A HUGE SPIDER! or is it?

To See BIG BUGS click here

On our (working) mini-vacation a couple of weekends ago we also encountered some amazing and huge bugs!!!  I grew up believing a Daddy Long Legs was a spider.  Well, guess what?  It is not....apparently it is not a spider or an insect...don't ask me what it is.  I just know it is a Daddy Long Legs!

If you would like to see these amazing bug art sculptures, click on the above link to find out where and how.  AND, you will get to see more pictures.  They are gorgeous.  There is even a 20-foot tall praying mantis!

Again, we can see the sacredness as we consider the love the sculptor put into his work. This offered us an opportunity to consider the world a bit differently as we weren't giants - instead the bugs were :-)



Something that really touched me was our youngest son posing for a photo...for no apparent reason he chose to put his palms together and bow his head.  Perhaps, he was honoring this magical place as it was most certainly magical to him. 

The Money Blues

At some point in your life you’ve felt down. Probably more than once. Somebody you cared about may have had a misfortune, your heart was broken, a health issue stopped you cold in your tracks or you had a financial disaster. Nobody is immune to feeling blue.

But the problem is when you get stuck there for longer than necessary. I once had the money blues for over a year and it wreaked havoc on my overall quality of life. I was there for waaaay too long. I’d become a victim to the circumstance and it stole my confidence. For the first time in my eighteen years as an entrepreneur, I didn’t know if I would recover.

Of course, I did recover and I came back better than ever. If I had to do it again, would I? HELL, NO! However, if I had to it again, I would’ve approached it very differently. I would’ve fest up to myself, and others, how I really felt.

I didn’t start out feeling blue or depressed. I began with a feeling of being out of control and a little nervous. I had been so focused on a personal issue at the time, that I was paying little attention to my business. By the time I noticed, I was going broke fast.

I’d always been able to quickly recover from a financially slow month or two, but this had gone out of control. I was charging my groceries and everyday needs on a credit card and it was at its limit. My emotions quickly went into panic mode and of course, that’s no good for attracting new money. The more I focused on my urgent need for money, the more helpless I felt. I let my emotions consume me, therefore I was stuck in a holding pattern.

What I highly recommend if you have the money blues (or any other type of blues) is to take a step back and see what is happening from a meta-view. When I stepped outside of my emotions, what I saw was a previously successful business owner who was beating herself up, I put the whip down.

Next, I created a spreadsheet of all my debt, monthly expenses and began tracking my income. I knew it wasn’t going to be pretty, but I needed to face the situation rather than running from it. When I got a grasp on the severity of my financial snapshot, I surrendered to it. I was broke, had no creativity or inspiration in sight and no idea how to make a comeback.

I created a couple of new daily habits to support my finances and business. The most important thing I did was to commit to myself that I was going to pay off the debt and get back into making a profit. My plan was minimal, because I really didn’t know what actions I could take to create financial peace at that time, with my current perspective.

I can say now that having that financial crisis was a blessing because I now know the power of making a solid decision. My decision to move forward served me well. In less than a year, the debt was at zero and I was back into six-figures.

My advice to anybody with the blues is…

Allow yourself to feel the pain but not for so long that it swallows you whole and spits you back out

Look at the reality of the moment head on. Tell the truth.

Drop any judgment. You’re human so “stuff happens”. Even if you’ve had the blues longer than I did, so what?! It is what it is. You’re still a rockstar under the blue costume.

Make the decision to move toward an outcome. Something that will empower you and that’d you’d feel thrilled about arriving.

Create a few new habits or structures that you will practice to support the journey to somewhere fresh and alive (cuz blue feels dead).

Give it time. You may see or feel relief in days. Or it may be weeks. But it will come. I felt better in less than a month and soon thereafter I literally began finding and attracting large sums of money…where there was none before. If I didn’t know about Law of Attraction, it might’ve freaked me out!

Feeling down on your luck for any length of time truly does suck. It can impact your self-worth, health and relationships. Do yourself a favor and take back the reigns of your life. Your power is not far if you’ll just reach for it.

© 2011 Master Peace Coaching

Jeanna Gabellini, is a Master Business Coach who assists high achieving entrepreneurs, corporate leaders & their teams to leverage fun, systems and intentionality for high-octane results. An entrepreneur for 20 years she has a treasure trove of kick-butt tools to give you peace & profits. A Gift For You! Get your complimentary Business Building Audio CD “Transforming from Chaotic Entrepreneur to Conscious Leader” for the entrepreneur who wants to be a SUPERpreneur: http://www.MasterPeaceCoaching.com/freecd.

Photo by lixai from photoxpress

A Castle in Ohio?

YES!  A Castle in Ohio, USA - Chateau Laroche in Loveland, OH!  The man, Harry Andrews, who built it had a heavy interest in knights and castles.  He served in World War I as a nurse and didn't agree with modern warfare. 

