Power Masks for Power Manifestors

So after letting ourselves die at the New Moon in December, we were born anew.  We came out with a blank slate capable of creating anything we wanted.  We unveiled that blank slow and were given the opportunity to create the mask to model our true selves.

Here is the first to do so, perhaps this will encourage and inspire you to do your own.  I'll be updating this file as people share their masks (if they so choose to do so).  Yes this is one person.  She made a first attempt and decided it did not reflect what she wanted.  So remember don't be attached to the outcome, it's only true for the moment.  I did ask her to name her mask or the process it's called Awakening

AWAKENING

Courage

Mirror of Truth

Face of Self

Olea in the RAMA Garden

Yes Santa Exists and He Plays The Sax....

So you may want to know how I know this.  Well, I witnessed him myself at the Union Square Subway Station.  I was actually having one of those days yesterday.  When I got to the subway, I realized I left my cell phone home and had to start over.  I had even put my dress on inside out but didn't realize it until my niece pointed it out while we were at my office Christmas party.    I may have started out oblivious but that shifted once I was in the presence of Santa.

I had just gotten off the L train and then climbed the stairs to the uptown side for the N/R/W/Q line.  I walked to the spot I go to because it will drop me off where I want and sitting there was Santa.  Well it took me a bit to make the connection that this was Santa right away, at first he was a sweet man playing the sax.  Then I put the pieces together.   He wasn't in one of those cheesy velvet costumes like the ones for salvation army.  He was wearing a RED hoody and look at that beard.  

So you tell me...is this Santa or what.  I was so excited and he was playing Silent Night on his sax.  Which was ironic because it was far from silent in the subway and it wasn't night either.  And people kept walking unconsciously as if they didn't notice him.  I would have that it was a dream or some shamanic vision; however, my trusty blackberry gave me proof.

It only makes sense that  Santa would need to chill before the big night.  After all he's about to go on a 24 hour bender with the reindeer.  And giving out all those gifts across the world in 24 hours can be pretty stressful, Santa needs his downtime too.  For me this is proof that you can't force the magic; however, if you open your eyes it's right in front of our faces.

5 Days into Solstice

In the New Moon, New Life playback,  email you should have received the update from the Wed. evening ceremonial and a link to the earlier blog with pictures immediately following...and the process continued.  

On Friday, after I sent off the ceremonial gifts to the dreamworkers.  I was called to put the remaining red carnations into a basket to create a cushy bed of hampi (good medicine) for your prayers.  I already had the compost from what was surrendered and I then added your dreams which I used the fire of tranformation as well.  All ashes were mixed together...as it is all energy.  I then placed the ashes onto some papers that had all of your names.  I used that paper as a blanket that was then wrapped around the ashes, blessed with some Young Essentials Joy and then adorned with some buds from the carnations and sweetness.

Look at How Precious that Center Bud of New Life Is?

I was then called to put a small symbolic piece of the veil to cover it as we were going into the solstice ceremony and would unveil it at that point.

Followed by the placement of the garland of dreams...nothing can veil that.

This sat in the North of my mesa until I packed the next day to head to my dear friend Laurie's.  We had scheduled some play time before the solstice ceremony which she had planned.  I got up to her home in Connecticut just before the snow.

As you would imagine, we did not drive to Grafton to the Peace Pagoda, but held the ceremony in her home, which is truthfully like a Peace Pagoda anyway.  Laurie orchestrated a beautiful ceremony in which the basket of new moon prayers was woven.

The beautiful despacho made by Laurie

First the veil was burned with the intention of removing any obstacles from keeping us in a co-creative relationship with the unseen forces and wisdom of the natural world.

I then offered the blanket of ashes...and then we adorned the despacho.

To which we added all the petals and sweetness from our basket. 

Which was then blanketed with paper cranes, symbolizing spiritual justice

We were ready to feed the fire with our despacho filled with gratitude and grace

And well received it was...one would think that this was enough but "coincidentally" I had forgotten the wedding bouquet in the NW (source of manifestation) of my mesa.  So on the Solstice (today) I walked to the East River and offered the bouquet.  I unbound the ribbon around it, as our dreams needed to be free.  It was well accepted by the river and I practically had to chase it to get the next shots.  As part of the bon voyage, I didn't have rice, but offered some paper heart confetti.

