And They Flew

I was fortunate to stumble upon a pileated woodpecker's nest with three babies. Two males and one female. It was such a treat!

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I read in Animal Speak that according to native American tradition, Woodpecker is a bird connected to the heartbeat of the Earth itself. 

These beauties remind me that we humans are also connected to the heartbeat of the earth. By design.

It has never been any other way. We are connected to Earth and to All. We are never separate. We only have the illusion of separateness and that illusion can leave us feeling alone and bound.

The belief that we are separate has wreaked all kinds of havoc and led to all manner of unnecessary suffering. Leaving us bound needlessly to the nest.

We are not alone. Life is living you and me just as it lives the pileated woodpeckers and their three babies.

These babies won't remain in this tree much longer. Already the parents are urging them to fly. They are born to fly.

I believe they feel the urge but they don't yet trust their wings.

It won't be long now. The desire to fly will overcome their fear. They understand that they are not alone.

Dad calls sounds of encouragement from another branch. It's time, babies. It's time. You can trust your wings.

He brings them more food. They will need their strength for their first flight. He understands. It's time, babies.

COME TO THE EDGE

Come to the edge.

We might fall.

Come to the edge.

It’s too high!

COME TO THE EDGE!

And they came,

And he pushed,

And they flew.

~Christopher Logue~

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Contact Carla to learn more about coaching and how you could benefit. Carla's total commitment is to help her clients wake up and live the life they've been dreaming of. 

Carla is currently running an annual fundraiser to help folks who can't afford coaching. Please take a look at this page to hear from a couple of pro bono clients, see what cool bonuses she is offering, and to learn more.

By the way, I offer Free Well-Being Resources for anyone who subscribes to my weekly newsletter. You will receive inspirational tools to support you in returning to a place of clarity and wellbeing in your day to day life plus framable (high resolution) images and quotes that I have created just for my subscribers to inspire you. It's my way of saying thank you for your time and attention. These tools, quotes, and images are completely free of charge and can be accessed instantly when you sign up for the newsletter.

Relax Your Grip

When we are grasping, clutching, or clinging, whether to an idea, person, situation, political stance, or belief, we may find that our focus becomes very small, limited, and rigid. In this state, we may not be able to see clearly in order to find our way. Instead we may become frustrated and ineffectual.

In college, I spent many days rock climbing and rappelling. I loved it! We were out on the cliffs at least once a week. I remember doing some crazy stunts like hooking into the rope backwards and going down the cliff headfirst. We had no fear most of the time.

I remember the first time I climbed a particularly exposed cliff wall. The cliff looked out over the valley and the Tennessee River. It wasn’t a difficult climb but it felt harder and trickier because it was quite exposed. I felt like I was hanging out there and I was scared. My reaction was to cling to the wall—pressing my body into the rock. The problem was that in grasping and clinging, I could no longer see nor negotiate my next move. I was stuck there.

I was stuck until I relaxed my grip and stopped clinging. I was stuck until I pushed out from the rock a bit so that I could survey my situation more broadly. I was stuck until I realized that the expansiveness was glorious and beautiful, and nothing to be afraid of. At that point, I could see my next handhold. I was able to move beyond the limited perspective of fear and see that there was a way to safely navigate the climb after all.

There was nothing to fear. I was safely tied to the rope. The climb was actually easy. All I had to do was push out enough to see what was before me and make the move that was immediately available to me.

Life is no different. When we stop clinging to stressful thoughts, beliefs, or perspectives, our mind returns to its natural state of clarity. We remember that we are tied safely to the rope of life and we are able to find our next handhold. 

I welcome your questions or comments below.

I'm currently running my annual fundraiser to help folks who can't afford coaching. Please take a look at this page to hear from a couple of pro bono clients, see what cool bonuses I'm offering, and to learn more.

