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The Lady of the Lake:

Love is in the air

The origins of St Valentine’s Day are about as clear as the mud at the bottom of the lake. There are numerous suggestions as to who he was, when he lived, how he died and what he did to be heralded as the man associated with the day of romance in the Christian calendar.

One thing that is clear however, is that the day that has been dedicated to St Valentine, coincides (almost) with the pagan festival of Lupercalia: the festival of fertility on February 15th. And you only have to go out in nature to realise the reason: early spring is the time for mating!

Waterfowl all across the lake are pairing up. Cobs fighting off other male swans; ganders shooing away all-comers for their mating rights; drakes battling it out for their chosen partner. The testosterone is rising.

I have been observing these behaviours for many years as I sit and contemplate life, the lake, the universe and myriad other topics that fill my head. And, as a woman; a feminist, I can’t help wondering what the females think of all this male dominance? And, of course, it’s not that long ago that woman were also treated as chattels to be bartered, fought over, handed over to a man she might not even have met before. And, of course that is still happening in some parts of the world.

So, as I celebrate Valentine’s Day today with my choice of husband, I will also send out energy to those women around the world who do not have a say in their partners; the ones who are forced into marriages; the men and women who live in countries where it is still illegal to be with the ones they love; those who are less fortunate than we are living in C21st Britain.

Happy Valentine’s Day. And, if you can’t be with the one you love – love yourself! You’re in a lifetime partnership with YOU so make sure you pay yourself as much attention as you would like a lover to pay you!

The sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself 

That profound quote from Kahlil Gibran in the book The Prophet, relates to children. It begins: Our children are not our children… and then goes on to say that they are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.

When I first read that, about 25 years ago, I struggled to get my head round it. Of course, my children were my children! What was he on about? But, as my children grew into beautiful self sufficient adults – and then went on to have children of their own – I realised that although I had given birth to them and nurtured them through infancy and childhood, they did not belong to me. I had simply launched them onto Life’s vast ocean and it was up to them to navigate their own voyages.

I think a lot about my children and grandchildren. Especially when I’ve just spent a weekend with them all as I did last weekend. I never cease to count my blessings where they are concerned.

I have always wanted children and I was fortunate in that I had no problems conceiving. Not everyone wants children, of course, but for those who do and, for any number of reasons, find it difficult to fall pregnant, it becomes an all-consuming preoccupation. Their life’s longing for sons and daughters of their own.

I have treated two clients who were undergoing IVF and were still finding it difficult to conceive. One I treated with Reiki and the other with TheataHealing (TM). And it’s the latter that I want to speak about. ThetaHealing uses muscle testing to discover deeply held beliefs that are holding us back or blocking our energy and changes them into more affirming, productive beliefs. This doesn’t just mean changing I can’t have children into I can have children. It means going deeper into our unconscious and unearthing some long forgotten off-the-cuff remarks made in passing that have hunkered down and germinated until they have completely swamped our energy pathways.

In the case of client B, by going back and uncovering years of beliefs, we discovered that, as a child, her older sister had said, “You’ll make a rubbish parent one day.” Gradually, by paring back the layers, we changed this into something that was authentic and real: I am a loving, nurturing woman. Within a year, she was pregnant and now has three thriving children of her own.

Many years ago I worked with a young woman who kept saying, I’m never having any kids; I’m never going to have children. Some years later when she decided she did,  after all, want children, she was unable to have any. All manner of tests showed nothing physically preventing either her or her husband having children and numerous rounds of IVF didn’t work. It was as if she’d brainwashed her body into infertility. Perhaps if ThetaHealing had been available then, it might have been a different story. But, sadly, it wasn’t.

The mind, body and spirit are all interconnected and affect each other – even when we’re not aware of it. People always say, be careful what you wish for, but be careful what you think and say too! We can only have one thought at a time so let’s make it a positive one.

And, by the way, client A who had the Reiki is now also a proud mother of two boys .

Only dead fish go with the flow!

Some years ago I saw a card with this quote by Andy Hunt: Only dead fish go with the flow! It made stop and think because whenever I’d resisted anything in the past, those around me had always encouraged me to just go with the flow. 

And that was how I had lived my life for a long time – going with the consensus; not rocking the boat; trying to keep everyone happy.
Except the big flaw in my plan was that I never could keep everyone happy but I could guarantee that the one person who was rarely happy was me!

I can’t remember at what age the penny finally dropped but I was certainly an adult: a mother with three children in fact. I realised that I’d drifted into a career that I didn’t enjoy – to keep my parents happy; I was eating meat which made me feel ill – because I’d been told it was `inconvenient and selfish’ to be vegetarian (???). I was even wearing clothes that I didn’t feel comfortable in to fit an image of what people expected of me. I was denying who I was: going with the flow, drifting through life with no clear purpose for what I wanted. And I didn’t want my children to fall into that trap. I wanted them to be strong, independent individuals with a clear sense of self. (Which has happened, by the way.)

Our lives are like journeys through a forest – at each fork in the path we must choose; some choices might be good ones, some not so good but we will have made those choices ourselves.

If we don’t take charge of our own lives, we give away our power to others. Not making decisions is making a decision to hand over responsibility to those around us. A client who is in remission from cancer said that now she’s got her life back she was not going to sit back and allow things to just happen: she was going to proactive in creating the life she wants. And we don’t need to wait until we have cancer to make that decision for ourselves.

