Healing

Coming into One’s Own Power

Last week I shared some of the wisdom to be garnered from Dreams if we have obtained the knowledge and skills to use their guidance.  This week the story continues by illustrating just how powerful dreams can be in relation to uncovering the depth of a situation, assisting us to shed and heal conditioned patterns of behaviour we can repeatedly subconsciously attract to us, whilst also transforming our reactive behaviours into responses.

In Dreaming, a male I have known for over a decade approaches me, he has a blonde woman with him. I know they are here to tell me they are wanting to be together, and then he says so.  He appears intoxicated as a consequence of either alcohol or perhaps some type of drugs. It is obvious he is not thinking or acting clearly in his normally lucid non-reactive, kind and empathetic manner.  His aggressiveness in this situation creates a huge argument between us, the first ever, and to end it as I have no time or energy for arguing with anyone, I tell him that’s fine, off you go then, but don’t say I haven’t warned you about the woman you are choosing to involve yourself with. 

Then the woman in the dream is suddenly holding both my wrists and will not let go.  I feel infuriation at this violation and bondage.  I start screaming at her, using expletives, to let go of my wrists.  I struggle with her and eventually break free.  Her grip had been tight and left its’ mark.  Having freed myself, I am right in her face, screaming at her that if she EVER does that to me again, I will knock her out cold and kick her arse to the kerb.  I can’t recall feeling so enraged and explosive, in a very long time.

The scene shifts and I am now in “Observer Mode”.  My awareness is looking at the scene of the three of us. Paths appear, one to my left and one to my right.  The left leads towards a dark, murky, icky feeling place and the right to a space of brightness, vibrancy, colour, peace and love.  My friend and this woman take the left path together and as I am deciding which path I will take, the lines from Stairway to Heaven,

“Yes, there are two paths you can go by
But in the long run
There’s still time to change the road you’re on”

come to mind.

I do not follow my friend and this woman, for I choose, at that moment, to take the right path and see myself walking away in that direction.

For me left is symbolic of past, of what is needing to be left behind, is coming from the past or what type of behaviour is needing to be let go of if a symbolic aspect of Self moves in that direction.  Right is future and forward movement because all that yet awaits us is there on our “right” path.

Emerging from this experience, I felt clarity and peace regarding the action I now knew I needed to take, which I previously hadn’t been experiencing. A parting of the ways was coming between this friend and me and it was up to me to cut the ties after a month of retreating and putting together the puzzle pieces.  For the sake of both our continued growth and learning and perhaps even healing purposes, there was nothing more of value, for now, we could bring into each other’s lives. I knew whatever now awaited both of us, I would need some alone time and ultimately, we would both need different people in our lives to accomplish it with.  If subconsciously, or perhaps consciously, the obnoxious manner in which I felt I had been treated, was being done deliberately to push me away it was working effectively but it really was not necessary. An honest conversation would have been much more preferable but that is how he appeared to be choosing to deal with it. 

The dream’s messages and what this waking reality was showing me revealed that once again I was dealing with masculine energy I had been attracting since childhood. It was exactly the same energy as my two main male role models had been, unavailable in one form or another and/or abusive and disrespectful.  The woman symbolised the part of me who had been holding me back, keeping me feeling loyal to my friend and hopeful of the various things we had discussed we would like to do together, which never came to pass. Synchronicity began coming into play also with numbers and other symbols/signs that were coming my way.  The final confirmation arrived when I heard the song “Time to move on”, by Tom Petty, for the first time. 

The path before me was clear as were the underlying reasons for my friend’s behaviour.  The gift they were freely giving me was that I was in yet another, and I highly suspect and hope the last, process of freeing myself from this unfulfilling energy that I had always given my all to where others were concerned and in return I would be ultimately shocked by their behaviour, brought down, abused and held back.  

Events then occurred which showed me clearly those who try to fool me, only truly fool themselves as all I had intuitively known, came to pass.  I cannot say the process was painless, even though I acted swiftly, not dissimilar to the Queen of Swords energy in the Tarot, once I knew the time was right to state my intention to walk away and leave the pair of them to it.  So whilst my friend was busy reactively blowing up long-standing bridges to smithereens with myself and my family, thanks to my inner guidance and wisdom, I was able to fully grieve the loss of this longstanding friendship and walk away calmly, with peace and acceptance, grace, integrity and gratitude, taking many beautiful and funny memories with me. 

The only permanent aspect of life is impermanence and when I know intuitively, something is going on that just doesn’t make any logical sense I take extra notice of what my dreams are telling me. If I need to make a change in my life, regardless of how painful I know it will be for me, I will do so because if I don’t, I am just putting off the inevitable.  It’s a futile exercise and a total waste of what precious little time I have left of my life, as it just creates more pain and suffering for myself and others, the longer I put it off.  If I delay for too long, life situations will arise that historically have made the situation even worse, created very unpleasant memories, some of which have been traumatic and are akin to a Universal kick up the backside or clip around the ear, in order to keep me moving, changing, growing, learning and evolving.

The past six months or so have been ones of great change where my intrinsic values and boundaries of how I want to be treated by others have become a lot clearer and firmer. Many folk have fallen by the wayside as a result and the dynamics in some other relationships has also altered for the better.  To those who did fall by the wayside I wish you all well and am grateful for all the known and unknown love and support you have gifted me with, in my journey towards stepping back into my own power more fully after three decades, so far, of healing from the abusive and dishonest and unkind behaviour, I had been attracting most of my life, until recently, in one form or another.  Inner growth: It never stops.

© Cheryl O’Connor, February 2020.

Living In Now

It seems to me for many of us living in right here, right now is one of the greatest challenges we all face given our conditioning.  For most of us who have been brought up in western culture we think in lineal terms of past, present and future.  We think in terms of what has been, what is next, where we are going, what we want to achieve and many of us like to make plans, be organised and know what we will be doing from one moment, one hour, one day, one week to the next.  All of which really just becomes a story we tell ourselves we become attached to and often re-act to, if it doesn’t go according to our little plan or story we are creating around it all.

My mum, bless her, was the Queen of Organisation as I was growing up.  She had to be as she worked and also ran a home consisting of herself and five other people.  We all had our set jobs and times/days when they were to occur.  Her week was mapped out and ours with it, so I was brought up in a very well organised environment where we always knew what we were doing from one minute to the next, generally speaking.  Being organised and knowing what I would be doing, whilst many curved balls occurred, was rather comfortable.  I grew to see the more organised I was, the less stressed I became when I myself became a mother.  This flowed into my work and whilst I am not as rigid as my mother felt she needed to be, her influence couldn’t but help rub off on me.

Working in the legal industry for nearly three decades also reinforced my organisational skills.    For many years I too made plans and was set in an automatic daily rhythm, which gradually turned into a rut, ultimately boring me silly and sapping me of excitement and joy for life.  I also began to see that organisation, whilst it alleviated stress and helped me achieve goals, when it was out of balance and too rigid, was a form of needing to control.

As I started to become more aware and more conscious of time not really existing, of all time being now and of there only truly being one time anything can occur, that being the right time, life became easier, disappointment and emotional re-actions became less as I learned not to expect anything and I began to experience detachment to ever so much.

Less plans were made and I moved from what many of us term “going with the flow” to becoming one with the flow of life.  I became less attached to things, to people and to outcomes, more open to spontaneity and realised the most I could ever have in terms of plans in place was a very basic skeletal plan for one day at a time, no longer for a whole week and certainly not as is often asked in job interviews – where do you see yourself in 5 or 10 years time?    How can we honestly even know that?  That we put pressure on ourselves and our children with a question such as that or one like – What do you want to be/do when you grow up – is so very indicative of our cultural conditioning and it is conditioning which so very often robs us of the moment of now, along with the infinite possibilities that exist, by becoming set on a fixed direction or plan for not only our day but also our lives and anything in our lives we are wanting to achieve.  I learned the hard way that plans NEVER go according to plan.

As I moved more and more consciously into the moment of now, anything that didn’t feel right to do or wasn’t working I would let slide and move onto whatever was next for it seemed and still seems senseless to me to get myself all stressed, frustrated etc., if I am wanting to do something and everything around that thing is just not working.  I began to see how very stressed and distressed folk often become if things don’t go according to their plan and how the expectation of their plan manifesting leads to major disappointment and sometimes even angst which creates barriers to come up with other folk in their lives.  I also began to see that if something isn’t working as we want it to, it just means something else needs to fall in place which will make it even better than we thought it would be.  Until all the pieces of any puzzle are in place and until energy matches up the time is just not right for whatever to manifest in the physical.  Often too if we want to do something and it just isn’t happening, we are actually being protected.

I “thought” I had “got” this whole it’s okay to have a skeletal plan and to just be one with the flow of life, being fully present in each moment without any thought of what was next, to do list and calendar in place so I wouldn’t forget anything important which needed to be done, as it all seemed to be working just fine and dandy, until this week.

I was in a situation where communication hadn’t happened effectively and I didn’t know what it was I was “supposed” to be doing next.  I started re-acting as I’d been told one thing, which suddenly changed and now I was floundering and getting frustrated.  I was also totally confused.  This lack of organisation wasn’t sitting well with me and I could feel myself starting to get really annoyed as my head told the story of how it would be so much better if communication had of been clear from the outset which would have alleviated my thinking I was doing this thing, then suddenly I was doing something entirely different, that I wasn’t really expecting or prepared for.   It was all pushing me out of my own little comfort zone, what little there is left of it.

Along came the wisdom of another and the lesson they were giving me.  Seriously what did it really matter what I was doing next?  Just because I “thought” I was going to be doing one thing which then changed and I was clueless and confused, who was really creating that confusion?  The person who had not as far as I was concerned communicated effectively?  Or me for having a story in my head of what I thought I would be doing next, which was pushing me into future, into an emotional re-action and out of being fully present in the moment?

I couldn’t help but laugh at the simplicity of the wisdom, the lesson or the very effective way in which this other person had actually taught me this lesson of all that is truly needed by any of us, is to just show up, do whatever is needed in the moment and truly enjoy each and every moment of now without any thought of what is next.

 

Cheers, Cheryl.

© Cheryl O’Connor 2015.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

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DREAMING TRUE – A FREE INTRODUCTORY DREAMWORK WEBINAR

I have now finalised all I need to so that I can present the first in a series of webinars I am putting together which will be hosted in The Wellness Universe Lounge at the end of January.

This class is a prerequisite class for all future classes and I invite you to  join me by registering at Dreaming True as it will be informative and fun. If the time and date doesn’t suit, once you have registered you can watch the recording when it works for you. The AEST time given is for Brisbane, Australia. EST (USA).

It will be an interactive 60 minutes during which we will be exploring how you can use Dreamwork to assist and empower you 24/7 whether you recall your dreams or not.  All you need will be an open mind along with writing and drawing materials.

If you have any questions please contact me. Cheers, Cheryl.

 

© Cheryl O’Connor 2016.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

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RECONNECTING WITH OUR INNER CHILD

Within the confines of being told we have to “grow up,” we lose ever so much. Our conditioning is such that as children we begin to learn to fear the world and just about everything and everyone in it, hearing more often “don’t,” than “do.”

The inner child begins to shut down and off to a world that was once magical, full of adventure, imagination, play, fun, beauty, excitement and sheer delight. Just watch any child as they start to explore the world – all is new and exciting. The feel of grass underfoot, the raindrops dripping, the love of singing, dance, water play, mud, creativity and laughter just because they are happy and want to have fun.

When expressing anger or frustration they are often told don’t behave like that and are these days sent to the naughty corner. When parents fear they will fall from the tree they are climbing or fear whatever else they do, or tell them what they experience is not “real,” when they are taught to seek approval from others at such a young age, are told things about themselves and the world by adults they fully believe because the adults said so, are yelled at, hit, abused and so it goes on, all that joy, excitement and sheer delight with just the pure magic of being alive seems to disappear. Lost and seemingly gone forever as life becomes nothing more than a “job” full of adult responsibilities, concerns, worries, anxiety, conformity and fear which then leads to illness, addiction, depression, reckless behaviour, more abuse and sadly in some situations the taking of one’s own life.