By the way, I offer Free Well-Being Resources for anyone who subscribes to my weekly newsletter. You will receive inspirational tools to support you in returning to a place of clarity and wellbeing in your day to day life plus framable (high resolution) images and quotes that I have created just for my subscribers to inspire you. It's my way of saying thank you for your time and attention. These tools, quotes, and images are completely free of charge and can be accessed instantly when you sign up for the newsletter.

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Contact Carla to learn more about coaching and how you could benefit. Carla's total commitment is to help her clients wake up and live the life they've been dreaming of. 

The Dark Seasons of Life

Darkness and decay get a bad rap. I think of all that grows from dark decay, the necessity of it. Whole ecosystems spring from decay. There can be no life without death.

I think of all the times I resisted the dark seasons of my life and how often I struggled against death; death of a person, a dream, a relationship, a belief, an identity. 

I look back over the years and see that something was taking root in that darkness and decay.  Something rich and beautiful. I couldn’t see it at the time. I didn’t know that life was living me. I didn't understand that I had innate wellbeing despite the difficult, dark times.

Because I couldn’t feel it, I thought it didn’t exist. Could it be more accurate to say that I didn’t believe it so I couldn’t feel it? I think so.

Now I know whether or not I feel my innate wellbeing, it is always there. This understanding alone helps during times of difficulty. I can trust the darkness and decay to support life.  I know now that I don’t have to resist it. I don’t have to struggle against it. Life always springs forth again.  Always.

If you going through a difficult and dark time, go ahead and cry. Grieve. It will do a cleansing work in you. You can be assured that the storm clouds will pass. You can be certain that the light will return. Life supports you. Always.

 “All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.”  Julian of Norwich

I welcome your questions or comments.

By the way, I offer Free Well-Being Resources for anyone who subscribes to my weekly newsletter. You will receive inspirational tools to support you in returning to a place of clarity and wellbeing in your day to day life plus framable (high resolution) images and quotes that I have created just for my subscribers to inspire you. It's my way of saying thank you for your time and attention. These tools, quotes, and images are completely free of charge and can be accessed instantly when you sign up for the newsletter.

Contact Carla to learn more about coaching and how you could benefit. Carla's total commitment is to help her clients wake up and live the life they've been dreaming of. 

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Relax, Love

I have a chalkboard in my office upon which I write inspirational quotes. For a few weeks now, I’ve had this wonderful quote by Nayyirah Waheed: “You will be lost and unlost over and over again. Relax, Love. You were meant to be this glorious. Epic. Story.”

Relax, Love. Those were the words I needed to hear during my breakdown breakthrough. Relax. This too shall pass. No need to take it too seriously or too personally. This angst (depression, grief, anxiety, shame, anguish) is not who you are. The storm clouds will pass.

But I did take it seriously, very seriously. I created a tragic and melancholic saga from the stressful thoughts and emotions that were trying to pass through me. I did this innocently because I didn’t understand the inside out nature of life. I kept the stressful thinking alive and I seriously suffered as a result. For years. I didn’t know at the time that I had the capacity to handle what I was going through. That it didn’t define me. I didn’t know that it wouldn’t harm me at my core. I didn’t know that it would pass if I left it alone. I didn’t know that resilience and well-being were innate in me.

No. I analyzed it. Judged it. Diagnosed it. Medicated it. Ran from it. Barreled toward it. Escalated it. Tried to pray it away. Tried to drink it away. I misunderstood it. I became mired in shame and despair. I couldn’t find a way out. All I wanted was for it to end and I thought I had to end it. One way or another. I didn’t know that all those feelings of angst would end themselves by simply moving though me. In their own time. There was nothing to be afraid of all along. Relax, Love.

Sydney Banks, a philosopher and author, said, “If the only thing people learned was not to be afraid of their experience, that alone would change the world.” I’ve found this to be true. As I take my moods and emotions less seriously, I find that they have minimal influence over me. As I stop adding my personal thoughts on top of the impersonal thought that is naturally passing through, I’m not as affected by them. As I become aware that I am spinning stories when I reach into the past or project into the future, I relax a bit and the fog begins to clear so that I am able to see my way forward again. Relax, Love.