He regularly had friends coming to his little neck of the words to fish on the little river, which the castle overlooks, and just hang out.  The called themselves the Knights of the Golden Trail.  Their only vows were the ten commandments, which just so happen to be inlaid into one of the walls inside the castle. 

Also, in the castle walls are a large number of rocks and stones from all over the world.  We were unsure if these were all places that Mr. Andrews had personally visited, but no matter, it was really neat to see them throught the castle randomly placed in the block. 

The winding steps up to the second and third floors as well as to the dungeon were quite treacherous (stone steps with alternating heights).  But, my understanding is that they were built that way on purpose to slow the process of intruders.  Didn't make it easy to navigate in flip-flops and with a nervous pre-schooler, but it was well worth it.

This is a very interesting place to visit.  When we first found it we didn't consider how sacred it was, but upon visiting and learning about the story we came to realize it was a very sacred place to him, and his "knights" were a very sacred group.  Mr. Andrews also taught Sunday School at the castle for a number of years. 

Perhaps the old guy was eccentric, but the place was certainly deeply important to him and his fellow "knights".  When he died in 1981 he left the property to be taken care by the KOGT (Knights of the Golden Trail).   

Keep your eyes, your hearts, and your minds open.  You just might come to find out how spiritual and sacred things that may seem odd or eccentric to you are to other people. 

Sacred Site - Serpent Mound

This past weekend we took a short little trip with our boys to visit a couple of sacred sites that are within a few hours of our home.  Our plans included some places along the Ancient Ohio Trail.  Amazingly not only did we visit some of those, but we found a couple of hidden treasures along the way – a castle and an art display of giant bugs (which I will share with you tomorrow)!  Our trip certainly connected us to the sacred.

Serpent Mound is considered the most famous effigy in the world.  Found in the rural southern corner of Ohio, USA it was built by a people oddly named “Fort Ancient”.  Native American Indians built mounds and geometric earthworks throughout this area in Ohio as well as other areas.  The Serpent Mound was not a burial mound.  Instead it was designed so that the head of the Serpent faced the summer solstice sunset and other various points of the body “pointed” to other times such as maximum southern moonset.  It is believed that this mound was used for ceremonial purposes. 

It was quite amazing to experience something that was built by a people from many hundreds of years ago.  There is most certainly a “feeling” at Serpent Mound. The exact purpose of Serpent Mound is not known - there is only speculation.  Some have suggested it is evil, that does not seem to be the strongest consensus.  We did not sense a negative feeling, but we felt something.  There is no way to describe it.  

 

We also visited an area simply called Fort Ancient.  The mounds and earthen walls were built by the Hopewell Indians, but it is not believed that it was ever a “fort” or used for defense.  They built walls, ramps, mounds, and monumental gateways.  As you can see in the photo above many of their mounds were covered with rock slabs.  We were unable to see some of Fort Ancient because it requires strenuous hiking and we had our four-year-old with us.  Yet, we had an amazing adventure. 

The Native Americans lived such a different life and we are thankful that their history is being preserved for future generations.  So much of their life revolved around ceremony and spirit.  Perhaps because they were so close to the Earth and so connected with nature they understood how to build earthworks that were like a calendar (Serpent Mound). 

Ancient cultures seemed to be so much more “connected” than we are today.  Have you ever wondered why that is?  They trusted in their spiritual beliefs for one thing.  I tend to think they trusted in what they knew from their inner guidance as well – something that far too many people today ignore.

So, today maybe you should listen to your inner Self...an take a good look around you...see what you can see. 

Photos by Rob Alex

Just What Does God Want?

Neale Donald Walsch recently posted this on TheGlobalConversation.com. 

I am now going to answer, in this blog, the most important question in human history.

What does God want?

For many people that answer will be startling.

Even for those who aren’t completely surprised, the answer will be dramatically different. It will not even come close to the ideas that people usually hear about God.

Humanity’s ideas about God produce humanity’s ideas about life and about people. Dramatically different ideas about God will produce dramatically different ideas about life and about people. If the world could use anything right now, that’s it.

We stand today on the brink of a global cultural war. The opening volleys have already been exchanged. The really major clashes, the unthinkable FutureWorld battles, may be yet to come.

Given the direction in which humanity appears to be moving, it may seem as though this larger conflict is inevitable. It isn’t. There’s something very powerful that can stop it: dramatically different ideas about God and dramatically different ideas about life and about people.

Such ideas, if accepted and adopted, will produce dramatically different ways of living and being. Values will change. Priorities will change. Power structures and power-holders will change.

When all is said and done what will change…or, at least, what could change…is humanity’s Cultural Story. And that is what we are “up to” here at The Global Conversation. We are “up to” changing our Cultural Story; proposing and co-writing, with you, a new one.