As I sat by the lake this morning it was very windy and I watched a bevy of swans drifting wherever the wind took them. Then, almost in unison, enough was enough. They started paddling against the current taking charge of their own, and the group’s, destiny. Floating is fine for a while but swimming is much more productive and much more exhilarating!

So let’s start swimming. Literally swimming for our lives!

The blessings of responsibility

People often talk about the burden of responsibility – and taking a lot of responsibility can sometimes feel, emotionally, very heavy. However burdens, like carrying any weight can, and will, make us stronger. Learning to take responsibility for our speech, actions and choices in life helps us to grow as people. And learning from the consequences of our life choices will make us wiser. Avoiding making decisions might feel like an easier way of being but it also opens us up to dependency on others and, if things don’t turn out the way we wanted, blame!

Blaming others is, in my opinion, the scourge of our society. Listen to politicians: the government accuse the opposition; the opposition accuse the government. Look at divorces: he blames her; she blames him; or he blames him and she blames her – and on and on it goes. The merry-go-round of blame – only it isn’t very merry!

This morning I was contacted by a friend – let’s call him Bob. Bob’s friend, Ray, has bowel cancer. He’s very ill in The Cristie Hospital in Manchester and Bob said, `I’ll tell Ray that you’d like to send him Reiki.’ Er – no! Absolutely not! It’s not for me to tell anyone I’d like to send them Reiki. It’s up to Ray – or Bob, on Ray’s behalf – to ask me to send Reiki. Let’s imagine that this is Ray’s time to pass from this world to the next and his family found out that I’d been sending Reiki without permission, they might be angry and blame me for Ray’s death. By the way, Reiki can’t cause anyone’s death however, it can make it more peaceful and pain-free. But not everyone knows that. It’s about taking responsibility for ourselves rather than assuming we know what’s best for others.

Towards the end of his life my brother, Martin, went blind. One day he was standing in town waiting to meet a friend when a total stranger, seeing his white stick, took his arm and led him across the road. Martin protested but the man continued, almost dragging him to the other side. No doubt the man thought he was doing a good turn. Perhaps he’d gone home and told his family how he’d helped a poor blind man. The problem was, he hadn’t asked my brother if he wanted to cross the road. And the reality was, instead of helping him, he’d actually endangered his life because Martin then had to negotiate the traffic on his own to get back to where he’d wanted to be in the first place!

It’s something I feel passionately about: taking responsibility for ourselves – and that includes our mistakes; owning our `stuff’; asking others if they want support – and accepting their answer.

Responsibility makes us stronger and wiser; without responsibility we’re still treating ourselves like children.

And, by the way, Bob asked Ray if he wanted to be on my Distant Healing list and Ray said yes. So this morning he, along with 17 other souls and their families, were sent Reiki from the lakeside.

Imbolc, Candlemas and a cosy fire

February 1st is the Pagan festival of Imbolc (pronounced Im’olc) and it is half way between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. It’s symbolised by lighting fires so that people could have power over the sun in the months ahead to warm the earth so that seeds will grow,

Later on this became the Christian festival of Candlemas which is celebrated on February 2nd because that’s 40 days after Christmas and is, as its name suggests, represented by lighting candles.

Fires and candles are both forms of energy: heat and light energy. When I give Reiki energy to a client I feel heat coming through my body to my hands and transferring to the other person and I visualise light coming through me. Sometimes clients feel the heat, sometimes they don’t. Everyone is different. Some people report feeling tingling, others pulsating energy during a Reiki treatment; some experience flashing lights or colours. Some people say they can’t feel anything. There is no right or wrong: whether or not a client experiences feelings during Reiki, I can feel the energy being absorbed so I know that energy is being transferred.

Imbolc and Candlemas are also the time of year to be preparing for the forthcoming year’s harvest – be that a food harvest or a fruition of ideas put in place at this time. It’s a time for planting seeds and planning where we want to go with our lives in the next few months.

Take time to plan your journey, plant your seeds and then allow them to germinate by a cosy Imbolc fire! Which is exactly what I’m doing now!

Thermals at Dawn

Although we don’t have any snow in Wanstead (yet!), it was -4 this morning when I went out to the lake, so it was definitely a day to don my Damarts.

I first started to go to the lake when I had a dog. Jess, a German Shepherd cross and, later, Bumble, a bearded collie, would wander around or go for a swim while I stood, or sat, and used the Reiki distant healing symbol to send Reiki to people who had asked to be on my list.

Sadly, we haven’t had a dog for 10 years but I still go to the lake to meditate and send Reiki to those who are ill or in physical or emotional pain. I find the energy flows much more readily when I’m outdoors, especially by water whether that’s a lake, a river or the sea.

All forms of energy healing require the person’s consent however, I am often asked to include people’s family or friends so I always start with the following mantra:

Send Reiki energy to the following people. If they have not given their direct consent, send it to their higher selves to decides when and how best to dispense it for their, and the Universe’s, highest good.

It’s wonderful to spend time immersed in nature: it grounds me and I feel ready to face the day when I’ve been to the lake. Today I watched a fox trot across the frozen lake, a flock of brightly coloured parakeets swoop by and a brazen little robin come right up to me as I sat on the bank.

Of course, being mindful of the beauty of nature is one thing but it’s also important to be mindful about what we’re doing with our bodies – as I discovered when I came a cropper on a frozen puddle!

Thankfully, I have well padded glutes, so the only damage was to my pride!