Cara Lumen | Sing a Deeper Song

Sing a Deeper Song

Self Transformation

Clean Your Inside Home

By

packing boxes

It may have been a dream, it may have been a message from the stone I held, but when I woke up from a meditation I remember that my insides, my heart area, my inner landscape had been full of packed boxes and I was going to “take them downstairs” to dispose of them.

Here’s how I interpret that. Somehow, in an inner state, I had managed to box up all the old stuff I no longer needed — the beliefs, the hurts, the lack of confidence in my own value, old stuff that was getting in my way — and had gotten the boxes ready to be taken away so I could live in a spacious cleared space. The keys were in my hand, I just had to let in the movers and release the stuff I no longer needed.

Can you picture that? Can you feel that? What happens if you clear out your inner space of all the stuff you have stored there and start with a clean, sparsely but effectively furnished space?

Feel the light coming in through the windows, feel the breeze moving freely through the doorway. Feel the room where you can stretch and move and express yourself. You now are an open space ready to live life simply, one moment at a time, each experience mindfully savored.

I don’t know what was in the boxes. I have had dreams about moving before, but this was not about me moving, this was about me moving stuff out — getting rid of it — simplifying. So that what was left inside was pure me and clear light.

Packed up but not gone

The next day I went back into meditation to see what had happened and the boxes were still there, packed up and ready to be moved — but still there. I began to take deep, cleansing breaths and with each exhalation the boxes began to move. I pictured a big wind coming in to push them out of my inner space, some of them were heavy and it took a small tornado to lift them and take them away (I’m from Kansas!).

As the space cleared and the boxes left, the sun and fresh air came in, and it felt awesome. Only mindfully chosen ideas and concepts will be let in. But the space is now clear and free of clutter and is mine to arrange as I wish.

The freedom of cleared space

What freedom! What joy! How wonderful to have made my inner space a room of light — pure loving light! I was left with a clean open space with a clear view all around, fresh air coming in and the sun shining through the windows.

There was room to move, to think, to breathe, to dance. All because I had cleared out my inner stuff. I can breathe deeply again. I now fill myself with healing, wholing energy and have the space cleared for it to do its work.

Create your own cleansing process

Perhaps you can create a ceremony to clear your inner space, maybe meditate with the intention of releasing what no longer serves you, maybe sit outside in nature and bring in deep, cleansing breaths with the intention of clearing out your inner space.

There’s stuff we carry around that slows us down — things like beliefs that are no longer true, or ideas that are outmoded. Change is constant and we need to keep our inner room open and clear for the constant activity of change that’s taking place there.

What do you have to give away from inside in order to feel lighter and more open?

You may not need to know exactly what it is. Just set the intention to clear our your inner space by releasing everything that no longer serves you.

Then do your life dance in your clear space of light and love!

How will you clean your inner house? And when?

To Sing a Deeper Song Consider:
Reserve Space For Yourself in Your Life
The Move From Inner to Outer Work
What Do You Do When You Feel Stuck?
Take Time to Explore Your Talents
How Being Different Makes You Special
How to Develop Your Distinctive Voice

Why We Are Afraid of Change

By

choices

What we’re seeing in the political responses around the world is a reaction to change. People want to go back to the way it was. They’re afraid of change.

That’s helpful to know.

It’s hard to keep up with change

Technology is moving us faster and farther than we ever dreamed of. It’s hard to keep up. It takes determination to keep learning It takes flexibility to change. And although, to those of us who are older, it may seem like today’s world needs an entirely new skill set, our children and grandchildren are being brought up with technology and instant access to information and the answers they seek.

Change is a constant

Here is the core truth — change is constant. Life goes in cycles and that always means change. Even when you think the cycle has returned to a situation you’ve experienced before, you find that you’ve moved forward and are standing in new and unfamiliar surroundings. Change is ever-present. Change moves you forward.

You can’t hang on to the past

It will never be the way it was — and that’s a good thing. I remember when there was no TV. I remember riding in my grandfather’s Model T car. I remember blocks of ice delivered to my grandfather’s home to a real “ice box”. My mother could vote only twelve years before I was born. Very few women my age went to college. It wasn’t expected of us. It wasn’t the norm.

Yet today, 80 years later, women are heading large companies and entering politics and making a huge impact in our world.

All because the world keeps changing.

Our roles change

House-husbands began to happen when the man stayed home and the woman was the bread-winner. Both women and men took a closer look at marriage and the long-term commitment to raising children. People of diverse genders began to define themselves. Women began to stand up for themselves and men were uncomfortable as their roles and power changed.

That’s still the case. Old male power is still in place but it will disappear in a generation. And women will have to change how they see themselves and their role. We will have to change how we participate.

How do you adjust to change?

First you have to accept that change is constant. You can never, ever, go back to the way it was. You change every minute of your existence. So does the world around you. Going back is not an option. There’s only going forward. And that takes increased flexibility, and usually some effort.

