The Land of ‘Up’

Hello, Dear Readers!

Marcia here.  I’ve been having a delicious conversation – in poems – with a friend and I wanted to share one segment of that with you!  Enjoy!

wiggles & jiggles & giggles galore
laughed ever so hard & still wanted more
so in order to keep the momentum flowing
i thought to record what i thought to be knowing
as i reached for a pen something soft i did touch
it startled me ever so, ever so, ever so much
that i started to giggle all over again
realizing where i was now & where i had been
my feet had been planted quite firm on the earth
yet with all of our banter, camaraderie, mirth
bubbles of giggles expanded inside
and with highest vibrations taken me for a ride
with my head in the clouds and my toes in the sea
what touched me was water, yes water! you see
and i know that you know what i know to be true
’cause we live magic lives, we decidedly do
the water of life fills our glorious cup
for you see we are blessed in the world of UP
In Light and such glorious Laughter!
Sending Rainbow Hugs your way!
Marcia 🙂

Marcia’s Meanderings ~ Most Definitely!

Hello Dear Ones!

In a world where possibility and probability have become buzz words, where potential is highly praised yet expectation remains in question, where receiving product just on time rather than ahead of schedule is the norm ~ wouldn’t it be delicious to make room for: Most Definitely! Why Certainly! Absolutely!

Rather than building in contingencies for problems, limitations, setbacks and just-in-case scenarios ~ resulting in a greater probability of encountering them by the very matching of that same energy ~ how be we grow, develop and come to expect the very best of everyone, the power of teamwork, and the perfection of an idea, a dream ~ and live into its fulfillment by choice and by design!

In Light and Laughter,

Marcia

He Says, She Says… When Dreams Do NOT Come True

Hello, Dear Reader:

A desire arose within Marcia four weeks ago. An ad appeared in the employment section of the local newspaper requesting applications for a position Marcia had both the skill and the passion to tackle. She felt it a perfect job fit and a truly outstanding role. Thoughts of moving into this role had her excited! The added advantage of a more remunerative wage than her current position offered, plus medical benefits and other perks had her submitting her revised resume with a very wisely worded, professional cover letter.

She got an interview. In fact, she was the first to be interviewed by a 3-person panel. It went outstandingly well. Marcia felt she set the bar high for all other candidates being considered. As she had been taught and because it felt right, she then sent an e-mail to all 3 interviewers the day after the interview to thank them for their time, their expressed interest and the pleasure and privilege it was for her to have shared with them and learned from them during the process.

Due to a large number of qualified candidates and a week’s unavoidable absence by one of the interviewers, there was a two week wait to hear the results. By the  Thursday of the second week, Marcia thought (at Mike’s wise suggestion) to send a  “Thanks for taking the time to interview me, I’m still interested …” e-mail to each of the 3 interviewers. She was in the midst of composing this e-mail when the telephone rang. Continue Reading →

Being Green – Finding Inspiration

Hi Folks:

Friday once again, and time for this week’s ‘Being Green‘ post.   Before I get started, if you happen to be in Victoria, BC this weekend, the Cascadia GBC Vancouver Island Branch Emerging Professionals and Jawl Properties are hosting an art exhibition with eight artists on the theme of sustainability.  The exhibit is being shown in the lobby of ‘The Atrium‘, one of Victoria’s newest  buildings, targeting LEED Gold certification.

Okay, the title of this post is ‘Finding Inspiration’.  I was originally going to name it ‘Seeking Inspiration’, but since it’s possible to look for something and not find it, the latter choice of title seemed more appropriate.  In one of his blog posts last month, Seth Godin wrote about ‘Heroes and Mentors‘.   In a nutshell, mentors are great when they’re available, but if they’re not, heroes can fill the gap and provide inspiration for all of us.  Every week I collect links, stories, news articles and information from a number of ‘sustainability’ fields, and I find a lot of inspiration in what I read too.  I thought I’d share a couple of those stories with you this week. Continue Reading →

He Says/ She Says … More than Enough

Hello Dear Ones!

Today’s topic came clearly and emphatically to both Mike and I this week. What each of us thought (independently of each other) to be a challenging belief, turned out to be a symptom or mask of an actual core belief. See if this resonates with you:

You are doing everything you sense is wise. You are living your true self.  You trust and follow through on your instincts and inspirations. You know that things should be moving along swimmingly and yet are finding things not flowing easily or synchronistically. In the short term, you try to let this go, finding ways to rationalize the discrepancy. However, as it continues over the longer term you begin to question what is occurring.  Something is not right. You look around for the source of the dichotomy between what you know should be unfolding and what is failing to appear, to manifest.

