledging. If you can’t get past your denial, you might look at where you have a secret wish for harm to come to those you are judging. Maybe you wish they were dead. That is violence. When you wish anything negative to happen to another, you are exhibiting violence. Are you absolutely certain there are no violent tendencies within you? Why do you avoid acknowledging the violence within you? Do you fear a punishing God? No such God exists; you are loved unconditionally. You are projecting your own belief in a need for punishment upon God. Are you afraid that you will not be rewarded with heaven, God’s forgiveness, ascension, enlightenment, or awakening if you admit to being a violent person? The only one standing between you and these “rewards” is you. Holding on to untruths keeps you separate from realizing the truth of God. Accept that you are violent. If you notice fear or judgment accompanying that, accept that also. Perhaps you also notice embarrassment or shame. Acknowledge that. The distraction is in believing it is somebody else when it is always you.

Connected with the outer distractions are those that come from your thoughts. Nearly every thought that you hold expresses a belief that is not true. Let’s say the thought expresses a judgment about your partner such as they hold you prisoner and don’t allow you to fully be who you are. There were events in the past that you projected onto your partner. Now you hold a belief that is “proven” by this imagined past. Today when you meet your partner, instead of being in the now – in this moment, you are living in the past with the lies you projected. You recreate something you never wanted to begin with. This is not your partner doing this; this is you. Your job is to not let yourself get distracted with untrue thoughts. Notice each thought that emerges in your mind. Ask yourself if that thought is really true. Is there projection involved? Is it my partner who doesn’t let me be who I am or do I do that to myself? Am I afraid to be who I am? Notice these things.

You are distracted by your beliefs that come from the past. Believing these thoughts keeps you from being present. This is not to say that the past and your thoughts hold no value for you. Technological information is valuable. You want to remember what you have learned about driving a car or using a computer. This value ends when your thoughts are about yourself, others, and what to do. Here the past can only confuse things. You know things about how to work with the physical world, but you know nothing about the truth of yourself and others, about divinity. You know something about how to survive in the world, but you didn’t come here to survive. You came to wake up. Thoughts cannot help you there. Finding the truth is a process of elimination. As these distracting thoughts enter your mind you recognize, one after another, that they are not true and you cast them off. When you have discarded what is false, all that can remain is truth. It is likely that every thought you have is not true, is a distraction from being present, from being awake. So, look at each one and then release it. If you give energy to a concept, you sustain an untruth and you remain in confusion. To paraphrase Socrates, “The only difference between me and those I meet is that, even though neither of us really understands anything, I know that I don’t know anything while they believe they are wise.” As long as you think you know, you cannot find the truth. You can reset your default reaction to each thought that enters your mind to be one of disbelief. Fears and hopes about what might happen in the future also distract you. These thoughts, too, keep you from acting in the present.

As you learn to ignore the past and the future you are left with the now. You ignore the distractions of your thoughts and notice what is truly present. As an example, say that someone stomps on your toe with their boot heel. You feel immediate pain. That is real. It is in the now. If you blame or judge the other for that action, that is not real. It is not a present reaction, but a thought about the recent past; it is likely a projection. As you release that thought and come back to the present you will likely find the pain quickly dissipates. What is real is the nature around you, the sun shining or the rain falling, the birds chirping or the dog barking. To wish that it wasn’t raining is to deny the reality of what it is and substitute your thought from the past about how the weather should be. You will never win that fight. It is insane to try. Accept what is. Release your thoughts. Analysis and interpretation are always misleading. Thinking you should or shouldn’t do something isn’t sane; these are just more thoughts from the past. You have been taught ideas by your society, your parents, your teachers, and your peers. You made a decision in the past and you believe it applies to the present. In the now, you never have to make a choice. Choices come from your mind and from the past. The now lets you know what to do. It is certain. You don’t have to decide what to do if a dog attacks or a car swerves toward you. You simply act. Knowing exactly what to do is sometimes called intuition. It is knowingness without understanding why you know. It is certainty that defies explanation. Sometimes this can feel perfectly natural. You eat when you are hungry; sleep when you are tired. You may want to sing or play an instrument, to draw or paint, to run or to swim. You do these things as expressions that move from within you, not because you think you should. If it is the latter, you will eventually meet resistance. The mind always tries to complicate things. It wants to dictate what and when you should eat, the proper position for sleep and the right time and purpose for creative activities. All of the craziness of distractions enters, keeping you from being present. This fills your time and saps your energy.