Learn from others

If you want to learn how to use your computer or your cell phone, talk to a young person. If you want to understand environmental change, listen to those who study it and reach informed decisions based on your own inquiry. If you want to learn about your own city government, get involved. Become informed. Do your homework. Check the facts.

Know yourself

Look closely at where you stop yourself with your beliefs or opinions. Identify your strengths as well as your weaknesses. Where are you happiest? What do you need to learn in order to expand your path of service? What are your gifts? Your passion? The more self-aware you become, the more aligned are the choices you make. And there will be choices — many of them —often. Knowing yourself well is the foundation upon which you stand and from which you choose. Be flexible. Be accepting. Be willing to change.

Change takes consistent action on your part

It’s very easy to learn new things. The internet gives you instant answers. Videos can show you step by step how to do anything. You now have access to fascinating thinkers online and innovative research and diverse-minded people gathering for a common cause. It’s all there, spread out before you. Don’t hide your head in the sand. Don’t harbor any desire to go back because that’s simply not going to happen. We’re going steadily forward, like it or not.

How to keep up with change

Listen. Listen to what others are saying.

Look. Look at what others are accomplishing.

Absorb and choose. Immerse yourself in possibility, choose ideas and actions that are aligned with your passion and your gifts and take the steps that will help you move forward.

Trust where you are led

When you focus on listening to your inner voice, when you use your emotions and your feelings to determine what calls to you at this moment in time, and when you simply let it unfold, it will find you and call to you clearly.

A recent shift in my own direction took a while to clarify itself. First there was just a wisp of a thought. Then waiting. Then a bit of an idea. I explored how I felt about it. More waiting. Then came a knowing about the general direction. Again waiting. And finally, like a geyser, the specifics and action steps began to flow out and fill my life. I went to work.

Don’t push your calling. Let it emerge. Don’t push change but do welcome it and enjoy the adventure.

After all, change is all there is.

To Sing a Deeper Song Consider:

How to Hold the Space for Things To Change
How to Hold the Space for the New Vision to Emerge
Reserve Space For Yourself in Your Life
How to Design an Unfolding Routine
Mindfulness and the Moment

Are You Inspired By Your Own Life?

By

indiviual light

I bet you never noticed whether you inspire yourself or not. Why not? Why do we always look at the lives of others for inspiration?

Notice your own path

Stop and see yourself as others see you. Listen to what they say about you and to you. Watch their faces when you interact with them. Notice how you feel when you’ve accomplished something. You’re doing so much more than you realize you’re doing.

Trust that your light is shining

Whenever you affect someone’s life, this creates a ripple effect because the person turns and to the next person offers a reflection of how you’ve affected him or her. Your presence goes on and on and affects many more people than you can imagine.

I’m a writer. But I truly have no idea how I am changing lives. Yes, there are “likes” on Facebook, and personal notes on occasion, but what I really care about is that someone has read what I wrote and was changed by it. I’ll probably never know how far-reaching that ripple is. But I know I am compelled to keep on sharing.

Shine your brightest light

What I can do is be the best me I can be. I continue to explore what calls to me and explain it the best way I can and let it go. I have grown by the doing. Others will grow by the reading. And still others will be affected by the resulting changes in us.

You can’t measure your brightness nor can you have any idea of what darkened corner your light will reach into. What you can do is shine your brightest. Do you best work. Be your kindest self. Express your best ideas. Do your best work.

And feel.

Feel the power of your own life

If you’re growing as a person, you’re inspiring others. If you’re enthusiastically going about your life, others will most certainly be inspired.

Make a list of what you have accomplished and the known effect it has had on others. Be inspired by touching even one person. Be inspired by the completion of a project, no matter how small it was, knowing that you did your best in the moment.

Look in the mirror and smile and know that your mere presence is inspiring.

You’re inspiring not because of what you do but because of how you are. When you are the best you possible, you are inspiriting.

Trust that.

To Sing a Deeper Song Consider:
What is Self-transformation?
Where Do YouPlant our Stake
Our Work in the World
How do You Put your Spiritual Insights to Work?
The New Wave of Powerful Purpose
The Move From Inner to Outer Work

What is Self-transformation?

By

 

butterfly

I know the importance of self-awareness — the need to know our passion, recognize our gifts, understand our needs and define our core values. The better we know ourselves, the more aligned are our choices. But when I came across the concept of self-transformation, it called deeply to me. It’s so powerful and empowering. What is the difference between self-awareness and self-transformation?

To transform is to reshape

Transforming ourselves takes us beyond self-awareness.
It’s like being a potter, holding a ball of clay in your hand. You have shaped it to the best of your ability through your self-awareness; now you must take the additional steps to turn it into a cup or bowl or vase. There are the transforming steps. For instance, pottery requires steps like glazing and firing.