I was once told as a child, only children can enter “The Kingdom of Heaven.” This terrified me at that time because I figured once I became an adult – straight to “Hell” I would go, forever. In many ways, we do go to Hell though because due to the adult behaviour around us and the beliefs and projections which shape us we lose conscious awareness of all that is childlike.  Yet we are also told we need to be childlike to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

The ability to make friends easily, to trust, to have fun unless we are drunk, stoned or participating in other activities that bring momentary pleasure from outside ourselves all goes. If we were feeling joyous and broke out in song on the morning train commute, for example, we would be given strange looks like something was “wrong” with us. So we conform, we play the game the adults around us play and we do indeed lose a huge part of ourselves along the way.  Many become miserable and bitter, negative, resentful, spiteful, manipulative, greedy, needy, liars and haters who try to desperately control others around them. Each day becomes a chore to drag oneself through and many literally start looking like robotic walking dead.

For myself I had to “grow up” very quickly, leaving home at only 14, and life for me became a matter of survival for many decades. Survive I did, ever so much, but it was just that – surviving, not thriving.

We speak of “The Journey Home” and how we are all on the same journey back to conscious awareness of all we once knew before it was shut down because of fear and conformity.  For myself, it took decades of Self work and inner child work to reach where I am at within myself now, which feels like “home” to me

Some of the tools I used along the way which can help are:

  • Pay attention to what your dreams and daily synchronicity are telling you.   If you don’t know – learn.
  • Spend time alone in nature.
  • Use your dominant writing hand to ask your inner child a question, swap hands and wait for the answer to be written.  Go with the very first thing that comes, do NOT think oooh that’s just nonsense.
  • Do not doubt what others told you was “just your imagination” – whatever you experience is real for you because it is YOUR experience.
  • Try to remember things you used to LOVE to do as a child and MAKE time to do them on a regular basis.
  • Run with your gut feelings about anything and everything – don’t pay attention to your logical doubts and fears which have been instilled in you by others.
  • Pay attention to any memories or feelings that come – especially those which create an emotional reaction and ask yourself “Where is this TRULY coming from?”  Wait patiently for the answer to come to you.
  • Parent your own inner child.  Most of our inner children are scared, lost, angry, hurt and confused and often feel like they have been abandoned, which they have been. Mine was SO angry and hurt it took months of solid work for her to even feel safe enough again to just start dialoguing with me.
  • Don’t blame, hate or punish your parents for the damage done – they did the best they could with the awareness they had, they still are and at some stage we all have to actually accept responsibility for ourselves and start to parent our own inner child.

As a child, I wanted desperately to live “Somewhere over the Rainbow.” It was however quite literally a journey into,  through and out the other side of Hell to follow my own yellow brick road, but it was worth every single step to reach “home” and the “Kingdom of Heaven.” That isn’t some place in the sky as so many of us were told it was, but is within each of us and fully accessible to all of us by reconnecting with our own inner child.

Cheers, Cheryl.

© Cheryl O’Connor 2014.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

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#Cheryl O’Connor. #Cheoco
#Holistic #Counsellor, #Author & #Writer.

* #Cognitive & Body Based #Counselling.
* #Creative & #Artistic #Therapies.
* Specialising in #Dream #Analysis, #Conscious #Dreaming & #Shamanic #Journeying.
* #Reiki #Seichim #Treatments & #Attunements.
* #Isis #Meditation.

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Are we truly busy?

“The most common thing I hear folk say these days when asked how they are is “Busy”.

Today’s technology was essentially designed to make things easier, give us all more “time” and yet it appears to me it has failed to do that.  If anything we all seem to be way busier than we were a couple of decades ago, with seemingly never-ending to-do lists, copious emails that flood our inboxes, umpteen “notifications” by way of social media, errands to run and so it goes on. This influx of things to be attended to is often overwhelming and creates stress, for we are now living in a time where we think we need to attend to ever so much immediately.
I’ve been pondering this standard comment we all seem to be giving these days of I’m busy or you are busy.  I have a huge variety of activities in my life simply because I do not do boring and mundane well at all and abhor being stuck in any sort of rut.  Variety is indeed my spice in life and to have any two days spent doing exactly the same thing is my worst case scenario.  Many interpret that as me being busy.
I spoke in my last article about living in NOW.  Such a hard thing for so many of us to achieve and yet, once you do get the hang of it, it is very easy.  As I looked back on all my years of being unconsciously busy, rushing here and there, achieving this and that, the stress that comes with always being busy and the many comments I hear of “busy” I had an epiphany of sorts.  When we are fully present in right here and now “busy” is totally eliminated.  How so?
Well, I saw that busyness lives in our heads and only occurs when we move out of now and think “a head” too far.  Often we become overwhelmed with how much we think we need to do or must do, which in fact, we are all choosing to do for no-one is making us do anything.  When we are so busy we miss the moment of now for always we are thinking I need to do this, then that, then that and on it goes, usually ticking things off either in our heads or lists as we go. Often not even fully focussed on whatever it is we are doing right now, due to thoughts of once this is done then the next thing needs to be done.
I also saw that much stress lies in the busyness of our minds and the things we choose to do that we perceive “make” us all so busy.  I saw that being in the moment of now with absolutely no thought of what is next until I got to what is next, does indeed and quite miraculously not create a feeling of being busy at all.   As I was pondering this whole busy aspect of life, another crossed my path who shared that we create busy to avoid being in now.  Synchronicity?  Well of course.
When we live in each moment of now, fully, we are just being and we are all essentially, beings, not doings. Many think we have to go and have a vacation and do absolutely nothing to avoid the stress of being busy, to wind down and “get away from it all”.
Personally I find life far more interesting, way less stress full and not at all busy, to just do the things I feel I want and need to do, when I want and need to do them. I also find that things don’t go “wrong”, I don’t hit brick walls nor do I experience any of the elements that once brought frustration, stress, major muck-ups, accidents or rushing around like a lunatic when I am just focussed on and fully present in NOW.   Another miraculous aspect of living in NOW – I have more “time”.
Try it, you may just be very surprised by what happens when you stop thinking “a head” and actually become one with the flow of life.
Cheers, C.

ADDICTION FROM A SHAMANIC VIEWPOINT

It is becoming clearer to many that addiction is a disease or illness, not a choice we consciously make that we should be punished for. God knows we punish ourselves and suffer enough in this life without “society” and law makers punishing us further simply because we are not well. A very long time ago I read that all disease could be seen as dis-ease i.e. not being at ease or at peace with ourselves. So is addiction to anything actually really just dis-ease? The roots of which lay in learned behaviour?

Addiction is, from my perception, certainly a symptom of a far deeper cause than that which lays on the behavioural, psychological and physiological surface.  Western medicine primarily always looks at symptoms and what can be seen, attempts to treat that solely usually with chemicals or surgery and rarely does it look for causes that to the naked or microscopic eye are unseen. Yet when we find and heal cause within ourselves of physical symptoms, dis-ease, or behaviour we do not find acceptable, would like to not be experiencing or are subconsciously participating in, the symptoms just simply no longer exist. From birth we are taught to seek outside ourselves for what we need to make us feel good – love, encouragement, nurturing, guidance, cuddles, belief in ourselves etc.

As the child of an alcoholic step-father and cigarette smoking mother their addictions became learned behaviour for me so it stood to reason that as they were the two main ways in which I was shown adults behaved and coped with whatever they were trying to cope with, that I would naturally follow in their footsteps. As a teenager from about 14 onwards after a rape situation occurred I began to consume cigarettes. Not long after when I left home due to the situation I was living in there, I began to consume alcohol and drugs to the point I damn near killed myself. Surviving on little food, drugs, cigarettes, coffee and alcohol was not at all healthy, nor was it a good mix, reducing my weight so dramatically after six months, the only clothes I could wear were size 16 children’s clothing and I was so unwell that not even my own mother recognised me.

I didn’t feel that anyone cared about me, so why should I care? What did it really matter whether I lived or not? All I wanted to do was have a good time and feel better. I did not want, at all, to feel the pain and sadness of not feeling loved, cared for, cared about or understood, of being hit, yelled at, controlled, nor the fear of the alcoholic induced, often physical, arguments and abuse I had been living with since about 6 years of age on a regular and totally unpredictable basis.

To say I, like so many people in this world, grew up in a dysfunctional environment is putting it mildly. My consumption of alcohol, drugs and cigarettes lessened for a short while after another whose love for me quite literally saved my life by showing me they were the only person in my life who did care which gave me the gift of hope and I once again started ingesting regular meals.   I then slid back into copious ingesting of drugs, alcohol and cigarettes whenever I got the opportunity to do so after I was involved in a fatal car accident at 17 in which the young man I had been living with for six months was killed. Back in those days there was no counselling available like there is now.

There was also no funeral and no grave for this young man who lost his life to a drunk driver at only 23 years of age. I was seriously injured and it took a good six months for me to learn how to walk again. The only words I heard at the time from my step-father were “Write down how much pain you are in each day so we can get more money.” The only people in my family who even said they were sorry I had been injured and this young man had died was my mother and one of my step-brothers.   For everyone else in my immediate circle it seemed to me to be a case of suck it up buttercup and just get on with your life.

Drugs, cigarettes and alcohol became my friends, they numbed me from feeling all that was going on inside me. They distracted me and they became my “pain killers”, my “feel good medicine” of choice because I simply had no knowledge of other coping skills I could utilise. The catch being, as all addicts know, is that once we start down this path our brains and our bodies tell us we need more and more “feel good medicine” and “pain killers” to maintain that feel good state of being, to actually cope and survive, to not feel all that pain, anger, grief and sadness living within us that is so very real and raw and it is a very slippery slope we travel until eventually we either kill our bodies or our lives fall apart so badly we hit rock bottom.

We have two choices if we actually do survive and hit rock bottom, continue as we have done and physically die, or trawl the depths and start to bounce back from what feels like the bottomless black hole we have been sucked into that also very much feels like a literal hell or nightmare there often seems to be no escaping from.   Thankfully I was one who chose to trawl the depths and bounce back when in 1992 at 28 I was again faced with my own impending physical death.

What I came to understand as I started to walk the path of the Shaman which was a path that at the time I had no clue I was even walking, was that I, like so many other folk in this world, was actually experiencing what in Shamanic terms is known as Soul loss.

Soul loss can best be described as us becoming like the walking dead, merely surviving, not living and thriving as was intended, simply because who we truly are is not fully present in our bodies.  Parts of us that have not wanted to feel grief, trauma, fear, shock, loss or pain have fragmented off into the subconscious abyss and in very simple terms it is like we are not fully at home in our bodies when we are ingesting substances or distracting ourselves with addictive behaviours or by external means in order to make us feel better or not feel our pain. It is literally like we have huge energetic holes in us, great gaping wounds that we defend, need others to fill, or don’t want to feel the pain of because they are so raw and we are so very vulnerable.

These energetic holes we have, we attempt to fill with external substances or means which consequentially then just make our bodies and our minds very sick indeed. We behave in ways not previously known to us once we start on the road of addiction and it is also not behaviour that those close to us know from us as being “normal”. How many times does the drunken or high person just not seem to be themselves? It is like we become totally different people, often aggressive, angry, totally uncaring and hurtful towards others simply because we are hurting and we just don’t give a damn. We become harmful to ourselves and others and we often have absolutely no memory the next day of our behaviour.

Our behaviour however is NOT us, it is a symptom or cover up if you like hiding whatever we have experienced or been conditioned to believe. How many times does the drunken or drugged person lash out in Jekyll and Hyde fashion?   You never really know what to expect but you just know that who you know that person to be is no longer present in the body in front of you.   This is because we are definitely NOT ourselves at all. Who we truly are is no longer contained in our bodies. What primarily happens with ingesting alcohol and drugs is that when who we truly are checks out of our bodies it’s like an empty house and other “darker” energies with perhaps not so good intentions take over.   This may seem like a very strange and far-fetched concept to many but perhaps for those who have lived it, seen it in others, you will know precisely what I am referring to.

So… how do we heal these gaps and holes we try to fill by external means? How do we stop this happening? How do we change our behaviour? How do we become fully present in our bodies and become whole, well and healthy again?   There is only one way I personally found and that was firstly to make a decision I didn’t want to be that way any longer given that I was so out of control at times, often very re-active, aggressive, defensive, angry, miserable, depressed and more times than not, suicidal.

