Ho'oponopono

ho'oponopono and what is cleaning? ~ miracle in the mirror ~ myelitis ~ spine, paralysis, inflammation

I haven't read Miracle in the Mirror in two years. I just picked it up to write a post on another blog. It's the true story of young college student Nita Edwards descent into a debilitating illness. Flipping through it, I was surprised to see how much Nita's prayer resembled ho'oponopono in intent. 

I found the book through serendipity during a dark time in my life. As I was reading it I focused more on her finding a cure and being healed. However, I did underline the passage where she starts to asking to know her purpose in life rather than to be saved. Re-reading that page today, it talks about the more she delved into that style of prayer the more she was clearing herself to be a direct spiritual pipeline so she would know the answer and live it.

The word 'cleaning' is the #1 word Dr. Len uses to describe ho'oponopono. If you clean (or clear) whatever is obscuring direct divine inspiration (he calls it inspiration, and other times zero point or zero state). I call it inspiration as well, not intuition (there's often a sense of "checking in" with intuition whereas inspiration is immediate and spontaneous and without  a second thought.) Basically, in the present moment, if one was not obscured by relying on, grasping to and repeating past memories and patterns, it's clear what to do (or not do) in divine harmony (usually in a fresh, fluid way).

It's interesting (that is all in the past for both Nita and myself) to note the symbolism of Nita's disease as it applies to what was going on in my life during a dark time two years ago.  (I wasn't combining Louise Hay's symbolism and ho'oponopono then, I think.)

Spine: Flexible support in life.

Affirmation: I am supported by life.

Paralysis:  Fear, terror. Escaping situation or person. Resistance.

Affirmation: I am one with all life, I am safe and totally adequate for all situations.

Inflammation, -itis:  Fear. Seeing red. Inflated thinking.

Affirmation: My thinking is peaceful, calm and centered.

There's not a direct entry for myelitis, so I'm using the primary symptoms and body areas of the disease below. For instance, Spine: At the time I did not feel supported by life (but if truth be told it was because I wanted my mind/brain to figure out and wrestle down the answer, or in other words, I was being a control-freak and not allowing life to unfold in a graceful way).  Paralysis: The worse the hardship was the more I resisted and felt intense fear around sheer survival.

I included the affirmations not because I use affirmations as is but because they sort of point to an antidote, or a hint. Surrendering to Life to support me one moment to the next through its guidance and inspiration and grace would have done wonders for me at that time (still does).

Inflammation: I was frustrated and angry that compromising my work (to be palatable to masses or in other words, publishers) had resulted in financial hardship, and I probably blamed a whole host of people who didn't seem to be helping the situation.

Again, the most important point for me in flipping through the book tonight was not the curing of the disease but that clearing of herself to be open to divine guidance and inspiration. The Divine (inclusive of you, I'm not referring to an exterior being but all Being) is already well-being itself, so all that's necessary is to clear away blocks.

A few excerpts from the book, Miracle in the Mirror:

"She lay sulking in the bed, a bag of bones, praying, "Why me, God?" and angrily holding back the tears, when the husband of another relative walked in with Colton Wickramaratne. For a long time, he had wanted Colton, his pastor, to pray for Nita.

Nita made every effort to be pleasant, as always, as they were introduced, but she was not disposed toward socializing at the moment. She was still mad at God. She answered the preacher's questions, smiled sweetly, and closed her eyes as he prayed. As he left she said, "Thank you for coming," but she really meant, "Thank you for going."

[In this excerpt, the pastor Colton revisits her and reveals a vision he had. . . . ]

"She was dying of myelitis, a creeping paralysis that was destroying her limbs and vital organs, and, apart from that, she had always been cynical about visions and dreams and voices. The story Colton told her really bore no relevance to her.

"God is going to heal you," Colton insisted. "You're going to have an impact on all of Asia."

"You can't be sure of that," Nita replied coolly. "I come from a family of medical people. I know full well that my disease will eventually reach my heart and lungs, and I will die. But you're good to try and encourage me."

"I would never give you false hopes," Colton answered. "But I saw your face in the vision. You are going to live."

Nita shrugged. The preacher could believe whatever he liked. She couldn't stop him.

[Days later . . . . ]

"Oh, Colton," Nita sobbed, "why don't you just stop praying for me?"

"No," he replied, adamant. "I'm not going to let go until God tells you what He intends to do with your life."

A subtle change occurred to Nita that day. Her prayer life experienced a fundamental change.

"I'm not asking for healing any more," she told the Lord each day. "I'm not asking to be taken home to heaven. Just tell me what you created me for, and do anything you like with me."

She doggedly repeated the prayer, day after day, night after night.

"If your plan is to let me die, that's fine," she often added, her fear of death completely gone.

"If your plan is to let me lie here like a vegetable for thirty years, that's O.K. I don't like it, but I'll live for you right in this bed. Just tell me what you want me to do, why you created me, what purpose you intended when you formed me in the womb. What is your plan for me?"

. . . When she felt herself doubting that God would ever answer her, she repeated the last verse of Isaiah 40 as a counter-argument:

"But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."

And for Nita, that promise--mounting up, running, and walking--made it worth the wait, even if it would only be a figure of speech.

It was a strange change, after so many months of demanding a miracle of healing. Colton and Suzanne, her mother, and hundreds of Christians all over the world, were demanding her healing, and in the swirling midst of all this, she was asking only for a word --not action.

And daily, Nita's spiritual pipeline was being cleared. The earthly longings she had felt for so long were being swept away. The obsessions of her teen years, the self-indulgent prayers, the earmarks of immaturity began to be dissolved within her by a divine touch. Every day, she could sense in her spirit that her spiritual pipeline was coming close to a total cleansing--a little closer to the day when it could freely transport God's answer to her heart.

. . . The advance of death indeed appeared to continue in Nita's body."

Nita got her answer. And it wasn't the healing--that was the echo of the song. The answer was the clearing itself. A purely physical healing would have been much, much less than what she asked for.

It's hard to believe that the paralysis caused by myelitis, the whole disease itself, and visible scars from surgery vanished completely for Nita but she testifies (and others) that they did and knowing and seeing some of this type of miracle first-hand, it did so because any disharmony is an overlay (and even dare I say an illusory one). Once the overlay is cleared, metaphorically, what's always been real (well-being) is simply there. Just like clouds don't remove or replace the sun, yet can they obstruct it.

ho'oponopono on pride/shame failure/success and other polar opposites that can knot your insides & solar plexus chakra

"What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?" is as good or bad a question as "What would you attempt if you knew you would succeed?" These sound like great questions don't they?

Yet it all hinges on whether you are a loser, or not. A failure or not.

Labels such as winner and loser, loyal or traitor, success or failure, honorable or dishonorable, worthy/unworthy, redeemed and unredeemable are on the seesaw spectrum of pride/shame I spoke about yesterday, and also deal with the solar plexus chakra and all its associated organs.

If a plant doesn't fit into a pot anymore, has it failed? Perhaps from the pot's perspective. It's just growth from another perspective.

Success/failure is based on judgment and interpretation. It's a polarity of opposites, just like pride/shame.

Accept and allow yourself, others, and that life is unfolding in surprising ways (that don't fit neatly into polar interpretations).

