Category Archives: Body, Mind & Spirit

Coping With Loneliness

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Spiritual Loneliness: What To Do When No One Understands You

For those who are spiritually-minded, it’s not uncommon to feel a little disconnected from other people at times.  The experience of loneliness is almost a natural byproduct of spiritual awakening.  Though we might be connected to our inner guidance system, we might also feel a little displaced in modern civilization where materialism, consumerism and negativity often reign supreme.  If you are going through an awakening process, or if you already have, then you will certainly know what it feels like to be rejected by the herd.

So how do we maintain a feeling of unity with everyone, while also feeling like we are emotionally separated from everyone?

Here are some helpful ways to cope with spiritual loneliness:

1) Reality itself is just a play in consciousness.  It’s all a dream.

You are dreaming right now.  You aren’t dreaming in the sense that your body is asleep, but you are dreaming in the sense that when you die you will wake up in a new dimension.  You will realize that your life and your journey was all one big play that was setup so that you could evolve as a soul.  Zooming out and gaining perspective like this really helps with dealing with loneliness, because it allows to remember that our life is a manifestation of our consciousness and a projection of our creativity.

Don’t take things too seriously! Learn from the dream, listen to the dream, and explore the dream.  But don’t let the contents of the dream hold you up.

2) Operate from love rather than fear

Don’t let thoughts like “I’m always going to be alone”, or “I’ll never find a good group of friends”, or “I’m never going to have someone I can relate to” dominate your consciousness.  The problem of using fear as a motivator in life is that making decisions out of fear actually pushes the things that we want away from us.   For example, if we are afraid of being lonely, we actually attract more loneliness into our lives.  Will anyone actually be energetically attracted to an energy field of fear and self-pity?

Operate from a space of self-certainty and self-love, and you can’t help but attract that into your life.  When you allow fear to be your dominant feeling, you are telling the universe you aren’t ready to step into greatness yet.

3) Go with the flow

Life in modern society can be very frantic.  There is no need to rush, and no need to try to win the rat race. Remember, there’s nowhere you need to be, nothing you need to do and no one you need to impress.  Sometimes, we cause ourselves anxiety by holding ourselves up to expectations society puts forward for us.  You don’t need a group of 10 friends that you get together with each weekend.  You don’t need a Twilight relationship.  Holding expectations of achieving a cookie-cutter life only breeds stress and confusion. Learning to completely let go and relax will be one of the best things you can do to creating a happy life for yourself.

Follow your intuition and do the things that come naturally to you.  Life is about the journey.  Work with the universe, follow your heart, and be open to possibilities.

4) Seek others out

Always remember, there are many spiritually-minded people out there.  Don’t be discouraged if you haven’t found any yet within your immediate surroundings.  Take action towards the lifestyle you want, and meet the universe halfway so that it can create synchronicities for you.  Take a yoga class.  Take a class at a local metaphysical shop.  Hangout at a progressive cafe.  Join a spiritual community online.  Keep all your doors open.

It’s not uncommon to feel alone or excluded in our society, especially if you have alternative views and beliefs.  Don’t feel bad for yourself.  Self-pity is useless.  Feel proud that you have the courage to be yourself in a world where individuality is suppressed.  Feel excited that as long as you are in integrity, you will only have incredible relationships from here on out.  You are loved, and there are millions of others who feel the same way you do.

I feel “spiritually lonely” too sometimes.  But the important thing to do when you feel lonely is change your perspective, operate from love, be proud of yourself for being true to who you are, and trust that the universe will provide you with the support system you need if you are willing to take a step outside your comfort zone to make those connections happen.

from:    http://thespiritscience.net/2015/04/06/spiritual-loneliness-what-to-do-when-no-one-understands-you/

Types of Empaths

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Empowerment Through Sensitivity: The 10 Types Of Empaths

June 28, 2016 

The 10 Types Of Empaths

by Dylan Harper,
DreamcatcherReality

Our sensitivity can empower us in ways we can’t quite understand. Find out what kind of an empath you are and how you can become a better person through simple awareness.

In today’s society, sensitivity is viewed as a weakness, which is kind of ironic because our sensitivity can be quite empowering.

So, how can we become empowered by a trait that makes us soft and delicate, in a world dominated by loud and overpowering people? Yes, it is true that many empaths may seem weak and even get overpowered, but there is another aspect to this sensitivity.

Deep down, way beyond the veil of our superficial personas, all empaths have something distinctly quiet and quite powerful. This power doesn’t dominate or overpower people but rather empowers one in an extremely useful way.

This gift allows empaths to benefit in the long term by gathering psychological, emotional, and physical information from their surroundings. This information is usually inaccessible to the unreceptive mind.

Although it is indeed correct that empaths cannot bully people or use brute force, they can however, protect, guide, heal, and deeply understand the people around them.

In this way, they can gather incredible amounts of information and how they use this knowledge is at their discretion. Knowledge is, after all, the greatest power.

Think You Are An Empath?

If you suspect that you are more sensitive than the people around you, then continue reading to find out if you too are an empath in an insensitive world.

If you really are an empath, you will recognize some of these experiences that are faced by most empaths:

  • You tend to absorb other people’s feelings and emotions and experience them as your own
  • You consistently feel mental and physical fatigue
  • Your emotional state tends to swing throughout a day based on external stimuli
  • If someone close to you is in physical pain, you can feel their pain in your own body
  • You cherish solitude, which helps you refresh and recharge
  • People prefer to come to you with their problems
  • You simply cannot bear violence or cruelty
  • You are naturally caring and nurturing
  • You are an excellent listener
  • Your awareness of our physical environment is greater than normal, e.g. your sense of taste, smell, hearing, touch, etc.
  • Crowded places tend to overwhelm and drain you
  • Animals and children seem to be attracted to you

Different Types of Empaths

Yes, being an empath can have many benefits, but at the same time, it can also weigh you down and cause anxiety. This is one of the reasons why it is important to understand our individual experiences in the hope to better understand ourselves.

The following is a list of different types of empaths and a small description to help you understand what kind of an empath you may be.

1. Physically Receptive Empath

Many empaths seem to be receptive to the physical pains and illnesses of other people. The pain can manifest in the empath’s own body – an ability which has proven to be extremely useful in healing.

2. Emotionally Receptive Empath

Almost all empaths are extremely receptive of external emotional states. This can result in physically and emotionally feeling other people’s emotions before they are expressed.

3. Claircognizant Empath

Claircognizant empaths have the ability to know if something needs to be done or if a statement of a person’s intentions is true or misleading, without any rational reasoning. Such empaths have the ability to know if they should do something or not.

