
You Are the Composer of Your Own Song
Living Our Deeper Song
Ashe
(“Ah-Shay”)
The Creative in me honors the Creative in you!
It’s an interesting state of affairs when your belief system says you are the one responsible for everything that happens to you and you’re not exactly excited about what is showing up. Do you feel helpless? Do you feel angry? What do you do when you feel that you are totally responsible for every part of your life and things are not going well? Hmmm.
You get busy. You get creative. You try new things. Self-responsibility is an opportunity. It can be challenging and it can be unnerving. But most of all it is creative.
Here’s the problem I want to solve, the situation I want to change. What am I going to do about it? What resources do I have? What do I need to learn? Self-healing is an interesting opportunity to change your belief system. What are the tools that you are going to use in order to create your wholeness? That’s true of every level – mental, physical, emotional and spiritual. You design your path. You design your journey, you compose your own song.
That doesn’t mean we can’t look around and see what others are doing. Would that work for me? I would do that differently. Let me try that for a while. A great part of self-healing is being aware of what needs shifting or changing or releasing. And then do that. What’s not working in your life? What choices do you have that might change the outcome? Go exploring. Try them out. Observe what happens. See how you feel. If you don’t get the results you want, try something else.
Yes, we are part of a huge all-encompassing high vibration. We have access to that all the time. We don’t always take advantage of that. So expand your expectation of what is possible. Expand your expectation of what you believe you deserves. Those are game changers as far as creating outcome.
Go exploring. I’ve studied Yoga and Tai Chi and I am into Qigong right now. I’m working with tuning forks and native flutes and drums. I’m into shamanism and Reiki and bio fields. All of these are a part of my personal adventure. How diverse is your path of exploration? What new adventures await you? You are the weaver of your own life. You can pull into it any threads that calls to you. Pay attention. Go exploring. And compose your own song.
DEEPER SONG AFFIRMATION
I broaden the range of my exploration as I continue to compose my own song of life.
DEEPER SONG PROCESS
- Try one new self-healing technique and see where it takes you. It can be meditation or toning or tuning forks or Qigong or whatever comes to you. Try something new and notice what happens.
- Continue to explore as your life evolves.
===INNER WORK===
The Gift
My friend Martha Lacy offered to make an altar piece for me out of clay. She is an accomplished potter. I immediately got an image of an infinity shape representing the cycles of life in the past and in the future and how they intertwined. The images I wanted on each side appeared immediately – a butterfly for the organic changes in the waning cycles and a spider weaving her life from within in the waxing cycles.
In the first on Zoom session Martha shaped the altar piece with me making choices and decisions all along the way. The image of what I wanted was very strong. In the second session we began to put the design on. Again my internal images were very strong. I watched as Martha interpreted what I was seeing. The songs I would sing in ceremony with it began to emerge. It was truly a combining of our imaginations and an extraordinary experience. She also made me a rattle she designed and again I had string images for the decoration of that. We put specific intentions into the clay beads that are inside.
They have now been glazed and fired and I have a unique, one-of-a-kind ceremonial piece for my spiritual practice.
I have never entwined my imagination with someone in this manner before. She was interpreting my vision and I saw my vision take shape through her skill. I’m not sure where you get that kind of experience in life. I’m sure there are other places. Do you have a collaborative relationship with someone in which you nurture each other’s purpose and imagination? This was a first for me and it was very, very special.
===SELF-HEALING===
Two Powerful Self-Healing Practices
I have added two powerful self-healing practices to my daily life and they are making a difference. I shared them in this newsletter before but they are turning out to be a remarkably effective combination so I thought I would repeat them in some detail. They come from two separate people and I learned them on that Qigong Healing Summit of the Shift Network.
The first one comes from Teja Bell TejaBell.com Rōshi (老師) Teja Fudo Myoo Bell – 84th Zen Ancestry Heir – Roku Dan Aikido. His talk was Integrating Embodied Mindfulness: Qigong and Meditation With Teja Bell. The movement I found so pwerful was a preparation for meditation.
He said that Qigong practice is an integration of your attention with the underlying principles though mindfulness. We are to cultivate a field of presence, a field of being. In our Qigong practice we move the chi and encourage its uninterrupted flow.
He showed us several movements but the one that resonated with me most dramatically is one I now use many times a day. It feels literally like pumping chi. Begin with your hand in front of your heart to center and balance you. Lower your hands beside your body and with palms facing, gradually bring the qi energy up your body to your head.
At the top, turn your palms to face downward, close your fingers over your thumbs and begin to move your arms down as if bringing that energy back down into your entire body.
It was the fingers over the thumb in the downward movement that energetically caught my attention so dramatically. I was surprised at how powerfully I felt the energy move. So I began doing that on a regular basis to begin my meditation and before I go to sleep.
