Message from the oracle deck
03/08/2021 at 5:28 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a commentTags: Guidance, healing, inspiration, Intuition, intuitive development, Mind body spirit, oracle, self-care, Spirituality, wellbeing
There is a pack of oracle cards, called the Oracle of Illumination, that was given to me by Vivien, a dear friend whom I met during my training with The Healing Trust. The bag that the cards rest in nowadays was a gift from Judith, a beloved sister of mine. Both women are now in the light, and yet it feels to me as though their kind influence is evident each time I use the cards.
This morning I drew the card, ‘Energiser’. The book that came with the deck was discarded long ago as I am one of those lawless beings who likes to receive impressions directly from an oracle, without reference to the authors’ personal interpretations. Instead, I went for a walk through the local meadows and let the word become a refrain as I strolled. And these were some of the questions in my mind.
How does the word ‘energiser’ figure in your life today? What and who energise you? What and who leave you feeling low in energy?
I realised that walking in green spaces or doing some yoga or writing my current novel can be deeply energising, even if, before the start of those exercises, I was feeling tired. In contrast, sitting still for long periods doing nothing in particular can actually deplete my energy. And although there are necessary, dull tasks in everyone’s day, making sure to include energising activities, whatever that means to you, is essential self-care.
Wellbeing notes: message from a stream
01/02/2021 at 10:00 am | Posted in Uncategorized | 3 CommentsTags: inspiration, meditation, Michael Tippett, nature inspiration, stream, wellbeing
There’s a simple walk near my home that takes you over a brook. If you were to follow the brook’s flow you might discover that all the interlacing streams in the neighbourhood bear the same name, Cocklemore Brook, and you would eventually find that the water from the many branches of Cocklemore Brook flows into the River Avon. And the Avon would carry you through the cities of Bath and Bristol until you reached the sea.
On this particular morning I am walking beside the brook thinking about various personal projects – things relating to work and family and home. And suddenly I see that the interlacing flow of these projects is somehow the same in principle as the flow of tiny tributaries that join together into a river leading eventually to the sea. The details of my life are small and insignificant. And yet when combined with the countless tributaries of other people’s endeavours, an ocean is maintained.
What we collectively put into the ocean of our endeavours matters. If I approach my day with kindness, creativity and love, then that is what I contribute to the ocean of humanity.
The name ‘Cocklemore’ comes from the old English words ‘ock’ or oak tree, and ‘more’– a wild, unfarmed place. There are many oak trees here, and the brook flows through boggy, unfarmable land. Like its name, the insights I receive from the brook appear wild, eternal and true.
Photo: renowned composer Sir Michael Tippett used to sit on this humble bench by Cocklemore Brook, creating his later works such as ‘The Rose Lake’. It’s amazing to listen to this shimmering music while visiting the stream today.
November’s message of self-acceptance
01/11/2020 at 9:48 am | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a commentTags: autumn, healing, inspiration, self care, self-acceptance, wellbeing
The trees around me in Wiltshire UK where I live are fast losing their colourful canopies as we approach winter. Leaf by leaf, they reveal their true shape. This is the perfect time to notice that there is no such thing as a perfect tree. They are all asymmetrical. Limbs and branches twist and extend in a mysterious pattern. We accept and delight in a tree’s unique shape. Why then should we not delight in our own unique human forms?
Seen without judgement, human beings are gorgeous examples of creation. I’m pretty certain we are adored by the divine, creative force that lies within and beyond all living beings. And yet we can be so quick to find fault with ourselves. Even something as simple and natural as our age or weight can become something we prefer to hide. Think, for a moment, about how conscious so many of us are about our height. We feel too short or too tall. And yet we are only talking about a difference of a few inches! How can that matter compared with the vast reaches of the universe?
Each of us has the capacity to carry many psychological wounds through life. From childhood onwards we may retain messages from external figures of authority who have left us feeling ‘not good enough’. In adulthood we may become experts at criticising our appearance and our actions in countless small and punishing ways. We may even be unconscious of how wounded we are in this respect, which can lead to a tendency in us to project our unresolved issues on to others, and even to judge others harshly for their own perceived faults.
Yet the revealed shapes of trees in winter suggest to me that humans, like trees, are perfect, just as we are. Our healed wounds and scars are part of our personal story, to be honoured and even loved. Humans, like trees, are surely a beautiful and unique addition to the landscape. And, just like our cousins the trees, as we prepare for winter we carry the potential for new personal growth in the new year.