4. Geomantic Empaths

These empaths have the ability to read signals and energy transmitted from the soil or earth. Meaning, they can feel if a natural disaster is impending.

5. Fanna Empath

Fanna empaths can feel, hear, and interact with animals.

6. Medium Empath

Medium empaths, as the name suggests, can either feel, see or hear spirits.

7. Flora Empath

Slightly similar to Fanna Empaths, as they can communicate with plants by being able to feel or receive their signals.

8. Psychometric Empath

These empaths develop the ability to receive energy, impressions, and information from inanimate objects such as jewelry, photographs, etc.

9. Telepathic Empath

Telepathic empaths can accurately read another peron’s unexpressed thoughts.

10. Precognitive Empath

Such empaths can feel a situation or event before its occurrence. These usually manifests in the form of dreams of emotional or physical sensations.

In this insensitive and coarse world, empaths can often find it difficult to maintain their inner harmony. But with self-awareness, everyone, including empaths, can learn to appreciate their unique gifts and abilities.

from:    http://in5d.com/10-types-of-empaths/

Stephen Hawking & The Perils of AI

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Stephen Hawking

Stephen Hawking: Governments are engaged in an AI arms race that could destroy humanity

“Mankind is in danger of destroying ourselves by our greed and stupidity.”

By Matt Agorist –

On Monday, English theoretical physicist, cosmologist, author and Director of Research at the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology within the University of Cambridge, Stephen Hawking went on the Larry King show. He was less than optimistic about the future of humanity.

Six years ago, Hawking was on the King show and said, “Mankind is in danger of destroying ourselves by our greed and stupidity.” When asked if he thought humanity has changed since their last visit, Hawking replied, “We have certainly not become less greedy or less stupid.”

In summarizing the last six years,
Stephen Hawking said, “Six years ago, I was warning about pollution and overcrowding; they have gotten worse since then.”

Hawking’s faith in humanity is apparently dwindling as the theoretical physicist predicted little more than doom and gloom. “The population has grown by half a billion since our last interview, with no end in sight. At this rate, it will be eleven billion by 2100. Air pollution has increased by 8 percent over the past five years. More than 80 percent of inhabitants of urban areas are exposed to unsafe levels of air pollution,” he said.

Hawking says that addressing pollution is a major concern, but we’ve yet to do so.

“The increase in air pollution and the emission of increasing levels of carbon dioxide. Will we be too late to avoid dangerous levels of global warming?” he said.

If humans don’t kill themselves with pollutions, according to Hawking, it will be the robots that do us in. When King asked Hawking about the dangers of artificial intelligence (AI), Hawking explained that when government is involved in technological evolution, the outlook is bleak.

“Governments seem to be engaged in an AI arms race, designing planes and weapons with intelligent technologies. The funding for projects directly beneficial to the human race, such as improved medical screening seems a somewhat lower priority.”

When King asked Hawking about his views on Ray Kurzweil’s theory of the singularity, Hawking shot it down as “too optimistic.”

“I think that his views are both too simplistic and too optimistic. Exponential growth will not continue to accelerate, something we don’t predict will interrupt it as has happened with similar forecasts in the past,” he said.

As he continued, Hawking alluded to the fears that some people hold about AI wiping humanity from the earth because of having differing goals.

Hawking said. “Once machines reach the critical stage of being able to evolve themselves, we cannot predict whether their goals will be the same as ours.”

King goes on to ask Hawking, “Will artificial intelligence ever go on to render human society obsolete?”

“Artificial intelligence has the potential to evolve faster than the human race. Beneficially AI could co-exist with humans and augment our capabilities. But a rogue AI could be difficult to stop.”

After claiming humans are stupid, greedy, and AI will destroy the world, Hawking noted that it is still important to pursue the cause of AI as it will be highly beneficial to humans in the future.

Via Free Thought Project

from:    https://www.intellihub.com/stephen-hawking-governments-are-engaged-in-an-ai-arms-race-that-could-destroy-humanity/

6 Steps to Lighten Up

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How To Get Out Of A Funk In 6 Easy Steps

grounding with earthby Sarah Petruno
Shamana

You’ve been having a bad morning, a bad day, a bad week – your car wouldn’t start on the way to work, then it started snowing and your forgot your ice scraper, you forgot your lunch, and your favorite food cart was not there, then, when you finally got home, you realized you forgot to turn the slow cooker on this morning.

This is miserable! And the temptation, to remain sulky the rest of the day, evening, or the next few days, feeling down on your luck, focusing on all the terrible, is very high. We all do it – we have a series of crappy events, then, we just want to sit down and feel sorry for ourselves.

While this is certainly an option, there is an alternative. We can’t change what happened, but we can change how it made us feel. And while yes, you’ve heard this a million times before, there IS a way that you really can do this. With practice, in as little as 10 minutes or less, you can quickly energetically heal yourself and shift your perception, turning your crappy day, into an opportunity to realize all that you are grateful for, and give yourself a second chance to change your mood and outlook. All it takes, is to realize you are in a funk, then decide you don’t want to be anymore. Then, follow the steps below – and boom – your sad day cloud is lifted, and you begin to feel better and motivated to give it another shot. This process, is a quick, simplified version of a grounding and clearing meditation. Get out of a funk, ground, and clear your energy in 10 minutes or less. So, how about it?

How to Get Out of a Funk – In 6 Easy Steps

1. Ground Yourself.

This is the first step in working with energy, and as we begin, you’re becoming a self energy healer. The process of grounding is essential to all spiritual and energetic healing practices. Simply, you place a grounding cord that is connected to the seat of yourself to the Divine Energy located deep within the earth. I call this Earth Energy. This anchors you to the Earth, and allows you access to receive Earth Energy – it also provides a firm foundation to connect you, with the Divine Mother Earth. If you’re connecting upward, you need to be firmly rooted on the Earth, because, well, that’s where you live at this time and this is where most of your energy comes from. Without grounding before connecting upward, you could lift off and become lifted, which can create feelings of aloofness and disconnection. Grounding yourself allows you to in essence, pull it together, calm down, feel a sense of stability, and security – you’re connecting with sacred Earth Energy here, and in doing so, a sense of calmness, centeredness and stability is always the result. Seated in a chair, with your feet on the floor and your hands in the receptive position, take a few deep breathes, and while doing so, imagine a tree trunk starting at the base of your spine, encompassing your legs, and traveling down into the earth. The roots of this tree extend deeper and deeper until you reach the center of the Earth, where your roots will reach the center of the Earth, the location of the source of Earth Energy. Imagine this center as a glowing ball, and allow your roots to wrap around it a few times. Now, imagine your roots traveling back up to you. With each deep breath, imagine you are taking up white Earth Energy into your roots, and drawing it up to your body. You are now accessing Earth Energy. Imagine the energy flowing up your roots until it reaches your feet – and see it travel upward through your thighs, torso, chest, until it reaches the top of your head, the Crown Chakra. Imagine it flowing out of the top of your head, like water from a glorious crystal fountain, the blowhole of a whale, a geyser eruption. Allow all or some of this Energy to cycle back down from your head to your feet, in a loop, and travel back down to the center of the Earth. Complete this loop 2-3 times, to ensure that Earth Energy is completely flowing through your physical body. You are now grounded.

