Reiki Precepts

I'm reading Reiki by Pamela Mines and she has a really nice version of the Reiki precepts:

Just for today do not be angry and do not worry.

Value your life and make the effort necessary to actualize your life's purpose.

Be kind.

I've been doing Reiki for many years now. I was attuned to level one in nursing school 13 years ago and then the level two (where you can send distant Reiki) before I went to India in 2001. (I wanted to be able send it to Rob while I was away for a few months.) Just lately I've been getting brave enough to do it a bit at work at the hospital (where they have a program to train and support nurses doing Reiki). I've also been giving treatments to my friend who has cancer and another friend who is trading off Mayan Uterine Massage for me (to help with fertility so I am ready for the financial family-expanding windfall!)



The Reiki has been really subtle for me, mostly done on the faith that something was happening, but lately it is feeling more tangible and more powerful.

Today I gave my friend an hour long treatment and hours later I still feel a pervasive feeling of peace mixed with a deep desire to close my eyes and sleep.

Happy Spring!

We started the holiday with carrot cake cream cheese frosted cupcakes from 2nd Street Bakery. I'm feeling a bit sick as the noon hour approaches.

Glad spring is here, but must admit I feel some trepidation about the year just singing along like it is.
Lily is loving first grade, I can still easily carry my Georgia in my arms, and I was supposed to get pregnant this year. If warm weather and summer keeps coming it means Lily will soon be a SECOND grader. Yikes! Georgia will get too big to carry. Sadness! and I might notice the baby supporting financial windfall has yet to arrive. Oh NO!

I'm thinking this might be the first year I've wanted to put out my heels and stop the sled of time.
I'm sure the antidote is trying to drink up each moment, but for now I'm tired and cupcake frosting is buzzing through my bloodstream in an unpleasant way. So, instead of trying to turn it around, I am going to continue to feel conflicted about inevitable passage of time.

Signs of Hope

Well there you have it. Instead of wondering if I am a fool for being ever-hopeful; I'm just going to decide that hopeful is my default and go from there. Enough wondering if the muggle world will think I'm a weirdo. I'm going to carry on and do great things. like sing more, write more and hang out on the couch with my marvelous family.

Here is a lecture by Jill Bolte Taylor that I watched twice while I was working my overnight last weekend. I want to watch it again. Talk about hope!

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html

Blessings.

654

Ok, I still try to ignore it because it is so subjective, so goofy, so embarrassing, but I cannot get away from the number 654. Time of birth, clocks, mailboxes, license plates, everywhere, so I looked it up.

"654 The changes you're considering regarding your behavior, habits or patterns are supported by the angels."

That's good, but I'm not sure what changes.

I was going to sign up for another Reiki class. I am trying to lose the last 10 pounds and be done with paying weight watchers (But not get weird and neurotic). I was struck by this suggestion by Martha Beck "It never works to inflict on yourself anything you wouldn't force on someone you love."

I'll keep wondering and see if anything clearer comes.

Azalea

I just let Azalea out into the cold snowy night. She's old, so she doesn't go far. I worry someday she won't come back. Then I'll have to suit up and head out there to find her in the dark. I know I'm 38 but it feels like a grown up's job to decide when its time for a beloved dog to go. I don't know if I'm up for it. Well, I know I have to be, but I want to do right by her. Rob thinks she knows she's mortal, that she's aware there is an end. I don't know. I have no idea what goes on in that head, in that soul.

She's been with us for 14 years, since she could fit in my pocket. I am accustomed to her presence in ways I don't even fathom. The girls love her, their fox-like brown dog. She catches snowballs, she chases the sled, now sometimes she wipes out and her back legs splay. She can't get up. She cries as she slides and she cries when I go pick up her hind part. I feel panic. Then as she walks away, wobbly, I feel like we're both a bit embarrassed.

I've checked for her twice now and she's not there. I know she'll come to the door when she's ready. She's so totally deaf now, it's not worth calling for her.

I know I can deal with alot of emotional and physical intensity because I am a labor and delivery nurse. I think I'm pretty tough, but in some ways it seems like Azalea is the grown-up. I don't want to be watching her age and decline faster than me. She is solid, content, accepting, protective of her boundaries and loving. All things I strive to be.