You see, thoughts are impersonal. They constantly arise. That’s what thought does. As we attach to them, making them personal, we feel them. That’s how we are able to have this epic human experience.

You could think of thoughts like the painter’s palette. The painter has an array of colors available to her. She chooses which she wants to create with and she leaves the others on the palette. She creates with the colors she chooses, creating form from formlessness. Thoughts are similar. They are energy moving through us but once we start painting with them, we create our unique experiences, we create our lives. That’s why you and I and every other person can react or respond to the same situation completely differently. We are painting with different colors.

When we notice ourselves caught up in complicated thinking, analyzing, judging, reaching into the past, or projecting into the future, no problem. That’s our cue to slow down and allow our thinking to settle. We don’t get to choose which thoughts arise but we do get to choose which thoughts we paint with. If we have a stressful thought arise, we could leave it on the palette.

Relax, Love. You are resilient. That is your nature. You have all you need to move through this life with its ups and down. 

I welcome your questions or comments below.

By the way, I offer Free Well-Being Resources for anyone who subscribes to my weekly newsletter. You will receive inspirational tools to support you in returning to a place of clarity and wellbeing in your day to day life plus framable (high resolution) images and quotes that I have created just for my subscribers to inspire you. It's my way of saying thank you for your time and attention. These tools, quotes, and images are completely free of charge and can be accessed instantly when you sign up for the newsletter.

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Contact Carla to learn more about coaching and how you could benefit. Carla's total commitment is to help her clients wake up and live the life they've been dreaming of. 

Imaginal Cells

Almost 20 years ago, I had what I call my breakdown breakthrough. It was the culmination of 5 years of desperate struggle (all in all, more like 10 years). I lost my mother, my marriage, my life-long dream of having children, my home, my credit, my faith, and I almost lost my life. Literally. It was the messiest and darkest period of my life. It was also the most transformative. Beautifully transformative.

Looking back, I see that I entered a chrysalis of sorts. When a caterpillar enters the chrysalis, it digests itself. Certain imaginal cells survive the digestion and those cells transform into something radically new.

Listen, when a person is digesting herself, it can be hard on those around her. They can’t see the metamorphosis as anything other than destruction and it scares them. Understandably. So, people try to intervene. They try to solve, fix, treat, medicate, preach, protect, or get her to snap the hell out of it. They do this because they are scared and because they love her. What else are they to do when they don’t understand metamorphosis for what it is?

It’s scary for the person going through it, too, but she hears those imaginal cells whispering words of new life to her. So, she’s flying in the dark. She’s confused and frightened. She may even believe she’s dying and, in a way, she is. She can’t see what is beyond the chrysalis.

Too often, we are afraid of our experience and emotions. We avoid them or indulge them because we take them very personally and seriously. We do this innocently because we don’t understand the inside-out nature of experience. I believe this is why my breakdown breakthrough chrysalis lasted as long as it did. I was confused. I didn’t understand that the dark transformative place would do its work and pass. I didn’t understand that I wasn’t broken. I couldn’t see my innate resilience. Yet, every now and again, I felt the pull of those imaginal cells. Had I understood that I wasn’t broken, I believe I would have moved through the metamorphosis more easily and quickly, though I still had to dissolve in order to transform. No way around that, I suppose.

I’m telling you all this because I want to invite you to be a little more hopeful and gentle when you, or someone you love, are going through a difficult time. Even if it lasts a decade or more. Neither you nor they are broken. You don’t need fixing. There is nothing wrong with you. You are whole and resilient. You have innate well-being. Always. And so do they.

You have the wisdom to navigate the darkness. I invite you to take your experience and emotions less personally, less seriously. They will pass. I promise.  I want to assure you that you are OK, even if everyone around you, including the experts, have told you otherwise. Take a deep breath and allow your revved up thinking to quiet down a bit. Feel your own imaginal cells. They may be calling to you.