I did not do the whole re-hab thing, nor did I do AA or have any other types of support in place similar to those, I just said enough when I was faced with my own impending physical death, for the fear of death at 28, which I no longer carry, put the wind up me, literally, and I prayed like I had never prayed in my life prior to be free of it all and to feel nothing but peace, love and acceptance within me.

What ensued was 10 solid years of feeling ever so much grief, trauma, pain, confusion and sadness as I firstly turned to alternative therapies to help heal my body because all the doctors I saw over a six month period all said there was nothing wrong with me – here have some Prozac, meanwhile my body was shutting down more and more each day.   I uncovered and discovered all my physical symptoms were due to constant abuse and unfelt emotions, which I also discovered did not just come from this lifetime but past lifetime experiences as well, all of which had resulted in symptoms associated with having a blocked small intestine and kidneys that were barely working.

I trusted all I was drawn to and underwent attunement to Reiki/Seichim, learnt how to work with my dreams, attended many courses, began walking, meditations and yoga, ate better, studied for two Diplomas in Counselling, one Holistic, one standard that also included some alternative modalities. I read all I could get my hands on, discovering along the way many fragmented parts of me, along with many gifts and skills I never even knew existed within me. Gradually my addictions abated but always there is work to be done.

Physical pains were always linked in with emotional pain, the true cause and source of which came to me either via dreaming or during meditations (which is really the same state of consciousness) and it truly was only in the fully feeling of ALL the emotions that bubbled up from within me and by integrating/re-membering i.e. bringing into being, the fragmented parts of me I re-connected with in The Dreaming, that eventually there was peace. I came to see that time did not exist as we know it to exist, that past definitely has an impact on the present until we heal it by fully feeling it and releasing it (shutting the door on it and just saying past is past, forget it and get on with your life, simply does not work) and that the emotions which came with memories or in the dreaming, meditations etc., were just energy passing through.

Rather than numbing those emotions, once felt and released, with each and every process of integration and release, a strength, love, acceptance, understanding and peace began filling me up like nothing I had ever experienced before. There is an old saying you may have heard of – The cup must be emptied before it can be filled.   This was certainly the case for me and I began to live by the motto which Jamie Sams brought into the world “To feel is to heal.”

Emotional pain is the LAST thing any of us want to feel – we do everything we can to avoid it yet it is only in feeling it, that we truly do heal it and are free of it. Was it easy work?   Definitely not.   Was it lonely work? It certainly was. Was it worth it? Without a doubt. For I learnt the hard way that no matter what I chose to ingest that was external to me, no matter how much I sought love and acceptance externally from others, no matter what I did to feel “better”, and no matter how “strong” I had been to just carry on Columbus and survive it all, the real strength came when I turned fully inward to find, eventually, all I needed was already inside me for me the love, peace, wisdom, knowing and acceptance I was seeking only came when I paid attention to what my dreams and daily life were showing me and what my memories and emotions were telling me about myself and about life. As I uncovered who I truly was I also discovered there would never be a need again for me to re-cover my Self.

To free ourselves from addiction is a huge undertaking as there is so much in this world we can become attached and addicted to. It is however achievable if we have the courage, faith and trust needed to turn inward, face our fears, grief, pain and trauma, feel it all fully and be free of it once and for all. Many of us are so busy telling our stories, which whilst important, does not enable us to actually feel the emotion contained in those stories for our stories come from our heads.

No-one can do this work for us, it is something we all must do for ourselves for it is only in doing for Self that we become more Self-aware, more Self responsible, heal and become more Self empowered. It is not at all selfish to do this work for it brings about self-centeredness, balance, peace, love, acceptance, respect for all life and an awareness of our wholeness with all life, like nothing else we have ever experienced can, all of which is then reflected back to us in the world.

The choice whether we do this work or not is entirely ours to make. We can keep going as we have been or we can quite literally turn our whole world and reality around by coming from the inside out and in doing so move out of the nightmare of externalism, blame, victim mentality, attack, defence and addiction.

Much love and peace to all.

Cheers, Cheryl.

Copyright. C. O’Connor.

Grab your free copy of my Dreamwork Booklet at http://bit.ly/CheocoNews when you sign up for my monthly Newsletter.

*´☾☆☽`*•

#Cheryl O’Connor.
#Holistic #Counsellor, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in #Dream #Analysis/#Conscious #Dreaming & #Shamanic Journeying.
* #Reiki/#Seichim Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis #Meditation.

Website @ http://www.cheocoenterprises.com

My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

Facebook: http://bit.ly/FBCheoco
Online Shop: http://bit.ly/Cheocoshop
LinkedIn: http://bit.ly/linkedincheryloconnor
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Proud member of The Wellness Universe: www.thewellnessuniverse.com #WUVIP

Image credit: Pixabay.

Is “Constructive Criticism” really Constructive ?

One of the most common human behaviours I am privy to not only where others are concerned but within myself over the years and still even now it slips in at times despite my best conscious efforts not to go there, is that of being critical.

It’s SO easy to be critical because that is our conditioning. It astounds me that we actually have an economic industry of “critics” who get paid to go and see, listen to, or experience others creative endeavours and “critique” them which they then feel it necessary to publish. If the creative persons interpretation of something they have gone to experience isn’t in line with the critics perception – too bad so sad they receive a “bad” review that ripples out to others and has a domino effect which can limit severely the amount of folk who go and see or experience it for themselves and decide whether they enjoy it or not, based purely on what someone else says. It is also often the case that many who are standing in the wings and not even involving themselves in something or aren’t even aware of what is REALLY going on, on the stage, take it upon themselves to be critical of what the ones on the stage are doing, in all areas of life. Yet we all perceive and do things differently.

Just watch any group of people for e.g. in an art class – all can be looking at the same tree which they are to paint and yet every single painting each creates will be totally different not only to the tree given as an example, but to each others trees. How truly miraculous is that?! Yet so often in so many situations another will say no that’s not how you do it, you “NEED” to do it this way. How so and who says so?

Everything we do is an act of unique creation so how can it be that we have fallen into this trap of being so critical and judgmental? We seem to live in a society that is full of competition and judgement which starts not long after birth. It’s rampant in our schools, in politics, in sports, in workplaces, it’s persistent in those “Women’s” magazines where celebrities are criticised for just about everything from wearing a pair of track pants out to the local shop to having their hair done a certain way. In more recent times on television screens and other media it is also rampant by way of “reality” shows where folk compete against each other to reach a temporary status of “winner” and being labelled “the best”. The label being given to them by “judges” who are really only just sharing their perception of another’s “performance” in a given moment. Yet that perception in that moment of being “judged” can absolutely crush another’s dream and devastate the person who isn’t given the label of “the winner.”

It’s so often the case that if folk don’t do things the way we think they should be done or how we ourselves would do them rarely do we stop to ask questions. Instead, out of our heads and mouths, usually automatically, will come all sorts of “stuff” that is judgmental and critical which perhaps whilst not consciously meaning to do harm, does – just like the critic who published their opinion.

This has been disguised to make it more palatable in recent times by being labelled “constructive criticism”. I personally don’t understand how any criticism is “constructive” – giving and receiving honest and respectful feedback however is a totally different ball game. Words float around all the time about not judging others, about “loving” and accepting yourself and others as they are and hey if those others are rattling your cage with a big stick no worries just shrug it off and walk away – not always that easy though is it?

Phrases have long been within the minds of humanity along the lines of – Don’t judge another lest you be judged; Don’t be so busy pulling the splinter out of someone else’s eye that you can’t see the lump of wood in your own; People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones; Let he who is without sin cast the first stone; He who points a finger at another will find three pointing back at him, and on it goes.

When people bring forth their best endeavours, ideas and passions to create a more peaceful, love filled, tolerant and respectful world for all, they have often landed up being persecuted, imprisoned, harshly criticised or dead for their efforts for what they are doing or saying. Why? Have we all really become so arrogant as to think that there is only one way to see or do something, our way? Further down the track when it is often way too late, others begin to see what the person was doing and saying with more clarity and then those who were working solidly to create change are treated as heroes, legends or saints.

Sadly they are often no longer even alive by the time the rest of society catches up. It’s often the case that a person or people with “vision” will see much that others clearly do not yet see and due to their passion to manifest that “vision” they run with it whole heartedly, only to be continually met by others trying to pick to pieces what they are doing. What exactly does that achieve I wonder, besides perhaps maybe making the picker feel good about themselves in some bizarre way, like they are “better” than the one who has gotten off their butt, stopped whinging about a situation, and is actually doing something to change that situation for the better, not just for themselves but more importantly for others.

On the flipside to this we have all this information and push occurring about not bullying, teamwork, collaboration etc., and yet many of the so-called political “leaders” in this world are still coming out of the mental and emotional framework of Ego, criticism, one upmanship, bullying tactics, abuse and judgement even though we are given examples time and time again of what actually happens when we ALL work together to achieve something. Is that I wonder part of the reason why “natural disasters” occur, so that we can more consciously become aware of the part of our nature that is supportive, kind, empathetic, loving and compassionate? Collaboration NOT competition will get us ALL wherever we are wanting to go way faster than if we spend our time and energy constantly being judgemental and critical of what others in this world are doing and bickering amongst ourselves about whatever.

Someone close to me has a beautiful expression they often use which I love – The world would be a better place if everyone minded their own business. This person does not mean that we should not care about each other or support each other, they mean that each and every person (unless they are incapacitated in some way) is fully capable of doing whatever it is they need to do for themselves and that we would all live in a better world if we were ALL working together and supporting each other, not wasting our precious time and lives in these temporary physical bodies, trying to tear others down whilst our Egos climb whatever ladder to success they decide to climb, ripping people off or ripping them to shreds, gossiping, judging, undermining and criticising them, telling them they are “wrong” or giving them “advice” when it hasn’t even been asked for.

This person is also referring to those situations where we are doing something and another comes along and takes over because in the other’s eyes we are not doing “it” right. They are of the opinion that this unintentionally diminishes the person who was doing it their own way and shows disrespect. Quite simply humanity has created the present mess in this world, no-one else, and no-one is coming to “save” us, or the planet. The Politicians don’t give a hoot for they cannot see what many of us can clearly see and we are ALL simply just going to have to pull our big girl and boy knickers up clear out our own muck and heal our wounds, so we stop projecting it all onto others if we want anything at all to change.

The time of separation – of you, me, us, them, right, wrong, greed, slavery to jobs that just create nothing but stress and sickness to all life on this planet is coming to an end. Honestly can you actually even begin to imagine how much more we would ALL achieve in this world if the amount of time, money and energy we spent on sticking our noses into other folks business, being critical and judgemental, bickering or gossiping about this, that and the other was actually spent on creating the type of world we not only want to live in but pass on to our children and grandchildren?

It has always been said that our children are our future and whilst I was a child I really didn’t have a say in the future I would be living in. I was often told by my Grandfather though you can achieve anything you want to in this world and so far all I have set out to achieve I have accomplished but there is still more, so much more I want to achieve. Now that I am living in the future I was told about as a child, as a mature aged woman, it is not at all the future I envisioned it could be but I can have a say now and I am so very passionate and driven about doing everything in my power, by collaborating, not competing with others, via The Wellness Universe, other initiatives and with folk who are near and dear to me, to assist in creating the future I did envision as a child that I want to pass on to my children and grandchildren. A world where there is full collaboration, peace, love, understanding, respect for all life, compassion, gratitude, joy, beauty and creative vision and as John Lennon once said, “You may say I’m a Dreamer but I’m not the only one. I hope someday you’ll join us and the world will BE as one”.

I may never get to see a world like the one I envision but that doesn’t mean for a second I can’t and won’t do whatever I can to help create it. We are ALL in this world together regardless of our social status, gender, sexual preferences, financial situation, religion or religious beliefs, varying skin colours, ages etc., It doesn’t matter diddly squat what job we do that we label with a name or how well known or not known we are in the world, and for the sake of all the children, grandchildren and generations yet to come into this world, I truly do hope and yes I even pray (even though I am not for once second “religious”) that we ALL start spending way more time collaborating and supporting each other to create a better world than the one we have been left with by those who came before us, than we have been and often do spend criticising and judging each other.
Cheers, C.

Copyright. C. O’Connor.