I check again and there she is. Looking up at me as I open the door, thundering up the stairs and bounding into the living room on old legs because she knows it's time for a bone and a sleep by the woodstove.

Good dog.

Don't be a Muggle!

is a plea from Steven King's On Writing, which I mentioned in my first post. It comes to me frequently. Even now I was just thinking maybe I'd head to bed after a teeth flossing. The children are sweetly sleeping and Rob is out of town visiting his brother. But I'm no muggle, so here I am starting to write at 10:05pm.

We ran out of heating oil last night and I'm still feeling a bit bruised from it. The balance of homelife and work feels strained by our need for more money. I felt so ashamed when Rob called me last night at work to say, "Could we be out of oil? It's freezing." I'm the chick in charge of money in our house. Rob gets a terribly strained look on his face whenever we talk about it so it ends up being my job. I had to call a friend and have her drop off wood at our house in the cold dark at 9pm when she got home (We just used up the last of our three cords of wood for the new wood stove last week, nice.)

Home was cozy when I arrived at 1 am after work. Oil arrived today and someone bled the air from the system; all thanks to my credit card that I had vowed to never use again. I felt like a failure, someone who can't pay her bills and keep her family warm. I wondered about my hopeful magical belief in the world; my desire to write and play the violin, and felt a bit like chiding myself. "Why do you kid yourself? The world isn't magical and warm; it doesn't give a shit about you or anyone. Get back to work and stop staring up at the sky looking for a sign." I prayed for some help, some light as I went about my day.

Lily came home and wrote out a song she sings at school.

"Margarie go feed the Black Sow all on a misty morning..." she sang to me in her sweet high voice. It made me cry with delight! It was magic!

And then I did a week's worth of grocery shopping in less than an hour, also amazing.

I learned it is very difficult for me to ask for help. It was so uncomfortable making the phone calls and asking dear friends for wood. Today the woman who broke wood from her frozen woodpile told me she overcame a fear of being outside alone at her house. She pointed her truck lights at the woodpile and made herself be brave, "I can't let Katherine's girls be cold tonight." My other friend said I could borrow money from her tax return, which I won't, but it was very sweet.

By tonight I felt more held in the world.

I get the Pause for Beauty email from Heron Dance (here is the blog address)

http://pauseforbeauty.blogspot.com/

and I thought back to this quote from this week's email.

that, for me, describes the struggle between our inner muggles and wizards.

May the wizards win!

"Often I have tried the frightening way of "reality,"Where things that count are profession, law, fashion, finance,But disillusioned and freed I fled away alone To the other side, the place of dreams and blessed folly."
—Hermann Hesse, excerpted in Issue 56

Rob Brezney's astrology update for this week


According to expert gerontologists, Rolling Stones' guitarist Keith Richards (a Sagittarius) should have passed on to the next world a decade ago. The man has abused his body so thoroughly, his continued survival is a mystery. You're currently in an excellent position to achieve equally stupendous feats of persistence yourself, Sagittarius. More than ever before, you have a dogged capacity to keep pushing -- even in areas where you've been flighty or sketchy in the past. I'd say this is an excellent time to deepen your commitment to your dreams in very practical ways.

see link for Rob Brezney's fun horoscopes
http://freewillastrology.com/horoscopes/


Very exciting I can cut and paste!!

I think I'm going to need some "stupendous feats of persistance" in the coming year to keep my dreams flying in the air.


I have been having a lot of fun practicing the violin; the other day during the lesson when we were playing the same phrase over and over, I thought, "OH-I'm happy, really happy." It was a deep contented feeling.


I have been waking up in the middle of the night, lifting my head to look at the red numbers on my clock radio, "Is it time to get up?" Several times it has been 11:11 or 4:44 which are magical numbers for me. I sigh as I lay my head back down, I feel blessed and visited, but also puzzled, "What am I supposed to do with that?" Am I supposed to get up and go outside like in that Rumi poem.


The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. Don’t go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want. Don’t go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the doorsillwhere the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open. Don’t go back to sleep.
–Rumi


So far I've been going back into quiet sleep.


I've been listening to Byron Katie's 6 cd set. Holy crap! It is so intense to hear her just breaking al the walls of shit down in that loving amused voice.

http://www.thework.com/video_cancer.asp

I realized all I can do is try to be present with love. That can be all for now.

Maybe next week I'll find the round door.