It's taken me my entire existence until rather recently* to recognize that failure and success are cultural notions (often based on control), and are woefully subjective. Really, I didn't see that failure and success were perceptions; I'd gone along with the program and believed like most people that they had held some objective truth.

When ten years ago I could not afford health insurance, I became a loser as a health insurance consumer. Plus, an utter failure at the yuppie identity that I had groomed ;) Yet little did I know it would pave the way to learn healing on my own and techniques shared on this blog, so even when I could afford it again, 'insurance' made no sense to me.  Another example is when my car failed, I was a loser who couldn't afford a working vehicle. I had to walk or bus everywhere in suburban San Jose. That's how I learned I had neighbors and hosted a tea party for all of us on Sept 11, 2007, that magnolias bloomed on my block, that serene parks and tall sequoias welcomed my footfall, that street art flourished best for pedestrians. It was from that time on when I started valuing walkable neighborhoods, community placemaking and public space. In some strange way, it is as if I were guided to abandon routes that I'd been accustomed to--which definitely looks like "failure" since it doesn't meet any cultural norms--and get mighty curious.

When you see the word "failure" or "success" bandied about (and it happens often in USA), either directed at you or to a project at work, or to someone else in your circle, or even to an authority figure, that would be an opportune time for Ho'oponopono and seeing the pattern of believing in that dichotomy that we all may yet share. They are both sides to the same coin, which is easy to flip. Look within where you feel reactive around the words and the emotional tone behind them. Look within where you feel any kinship with the person's or situation's pattern. Then, silently or aloud to yourself: "I love you, please forgive me, I'm sorry, I love you, thank you."

A better question might be along the lines, "What would you attempt to do if you knew you did not fear the unknown?"

Or poet Pablo Neruda's questions:

How much does a man live, after all?
Does he live a thousand days, or one only?
For a week, or for several centuries?
How long does a man spend dying?
What does it mean to say 'for ever'?

* Here's when I opened my eyes about concept of failure and success being trained into us, and not true.  I read about these research studies by Carol Dweck and others that compared children who were praised (or upbraided) for being smart and capable with children that were praised for moving forward, growing, learning and stumbling along the way regardless.  Over time, the praiseworthy "capable child" will give up in the face of failure and avoid unknowns to retain their honor, whereas the other children praised for trying are motivated by the chance to explore. See article: "The Effort Effect. According to a Stanford psychologist, you’ll reach new heights if you learn to embrace the occasional tumble," Stanford Magazine, March/April 2007

ho'oponopono ~ busting loose from the money game ~ When you get the Infinite thing, you can relax because everything you could ever want or be, you already have and are ~ i love huckabees

Apologies for being offline since October. It costs $180 per year to keep this blog up and going, and things have been pretty tight financially--so what happens is the software provider locks me out of the the website entirely so no updates are possible until I've paid up.

So I thought I would use this opportunity to talk about financial discord, and how Ho'oponopono can be of benefit.

Also, since this discord is a fixated pattern in the holographic universe, or you can say a pattern in collective unconsciousness applying Ho'oponopono has effects well beyond the individual (well, there isn't actually an  individual separate from collective consciousness; it's all a singular consciousness in flux).  The global economy today also attests to this pattern.

Getting back into the website today I had to go clear out months and months worth of spam comments. As you might already know, spammers use real words in their gibberish to make it past the software filters. One spam gibberish comment began with the words:

"The harmony is a bank account. . ."

Which is intriguing because I consider ho'oponopono to be about harmony.

First, I'd like to say that I wholeheartedly recommend a book that isn't your typical financial advice. It fits very neatly with Ho'oponopono. The title is Busting  Loose From the Money Game, by Robert Scheinfeld.

The book is significantly contrarian (to what we've been educated, conditioned, and domesticated to believe) that I couldn't possible distill it here since I don't have a common context or framework to rely on--another book would be necessary! Why Busting Loose From the Money Game ties into Ho'oponopono is the main technique used to reclaim and acknowledge we are infinite beings in Infinity has to do with looking at where we feel discomfort (comes in many guises--stress, anxiety, and other uncomfortable feelings of pressure, conflict, restraint, stuckness, etc.) As Dr. Len has said, he looked at his own REACTIONS in regard to each patient and their case history in the criminally insane ward of the hospital. He didn't treat them with talk therapy, he cleared his own discomfort and discord.

This is possibly the one area I may have neglected to be clear on using Ho'oponopono.

It's very important to look at if and where we feel discomfort or discord. We are looking at our reactions to external situations, more so than judging whether external situations are good or bad or should or shouldn't exist in the world.

For instance, if you read in the paper about homelessness and foreclosures rising in your state, if you feel neutral reading that, there is no need to apply Ho'oponopono, because you are not sharing the pattern. (Different events may be more your trigger points.)  However, if this causes you anguish or fear or sorrow--in other words, feelings of discomfort as author Robert Schienfeld calls it (or stressful thoughts as Byron Katie names it) then ho'oponopono can be useful to clear all held patterns you may have around that.

The way Schienfeld would possibly word it, we have given power and energy to these situations, events, people, institutions in Phase 1 of the Human Game that are now showing up again so that we can acknowledge that they do not any independent authority and in fact are forms arising from and within the infinite Consciousness we ourselves actually are.  In Phase 2 of the Human Game, we are realizing that infinite means infinite, and all that that implies. (Yes, it also implies you never need to hustle nor worry for money; I know I myself allowed money to have power and energy OVER me, and that doesn't reconcile with infinite totality. Although U.S.A. bills are printed with "In God We Trust," that's not typically lived out.)

Until we truly grok at every level of being that I are infinite, I will experience discomfort at the edges we have imagined out of boundless spaciousness, and experience the discordant affects of clinging to fixed conclusions of reality based on my imbalanced perceptions.

However, those areas of discomfort are precisely the clues that will free me/we! That's where we can apply ho'oponopono (and/or Scheinfeld's process and/or Byron Katie's The Work).

To give you a flavor of the book, here's an excerpt from the Q&A section. Note Scheinfeld uses "hologram" to denote the holographic nature of form/matter, and Expanded Self, to denote Infinite Consciousness flowing through an individuated expression of 'you':

Question: You said that my Expanded Self takes great care of me, supports me perfectly as I play The Human Game in Phase 1 and 2. However, based on the painful experiences you described as being part of your Phase 2 journey and the stories you shared about the painful experiences of others, it looks like many of the things that may happen to me aren't what would be called favorable. Is that right?

Answer: "Not favorable is a made-up Phase 1 concept and judgment. Everything that gets popped into your hologram is favorable, no matter how you choose to judge it, or it wouldn't be there. There aren't any accidents. Nothing is random. If it's happening, there's a pattern in The Field that your Expanded Self put there for a reason, with intelligence, and then popped into your hologram. We all make up stories about what it means and whether it's good or bad... We judge everything, sometimes negative and sometimes positive. In Phase 1, its slightly different, but in Phase 2, everything you call unfavorable is the exact opposite because it gives you the opportunity to reclaim huge amounts of power that translates into huge amounts of freedom and joy!" - Busting Loose from the Money Game, by Robert Scheinfeld

Bonus: I watched the movie, I Love Huckabees yesterday, and it was very funny and also gave a few hints around "infinite is infinite." Plenty of people have heard of this philosophy of nonduality and may hold it as a mental construct, but living It is another thing. I thought the movie did a decent job (for Hollywood) of showing how life will provide the clues (often in the form of discomfort or as my spiritual mentor says, "fierce grace") to liberation. The movie is much more experiential, less didactic, than this video clip shows:

 

In the first clip, the blanket scene, Dustin Hoffman is using the blanket to symbolize the Infinite. I'll share the rest of that scene's dialogue below:

"Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why do I need to see the blanket truth in the everyday stuff?"

