It wasa beautiful clear morning but a stiff southerly blew down George St and I’m sure there some banner bearers with very sore arms this morning as they struggled into the wind while the photographer operating near us found a secondary task in running after band members whose hats had blown off. 

On the ferry I found two friends who were marching, both with their father’s medals proudly pinned to their chests.  One friend’s son, who has followed his grandfather into the army, has recently done a tour of duty in Afghanistan.  As the Sydney Morning Herald is currently investigating the lack of adquate care for returned veterans and the dreadful consequences of this – the army is cognizant of the suicide rate in America being higher than deaths in combat and expecting it in Australia - it seems a good time to embark on an effort to get the DVD documentary “Operation Emotional Freedom” in front of army personnel.  If you have any contacts in the army please let me know. 

You can find the documentary at www.operation-emotionalfreedom.com. You may want to buy some copies and send them off yourself.

I watched two dads in the park at the weekend.  I was sitting near one who was very patiently teaching 3 young boys to skateboard down an incline.  He gave them directions, encouraged them, physically helped them – time after time. But I noticed there was one thing he didn’t do – congratulate their success.  The youngest one couldn’t even get on the skateboard to start with but he ended up being able to go all the way down the gentle incline.  And he so wanted acknowledgement – he got to the bottom, looked hopefully back up to his father – but nothing.  I wanted to jump up and run over to give him a high five and say “fantastic – you did it!”.   What meaning will the little boy take from that about success and acknowledgement that will run unconsciously through his life?  

The other dad was telling his son, who had fallen off his bike and was on his back holding his knee and screaming, “just get back up, come on jump up”.  He was firm, quiet, not angry but didn’t realise his son needed acknowledgement of his pain, and that if he felt his pain was heard and seen he would probably get back up of his own accord.  When our pain isn’t acknowledged it is hard to move on from it, and we lose the ability to have compassion for our own pain and heap criticism on it instead. 

So even a trip to the park with a loving, caring dad can have a negative impact on your life!  BUT this is not to blame parents or for parents to feel guilty.  As a parent myself I know we do the best we can with the resources we have available.  What IS important is that as adults we become conscous of and take  responsibility for the beliefs and behaviours we have taken on board – and I believe that’s also the biggest gift you can give your children if you have any.

An Experiment…

On rare occasions (and often on death beds), people give away the secret of life. These secrets are often profound, simple and easily overlooked.

One such example was when the Dalai Lama was asked about his religion and he replied, “my religion is kindness.”

Could it be that the whole point of our lives is to learn how to live from our hearts and cultivate kindness? Could it be that the measure of any good life is the small, “ordinary” gestures of warmth you show to yourself and others? Could it be that kindness is our planet’s greatest need?

What I like most about kindness is that it’s not some grand state of enlightenment. It’s really DOABLE – even if we don’t feel like doing it!

Here’s a 2 minute experiment (for real): Close your eyes and take 3 long, slow deep breaths. With each breath, let go of any tensions or anxiety. When you feel settled, bring your attention to your heart. After settling into stillness for a minute or so, ask yourself the question, “What could I do right now to make someone’s day?” Really listen. Notice any images, ideas or thoughts. Who could I be tender, warm and encouraging to today (including myself)? Allow yourself to be responsive to small and “ordinary” ideas. These are the seeds of the revolution. Maybe it’s picking up the phone and calling a friend or your mum; perhaps it’s writing a really thoughtful or appreciative email to a colleague; it might be taking yourself on a quiet walk to the beach for a swim; or putting a handwritten note on your partner or child’s pillow?

I know it’s simple, but it’s so filled with possibility.

Your life only exists now – in this very moment. The place where all the “ordinary magic” occurs.

I raise my glass to all the saints, scientists, songwriters, mystics and ordinary folk who have reminded us that in the end, “only kindness matters.”

Yours in the vision of Kind Society,
Jono

When you start something you never know where it’s going to go and so when I started inviting women round for afternoon tea to focus on acknowledging our strengths and celebrating our greatness – inspired by Howard Glasser’s book “You Are Oprah”, I didn’t know what would happen.  I figured if people came I would keep holding it – and so here we are two years later.   

I read a passage from Marianne Williamson’s book “Return to Love” – 20 years old now but still definitely worth a read.  I thought I’d share it with you again here:

“Seeing The Light.

Only the light within us is real.  We are not afraid of the dark within ourselves, so much as we are afraid of the light.  The dark is familiar.  It’s what we know.  “Yet neither oblivion nor hell is as unacceptable to you as Heaven.”  The light, the thought that we might indeed by good enough, is such a threat to the ego that it takes out its very big guns to defend against it.

Someone I know remarked to me about a mutual friend, “He has a mean-spirited soul.” “No, he doesn’t” I replied.  “He has a mean-spirited personality.  His soul is one of the brightest I’ve ever seen.  His mean-spiritedness is simply a defense against the light.  If he were to let in his light and choose to really express all his love, it would  overwhelm his ego.  His meanness is his armor, his protection against the light.”

