Be the person of your dreams

Dearest Goddesses,

Today I began the cleanup of my life and decided to start with my email and the 1,980 unread messages in my inbox. They are the myriad of emails that I´ve signed up for, yahoo groups, motivational emails, etc. You miss a few days (or months…) and suddenly you've got 2,000 unread messages. So in my effort to get rid of the clutter, I started taking a look at my emails and decided to "unsubscribe" to tut.com. And of course, I get the perfect message which totally relates to Minerva and the exploration of our beliefs…

Patty, today, be the person of your dreams.

See life through THEIR eyes.

Make decisions with THEIR mind.

Let every thought, word, and action come from THEIR perspective, as if you had already arrived, and just watch how 2009 warps into the kind of year you talk and laugh about forever and ever and ever...

Peace, love, and green M&Ms -
The Universe

Thoughts become things... choose the good ones! ®

©www.tut.com®
Patty, here's a little secret: That person already exists, there's nothing new to learn, just "let 'em out."

I know that (prepare for a convoluted rationale) I have let my beliefs about what I THINK others believe about me change my perception of myself and who I am in this world. It´s changed the way I´ve interacted with the people in my life, it´s kept me from sharing, it´s kept me from being present. The truth is, I´m probably making it all up anyway!! Silly girl…

Be the person of your dreams for that already is…you!

Love to you,

Patty

P.S. Check out your Personal Year Number according to Numerology: Key to Your Inner Self by Richard de A'Morelli

Happy New Year!

Dearest Goddesses,

It´s New Years Day and I have been waiting for the chance to open a brand new calendar and sort of brush off 2008 for what it was for me – A year of transition, of completion of contraction. I am looking forward to growth , joy, abundance and expansion beginning in 2009.

As you can tell from the distance between this and my last post – I have allowed my life and circumstances to distract me from my goal which is to truly make a difference. And rather than go through the grocery list of why and how come the distance existed – which would also not be in keeping with my commitment – I have decided to complete what I started last year which was sharing The Goddess Oracle and my life inside of those messages and hopefully make a difference for the people in my life.

My new boss has asked us to write out our goals for 2009 and put it in a sealed envelope with our names on it and give it to her to hold for the duration of the year. At the end of the year, she´ll give this envelope back to us to review – what did we want to create that we accomplished and then some? And also, what was important to us in January that changed over the course of the year? I encourage you to do the same and either have someone hold it for you, or put them away where you can review it in December.

In closing, to tell on myself, I don´t feel ready to begin sharing again, but I felt it was important to get over myself and to not make this about me. That perhaps my message, however small they may be…well it might just make a difference. And so, hopefully, as you are contemplating what it is that is important to you in this year - get out of your own way and take action, regardless of whether or not you are ready.

So, I leave you with where I left off last year…This weeks goddess is: Minerva who represents Beliefs. What a great way to start the New Year!

Wishing you all love, abundance, joy and expansion.

Love to you,
Patty

Minerva - Beliefs

The following is excerpted exactly from The Goddess Oracle by Amy Sophia Marashinsky and the illustrations are by Hrana Janto. For more information on their work, please visit the following websites:

Amy Sophia Marashinsky: http://www.amysophia.com/
You can download the meditations included in the ritual suggestions at http://deepspiritualnourishment.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=2

Hrana Janto: http://www.hranajanto.com/

I am what I think
my life is shaped and formed
by what I tell myself
Who I am in the world
is who I think I am
WHat I have in the world
is what I think I can have
The contents of my mind
ae what I choose
I discard, cut out, drop
that which doesn't contribute
What others believe about me
is their story
It tells more about what they think
than who I am
In my journey
I make sure that what I carry
is of my own careful choosing
and serves me well.

Mythology:
Minerva, the Roman and Etruscan Goddess of inelligence, creativity, wisdom, domestic skills, and handicrafts was the patroness of artisans, of all people whose handiwork was guided by their minds. Her very name comes from the ancient root for "mind". Minerva appears here with her sacred tree, the olive. She wears an aegis, which is a breatplate edged with snakes, and an owl on her headdress which identifies her as a Goddess of death and the deepest mysteries.

Meaning of the Card:
Minerva has come to tell you it is time to examine your beliefs and change them if they do not nurture your wholeness. How are old, outworn, unhealthy thoughts undermining your life, your energy, your happiness? Do you believe what other people think and/or say about you? Are you still running the tape of negative messages your parents or caregivers gave you when you were a child? Do you believe the worst about yourself, or the best? Are your beliefs too rigid to permit and support your evolution? We are all born with a story. It is our choice whether we want to live the story we were born with or create one that nourishes all we want to be. Minerva says that wholeness is nurtured when you see yourself with all your parts - both dark and light - and choose your beliefs to serve your highest good.

Ritual Suggestion: What's in My Attic?