2. Remove Foreign Energy.

Now, it’s time to remove all the energy that you have absorbed or has been transferred onto you, that is no longer serving you. For now, we will be focusing on how to remove it the foreign, negative, not-you energy. This happens in 2 parts – an internal removal of foreign energy, and an external, aura focused energy removal. Internal Energy Removal. Using the circuit of Earth Energy that is now flowing through you, you can remove, or flush out, the foreign energy inside your physical body that is no longer serving you. To do this, simply imagine that as the Earth Energy cycles back down to your feet from your crown, the strength, and energetic pull of the flow is yanking out all the little black and grey wisps of energy that are no longer needed, and flushing them out, back down to the center of the earth, where they will be cleansed and purified. If you are familiar with Biore Pore Strips, the process is similar to that, except internal. The energy no longer serving you, is being pulled out and flushed away by the flow of Earth Energy. Aura Energy Removal. In addition to the foreign energy existing externally, foreign energy also attaches itself and sticks to your aura, as part of a natural process of the energy that exists all around us, radiating from each being who may cross your path. After you have finished grounding, and the internal energy flush, now is time to take a peek at your aura, your external energy, and see what it looks like. Your Aura is your energetic shell that exists around you physical body, imagine it now, as a golden egg that extends all around you, including above your head and beneath your feet. Imagine what it looks like, and imagine now, where foreign energy, energy that does not belong to you, exists. This foreign energy, can be any place surrounding you, and typically looks black or grey in color. The shapes can look like small rocks, boulders, spikes, helmets, clouds, shields, capes, or even as a dusty covering of your aura. As you identify each piece of foreign energy, work your way through removing it. Simply imagine yourself pulling it off, brushing it away, throwing off the black cape, or tossing aside the small rock – imagine each piece falling to the ground. Continue this procedure until all of the foreign energy is removed

3. Cut Cords.

You are grounded, cleared of all foreign energy, now it’s time to cut your cords. Cords are energetic attachments to other individuals, places, or situations – anytime you think of or converse with someone or something, there is the potential that an energetic cord has attached to you in this single interaction. It is either drawing on your energy, sending you energy, or both. For the purposes of this exercise, we are not going to find out who the cords are attached to or what they are doing, we just going to remove any that exist, all at once. Sometimes, it’s really not important who it is, or what it’s doing, it just needs to go – and that’s what we’re going to do here. Any energy connection to any individual creates an exchange, and with this flow in continual motion, your ocean may never be still. Grounding, is a process of stilling the ocean within you. To do this, imagine your hand out in front of you, it is grabbing onto a bundle of ropes. Each rope is a cord that is attached to you, in some way or another. All the ropes could be connected to you as a spider web in all directly with many strings, or as a single bundle to one or two sources. Now, bundle them all up, and now, you are holding onto this rope bundle. Now, yank the bundle of ropes quickly and forcefully, removing all the ropes and their attachments from you, as though they’ve been plucked rapidly by tweezers. Now, you are holding a bundle of ropes, and on one end, your hand frees each end of the rope and their attachments to you, but they are still connected on the other side – to everyone, and everything else. Give your rope bundle another quick yank, detaching the ropes from everything else they’re connected to on the other side. In your hand now, is the rope bundle, and a pile of loose rope lies on the ground. Drop your rope bundle aside, and toss it to the ground. Done. Cords removed.

4. Call your Energy Back.

You’ve now detached yourself from all things to which you were corded, but, your energy may still exist in those places. It’s time to call it back. All the places to which you have invested a lot of your energy, past, present or future (think: worrying), your energy may exist there, outside of your body. In calling your energy back, you will be operating at full energetic capacity, and it will restore you with a sense of rejuvenation and motivation. To call your energy back, quickly, simply imagine all of the people, places, things, or relationships in which you feel you’ve been giving a lot of your energy – and ask it to come back to you. Imagine this energy leaving that place, and flowing back to you, as a golden stream of light, coming to rest in your core, your physical center, as an ever growing ball of golden light. Start the process by focusing on a single place, and continue moving from one place, to the next, until you feel that you have asked your energy to return to you from all of its pursuits outside of your physical body. There’s no right or wrong amount of time here, it’s up to you, and following your own intuition. By the nature of our existence, always interacting with other beings, there is nearly ALWAYS some of your energy existing out of your body, but the extent to which this is the case, depends really, only on how frequently you ask your energy to return to you. Allow yourself to be open to the places from which your energy returns. It can return from somewhere you never believed it to be, or even from very past events and scenarios, those which may cause you sadness or pain. For learn more and for more detailed instructions on how to do this, check out this article on energy retrieval.