"You wouldn't want to miss out on the big picture, would ya?"

"Uh-uh."

"That's partly why you're here, right? I'm talking about it right now. It'll take you a while to get it, you know. But it'll help you."

"How?"

"When you get the blanket thing, you can relax because everything you  could ever want or be, you already have and are.   That sound pretty good?"

 ART CREDITS: Freedom sculpture by Zenos Frudakis

ho'oponopono ~ money woes ~ homelessness, foreclosure and eviction ~ busting loose from the money game

Yesterday, I read this letter on a website:

"Pat,
I have tried for so long and I think it is safe to say I give up. I have tried to stay as positive as I can and nothing has worked unless I am blind to things happening. In June 2011 I lost my job and I have gone on so many interviews that I cannot understand why, I wake up at 5 every morning and live as though I am going to work actually get on my computer and do work. I have tried to manifest the things I need for my children but I nothing has worked. God knows I need a miracle, tomorrow at 1:30 I go to court to be evicted out of my home because I have not had money to pay the rent since August (I managed June and July). Today I sit here on my computer with a smile on my face because I know if I let go of this smile I will cry unstoppable. I have tried all that I am aware of and nothing has worked."

I was homeless for 18 days in 2010. And I'm not talking about couch-surfing at a friend's and not paying rent--been there, done that too. It was one of the most harrowing experiences of my life.

In some ways, it is sort of surreal as eleven years ago, I was making $88,000 a year and my ex-husband was probably earning something close to equivalent (I don't recall his income, he was consulting at energy companies part-time and day-trading Internet stocks). I never balanced a checkbook back then as there was always enough for whatever I dreamed up. I traveled all over the world. However, I'd not traded places for those times. I lived in a rather narrow, secular world that only consisted of what I knew through my five senses and cognition.

"Most people cannot conceive of any meaning when their life, their world, is being demolished." - Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth

*****

Ever since I hear that Obama read ten letters addressed to him each evening at the White House from citizens all over the USA, I've decided to read the individual, personal stories on WeAreThe99Percent site, and do ho'oponopono on them. A little each day. There are many people struggling right now. It's a big topic for one shot, yet it all fits the theme of power/powerless imbalance that already started a few posts ago.

Symbolically, which means unconsciously, the message in homelessness is not inhabiting your Self. It is a disconnect with your own Self. This abandonment of your Self happens long before the exterior home is lost; that's just the last straw. This is usually also the case in a foreclosure as well, losing touching with expressions of your Self. Most people are taking their mind-made little self as their Self... at some point, something internal/external appears to revolt at that confinement. Or maybe it is consciousness that asserts itself, I'm not sure what is the instigator as at the level of language it's all paradox.

It's the self coming home to itself I guess, no matter what.

*****

Why Bodhidharma Went to Motel 6

"Where is your home?” the interviewer asked him.

“Here.”

“No, no,” the interviewer said, thinking it a problem of translation,
“when you are where you actually live?”

Now it was his turn to think,  Perhaps the translation?

-- by Jane Hirschfield, After

*****

The origin of the word dwell means "to dig deep." I already know what happens when I stay on the surface of things. I already know what happnes when I avoid, or try to follow the cues of the culture. None of that digs very deep.

I see in that letter above my own little self scrambling to strategize and scheme up ways to stay afloat--all using what Dr. Len would deem memory. That worked in 2008, maybe I can do that. That worked for X, maybe I can do that. Scrambling.

Inspiration requires a bit of stillness and a bit of surrender to the moment without a reference point. The word surrender can be scary, I mean here surrender to the Infinite, not a capitulation to your self-pity, or a resignation to playing small. I see myself in that letter even though I'm not freaking out (now, I have). I can see how the letter brings up my own self-pity, the feeling of lack of options closing in on me, constriction, and clinging to old societal and 'safe' solutions as salvation. So I clear on that. I thank the letter-writer for reminding me how I can worry and try to solve my problems from an unconscious fear-driven place. I love you. I thank you. Forgive me. I'm sorry. I love you. 

Q: I imagine that the sapling that pushes its way through the soil can't be in total harmony with the present moment either because it has a goal. It wants to become a big tree. Maybe once it has reached maturity it will live in harmony with the present moment.

A: "The sapling doesn't want anything because it is at one with the totality, and the totality acts through it. "Look at the lilies of the field, how they grow," said Jesus, "they toil not, neither do they spin. Yet even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." We could say that the totality--Life--wants the sapling to become a tree, but the sapling doesn't see itself as separate from life and so wants nothing for itself. It is one with what Life wants. That's why it isn't worried or stressed. And if it has to die permanently, it dies with ease. It is as surrendered in death as it is in life. It senses, no matter how obscurely, its rootedness in Being, the formless and eternal one Life." -- Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to your Life's Purpose

*****

Early this week, I also read the below (so true). And laughed. It's hard. It's fierce grace. Yet as with 'health' I shall learn that 'wealth' doesn't depend on externalities. That will be a real liberation when flow and grace aren't about watching a bank account like a hawk, whether there is 24 cents there or $24 million. Most of the difficulty I experience is fundamentally resistance (i.e. not surrendering to the Infinite).

"In life, purifying experiences often move us into extreme places emotionally, so that we will release control, become vulnerable so as to be open, and allow our heart to rise above our head in surrender. On a 3D level, this can suck and be dramatic, but one eventually learns about grace (always an experience). On a 5D level, this becomes alchemical, and while discomfort likely remains a bit, there is also the “magic” of witnessing synchronicity and the universe/god meeting you just as you break through the veil of fear." - Britt Martin, October 17 2011

*****

I am reading a rather unconventional book called Busting Loose from the Money Game, by Robert Scheinfeld. Typically, I'd never read a book with a title like that. 

Yet these are not typical times. What felt like dire financial straits has me asking more open-ended questions about what I don't know that I don't know. And thus I stumbled into this book. It's very riveting in that it is not like any book on money I've ever read. It's about not allowing money to enthrall you into believing that power is contained in it. It's about know that power is in the Infinite and you are being guided to reclaim power, and once you know that (it's a very application focused book, not just to read, but to do) than money ceases to be a concern at all. I believe it has a lot of parallels to Ho'oponopono as the idea is to not see 'power' as external, to clear up any emotional reactions, and to trust Divine inspiration. Before I grok that, however, all the old beliefs--including work hard, keep your nose to grindstone, stay positive, worry, get more proactive and make things happens--get nearly violently challenged. The fiercer I hold onto old beliefs (memory, or programming as Dr. Len would name them), the harder I make it on myself.

"I explained that in Phase 2 all your core beliefs will be challenged and then dynamited to support you in opening up to The Truth and your natural state of Infinite Abundance." - Robert Scheinfeld, Busting Loose from the Money Game

*****

And finally, I had to love this story, that I also stumbled into two days ago.