Click the link below to download the meditation for Minerva for $1.75

http://deepspiritualnourishment.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2&products_id=52

Find a time and a place where and when you will not be disturbed. You will need paper and a pen. SIt or lie comfortably with your spine straight and close your eyes. Take a deep breath, breathing into all the parts of your body, letting the breath fill you as if you were a balloon. When you are absolutely filled, release it. Take another deep breath and release it. Close your eyes and sense, feel, or see a flight of stairs leading up to an attic. It can be an attic you know well or one you imagine. Climb those stairs. At the top of the stairs is a door. You have the key to the door on a cord around your neck. Take the key and open the door. You enter a room. On one wall are shelves. On one of the shelves is a box marked "beliefs." Take the box down and open it. Inside the box are your beliefs. Reach inside, pull one out, and examine it. After you have finished examining it to your satisfaction, ask yourself the question: "Does this belief serve my highest good/wholeness?" If you answer yes, put it back into the box and take out another. If you answer no, then change the belief into something that serves you, something that feels good, something nurturing.

Repeat your new belief several times and feel it sinking into your heart, into your consciousness. Let yourself feel the joy of having this new belief. When finished, put the new and improved belief back into the box and return the box to the shelf. Close the attic door and lock it with your key. Come down the stairs. When you arrive at the foot of the stairs, take a deep breath and exhale slowly as you come back into your body. When you feel ready, open your eyes. Welcome back!

Note: If you find that your belief seems to resist your efforts to change it, repeat this ritual at another time. This is a process and te beliefs you are working with have been in place for a long time. Commitment is important here. You might even try writing your new belief and posting it in a prominent place where you will see it often.

Winning Formula

Dearest Goddesses,

We all have winning formulas, ways in which we interact with the world that puts us out ahead, but doesn't really leave us feeling fulfilled or taken care of. I always thought that my winning formula was being accommodating - I would make sure everyone else was taken care of and not consider my own needs. And while that very may well be it, I've been confronted by another winning formula lately that I actually got clear about in my last post which was ultimately about facing my vulnerability, specifically relating to my body.

I have always been strong and being strong, or rather being stronger (than everyone) is the winning formula I have been facing since that last post. My body is made for strength - 6 feet tall, NYU record holder in shot put and discus (I decided to use that instead of putting my weight ;)) I've never been a small girl. And because I'm not a small woman, I believe I have used my strength to set me apart. And this strength has become my armor. If I am not perceived as strong (and this goes beyond the physical) I feel like a failure. Somewhere along the line, I decided that vulnerability = weakness. And since who I have defined myself to be is strong, there is no room for vulnerability - or rather, I have not made room for vulnerability.

My mantra didn't work and I ended up getting sick. It didn't last very long at all, but as I was driving to work yesterday morning, feeling rotten, I realized that there is a place for being sick. A time to regroup and force yourself to take care of yourself. Just because my mantra didn't stick, doesn't mean that my mind is weak, it just means that in order for my body to stay strong, it needed to fight off whatever I got which caused the symptoms that I had. And it really was only for a day - others were sick for a lot longer, so I can still work my winning formula at being stronger! I suppose everything is all about perspective anyway...

What is your winning formula? How is it keeping you at a distance from the people in your life?

Love to you,
Patty

Vitally Healthy

I am vitally healthy, I am vitally healthy, I am vitally healthy.

Or at least that's what I'm trying to convince my mind so that it doesn't listen to my body or my stuffed up nasal passages. I haven't had a cold in about 2 years. I've had days of the sniffles and I've been under the weather and sad and I broke my wrist and I even think I've thrown up, but I haven't had that throw down kick you in the arse, can't get out of bed, residual snot for two weeks kind of cold. When I feel the sniffles coming on, I get my mantra out to work it

I am vitally healthy, I am vitally healthy, I am vitally healthy.

But the combination of air conditioning and germy co-workers has given me a sore throat and the sniffles and while I will not come right out and say that I am sick - because that's like an invitation or self-fulfilling prophecy and I truly believe in the power of the mind to determine the state of your health - I'm not quite connecting to the power of my mantra. And as I curve my arm at the keyboard, I understand what the shift is...I'm vulnerable. A little over a month ago I broke my arm. After 35 years of never breaking a bone, my arm broke. After 35 years of falling down stairs, of slipping on wet pavement, of running into doors (I think you get the idea, I'm more clutz than grace)...I broke something. At a different time, I know that the fall that I had wouldn't have resulted in a broken wrist. Some bruises, a big scrape perhaps, but not a broken wrist. There was something in that day - my state of mind, my circumstance, whatever - that allowed the break to happen.

Like any vacation, when you take time off from living your best life (connected, centered, powerful) you come back to lots of work in your inbox. In order to make my mantra work, I need to chip away at the onion layers that have accumulated since I've been on "vacation". And understand that while I've been broken and while I still feel a bit vulnerable, I do have control over my thoughts, beliefs and actions and Yes, darnit, even whether or not I succumb to the sniffing, sneezing, coughing, aching, stuffy head, fever, please just kill me cold.