Stone Age – a (free) audio meditation
07/04/2020 at 1:22 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a commentTags: healing, humanity, inspiration, meditation, nature, reflections, Spirituality
Here is your (free) audio meditation for this week. Again from the Studio seven years back, it’s a Stone Age visualisation, giving you an opportunity to imagine yourself living a truly simple life, in nature, bathing in refreshing water and breathing the freshest of air. I hope you enjoy it. I will join you listening to it in spirit this Thursday at 1 pm, or any time to suit you. So sit or lie down, relax and enjoy!
With love
Suzanne x
Stone Age Meditation
This is why I let the wild bees go
10/06/2019 at 8:01 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 2 CommentsTags: bees, community, disabilty, inspiration, lessons from nature, nature
The honey bees buzzed into the garden like a striped, determined blizzard, and settled in a wild cherry tree where they became a solid mass that moved constantly yet kept its shape. The way they seethed and settled seemed alarming to this bee-ignorant person. I called a local beekeeper, who said he would turn up the next morning and capture the swarm. In the meantime, cautiously, I studied them. And began to see patterns in their movement.
Firstly, they were reassuringly peaceful, cocooning and protecting their all-important queen. Then there were individual bees, scouts, who constantly buzzed off to search for a new nesting site in the nearby woods, and returned to communicate their findings to the swarm.
For hours, on and off, I watched them. They were mesmerising. Gradually I began to see the swarm’s point of view. I liked the way so many bees could act as one community. As chance would have it, my own home was about to become a community. Within the week, our disabled son, Tim, would return from college to live a semi-independent life with us. He would bring a team of carers with him. I was looking forward to Tim’s return very much. However, I felt trepidation about the team that would nearly always be with him.
While I watched and waited, the bees quietly buzzed their message, that it’s okay to be part of a community, in which everyone has their role to play. During those hours, my attitude shifted. I began to accept my family’s new phase. Our home shimmered and changed shape around me, becoming its new, more public self.
The next day, I phoned the beekeeper and asked him to come a couple of hours later than planned. I had to go out but also, secretly, I hoped our visiting bees might have the chance to live a wild, free life. And sure enough, in that time the bees lifted and vanished into the woodland. They were gone within seconds. I understood that they had found their own home. And I wasn’t sorry that I let them go.
Choosing bluebell pathways
26/04/2019 at 11:07 am | Posted in Uncategorized | 4 CommentsTags: inspiration, meditation, mindfulness, nature, spring
At the weekend I was lucky enough to be shown Duncliffe Wood, in Dorset. It had been raining heavily, which meant this ancient woodland was largely empty of visitors, like a forest from a bygone era. The rain was still falling lightly as we walked through clouds of purple blooms. The ground was bumpy with odorous leaf mould and sap-filled roots, and the subtle bluebell fragrance lay all about us, mist-like.
There were many small paths through the woodland. Every few paces, it seemed, there was a new choice of route. At first we chose carefully, and then it dawned on us that the route didn’t really matter. Every choice was the right choice. This was a walk that meant us to meander, to explore, to absorb the bright spring vitality of the place.
When the walk finished, I carried away my own share of that diffuse purple bluebell energy which lay like a shimmering ball in my cupped hands. The next day I felt a portion of the ball pour out into two meditation sessions that I hosted. Afterwards there was still plenty left to pour around my house and garden, and into the everyday jobs I had to do there. Then some flowed into my writing and yet more seeped on to my list of things to do, muddling the tidy lines, creating watercolour opportunities that changed shape as I looked at them.
It was just a little walk. But its fragrance will linger, I think, for a goodly time.
Celebrate what your body can do
27/12/2018 at 6:12 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 5 CommentsTags: Exercise, gratitude, Health, inspiration, Mind body spirit, mindfulness, motivation, sprituality
At this time of year it’s so easy to feel bad about eating too much and exercising too little. That’s why it was good to step through the sunlit winter mist and into my local gym, where the following unattributed message was displayed: “Exercise is a celebration of what your body can do, not a punishment for what you ate.” So true! Have you ever noticed that it’s easier to exercise when you accept and appreciate yourself wholeheartedly, just as you are? “I can do this” is a mantra that gives us wings.
The next step from appreciation is thankfulness, and that’s the word that we will be meditating on in sessions through January. I’m thankful for a body that is, on balance, pretty healthy. I’m thankful for family and friends and warmth and nourishment. I’m grateful for being part of overlapping circles of community that cooperate and help one another. Being thankful gives sustenance to the very things we appreciate. What will you appreciate in 2019? What forces will you feed with your thankfulness?