"We had very little money and no foreseeable prospects. One evening after we had splurged on dinner and a movie, we walked back to our car to discover a $25 parking ticket. I just turned inside out with despair, but Steve did not seem to care. He had a deep well of patience when it came to discouragements. We drove to the ocean near Crissy Field in San Francisco and walked out onto the beach to see the sunset, where I began talking about money worries. He gave me a long, exasperated look, reached into his pockets and took the few last coins and dollars we had and threw them into the ocean. All of them."

Did you recognize who the characters in this true life story are? It's about Steve Jobs.  In an essay written by his first serious girlfriend Chrisann Brennan about when they were young (I didn't catch exact ages, maybe 18-21?). It's nearly unnatural for me to admit this, but I am clearly being supported in being shown patterns, seeing reactions clearly, and getting a chance to clear them once and for all.

Perhaps then I shall not put power into things, even things like coins and paper bills. 

There is one power and it flows through everything.

*****

I recently finished all the pages to scribble in a bland gray colored journal (yeah, and gray tends to reflect symbolically a confused/doubtful pattern of thought). The last notes in there are about the solar plexus chakra around power and my thoughts (references this list of chakras).

My mom gave me a new journal (and she's not particularly religious, btw, which made it all the more serendipitious). On the front cover are joyful teal and green colored birds flitting and alighting on tree limbs, and it reads:

Look at the birds of the air;

they do not sow or reap

or store away in barns,

and yet your heavenly

Father feeds them.

- Matthew 6:26 NIV

p.s. If you wish to donate... I also derive a great deal of benefit from feedback and exchange,  in comments or via email. Thanks.

ho'oponopono ~ sing your inspiration ~ acute myeloid leukemia ~ lupus ~ speaking truth (you are power) during salem witch trials

Acute myeloid leukemia continues to come up as a signal, and a symbol in the collective. Also I read this story today in a local paper about a singer who was brutally assaulted by a priest in January 2007. She now is in the midst of treating her leukemial.

From the last post recently on leukemia, the message underlying is: Brutally killing inspiration.

"If someone wishes for good health, one must first ask oneself if he is ready to do away with the reasons for his illness. Only then is it possible to help him."- Hippocrates

In the strange way that everything is One, and thus more than just interconnected, this all is coalescing into a singular larger message that relates to the recent spate of posts on pancreas, Occupy Wall Street, Steve Jobs, and becoming our own authority/expert.

I won't get to tie all the puzzle pieces together in this one post. As a catalyst, consider the feeling (not the meanings) of power/energy/will and the solar plexus chakra. Keep that feeling "in mind" for the next several posts.

In my own life, I tend to "kill inspiration," when I conjecture that the status quo power structure would mock my ideas--or, gulp, worse, and thus I self-police myself.

An intense self-preservation reaction takes me over as a force that I hardly understood until I read two books recently.

I received more insight into that self-censoring impulse (and truthfully it was just two chapters within each book that together were the huge Aha!). The nutshell is that cultural memes that progragate the easiest are the ones that stifle innovation, and serve to keep the status quo in place (see The Beginning of Infinity, by David Deutsch--particularly chapters The Evolution of Culture, and The Evolution of Creativity). It's not me, it's not you. It's the memetic milieu you're born into. This is often done through the use of pyschological pressure of shame and praise and through the labeling of taboo. 

More than anything, it's failure and success, that are shamed and praised (see Little Bets by Peter Sims). Thus, cultural indocrination (inherited generation to generation) instead of viewing failure as being a valid, natural part of the journey towards new inventions (and heck, adventures), paint obstacles as evidence that we are worth less as valued members of society. "They might not think I'm smart, so let me avoid that challenge since it may not pan out and make me out to be the fool."

"A functioning police state needs no police” - William S. Burroughs -- think that one over

Do you self-police your self expression? Do you censor vibrant inspiration since it doesn't fit the message and memes of yesteryear's society? As far as I'm concerned, it's all yesteryear's ideas since same old, same old memes and memories have been recycling in a loop-de-loop for a while. Dynamic civilizations ability to grow, progress, and evolve depend on knowing and allowing that failures aren't personal shortcomings. They're part of the process of progress.

Several research studies, including those by Carole Dweck at Stanford University, show that children praised for process and effort take on new challenges more readily than children praised for intelligence. The latter seek external pats on the back to keep up their self-image, and thus adopt a "fixed mindset" that pretty colludes with static societies. The former adapt to a "growth mindset."

If truth be told, I was a child praised for intelligence. Straight A's, yada yada.

The last few years I've lived a fairly unconventional life--probably classifying me as a 'loser' in the black-and-white failure-or-success culture of USA. I would keep feeling these strong, nearly debilitating sense of shame that was unsettling, and I didn't know why. Now I know why, and that knowledge that it isn't personal--but embedded into the cultural--has broken its hold over me (very, very recently).

Isn't that Dr. Len's point? That these patterns aren't personal to you or I. They're programming (and, memes serve that function). They're collective. That may explain why it feels like a force field when you begin to make some head-way and bump against their boundary... there's generations of cultural energy charging the battery up.

Enough was enough. No cultural censors--no priestly classes or doctor classes or police classes or what not authority figures weild power over me such that they will silence me.

I shall speak and express freely.

Power and energy are forces of life and existence itself, and thus are available to all.

Shortly after reading the article about the singer who is healing from leukemia, in the same coffee shop, I picked out a book from their shelf on New England Legends and Folklore. And lo and behold, I find a story about the Salem witch trials. (Remember static tactics are taboo... shame and praise... "You're a witch!" is a shaming tactic. Or, "You're a heretic!") Back then, shame went a bit further than just mere psychological abuse, it was literally killing inspiration.

In those days, traits of a witch included singing, writing, storytelling, reading, and spending  time alone.

Even though I've been to Salem, Mass., myself, I don't recall this story at all. To summarize.... at that time the Mather family was quite powerful. (There's that word again.) And Cotton Mather was "the foremost clergyman of that dark day." Church and state were much less separate in that time as well, btw.

Reading this chapter I got the impression that everyone was cowed into obeying external authority of the day, especially if they claimed direct access to Divinity (as if you don't?). It's quite possible everyone believed the truths of the day unquestioned. Or, even if they did not, who wants to be the minority outspoken one who is made an example of ("off with her head"? Oh, at this point I should point out I have an unhealthy fear of being burned at the stake. Yeah, it makes no sense but maybe it does.

Except not everyone was intimidated. A clothier named Robert Calef spoke up.

"The sickening reflection that the judges had decreed the death of a score of innocent persons upon a mistake paralyzed men's tongues, unless, like Calef, they spoke in obedience to the command of conscience." - New England Legends and Folklore, by Samuel Adams Drake

Calef bundled together his thoughts in writing to rebuke Reverend Mather's teachings.

"No printer could be found in Boston or in the Colony willing to undertake the publication or expose it for sale. "

Fine, then, all the powers that be in the Colony may have the ability to intimidate the printers, but that didn't deter him. Calef printed his words against phony witch trials in London.

"It was publicly burned in the College-yard at Cambridge by order of the president, whom its exposures reached through his near relative."

The near relative was the father of Cotton Mather, a puritan Minister whom was President at Harvard. Fine then, the power plays escalate. The Mathers print a denounciation of Calef's work in his printing a response, Some Few Remarks upon a Scandalous Book. (That label scandalous is to make sure that the pious adherents to memes understand that it is taboo, just in case):

"To break its force, a vindication was prepared and printed;. . . ."