Our defense against light is always some form of guilt that we project onto ourselves or others.  God can love us infinitely, the universe can support us unendingly, but until we agree with God’s kind appraisal of us and the universe’s merciful behaviour, we will do everything in our power to keep the miracles we’re entitled to at bay.  Why the self-hatred?  As we’ve already seen, the ego is our mind’s endless need to attach itself.  And how do we escape this?  Through the acceptance of God’s will as our own.  God’s will is that we be happy.  God’s will is that we forgive ourselves.  God’s will is that we find our place in Heaven now.”

After 10 years drought the lake dried out but recent rains have started to refill it and the ancient landscape is an everchanging feast for the eyes.  As I stood watching the setting sun cast its magical light I chatted with a photographer.  I asked what she was doing – being a point and press camera person myself – and she explained she was deciding what effect she wanted to produce and hence what lens she was going to use.  

My mind, working the way it does, immediately found that to be a great analogy for life.  The mindset through which we view the world delivers the effect.  That’s because the way we think causes us to act in a certain way and ultimately our habitual actions create our life.  

So if you aren’t happy with how your life looks, check out the lens through which you are seeing it, because, like my photographer, you get to choose.

It’s a strange thing, yet there is something to be done about it.  One of the members of the tapping group I run was putting off making a phone call that could possibly be very valuable to him in his business.  It was really beginning to bug him so we tackled it and looked at two specific causes.    

1.  Needing to have things be perfect before making the call.  It’s common enough isn’t it – we want everything to be right before we approach someone.  But of course perfection never comes so we don’t take action – in this case no phone call.     

2. I figure that if we’re prone to criticise ourselves we need to have something to criticise ourselves about.  Procrastination is wonderful fodder – we can criticise ourselves continuously over something we haven’t done.  And the thing is we can continue to make ourselves feel bad, which on some level is what we’re used to.  If we get something done then we feel good so I actually see procrastination as a form of self-denial.

So we tapped on all this and my client declared he would go home and make the phone call – which he now had the impetus to do.  And what an amazing response he received from the phone call – an outpouring of resources!   When I asked him how much he thought the outcome of the phone call would be worth to him down the track he replied, “Hundreds of thousands of dollars”.    

Enough said – tackle whatever action it is you are not taking and even if it’s not worth hundreds of thousands of dollars you will be allowing yourself to feel great at the satisfaction of having taken action.

I realised my mind couldn’t even begin to conceive how someone else’s mind could come up with some of what was on offer.  It gave me a glimpse into a radically different world and made me want to join in, to add more colour, more life, more creativity to what goes on inside my head.

Number One is “Love is who we are” – not a stream of energy between two people. Our essence is love and when we get in touch with that essence we become as an ocean of love.

Number Two is “The purpose of our life is love” – it’s the reason we are on this planet. The ultimate question at the end of your life is “How much did you expand your capacity to give and receive love?

Number Three is “The portal to love is the heart” – which is much more powerful than our brain and is in fact the master control centre.

Our task is not to create love but to remove all the blocks to experiencing it. Of course EFT can help us to do that and Marci is actually a great fan of it. Amazing things can then happen when we live in that state of love.

Carol talked about the way in which we end up in conflict with our body and the pain we feel in it. Our languaging supports this conflict – we fight the illness, do battle with the pain – and then feel defeated or discouraged. I loved her point that when you are doing battle you have to have something to oppose so you are setting yourself up in opposition to the very thing you are trying to heal! Not only that but when you have a battle, someone has to lose. Not exactly the way to generate the love which is ultimately what heals.

Energetically what you focus on expands, so when you focus on unwanted symptoms such as all the various sorts of pain the body can express, that pain is bound to expand – again not what we are after. So the goal here when you are sick or in pain is to be on the same side - make the pain your ally instead of your enemy.

Happily tapping can help us do that. We can tap on the symptoms and we can also tap on releasing the battle we are having with our body and create peace instead. We can forgive ourselves for being at war with ourselves and start to be on our own side. We can forgive ourselves for taking up this position and decide to look at things in a new and loving light to give our body the best chance of releasing the symptoms that it is putting forward for us to listen to.

There is such a powerful connection between negative emotions and pain people are often surprised at how pain subsides when the unresolved emotions are taken care of. Do some tapping and find out for yourself.

So, how to do that? First of all measure the restriction either visually or with a number so you can tell how you are progressing. With a shoulder you can obviously measure it a few different ways, lifting it to the front, side or back. Get very specific about where the lack of movement is – EFT always works better if you do. Then do a set up statement that includes where and what the problem is. For example: “Even though the movement in my right shoulder is very restricted I deeply and completely accept myself.” Tap around the points with a reminder statement such as “this restriction in my shoulder”. Take a breath and then check to see if there is any change. If there is a change you can keep going with “Even though there is still restriction in my right shoulder I totally accept myself” until there is as much as a shift as you want.

If there is no change you could tap on “Even though my left shoulder isn’t releasing I accept all of me”. Keep persisting.

If there is a sensation that goes with the restriction tap on that as well – it may be soreness, a sharp, pointy or dagger like pain – see if you can name it and do some rounds to help that release as well. You may find as you tap that the nature of the pain changes so you change your set up statement and reminder phrase accordingly until the level has dropped.

It’s worth having a go and see what happens – and it could save you a lot of money at the physio!