Finally, and we could have just as easily begun here, let’s look at distraction as simply not paying attention. This is a form of resistance. You have made the decision that you wish to wake up, to ascend. Most days you don’t focus on that intention. You go on living life as you always have, distracted by each little thing you encounter each day. You take your thoughts seriously without further investigation. Periodically you become aware of what you are doing and feel guilt, perhaps hopelessness. What is there to do? You can at least acknowledge how you are dealing with life. Intention for you does not seem to be enough. There needs to be a fire lit within. The whole world and all of your education and experience seem to oppose your awakening. There must be a passion to face all of this and to keep facing it. Without this passion the distractions will continue to control. Maybe you can generate such a focus. Perhaps things need to get worse for you before they can get better. Your situation might have to become unbearable. Spirit is always doing whatever it can to shake you awake. Your thoughts may judge this as good or bad. In the now it is always perfect. The process of getting there may be frightful and painful, but so is the illusion of the world. In the now there are no distractions. There is only the real-time perfection of what is happening and your inner guided response. Eventually the passion will come. It is your call, and your calling.

Good Now

Sanhia/Spirit

What if this was the last day of your life?

/in , , , , , , , ,

A question that sometimes is asked of a person, often in connection with their spiritual path, is “What would you do if you had but one day left to live?” This, of course, is not a question of what heroic efforts might save your life, but rather one that forces you to choose what is truly important. This necessitates a great personal investigation. What do you place such a high value on that you would be sure to make it a part of your last day on earth? Conversely, what things would you definitely not do, not waste your precious moments with. As you are working with this process, you are not limited to pretending that you have only one day to live, you can give yourself a week, a month, or even a year. Perhaps what remains undone seems large and would require more time. Whatever the time span, the purpose is to become aware of the deep passions and desires that you are not exercising in your day to day life, to look at how much of your existence is spent with things that are not truly meaningful for you. It is about using your time productively. On that level it is a wonderful process, but that’s not where we are going today. We are moving to another level. That is always what these messages are about…taking things to another level, or looking at things from an ascension perspective. So, let’s be a little counter-intuitive again today.

You have likely done some of this kind of work already, looking at what your passion or your purpose is. You are aware of what gives you joy. Perhaps you don’t fill your days with these things to the level you would wish, but you have awareness. You are not choosing to live your life in absolute denial of where your heart or Spirit leads you. So what is this different perspective I am suggesting that you take? If you are on a serious ascension path, rather than holding spirituality as an interesting hobby that you enjoy exploring, there is another way to play this game. If your intention is to realize your Divine self, to experience that this is all an illusion, and to let it go – and that this takes precedence over everything else – you may wish to look at what you would do with the last day of your life from a different perspective. Whatever your answer to this month’s question might be, that is what stands between you and the realization of your ascension. Whatever you feel is undone or has not been completed yet, is what keeps you tied to this body. You will stay until you either complete it or let it go. The purpose of the “last day” process is not one of learning to stop wasting time. Time is an illusion that cannot be wasted. It is not about doing what you came here to do. There is nothing that is really important to do here. This is not real.  If there is anything important for you to do (I am just throwing this contradiction in here because the ego mind goes absolutely crazy with inconsistency, while absolute truth can never be communicated in words), you have no clue in your conscious thinking mind what it is. But, there is a plan that Spirit has for you.