Over time, you begin to question your own role in the less-than-ideal outcomes. You start to doubt your instincts, insights and wisdom. You may get angry – at yourself, at situations or at the Divine … depending upon where you may be at that moment within your inner growth. You recognize this as the problem or challenge you need to overcome and  you are ready and willing to tackle it.

Sound familiar? Continue Reading →

Marcia’s Meanderings – Ah, to be a ‘stupid flower’!

Hello Dear Ones!

If you’ve been following my writings the past few weeks, this post will make immense sense. If you have not, may I suggest that you go back and read the following brief articles when you have time:

1.) A Crisis of Spirit
2.) Kicking & Screaming
3.) Insights from the Celestine Prophecy

The general gist of the above is about me going through a major spiritual crisis and the process of change and development that has since ensued in the weeks that followed. Yet another major life crisis arose this week resulting in a culmination of additional growth both emotionally and spiritually.

The past twelve years I have attempted to adopt a spiritual lifestyle more current with today’s new age phenomena (such as the Secret, the Law of Attraction, the counsel of Abraham, etc.). I have, however, recently realized that since the introduction of these newer philosophies, what I had innately lived all of my life – the magic and marvel of insights, inspirations and guided unfoldings – had begun absenting themselves more and more as I pursued these newer teachings.

With the additional crisis that arose this week, I have realized at my core that I no longer want to be responsible (the creator or co-creator) for the magic and unfolding of my life’s experiences. I do want to be a supportive and playful participant in all of the delicious and magical unfoldings as crafted by the Divine. Plain and simple. Continue Reading →

He Says, She Says… ‘Insights’ from the Celestine Prophecy

Hello, Dear Reader:

When James Redfield’s book ‘The Celestine Prophecy‘ came out in in the early 1990s, we bought two copies of it and read them avidly.  The ideas contained within the book added nicely to the stores of knowledge we already had.  Time went by like it always does, and over the years the ‘insights’ from that book were overlaid and integrated with that received from other sources.  We heard a few years ago that a movie had been made from the book, but we never saw it.

A week ago we were at the local library getting some children’s books for visiting family and we came across the DVD version of the movie ‘by chance’.  Intrigued, we checked it out and took it home to watch it.  The movie matched the book fairly well (at least in our memories), but coming across those ideas again sparked new thoughts for both of us.  So, without further ado we thought we’d make this week’s ‘He Says, She Says…‘ post, “‘Insights’ from the Celestine Prophecy“.

Hugs,
M&M

Follow these links to read what He Says/She Says: Marcia’s View / Mike’s View

Marcia’s Meanderings – Overcoming the Fear Funk

Hello Dear Ones!

Ever find yourself in a rut where fear has talons hooked deeply into your psyche and won’t release it’s hold? Ya, me too!

Fortunately it happens less often and for shorter and shorter periods of time. Blessings be! Yet when it does surface – showing me a perspective I don’t want to see or address or acknowledge in any way shape or form – I feel frozen into immobility. Everything in my world takes on a gray pallor and I see the fear, missing out on the beauty and sparkle of all else around me. So sad.

My most recent Fear Funk stopped me from writing anything positive. No poetry. No journaling in the front of my binder. I record all negative energy entries in the back of my journal book to at least keep up my writing habit, as well to separate the negative from the more upbeat positive energies. Also, it means I can tear up those negative pages when I’ve moved beyond and through the challenge they revealed to me.

Believe it or not, fear is a gift to us – one that reveals a challenge we need to address within ourselves. Next time you’re in a Fear Funk, when you can get to the point of appreciating the gift it is giving you, you’ll know you are on your way to a solution and the joyous release of its hold on you.

One of the keys to removing those nasty talons that have dug deep into your soul, is to name the fear. Once the Fear Funk is named – give it a label or make a statement about what hold it has over you – then you can more easily address the challenge and more freely side-step your way out of its strangle-hold.

Most often the plain and simple truth of the matter, the bottom line of it all, is that there is no trust in the value of self. No value in self means no value in Self and certainly no trust in the Divine.