The other addition I added to my meditation practice came from Master Chunyi Lin, Creator and Founder of Spring Forest Qigong (springforestqigong.com and chunyilin.com)
The movement is to breathe into the lower Tan Tien which is behind the navel and breathe out all the imbalance and negativity and stuff you don’t want as smoke. I often experience a very large and deep yawn when I do this.
The hand movement seems to simulate the breathing and the breath movement clears the chi. They came from two different people. They are very powerful combination.
I use the hand movement as the foundational movement and inevitably as I bring my hands up, I find myself yawning and taking a deep breath to exhale. I make it a point to bring in everything I don’t want into my lower Tan Tien and release it on the exhale which very often becomes a very large yawn. At that point my hands have reached above my head, my fingers close over my thumbs and as I lower my arms it is a very centering and focused motion that makes me feel like I am filling myself with positive Qi.
I am making remarkable progress using a combination of two Qigong moves.
===OUTER WORK===
In my self-healing Qigong class, Master Chunyi Lin springforestqigong.com, chunyilin.com taught us that there are six causes of illness: emotions, diet, injuries, change in weather or seasons, wrong medication, and living environment and that all qi blockages can be removed. Then you clear the space and give energy back.
Those are pretty easy to identify. Whatever’s going on in my body is from an injury in a past life. I don’t have any idea why the dry macular degeneration is showing up and Western medicine cannot cure it. They can only describe what happens. So I’m on my own with that one. I’m going to look for it’s cause and release it.
An easy first look for the cause of illness is your environment. I love my apartment space. But because of my specialized interests I don’t have any friends here. My friends are online. So I’m missing periodic in-person conversations. And I know I fluctuate between boredom and depression. I could work on that. It’s pretty easy to become more aware of the seasons in your response to health as well as the food you eat. After years of not eating dairy, I seem to be drawn to cheese and yogurt. I get to watch that.
What’s going on in your life that is emerging as imbalance and can you identify the cause of the illness as either emotions, diet, injuries, change in weather or seasons, wrong medication, and living environment?
Master Lins deep breathing sequence to empty the Lower Tan Tien is a good place to begin. All qi blockages can be removed. Get to work.
What If You Keep Getting the Wrong Results?
Our thoughts create our reality so what shows up is a result of your thoughts and intentions. How are you doing? Do you expect the best? Don’t settle for second best. Do you expect a situation to change, to heal? It won’t if you don’t. What do you think is possible? What needs to change? How willing are you to change? What are you doing to help the change occur? Monitor your thoughts. Notice what shows up and change your thoughts accordingly.
Test The Market and Your Focus for the Future
Several of my friends are getting ready to retire. That means they have another wonderful 30 years to do nifty stuff in. It’s a good time to test the market. Not only to see what people want from you but what you are excited to give.
One friend is both a healer and an artisan. When you start to build a business, you need to look at time versus income. That needs to be tested. Can you be paid enough to do the work the way you want to in the time you need? Or do you have to modify it and offer it in chunks that are more affordable? You simply go exploring. You try things out and see how you like doing them and you see how people respond to what you offer. You can go exploring long before you retire. Begin to figure out this second career path. This flexible freedom that also inspires and motivates and stimulates your life experience. You can begin exploring any time. What do you want to create next?
Do You Organize for Priority?
I’ve got a pretty good system on creating this newsletter. I have a template. I often write something every day, dictating in what I think just to capture the ideas. I often have so much material that I find I’m working ahead on the following week. So the first step in creating anything is to do something. Take some steps, get some ideas and explore them a bit.
Two days before I want to publish it I begin to read what I wrote and see if it makes sense and see if I like it and edit it for clarity and focus. Sometimes I leave a whole segment out. So the second step is to look what you created and see what you want to work on. The third step is more detailed because it involves things like checking the spelling and the overarching message. And of course, final steps are having it proofed and then putting it in out to the Deeper Song Community and on Facebook and on my website. Those are all separate steps leading to the outcome I want.
Can you bring your attention to one step at a time so you don’t feel overwhelmed? Do you know what steps you need to take in order to get the product or idea completed? Break it down into steps. See where you are and perhaps make new choices before you take another step. One step at a time will get you there.
===DEEPEN YOUR SPIRITUAL PRACTICE===
Past Life Work and Time Lines
I believe in past lives and I also believe in parallel timelines so that everything is happening all at once. I have no proof. It’s just an idea that resonates with me. Particularly since this physical adjustment in my hips seems to be coming from a past life and has manifested through several dimensions. At least I hope that’s what’s happening. So rather than feel hopeless or helpless, I feel expectant.
I don’t know how these parallel timelines work. I’m pretty sure my choice today goes both forward and backward. As it has always done. But that can feel like a big burden if you consider you have many lifetimes. But when I work with it right now, my energy is now, my choice is in the now and my expectations are formed in the now.
I have looked ahead 10 years and there I am doing jumping jacks which I can’t do right now so something good is happening today. I’m also planning a new garden in that future life. It’s still an experimental garden but there are new crops there to explore.
