The Growing Edge

Finally, after several days of technical challenges, I have managed to finish my High Vibe game activity and high-vibe some other bloggers. Haven’t found 5 yet that I love (a few of my faves have already been tagged) but here are three goodies:

1. How to be creative. A great post, if a few years old, illustrated with clever cartoons.
2. Financial stats illustrate generational rifts. Not exactly a title to raise your vibration, but the post is illuminating and affirming to those of us in Generations X and Y, for whom the American Dream is about time, family and fulfillment.
3. The earth remembered me. Evocative and poetic, a reminder of how nature can heal and bring us back to ourselves.

Enjoy!

I’m walking down a city street, double lanes of traffic whizzing by. The gardens are lush with flowering trees. The sky is blue … and brown with smog.

I’m here - hundreds of kilometres away from my home, my husband and my dogs - to work full-time on a contract during the week. I travel home on the weekends, long enough to do my laundry, ideally write a couple of blog posts, get out in the kayak for a paddle around the lake and then pack up again. 

I chose to do it - though I’d rather be at home, looking out at the trees and working on this blog - because I “need the money.” It’s an opportunity that came along when I was reaching out to the universe for an income stream, so I took it. The upside? Besides the cash, working with someone I know well, respect and spend a lot of time laughing with.  

But, am I ”selling out”? I started off the year determined to never again do work that isn’t deeply fulfilling and creative. Since then I’ve started to see that my purpose in life is pretty easy to fulfill in almost any situation. (Be happy; develop every aspect of my potential; inspire others.)   As long as I can stay focused on my purpose, there is no selling out. This work may not be deeply fulfilling, but it is stimulating and fun.

What I’m also remembering is what a great opportunity these situations are for personal growth - taking on the challenge of staying centered when things are busy or stressful, hanging on to my core values and connection to spirit in a business environment.

And that brings me back to walking down the road earlier today, feeling spacey and ungrounded. When I arrived back at my rental pad, I opened my inbox and found a message from Kara-Leah Masina with the tag for this meme, sparked by Optimist Lab and designed to raise awareness of a new social bookmarking site, High Vibe it. And guess what, up went my vibration and here I am solid again.

So my first favorite trick is ….

1. Blogging. Writing a post that comes from the heart. Finding a new post on a favorite blog. Sharing comments and discussion. Connecting with another blogger on the same wavelength. Playing with new “toys” like google ads and widgets. I sometimes procrastinate about it, but as soon as I get blogging, I’m having a great time.
2. Nature. When I really need help, I go for the green. Even when I lived in the heart of the city, I would sit on my fire escape and drink in the one tree I could see, past the far side of our parking lot. If I could scrounge up a car, I’d head out of the city to a conservation area, or I’d hit the subway and head to a park. No matter how upset, how stressed, how overwhelmed, how depressed … I breathe easier and feel better when I am outdoors and can see grass, trees and sky. There’s something about the elements and plants that I find instantly healing.
3. Read something uplifting. I find a lot of inspiring, hopeful material on the web. But Esther and Jerry Hicks’ book The Art of Allowing is guaranteed to lift my vibe. I only have to read a paragraph and I automatically perk up. There’s something about the language and the way they present the law of attraction that makes me breathe a huge sigh of relief. The words convey a comforting kind of acceptance and a sense that at the deepest level , everything is all right. And they offer very practical, fun ways to gradually shift your emotional state up the scale towards the positive.
4. Talk to the universe. I call on the elements, the four directions and whoever else I can think of. Whether I’m in the bath, waiting for the bus, lying in bed or I’ve built a ceremonial medicine circle doesn’t matter. The act of calling in the powers establishes a sacred space - a place that’s safe, and in which I feel deeply connected to myself and the spirits around me. And then we chat.
5. Do something new. If I hit a spell where I’m kind of low for a period of time, I try to get out and do something different, something I’ve never done before. If it’s something I’ve always wanted to do, so much the better. But really, it’s about breaking up the routing, changing the pattern … and that lets some new energy in.