Here's to health. Vital Health.

Love to you,
Patty

Removing the Casts

Dearest Ladies,

I'm sorry for my "emergence" and then disappearance. I have been a bit technologically deficient these past few weeks and haven't had a lot of internet free time.

John and I survived Hurricane Ike with barely any inconvenience, thankfully. There are a lot of people who weren't as lucky and our hearts go out to them...

So I've been thinking a lot about casts lately. I had a mini nervous breakdown the other day when I was desparate to get it off and none of the clinics in the area were able to take it off and I just couldn't bring myself to pay an orthopedic $500 to get it taken off and tell me that everything looks great. Without going into detail, I took matters into my own hands and all is well.

When I first got the cast put on, I was so timid. I didn't want to exert myself too much, it was still so sore and tender. Of course that lasted about 2 days before I was packing up everything in the house to prepare for our move. Little by little, I used the arm more and while it was awkward and annoying, there wasn't too much that I couldn't do. So when I got the cast taken off this week, it was a little scary to see this long limp arm that I hadn't seen in a month in front of me. I was weak and sensitive and felt like at any minute, my wrist would re-break. I felt vulnerable, exposed - I immediately put a brace on it to protect it.

I couldn't help feeling like this was a metaphor for life. We run around all self-expressed until one day we break something (like our heart for instance...) It takes time for the wound to heal, we put a cast on it to protect it, make sure that it starts to heal. After awhile, we become less and less aware that the cast is there - but still, there are some things that you can't do like you used to. You might feel constrained in the cast - I'm ready to get out there again!! Ando so you take away this constricting cast and suddenly this raw, unused part of yourself is exposed and you feel completely vulnerable and immediately want to cover it back up and put the cast back on so that you don't get hurt again.

We need to remember that while it takes time to heal fully - healing will not take place without a little physical therapy. If you go back to your cast, you will always be weak and shrivelled with only a facade to protect you. But if you take off the cast and then use a brace for a few days and then allow yourself to move freely more and more often, you will be amazed at the body's (and the spirit's) ability to heal itself and get stronger.

So, here's to breaking free of your cast. It's okay to take it slow, it's okay to take it in steps, but it's so important to get those muscles working as soon as possible.

Much love,
Patty

Emerging...

Dearest Goddesses,

I am emerging after a most challenging few weeks. Nothing like transition and change to throw you off your center.

One of my last posts was pondering the end of the life of my precious dog Wilma. Thank you all for your kind words of support and love. I have some follow up posts that I want to share, but will leave today for an update and a pondering of the idea of change and transition. I spent a last lovely week with Wilma after that post and let her go on the 23rd of August. It was a terribly hard day and the hardest decision and I couldn't help but feel in some way that I had failed her. I went to bed that night and asked her to visit me in my dreams and let me know she was okay and that I had made the right decision. And while I don't remember any dreams specifically, I woke up completely at peace and when I think about her, I don't think about the "loss" of her, but of her contribution to my life. I don't shed any more tears, but simply smile at her memory. There is nothing better than a dog to teach you the valuable lessons of unconditional love. I miss her.

The day after we let Wilma go, I walked out of a restaurant into a rainy Costa Rican afternoon wearing flip flops and fell down hard breaking a bone in my wrist of my right hand. Needless to say, writing and typing have been quite a challenge, but it is all getting better. I have dreams every night about the cast being off and my arm being all shriveled and gross!!

And that was just the beginning of our transition! After spending 3 years in Costa Rica, we thought it might be time to try something new. We were lucky to have met some guardian angels who have provided exciting opportunities in Houston, TX. While we are still committed to seeing our Costa Rican projects develop, I was desperate for a change and to be back in the states. Besides, none of you were visiting me anyway...Tomorrow marks our week anniversary in Houston and this guy named Ike is planning this enormous welcoming party for us. Ike, it really wasn't necessary!!

It's actually quite scary and of course the non-stop news coverage doesn't help the feeling of anxiety. Currently I am hunkered down in Southwest Louisiana at the hotel that John is doing some marketing for. We are completely booked with the electrical company, so hopefully if the electricity goes off, we'll be the first back online!

So while with this update I can say, "see, there were a lot of reasons why I've been out of touch" the truth is, the idea of "not knowing" terrifies me, and I could't bring myself to write a single word. I find this terror interesting. I know that if my life were written out completely, with no potential for surprises I would be miserable. But when I turn the page in the book of my life and there is a situation that is out of my control, I freak. My goal is to stay centered - not just as a task master and a list checker but as a spiritual being. Connected not only to my discomfort and my terror, but also to the beauty and to ultimately trust that if you just trust and surrender to the universe you will be taken care of in the long run. (Not that it will look the way you want necessarily, but you are taken care of...) AND I am reminded of this quote:

'When you come to the edge of all the light you have known and are about to step into the darkness, FAITH is knowing one of two things will happen...There will be something to stand on, or you will be taught how to fly.'

Love to you,

Patty