If I want to transform my life, where do I begin?

The first step is to know that you can. You can change anything — how you act, what you say, what you think. All of which shape your life experience.

Begin there. In particular, get rid of the beliefs of self-doubt and know that you can change, you can transform.

Let it unfold

Self-transformation. What does that look like? Feel like? Just be still and listen to the voice within and shape whatever shows up.

Begin with the work within

What calls to you? What do you want to learn, to explore, to try?

As I deepened my connection with the voice within, I could hear it and interpret it more clearly. It required stillness and receptivity on my part for several weeks before any direction began to emerge. Now the signs and ideas and opportunities are emerging clearly and rapidly.

What shows up, what evolves, what changes, cannot be planned for. It can only appear as it will. Work with what you are given.

Be willing to change

Your actions and choices will automatically transform your life. That means you make a choice, watch what shows up because of it, and choose and re-choose until you feel you’re closer to the right place, the center of your being, the core of who you are.

You’ll have to let go of some things, adjust others, and push through perceived barriers in order to achieve new understanding, move in new directions, rise to new heights.

What is your next step?

You embrace the concept of being willing to transform — to be responsible for your choices, to actively take part in deepening your inner life and broadening your reach. Be present. Be aware.

That’s the beginning of self-transformation.

To Sing a Deeper Song Consider:

Where Do YouPlant our Stake
How to Manage Your Subtle Energy
How to Hold the Space for the New Vision to Emerge
The Power of Positive Purpose
The Move From Inner to Outer Work

Our Work in the World

By

heal world

Those of us who are spiritually active have very specific and powerful work to do. We have steadily worked to develop a highly conscious awareness. We look for spiritual guidance in the lessons of nature and embrace the on-going cycles of change. We understand our interconnection will everything. This inclusive consciousness gives us the ability and responsibility to promote and support positive change and we are greatly needed in the world of today.

At first I didn’t understand how I could help. I watched divisiveness and negativity and hatred erupt, even in countries that seemed more tolerant and accepting of individual expression. It shocked and dismayed me and I felt truly helpless.

Join with others to change the group consciousness

As I began to join groups of people from all over the world who came together to vision and meditate for a common cause, to focus their group energy on a higher outcome, I felt useful. I felt needed. And I did more.

I now understand the power we, as conscious, caring individuals, have to change our world. Those of us who work with the express purpose of helping the world to move into a higher consciousness, are expanders of consciousness, changers of the group energy.

This of us who are using our spirituality to heal and whole, are finding each other online and in person. As we combine our collective energy, we bring peace and harmony to others. Since our work is on the inner plane it may not be readily noticeable, but people will feel it and radiate more wholeness in their lives. Their light will ripple out and touch the hearts of others and the world will change and heal.

We energy workers are a small percentage of the population and there’s much work to do. Collectively we are very impactful.

We hold the vision

As spiritually aware and consciously active participants in our world, we are charged with holding a vision — a vision of inclusiveness, empathy, and active caring for the well-being of the whole planet, not just our own personal life experience.

We learn to move beyond ourselves to think bigger, to see the overview, to pull others up so they can see new possibilities. We believe that we can heal and whole our world by changing the group consciousness around what is possible. And that work begins with each of us and our daily, individual, active spiritual practice, whatever that looks like to you.

What is our purpose?

As healers of the planet, our purpose goes beyond our own lives. We have to hold the light for those who are not yet in the place of understanding that we are all one energy, that we are interconnected, that we are the same. Our purpose is to hold high a light of collective consciousness and show others the path to feeling and knowing and immersing themselves in the oneness that we are. We are leaders and explorers. We are way-showers. We are teachers, and guides. We are consciousness changers.

We do our work by actively and consciously focusing positive energy, both in our individual spiritual practice and in like-minded groups. Our personal energy work makes a major difference in the world, but when we gather together and focus on the same positive purpose, we more greatly affect the group consciousness and that leads to major positive change in our world.

Do your consciousness work – daily

Do some form of purposeful energy work every day. Meditation, prayer, affirmations, visioning, hands-on service. Shift your own consciousness to become more inclusive, more empathetic. Broaden your experience of the glorious diversity around you. Look for the gifts others bring. Learn from them Love them. Send your soul out into the world to heal and whole.

Do the work, daily. Focus on the well-being of the whole world or focus on a specific cause. Work with the knowledge that we are all one energy, one web of life. As you work, watch for change and become more aware of the power of your own focused and purposefully intention.

That’s our work in the world. To shine light in the dark corners and show others a higher path.

To Sing a Deeper Song Consider
The New Wave of possibility
The Power of Positive Pursue
How to Hold the Space for the New Vision to Emerge
The Emergence of Collective Individual Spirituality
How to Embrace our Differences
The Core Value of Inclusion
How to Activate a Tree Messenger to Send Your Healing Energy into the Word.