Grab your free copy of my Dreamwork Booklet at http://bit.ly/CheocoNews when you sign up for my monthly Newsletter.

*´☾☆☽`*•

#Cheryl O’Connor.
#Holistic #Counsellor, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in #Dream #Analysis/#Conscious #Dreaming & #Shamanic Journeying.
* #Reiki/#Seichim Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis #Meditation.

Website @ http://www.cheocoenterprises.com

My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

Facebook: http://bit.ly/FBCheoco
Online Shop: http://bit.ly/Cheocoshop
LinkedIn: http://bit.ly/linkedincheryloconnor
Pinterest: http://bit.ly/pinterestcheryloconnor
Google+: http://bit.ly/Googlepluscheryloconnor

Proud member of The Wellness Universe: www.thewellnessuniverse.com #WUVIP

Image credit: Pixabay.

I HAVE MOVED

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We’ve all heard that old saying one door shuts and another opens and it was very much the situation for me this past week.

The same week my contract with Earthlee Angel Therapies at Burpengary came to an end and I chose not to renew it,  I was gifted with the offer of using the space of the Signal Room which is part of the Railway Station, located in the South West corner of the Park at Old Petrie Town, North Pine Country Park, Dayboro Road, Kurwongbah by my lovely friend and family member, who has always been supportive of me and my work since the first day I walked into his Gallery in the park some 20 years ago now, Mr  Terry Saleh, Spiritual Artist and Healer of Terry Saleh Art Global Enterprises.

The Railway Station was originally North Pine Station, opened in 1888 and it served as a Cobb & Co Station and Railway Station for over a century.  It was later re-named Petrie Station after pioneer Tom Petrie.  In 1992 it was moved to the park and it was officially re-opened by The Honourable Leneen Forde AC, Governor General of Queensland at the time in 1993.

With the help of my Warrior Woman mum, in less than 24 hours over a two day period, we cleaned and transformed the inside of the building and set it up for me to start practicing in as of this Sunday.

To have a space of my own to work from and create the Steiner Based Dolls and Toys in is just the most blessed gift I could have received this coming Easter.  No longer will I need to cart boxes of materials and supplies constantly, loading and unloading my ute, or having craft materials scattered throughout my house which is where I have been making the dolls and toys from.  Absolutely chuffed, excited and delighted is the only words close to how I was feeling when I accepted Terry’s offer.   Filled with awe inspiring gratitude when I sat quietly in the space on my own yesterday also comes somewhat close to that experience.

Please note change of availability with this move starting this Easter Sunday:

Sunday:  8am to 1pm  you will find me in the Signal Room.

Monday to Wednesday: 9am to 3pm at the Signal Room or at Lawnton.

If you would like to make an appointment please send me an email at cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

I have a vision in my head of things I  would like to do with the space in due course but really didn’t think we could get it ready as quickly as we have done, so I am pretty darn pleased with the transformation so far.   If you are passing by or just want to come and say hi – you are most welcome to do so, have a cuppa with me and lap up the peace and beauty of this space whilst you are at it.

Cheers and for those who celebrate it – Many Blessings for your Easter too.

Cheryl.

 

FORGIVENESS – IS IT REALLY NECESSARY?

Like many I was brought up with a belief that it was necessary to forgive others who I perceived created trauma, heartbreak, grief etc., for me and were hurtful and/or abusive towards me. There were many to forgive in my life and I saw the only way to find peace and acceptance within myself was to do the inner work, feel the pain, shock, trauma etc., and to literally “let it go” and in doing so forgiveness came.

Letting go doesn’t appear to me to occur just in the mind by thinking you should let it go or trying not to think about it, if something is coming into your mind it does so for a reason and for myself letting go only occurs with releasing the energy of whatever emotions have been stored within the body and subconscious from the experience that haven’t yet been fully felt. This combined with “Forgive them for they know not what they do”, which had been drummed into my head as a child, all worked fine and dandy until recently.

There is much written about the necessity of forgiveness and for a while I saw forgiveness as being for giving to self and others.  That worked too for me but as we are all works in progress “stuff” comes up and into our awareness and we also gain more insight and understanding as “time” goes on, becoming more and more conscious.   Things we may have thought 10 – 20 years ago for example no longer apply to so many of us for we are forever evolving and learning. For myself I’ve always been learning, growing and changing and may I never stop doing so.   Much I was sharing some 20 years ago with folk, who thought I was nuts, is now very common to read or over hear being said.

An event had occurred in my life way back that bubbled up emotionally yet again for me to explore.   Of all the events in my life I would have to say that this particular one has had the greatest impact on my life and my heart since it occurred. Many say the past is in the past so just move on, forget about it, let it go, that whatever just wasn’t meant to be and I have always struggled with that concept particularly around this specific incident for I am very aware that past, present and future all exist in now and that the energy of what we label past has a huge impact on ever so many of us.

If it didn’t cultural traditions for better and sometimes yes for worse would not be handed down, people would no longer re-act to things others say and do, there would be no need for “protection” by way of the military or arms and so it goes on.   How often for example does it occur that we have a gut re-action of anxiety, fear, defensiveness or attack, which is purely based on a past experience that is merely being triggered by a present situation?

This particular event in my life is one that wounded my heart very, very deeply. It is not something I will ever forget. It has been something that I have just had to learn to live with and allow the grief to surface and be released as and when it needs to be and so as I found myself re-visiting it yet again, as we do when something is so traumatic and overwhelming that to process it all in one hit is just way too much to cope with, I had the thought and feeling that I needed to forgive behaviour which I found totally manipulative and one of the worst behaviours imaginable to me. Forgiveness had come easily with ever so many folk yet with this particular event I was struggling big time.

I could see the gifts that had been received from the event as my journey through life would never have been what it was if things had of been different and there were ever so many gifts and so much to be grateful for.   Yet forgiveness just was not coming and I started beating myself up about it not coming.   Dreams were indicating that something really yuck and awful was on its way out and physically I became ill for two weeks with flu like symptoms as I was processing it all. My bones ached to the very core of them and I just had to shut down and off to sleep, dream and rest my body.

I then stumbled across a poster that Mena of Mena Canonico DARE to be REAL had shared on Facebook and it was along the lines of there being no need for forgiveness unless we see ourselves as a victim. A light bulb went on for me in the moment of reading that poster and the truth tingles ran rapidly through my body. I was SO delighted to have this come my way as it made perfect sense to me of why I had not for a second been able to feel forgiveness towards others who had created so much grief for me and for another, with their manipulative lies. It was indeed to my heart and head an unforgiveable act of manipulation and certainly not something I would or will ever forget or forgive.

It did however send me off on a tangent at a young age that without the gift of it I never would have taken.   I could clearly see that at a Soul level if you like my path was just meant to be what it was and that these particular people had played their roles beautifully in ensuring I stay on track in order to achieve what I was here to do for myself in terms of healing and learning so that ultimately I could provide a safe, nurturing, validating and sacred space for others to explore themselves in.

Mena’s poster was a life changer for me because it is so very true that when we can see the lessons and gifts, can feel gratitude for all we have experienced and do experience, the good, the bad and the ugly, we gain acceptance and peace and we learn that truly there is nothing to forgive ourselves or anyone else for when you know with every cell of your being that you are NOT a victim, that you chose at some part of you to experience what you did and do experience for your own growth and learning.

This then led to another conversation with a longstanding and very dear friend about blame and judgement and we concluded for now that those too are all part of the Victim mentality. Of things being done “to” us rather than us taking responsibility for our part in the experience and seeing that nothing is ever done “to” us without our consent and permission at some level for we do indeed choose to participate in whatever we experience for our own development and evolution.

There is also much talk about forgiving yourself – for what exactly? For learning, for growing, for becoming the person you have become or are still becoming due to your lessons and experiences? What is there really to forgive yourself for? Why not just work on loving and being proud of yourself instead for being so brave and courageous to choose to experience ever so much that we all do here to ourselves and others, usually in ignorance, in this physical world.

Cheers, Cheryl.

Copyright – C. O’Connor 2015.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

#Cheryl O’Connor.

#Holistic #Counsellor, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.

* Creative & Artistic Therapies.

* Specialising in #Dream #Analysis/#Conscious #Dreaming & #Shamanic Journeying.

* #Reiki/#Seichim Treatments & Attunements.

* #Isis #Meditation.

* Proud member of The Wellness Universe – www.TheWellnessUniverse.com #‎WUVIP

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 33 awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

LAUNCHING THE WORLDS FIRST WELLNESS UNIVERSE WEBSITE DIRECTORY

Many of us no doubt wish there was “something” we could do to change much in this world which we see “society” as being responsible for, yet the reality is we are “society”.  Many of us may feel that there really is nothing as individuals we can do other than to wish that change would occur and that humanity as a whole would become more peaceful, compassionate, understanding, respectful and caring individuals when it comes to some of the behaviour we witness occurring courtesy of the media, in our daily lives and via some social media towards others, towards animals and towards the planet we all share.

We come to realise that the only thing we can every truly change is ourselves.  As we change ourselves, so too do we change the world around us, for the changes in ourselves ripple out and touch all we come in contact with.  It can however often be a slow, tiring and painful process to want change to occur all over the world and to still witness behaviour that has been happening on this planet for eons due to greed, blame, resentment, control, power over and manipulation along with a mentality of it’s not impacting on me and my life so what do I care and what really can I do about all of it anyway?

Yet many of us KNOW it really doesn’t have to be this way.  Many of us also want to change ourselves and our re-actions, behaviour, habits etc., but have no idea where we find the resources we need to assist us to do this. For over two decades now I have been putting what I do “out there” and it has been only in more recent times that I have had a Facebook page to do that from.  I don’t have the massive amount of likes at my page some folk have but I have witnessed an increase of over 1,200 “likes” in perhaps 8 months due to the networking I have been doing there and the groups I have become involved with. One such group is The Wellness Universe.

There is no competition in this group, there are no politics, there is only beautiful collaboration, a heartfelt desire and a Soul purpose to live the truth of what we love to do and to assist in bringing change for the better into the lives of those our messages reach, into this world.  There is in this group also only a desire to help each other with information, resources, networking opportunities, sharing and support  and well… finding this group of folk on Facebook for me was like finding my tribe at an oasis after a very long dry, dusty and tiring trek through the desert on my own. For the past twelve months behind the scenes at Facebook, as admins of this group, three very special women Anna Pereira, Sheila Burke and Shari Alyse have been working solidly, assisted by others also, to bring together a World First Website Directory that will showcase the best of the best Facebook Wellness pages (based on certain criteria that is needing to be met).

The impetus for this Directory is that Facebook is pretty much a case of not knowing who is using that platform and what is actually available to you unless you just happen to stumble upon it. My page Cheoco Enterprises,  along with many other pages has been selected as a Top Resource for The Wellness Universe Website Directory which these amazing women have been creating and which you can find here www.TheWellnessUniverse.com It is a Directory of Resources to Expand Your Well-Being and this Friday 23 January at 11.11am (New York time – which is 2.11am here in Brisbane on Saturday 24 January) sees the SITE GOING LIVE! The birthing of this baby being ushered into the world by these very special ladies who have poured endless time, effort, energy and their own funds into during the past 12 months has been in order to provide you  with a Facebook Directory that will showcase the best of the best Wellness Facebook pages by a huge variety of admins, all of whom are movers and shakers and whose Soul purpose it is to assist in creating a better world for all.

As one person no there isn’t a lot many of us can do to help change the whole world but as this group has proven change begins with us as individuals and when we all come together and work together the most powerful, beautiful and amazing changes in the world can and do happen. Personally I have been flat out like a lizard drinking behind the scenes just trying to keep up with it all as these women are a combined powerhouse of ideas, talent, joy, excitement, passion and they are doers.  Which yes is right up my alley 🙂

So please do join us at www.TheWellnessUniverse.com for the launch where you truly will find resources you may never even know existed because the change in this world so many of us would like to see begins within each. From me, here in Queensland, Australia I sign off with a massively huge round of applause and much gratitude in my heart for these 3 women, for achieving such a mammoth task which  was organised so efficiently, ethically, methodically and with such joy, love, enthusiasm and passion for humanity and the beautiful world we all share.