And Inti (the sun) was shining on the river laying a path that you will see the bouque flowing towards...

and our love and dreams, merged with the essense of water and fire!!!

The transformation is complete!!!

Photos From December New Moon

So last night was fabulous new moon and wanted to give you a glimpse...those that chose to participate got an email with description.  Besides, a picture says a thousand words.

Wedding Bouquet and Basket of Dreames

  Garland of Dreams

Source of Manifestation (dreams and divine child/True Self)

                  

 True Self Veiled   True Self Unveiled

                                  

God Helps Those Who Helps Themselves...

Before I get into my story, I am providing a Lulu warning: If the word God is not one you would typically use nor are you comfortable with, please feel free to substitute what is significant to you, e.g. Spirit, I Am, Self, Universal Truth... Although I am known to use nicknames myself, (some which are not included in the previous examples:)) for sake of this article, I'm sticking to the "G" name. And if none of those terms work for you, but believe in the power of love, use love. Actually I may like that more, “Love helps those who love themselves,” but that may be a different article.

I must have been channeling my mother at Sunday's New Moon ceremony, as I typically cringed in my youth when I used to hear her say “God helps those who helps themselves.” It was something my mother used to say to get my lazy ass into action. Yet it came out of my mouth as a complete and utter truth. I also never expected to blog about this either, yet I’ve learned to like to expect the unexpected.

Monday morning, as I was driving through some very beautiful fall foliage, I began to reminisce about the ceremony and what a gift it was to share the ceremony and to be trusted to pray for people's dreams to come true. Then I drove through a 5 mile patch of cloud and the lightening bolt of illumination hit me. Perhaps the clouds led me to think of heaven and that lead me to repeat the title of the blog to myself and I said "Hello! Of course God helps those who helps themselves, because in truth we are just microcosms of the macrocosm that we call God. So us helping ourselves IS UNDOUBTEDLY God doing the work. We are co-creators with the big cheese." Not only did I re-recognize this truth, as this wasn't new to me, but I also clearly saw how ceremony helps embody this statement as well as the three critical components to manifestation.

I've always known this but this time it gave me shivers. The shivers was not only over the truth that we are microcosms of the macrocosm and hence co-creators which is extremely empowering, but it was also that I felt the agreement and nodding heads of all levels of my being. When I say, all levels, I mean my physical, mental, emotional and spiritual bodies. In this case my entire being said yes; however, there have been times when I don't get agreement on an idea or intention. I’m sure you all know how the tug of war feels when the mind says, yes but the heart says no. The same disagreement can show up in our physical body as well, which can really stop us in our tracks.

In cases where I have disagreement, I often find that the manifestation doesn't happen or worse if it does happen, it doesn't stick and then I'm disappointed. Or worst of all, it comes in a little wonky and then I'm befuddled and disappointed, a futile combination. Some of that is the clarity of the intention and a big part of it is that we have to be "all in," to use a poker metaphor. So in ceremony we work with all levels of the being and set our intentions to fulfill our dreams from the place of alignment and not just one of the multiple levels.

I said there are three parts to successful manifestation. So the second critical component (and the part of the discussion in the ceremony in which I channeled Mom), is that a catalyst or action is needed. If you want a job, you need to make some calls or send out some resumes. And the most important action we can ever take is to ask for help. It really does take a brave person to ask for help. In ceremony, we are asking for help from God and the unseen forces.

Oops, there's actual another component that I like to most every ceremony with, which is with some chocolate or sweetness. Not only does chocolate help activate the dopamine in our brains to make us happy, but we are symbolically also showing god and the spirit world that we are willing and able to take in all the sweetness that life has to offer. OK it's yummy too...the chocolate and the ceremony that is. And I have to say, I have had some interesting occurrences since Sunday. Try some ceremony, you may like it.