The best you might do with today’s process would be to say to yourself that if you have only one day (week, month, year…) you are going to listen to Spirit and do whatever you are directed to do. Anything else is coming from your ego. It amounts to your ego placing an importance upon you in this body in this illusion. Take some deep breaths and let this be assimilated into your being. What does this mean? It means that while you are in this process of waiting for the grace of God to lead to a full awakening to your Divine nature, you could be compressing time by looking at what you think you still have to do or want to do – perhaps what some people refer to as their “bucket list”. One choice would be to achieve all of those things so that they no longer stand in your way. The more efficient path would be to release the desires, to give up all your plans. Give them all to Spirit. If Spirit so guides you, take an action, but as for your ego self, there are no directions to be taken. You simply do the things that allow you to remain in your body in the moment…breathe, drink, eat, exercise, play with your mirrors…and then let them go. We are not just speaking of actions, of achievements, and of concrete goals. There may also be emotional, relationship desires you want fulfilled. Perhaps you want to feel loved or to have others express love to you in certain ways. Maybe there are spiritual gifts you want to demonstrate, such as translocation, channeling, time travel, or direct manifestation of objects. There is no limit to the number of things that your ego may want to experience. I wish to remind you that each one of these desires, including those that you may not even be conscious about now, keeps you rooted in the physical. They are all things you need to do in a body.

There is no judgment here. To be human is to have ego desires. There is no punishment for holding on to them. We are only suggesting that you become fully conscious of what your desires are. If you wish to release some desires, judging yourself for having them is perhaps the most inefficient technique you could come up with. Let them go when you are ready. A motivation for choosing to let go of these goals is to realize that whatever joy or satisfaction this experience or achievement might bring you, it will not relieve you of the pain of believing yourself to be separate from God. It will not bring you nearly the joy, pleasure, and ecstasy that are the truth of who you are when you let go of the illusion of being this physical body. You will get but a taste of Divine love.

It is a very simple process for today. Ask yourself what you would do if your time remaining in this body was limited; then let go of all need or desire to do those things. If that isn’t easy, give it to Spirit. If you don’t have the will to let go of something…go do it. Have that experience. Manifest it. Create it. One day you will simply say to yourself:

 “Enough! I give up all my desire for earthly experiences. I surrender it to Spirit and let myself be guided by Spirit to whatever actions are part of His plan for me while still in a body. Let me become one with the divine plan, which is truly my plan.” 

Good Now

Sanhia

What tools are there for realizing ascension?

/in , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

You deserve to be in a place of joy, love, and peace. The ego always pulls you away from your true inheritance from God. What is certain is that you will ascend; you will realize your divinity. You will know true joy, love, and peace. People have asked how they can shorten the period in the meantime in which they are suffering and in fear.

I am presenting you with a short list of things that you may do to help speed up the chasing away of the ego and the welcoming of your divine self. I present this not in the spirit of burdening you with more thoughts about what you should be doing, but to offer you some inspirational choices. As you move toward realizing your ascension, your moments of pain will be spread further apart and will be of shorter duration. Your go-to place will be joyful, loving and accepting of whatever is present.

First are some suggestions for how to deal with all the lists in your life. I expect that most of you have lists, whether written or mental. Some of the experts suggest that the way to handle your lists is to tackle the toughest thing first. The thinking is that when the biggest challenge is out of the way, everything else becomes easier. Of course, the next thing you take on is what is now the biggest challenge. I think this orientation is backwards. Look at your list and ask yourself what would be the most fun thing to do. What would give you the most joy and excitement? Or ask what is the easiest thing for you to do? You do that task first. After experiencing the joy of crossing something off your list, check to see what is now the most fun and easy thing. That is all you do. Of course, your list will never be finished: you will always be adding more things to it, but the choosing remains the same. It is not a question of what has been on your list longest or what most “needs” to be done. The choice is always determined by your passion. If you believe that life is a struggle, choosing the hard things first will reaffirm that creed. You think that if you just force yourself to do these tasks you have been putting off, your life will ease up and you can enjoy things. The truth is that your list will keep growing, as will your certainty that this is just how life is. If the habit you nurture is to look at your list and ask what would be fun to do today, what is most exciting – your whole attitude toward life will begin to shift. You deserve to do what you came here to do, and that “doing” will be a joyful experience.