Cheers, Cheryl. Copyright – C. O’Connor 2014. •*´☾☆☽`*• #Cheryl O’Connor. #Holistic #Counsellor, Author & Writer. * Cognitive & Body Based Counselling. * Creative & Artistic Therapies. * Specialising in #Dream #Analysis/#Conscious #Dreaming & #Shamanic Journeying. * #Reiki/#Seichim Treatments & Attunements. * #Isis #Meditation.

* Proud member of The Wellness Universe – www.TheWellnessUniverse.com
#‎WUVIP
Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 33 awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

HEALING PARENTAL WOUNDS

We all know children do not come with instructions and that we receive no prior “training” in order to become a parent yet for any other job or activity we undertake there is a period of learning before we are deemed “qualified”.   It is very much a learn as you go experience and no-one can really tell you how to do what ultimately becomes the biggest task in your life, nurturing, being responsible for, guiding and teaching another person to an age and a stage where they can and do look after themselves totally and are totally responsible for themselves and their lives.

In times gone past a tribe would be involved in the upbringing of the young ones, then we moved to large family units being involved in their raising but more and more over time we have moved to the reality of just one or perhaps two people taking on this mammoth task of raising young folk and for many who are in pursuit of obtaining adequate housing and lifestyle that is in keeping with the “societal” standard more and more parents are working full time, mostly to pay off debt they incur to live the societal lifestyle standard, whilst leaving their child in another’s care who they do not really know but who has apparently received adequate training in caring for children.

It has me a bit baffled that in order to leave a child in another’s care in day care centres those others have to undergo a lot of training, cannot turn up to work drunk, cannot be abusive emotionally, mentally, physically or sexually, and yet we parents undergo absolutely no such training, nor do we have to meet such criteria.  Our training is usually on the job, in the moment learning.

For others such as single parents it is also often the case that they simply must work in order to keep a roof over their and their children’s heads, clothes on everyone’s back, pay the bills and have food on the table.

It’s a huge task being a parent, often tiring and often stressful as we juggle work and family commitments all the time just winging it as we go.  We all do the best we can with the awareness we have at any given time and really cannot expect much more than that from ourselves, given our lack of preparedness and training for the job.

Many children, like myself, grew up in environments where alcohol abuse, used as a medicine for coping with whatever stresses were being experienced, was common.  We also grew up in an era where copping a flogging was the norm, being told not to behave in certain ways when we got angry, thereby squashing down our emotions or were projected onto by unresolved issues our parents had etc., and today much of what we grew up with would be considered child abuse.

Many of us grew up with wounds being inflicted upon us by our parents behaviour and lack of self-awareness, lack of ability to cope and in dysfunctional families, and many children still are growing up in similar environments being yelled at, put down, living with alcohol or drug addicted or abusive adults, being treated in ways that no doubt are creating wounds for them and forming patterns of behaviour which their parents are handing down to them, just as those who came before them have unconsciously done.

For myself the most mammoth task of parenting came when I would say or do things and think oohh my goodness that is not me, not really, that is my mother.  My first born was a catalyst for me to become aware of and heal many wounds that had been inflicted on me as a child and for that I will always be ever so grateful to her.  In the process though there were wounds unconsciously inflicted on her by me as I juggled full time work, often getting up at 3.30am and not getting back to bed until 9 – 10 o’clock at night.  I was not in a position for several years where I could just not work, it was a necessity to our survival and yes it was exhausting.  The only support available to me at the time was that provided by the day care centre she attended and some assistance from my own grandparents.  For myself I have been working full time 90% of the time since I was a young teenager.

I was not the type of mother who would leave my child and later children on their own and go out clubbing or pubbing.  I did not bring an endless stream of men home nor did I drink alcohol or wipe myself out on drugs.  My child/children have always lived in nice, clean, lovely homes, always been well dressed, never gone without a meal or anything they have really needed.  Luxuries have never really existed and there are many things I would have liked to have done for them or with them but just had no money or time to do those but yes good budget management has no doubt been learned along with many other necessary skills.  There has been the odd holiday here or there locally but for the most part the past 25 years of my life, being an 80% of the time solo parent, has been devoted to raising two children whilst doing all that needs doing at home as well as working mostly full time with just the odd break to that here and there.   Was I a perfect mother, far from it and I never will be.

I spent 10 years in and out of depression and on a mammoth journey to rid myself of all that was no longer serving me or making me happy, whilst going through what is known as a Spiritual Crisis.  I worked solidly on healing the wounds which had been inflicted on me by my parents –  abandonment, abuse, alcoholism and essentially I did the very best I could do given my situation and my need to be responsible for myself and my child/children, just as my parents had done before me.   It wasn’t until I stopped focussing on the self indulgent hard done by mentality and started digging into my parents stories that I uncovered the why of how they had behaved towards me.  I came to realise, with age, that no matter what a parent does for a child, teaches a child to do for themselves, no childhood is EVER going to be perfectly how we as children would like it to be.

I am 50 now, still raising one child on my own and I have two grand-daughters.  For the past two years since a work contract ended I have been working my butt off, often up to 18 hours a day, 7 days a week to study so I have the mainstream qualifications necessary to tie up in a neat bow that which I love to do whilst also establishing a business out of what I love to do, not just doing any longer what I have felt I have needed to do to survive since I walked out of home at 14.  My whole parental life has been a situation of my children are part of my life but they are not my whole entire life as I saw ever so many women whilst I was growing up who made their children their entire life and then once the children had left the nest, as children rightly do, they were lost and had no sense of identity other than being someone’s Mum.

One of the greatest gifts given to me on this journey was seeing how patterns of behaviour have been passed down through the generations and how at some point in every child’s life it is a totally necessary part of growing up and taking responsibility for themselves that they do whatever is needed to also heal the wounds their parents unconsciously inflicted on them and learn to totally stand on their own two feet.   That they cease to blame or accuse their parent/s for whatever they feel or think the parent has or hasn’t done which is not to their liking.

It is said children choose us, we do not choose them and from my experiences with my children that was very much the situation.  Children come through us, they do not belong to us.  We give them the gift of life out of love, what they ultimately do with that life is entirely up to them but there must come a point in all our lives where we stop attacking, blaming and getting our knickers in a twist because our parents didn’t or don’t do what we believe as children or even as adults they “should” do now or should have done way back when, or what we expect them to do.   We all at some stage reach the point where we simply have to start parenting ourselves.  When we love others, truly love them, we have no expectations of them.  We don’t chuck hissy fits at them, nor do we ignore them or be rude to them simply because they are not doing what we think they should be doing or what we want them to do.

Many children these days seem to expect that their parents, after they have raised them and they have children of their own should be there to constantly offer support and guidance and to look after grand-children whilst they go off and do whatever.  Guess what kiddies, many of us grandparents are tired having raised our own families and whilst many of us dearly love our grandchildren and enjoy spending time with them, we have reached an age where we also enjoy our quiet time, when we can get it.

We don’t have the energy we once had nor do we much have the tolerance for noise we used to have.  Life moves, finally, at a bit of a slower pace for us and we have learnt the hard way that having expectations of anyone is just a recipe for heartache and disappointment.   We can no longer be bothered engaging ourselves in the dramas of youth either with your relationship issues and we live very much in the moment of now for we know there truly is no guarantee of tomorrow for any of us.  We’ve learnt that whilst having goals is essential if we are to create and achieve what we would like to experience in life, it is futile making set in cement plans.  Plans rarely ever turn out how we plan and so we move more easily in the flow of life rather than constantly battling with that flow.  Our emotional life has become much more stable, we don’t suffer the highs and lows that we did like a pendulum at full pelt swinging from one extreme to another at a younger age and if things pan out according to skeletal plans made they do, if they don’t we don’t get in a fluster about any of it much anymore.

We all come here to learn and grow, not to have everyone do what we think they should do.  We come here to experience ever so much and we cannot ever expect that one person is going to be able to give us all we need.  As I have always said to my two – you have one father and mother but if you are really lucky you will meet many who will fulfil the gaps in those roles because neither I nor your father will EVER be able to give you all you need or want.

So regardless of our ages if we haven’t yet healed our parental wounds we are still acting out of them with barriers and defence mechanisms and having re-actions rather than responses towards our parents and also towards others.  We all have them, there is no escaping them but ultimately at the end of the day it is OUR responsibility to heal them, not our parent’s responsibility to do that for us, nor can we blame them for what we think or feel, nor the lessons we have chosen to come here and learn which they have so beautifully provided for us to learn by giving us the ultimate gift, the gift of life.

Cheers, Cheryl.

Copyright C. O’Connor 2014.

Image sourced from Pixabay.

 

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD?

I’ve been hearing this question or the statement I don’t know what is wrong with the world more often than not lately.

It’s prompted pondering – what actually is wrong with the world?

Essentially I see nothing at all “wrong” with the world as such, however some human behaviour leaves a lot to be desired and a lot of us are left scratching our heads totally incapable of understanding why people are abusing and/or murdering each other and children, why folk are raping, pillaging and poisoning the air, water and land, why people in government are constantly receiving pay increases whilst cutting essential programmes and services we NEED and pay for with our taxes, when some of us can barely scrape enough money together to pay our rent, our bills or put food on the table.  We are also left wondering why there are people who are homeless, hungry and sick whilst others spend absolutely ridiculous amounts of money on trinkets and toys.   Many of us cannot for the life of us understand the why of any of it for it appears to us to be total insanity.

Perhaps it is insanity, or perhaps it is more a case of many people being in a state of total unconsciousness i.e. totally unaware of all they are projecting onto and blaming others for which would, I hazard a guess, fall into a category of those folk not having the willingness or even the knowing or desire to accept responsibility for THEIR thoughts and THEIR feelings, nor the skills to process them, without harm to the planet and those who live here, not just humans either.

Perhaps it is also about greed which falls into unconsciousness as those who are greedy have absolutely no awareness the Universe is abundant and provides us with all we need.  Perhaps it is about a need to feel powerful and in control of others because those folk are not in control of themselves and feel powerless hence their need to control that which is external to them.

Perhaps it is due to our extremely reinforced conditioning that all is external to us, including what many refer to as “God” which yes again falls into a category of total unconsciousness.   Is total unconsciousness then actually the “Insanity of Humanity”?

I am reminded of the Beatles song – “All you need is love” as I sit here processing thoughts and feelings about what I affectionately call “The Insanity of Humanity” for there is nothing that can be written that hasn’t already been said.   So why bother writing or sharing anything with anyone?  A very good question and the only possible answer I can give is because even though it’s all been done and said so many, many times over and over again, we humans still haven’t got the message and why is that?

We are all intelligent and many of us claim our intelligence is what makes us “superior” over the whole of the natural world and even the Universe which we generally see as being “beneath” us and “belonging” to us as we pillage, rape, pollute and destroy our world in order to be “wealthy”, “rich” and “powerful”.

How very intelligent we are to allow major banks and corporations to destroy our natural world, the only true home we all have, our health, our cultures and our well-being with their greed for money and “things”.  How very intelligent we are to allow so very much of what occurs in this world to occur and when will we all wake up to the reality that we belong to the Earth, the Earth does not belong to us?  That we are in fact an intrinsic part of nature, a part of the Universe, not separate to it or from it and that we and all we see are connected?  When will we all truly get it that nature has MUCH to teach us about ourselves and each other and that nature provides us with all we truly need to live on this planet?  It is therefore to my way of thinking nothing but TOTAL insanity to keep on polluting, pillaging and raping the Earth that freely gives us all life for there is no other planet any of us are aware of that sustains life.  Even if there were we are custodians of this planet and well frankly we are doing a pretty crap job for the most part in being responsible custodians of it for future generations to live here.

The world has existed for millions of years as humans have come and gone, and in more recent times, sadly leaving a path of destruction behind them.  What of the future?  Will Mother Nature, as she has in the past, say enough of all you humans and wipe us out totally because of our fear based way of life, our ignorance, our unwillingness to free ourselves from a system we have just blindly accepted is the only way to live on this planet, and our greed? Every great civilisation that has ever lived on the planet reaches a certain stage of its development or evolution if you prefer to call it that, and then is wiped out by natural or human causes.

