February 18 is the start of Random Acts of Kindness Week. Their website is packed with great ideas on how to celebrate, and I especially love the approach of committing a random act of kindness for three different people: Someone you don’t know Someone you know Yourself Someone you don’t know This is pretty simple and can quickly become a habit. (That could be a good thing!) Smile. When you’re in a depressingly long line at the bank, watching a parent deal with their toddler’s public meltdown, or sitting next to another car in traffic. A kind grin goes a long way when you’re feeling a bit hopeless about the…

Have you taken the time to check your “Feel Good” barometer?  On a scale of 1 to 10 (with 1 being awful and 10 being great), how would you answer this question … How good do I feel? Some people say things like “oh … well … I have a little pain or discomfort, but it’s not too bad.”  On the above scale, where would you place the level of that discomfort?  Many folks brush off these regular discomforts without realizing that excess or stuck energy may be the reason for that pain/discomfort.  It’s all relative to the person in pain; however, I think anything 5 or below to be…

The holidays can be kind of weird.  Despite all the ‘Most Wonderful Time of the Year’ jingles, it’s the toughest time of the year for many people. Some people over-commit to family, friends, volunteer tasks … they find themselves over-scheduled and unable to actually enjoy the season. Some of us dread the inevitable, obligatory socializing and the pressure of being ‘on’.  Some of us are grieving. Here are a few less-typical Holiday Survival Tips.  Some of them are brilliant.  Some of them are not. But maybe you’ll find a nugget in here. Ditch obligations Just because you’ve always gone to Aunt Sue’s for Christmas Eve doesn’t mean you always have to.…

We are living in a world which demands that our body is on high alert almost all the time.  The consciousness of mankind is bombarded by stimulus every waking moment.  We process more data/noise in an hour than our grandparents might have processed in a month.  When does the body have a chance to shut down from this, regenerate and seek to balance itself? We need the down time, and yet we rarely take it.  We say we are too busy and yet our busy-ness is creating a stress level that our ancestors would have found unbearable.  Actually, our bodies do find it unbearable.  Our high stress levels are contributing…

I grew up on a farm in northern Illinois and my family trained and showed Quarter Horses. I was very active in 4-H and participated in both the equine and canine project areas. My children were also actively involved in 4-H showing dogs and rabbits. My daughter and I raised Mini Rex rabbits and were able to travel throughout the US showing them. I originally studied massage therapy in 2005, but unexpected family matters required me to withdraw from the program prior to completing my final semester. In the fall of 2007, a friend in Maryland mentioned she was studying animal massage and I knew immediately that it was something…

For the past few weeks, I’ve been using some personal affirmations, elemental/directional statements, parts of the Prayer of St. Francis, and paraphrases of the Reiki Principles during my meditation.  It helps me focus my meditation and provides positive statements for my mind to dwell on.  And it’s made a big difference in my mental outlook in just a few short weeks. I’ve had time over the past few days to listen to some Abraham Hicks sound clips on YouTube … you gotta love the wealth of information that’s on YouTube.  Anyway, I’m working on a short list of meaningful statements to use during my devotional time which will allow me…

Sometimes letting go of things that no longer serve our highest interest is easier said than done.  Those pesky thoughts keep coming back and are often at conflict with the new thoughts and beliefs we want to bring forth.  Maintaining balanced thought processes and healthy relationships can be a real challenge.  Despite our best efforts, it just seems like we are in a pit of quicksand that those old thought patterns are slowly sucking us in and holding on tight.  Just when we think we’re about to break free, we lose our grip on the life rope or low hanging branch and are stuck again. When all else failed, I…

There has been a huge crack in this melting pot we call American society. That crack has been covered up with matching wax (to make it look like it was great, whole, beautiful, and perfectly functioning). Well, folks … our melting pot heated up the past few months and the wax filling that huge crack melted. All of the hatred and separatism that’s been simmering, under cover, for centuries just leaked out and the whole damn stove top (country) is covered with the residue. How do we clean it up?

I hadn’t thought about it much as I stopped watching the news a long time ago. But it was mentioned in a group the other day that the news typically points out only the negative.  I knew this, that’s part of why I stopped watching the news.  If only people knew how much fear and negative energy this was putting into their lives and their vibration. There was a time, not that long ago, when we didn’t need to talk about a concept like “random acts of kindness” … because people just did them.  But our media focus on the negative has left us in a perpetual feeling of gloom,…

To what are you giving your time and energy? What are you creating in YOUR world with YOUR thoughts? In a sense, the world really does revolve around you. It constantly swirls with the energetic frequency of your thoughts and feelings. These are the magnets in your life that attract or repel everything in your life. All of life attempts to join you with similar vibrations. This isn’t some magic thing or a line of BS. It’s based on the laws of physics. Have you ever seen the short video of 32 metronomes that synchronize to be in time? Take a minute to watch the video below. I think you’ll…