5. Rejuvenate Your Aura.

By this point, you have removed foreign energies, cut cords, and called your energy back. All of your energy is now yours, and yours alone, but now – you must fill the holes left behind by the cords, or by the removal of foreign energy. It is not enough to stop now – your energy is filled with holes and you must seal them off, and in doing so, you are healing your aura, your energy. You are protecting yourself from further cording, or attachment of foreign energy. Once the holes are filled, it’s time to strengthen, reinforce, and boost your energy, infusing your energy with that of the Divine. This sounds wonderful. . . but are you sure I can do this? Yes! Everyone has the power to draw upon Divine Energy to heal themselves. Everyone. All you need, is the knowledge and the wherewithal to do it, which is what I’m teaching you now. The first step, is to imagine the skies above you opening, and from those skies, pours down a pink, golden light. This is a healing light, and as the light falls upon you, imagine it filling each, and every hole, and watch as the holes become filled. Imagine this pink, golden light, gliding over the surface of your body, smoothing, buffing, and patching over the holes. As if you are using a golden glowing spackle to blend plaster into the wall of your home. You are now applying this same practice to your energetic field, except instead you are using a plaster of light. Continue to draw down this Divine Light, and imagine it filling, smoothing, and polishing your energetic field until you feel the job is finished. Next, still with your grounding cord connected to the Earth, draw upon that Earth Energy once again. Only now, imagine it filling your physical body from below the earth with bright, white light. Internally, imagine the energy of the Earth, filling, and internally boosting, your energy – and continue to draw upon Earth Energy, until you are internally glowing, bright, white light. You have now, rejuvenated and restored your energy, internally. The final step, is to draw upon Divine Light once again, only this time, the color changes to a bright, golden yellow. And instead of filling holes, you will now imagine the Divine Light swirling all around you, as if you are Cinderella being transformed by the Fairy Godmother. As the Light swirls, it condenses, and piles on top of itself, creating a bright, golden bubble, swirling around your physical body. Continue drawing upon this Light, until this bubble of golden yellow light fills the room in which you sit. You are now protected, and surrounded by Divine Light. This now completes the meditation portion of this exercise. Before you stop, be sure to thank the Earth, for restoring your energy and receiving and cleansing all energies, cords, and ties that you have returned to it; thank the Divine Light, for healing and restoring your auric field; and finally, thank your Guides, for assisting you with this process (because they were).

6. Shift your Perception.

Your Energy is healed! You are filled with Divine Light and Earth Energy, and inherently, you are now radiating pure love, positivity, and high energy. In this moment – you have the choice. The choice to maintain this current state, or the choice to return to your previous state, the state that you just healed from. The decision is yours to make in this moment. Yes, you had a bad morning, a bad day, a bad week. You can choose to continue to focus on these circumstances, or to shift your perceptions, to change your outlook. Let’s say, for example, the woman at Dunkin Donuts drive thru forgot to make your latte a non-fat latte. That’s it! She ruined your diet. 80 calories, you’re totally screwed. And now it’s all you can think about – your messed up latte order. Consider the alternative: She’s at work, and in fact, she made it to work this morning at 4am in a snowstorm while her children were still sleeping. She’s just doing her best, to support her family. Mistakes happen, and hey – what does 80 calories matter in the long run anyway? Instead of sending hate, choose to send love and compassion instead. What about that crockpot you forgot to turn on? You’re beating yourself up for it, you failed to provide dinner for your family, and not only that, but you also just wasted $10 and no one has dinner. Hey! Snap out of it – you can choose to let it go! Shift your perception – who cares that dinner wasn’t ready when you came home?! Make some macaroni and cheese, and consider it a blessing – your freezer meal wasn’t going to be as comforting anyway. Choose now, to release yourself from this burden and allow yourself to have a more pleasant evening. You deserve a break! After you’ve completed your energetic exercises, give yourself a small pep talk, filled with positive affirmations and positive thoughts for the rest of the day, week, or month. You choose to embrace and exude love, positivity, and happiness. You choose to be a beacon of light now. You choose, to be grateful and appreciative. You choose to release, let go, and shift your perspective to one rooted in love, happiness, and gratitude. You are now an energy healer, a healer of yourself! With these tools, you can lift yourself up and power on, through your funk, and complete your day with a new, rejuvenated, and loving outlook.

from:    http://howtoexitthematrix.com/2016/06/27/how-to-get-out-of-a-funk-in-6-easy-steps/

The Malady of Normalcy

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Being Crazy in a Sick Society is Actually Healthy

BY SOFO ARCHON

be different

To be normal is to be sick

Krishnamurti once said that “it is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” However, being born and brought up in such a society, most people can’t realize that it is sick, let alone that they are part of this sickness, just like fish, which, living in water, cannot realize that they are in water and part of the sea life.

What does it mean to live a normal life? In the modern world, especially in the West, it means to be brainwashed at a very young age for over a decade by what we call schooling, to later on work as a wage slave for almost the rest of your life competing with others so as to merely survive, to mindlessly consume products without end because manipulative advertising convinced you to do so, while at the same time you unconsciously harm the planet we inhabit, to slowly poison your physical organism by feeding it with disease causing foods, to obey to the rules and believe in the dogmas handed down to you by those in authority, to be passive and uncreative, suppressing yourself in countless of ways, living in suffering yet doing nothing to overcome it.

If you stop for a moment and think, you might realize that this kind of living is absolutely sick, yet it is accepted by almost everyone as healthy and is actually rewarded by society. In fact, those of us who are better at living this way are considered to be the most successful and respected, while those who are different, more sensitive and intelligent, desiring to create a different path in life, are ridiculed and looked down upon, being considered as stupid, weird, or even crazy.

But what is the point of living the way most people live? Life can be lived so much better — we can live playfully, filled with laughter and love, with a desire to be creative, at peace with ourselves and others, savoring the gifts of existence. Unfortunately, only a few people manage to think outside the mental box that society has provided us with and escape from the matrix they’ve been unconsciously living in since they were born. Those are the rebellious ones who at some point in their lives felt the need to break free from the chains of tradition and help create a more beautiful world for all beings on earth.

Rebelling against normalcy

To rebel against normalcy is the most difficult thing you can do because you need the guts to be honest with yourself and others. To voice the truth in a world where almost everyone is living in lies is quite a risky thing to do. Speaking the truth means going against the current of tradition, which in turn means confronting the herd mentality and having the strength to keep on going your way regardless the hardships you might face.

There have been many people who had the courage to rebel against the normalcy of our sick society, but most of them couldn’t deal with the negative consequences their actions had on themselves. When nobody embraces your uniqueness and is able to understand you, and when everybody is trying to suppress you and help you fit back into society, it is easy to lose courage, and not uncommon to experience immense psychological anguish. That’s why some of the greatest minds to have ever walked on earth were suffering from serious mental and emotional issues. And although now, after a long time since they passed away, they are recognized as geniuses, when they were alive they were seen by the majority as weirdos or lunatics.

Once you realize how sick the way you and most people are living is and openly go against it, trying to reclaim your freedom and create your own path in life, you are bound to get in trouble. People, including family members and friends will do everything to put obstacles on your path with the intention to “help” you become normal again, exactly like they are. Instead of helping you to grow your wings of consciousness and leave behind what is burdening your psyche, they do their best to cut them off and make you crawl by their side so that you can suffer together.

Dare to be crazy

Your inner voice has for a very long time been telling you that life could be lived much more beautifully, and you should trust it because it’s right. And although it might be the most difficult thing to achieve, it is the only thing worth working for, because what is the point of living otherwise? What is the point of wasting your entire life just because others told you that’s how you are supposed to live?