In 2012 according to some this was the year the world would end, cease to be, clearly it never did end and is it possible the world will ever end?  Perhaps…. It hasn’t however ended at any time during the past 405,000,000 years that we know of, just evolved continually as has the life that lives upon it, so why would it just suddenly end?  Whilst countless lives have been lost on this planet due to war, greed, ignorance, revenge, hate, possession and a need to control and have power over others, the planet has lived on.  What is possible though is that the billions of human inhabitants, many of us who have been slowly waking up to who we truly are will fully wake up and take back our own power and our lands peacefully.  For according to someone’s story in a book called “The Bible” – “The meek shall inherit the Earth.”  I live in hope.

For thousands of years many have spoken of peace and love, compassion, kindness, equality and respect.  Many of those who spoke this and attempted to implement it were killed for doing so, why?  Messages and messengers have been all around us for eons yet do we see them?  Do we hear them? It is like we are mostly blind and deaf to our true potential, to who we truly are and the ability we have to heal ourselves and our planet (which is truly just reflecting the damage we have done and are doing to ourselves) thereby creating Heaven on Earth rather than continue to exist in the Hell of suffering we have created for ourselves and many others on this planet.  Do we not realise “the Kingdom of Heaven lays within” just as too so does “Hell”.   Do we not at all see that our internal reality is what manifests back to us in the external?   Do we not see that we have enslaved ourselves in a totally fear based “control system” which rewards the “rich” and penalises the “poor”?  Yet who is to say that those who do not have a lot of material wealth are poor, for they are rich in many ways the so-called rich cannot even begin to imagine.

Is it not insanity to accumulate debt that we have no means of paying back?  We truly never do own the land we live on we just think we do because we have exchanged pieces of paper with numbers written on them for a piece of paper that says we do.    Is it not insanity to destroy the very world and life that sustains us?  Is it not insanity to give humans chemicals in the form of pills to make them feel better when they are “sick”, which have the potential to create even more sickness with their “side effects” – what side effects?  An effect is an effect, there is nothing about it being on the side, and all of this is as I see it  a result of fear based conditioning and programming we have been subjected to for most of our lives.  Is it not insanity that the bulk of the population on this planet spend their lives, not living but surviving?   Is it not insanity to accumulate “things” only for them to land up as rubbish that pollutes our world?  Is it not insanity to spend, on average, some 40 plus hours a week making someone else “rich” or focussing on money so much for ourselves to appear to be successful, whilst we neglect family, get stressed, become exhausted and ill, whilst thinking that we are in fact providing for them and ourselves with “things”.

How do we justify this insanity?

Personally I can’t justify any of it other than to conclude that those who appear to be acting from a space of insanity may just simply not have awoken to the truth of themselves and of life yet.  I live in hope they do for all our sakes.

Copyright C. O’Connor 2014.

Image sourced from the internet, creator unknown.

 

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

FROG – CLEANSING

Welcome to the first in a series of articles that will explore the very generalised symbolism associated with certain animals.  Frog is known to call out when rain is needed and is all about cleansing and renewal. A tadpole looks exactly the same as a foetus and like Frog we firstly grow in water, forming in a similar fashion to Frog.Frog has a cycle of growth, not unlike Butterfly and relates to the growth and transformation that occurs when we cleanse our bodies and Souls with our tears. Frog is primarily water “medicine”.Frog can bring a message to slow down and allow yourself to feel your emotions. It may be that you could benefit from a long soak in the tub to clear away the mental or physical muck that has accumulated.There is an ancient practice associated with Frog Medicine where the Shaman or Medicine person would place water in their mouth and spray it over the body of a sick person to clear away accumulated negative energy.

With the rain that Frog calls out for when the Earth is dry, comes renewal, it is no different for us for when we remove the muck and mud through cleansing and releasing, we too are renewed.

If Frog appears it can be about these things but it can also be about our unwillingness to remove the muck, unstick ourselves from the mud we have accumulated. It could also be about allowing ourselves to become so involved with other folks issues, dramas and problems that we have become overwhelmed or are feeling drained or that perhaps we have immersed ourselves in one particular aspect of our life and need to get ourselves out of our dry ruts.

It speaks of obtaining a different viewpoint also and that it would be beneficial to take a break, re-new and re-vitalise yourself.

Like all symbols – what Frog means to you will be based on your own perceptions and experiences – generalised meanings are just helpful starting points for you to explore further if you choose to.

Copyright C. O’Connor 2014.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

THE SYMBOLIC NATURE OF WEATHER

How often do you really notice the weather and its’ reflection of what is going on inside of you at the time?

It never ceases to amaze me how often I hear folk saying what a horrible day it is when it is raining, or it’s not going to be a good weekend due to rain.  Have you ever noticed this?  Does everyone really expect to walk only in the sunshine?

To me many people seem to become thoroughly miserable when it rains and I often wonder why folk choose to run for shelter and protection when it does rain.  Are we all going to melt or something if we get wet? Or… is this running for protection and shelter symbolic of people really not wanting to do the inner work that would bring about cleansing and change by fully feeling their emotions?

If you stop and pay attention to your feelings when it is raining you may just find that you are going through some sort of emotional releasing process yourself.  Frogs always call out in the rain and generally speaking frogs symbolise transformation and also cleansing, as does rain. Sometimes the rain can just be a drizzle, other times a damn good downpour – how does this relate to your emotions?

When the rain stops so too do the frogs.  The Sun then comes out again representing warmth and light and everything on the Earth is fresh and clean again.  Sometimes we may even see a Rainbow – symbolically speaking the colours of the Rainbow are a reflection of the colours of our Chakras – now all shining brightly due to our internal cleansing.

Floods are symbolic of major emotional releasing within human beings – if emotions aren’t released prior to one occurring by all of us being aware of and listening to our inner life then our emotions will certainly be released with the damage a flood causes.

Fog represents emotional cloudiness and many times when fog appears if you look at what is going on for you, you will soon notice that perhaps your mental and emotional faculties are not as crisp as they usually are.  Perhaps you are in a state of confusion over something.

I’ve also noticed that Wind is not only related to “the winds of change” but in some instances anger.  So perhaps cyclones, tornados and hurricanes are symbolic of the collective consciousness needing to release that energy from themselves and the Earth.  The Earth symbolises the physical body.

Lightening and Storms are my favourites because they produce incredible energy and transformation for the Earth and all who live on her.  I like nothing better than to watch a damn good storm.   There is a Native American story I read once where a storm is described in a similar way to what follows:

Mother Earth and Father Sky (being the feminine and masculine aspects of Creation) show their love for each other in a storm.  The Thunder Beings announce the prelude to the love making session between the two, sometimes it’s a slow rumble other times it gets extremely noisy.  The Wind being the element of Spirit and Life Force plays a major part of the foreplay and can start off being gentle, soft and caressing leading up to wild and turbulent as the passion between the energies increases.

As the intensity of this beautiful lovemaking performance gains momentum and reaches a climax the lightening begins to strike the Earth Mother, charging the Earth’s energy grids with new life force – bit like sperm in a sense with the Earth being the ovum I suppose.  Then usually comes the rain which just like sperm impregnates the Earth Mother enabling her to nourish new life and continue growth.

Bet you’ll never think of a storm in the same way again.  I know I don’t.

Hail would therefore, to my way of thinking, represent cold long held onto emotions which need releasing.  Usually when a storm hits, again if you pay attention to what is going on in your life you may just realise that it is a marvellous reflection of what is happening for you.  We often use the terms “The calm before the Storm”, or “A storm in a teacup” when referring to personal circumstances but do we actually realise what we are truly saying?  We all know that with any big storm there is the “eye” – “I” of the Storm where peace and calm exist.  Again a beautiful reflection of our own “I” or centre where no matter what is going on around us externally peace and calm can be obtained by focussing on our breath and centering ourselves.

Whilst in some cultures the Sun represents the feminine, for me it represents the Masculine – “God/Great Spirit shining “his” light on the World.  The Moon again in some cultures represents the Masculine – for me it represents the feminine.

Not only do we hide from the rain but many of us hide from the Sun in fear of sun cancers.  We spend millions if not billions of dollars world-wide buying skin protection creams that are full of chemicals.  We believe we will get burnt by the Sun if we are exposed to it for too long.  We then dump the containers of the protective sunscreens into the Earth.

I have to wonder if perhaps many of the skin cancers that have only been developing in recent times aren’t in fact due to the fact that many of us have become extremely lazy, spending most of our time indoors in artificial environments, or if perhaps, just maybe the skin cancers are occurring due to all the chemicals that go into the production of our food and drinking water which we then ingest.  We also put an endless assortment of chemicals into our bodies in order to try and “heal” it and “protect” it.

Without a balance of rain, sun, wind and storms there would simply be no life on this planet.  So next time it’s raining perhaps instead of complaining about it we could all just actually stop and enjoy it fully whilst giving thanks for the gifts of cleansing, growth and change it actually brings us.

How long has it been since you stood barefoot on Mother Earth and let the gifts of rain wash over you and through you?

Cheers, Cheryl.

Copyright C. O’Connor 2014.

 

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

THE HEALING POWER OF THE BREATH

When our bodies become stressed due to pressure we feel is placed upon us or when we become anxious about anything the body produces adrenalin from the adrenal glands located near the kidneys. This adrenalin makes our hearts pump harder and faster to push blood to our larger muscles because adrenalin is naturally produced by the body for situations where we are faced with either a fight or flight for our lives scenario.

Whilst this is occurring our breathing becomes shallow which does not allow enough oxygen into our bodies. Lack of breath to the body can result in panic attacks, fatigue, further anxiety, emotional distress, depression, muscle tension, headaches and may also exacerbate the symptoms of people suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

The normal function of the breath is to bring oxygen which is life force energy into our bodies so that not only do we receive oxygen to stay alive but also so that we can exhale any toxins contained within the body in the form of carbon dioxide. A person can survive for a time without water or food but they cannot survive without oxygen.

It is therefore vital to our health and well-being that we remember to breathe in times of anxiety or stress. Bringing oxygen into the body where pain exists also assists that pain to lessen. As a baby and small child this came natural to all of us as watch any baby or young child and you will see they do not breathe into their chests but into their abdomens.

With our busy lives many of us have forgotten how to breathe deeply into our abdomens and instead only breath into our chests, which results in irregular or rapid breathing and that in turn heightens our stress or our anxiety and emotional distress. As less oxygen is available to our blood there is also less time available for our toxic carbon dioxide to be exhaled which can lead to us feeling very tired, lethargic and also depressed.

THE BENEFITS OF CYCLIC DEEP BREATHING ARE:-

  1. It increases the circulation of the lymphatic system which in turn speeds up recover and assists with our internal garbage disposal system.
  2. It aids our immune systems by giving us more energy to allow our bodies to regenerate, detoxify and self-heal.
  3. It assists to balance both the left and right sides of our brains, whilst also calming our nervous systems which in turn decreases our anxiety and the stress-related disorders many of us suffer due to our busy lifestyles and interactions with other people which we may find upsetting or stressful.
  4. Deep breathing can be used in any situation and requires no supportive tools to achieve it. All that is required is remembering to use this technique whenever you are feeling stressed, anxious or fearful.
  5. The time required to complete cyclic deep breathing exercises is minimal.

LIMITATIONS:-

 Should you be someone who is suffering from asthma or any other breathing condition the method of cyclic breathing may exacerbate your condition and it is therefore not recommended that you use it.

WHAT IS CYCLIC BREATHING?

Cyclic breathing is a technique used to calm both body and mind whenever anxiety, stress or fear are present.

It is done in rounds whereby you follow the sequence outlined herein in this example of what is known as Hoóponopono Breathing :-

  1. Sit in a comfortable position, both feet on the floor and place your hands either palms down in your lap or on your abdomen.
  2. Breathe as you normally would and be aware of your inflowing and outflowing breath.
  3. Start to breathe in to the count of seven.
  4. Hold your breath to the count of seven.
  5. Breathe out to the count of seven.
  6. Hold your breath to the count of seven.

This constitutes one round and the round should be repeated seven times.

Variations of this which can occur where counting is concerned can be:-

Breathe in to the count of three.

  1. Hold for three.
  2. Breathe out for three.
  3. Hold for three.

or:

Breathe in to the count of three.

  1. Hold for three.
  2. Breathe out for five.
  3. Hold for five.

Your counting should be slow and you should regulate your breath accordingly to your counting. For these additional ways of achieving cyclic deep breathing repeat the rounds until you feel calm.