However, borrowing William Burroughs again, “Writers are very powerful,” Burrough tells us; they can write, and “unwrite,” the "script for the reality film." Calef used his own energy rather than bowing to others' perceived power, and in so doing, balanced the imbalance of power:

". . . but there were no more denunciations made for witchcraft, or courts assembled to hang innocent people. Calef indeed felt the resentment of the Mathers, but he had saved the cause."

John Greenleaf Whittier wrote a poem in Calef's honor called, Calef in Boston. Here's one verse (the full poem here) that I'd have to say pretty much could be a poem in honor of Ho'oponopono--cleaning away the old to allow the fresh, moment-by-moment inspiration:

"Falsehoods which we spurn to-day
Were the truths of long ago;
Let the dead boughs fall away,
Fresher shall the living grow."

BONUS: A related video that I found really helpful is below. Almine uses Ho'oponopono principles to heal herself, even though it appears that a student is asking her for a healing because he'd completely lost his singing voice.

Particularly note the symbolism of singing voice, the singer in the Las Vegas Sun article, voice, inspiration, expression:

 

 "My own life needed to sing more... even if it meant simplifying a great deal." - Almine

p.s. If you want to do some homework in anticipation of future posts, take a peek at the Third / Solar Plexus Chakra attributes in this chart/list.

p.p.s. I'm also finding that lupus seems to also have a similar message. This post may be useful to delve into that too. The message in lupus is that one is feeling, "A giving up. Better to die than stand up for one's self." Again, it seems very related to power, 3rd chakra, and cultural meme of fitting in to rest of the tribe (by psychological pressure). For instance, a friend comes from a strict Asian family, and they don't like that she "defies" their cultural mores to go to school to be a modern dancer. So, yeah, you guessed it, she is diagnosed with lupus. It's almost as if this massive collective conflict between meme-memory and the flow of future is playing out inside us...  Thankfully, life itself has no opposition.

ART CREDITS:  Jazz Singer, by Erica Laszlo, www.ericalaszlo.com.

education as a process of living ~ pioneering and prototyping ~ the future of well-being ~ the real fixers

 

 

 

 

"I believe that education, therefore, is a process of living and not a preparation for future living." John Dewey

A family member of mine remarked to me (they must have glanced at something in my regular blog, as this blog is secreted away and discovery is via the right keywords), "I don't believe in meditation."

"I don't believe in meditation." That statement perplexed me. What is there to believe? You try it. You do it. You either like it or not like it. It's not intended as yet another belief system.  So too with many 'alternative' methods of healing, alternative methods of living, alternative methods of ___ <fill in the blank>. You try it, you do it, you perhaps wrestle with getting it (I recall my first faltering attempts at skiing!) yet that's still through doing, and ultimately it either rings for you or it does not. It works for you, or it does not. There's no need to believe when you can get your hands dirty, your mind messy, and check it out for yourself.

"Don't blindly believe what I say. Don't believe me because others convince you of my words. Don't believe anything you see, read, or hear from others, whether of authority, religious teachers or texts. Don't rely on logic alone, nor speculation. Don't infer or be deceived by appearances.

Do not give up your authority and follow blindly the will of others. This way will lead to only delusion.

Find out for yourself what is truth, what is real." - The Buddha

Trying out for yourself. It's kind of like prototyping: "In a world that prizes answers and solutions, prototyping can be somewhat counterintuitive, placing the emphasis on doing to be able to think rather than thinking in order to do. Discovery doesn't happen in a vacuum, which is why doing things, however imperfectly at first, opens us up creatively," says Peter Sims in Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge from Small Discoveries.

I like to think from stratch too, what if we could start with a totally clean slate and build from the ground up... what would responding to dis-ease and imbalances look like? What would maintaining a moment-to-moment alignment with well-being look like? So I really gravitated to a few stories of innovators and pioneers I ran across today....

"One evening about nine years ago, Simon, Mike, Aiden and I met up at a Vietnamese restaurant in Chinatown. We’d become friends over the previous five years, working in various capacities at West Philly High. Somewhere in the midst of swapping gossip, storytelling, and generally giving each other a hard time the conversation turned more idealistic, driven by a simple question: if we could start with a totally clean slate and build from the ground up, what would high school look like?" - Introducing the Sustainability Workshop (from the school's blog on opening day)

So I'm kicking around ideas for an online curriculum and workshop to teach Ho'oponopono and other 'modalities' of Mind-based healing (even that word choice is wrong, that's just me trying to fit into conventional frameworks; the way 'healing' works is by clearing up habitual patterns obscuring the underlying perfection of Wholeness.... I've never gotten any positive results from focusing on brokenness nor 'fixing'...)

As much as I've learned from books and other teachers, it's been my own first-hand experiments and experience that has taught me the most, usually by trial and error, inquiry and refinement. So I'm working on a structure that is based on experiential learning. I liked what I read this morning in Newsweek, September 19, 2011 issue on "The Real Fixers" (yeah, ironically the headline labels them FIXERS, but many of them are really DOERS) about a pilot school: 

"The boutique school follows the “project-based learning” model made popular by San Diego’s High Tech High and others around the country, where conventional classes are replaced with long, interdisciplinary exercises to solve real-world problems, like designing a solar charging station or writing energy-efficiency legislation. More engaged students, the thinking goes, learn deeply and retain knowledge longer. - The Real Fixers (on Simon Hauger and The Sustainability Workshop)

A family member of mine remarked to me (they must have glanced at something in my regular blog, as this blog is secreted away and discovery is via the right keywords), "I don't believe in meditation."

"I don't believe in meditation." That statement perplexed me. What is there to believe? You try it. You do it. You either like it or not like it. It's not intended as yet another belief system.  So too with many 'alternative' methods of healing. You try it, you do it, and it either rings for you or it does not. And it works for you, or it does not. There's no need to believe when you can directly check it out for yourself.

I foresee two closed-intertwined tracks of project-based study and experiments. One focused on healers: clearing physical, spiritual, emotional, mental, psychological ailments and dis-ease as well as environmental dis-ease (i.e. anything from pollution to natural disasters). The second track focused on creators: releasing past to create through inspiration, improvisation and visionary (meaning could include manifestation, but not limited to that) in scope.

The complete list of catalysts to be introduced, presented, and then jointly as a class develop exercises and experiments to learn through direct experience might include: A Course in Miracles (particularly Psychotherapy: Purpose, Process and Practice booklet), Ho'oponopono, Byron Katie's The Work, dream/archetype/shadow work ala Carl Jung, Belvaspata, Louise Hay's symbols from Heal Your Body, Heal Your Life, Lise Bourbeau's work, Debra Shapiro's work, traditional Chinese Medicine (particularly the symbolic associations with body organs, etc.), Mary Baker Eddy's work, Gregg Braden's The Isaiah Effect, The Trivedi Effect, Zen Buddhism's notion of 'direct transmission',  Full Catastrophe Living and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (Jon Kabit-Zinn's work), Richard Moss' work, post-traumatic growth resarch, sound healing (especially correspondence of frequency to different body organs), Jane McGonigal's SuperBetter health game, Florence Scovel Shinn, Abraham-Hicks, Thich Nhat Hanh The Energy of Prayer, Advaita inquiry, The Holographic Universe, Toltec teachings, Russian magical priniciples from the medieval guild of skomorokh performers--and, that's for starters.