If you desire to live the way you want to live and not the way others expect you to live, you need to gather the courage in your heart to be a little crazy — crazy according to society’s standards. You need to distance yourself from the comfort of the herd and follow your calling, without caring what others think of you. You need to be willing to go through hardships and experience pain, without giving up trying to turn your dreams into reality.

Remember: no matter how much pain you might experience by walking the path of non-conformity, the rewards of doing so far outweigh the disadvantages. Just like a mother experiences tremendous pain while giving birth, you are experiencing immense pain birthing a new kind of life. A life of beauty, of joy, of celebration. Pain goes hand in hand with change, so embrace it, allow it to guide to you and let it be a catalyst for your inner metamorphosis.

from:    http://theunboundedspirit.com/crazy/

 

Synchronicity Happens!

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The Mysterious World of Synchronicity

By Luke Miller
Guest writer for Wake Up World

Do you often see 11:11? 12:34? 3:33? Or any other synchronistic patterns?

Do you ever have strange coincidences that defy logic, and often lead to magical unfoldings? 

In this article we’ll explore the strange world of synchronicity.

What brought you here? Why in this very moment when you could be anywhere doing anything, is it that you have found yourself on this blog? Chances are that you saw the image and it made sense to you! Do you see 11:11? Does it boggle your mind and at times create weird and wonderful confusion? Are you struggling to make sense of its meaning? Don’t worry, I totally understand, and I hope this article can be of some comfort…

This article is not going to be just about numerology, that is only a small part of the mysterious world of synchronicity. I am going to try and bring some kind of meaning to something that is hard to understand at a purely logical view point, and something that I have to admit I do not fully understand. But it is my belief that synchronicity does not work on that kind of level. I know it is significant, I know that following it can bring great things, but it is not something that can be fully understood by the mind.

What is Synchronicity?

Synchronicity is a sequence of events that coincide with each other, and have significant meaning related to each other. These events would appear on the surface to be just chance, but are in no way a coincidence.

An example would be: You want to pursue your dream job and you are trying to make an excuse not to do so and for every excuse you make a solution seems to fall in your lap. Or you attend an event you would usually avoid because every time you switch on the TV, radio or speak with someone it’s all you hear about. Then as a result of attending that event you meet someone significant, like a partner, a business associate or a future friend.

One extreme example from my own life was when I was thinking about giving up on my passion of writing and sharing information about spirituality and growth due to the financial strain it was causing. I had gone online looked up some jobs and was ready to quit, that night I went to bed and said, “If you are going to give me a sign, now is the right time”. The next day I received a cheque from a family member that fixed that problem.

Synchronicities differ from coincidence, a coincidence could be you sneezing and at the same time a firework going off. It may be a little weird that it happens, but in most cases there would be no significant meaning.

Types of Synchronicity

Predictive: This is where you see, think or do something that links to an outcome. The classic example is thinking of someone and them calling you.

Guiding: This is where all signs guide you to a specific outcome. This could be you thinking of giving up on your music career because of a lack of work and just as you are about to do so, you get a phone call from someone trying to book you for work.

Reflective: This is where you are forced to reflect due to a synchronistic event. An example would be if you decided to cancel your gym membership and then as you go to do it an email hits your inbox about the benefits of exercise, making you reflect on if you have made the right decision or not.

Testing: This is where synchronicity tests you ego. An example would be if you had a food addiction and absolutely loved fried chicken, when thinking about this addiction a fried chicken advert comes on the TV. Testing your ability to fight the temptation. Be strong, don’t do it!!!

Synchronicities are Always Happening

One thing I have noticed is that there have always been synchronicities in my life, maybe not quite in the quantity that they are happening now, but they have always been there. Your job is to follow the synchronistic events. The magical thing is, the more you follow them the more they happen.

Don’t go searching for something that is not there, but learn to recognise when something is in front of you. If the perfect relationship seems to fall from the sky at the perfect moment and you decide not to pursue it, you are seeing the synchronicities, but not following them.

When you start to live out these synchronistic events you will start getting the little cosmic nudges, like 11:11 or in my case 33, I see this number everywhere and it was only on a doing a little research I realised the spiritual significance of it.

Synchronicity in Your Life

Think back to every significant event in your life, I am sure it is full of synchronicity and it is usually the bigger the life event the more synchronicities coincide with it.

A while back I had been trying to get in front of a bigger audience. These events led towards me being able to work at Truth Theory:

Synchronicity number 1: I had a list of around 30 blogs I wanted to write for, out of that list I sent my article: 6 Ideas For An Educational Revolution to Truth Theory.

Synchronicity number 2: The owner of Truth Theory was working on an educational website so he was drawn to the article.

Synchronicity number 3: Out of anywhere in the world he could have lived, he lived just 5 minutes from my house.

Synchronicity number 4: We decided to meet up and it turned out we were pretty much on the same wavelength and that he needed someone to write for Truth Theory.

If anyone one of these events didn’t happen, I would not be here writing this article. But they all did and now I am here.

What Is The Point of Synchronicity?

Synchronicity serves many purposes; it can serve as a reminder that you are on the right path, it can be for guidance, sometimes it is to test you, sometimes it will lead you to form significant relationships and other times it is just for you to stop and be present

from:    http://www.zengardner.com/mysterious-world-synchronicity/

On Mudras & Healing

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Mudras: The Healing Power In Your Hands

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C Katt Krespach

Mudras hold an innate healing power that supports the mind-body connection … and have been used for centuries.

A mudra, a symbolic or ritual gesture performed with the hands and fingers, is a spiritual gesture used to stimulate different parts of the body involved with breathing and to affect the flow of prana in the body.

Mudras have been in use in the East for thousands of years, particularly in Buddhism. Buddha statues often have the hands in certain hand positions. They have been used as a spiritual practice (and still are), as a way on the path to enlightenment.

However they’re also used for physical ailments. – source

The Healing Power In Your Hands

Mudras are a powerful addition to any meditation.  In a recent article posted by Forever Conscious, shows us some of the most common mudras and how to use them to boost our mind and body connection.

by Tanaaz, Forever Conscious

Mudras are positions of the hands that are said to influence the energy of your physical, emotional and spiritual body.

Mudras have been used in the East for thousands of years and were practiced by many spiritual leaders including Buddha. Today, Mudras are still used in Yoga and meditation.

Sometimes we may subconsciously place our hands into Mudra positions without even knowing it and other times we can use them to help channel and stimulate healing.