As for past lives, I have gone back beyond this injury on my right leg in a past life to see that I was part of a circle of very strong women friends and the injury was an accident, not a battle. And I had a very strong circle of very strong women around me then as I do today.
So what action do I take today to continue self- healing and to bring harmony among my many lives? I don’t know. I’m making stuff up here. But I keep going back to the core belief that I get what I believe I deserve and what I believe is possible. So it all lies here within me. What do I deserve? What is possible? Do I expect to be able to walk without a walker again? Kind of. Do I expect for my eyes to reverse so I see clearly? I have to work on that. Western medicine seems to have no cure and that’s an interesting blockage for my belief system since I am bringing things forward from a past life. Do you think I could just handle the eyes as part of simply affirming “I see clearly within or without.” I’ll try that. And “I now release anything that no longer serves me from this lifetime and all my past lives.” And maybe I’ll start lobing light balls into the future.
How are you working with your time lines?
===BROADEN YOUR HORIZON – EXPAND YOUR VIEW===
Jupiter/Neptune Conjunction April 12
If I had known about this earlier, I would’ve written you in time to help you celebrate it. This conjunction of Jupiter and Neptune only happens every 154 years! I got some lovely information from Astrology Hub forwarded from a friend about creating a lovely altar as an invitation to your guest. But I kept my ceremony very simple. I focused on two things – self-healing and the next part of my path. I decided to take a dismemberment journey where I put myself back together in the energy of these two powerful planets. It was an interesting journey and I went to the misty circle in the middle of the redwoods and I got help from a whole lot of squirrels. I’m still working on figuring it out. I did not dismember but my team is now bigger!
===OUR EVOLVING FUTURE===
Where Do You Find Your Answers?
There is only one place to look for the answers you seek – deep within you in the silence. Insight comes from your inner voice. It comes from your intuition. It comes from simply knowing. Be aware that it may not be time for you to have an answer. If I go looking for a solution to the world crisis of today, I may not get a whole lot because it’s unfolding, there are many choices that will take it in a different direction, and my role has not been clarified other than I simply send energy for clarity and knowledge when the time is right. Be patient with unfolding. But bepersistent. Be aware. Be flexible. And go exploring.
===REFLECTIONS OF A DEEPER SONG PODCAST===
Expanding Awareness
Stand Steady in Your Own Truth
Listen to my
Reflections of a Deeper Song Podcast on
Apple / Spotify / Googleand the
Deeper Song Website
===CARA’S CORNER===
The Cycles of Life
My friend did the clay work while I watched on Zoom and designed the piece we were making together. It was a powerful experience. The vision of what I wanted was very clear at every stage. We were making an altar bowl and a rattle. The altar bowl concept began with the sign of infinity. The cycles of both past and future that are ongoing and ever connected. So how do I use that concept of connecting cycles in my spiritual practice, my daily life, my expectations?
The first thing is that everything is vibration, the same high vibration so whether I am in a cycle of the past or a cycle of the future or in the moment where cycles begin and end, it’s all the same energy. My choices don’t affect the energy, they affect how I perceive the energy and where I see myself in the energy. Think about that. Where do you see yourself in life? I’m at the end of my physical plane life but I see it as a high point, not a low point. I see that as being at the top of a tall mountain that I’ve climbed with more to go to reach the top. How do you see where you are in your life? Are you going downhill or uphill, racing to higher heights or lower depths? That’s important to know because it’s a viewpoint you can shift and it will make a huge difference.
So here I am building on a lifetime of wonderful adventures with a great deal of wisdom and knowledge and interests and introspection to build upon. And I feel useful as I find ways to share that information. That knowledge. That wisdom. That awareness.
At 89 I’m not exactly planning years in advance but I am holding steady on my path. I’m taking conscious steps to continue to explore and deepen my awareness and my wisdom and my expectation.
You need to be creative as you age. There are always choices to be made and expectations to be changed, not lowered, just changed. It’s part of the cycles of infinity – increasing and decreasing cycles of energy and our place in them.
Be present. Be aware. Explore and experiment. Find what works right now in the here and now of your current life. Be creative. Make changes. Expect positive results.
Different aspects of your life will be in different parts of the cycle. The waxing, the waning. Just notice and be positive and creative and expect the best. Life is a series of interconnected circles of expansion and contraction. Go with the flow.
===SING A DEEPER SONG ===
This Day is Mine.
This day is mine.
This day is mine to spend as I choose.
I will fill it with peace and serenity and love.
I will use it to encourage self-healing.
I will use it to raise my vibration and deepen in my inner wisdom.
This day is mine.
I use it wisely.
Cara Lumen. April 2022
We create our future with every thought we think, every action we take. Move forward mindfully as you sing your Deeper Song.
Namaste,
Cara
Come Sing a Deeper Song
I help adventurers who are ready to explore the new possibilities in the emerging energy of the Divine Feminine to align their dreams and choices with what is emerging as possible today so that they go beyond their own expectations.
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