Wellbeing notes: A time to share
03/11/2022 at 11:12 am | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a commentTags: helping hand, kindness, peace, refugees, sanctuary, sharing, Ukraine
Recently a stranger, a young woman, moved into my spare room. Before she arrived, I was nervous. I’d heard stories about house shares that had gone wrong: lodgers who expected hotel service; who made a terrible mess; who were noisy; who smoked or drank too much.
“It’s wise to set clear boundaries,” said the rep from the refugee department at the local council. So I settled on ‘No smoking’, and ‘No visitors’, and hoped for the best.
Needless to say my new lodger is lovely: quiet, considerate and thankful to be safe. The council rep is just a phone call away if I need guidance. A government payment covers any extra costs that I might incur. Honestly, the risk is minimal, and I’m glad I took a chance in opening my door.
Imagine, now, that bombs were falling in a town near you – close enough to hear them, close enough to feel unsafe. And now imagine that in some far away country there’s a household where you can stay… how welcome that sanctuary would be.
There are various ways to sponsor a refugee. In the UK, the easiest method is to register interest at gov.uk. In due course your local council contacts you, to invite you to join their list of available households. They send someone to okay your property, and organise a DBS (criminal record) check. And then, when your room is needed… your new lodger comes to stay.
How to transform your relationships with one fascinating word
05/06/2017 at 10:04 am | Posted in Uncategorized | 2 CommentsTags: energy healing, healing, inspiration, intuitive development, meditation, peace, Relationships, spiritual healing, wisdom
Understanding blends knowledge with kindness. When you apply understanding to a relationship, conflicts crumble. Dynamics alter. Ego gives way to empathy.
An understanding person comprehends something or someone with compassion. They hold a cup of knowledge that contains kindness and love as well as wisdom and perception.
Understanding can strengthen a floundering relationship. If a partnership is ending, it can enable that to happen with love rather than anger. Understanding can also be a wonderful doorway to laughter and humour which in themselves can heal relationships.
Understanding is our meditation word in the Studio this week.
How could applying this word alter a challenging situation for you?
A young hare’s guide to peace
03/07/2015 at 4:26 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 6 CommentsTags: Guidance, happiness, healing, inspiration, mindfulness, nature, peace, personal development
When we are peaceful in nature, nature comes peacefully to us. Last spring, collecting wild garlic in the woods, I was delighted when a deer came to graze nearby. We continued to crop the spring greens, each in our own way. It was companionable. I was the one who moved away first, when my basket was full.
Then, ten days ago, a young hare came to live in our garden. He wasn’t distant; he was frequently under our heels. Although we startled him, he didn’t move far away. He ate some carrots I left out for him. One day, I sat on a stone step, drinking green tea, and he sat nearby, eating grass in the sunlight. Ears upright and contented. I chatted. He listened. I loved the way his ears swivelled attentively when I spoke. If you want to learn the art of true listening, watch a hare.
When a being so wild and natural is happy in your company, it is a wonderful feeling. Again, I was the one who eventually moved away. My human schedule beckoned. His precocial nature allowed him to simply be.
Our hare is now spending more time in the field next door. But he still visits our garden. Two nights ago, I saw him in the silver light of the full moon, grazing on the lawn.
Hares and people have a lot in common. When we are peaceful, others around us are more likely to be calm and contented. Maybe that is how we will eventually create a more tranquil world: not by telling others that they are wrong and we are right, but by experiencing a deep, numinous peace within ourselves. It’s a feeling that others can’t help but respond to.
Spiritual: a quick definition
08/04/2015 at 4:27 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 6 CommentsTags: chakras, inspiration, meditation, mindfulness, nature, peace, personal growth, self-awareness, Spirituality, wisdom
People often talk about being spiritual. Others deny that the spiritual realm even exists. But what does being spiritual actually mean? Here is a definition that works for me:
Beyond the levels of thinking and feeling lies pure consciousness, which we experience as pure love. Reaching this is spiritual transformation.
Once you’ve been there – really been there – you’ll always have it. It never goes away, although sometimes we manage to forget it for a while. However, we always remember sooner or later. It has a way of reminding us.
We get there by being fully present in the moment, and thus forgetting our ego-centred worries and desires. Looking at a beautiful aspect of nature – such as a flower, or a small child – can bring us to the shores of the spiritual realm. So, too, can a regular practice of meditation. Sometimes, this happens spontaneously, especially in those moments between sleep and waking. And it can also happen in extremis, when our ego-driven policies are no longer working for us, and we find ourselves yielding to a different, infinitely vaster view of the universe.
Next week a new, huge series of meditations begins in the Studio. Term by term, for seven terms, we’re going to focus on each of the main chakras – the energy centres that enable us to function in the physical realm, and also to develop our deeper understanding of life. This epic theme is designed to suit all levels of ability, and you can dip in and out as you wish. The intention is that we will focus ever more fully on the building blocks of our human psyche and our interface with the wider world.
This term, from now until July, we’ll be focusing on the base or root chakra, which is concerned with physical survival and manifestation. Join us whenever you can. And I hope you will experience the bliss of the spiritual, one word at a time.
Intuitive mindfulness is a match made in heaven
03/01/2015 at 1:06 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a commentTags: Guidance, Intuition, meditation, Mind body spirit, mindfulness, peace, Spirituality, wellbeing
“Never do something because you feel other people expect you to do it, do it because you have that feeling of absolute certainty that what you are doing is right for you, because you have taken the time to be still, to listen and find out from within what you should do.”
The words are by Eileen Caddy, co-founder of the the Findhorn Foundation in Scotland. The poster here is shared with thanks to that spiritual community. Eileen Caddy’s book of inspirational writings, Opening Doors Within, was a major influence on me when I first thought about running meditation workshops in a Wiltshire studio.
The principle of noticing what you notice is central to mindfulness. When we are mindful, we focus on our breath, our pulse, the position of our body, the feel of the chair beneath us, the temperature of the air entering and leaving us, and so on. We notice what we are doing in the present moment, without rushing on to the future, or dwelling in the past.
When we mindfully wash dishes at a sink, for example, we take our time noticing the rainbow colours in the detergent bubbles, the feel of water against the surface of our hands, the sound and movement of dishes within a bowl of warm water.
As Thich Nhat Hanh teaches through his many writings on mindfulness, when we are fully present, we experience peace.
What is less widely talked about is that when we are mindfully present, we allow the quiet inner voice of our intuition to be heard. This is what Eileen Caddy understood fully, and Findhorn still encourages this in myriad ways today.
Noticing what you notice is an integral part of receiving intuitive guidance. Being mindful is essential if we want to understand what we truly feel, and the direction that we fundamentally wish to go.
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Suzanne Askham 