Be a Lake

Be A Lake  (Source Unknown)

The old Master instructed the unhappy young man to put a handful of salt in a glass of water and then to drink it.
"How does it taste?" the Masterasked.
"Awful," spat the apprentice

The Master chuckled and then asked the young man to take another handful of salt and put it in the lake.

The two walked in silence to the nearby lake
and when the apprentice swirled his handful of salt into the lake,
the old man said, "Now drink from the lake

As the water dripped down the young man's chin, the Master asked,
"How does it taste?"
"Good!" remarked the apprentice.
"Do you taste the salt?"  asked the Master.
"No," said the young man.

The Master sat beside this troubled young man, took his hands, and said,

"The pain of life is pure salt; no more, no less.
The amount of pain in life remains the same, exactly the same.

But the amount we taste the 'pain'
depends on the container we put it into.

So when you are in pain, the
only thing you can do is to enlarge your sense of things .....

Stop being a glass.

                                          Become a lake!

Day 68 Stuffing Emotions or Using Emotions

There is a difference between stuffing your emotions and controlling your emotions. Stuffing means not recognizing them, not allowing yourself to express how you feel emotionally, feeling that by showing your emotions you are doing something wrong. I think that stuffing is not balance.

Emotions are tools like screwdrivers. The best use for them is to bring happiness joy and love to those around us and thereby attain these things for ourselves and also to propel your intentions forward into manifestation. Now if you hide all your screwdrivers, how can you use them to build that patio? So it is good to see your screwdrivers, to learn what they are, how they work, what they are for and how to use them properly. It takes a bit of practice to learn how to use a screwdriver properly. Sure you can throw it at a wall but that won't do much good. And that is what we do with our emotions. We throw them around and even at each other without realizing that they are actually tools!

Too many people walk through life these days with one driving thought, "how does this make me feel?" They let how they emotionally feel make all their decisions and judgments for them. That is like a baby crying for its bottle! We have so many other ways to determine our decisions and judgments for us. We have life experience, our own beliefs, our own goals and goodness to choose with. Emotions are just screwdrivers. It would be like saying, "what does my screwdriver tell me to do now". ! LOL!

If I gave a screwdriver to every person walking around being led by their emotions we would see everyone talking to a screwdriver constantly! LOL!

So yes, emotions are valuable, as tools! We should learn about them, experience them, learn to use them wisely. Emotions are also part of our sensory equipment. I use my emotions to alert me to negative or positive energetic fields. I have stood in "places of emergence" and just felt what I felt just to feel it. It taught me something more about that place than if I had stuffed my emotions and not used them in that place.

Emotions are tools. We can easily use them for our own good and the good of others. Why didn't anyone teach you this? Good question!

Aho  ( “I speak my truth”)

Shaman Elder Maggie

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Day 64 The Four Enemies of a Shaman Part Two: Clarity

2. Clarity:

 How many times have you heard someone say, “O yes I know that!” This very attitude keeps that person from ever learning anything new, from ever getting a new perspective or changing an idea or an old worn out belief. I have had people tell me that I needed a microwave to make tea! Do you see how we put ourselves into a terrible prison by thinking we are clear on something? The truth is we have not yet perceived much more than 10 % of all that is. How can we ever say we have clarity on anything? And isn’t the fun of this life experience in the exploration itself? Assuming we have clarity cuts off our very creativity, our ingenuity, our problem solving skills or innovative ideas. It also makes us burdens on those around us as we try to force others to see things only as we see them. It violates the free will choice of others to impose our supposed clarity on others. So to battle this enemy we need to have an attitude of humility, “Ok I don’t know everything. In fact, I don’t really know much about anything”. We need to have the intent to honor, to honor the Self and to honor others and not put ourselves higher or grander or more important than anything else, even a rock.

So we overcome clarity with an attitude of humility and an intent to honor Self and others.

Aho ( I speak my truth)

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Day 57 Betrayal

In every person’s life as a child, there comes  a day when we discover that our parents lied to us. It is usually not a very big lie, but these parents who we trusted completely and believed every single thing they said and did and we even attempted to imitate them thinking that they knew what they were doing and were experts on how to live life in the best possible way, we catch them in a lie. It might be simply that there is no Santa Claus, it might be that we see them doing some act of selfishness at our expense. It might be one of those do as I say not as I do events. It might be overhearing our parents talking trash about us in the heat of an argument saying things they don’t really mean. But in every child’s life there comes a moment when that child realizes that her parents have lied to her. And this feels like the ultimate betrayal. It is usually the first time we are betrayed by anyone we truly loved. 

So it depends on how that child handles that betrayal that can color their whole life experience. Most of us suddenly realize that our parents are not gods. We may realize that our parents are struggling and suffering and not having a very good time here after all. We may realize that our parents do not know everything after all and so we change how we see them and they become human beings instead of gods and we learn to rely on our own selves from that point on. This is that moment in a young teen’s life when she stops confiding in her parents, when she starts making her own decisions, when she would rather choose for herself than rely on her now human parents to make choices for her anymore. This is normal and healthy. 