Let's All Be Goldfish Girls/Guys...Swim and Be Free

Last night, I was gifted with a Waterford crystal fish from a dear friend…she said it reminded her of me.  Hmmm, at first I thought, perhaps because we’re both Pisces. But of course the story doesn’t end there…it was a highly synchronistic event. Earlier in the week, I was listening to my IPod and a song from Ani DiFranco came up. I actually don’t know the name of it since the selection was burned on a cd for me by a friend and all I know is the track number. Well I did know the track number within ½ an hour of listening to it and did jot it down. And good thing I did it then, because know I remember something note worthy happened, but I can’t remember the track or the lyrics for the life of me and hence my deserved nickname of Goldfish Girl.

But before I put the cart before the horse, let me share the lyrics.  They are, “…I read a story and then I forgot it right away. And they say goldfish have no memory, I guess their lives are just like mine and the little plastic castle is a surprise every time and it’s hard to say if they’re happy but they don’t seem much to mind.”

This reason I was drawn to writing this down was not for this blog, but because it made me nostalgic. I was working on a project with a team of people for my day job and I started to forget things that people told me just minutes before, which was quite atypical for me. So an associate told me your like a goldfish, they only have a memory of  seconds. I wonder how they know or test this. So, throughout the rest of the project the team (including myself) mockingly called me Goldfish Girl and it’s always in the back of my mind when I get forgetful.

Now it’s more than three years later and I heard these lyrics while on the subway. I realized the potency of them although didn’t do anything other than put the lyrics to paper. Then as I already told you, spirit knocked on my door again, and has a friend gift me with a crystal goldfish. So of course I ponder my existence as Goldfish Girl even further. After all, pondering is what I do best.

How great life would be if every experience in life was like the song says and we could be like the goldfish with the plastic castle or a child pulling the toy surprise out of the box of Cracker Jacks and have a feeling of "wow that's new and cool" to almost everything...and we didn’t let our histories, our mistakes or our wounds define us and stop us from doing something new and exciting. Heck let’s forget the bad stuff, if we get too attached to the good stuff, we can stay in a rut and never venture out and discover another potentially more-wow experience. There is such power in freedom from attachment to our histories and reactions to that history.


So for any of you “realists”, I’m going to beat you to the punch. I know that I’ve also heard that the definition of insanity is when someone keeps banging their head against the wall and expects different results...and ,aybe that’s how they figured out goldfish have short memories, as they saw them crashing into the fish bowl walls over and over again.

However, the message I’m trying to convey is that by being free of our expectation and history we can be present with what works best for us in the moment. When we live in the present, our mistakes become our muse inspiring us with new ways to re-create ourselves.

Let’s be present with what is true in the moment and create from this place. Let’s all be like Goldfish Girls or Guys, depending on your gender preference, and swim through life and Be Free!

Einstein was right….it’s all relative!!!!

Not to fret, I’m not going to go into a discourse on physics, because just about anyone can out knowledge me on that one but this is what I’ve been thinking of, perspective and how mine seems to have shifted.

O.K., I know I keep talking about my clowning trip and the immense joy and freedom that has resulted. I should probably just accept it and move on, yet I want to understand why this felt unique and life changing. The reason I’m so awestruck by the effect of this heart-blowing experience is that historically after a major loving experience, I would inevitably experience a contraction shortly afterwards. I would have a min-freak out. Not a bad freak-out to have huh? Call 911 - Help I just experienced a drive by shooting of intense unconditional love. It sounds silly but it was true. After a major mystical and loving experience, I felt that I didn’t have the ability to chop wood and carry water afterwards. What was I supposed to do with all this love. My solution, out of old patterning, was to make myself and my love small and contracted. This didn’t leave a lot of room for joy.


So what also makes this experience unique is that, not only did I stay expanded around the love, but the interesting thing is that the less than pleasant experiences that have occurred in the last three weeks haven’t made me contract either.

Some may want to call this denial; however, since I’ve been back my life has certainly been less than absolutely perfect. Shit has happened. Without getting into details, certain events of a similar catastrophic size would have put me into moderate despair in the past. It would have been really hard to feel the love no matter what tools I pulled out of my back of tricks. However, this time when the less than pleasant experiences happened, I was able to experience both the container of joy and the sadness/frustration at the same time. Hmmm, this intrigued me.