In another example from The Real Fixers, lawyer Brooke Richie started a 12-week class, The Resiliency Advocacy Project,  to teach teens how to navigate the legwork, paperwork and legalities of effectively using both social (and other) services and resources to break out of poverty cycle. The part that really struck me is that those that completed the program were then empowered to teach peers in their own neighborhood: "Each class of 15 [teens] can help up to 400 teens get answers to their questions without paying legal fees."

Thus, our teaching curriculum and workshop ideally would be a grassroots wave that trickles out so that those who 'graduate' go out and share their experience with their own peers, and so on. The idea is to empower people to be their own author and authority--to clear themselves in a natural, innate way that addresses root issues rather than symptoms alone (like pulling weeds from the root so they don't just grow back), as well as assist others in regaining their authority without dependency on hospitals, professionals, pills, insurance and ability to pay.

As far as structure, I'm not quite sure yet. By structure, I mean is it online or live in-person class? Is it even a classroom feel or is it more self-study or small teams (slight personal preference for the small teams tackling projects) or a combination? Is it for-profit or non-profit or B corporation? I have enough resources to begin something possibly online--yet not enough to see this all through all on my own. It is definitely intended to be international, grassroots, spreadable, and experimental (in terms of keep pushing the edges, don't ever rest on laurels).

If what I've written so far ignites your soul and intrigues your mind in any way, please write me or comment below.

p.s. Coincidentally, in the same The Real Fixers article, here are some stats on healthcare in USA: "Because we currently reward quantity over quality, the U.S. spends at least twice as much per person on health care annually ($7,960 in 2009) as Japan, Canada, Germany, and other developed countries. Yet whether measured by infant mortality or cancer survival, we are far back in the pack in terms of quality."

p.p.s. Don't feel obligated, however if you would genuinely wish to donate to this project:

"Love has no obligations. Fear is full of obligations.... Whatever we do is because we want to do it. It becomes a pleasure; it's like a game, and we have fun with it." -- Miguel Ruiz, The Mastery of Love

ho'oponopono - diabetes & pancreatic cancer - pancreas = sweetness of life - gifts of imagination - steve jobs

Ho'oponopono is useful for any imbalance we perceive "out" there in the world. Whether that imbalance is a family member's "incurable" diagnosis or it whether it be a wildfire in another state.

It cares not for remoteness, and is equally effective for a child with malaria in tropical countries half a globe away, as issues up close and personal issues. (In the collective, nothing is really far or close. In One, it's all here now.)

In the subjective world of ho'oponopono (and if you've some experience in Zen or Advaita or that sort of thing, you can feel into what I mean that it's all occuring to the All) we are responsible for everything as it is all arising from one consciousness. (Note that responsibility is not fault. Many new practitioners in Ho'oponopono begin by cleaning up old, repeating patterns of guilt and blame. This is no-fault stuff.)

So getting personal.... I read in the newspapers that unemployment rate in Las Vegas is up to 14.2%. Of course, that is the folks that are still reporting to the officials within last 30 days--the actuals are much higher.  I've been reading newspapers much more thoroughly in the last few months (whereas I normally stay away from mainstream media) seeking out the recurring patterns in the collective unconscious to clean on through Ho'oponopono (and often I also use Byron Katie's The Work as well).

There are two patterns or messages that feel closest to me, because they are directly impacting and showing up in my life as well as "out there." One is scarcity/poverty-thinking and the other is "not being able to enjoy the sweetness in life."  I think they are related.

I'll keep this post short, as this will be a recurring topic until it is actually resolved. I've found lately that with Ho'oponopono the stakes get higher. At first, we clean up all the low-hanging fruit. Later, the patterns and programs we run up against are so ingrained we actually believe they define us (they don't, but it doesn't make it any easier). Saying, "I love you. I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you," alone does not suffice. No matter how heart-felt that mantra is, it isn't meant to be mantra.

 On August 9th, I wrote to a friend:

"I was getting a lot of syncs around Steve Jobs about 2-3 weeks ago.... and not in normal sense, more around his health problems (and he's younger than I thought when I looked up). So looked up pancreatic cancer it has to do with not allowing in sweetness of life (paraphrasing).  And that was SO true. I was pretty locked into working on myself, and figuring all manner of things out and fixing this and that.... that just simple ordinary savoring was missing when I was  ruthlessly honest with myself."

 On August 24th, Steve Jobs resigned his post as CEO. It is not clear why, but speculation is his health. From his resignation letter: "I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple's CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come."

For all his wealth, the speculation is (as it is quite plausible that Jobs simply wishes for a break from decades of long hours of work so he can enjoy himself) that doctors and drugs have not healed him completely from and of after-effects of pancreatic cancer (2004) and his liver transplant (2009).

Louise Hay simple message for pancreas problems is, "Not being able to enjoy the sweetness in life."

This past Saturday, my aunt's husband died from complications due to diabetes (he was quite old, so there may have been more complications upon complications). A fairly good site (as far as the symbolism) on Chinese Medicine states as far as the pancreas: "Metaphysically then diabetes represents a difficulty in processing the sweetness of life. One may be bitter at the world. Things are not the way they should be."

I have noted (being completely honest here, as in Ho'oponopono it is necessary to be honest with oneself) that I do feel bitterness. For the past 12 months, I have not been able to create more than $125 per month in income no matter what I do, think, or offer to others. You can do the math yourself, and realize this is not a living wage in the USA. (And if you are wondering how this is even a possibility, I'm living with family--basically mooching.)

I used to be a highly-paid professional, but now it feels (doesn't mean it is real) as if my gifts are worthless. That's bitterness talking. 

For me, ultimately it is not about the money (I live on $1500/month even in hot spots like NYC  or SF because of my ability to be resourceful and easily satisfied; however, $1500/year isn't frugality, it's depravation). It's the feeling (again, that could be the imprint talking) that I am being withheld from offering, contributing value that's bugging me. I think all people do want to express their gifts and contribute their talents:

"It is ironic indeed that money, originally a means of connecting gifts with needs, originally an outgrowth of a sacred gift economy, is now precisely what blocks the blossoming of our desire to give, keeping us in deadening jobs out of economic necessity and forestalling our most generous impulses... Our purpose for being, the development and full expression of our gifts, is mortgaged to the demands of money, to making a living, getting by, surviving. Yet no one, no matter how wealthy, secure or comfortable, can ever feel fulfilled in a life in which those gifts remain latent." - Charles Eisenstein, "Living the Gift," Ode magazine, September 2011 (edited excerpt from book, "Sacred Economics: Money, Gift, and Society in the Age of Transition")

After a long period of studying the similarities between health and wealth, I'm coming close to cracking the whole code. I decided to treat poverty as a dis-ease, too, since I already knew that health (i.e. ease manifesting itself in the body) was not dependent on hospitals, doctors, drugs, money, or anything external. (More on this topic of scarcity or infinity-thinking in future posts; here's an out-of-the-box-thinking video on the subject by Story Waters that combines the sweetness/joy and the wealth topic to kick it off:)

 

H(w)ealth is a matter of knowing well-being as an unshakeable wholeness that lies beyond (feels more like beneath to me) any appearances to the contrary. (In Zen, simply dropping into no-mind or awareness meditation simulates this knowing.) It is the natural ease of flowing with life rather than opposition to the flow of life which asserts itself as dis-ease.