I recommend that you treat the list I am about to give in that manner. There are more things on it than you could do every day. “Cherry pick” the ones that most appeal to you and play with them first. There is no order of importance to the items.

1. Intention: Have you made your intention to realize your divinity? If not, the pain will not begin to end until you commit to joy and ascension. If so, there is no need to repeat the request. However, as you are looking at whatever is troubling you or whatever logs you have thrown in front of yourself for the day, ask yourself how all this connects with your intention. That is the important question. The task is to align yourself with what you want. Perhaps this means letting go of something. Maybe you are giving importance to matters that are not connected to the truth of who you are. Are you are being true to yourself? Give everything to Spirit.

2. The five-step process: If you are not feeling good, emotionally or physically, do the process. Go through it on your own, or listen to the recording on the website, or contact one of your friends to lead you through it. Decide that you don’t wish to live with the discomfort; change your story. Remember that the fear that you transform to love through Spiritual Alchemy is permanently altered. You have accumulated a finite amount of fear in your body. It is only a matter of time before love rules your day instead of fear.

3. Numerology chart – Your Love Letter from your Higher Self: There are many different ways that you can play with your chart. You could pick any major position in your chart and ask for guidance concerning a situation you are dealing with. Or you could pick one position at a time and think and meditate on it. Eventually you might work through your entire chart. Focusing on the name numbers will help you accept, support, and love yourself, while looking at the birth numbers can assist you in accepting what you have created or drawn into your life. Allow Spirit to talk with you through the numbers. Your Ascension Numerology book will assist you as you begin this process, but eventually the numbers and positions will become such a part of you that you will only refer to the book occasionally.

4. Spiritually inspiring reading: Find an inspirational book to read out of daily, perhaps in the morning as a way to start off your day. You may have a particular favorite or might move from one book to another. Ask your friends for recommendations. You can read from our old messages here on the website or in the book format: God Blesses You: Ascension Messages from Sanhia. Reading regularly helps align your brain-mind with Spirit instead of the ego.

5. A Course in Miracles: I have separated this out from inspirational reading, because the Course is a particular study. It is designed to be worked with in small blocks of time on a daily basis. I see the Course as a spiritual equivalent to a workout at the gym, A day here and there will not make much difference. But years of regular training will perform Miracles with your body or with your spiritual awareness. We could call it spiritual toning. It takes quite a while to turn around the ship of mass consciousness. If you stay with the Course, the ego doesn’t have a prayer.

6. Forgiveness: Practice forgiveness daily, constantly. Separation evaporates. Forgive yourself; forgive others. Forgive God; forgive the weather. Forgive the driver for hanging out in the left-hand lane. Forgive everyone, everything, all of the time. You do this not because the forgiveness is needed, because everyone, including yourself, is innocent, but because when you forgive, it allows a place to align with Spirit. When you are judging yourself or others you are separate from Spirit. That places you in hell. When you are in hell you are suffering. The ego will tell you “that bastard deserves it”; he deserves your anger and your judgment. The ego loves righteous indignation. It creates enemies and separation. Forgiveness is the quickest way. Everything in your life that is painful is connected to a lack of forgiveness. Every physical ailment you have is linked to not being able to forgive. If you are having trouble forgiving, ask Spirit for help. In the end, as well as in the beginning, there is nothing to forgive. There is only innocence.

7. See the perfection: See the perfection in each person and each situation you meet. They are here to support your ascension. The driver who just cut you off was the perfect driver for you at this moment. You have the perfect President. Everything is perfect. That plane crashing with no survivors was a perfect event. Divine, as it should be. The dis-ease, whatever it is…perfect. Accepting perfection is the greatest threat to the ego. The ego’s job is to protect you from imperfections. It uses your judgment and your anger to accomplish this. Perfection puts the ego out of work. With the recognition of perfection, you can no longer be a victim to anything. Negative patterns will disappear from your life. There is nothing left to fear. This is heavenly. It doesn’t matter whether you understand why something is perfect, that knowing will come in time. Just trust. Nothing has to change.

