Day 30/366 days Towards Self-Mastery. Status: tentative
It could just be the word. Magic. When it's connected to our perception of reality, it makes my skin crawl.
Maybe it's because of the dearth of magic dreams and fanciful story books to stretch my imagination. Or perhaps it's to do with the dogged practicality that got things done around a busy farm and a large family.
Could it be because that scientific persuasion has been so intense and so convincing that it's taken all the magic out of living?
When people start talking about magic my first instinct is to run for the hills.
Putting that aside, now it's confession time.
In an unusual kind of way, I've been working with magic for decades. The magic of our mind and the magic of our deeper awareness.
In my mind I've convinced myself that it's physics, so when the likes of Nassim Haramein, Bruce Lipton, Rupert Sheldrake and so many others come up with a scientific theory to explain what I'm doing I'm delighted.
Admitting to working with a broader 5 sense reality than most people experience has been one of my greatest difficulties. Who wants to be called a "nut job"? In times gone by, people like me were burned at the stake. There's no doubt a deep genetic memory of those times is resonating in each fearful breath I take as I write this here in black and white.
If not now, then when? Now's the time!
Sarah asks me/us today to conjure up magic and work with it
Every time she throws me another curve ball she's testing my resolve to stay with the plan - 366 days Towards Self-Mastery.
Imagine a big mirror the size of a room, framed in 24 carat gold. Stand in front of it and imagine a shimmering, white light surrounding it. The light is love and it surrounds you and envelops you. See the reflection of yourself as an extraordinary women, radiant and bright, eyes sparkling and smiling warmly.
Meditation has been a tool that I've used for decades. Certainly no expert, I get by with the best practice I can conjure at any time. Mostly I meditate daily but then weeks will go by and I will have left it aside. That's okay.
Working with a virtual reality in a slightly meditative state has been one of my most helpful tools. It's what I call looking through my BodyTalk eyes. My other senses are also enhanced in this practice. What it boils down to is that a meditative state raises the frequency of your brain waves and from what I can gather, that enables you to access a broader range of senses.
In this way seeing myself in the magic mirror was an interesting experience. What I noticed is that I'm smaller than the best version of myself. When I asked that mirror to show me my most expansive self, the image in the mirror changed.
What has really helped is that I have focussed on doing all the activities suggested by Sarah so far, and I can see that this preliminary work is key to being in the right frame of mine to be talking to the mirror. Only this morning I set aside some time to complete my Pinterest vision board, starting with where I am now.
This tool can give you insights that you would never discover by trying to wait for it to emerge from the depths of your soul, unless of course your job is meditation. There's every chance it works best if you're a visual sort of person. Try it for yourself, and see how you go. You'll probably have to practice for a period of time to get the hang of it.
The magic mirror is a tool for the imagination to play with
This magic mirror tool is a way of accessing your deeper knowing. Our minds are so full of all the conditioning that we've ingested over the course of our lives, that anything that enables us to go into our deeper mind or our deeper knowing will reveal something other than what we know consciously.
If you're not practiced at meditation don't worry. Use your imagination to conjure up the image that is asked for.
Hesitate before you undervalue your imagination. It's another valuable mind tool, just as Albert Einstein and most of the great inventors of the industrial age discovered. Getting lost in your imagination reveals more of the world than our 3 dimensional vision permits. It's a gateway to realities that are hidden from many, and this exercise is calling you to look deeper into your knowing about yourself.
Whilst our mind is full of yadda, yadda, what we call our subconscious mind, or our unconscious mind, is not really too far away. Those descriptors don't do it justice. It can be as simple as listening to your inner voice. You inner vision is there as well, as is your inner hearing, touch, taste and smell.
The tools I use provide information to me via my inner vision, hearing and touch. Dr. Stephen Porges of Polyvagal Theory fame describes this phenomena as neuroception. As you work with me, you'll get an understanding of how that all shows up.
Coming to terms with the fact that our scientists don't know everything has helped. Just as it helps to understand that our medics aren't experts at everything to do with the physical body. When a scientist gets curious about something and decides to investigate it, it can take years to really explore what he wants to understand. There's no harm to doing a little experimenting yourself and drawing your own conclusions.
It was through this process that I discovered the properties of the Quantum Field. Kurt Lewin, a psychologist, brought Field Theory into psychological therapies such as psychotherapy. Significantly, I experience immense resonance with my psychotherapy studies and my BodyTalk Practice.
Give it a try and be open to not having to be in control of everything that you see. It might be a tool that you'll enjoy using. There are lots of different imaginative tools and this is as good as any I've worked with, apart from the extensive toolkit I work with in my BodyTalk energy psychology work.
366 days Towards Self-Mastery
When I considered my New Year's intentions for 2020 I had just one: To allow my heart to love what it loved...and let it lead me. (If not now, then when?)
I've spent months working on integrating my life. To live life more fully with my home life, my interests, my work, my responsibilities, all coming together, all connected. I want to give each the attention that they desire and need, and still have time and energy for the others. That means living and working from the heart.
As I was clearing out my bookshelf over the Christmas break I discovered Simple Abundance. I set it aside to explore it on New Year's Day as I lazed through another delicious day of nothingness. Sarah, the author, says this book is about living in grace. Living in grace I realised, is about Self-Mastery.
My thirst for understanding the human condition has driven me all my life, and hand-in-hand with self-mastery it has been a life-long goal. And seeing as I love to write, that living in grace is about self-mastery, and I love a bit of a challenge, then if I am truly going to let my heart lead, I really don't have any other choice. So scary as it feels, I'm starting out on a daily mission of leaning into the suggestions of this daybook and making a daily post to keep me accountable. If not now, then when?
I'm Josie. You can find out a little more about me here.
Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort and Joy: by Sarah Ban Breathnach
This book is written for the Australian and NZ market because it refers to seasonal changes. It's available on Amazon here if you'd like to follow along.