When the Fear Funk has a hold of you and the feeling of optimism or any potential thoughts of hope are so far removed they don’t even show up in your vocabulary let alone in your dreams, it’s time to do three things:

1. define and name the Fear Funk.
2. force your mouth into a smile. Curl the edges of your mouth into a grin. Even if the smile doesn’t reach your eyes and your heart in the moment but merely adds to the wrinkles on your face – smile.
3. think of the happiest, silliest, most joyously and memorable time you ever had as a child … and then *g*i*g*g*l*e* about it! *G*i*g*g*l*e* until you feel a wee spark of joy within you. That little feeling of joy is one or more talons gone from your solar plexus. *G*i*g*g*l*e* more, letting it take on a life of its own and filling you to overflowing! The Fear Funk hates laughter with a passion – it can’t keep its hold on you when you’re laughing!

When you are ready you can add one more phrase to the statement or the name you’ve given this ‘gift’: one that reflects the trust you are more likely to be feeling – that all will, in fact, work out perfectly – if you can only have enough faith that the Divine Universe will conspire on your behalf to bring the necessary solution into your reality. It may arrive just in the nick of time (depending upon how open you are to receiving it) yet it is there for you! Can you feel it?

With the Divine conspiring on my behalf,  I can …. !

Be gone, Fear Funk!

In Light and Laughter,

Marcia

Marcia’s Meanderings – The Immobilizer

Hello Dear Ones!

Sunday’s She Says – Embracing Perfection post may have given you a hint as to what my discussion might be today.

Two very powerful reasons almost brought that potential to a screeching halt:

1. The weekend’s passionate excitement became yesterday’s fear.
2. Yesterday’s fear brought forward old beliefs of not being good enough.

The plans I had to take my first baby steps forward into a new venture yesterday fizzled out with self-doubt and fear traumatizing my courage and questioning my value. What right had I to approach people promoting my hobby as a tool they should a) need and b) pay for … ? If there was no value to my own self in what I do, how did I expect others to see value in this?

Confidence flew out the window and perched on the nearest tree laughing at me, taunting me. I just wanted to cry. Yet I wanted to sleep – lay down, take a nap and forget the ugliness I was feeling inside. The Immobilizer – FEAR – had found a perfect place to nestle, expanding the terror and frozen world of inaction within me.

Doesn’t sound like the Pollyanna – the woman who sees the glass as being full (1/2 liquid plus 1/2 air) – that you’ve come to know over the past 6 months, does it? In Sunday’s post I spoke about embracing the perfection of who I am in every moment – with the excited anticipation of becoming even more. Yet knowing there could potentially be more for me, I was astonished to awake with immense self-doubt. As the day progressed, I became more and more agitated, convinced that my excitement was totally misguided.

My e-friend (and a very wise woman) Renee Ludwigs’ recent post discusses her dog Rudy and his persistence. Sad as it may seem, I envy Rudy his level of ‘dogged’ persistence. Me, I get truly excited about something and it’s the best thing since chocolate … yet, without continued variety and excitement, my enthusiasm has the potential to dwindle, fizzle, sputter and die.

Thinking back, I realized that only the things that kept me impassioned over time ever made it from the drawing board out into the ‘real’ world. I had to give serious thought as to whether this new adventure had such potential within me – enough to give me the ‘dogged’ determination to not only start but to follow through to its finish.

I decided today that it did have that characteristic.

The first step I was going to take yesterday and did not – I took today! I just hit the ‘SEND’ button on an e-mail that has the potential to jettison me into an exciting future!

Pollyanna is still alive and well and she’s living in Victoria, BC, Canada! And the Immobilizer? The Immobilizer has been vanquished … for this situation at least!

In Light and Laughter,

Marcia

He Says, She Says… Embracing Perfection

Hello, Dear Reader:

What does it mean to be ‘perfect’?  To some this appellation implies a ‘best possible’, whether it be a perfect day, a perfect moment, a perfect meal…  To others perfection can only be a goal, something that can never be achieved or attained.  As such there are those who would suggest we not even try.  In his book ‘The Bridge Across Forever‘, author Richard Bach described his search and failure to find what he considered to be the ‘perfect woman’.  He eventually came to realize that his goal was an impossible dream, that his perfect woman was, in his words, ‘a peacock’.  When he surrendered this dream he found instead the love of his life, Leslie Parrish. Continue Reading →