But there are some kids who are so traumatized by the idea that their parents would actually lie to them,  that they never got over it. They feel such a sense of betrayal that they cannot forgive their parents for being human. It becomes blown out of proportion in the child’s mind and there is no one around to seek counseling from, to explain this betrayal is just a human being- being human. 

And, instead of going through what most of us go through and learning at this time of childhood that it is better to make our own way than to rely on other humans to do it for us, this person has not recovered from this natural point in every child’s life when they catch the ones they trust doing untrustworthy things. She did not reach that decision to create her own life the best she could and instead just rejected her parents as defective and she is still thinking that there are gods in the world who can run her life for her and not betray her. So time and time again she trusts in someone and makes them the parent god for her life and tine and time again they betray her. It is a broken record. 

What she needs to do is take responsibility for her own life, just like that teenage girl who decided it is better to make her own decisions for her own life, no matter how bad or mistaken they may be, rather than to let any other human being run her life for her. We learn by experience how to make better and better choices as we go along. But this person has not even picked up the baton and tried to make her own choices. She has spent her life looking for someone else to make her choices for her. I would encourage her to stand in her power now and begin to create her own life for herself rather than looking for another parent figure god. There are no gods in this world. There is no one else here who would know how to live her life in the best way. Only she can determine that and create that for herself.

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Day 54 Dealing with Beliefs Given to us in Fear

When I was in first grade my first experience in school, We didn’t even have to go to any kindergarten or preschool then, my teacher was a nun dressed in black and white  habit who stood 6 foot 11 and wore size 16 men’s basketball sneakers, the only shoes that would fit her. Imagine this teeny little 6 year old girl sitting in an oversized desk looking at those gigantic shoes that could just stomp her out. I would look up to the top of the world and see that mean face wrapped in that nun outfit glaring down at me. I would feel the sting of her ruler on my back if I didn’t’ sit up straight enough. Yes I was definitely afraid of her.

When children are afraid of the parental authority like I was of this nun, and she tells me that girls are dumber than boys, I don’t need any facts or logic to believe what she is telling me. I believe simply because she said so! And I will believe it with all my heart and soul rather than have her come down on me and hit me or stomp on me. Anything she told me- I took for the whole truth.

As we grow up, even though that adult is no longer present in our lives. The feelings of fear that pushed non benefitting beliefs into our minds and souls is still there. Those beliefs are held in our psyche by a lock of fear. We still subconsciously fear the authority that taught us that belief. So even into my adulthood I still believed that men were smarter than women. There is certainly no data to back that up. No proof of that, in fact just about everybody would tell you it is not true, but because that belief was given to me as a result of a fear based authority figure telling me what to believe, I am going to believe that belief and not be able to change that belief. I will even make up my own reasons why that belief is true and I might even refuse to hear any one try to tell me it is not true. I clutch that belief because I am afraid to let go of it because I still have a child’s fear of that nun inside me, what might happen if I let go of her belief, how will I be punished, what terrible thing will happen to me if I doubt that belief. I subconsciously feel safe by continuing to believe this non benefitting belief. To change it would make me feel unsafe as though I was violating something and would get hurt. It is this feeling of safety I get from believing this belief that makes me keep it no matter how disabling it might be to me.

So with beliefs like these we have to see WHO taught us these non benefitting beliefs and are we still afraid of those authority figures? Do they still hold power over us? Until we can face the authority who taught us these non benefitting belief, face to face, adult to adult, until we can remove the fear that they had over us consciously, we cannot remove these beliefs.  We must realize that it is no longer dangerous to disagree with that authority figure who told us to believe in these beliefs and we can now update our beliefs based on the current reality of things in our lives today. I think we all have been given beliefs like these. I think it is worth it to find them and deal with them. What do you think?

Email me at shaman@shamanelder.com and we can work through such a  non-benefitting beliefs of yours for free! Or visit http://www.shamanelder.com/

Aho

Shaman Elder Maggie

Day 35 The Purpose of Emotions

When we are in an emotionally heightened state, we are not in connection with our spiritual self. We let go, we stop being in control of our spiritual self. We cannot achieve a balance when we are emotionally upset. And that is the problem we all have in our daily lives and why I say not to run your life based on your emotions. So many people do just that. Everything they do, every decision the average person makes is based on this question, "how does this make me feel?"

Yikes! What a terrible way to live! Emotions are sensory tools. That's all! Like ears and eyes and noses. Your nose shows you how something smells. Your emotions show you how something feels. Boy if I could just teach this one thing, the world would be better off! I know I digress here but this is so important! I love my emotions. I express them freely. I laugh I cry I experience life and what the world sends me each day but I do not make my decisions based on what I see or smell or feel. I take in all the sensory information and process it together to decide the best course of action for me.

Emotions also have another use as a tool. They are the driving force behind our intentions. Ask me about that. Send me an email to shaman@shamanelder.com

Aho

Shaman Elder Maggie

www.shamanelder.com