There are hundreds of Mudras but here are some of the most common:

1.) Gyan Mudra (Mudra of Knowledge):mudra of knowledge

The tip of the index finger touches the tip of the thumb while the other fingers remain straight.

Benefits: Enhances knowledge, stimulates the pituitary and endocrine glands, increases memory, helps meditation, prevents insomnia, can boost mood and bring clarity.

Practice: Any time while sitting, standing or lying in bed.

2.) Prithvi Mudra (Mudra of Earth): mudra of earth

The tip of the ring finger touches the thumb while the other fingers remain straight out.

Benefits: reduces physical and spiritual weaknesses, can increase the life force, can help clear skin, promotes body functionality.

Practice: Any time.

3.) Varuna Mudra (Mudra of Water): mudra of water

The tip of the pinky finger touches the thumb while the other fingers remain straight up.

Benefits: helps to balance emotions and helps to retain water. Helps to relieve constipation and cramps. Can also help regulate menstrual cycles and hormonal conditions.

Practice: 15 minutes three times a day.

4.) Vayu Mudra (Mudra of Air): mudra of air

The thumb wraps over the index finger while the rest of the fingers remain straight.

Benefits: helps to calm an anxious mind, soothe a strained voice and can help decrease stress. Can also help reduce impatience and indecisiveness.

Practice: 10 to 15 minutes, 3 times per day.

5.) Shunya Mudra (Mudra of Emptiness): mudra of emptiness

The tip of the thumb presses the middle finger down while the rest of the fingers stand straight up.

Benefits: reduces dullness in the body and can also be highly effective for ear aches. Can help restore confidence and boost mental cognition.

Practice: 40-60 minutes daily or for an earache- 4 to 5 minutes.

6.) Surya Mudra (Mudra of the Sun): mudra of the sun

Bend the ring finger under the thumb while the rest of the fingers remain straight.

Benefits: helps stimulate the thyroid gland, helps to alleviate weight gain and reduces appetite, stimulates digestion, helps relieve anxiety and stress. Helps to guide you to your purpose.

Practice: 5 to 15 minutes, twice daily.

7.) Prana Mudra (Mudra of Life): mudra of life

The ring and pinky finger both bend to meet the thumb while the index and middle finger remain pointed straight up.

Benefits: improves the life force, helps to strengthen the mind, body and spirit, helps promote taking action, improves immunity and motivation. Helps enhance vision and reduces fatigue.

Practice: Any time.

8.) Apana Mudra (Mudra of Digestion): mudra of digestion

The middle and ring finger are bent under the thumb while the pinky and index finger stand straight up.

Benefits: helps to regulate the excretory system, helps detoxify and stimulates bowel movements. Helpful at relieving constipation and piles.

Practice: 45 minutes daily

9.) Apana Vayu Mudra (Mudra of the Heart): mudra of the heart

The index finger bends to touch the base of the thumb while the middle and ring finger bend to touch the tip of the thumb. The pinky finger remains stretched out.

Benefits: stimulates healing of the heart and helps physically protect the heart. Can also help reduce gas and heart burn.

Practice: 15 minutes, twice daily

10.) Linga Mudra (Mudra of Heat): mudra of heat

Interlock the fingers of both hands but keep the thumb of the left hand pointing up. Take the right thumb and wrap it around the thumb so it touches the index finger of the right hand.

Benefits: helps to stimulate heat in the body, helps reduce phlegm and congestion, good for strengthening the lungs, helps to invigorate and balance the body.

Practice: Any time but do not over practice.

12 Healing Mudras,  Volume 1

The first 12 healing Mudras of vol 1 are: Guru mudra, Trajitam mudra, Jii mudra, Amrita mudra, Aghnya mudra, Raahu mudra, Danta mudra, Panjabhutani mudra, Tri stambha mudra, Naga mudra, Bhumi mudra and Svargatim mudra. These mudras can support your health..

from:    http://www.ewao.com/a/mudras-the-healing-power-of-your-hands/

Graham Hancock, Ayahuasca, & Consciousness

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By the time I got to Joshua Tree, Graham had already presented his main ideas formally, making this a real treat — an informal interactive session with the man who has unearthed so many of history’s treasures and put them into a meaningful and cosmic context.

Graham gave an account of his journey, beginning with his family roots in England and his horrific experiences being conditioned in a private school, then moving on to becoming a journalist with the ability to travel the world.  He had been an atheist until he was cracked open to a new concept of man’s history by encountering stories about the Ark of Covenant in war-torn Ethiopia.

This experience began his interest in “out of place technology.” Noting the connection between the Ethiopian stories of the Ark with his growing interest in the Ancient Egyptian texts, he dropped his atheism and became interested in spirituality — in “levels beyond levels” of reality that pointed to so much beyond the veil of what we take as truth.

Graham credits Robert Bauval with the “fundament breakthrough Orion correlation connection to Egypt,” which is the key breakthrough in tying Egypt to its past by discovering the connection to the stars of the constellation of Orion.

When he began writing about ancient mysteries Graham encountered what he described as the perils of academia; dedicated to making his case, he found that he needed to be beyond perfect with annotations and still he was criticized and vilified by conventional archeologists and historians.

One intriguing aspect of Graham’s insight is that he claims that you “don’t need ancient astronauts”; rather, the veils of consciousness can be lifted by using the resources of the earth itself, and specifically the chemical properties of plants like Ayahuasca to “open the doors of perception.”

Still, the monuments are key sources of inspiration and Graham believes that there is much to learn from the stars, citing how in terms of the ancient skies the constellation of Leo was aligned with the gates of the Sphinx.

Besides conventional academics, political skirmishes also inhibit many new discoveries, but Graham urges that it will take a cooperative and new scientific method, embracing openness, to bring many hidden aspects of reality to light.

A key discovery will be how, after “six million years of boredom” with different primates and versions of humans, there was a sudden leap in consciousness and intelligence signified by the cave drawings of the ancients such as at Lascaux, France.

While some attribute this to extraterrestrial intervention, Graham makes the point that a distinct type of psilocybin mushroom thought to only be in the Americas actually existed in Europe as well, and he posits that its effectA either contributed to or caused this enormous leap in the creative abilities of humans, and the birth of shamanic wisdom.

Graham became interested in the neuropsychology theory of cave art presented by David Lewis Williams of South Africa into deeply altered states of consciousness which suggested that it was psychotropic plants and the shamanic traditions that unfolded from their discovery that was responsible in the dramatic and sudden increase in intelligence among some human groups.