8. Accept God: This doesn’t make any difference to God, but it makes an enormous difference for you. Here is how I know that people fear God, even if they claim to be atheists. If they hold a speck of judgment, they believe in and fear God, a punishing God. People consciously deny the existence of God because they have made Him in their image. They think that God is judgmental and vengeful. They blame God for what humans have created…which is everything that exists in the physical world. They deny God because judgmental people claim to speak for God. Separate all of these ego lies about God from the truth, which is so simple. God is unconditional love. There is nothing that God would ever judge. Claim God. Reunite with Him.

If you pick just one of the items on this list, the one that most draws you, it will make an enormous difference in your life. When you are ready to take on more, you will know. If you skip a day, forgive yourself and start over. God doesn’t care.

God Blesses You, 

Sanhia 

How can I reduce stress in my life?

/in , , , , , , ,

When you don’t see perfection in everything that is happening around you, or when you don’t experience the divinity in yourself and others, you may think that you have to fix things. You often feel that the responsibility lies with you and a heavy weight descends upon your shoulders. It seems that you must deal with all of these challenges and with the ”idiots” surrounding you. It appears that you have to protect yourself from the latter, avoid them, or attempt to control them, so that they don’t ruin this great effort you are making to create perfection. It sounds like a tough job. I’m glad I don’t have to take that one on.

Your life becomes such a struggle that you lose sight of how total, constant, and unending the battle is. You try to reduce the amounts of stress you are aware of to a level that is bearable, but no matter how much you are able to alleviate situations, life remains a battle. This struggle is your creation. You are choosing to have hell on earth. No matter how much you let go of, the inferno remains. The questions is, ”Why are you creating hell on earth to begin with?” You can see divinity and perfection, or you can choose to fight. We have spent the past two messages focusing on the former, so let’s try working from another side this time. You don’t have to see the divinity in another, when they seem to act as your trigger. Nor do you have to see the perfection of what is happening, to give up your resistance. Just say NO to struggle. Decide to stop fighting. Let go of it. Decide that there is nothing that is so important that it requires straining.

If today were the last day you were going to be in this body, would you spend it in struggle and stress over little things? This is one acid test to see if struggle is involved in your day. Ease up on yourself. As you become aware that you are struggling, take a deep breath and relax. Go do something that does not feel like struggle, something that feels like fun, or joy, or even ecstasy. What would you truly rather be doing right now?

Buried deep in your consciousness is the belief that your very existence depends upon struggle, that if you don’t fight to survive you will simply go down – for the third time. And that’s it. Your whole life is defined by separation from divinity. Your brain-mind is full of reasons why you have stress. Things have to be done, it argues. This is a story of separation from the divine, a belief in your weakness. Argue for your limitations and they are yours. You are that powerful. The ego arguments for struggle are very rational to your brain-mind. There is no end of them. You will carry them to your grave. Or, you can just say NO. You can refuse to listen to them. You can change your mind. This might throw you into such terror that it will be best to do the five-step process. Eventually, you will be able to choose your passions over your guilt and fear with greater ease. The first step, as always, is to have the intention to give up the fight. Remember that what you are fighting against is always an illusion. It is never the truth.

There are two primary places where you can get stuck. One is the belief that the nature of life is simply that you have to struggle. You think you have no choice but to work at something you don’t like, that you are required to do all these things you don’t want to do merely to survive. If you want to do better than just subsist, it seems you have to strain even more. Look how much hassle is involved just to go have fun on a vacation. The other belief is that anytime somebody else is involved with what you are doing, there will be a battle. You anticipate working together as a challenge and relationships as hard work. That’s the story. It is a belief in struggle. You don’t have to do it anymore. The battle is totally within you. Nobody else can force you to fight. Every time that you give up a little piece of this resistance you realize a little more of what true joy can be like. If you absolutely give up control, you can sense your divine nature right here, right now.