As you wake up to who you truly are, you will find your way. Get support if you need or want to but seek out someone who knows you have innate well-being and who will point you back to your essence, to your own light. That's where you will find your resilience, clarity, and peace. 

I would be delighted for you to comment below.

By the way, I offer Free Well-Being Resources for anyone who subscribes to my weekly inspirational newsletter. You will receive inspirational tools to support you in returning to a place of clarity and wellbeing in your day to day life plus framable (high resolution) images and quotes that I have created just for my subscribers to inspire you. It's my way of saying thank you for your time and attention. These tools, quotes, and images are completely free of charge and can be accessed instantly when you sign up for the newsletter.

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Contact Carla to learn more about coaching and how you could benefit. Carla's total commitment is to help her clients wake up and live the life they've been dreaming of. 

Outside In or Inside Out? It Matters.

Click on images to enlarge

 Pistol

Last night, I dreamed about Oprah. She was doing some kind of performance with gorgeous white horses who had long flowing manes. It was a beautiful and perfect performance.

Sweet Sandy Sue

When she came in, she walked over to a vending machine where I was standing. I told her what a wonderful performance it was! She said, really? Are you sure? She was doubtful, insecure, tentative. I said, yes, of course! It was superb!

Tobe. My sister's horse!

You see, even Oprah has doubts about herself. Welcome to the human experience. The problem is not that we have those thoughts but that we take them so very seriously and personally. We buy into them and, by doing so, we keep them alive. You could call this contaminated thinking.

Maggie

Thinking, coupled with consciousness, creates our life experience. We are only ever dealing with our state of mind in the moment. That's how the system works. How it's meant to work.

Diana

It's what gives us our rich experience of life. It's a beautiful, creative system but most of us have a misunderstanding about how it works. This misunderstanding can cause all manner of discomfort and even suffering.

Sweet Caroline

We've grown up in a culture that has taught us to view life from the outside-in. That's the misunderstanding. We believe that what happens to us out there is what causes us to feel and experience. So, we read the books, attend the seminars, and visit our therapist, minister, or expert in order to learn the techniques and gather the tools to manage and combat our circumstances, deal with the people in our lives, and minimize our stressful feelings because what else can we do?

Rush, Sandy Sue, Shine

It's a constant game of managing all that is happening to us. No wonder we are tired! The techniques and tools can be helpful and sitting across from someone who really sees us and stays with us in a place of love can be wonderfully helpful, but somehow, we find that nice feeling and those techniques difficult to sustain and, before you know it, we're barely able to keep our heads above water again.

 Hawkeye

Once we understand that we experience life from the inside-out, we are able to find our clarity and well-being again. We are no longer at the mercy of what happens out there. We understand that our thinking about what's going on out there is the source of our feelings and experience. This understanding can be confronting in a way because it goes against everything we've ever believed, but when we take a moment to really examine it, we see how much more freedom and choice could be available to us if it were true.

 Meeko

Contaminated thinking, that is, stressful thinking that we buy into and feed, like Oprah did in the dream, is what causes our discomfort. When we turn our attention away from the contaminated thinking, we make space for new thought and clarity to arise. Thought is always arising. That's what thought does. We don't get to choose which thoughts we have but we do get to choose which thoughts we feed.

 Thunder!

This is good news because we don't have to fight our thoughts, or change our thoughts. We don't have to take our thoughts so seriously and personally. Boy, has that been a game changer for me. We can choose which to let move through and which to create our lives with. If we feed them, they will grow and we will feel and experience them. That’s the way of it.

Maggie

Practical example: Last week, I had a Facebook exchange with someone whom I love. We walk in very different worlds now and we disagree with one another on many issues. Hot bed issues, like politics and religion. I try very hard not to engage in Facebook exchanges like that because I know they are useless. On this day, and it’s not the only time, I got caught up in a thought that was passing through. How can these people think like this? I’ve got to convince them otherwise! Really, the thought was just passing through, but I brought it to a full stop and I fed it. Man, did I feed it. Let me tell you, it didn’t feel good. Not for a moment did it feel good. And taking action on that contaminated thought did absolutely no one any good. It did not deepen our love. It did not deepen our connection or understanding. It probably did deepen the divide. And I felt awful (and self-righteous, superior, and justified, dammit!, but not good).