Guidance is simpler than you think
30/10/2018 at 6:55 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 2 CommentsTags: energy healing, Guidance, healing, inspiration, parenting, special parenting
Twenty years ago, I was struggling with the challenge of parenting a baby with complex health issues. I was also, by no coincidence at all, starting off on my long path to be an energy therapist. In the night, I would dream vividly. The dreams were detailed, emphatic and helpful. I called them ‘Night tuition’. I saw them as a form of guidance. Where they came from, I had no idea. To me, it didn’t matter whether they originated from my own subconscious, or from some infinite dream library to which all beings have access.
What mattered most to me is that, over time, the dreams helped me to navigate the tricky path that I was treading, along with my partner and our tiny, so vulnerable child.
I’d like to share with you the simplest, barest dream that I experienced. It was simple, but it was powerful. It set the tone for all my future parenting. Actually, it set the tone for everything that has happened since, in every single aspect of my life.
In the dream there was just one, single thing to look at: a rectangle. The shape was shown against a plain background. The rectangle and the background were both devoid of colour. The whole scene was greyscale – just varying degrees of light and dark.
“Which is lighter: the rectangle, or the background?” asked a teacher, next to me but invisible.
I looked carefully. It felt for all the world like some kind of eye test.
Truthfully, the rectangle and the background seemed at first to be pretty similar shades of grey. However, as I looked, it seemed to me that the rectangle was shining more brightly. In fact, it was definitely lighter.
“The rectangle,” I replied.
“Good,” said my teacher. And waves of love washed over me.
In that instant, I understood that the rectangle represented a choice that each of us makes countless times. The rectangle represented the choice between love and fear. Love, in this dream example, was lit up, as though a light was shining through it. If I had seen the rectangle as darker than its background, it would have meant that I was viewing life through a fearful lens, programmed to expect the worst. However, by seeing the rectangle as lighter than its background, I was actually viewing life through the lens of love. It meant that on some fundamental level, I had learnt to trust that in the big scheme of things, all is well.
This was an important lesson for me. It helped me to understand that my love as a mother could be a powerful force in my son’s life. It enabled me to see that my partner’s love as a father could be as protective as mountains. And it taught me that fear would weaken that parental strength and power. So the dream reinforced my innate wish to choose love rather than fear.
How to improve your focus in meditation – and life
16/08/2018 at 5:59 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 3 CommentsTags: healing, inspiration, life skills, meditation, mindfulness, owl, reflections
What is your relationship with Focus? Have you been together a while? Was Focus a first love, or are you and Focus perhaps not even talking?
If I were a life coach, I might suggest that you feed your focus and starve your distractions. Or I might say, “What you focus on is what you get more of.”
However, I am not a life coach. In the spheres of wellbeing in which I move, focus is not an end goal. It’s an invitation to be fully present. All we can ever have is this present moment, but it’s enough, because it’s everything. If we witness this moment fully, it has the magical ability to open up like a fractal. Rather like the owl I met recently, we develop the ability to see, hear and sense in ever more detail.
The state of focusing is a relaxed, alert way of being. We become aware and awake to what’s around us. Importantly, we don’t focus on what we don’t have. We focus on what is. In so doing, we realise how very much is contained within the present moment. We can then make choices based on our expanded awareness, which can help us step into an optimum future.
What is your relationship with Focus? Are you perhaps close friends? Maybe, just maybe, Focus is your life-long guide and companion?
This is the perfect time for your self care
12/02/2018 at 6:29 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 2 CommentsTags: inspiration, Lent, mindfulness, personal development, reflections, self-care, Spirituality
Valentine’s Day and the first day of Lent coincide this year. The resulting fusion of love and abstinence from a selected item of food or drink makes this the perfect time to focus on self care.
How might you care for yourself for the 40 or more days of Lent, which begins this Wednesday 14th February?
One year ago, inspired by my friend Sarah Sexton, I gave up refined sugar for Lent. After Lent I continued the practice. I’m happy to say I am now 10 kg lighter, and back within a healthy weight range. Along the way I lost my sugar cravings, and the associated swings between high energy and tiredness.
Lent is a perfect time for self-reflection. On a scale of 1 to 10, how well are you currently caring for your body? What single act of food-abstinence will your body most benefit from?
Whatever your spirituality or lack thereof, approaching Lent as an act of self care is an invitation to thrive.
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Suzanne Askham 