You have experienced this. You have had moments when you were at peace and your brain-mind was at rest, not wrestling with any devils at all. You were enjoying what was there right then, feeling the unconditional love of the belly-mind. You feel that when you finish the second step of the process. But you have the story that it is not practical to stay there all of the time. You wonder how you could get anything done, how you could survive. On the other hand, when you believe that there is nothing but struggle, you begin to call for and welcome your death on a subtle level. Nobody wants to live forever if survival means constant stress. Let’s talk about what true responsibility is. You are responsible for choosing your reality. You are not responsible for taking whatever steps are necessary for making your reality happen. Spirit does that for you. Let it. There was an advertising program for an American busing company back in the 60’s. The image was a powerful, comfortable bus with a competent, professional driver. The voice-over said, ”Leave the driving to us.” The ad implied that you would enjoy the ride, have fun, relax, be safe and protected, and arrive well rested. In your mind, hear Spirit saying, “Leave the struggle to us.”

God Blesses You,

Sanhia 

Why do negative things keep happening to me?

/in , , , , , , , ,

Are there situations that you are not pleased with? Do you feel victimized by others or by life? Do negative patterns in relationships persist in following you? Do you live with constant stress, worries, or fear? Are you looking for a magic pill to make all of this go away? I have just the thing for you. Change your story. Things are the way they are because that is the way you believe things are. That is the story you have been telling yourself all of your life, maybe for many lifetimes. You are the creator of your reality. Nobody else has any control over your experiences but you. If you don’t like what is going on, change your story.

Changing your story is straightforward, but it takes some persistence. To begin with, take absolute responsibility for how things are. Maybe the way you believe things are comes from family or societal influences. Perhaps your parents told you that life is a struggle. Maybe they told you never to trust anybody. It could be that their example taught you that marriage means fighting, lack of communication, and power struggles. Possibly the society you grew up in told you that life is about competition or that you need to deny your desires in order to be financially responsible. You might believe that you are genetically disposed toward certain dis-eases or conditions. Let’s just stop there and go back to square one. You are a divine child of God. You are created in the image and likeness of your creator; therefore, the truth of who you are is a being of unconditional love and unlimited creative energy. There are no more limits on you than there are on the Creator of all that is. The physical world, as you experience it, is entirely your creation. Entirely. It is your story. If you don’t like the story, change it.

Once you have taken responsibility for your experience of the world, you are ready to change your story. Remember that all manifestation happens by focusing on the desired reality with your thoughts and powering them into manifestation with the fuel of unconditional love. If you are feeling fear, doubt, or any other emotion besides love, it is not time to focus on your desired reality. You will not succeed in manifesting your passion if you are not in touch with the love that is the truth of who you are. Use whatever techniques you have learned to get back to that sweet spot of unconditional love, that place where you love yourself without judgment. For some of you that might be through meditation, walking in nature, doing the five-step process, visiting with a trusted friend, or simply getting a good night’s sleep. If you don’t have such a resource, finding one becomes your primary goal. Spirit responds to your instructions. If you don’t treat yourself lovingly, how can It? When you find yourself in that sweet spot, take a look at what isn’t working in your life. What story have you been telling yourself to create such an outcome? What results would you rather experience? What is your new story?

The last part is the one that takes persistence. Become aware of each time you start to let the “old story” into your mind. Stop those thoughts cold in their tracks. Forgive yourself for letting them in. Go back to your new story. Slowly, the “old story” will stop appearing in your thoughts. Gradually you will notice the new story manifesting in your reality. Over time you will likely realize that you want to modify the new story as well. You are operating under a myriad of stories right now. It is not possible to change them all at once. Start with the squeakiest wheel. One or two or even three stories are all that you want to deal with now. The most important thing is for you to begin to realize on a cellular level that you are not a victim and have never been one. That is a tremendously freeing awareness. That is a major step toward realizing your ascension. Imagine a world where everybody is living the story of their choice. That’s my world. That’s my story and I’m not changing it.

God Blesses You,

Sanhia

What is meant by Right Livelihood?