You will find with practice that breathing deeply into your abdomen over time becomes normal to you once again as it did when you were a small child or baby. You should feel the rise and fall of your abdomen as you do the rounds.

To assist you with achieving this on a regular basis I recommend you do it three times a day, or more often if and when required. The more you practice it and get yourself into a regular rhythm with it the sooner it will become your normal way of breathing. Most new behavioural patterns take a while to develop into an unconscious habit. I have read that it takes our brains up to 21 days to form a new habit which requires no thought for us to do. I would however recommend you make a concerted effort to do it for a month on a regular basis.

 

Breath for WordPress Blog

© Cheryl O’Connor 2014.  Images sourced from the internet – creators unknown.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333 – Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

PUTTING OURSELVES BACK TOGETHER AGAIN

Over time as we have been growing up our cultural conditioning, the trauma, abuse and the energy of fear we have all endured causes us as we truly are to shut down and protect ourselves from further wounding.

Parts of us during such events fragment into the abyss of our subconscious in order that we survive. These fragmented parts create re-actions and energetic barriers with others, rather than responses, as often we behave in ways we know really isn’t us.

It is only by re-membering (bringing back into the membrane of our being – our conscious awareness and our bodies so the energy can be transformed through the physical body, for there appears to be no other way to do it but re-member/feel it) these fragmented parts of Self which split off that we were either too terrified to feel or did not want to feel the trauma, grief, sadness, pain etc., of, that we truly become whole again and realise our innate connection with all that exists.

Some refer to this as negative energy, darkness etc. but it is all part of the whole of who we truly are.

Once re-membered, felt and transformed, instead of Beings filled with holes which we self-medicate to fill, or we use others to fill the gaps with, or by putting up the barriers we do which push others away in order to protect our wounds, the core of who we all truly are comes more and more to the fore.

It is in The Dreaming where we have access to these fragmented parts of Self and as they are re-membered and felt, they also no longer create blockages of energy within our bodies which make us ill and dis-eased (not being at ease with our Selves) for what is often split off from our conscious awareness is actually stored in our bodies – we all become a bit like clogged drains which once cleared out life force energy is free to flow through us again.

The Dreaming is an altered state of consciousness that some refer to as dreams, astral travelling, conscious dreaming, Shamanic Journeying, past life regression, Spirit World, psychic ability etc., It is basically all one space/area of consciousness that we all have access to when our consciousness is not focussed in the physical body and is also experienced during meditation, in imagining and in memories of images and feelings that come to us. When we “drift” in a light “sleep” is also the space of The Dreaming and in that space all time is now. There simply is no past or future as we have been conditioned to believe there is and we do have access to both what we call past and future in this space.

We can never change the past but what I realised we can do is change the re-actions and behaviours we had in the past, not just in this life time but in past life times, so that they are no longer impacting on us, our relationships and our lives now.

By working with any dreams we experience in what we term sleep, when our consciousness comes back into the physical body, or by treating any re-active situation we have, just as we would if working with a dream we can change our re-active behaviours, heal our wounds and navigate our lives and the many processes we all go through ever so much easier.

*******
If you would like to experience Dreaming consciously I am holding a Workshop on the 27th of September and I am also available for private sessions of Conscious Dreaming and Skype or Email assistance with getting to the bottom of what a dream really means to you.

© Cheryl O’Connor 2014.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

DISTANCE HEALING

One very profound thing my life has shown me without question is that all consists of energy vibrating at different frequencies or what some folk term “levels”.   What appears to our limited logical, rational, in this reality minds is that we are separate to all that exists around us and that all feels and appears to be solid.  Yet basic science tells us that everything consists of atoms moving or vibrating at different speeds or frequencies if you like.  Quantum Physics has taken great leaps forward in helping us understand that true solidity as opposed to our physical reality of solidity, is just not simply so.  Consciousness is definitely not limited to physical boundaries, distance or what appears to us to be solid.

Where our attention and focus is directed with our consciousness/thoughts is where our energy flows.  Music is a perfect example of how the energy of sound impacts on us and can be very healing when it is focussed. When we truly feel the energy of music that resonates with us it also moves us to dance.

Many of us know that if we focus on “negatives” more negatives appear, if we focus on “positives” more positives appear.  Many of us also know we create a lot of what goes on with our thoughts and our emotions due to our thoughts.  Change the thought and you change the emotion. Feel the energy of the emotion and it no longer exists in your body, for it is transformed and in being released or transformed it stops us getting stuck like sticks on the side of the river bank of life in behaviours and situations that do not make us happy.  Stuck or blocked energy is a huge factor in illness and dis-ease.  Dis-ease whilst we often refer to it as disease, can often equate to not being at ease with one’s Self.

In conscious dreaming or active dreaming, which is what some call lucid dreaming, shamanic journeying or even astral travelling and which also includes what many call past life regression, you become very aware that your consciousness is not just limited to your physical body.  You can and quite often do experience flying or falling for example in your “dream” body.  You can also experience that you are not who you are in this physical reality i.e. you can for eg “dream” that you are an animal, or a tree, or that you are stuck in stone and part of a mountain, you can dream you are a bird and your consciousness can and does merge with other energies including aspects of yourself that normally would not happen for most in their experience within their physical body.

You can even walk through walls in your “dream” body and you can also gain access to what we call “past” lives where you are in a body that you “know” is yours but looks nothing like you presently do.   You can also interact with other Souls you know and even don’t know, some of whom have passed on and no longer exist in a physical body and yes you can also experience aspects of future.

Further, it is not at all uncommon to have telepathic or verbal communication with others, including animals and birds etc. in this altered state of consciousness where “time”, solidity and all that is logical and rational does not exist.   It is also very apparent to me that if you have an issue with someone which cannot be resolved for whatever reason in this physical reality it can very simply and easily be done in what we call “dreaming” so that you gain peace for yourself around whatever situation has occurred that has thrown you off balance emotionally.

HOW IT WORKS

Reiki is commonly known to most, but Seichim isn’t.  Personally I have had very lovely sessions with Reiki Practitioners, where I have either released mild blockages of energy that had not been expressed at some point in “time” or where it is all so very relaxing my consciousness has drifted off away from my body to somewhere very peaceful and pleasant.  Reiki alone however, in comparison to a combination of Reiki/Seichim is like comparing a small torchlight to a spotlight.  The energy is  so much more powerful.  Reiki is known as the wave of energy going in, Seichim the wave of energy coming out.

Seichim’s  foundations apparently lay in Buddhist teachings that were brought to India by Buddhist monks at some point in time and it is believed to have derived from the healing power taught and practised in Ancient Egypt called Sekhem and then translated into its Sanskrit equivalent Seichim.

The hieroglyphic symbols used for this very powerful energy are found etched on the sides of the Pyramids and within the tombs of Egypt.  Whilst Sekhem is the energy of the Goddess Sekhmet, primordial Goddess of both healing and destruction, Kwan Yin, the energy of the Eastern Goddess of mercy and compassion is associated with Seichim.  Like Reiki, Reiki/Seichim treatments can be done in person or via distance and then can assist naturally with the healing of any symptom, illness or dis-ease.

Although Seichim is a very gentle, feminine and loving energy it heals in a very direct manner working on core problems and beliefs.  It address the subtle aspects of cause releasing the imprints in the subtle bodies which create symptoms of illness and dis-ease in our physical bodies.  As a tool for self-transformation it accelerates our personal development and aids us in achieving our full potential.  It also assists us to make appropriate changes where necessary in our lives, allowing us to stay more balanced, grounded and confident as we clarify our emotions and experience the ever changing world.

For myself I have seen some quite miraculous things occur when I have done healing with others using Reiki/Seichim either in person or via distance healing and it is not at all uncommon for my hands to become burning hot during a session as I allow the energy to come through them.  Nor is it uncommon for me to experience what we generally call visions concerning the other person.

WHAT WE CAN DO TOGETHER

If you would like to experience the benefit of Reiki/Seichim Healing, distance only being relative to physical location, a half hour session will cost you $30 and the session needs to be and can be pre-paid on my website www.cheocoenterprises.com.    Once you have booked your session I will then email you to organise a date and time.   Whilst your name alone will be sufficient enough for me to work with,  it is hugely beneficial if you can also send me a recent photograph of yourself and advise me of what is going on for you. It is not totally necessary that you set aside the half hour we organise but again it would be more beneficial for you to do so.  Further information will come to you via email once you have booked your session and I will also check in with you after it.

Please note that I do not set intentions when doing any healing work.  I merely ask that the session bring whatever is needed for the highest good of all concerned.   I do not claim at all to “cure” anyone of anything a person may be experiencing.

For myself though I know firsthand that Reiki/Seichim alone was responsible for assisting me to stop limping and bend my knee again properly after some 18 years of not being able to due to an injury I sustained in a horrific fatal car accident I was involved in.  The result was quite miraculous as specialists I had seen concerning my knee over the years had told me emphatically that I would never again re-gain the full use of my knee nor lose the feeling of numbness the injury created.

If you have any questions or are interested in learning more and being attuned to Reiki, Seichim or both please do not hesitate to contact me @cheoco99@yahoo.com.au. Thank you.

Cheers, Cheryl.

© Cheryl O’Connor 2014.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

THE PROMISE

Hi folks, yesterday I completed the final touches of a story that has been part of my life for some 20 years now.  Originally written all in verse and self published I recently undertook the mammoth task of re-writing it and turning it into an Ebook.  It is the first in a series of books I will be publishing and encompasses several years of my life that were quite frankly the wildest ride of my life.

What follows is the synopsis on the back cover.  If you have any queries please feel free to contact me – Links which enable you to purchase it are at the end of the synopsis.

Thanks, Cheryl.

 

Cheryl O’Connor is a qualified Holistic Counsellor, specialising in Conscious Dreaming (aka Shamanic Journeying i.e. Soul Retrieval) and Experiential Dream Analysis.  She is also a qualified Dream Analyst, Reiki/Seichim Master and Isis Meditation Teacher who has facilitated many talks at various Community Centres throughout Queensland and Northern New South Wales as well as private sessions, Workshops and Courses since 1992.

She is the founder of Cheoco Enterprises which she began in January 2013 and is a Freelance Writer whose articles and verses have appeared in various newspapers and magazines and on websites throughout Australia and the World.  She writes regular articles for Wild Woman Community, has her own Blog Site and Facebook Page and she is also a broadcaster who has been a guest speaker on radio in Australia and the United States.   Cheryl is also a Craftswoman who creates beautiful handmade Dolls and Toys for children along with other items.

This is the first in a series of books by Cheryl which takes the reader right along with her on the journey she undertook to find her truth, heal her body from life threatening illness and begin to discover who she truly was.  It is quite literally a journey from Heaven into and through Hell to get back to Heaven.  This journey was one which required every ounce of strength, courage and faith that could be mustered but a Promise had been made and regardless of the cost or what needed to be faced, felt and endured, it had to be kept.

It is a very honest and often raw read which explores some of the initiations of the Shaman/Medicine Woman and will, at times, leave you gobsmacked when you see how past, present and future do quite literally exist right here, right now in the present moment.

Through Cheryl’s experiences of “waking up” we are shown that love and those we love never truly die, along with some of the symbology and synchronicity the Universe presents to us in Dreaming and in this physical reality in order to truly heal and understand ourselves and each other – eventually realising we are all One – for as Pythagoras once said:

“Know yourself and you will know the Universe.”

© Cheryl O’Connor 2014.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

KILLER STRESS

Image

It seems fairly acceptable in our society these days to accept stress as “normal”. Technology designed to make life easier has in fact made life busier with a constant flow of information, requests and demands on our time and things to attend to all run by numbers on a calendar, in a bank account or on a clock that our thoughts about them react to.

More and more automated voice options on phones that don’t get you where you need to be to actually speak to a human being does not add relief to our stress levels as they provide less and less customer service along with more and more frustration. We have less time to grow and cook good food and less time with loved ones because we are all so “busy”.

Whereas once upon a time you wrote a letter, wandered down to the post box and posted it, it was received and you then waited for a reply these days as soon as an email arrives there is an inclination to attend to it almost immediately in order to continue on with what you are doing or to attend to some “urgent” matter that has suddenly arisen. It seems too that being more and more productive is constantly pushed by bosses in the name of profit and greed. Combined with that the volume of information available these days on the internet can be and often is quite overwhelming.