Through ho'oponopono one can clear away the vibrational pattern from a habitual imprint (could be anything from trauma to cultural conditioning) that re-asserts a particular ailment.

For all the "I love you. I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you," I did prior to August 9th, when I wrote a friend an email about how much I'd been thinking of Steve Jobs' health (trust me, that's odd, as I don't even own any Apple products and he doesn't pop into my consciousness that much). I have to balance my imbalance. Is there sweetness in my life? Am I expressing that sweetness? Or is there bitterness? Am I acknowledging it? I have to clean the pattern within myself. Ho'oponopono isn't about reciting empty words with more emphasis on each refrain. If a recurring pattern is truly acknowledged deeply and appreciated for what it's shown you, it drops away in favor of a fluid state (what Dr. Len calls zero state) that is more responsive to the current moment, thus not automatic and reactive based on unconscious stores from ages ago.

Since the income issues, my life has become much heavier, more serious, more solemn than ever before. That's not like me, but it's been like me for over a year; closer to two years. I look at the newspapers, the radio shows, TV (again, this is recent development as I didn't used to) and I notice how dour and doom-and-gloom everyone else is too. The imbalance is inner and outer.

It is possible to enjoy the sweetness of life just as it is.

To that end, I'm living this experiment in changing a habit.

There's a quote that goes, "Worry is the misuse of imagination" so I'm focusing my imagination on whimsy, on playfulness, on my dreams and visions, on magic and even laughter to get out of this serious mode, and into sweetness mode. I'll be using (loosely) some of the concepts in The Art of Soaring and The Power of Luck (between the two, there are 48 pages of excerpts that pretty much spell out of the gist).

If you'd like to join me in this, I'm creating an online circle to share our whimsical new imaginings and imaginative gift-giving that really draw out the precious aspects of an ordinary life day by day.

I've tried to do the exercises in The Art of Soaring and The Power of Luck on my own, and I'm not consistent enough. I think 30 days without fail might help to make it into a habit. If you'd like to join, I'm starting Tuesday, September 27 through October 24, 2011 for $30 --Mage Your Own Luck for a Buck* (a day).

Another reason I'm reaching out to do this with a community is that the Chinese Medicine site I quote above continues (on the theme of pancreas and diabetes): "Excess weight, metaphysically, is a way of putting distance between ourselves and others; a way of emphasizing our separation and isolation from others." Isolation imprinting is another theme that I've noted to be getting more rampart in last few years, and unfortunately, now that I moved to a city where I don't know anyone (and so many social events depend on paying money) it is all too easy to justify isolation. To break the pattern of isolation on collective and individual levels, I am also purposefully doing outreach on things I'd normally keep to myself.

Please read The Art of Soaring and The Power of Luck excerpts first to see if this is interesting for you. (The books are NOT required to join in to share your daily gift, magic, luck, etc.)

* With ho'oponopono, based on 100% responsibity for everything in your world, I like to say to myself, "The buck stops here."

p.s. In Wired magazine, February 1996 Jobs said:

"The problem is I’m older now, I’m 40 years old, and this stuff doesn’t change the world. It really doesn’t.

“I’m sorry, it’s true. Having children really changes your view on these things. We’re born, we live for a brief instant, and we die. It’s been happening for a long time. Technology is not changing it much — if at all.

“These technologies can make life easier, can let us touch people we might not otherwise. You may have a child with a birth defect and be able to get in touch with other parents and support groups, get medical information, the latest experimental drugs. These things can profoundly influence life. I’m not downplaying that.

“But it’s a disservice to constantly put things in this radical new light — that it’s going to change everything. Things don’t have to change the world to be important.”"

We are a walking mirror. - Don Jose Luis Ruiz, Toltec shaman

Recall that Ho'oponopono is a Hawaiian shamanic technique. Here, in this interview, Don Jose Luis  Ruiz (who is Don Miguel Ruiz' son) describes some shamanic beliefs that relate to Ho'oponoono as well.  I climbed up the Temple of the Sun (Teotihuacan, Mexico City) with Don Jose Ruiz in November 2003 (Don Miguel was there too).

We are clearing the mirror, and ho'oponopono is a technique for stalking the smudges in the mirror, so to speak. These smudges tend to take us (in my experience) through re-runs and loop-de-loops, rather than movement through evolutionary (and magical!) experiences.

Yet even that cleaning up is sort of a mirage effect, just to make our everyday lives dreamier and nicer than say, a nightmare--as no image in the mirror can mar or enhance the mirror Itself--which is actually what you are, a.k.a. the Dreamer. Recall when you sleep at night, you are also each of the dream figures, the dreamscape, the storyline, etc as it arises and falls away all in your Mind; although all being said most people prefer their dreaming, as non-real as it ultimately is, to not be an excrutiating, painful, hell-ride. 

This interview was conducted by Julia Griffen, and the entire interview (excerpt below) is here at The Spirit of Ma'at site:

Don José: Dreaming is a big Being, and we are married to Dreaming. All of life is a dream.

We are a walking mirror. God is a mirror — everything we think, feel, or believe is reflected back to us through this great mirror that is life.

The world is a mirror that reflects back to us all that we believe. The world does not create what we are experiencing. We do that. We create our beliefs, and the mirror of God reflects them back to us.

God can send us only love and beauty. We create the distortions in this mirror of our life that is so short — and so beautiful.

. . . .

Julia:   A shaman said that he used stalking in dreaming to find the weaknesses in his consciousness. How is the art of stalking used in Toltec dreaming?

Don José: Stalking is used in dreaming to find the mental and emotional images that prevent us from being free.

When we dream, we must learn to discover in our dreams the forms or energies that limit us. They may repeatedly take the same form, or they may take different forms. They may appear in many different dreams, or just one dream that reoccurs.

We must dream with the purpose of stalking, to try to stalk who is within ourselves and see what our beliefs are.

We primarily stalk two things in dreaming: thinking (what is in the head) and heartbreak.

By heartbreak, I mean the incredible pain we feel from the terrible things that have happened to us. When we feel the pain of heartbreak, we close off parts of ourselves. In some way, we stop living. If the same situation comes up again, we say, "Oh, no, I won't let myself be hurt again!"

But this is no way to live. Life is so short and so incredibly beautiful. It is such a gift. You must forgive yourself for experiencing heartbreak. You must love the heartbreak in your life, because it is part of living. Most importantly, you must create a better dream.

We also stalk to find the thoughts that keep us chained in "reality." These thoughts that we think so many times limit us. If we can identify these limiting thoughts, we can pull the energy back from their mental patterns and create anew.

It is so important to take back these lost energies and share with the world the gifts given to us from the angels and God. Heartbreak and limiting thoughts are like a cage. They keep us caged, imprisoned, in the three-dimensional world. The cage is created from the fear of being the Self, of being authentic.

Lies and fears about our Self are the forces that keep us in the cage — and they are not real. We must reclaim the key to our cage by pulling the energy back from our thoughts and our heartbreak. In this way, we become free.