/in , , , ,

The Buddhists have a term called Right Livelihood, which is one of the Eightfold Paths. The Eightfold Paths list the ways to overcome suffering and experience enlightenment. Right Livelihood, which is concerned with what you do to make a living, has two parts. The first part is simply to do no harm to others or to the planet. If you desire to find peace, whatever you work with is not to cause damage to any person. Secondly, your work is specialized to you. It is what you are called to do. It is something that nobody else could do in the way that you can. This is the element of Right Livelihood that I would like to look at today.

Some of you know what you came here to do, others have a piece of the puzzle, and the rest of you are just puzzled. For those who know your path, I encourage you to surrender more fully to your purpose, to let go of everything that is unlike it. Trust your own guidance; nobody else can tell you what you are here to do or how to do it.

For those of you who have a piece of the puzzle, it is time to give your life to that piece. Stop doing things that you know are not your purpose. Move through your fear that you will not be supported if you let go of the job that is not fulfilling. If you are worried that leaving your job means that you will lose your health insurance, turn your health over to Spirit instead of selling your soul for your body – a trade that never pays off in the end. Commit to spending more time with your purpose, so that month by month you come closer to realizing just where it is taking you. Where you find there is not enough time, begin cutting out those things (including jobs when it becomes necessary) that can only drag you down, those things which are not a part of your passion. Sometimes this requires surrendering to the reality that doing is more connected to your path than having. Love your path into beingness.

For those of you who are puzzled, there are two directions you can take which are not mutually exclusive. First, move toward anything for which you have passion. Schedule time in your calendar each week to do these things. Don’t think about practicality or how it could support you. Increase the amount of time you give to your passions each month. Second, begin letting go of activities for which you have no passion. Stop doing them or begin to plan how you can let them go. Simplify your life. You can begin by cleaning your physical surroundings of all the things you are no longer using for your passion.  More of what you want. Less of what you don’t want. Gradually your purpose will emerge. Enjoy. Ask Spirit for support.  Persevere. The universe is on your side.

God Blesses You,

Sanhia

Can you suggest a prayer for ascension?

/in , , , , , , ,

As you are all aware, there is either love or fear in each moment of each life. Love is truth; fear is illusion – it is not real. The deep inner knowledge of love as truth is what is called faith. Those who live in faith, live in joy. The absence of fear is an ecstatic experience. Thomas Merton was a 20th century Trappist Monk who understood, lived, and communicated the truth of love and faith to a very high degree. I want to share with you a meditation or prayer he wrote (channeled) concerning faith.

“My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following Your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please You does in fact please You. And I hope I have the desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this, You will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore, I will trust You always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for You are ever with me, and You will never leave me to face my perils alone.” (from Thoughts in Solitude)

Allow me to interpret this into my terminology.

“Oh, Spirit, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road before me. I cannot for certain know where it will end. I still feel separate from you. I am following the guidance of my passions, but I’m not certain if I am guided by love or fear. I desire to be guided by unconditional love. I want to feel at one with you. I desire to be always aligned with my true passion. I desire to always listen to the voice of love rather than the voice of fear. I know that no matter which I choose you will lead me to the events that will best facilitate my healing, because I have asked for it. I know that everything that happens is perfect, even if I do not yet understand why. I trust that I am safe and protected no matter how great my fear may be. I know that I am never alone, that the truth of me is immortal and cannot be harmed, and that you and my guides are always with me.”

You are always safe. Everything that happens is perfect. Follow your deepest passions. You are greatly and unconditionally loved.

God Blesses You,

Sanhia

What does attachment mean?

/in , , , , , , ,

For those of you not familiar with Buddhism, the Buddha left us the Four Noble Truths.

  1. Everyone suffers.
  2. Suffering comes from attachment.
  3. There can be an end to suffering.
  4. This end comes from following the Eightfold Path.

I am not going to go into the Eightfold Path today, but it is similar to things I have been sharing with you for years. Let us talk about attachment. It means having your emotional happiness, your peace of mind, dependent on things being the way that you want them to be, now. It might be attachment to the weather being a certain way or to a friend doing as you wish or to having more money or to getting the job you want. Whatever it is that is not the way you want it to be will bring you suffering unless you give up attachment. I wish for you to be free of suffering.