Where once upon a time you only heard local or national news now you are bombarded with news about disasters, insanities and atrocities from all over the planet wherever you go which generally speaking you are helpless to do a damn thing about other than to either feel empathy for those involved, have a re-action to which is usually either anger or sadness and be ever so grateful for your own situation in a country such as Australia. Or you can always just turn it all off.

The push for more and more productivity, more and more profit driven greed is massive though and as the planet’s health is affected by it, so too is ours. If we have a day where we simply can just take in no more information, where all we want to do is just roll the rock over the cave entrance and hibernate, stay in our jim jams and sloth about simply because we just cannot be bothered with any of it or we feel like we just cannot do anything more without some shutdown time, our conditioning is, generally speaking to think we are lazy or are being self-indulgent. In recent days even our government here in Oz has decided it’s a damn good thing if people born after a certain year now continue working until they are 70 before they will be able to receive any government assistance by way of a pension.

When folk get snappy at others it is usually because they are rushing around frantically with a million things in their heads all screaming for attention, they are not present at all. They are in fact either living in the past in their heads or living in the future and so the reason usually given for a snappy or rude attitude and tone of voice is in many situations tied in with stress.

We, as humans, are not computers where buttons can just be pushed and information is rapidly processed, yet by many and perhaps even ourselves we have become conditioned to expect we can. However even the best computers need de-fragging and deletion of old files when they start to run slowly. Many people too are so busy talking about all their dramas and stresses or whinging and gossiping about other folk there is simply no space or time for self-reflection or introspection. As for self-nurturing well that is just something many don’t have “time” for.

A typical day for most of us (not exactly in this order but you will get the gist of it) is being rapidly brought out of sleep by a screaming “alarm”, so we are “alarmed” before we even get out of bed, a frantic rush out the door to get to where we need to be trying to make sure we have all we need, a day being bombarded with “stuff” by much and many, a frantic rush to get children where they need to be (if we have them), a frantic rush home to do whatever needs doing that night and then a run around situation on a weekend just to get ready for the following week. Folk work incredibly long hours to maintain jobs many really are not even happy doing, to either just survive or to pay off debt they have acquired to buy “stuff” they are usually so busy working to pay for they don’t get much time to enjoy the “stuff”, nor do they get much time to spend with those in their lives who they love and care about.

It all seems like total insanity to me and always has done even though I too have participated in it for several decades.

At some point in our evolution we have gone from a day that consisted of a natural rhythm of waking up at sunrise, washing and gathering our food for the day, making things we needed, not wanted (there is a massive difference) all of which nature provided us with the resources to do, spending time with our “tribe”, cooking, laughing, planting, caring for each other, telling stories, making music, harvesting crops and living a very simple but way more fulfilling life to my way of thinking than we all presently have and then going to sleep not too long after the sun went down. What we call “stress” has been part of humanity forever for it actually comes from the fight or flight response we all contain.

When “stressed” the adrenal glands create adrenalin which then makes our hearts pump faster and harder so that blood can be moved to our big muscles in order that we have enough oomph to either fight, literally for our very lives, or take flight rapidly to save our lives. We also breathe rather shallowly when stressed so not as much oxygen is available to pump our blood. The whole purpose of “stress” and the impact it has on our bodies is purely about survival and was designed to last for only a very short time to keep us safe. I became aware recently that it is seen to be a 15 minute maximum scenario.

So, what happens when we are “stressed” constantly – high blood pressure happens, sore throats happen if we are not speaking our truth, anxiety happens, nervous disorders happen, lack of sleep happens, headaches happen, muscles ache and so many other horrid impacts to our body, emotions and minds happens and whilst we all know stress isn’t healthy for us and we tout it is a killer – it is indeed very much a killer by nature of the human body when experienced on an ongoing basis. It is very often the case that unless or until it makes us really sick we just carry on Columbus with it as a constant companion.

I am speaking from hard learnt experience here and often it is the case that you really don’t realise just how stressed you were until you move into a space of not being stressed. For a time it is actually a really weird feeling to not be stressed, to not be racing around like a lunatic and to not be constantly achieving or producing. Many people when they start experiencing stress symptoms like digestive disorders and other apparent signs like I have mentioned above have the inbuilt conditioning to go see a doctor and get some pills so they can “carry on”. The pills they take have possible “side effects” which aren’t really things that happen on the side and are in fact effects and whilst yes for some pharmaceuticals are the answer for more and more of us they are fast not becoming the answer. The western medical system is a whole other topic and for some it works, for some it doesn’t. This article is not about that particular system for better or for worse or about my giving anyone advice. Essentially though what I have learned is that whenever we aren’t feeling well it is always a sign that the body wants and NEEDS rest and that in all situations where my own body is concerned there is a blockage of energy that needs releasing.

So what causes stress? Quite simply our own thinking causes the bulk of our stress. As an example I once was travelling to the city to work, the train was delayed due to an electrical failure totally out of rail employee’s control. They took action to get the fault repaired, they called for buses to take stranded passengers to where they needed to go and they informed all passengers what was going on.

There were well over a couple of hundred folk who this electrical fault impacted on. There was quite simply nothing more the rail employees could do about any of it and people just needed to ring their employers, inform them they would be late and wait for the buses. Most were fine with that but several became so anxious and extremely rude, loud, aggressive and obnoxious towards the rail employees simply because things hadn’t gone according to their plan that morning and so yes now they would be late for work. Their thoughts about whatever they were now going to be late for and perhaps how their own bosses would re-act to them being late were a trigger that created such a scene many fellow commuters were embarrassed by their behaviour and it led to many feeling and expressing empathy for the railway employees.

There is a story in Women Who Run With The Wolves. You can find it on page 328. If you don’t have a copy of this incredible and always life changing book of many stories for those who have read it, I do suggest you track down a copy, you will not regret it. I’ve had my copy since the early 90s and I still find such a lot of information, wisdom and inspiration within its pages.

The story I am referring to is called The Three Gold Hairs. It fits extremely well into the scenario of stress in our “modern world” and its impact on us. We actually become the old and withered dying man in that story as more and more stress envelops us until there comes a time where we simply cannot go on any longer with the pressure of the work “force” sucking away at us and impacting on us as we stagger through the dark forest with stress as our companion, primarily due to this whole work till you drop, constantly achieve and produce mentality that has become the norm for so many of us. We are really beings not doings and whilst yes there are things we need to do it appears to me we become healthier, more alive, more patient, more accepting and more energised when we do what we love to do, not what we feel or think we have to do.

It is a very necessary part of the feminine nature of life regardless of the sexual gender of our bodies to stop, to rest, to restore, to sleep, to dream and to nurture ourselves and to not allow our thoughts or the energy of others to create stress which engulfs us, for we are a bit like freshly baked juicy apple pies – steaming hot out of the oven and all will want a piece of us – just remember to always leave some for yourself and to bake yourself a new pie before you run out.

Cheers, Cheryl.

© Cheryl O’Connor 2014.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au

THE TRUE NATURE OF THE DOLL

Whilst Rudolf Steiner had much wonderful insight to share in relation to the importance of The Doll for all children and subsequently our culture/society and ultimately the world we all live in (which if interested you can read for yourself as it is just all too big for here) I stumbled across the following quite some time ago in Women Who Run With The Wolves which resonated with me strongly and which, I thought, may also be of interest to some.

I could very much relate to what Ms. Estes has to say about Dolls. The following comes from her analysis of the story of Vasalisa.

“Dolls are one of the symbolic treasures of the instinctual nature. In Vasalisa’s case, the doll represents vidacita, the little instinctual life force that is both fierce and enduring. No matter what mess we are in, it lives out a life hidden within us.

For centuries humans have felt that dolls emanate both a holiness and mana – an awesome and compelling presence which acts upon persons, changing them spiritually. Dolls are believed to be infused with life by their makers.

The Doll is the symbolic homunculi, little life. It is the symbol of what lies buried in humans that is numinous. It is a small and glowing facsimile of the original Self. Superficially, it is just a doll. But inversely, there is a little piece of soul that carries all the knowledge of the larger soul-Self.

The Doll is related to the symbols of leprechaun, elf, pixie, fairy, and dwarf. In fairy tales these represent a deep throb of wisdom within the culture of the psyche. They are those creatures which go on with the canny and interior work, who are tireless. In this way the doll represents the inner spirit of women; the voice of inner reason, inner knowing, and inner consciousness.

The doll is like the little bird in fairy tales who comes and whispers in the heroine’s ear, the one who reveals the hidden enemy and what to do about it all. This is the wisdom of homunculus, the small being within. It is our helper which is not seeable, but which is always accessible.

The dolls serve as talismans. Talismans are reminders of what is felt but not seen, what is so, but is not immediately obvious. The talismanic numen of the doll is that it reminds us, tells us, and sees ahead for us. This intuitive function belongs to all women. It is a massive and fundamental receptivity. Not receptivity as once touted in classical psychology that is as a passive vessel. But receptivity as in possessing immediate access to a profound wisdom that reaches to women’s very bones.”

Personally I have never been a fan of plastic dolls with false smiley faces or “perfect” model bodies and as a child I was never drawn to Barbie dolls at all even though they were all the rage during my childhood. As I have grown older I can see how that fits with my own need to always be real, raw and passionate and not pretend I am anything I am not. The last thing I reckon a child would want when they are upset is to cuddle a cold plastic doll with a painted smiley face. If it were me and I was upset I reckon I would want to throw it as far away from me as possible. To my way of thinking something soft and warm, made with love and care rather than a slapped together plastic mould type deal would always bring more comfort and nurturing.

What I have always found very interesting to observe over the years as the Bat Cave has been and still is a workplace for making dolls, toys and other items, is that absolutely every single item I have made of the doll/toy variety my son, as he was growing up wanted too, and his face would often light up with excitement as he witnessed each new creation. He was so perceptive that quite a while back his attention was drawn to a particular flower child I was making and he said “I really like this one, she is full of Spirit.”

So…. I cannot help but believe that Ms Pinkola Estes’ perception of the doll is a true reflection of their nature because there truly is something very special, beautiful and magical that occurs for me in the realm of doll/toy making. It is not seen, it is not measurable in terms of logic, but it contains a feeling that is truly beyond words, not just for me the maker, but more importantly for those who receive them.

I personally find there is nothing more satisfying for me than taking raw materials that look like nothing special or much at all and turning them into gorgeous little life and loved filled creations. There is also nothing more magical in my world than seeing the looks on folk’s faces when they see them on the table at the market.

Eyes light up, big smiles come, faces soften and exclamations of how cute and beautiful they are, are common. You can see the inner child in many come forth when they look at and feel my creations and in a world that is mostly full of manufactured, whack it out as fast as you can items, based on nothing more than making a profit which fall apart in no time, it is so very lovely to be able to bring the gift of handmade to many, for it is in those moments when I can see and also feel the affect my creations have on folk that truly do make the many hours they take to create oohh so worth it.

Cheers, Cheryl.

© Cheryl O’Connor 2014.

•*´☾☆☽`*•

‪#‎Cheryl‬ O’Connor.
‪#‎Holistic‬ ‪#‎Counsellor‬, Author & Writer.

* Cognitive & Body Based Counselling.
* Creative & Artistic Therapies.
* Specialising in ‪#‎Dream‬ ‪#‎Analysis‬/‪#‎Conscious‬ ‪#‎Dreaming‬ & ‪#‎Shamanic‬ Journeying.
* ‪#‎Reiki‬/‪#‎Seichim‬ Treatments & Attunements.
* Isis ‪#‎Meditation‬.

Newsletter Subscription @ bit.ly/CheocoNews – All subscribers will receive a 10% discount on their first initial consultation for any of my services along with 10 pages of awesome tips and tricks to help you start deciphering the language of your Soul, your dreams, as well as the symbolism of what appears to you daily.

Website @ www.cheocoenterprises.com
My book The Promise, Skype & Email Consultations Available – bit.ly/Cheocoshop

FB: https://www.facebook.com/cheocoenterprises
Skype: cheryloconnor333

Twitter: Cheryl O’Connor@Cheoco99
Email: cheoco99@yahoo.com.au