Peyton & Meeko

Here’s the thing, once I fed the thought, it grew exponentially and seemed to take on a life of its own. That’s how powerful thought is! My friend’s beliefs, ideas, and comments did not cause my feelings but what I thought about what she believes had everything to do with how I felt. How can I be certain? Because there are many times that the same situation is at hand and I feel neutral or maybe even love. It can’t be her. It can’t be the situation or I would react the same way every time. It has to be my thoughts about the situation. Once I understand this, I am free to allow the stressful thought to pass without having to act on it. I’m free to wait for a new thought to arise, a new insight to occur, that will allow me to respond from a place of love if a response is needed at all.

Meeko and Ashley

This is how thought works. This is how our experiences are created. No two people experience the same situation, circumstance, or person the same way because we are living from the inside-out. We are only ever living in the feeling of thought in the moment.

Tobe

Don't believe me, really examine it. See if it’s true in your life. Notice when someone cuts you off in traffic one day and you rage and when it happens another day and you are perfectly calm. There are a million examples like this. Just notice. Notice the stories you tell yourself about the circumstance on this particular day. Notice how these stories themselves are the source of your feelings, not what’s happening out there. Just notice. Once you see, once you understand, it will be like understanding and aligning yourself with gravity and not falling down as much anymore. You will flow with life a little more easily as you understand how this human system works. Life is experienced unfailingly from the inside-out and a fresh thought is always on the horizon.

I would be delighted to hear what you think in a comment below.

By the way, I offer Free Well-Being Resources for anyone who subscribes to my weekly inspirational newsletter. You will receive inspirational tools to support you in returning to a place of clarity and wellbeing in your day to day life plus framable (high resolution) images and quotes that I have created just for my subscribers to inspire you. It's my way of saying thank you for your time and attention. These tools, quotes, and images are completely free of charge and can be accessed instantly when you sign up for the newsletter.

Consider the Way of Nature

                                                Swallow Tailed Kite. My backyard. Dunedin, FL

Have you ever considered the ways of the birds or other creatures of this world?

                            Swallow Tailed Kite. My backyard. Dunedin, FL

Have you ever wondered how they know to migrate? Did you know that even birds who have been born in captivity know to migrate and in which direction to fly?

                              Bald Eagle. My backyard. Dunedin, FL

Have you ever considered how the acorn naturally, organically grows into an oak tree and how the birds innately know to nest there?

                                               Pileated Woodpecker. My backyard. Dunedin, FL

Have you ever thought about the natural and symbiotic relationship between the earth and her critters? How life naturally unfolds?

                                                                     Clearwater, FL

Have you always known that the setting sun would rise again?

                                                                      Clearwater, FL

And that the darkening skies would once again be clear and bright?

                                                             My backyard. Dunedin, FL

You've probably never questioned the moon's existence when it isn't visible.

                                                                      Clearwater, FL

Then, why, my friend, do you forget that the same life force that permeates and supports all of nature supports you, too? I understand. I forget at times, also. The truth is, we are not separate from all of nature. Life supports us. Life lives us. Like the birds, we know innately how to move through life, how to live.

                                                                        Dunedin, FL

Listen, we were born in well-being. We were born knowing how to be human. Yes, we get caught up in the clouds of our personal thinking and forget. But when our thinking settles, when we get quiet within, we find clarity, peace, and well-being again. This is our default setting. You don't have to take my word for it, you can experiment with it for yourself. 

I remember practically crawling out of my skin when I first tried to quiet myself. I didn't believe innate well-being, wisdom, and peace existed within me and, man, did I suffer.

                                                      Lotus. Atlanta Botanical Gardens.