I wanted to understand why this was so different. So I did some research and inquired with my friends from the clowning trip. In sharing my experiences with my fellow clowns, I came to a personal AHA!

So here goes, Lulu’s Theory of the Pink Elephant. Unlike Einstein I don’t think there is a Nobel Peace Prize in my future, but thought I would share. Whether an experience is bliss or shit, it’s kind of like the pink elephant in the room. No matter what you do, it’s there. Not to state the obvious, but the room is a container. As human beings, our emotional and mental bodies act as a container for all of our life experiences. We experience it and typically we label it as good or bad, insignificant, moderate or intense….you get the picture. So perhaps the judgment and attachment to the labels is also an issue but no matter what the experience our container needs to digest the experience to make room for more. Heck the digestion of our mental and emotional body is our way of processing life.

If the experience is huge and intense, it is like an elephant. How do you digest an elephant, one bite at a time. However, if the container is small – the elephant is cramped, there is no circulation, you get indigestion and all you can think of is this elephant in your gut. However, if the container is large and accepting enough, there is space. Keeps things in perspective. I would even go as far as saying that space is equal to love and acceptance. It gives you perspective and tolerance, which are certainly attributes at the top of my wish list.

Like my diagram ?!?! So I’m not going to win any diagram awards either but you can see that the elephant is the same size, it’s our container, aka mental/emotional body, that changes shape and size. So going back to my big undies metaphor in my previous blog. If you stretch the elasticity of your mental and emotional body, those undies can hold a lot even a pink elephant.

Was it the clowning trip that did this And the answer is yes and no. Yes it did for me but this was also one experience in a series of experiences in a life that has been deeply committed to personal transformation. For those younger than me, don’t despair, perhaps I’m a slow learner (funny comment coming from Lisa Lerner, huh?) Anyway, it took as long as it needed for me – but the magic ticket isn’t in the path or my timing. It’s my experience that the magic ticket is finding was in the expansion of my mental/emotional container. How does that happen. Well there are lots of paths to the same place and let’s just say that the ability to surrender, breathing at all times and an ability to laugh at oneself are quite helpful. Heck I’d say critical. And what gets us to surrender and expand is unique for each of us and I recommend having as much fun as possible in finding it. Nothing can take the wind out of our sails more than being too serious. So play away and may your days be filled with light, love and laughter.

To Blog or Not To Blog...(aka Love Is Like a Pair of Over-sized Undies)

During my long stays in India (cow picture pun inteneded) over the past few years, I used blogging as a way of updating friends and family. And more than a chronology of events, it felt more like a heart felt sharing. I enjoyed doing it and got positive feedback. So I did have some thoughts about continuing with blogging when I returned home and didn’t. Despite the positive feedback, my own negative inner voices came up. You know the ones or hopefully you don’t, in which case, I should be reading your blog.


I have been very fortunate to have experienced the magically transformative powers of love many times over the past 15 or so years.  For me, the voices would inevitably arise after a major love expanding event. Despite significance of each experience, sometimes later rather than sooner, there would be a contraction and the negative voices and feeling would get louder than the loving ones. When this happened, I would put up my walls again concerned that my love could actually be destroyed or taken away. Talk about a false belief.

Well I’m fresh back from probably the most heart blowing (yes, heart – not mind) experience of my life. This event feels like the one that blew the elastic on the waste band around my heart. Kind of like the undies Patch is demonstrating in this picture.

I thought that I had always been someone who loved life, yet now I realize that I was more like a bulimic. I would binge on love and then I would purge afterwards.  Silly me!  This time no purging, and I feel lighter than I ever have.

So even if those negative voices come up, to quote one of my teachers, I say, “Fuck, The Naysayers”.   My own self-judgement was way more severe than anything anyone else could say to me

So in answer to my own question of whether to blog or not…I choose to blog, as it is one of the many ways in which I’m choosing to share my love. And as they say, if your are around people that are receptive, give love. If you are around people that are resistant, give your love anyway. So if we keep with the metaphor of love being like a pair of big undies, when you let the elastic explode, see how much love can contain. And like big undies, the love tickles you from the inside out and all you can do is giggle and love…