Stalking in dreaming can be compared to opening gates. If a state of mind or heartbreak has been identified in dreaming, then we find the opening point of the wound, or the judgment, and we go in our memory to the point just before it occurred. When we remember the time before the memory occurred, we find a closing point for the wound — and then we go a little further back in time, so we can avoid returning to the wound.

Now we can see an entirely different world, or movie. We have created a better dream.

It is possible to use this technique to open a gate and see a different view.

Outer reality is a direct reflection of what is present within our individual and collective consciousness. - Barry Snider and Karen Anderson

"What mystics, saints and sages have always known is now being confirmed by quantum physics, transpersonal psychology, and holographic brain theory: Outer reality is a direct reflection of what is present within our individual and collective consciousness. Our ubiquitous crises can’t be fixed or changed “out there.” They will resolve only as a function of a radical, collective change “in here.” The solutions to humanity’s dilemmas will not be found within the level of understanding that created the problems. They can only emerge from a state of consciousness that can hold them all within a vaster, unified field of awareness. That unified perspective is the natural state of the soul, the presence of the Divine within each one of us." - from newly released book by Barry Snider and Karen Anderson, Soul Awakening: The Journey from Ego to Essence

p.s. I agree with Barry and Karen that there is no substantial "out there" divisible from "in here." And, essentially, that's why ho'oponopono can have the "outer" outcomes it does.

I may be one of the few peeps that doesn't have any sense of cosmic crisis, or dilemma. (Even, say, there were a dilemma, you'd be that dilemma too in wholeness.) I have a sense that the universe knows exactly what it is doing, how it is happening and all that that may require "individually" is cooperation rather that our active resistance to what unfolds (and I think it is going to be quite the surprise). Thus, Ho'oponopono is one of many many ways to clear up old webs of rote habit and reaction based on past strategies so that we may spontaneously surrender to the present moment's vast Intelligence.

what do you NEED to do ho'oponopono?

I got a question via email that I thought I'd answer publicly. It was about whether I thought it was a good idea to buy Ho'oponopono videos (and/or secure any other resources).

In my opinion, it is not necessary to buy anything.

It is useful (yet not necessary either) to have Byron Katie's book, Loving What Is: Four Questions that Can Change Your Life (based on The Work process) and also Louise Hay's You Can Heal Your Life (I believe this contains roughly the same content of Heal Your Body A-Z: The Mental Causes of Physical Illness and How to Overcome Them--what you want is the chart of dis-eases and associated symbolism, that's all that I use from the book.)

Yet you can find the nuggets of these books online as well.

There is definitely a fundamental context or paradigm shift that reading and applying The Work provides; however, there are so many online videos and audios of Byron Katie walking through The Work process in real-time on all sorts of subjects, that that is entirely optional. As well, books such as Loving What Is, You Can Heal Your Life, as well as Zero Limits are in libraries and I've checked them out from libraries.

Personally, I do own a copy of Loving What Is (it was a discussion group selection in 2005) and was gifted You Can Heal Your Life--although both books (as are most of my books) have been in storage for two years. I don't own any specific Ho'oponopono books.

So, in the end, it's your call on what you decide you want or need in your library.

Ho'oponopono is actually simple, and I have been doing it since 2003 beginning with only knowledge of the legend (at that time there was no confirmation that such a psychologist named Dr. Len had actually existed and healed said criminally insane ward--at that time, it was an urban legend for all I knew yet it really resonated to me as containing a truth nonetheless), and combined with my applied knowledge of A Course in Miracles (which also corroborated with Dr. Len did as feasible) that was enough to get going. 

I ought to mention that since 2001 I had aslo been working on seeing my "blind spots" (that was my word for "projection" as I was unaware of the terminology until 2002 when I read No Boundary, by Ken Wilber (fantastic book, especially if you're new to nonduality--and how Wilber starts to shatter illusions about space and time in such a short book is truly marvelous; I believe it's Wilber's best and most succinct work) and he used the word "projection") by noticing what I found irritating in "other" people as my cheap form of psychotherapy (cheap meaning absolutely free, and interestingly enough the most precisely relevant workshop I could ever attend--my own life). I thought it was psychological, yet, applying this idea of finding the mirror in myself of what I disliked "out there," proved to pave the path for a pretty wild and wide spiritual journey later on (I had no clue that this would be end result at the time).

Also, 2003 was way before I knew of nonduality or nondualistic philosophy. Although, nonduality makes it much easier to grok that there is "No one out there," as Dr. Len repeats over and over and over again.

Ho'oponopono doesn't necessitate any such knowledge as it only depends on sincerity and willingness to question our reactions and look at our own projections and thus, application. Then once we have acknowledged our reaction and the mirror, we just say the four statements, "I love you.  I'm sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you." (With the emphasis on the Thank You and I Love You.) That's it. When I started I didn't even know why I was saying those four statements. I mostly focused on really feeling clear on the projection, and on my reaction. It only occurred to me much more recently that clearing up automatic reactions would lead to a much more responsive, creative fluidity that isn't reactive.

Dr. Len doesn't get into the symbolism at all that I delve into, he uses his intuition and sticks with his immediate reactions to discern what is up for him internally. The symbolism (it can be complex if you're not intuitively adept with symbols--and that comes easier over time especially if you enjoy solving puzzles it can be enjoyable to 'solve' symbolism, but if it doesn't float your boat, don't need to bother with it, keep it simple) and using it to 'treat' dis-eases is my own twist (and it works too).

Other helpful questions or inquiries (hate to make more belief systems up... they're just starting point questions to see for yourself):

1. Is there really two people here? What does Oneness mean, what does it imply? Or, the statement, it's All One?
2. Based on A Course in Miracles, the idea is that everyone that comes into your sphere during your lifetime is there to open you up to encompass more of your self (i.e. One) . It is easy (way easy) to judge others, but to really see that "I am That, too," is pretty much the core of Ho'oponopono and begins to dissolve the notion of separateness.
3. If I heal myself (i.e. usually see past the illusion of something broken or wrong) then I heal all as we are not simply interconnected--there is but One.

I think you'll find there are enough free examples on this ho'oponopono blog, and used in conjunction with Byron Katie's The Work process (the Loving What Is companion book may be worth buying--again, your instinct), it is plenty.

Application rather than accumulating resources will itself yield more and more insight on how to apply it further in a way that feels natural for you.

 The Work process is also based on reclaiming our judgments "out there" and seeing them as ways the mind constructs separation based on past, and mind reiterates the past over and over rather than being aware in present Reality. Byron Katie (she is incredible, btw--exudes unconditional love and joy and freedom like water pouring from a fountain) stops short of saying that releasing our projections helps or affects others.... and in truth, even Dr. Len says the focus has to be on our self, not fixing the outer.... yet it remains that it DOES affect everything since we are everything.

ONLINE RESOURCES FOR THE WORK. Here Byron Katie includes the four questions worksheet which is valuable when you are starting. These queries will become automatic, and you won't need any worksheets with practice. You can find videos online on the official site and also many more on YouTube (search on Byron Katie as the word "the work" is too generic on YouTube).

ONLINE RESOURCES FOR HEAL YOUR LIFE HERE.  I don't really use the affirmations at all, peronally. I am simply interested in understanding the MESSAGE, or the SYMBOLISM for its insight. I also find that Chinese medical resources contain accurate information about the symbolism of certain organs and their associated emotional/energy blocks.