Graham agrees with Williams that the chemical agents in these sacred plants allowed humans to detach from materialism and evolve spiritually and intellectually very rapidly.”

Graham debunks conventional theories of Lascaux as merely paintings of animals our ancestors wanted to hunt for food; at Lascaux, for example, the main food item was reindeer but there is only a single painting of a reindeer in the cave, and it is portrayed with the feet of a duck.

At the same time, modern DNA tests have proved the existence of mushrooms in Europe.

This inquiry led Graham to conclude that he must experience the reality facilitated by shamans in altered consciousness, and so he went to the Amazon.

Here he became convinced that it is our “plant allies” that offer the opening to experience a suddenly expanded universe and discover truths about ourselves.

He was open about the experience in terms of having “Mother Ayahuasca” reveal to him his own hubris and arrogance in the 90s and his own toxic emotional tendencies. This changed him forever.

“Mother Ayahuasca” was the most powerful example of a disembodied intelligence or entity he found through the plant in his experiences, and She told him to write a book and to stop his dependence on cannabis, both of which he described in detail and which he followed thereafter, resulting in the novel Entangled.

In the novel he deals with one truth conveyed by the plant, that the Neanderthal peoples we currently see as primitive and crude were actually immensely telepathic, compassionate, and peace loving, and helped the humans until we surpassed them, and presumably wiped them out.

To his critics about using “chemical” or unnatural means of awakening he responds, “What could be more natural than a mushroom?” He said that he feels the need to personally experience everything he studies because otherwise it has the credibility of “celibate monks arguing about sex.”

Graham is passionate about the need for individuals to resist the efforts of the state to “control our consciousness” and believes this is an inalienable right of each human. He admits that this is “all British shit” and lauds the American people for reversing the trend electorally in states like Colorado and Oregon.

He summarized that “Mother Ayahuasca kicked my ass” in the state of pure consciousness and he was exposed to the multi-dimensional nature of reality.  Graham acknowledges the risks involved but compares them to mountain climbing or sky-diving.

He believes that Ayahuasca brings contact with disembodied intelligences and that plants are like antennae on the earth, receiving and transmitting a multitude of frequencies and energy.

Ayahuasca neutralizes inhibitors in the gut to open what Huxley called “The Doors of Perception” and open the user to the “intelligence in vine.”

Scientists believe that the force is

in the leaves of the Chacruna plant (p. viridis, containing the DMT element of the brew); but Graham believes the intelligence is in the vine and its connection to the soil and the earth, and that the vine harvests the leaves to affect the intelligence of beings, now humans, helping them to evolve.

He compares Mother Ayahuasca to the Goddess Isis in Egypt and described an experience where he was made to “weigh his soul” in the fashion of the Judgment Hall of Osiris in Egyptian lore. It was here that he confronted his own toxicity as a human and worked on his arrogance.

Graham cautions that in this state, nonphysical entities can take advantage and enter humans, which is why it is imperative to take the substance under the direction of an experienced guide or shaman. One can come under attack and be the victim of “psychic vampirism” by Trickster entities but the benefits are to forever broaden our concept of reality.

Finally Graham described his current fascination with the fact that 30 leading scientists attribute the end of the Ice Age 12,800 years ago to a cataclysmic comet impact, and his theory is that newly found ruins of advanced civilizations represent the efforts to preserve the knowledge and wisdom of a super civilization that perished at that time.

Graham says that the key lesson of the plant and many of his experiences is to silence the mind and “choose love, not fear.”

I felt privileged to be able to witness this remarkable individual for even this short period of time on a personal level, and I was struck by his humility and grasp of the widely disparate subject areas he presented and his unique ability to connect the dots. I also felt a kinship in terms of his many struggles to be accepted, his sense of being an outsider from a young age, his being an only child (as am I), and his discovery of his gift for the written word and exploration.

I almost blew off the event because of the ten hours of driving that it entailed but this was probably the most powerful lesson of all, that when life affords you a singular opportunity it is incumbent to accept — because our precious and privileged existence on this planet is truly a means of teaching and growth.

from:    http://www.collective-evolution.com/2016/06/20/graham-hancock-humanitys-true-origins/

Lucid Dreaming & Consciousness

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Lucid Dreaming as a Gateway to Spiritual Awakening

Lucid Dreaming Gate to Spiritual Awakening

24th June 2016

By Frank M. Wanderer, Ph.D.

Guest writer for Wake Up World

Allow me to draw your attention to an apparently surprising thing. If I told you that now, when you are reading these lines, you are in fact asleep, you would certainly believe that I have gone mad.

You are awake, you are concentrating your attention to reading, and you are aware of your environment as well. You can see the furniture of your room, you can hear the call of the birds from the nearby forest. You are also aware of your thoughts and emotions. How can anyone claim that you are asleep at this very moment?

Naturally, you – just like everyone else – sleeps at night. Yes, sometimes you see dreams while you sleep, but right now it is daytime, you are awake. So how could you see dreams?

You Imagine a Whole World Around Yourself

I believe that you do not only sleep at night, but also during the daytime. I believe that in your present state of consciousness, your greatest illusion is that you think you are awake. I believe that in your present existence, your greatest illusion is when you think that you are alert. What I see is that in your present state of consciousness you are asleep, and at present you are dreaming, and what you see and hear are all parts of your dream.

Your nighttime sleep is only different from your daytime sleep in that in the night your dreams are less active. During the day, you imagine a whole world around you, and you play an active role in that dream. Your personal history takes place in that world, and identifying with that world shapes your personal identity.

At present, you are dreaming that as a part of your personal history you are reading these lines while identifying with the role of the spiritual seeker, and you are outraged by what you are actually reading.

The question may arise, ‘Why do I claim that you are asleep and dreaming now?’. Well, from the state of consciousness I call Alertness, I can see that mostly, you are asleep, you believe yourself to be a separate self, you are a captive of the works of your mind.

You Are Not Present

What is the evidence for me to say that you are now asleep and, as a citizen of a dreamland, you are dreaming that you are awake?

It is because you are not present. To be present means that you are fully alert, attentive, and conscious in the present moment. Whatever you do, you do that fully consciously, you focus your entire attention on that particular activity.

Do you feel free to declare that you are present in every moment of your life?

What does it mean to be awake? It has happened to all of us that we have come under the spell of a moment, at some time during our life. A beautiful landscape, a sunset, a beautiful piece of art, the rhythm of music enchanted us. It may even happen that we are just lost in the silence of a peaceful moment. The identification with the forms and shapes loosens a little bit for a short while, and in that instant, we may experience an entirely different state of Consciousness.