It took many long walks in the woods for me to begin to quiet my mind. It was there that I discovered the long covered-over place in myself, my essence, that is just fine. That discovery has changed everything for me. And now I know that I'm only ever just a thought away from my true essence and well-being. So are you. So are you.

If you want to learn more about how thought works, read last week's post here. 

I would be delighted to hear your from you!

By the way, I offer Free Well-Being Resources for anyone who subscribes to my weekly inspirational newsletter. You will receive inspirational tools to support you in returning to a place of clarity and wellbeing in your day to day life plus framable (high resolution) images and quotes that I have created just for my subscribers to inspire you. It's my way of saying thank you for your time and attention. These tools, quotes, and images are completely free of charge and can be accessed instantly when you sign up for the newsletter.

Snakes! and the Power of Thought

spoonbill-4.jpg

I walk the Hammock almost every day. The Hammock is a 100-acre forest in the heart of Dunedin, FL. I feel perfectly at home there. I see roseate spoonbills, owls, hawks, egrets, herons, turtles, lizards, and the occasional snake, among other critters. I absolutely love walking the trails.

owl.jpg

Today, Pedro and I wandered into the Hammock and something fast and small bit my leg scaring the bejeezus out of me! Snake! I looked down only to find that I had stepped on a small stick. I shook my head and then my whole body, releasing the surge of adrenaline and cortisol that filled me. Fifteen minutes later, it happened again! Snake! Of course, it, too, was nothing more than a stick. I shook my head once again and laughed at how ridiculous I was being.

snake.jpg

I walk these trails every day, never afraid, even if sticks do pop up and hit me from time to time. What was different today? I had snakes on the mind because Pam and I had been talking about them the day before. I thought the stick was a snake. Even though it barely felt like much of anything, I almost jumped out of my skin! That, my friend, is the power of thought. I was experiencing my thinking in the moment, nothing more.

Additionally, I had a business meeting with a colleague today. The conversation didn't go as I had imagined. I hung up and began to feel a tad sorry for myself. That's when I got up and went into the woods, only to be bitten by two snakes! Of course, I've already established that there were no snakes. No snake bites and no snakes in the conversation. I realized that I thought the conversation was a snake, just as I thought the stick was a snake. I started to make up what was going to happen in the future as a result of the conversation. I decided it wasn't going to go well after all. I decided the call was bad news, yet, there was no bad news. Just different news than I had expected.

Once I realized that I was buying into these thoughts that were welling up in my mind, I began to relax, allowing them to move through me. I reminded myself that the future is an incomplete equation. I can't possibly know how the situation will unfold. When I started to believe that I did know and then the conversation didn't go as I imagined, I freaked out a bit, fearful that things wouldn't turn out well. Truth is, I have no idea how it will turn out and I had no idea before the conversation either. All of it was made up! I believed the thoughts to be real and that's why I felt I had been bitten by a snake. There was no snake. Only thought in the moment.

snake-2.jpg

Can you relate? How many times have you seen a snake, whether in the woods or in a person or situation only to find that it was a stick? How many times have you made up an imagined future only to find that the future turns out completely differently? Probably more than you can count. And how much stress have you experienced as a result?

When we get caught up in an imagined future and in our exponential thinking, insight eludes us and we can become stressed, angry, disappointed, or fearful. When we recognize thought for what it is, we relax a bit and can begin to bring ourselves back to the present moment, allowing the thoughts to move through and opening to the insights we need to handle right now. We have all we need to deal with this moment. Even if it is a real snake.

night heron.jpg

I would be delighted to hear your thoughts.

By the way, I offer Free Well-Being Resources for anyone who subscribes to my weekly inspirational newsletter. You will receive inspirational tools to support you in returning to a place of clarity and wellbeing in your day to day life plus framable (high resolution) images and quotes that I have created just for my subscribers to inspire you. It's my way of saying thank you for your time and attention. These tools, quotes, and images are completely free of charge and can be accessed instantly when you sign up for the newsletter.