Are you up to this with us? If so, stick around here now….visit this blogsite often…because I am going to be offering you here a new idea — actually, many new ideas — surrounding what our New Cultural Story could look like.

Chief among these are our ideas about What God Wants.

I think that we desperately need to change our thoughts about that. Now for people who really want things to stay the way they are, this could be a dangerous idea. Because the new idea that is going to be proposed here could change everything. And change can be a dangerous thing to suggest, not only around people of power (to whom change is the ultimate threat), but also around ordinary people (for whom change is threatening simply because it leads to the unknown).

Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore had it exactly right in a September, 2004 interview in The New Yorker: “In a world of disconcertig change, when large and complex forces threaten familiar and comfortable guideposts, the natural impulse is to grab hold of the tree trunk that seems to have the deepest roots and hold on for dear life and never question the possibility that it’s not going to be the source of your salvation.”

The final part of that sentence (italics mine) tells the tale of humanity’s belief about God and life in 15 words. Mr. Gore confirms this with his next statement. “And the deepest roots,” he says, “are in philosophical and religious traditions that go way back.”

Al Gore’s insight leaves us all facing a thunderous question: Is the way forward to be found by going way back?

The answer is, no.

And while, as the former Vice President notes, we never question the possibility that our philosophical and religious traditions are not going to be the source of our salvation—presumably because we feel threatened by such questioning—could there be times when not to question those traditions presents an even larger threat?

The answer is, yes. And this is one of those times.

So stick around. Come back here every other day at least. We’re going on a roller coaster ride — and you’re in the front car!

(FROM THE NDW RESOURCES & INFORMATION TEAM: The commentaries here are being excerpted from the book What God Wants, by Neale Donald Walsch. To discuss, in person with Neale, the ideas presented here, you may wish to join The Messengers’ Circle, a subscription service at http://www.nealedonaldwalsch.com/. In the Reader’s Forum at that location Neale is able to respond to postings individually, as there are generally far fewer of them. The Messengers’ Circle is a fee-for-service offering for those who choose to commit time and resources to become serious students of the CWG material.)

Read original post here.

How to Deal with Bad News?

The Energies of June

Hasn't it been an interesting year so far? And it has gone by quickly, as we are now entering the sixth month of 2011 and are only six months away from the beginning of 2012. So far this year we've seen unprecedented demands for social and political reform, unusual weather that includes some of the most devastating storms in a century, and the revelation of financial and political misdeeds that will continue for the rest of this year. And that's just what is happening in the world, much more is happening with in our own lives. What's going to happen next?

June is going to be an exciting month with three eclipses, starting June 1 and the Solstice June 21. Whenever a month begins with an eclipse we can expect powerful transformation. The June 1 eclipse is in Gemini, a sign that rules communication-expect some revelations about the media industry and demands for change. The eclipse of June 17 conjuncts the Galactic Center, the powerful midpoint of our galaxy, the unfolding center of our galaxy. The July 1 eclipse aspects Pluto, which is creating the kind of social and political disruption last seen in the 1770s, its previous transit through Capricorn, inspired by our new energies, self awareness and desire for connection. And we have the Solstice on June 21, bringing in powerful, extreme emotional energies. There is no more middle of the road, we must choose our path.

We are being pushed to being in integrity with ourselves and each other, recognizing our connection as the family of humanity. We may feel challenged on every level as we strive to assert our truth but that is because we feel we have to create, move and carry the energy and light of transformation. What if we assert our truth without the fear that challenges will be present at every turn? What if we just assume that we already are what we wish to become and powerfully assert our desires within the context of that knowing? Can we remember that we work with the Universe as co-creators? Are we going to live our lives in fear or in our truth? We can always find something to be afraid of but if we refuse to be in fear, then fear has nothing to connect to and it simply goes away.

That is a big choice for all of us as we enter this powerful month. We can be our pain or our power, our truth or in denial. We can try to fight the darkness or remember that it also has a place in the grand scheme of ascension. The beautiful stars we see in the night sky still shine in the daytime, we just can't see them because of the light of the sun. What beauty lies within our darkness that the light can reveal? We are spiritual warriors but our weapon is not the sword, it is our truth, our faith, our knowing and our commitment to the light. What can you transform in your life to be more powerful? What can you transform within yourself to release your fears? June will bring opportunities to express your truth and when you take them, you allow the light to be your sword that will reveal your path through the darkness and into a higher and greater truth

Copyright ©2011 by Jennifer Hoffman and Enlightening Life OmniMedia, Inc. This material is protected by US and international copyright now and may be distributed freely in its entirety as long as the author’s name and website, www.urielheals.com are included.

Photo by Xavier Marchant