Giving up attachment does not mean giving up desire.  It does not mean giving up passion. It works like this. You feel a passion for something. This is guidance from your higher self, your God self. You ask Spirit for support. Then you let it go. Your job is over, except for one small thing. You are to trust that the perfect thing is returning to you. It may not look exactly like what you thought it would. If you knew exactly what would bring about your ascension you would have requested it long ago. All you can do is ask for that part that is revealed to you, and let it go. Whatever is in your life today is the perfect response to your past requests. Give up struggling and accept. Trust the perfection of the moment.

Think about what you are doing when you are attached to things being different than they are.  You are affirming your powerlessness and your victimhood. You are expressing your lack of trust in the Divine. This is not only how you are experiencing your present, but it is what you are projecting for your future.

Why struggle? Why make it hard? Just let go. It is so easy. Just let go. Just trust. Just surrender. Just relax. It is all perfect. There is a present here for you now, today. You can’t open it; you can’t receive it until you let go of what you thought would be there in its place. Open it now.

God Blesses You,

Sanhia

How can I get more joy in my life?

/in , ,

This will reach many of you on New Year’s Day. Some of you will be making resolutions, so let me jump on that bandwagon. I want to encourage you to make a resolution to commit to joy.

“What does this mean, Sanhia?” you may be thinking. Remember, it is your passion that connects you to your God-self and it is following your desires that brings you happiness. At the micro-level in each moment, choose the action or the thought that brings you more pleasure. This cannot be predicted in advance; that is, you can’t make a schedule for yourself and trust that it will adhere to the guideline of following your passion. You may have a loose idea of what you would like to accomplish today, but committing to joy may require you to be eternally vigilant to what is burning within you in the moment, and then flow through the day from one thing to another.

In a given moment you may be conscious of feeling a need to attend to something that you do not have excitement for. Simply be aware that you are making that choice. Ask Spirit that the action be experienced as pleasurably as possible and that it lead you in a serendipitous way to increased bliss.

By starting with small choices, you can gradually work your way to the larger choices that will increase your joy. You don’t need to quit your job or leave your relationship today. If it is truly time to do something like that, you will know. In the meantime, find the small actions throughout the day that make the job or the relationship more enjoyable.

Be conscious also about how you are spending money. How many purchases are habit based rather than joy based? Check to see if you truly have passion in that moment for the purchase you are making.  Credit can sometimes numb your ability to perceive what your desires truly are. If you are having credit problems, you might want to try buying only with cash (or check or debit card). See what you want most with the funds you actually have.

Commit to joy. Commit to passion. Commit to ascension. Who would want to live in a joyless eternity?  Your commitment to joy will prepare you well for whatever awaits you.

God Blesses You,

Sanhia

Will I ever fully heal myself?

/in , , , , ,

Have you been working on your personal healing for years? Have you been doing a lot of “processing”? Does it sometimes feel like there is an infinite amount of crap in there for you to clean up? Past lives, birth trauma, parents, bullies, self-worth issues, relationships, authority figures, the opposite sex, sexuality, purpose………when will it ever end? The answer is that it will never end. As long as your focus is on healing your problems, there will be problems.

What do I do Sanhia? Just give up? That would be a good start, but let me give it a little different focus. All this concentration on healing comes from the belief that there is something (many things!) wrong with you and that you need to be fixed. My job is to remind you that you are perfect; that there is nothing to heal; that you are a divine and innocent child of God. You did not create this body in order to heal; you created it so that you could realize your divine nature.

You are here to love. This could be stated in a variety of ways. You are here to follow your passion, to express, and to be joyful. You are here to love yourself and others, and  to give joyful, devoted service. You are here to fully realize the truth of who you are as a divine and innocent child of God.

Choose fun. Choose love. Choose what you want. ‘Tis the season to choose to be jolly (as are all of the others).

God Blesses You,

Sanhia