You Live in a Separate World

How deep you sleep may depend on how realistic you find your dreams, how much you identify with your identity embedded in your personal history. The less alert you are, and the deeper you submerge into your dreams, the more isolated, solitary and individualistic you will become.

Liberation Through Lucid Living - Consciousness Within the DreamEvery sleeper –including you– has a separate world, only those who exist in the state of Conscious Alertness (the true Lucid Dreaming) have a common, shared reality. All those different and separate worlds are created by the mind, which generates the state of separateness: the Ego, which appears as the focus of our identification with our thoughts and emotions. Thus everybody has a separate identity, personal history, individual world view and methods of action.

Sometimes suffering alarms you from your sleep, but then you hasten to return to it, and start a new dream, a new objective in life, new ideals, passion, ambition that confirms your connection with your identity, rooted in your personal history.

The Reasons of Your Sleep

The reason of you sleeping is that you are not alert, only awake. Only one dimension of Alertness is present in you. Although you are able to focus your attention on your internal emotions and your environment, in your present state of Consciousness you are still powerfully identified with your mind and its functions.

You are therefore drifting on the stormy ocean of your thoughts and emotions day by day, and the space necessary for the emergence of a contemplating Witness is missing from you. You still identify with your thoughts and emotions. These generate the dreams of the Mind, in which you live as a separate self, and try to find the ways of safely navigating your life on the stormy sea.

Longing for Freedom

In this separate state of Consciousness, the lack of Alertness may appear as a desire for freedom. This desire emerges from your real self, as your mind remembers its origins. This atavistic memory of the ancient past is the quiet attraction that will eventually take you back to Silence.

This deep desire will only cease if you become alert again, that is, you will not be awake but also alert. Then the Consciousness awakens to its own existence in the human form you at present call yourself.

Only giving up the struggle with the thoughts and emotions and the recognition of the futility of insisting on them will bring you the real freedom, The freedom of independence of the functions of the mind.

Alertness, the awakened Consciousness, the world of internal silence are all beyond the functions of the mind. If you wish to reach beyond the identification with your thoughts and emotions, if you recognize the functions of the mind and the intensity of your identification with them loosens, you may become alert again, in the quiet, pure space of Consciousness.

In this way, the third dimension of Alertness, that is, the contemplating Consciousness, appears in your life. This the original state of our existence, the pure Consciousness, the state of the witnessing Presence.

This article was excerpted from the new book by Frank M. Wanderer, Ego – Alertness – Consciousness: The Path to Your Spiritual Home.

from:    http://wakeup-world.com/2016/06/24/lucid-dreaming-as-a-gate-to-spiritual-awakening/

Time to Exercise the Imagination

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Visualization: Are You Using Your Imagination Wisely?

By Christina Lavers
Contributing writer for Wake Up World

Imagination is our inner vision. It is the magical bridge between the everyday and the ethereal realm, the gateway between the finite and the infinite. Children naturally have vivid imaginations and use this innate faculty to explore and animate life. With the advent of science and rationality, a clear distinction between the fanciful and the concrete came to define our understanding of reality. The magical enchantment of the world largely receded into the cracks and humans were left to operate within the confines of the ordinary, the quantifiable, and the normal. We came to see imagination as something of little value, to be left behind in childhood.

Today we are rediscovering the importance of imagination. Quantum physics has transformed our understanding of the landscape of reality and our role in it. Quantum theory has forced the scientific community to question the assumption that consciousness cannot affect external reality. Increasingly, evidence demonstrates that due to the intimate way we are energetically entangled with all that exists, our thoughts do have the ability to affect our physical world. As a result more people are opening to the possibility that we can indeed use the power of our minds to influence what unfolds in our external reality.

An important way that we can use imagination to improve our quality of life is through visualization. Visualization is a cognitive tool using our imagination as a vehicle to explore an idea, action, or outcome. As a practice visualization can be used to rehearse, investigate, or induce a particular state of mind. For example we could imagine ourselves engaged in our dream job, picture ourselves in a highly relaxing scenario, or watch ourselves conquering a fear. The more we repeat the process and the richer we make the experience, the more entrenched the positive scenario becomes in our subconscious and thus the more likely it will be to manifest in reality. Of course there are many factors that influence us at unconscious levels. So, while visualization cannot guarantee any particular outcome, it is still seen as effective enough that today many professionals and athletes use this technique to help prepare them for events and challenging circumstances.

One of the reasons that visualization is such a powerful tool is that the subconscious and physical brain are not able to distinguish between what we experience in our external reality and what we see in our mind’s eye. It has been established that mental images (imagining/visualizing) activate the same parts of the brain as actual sensory input – this means that these parts of the brain can’t differentiate between real and imagined input. The brain will respond by releasing the same chemicals into the body regardless of whether the stimulus is real or imagined.

Here is an amazing example of what that can mean for us: Guang Yue, an exercise psychologist from Cleveland Clinic Foundation in Ohio, compared a group of volunteers who performed physical workouts with another group who only imagined doing virtual exercise in their heads. He found that a 30% muscle increase in the group who engaged in physical movement. However, the group of participants who only imagined doing the weight training exercises increased muscle strength by almost half as much (13.5%).

In another similar study, Brian Clark from Ohio University recruited 29 volunteers and wrapped their wrists in surgical casts for an entire month. Throughout this period, fifty percent of the volunteers thought about exercising their immobilized wrists. For 11 minutes a day, 5 days a week, they focused on seeing themselves flexing their muscles. When the casts were removed, the group that imagined doing exercises were found to have wrist muscles that were twice as strong than the group that had done nothing.

Another story that illustrates the power of mental visualization is described by Wenger in his book, “The Einstein Factor”. Wegner describes an American soldier who was a prisoner of war in Vietnam. For more than seven years this man was confined alone in a tiny cell with barely enough room to stretch his limbs. In order to maintain his sanity he played a detailed game of eighteen hole golf in his mind every single day. When he was finally released and allowed to return to the United States he found that without having stepped foot on an actual course for so many years, he managed to cut 20 strokes off his game (which is apparently pretty amazing!) just through using his imagination to visualize himself playing golf.

One of the reasons that visualization is such a powerful tool is that it allows us to engage and interact with our unconscious. While science is able to document some of what we are capable of at the deeper levels, there is still an enormous amount of mystery around what the unconscious actually is. It is not something that can be dissected and examined with a microscope. We may have mapped so much of our physical world, but our internal one is still largely uncharted territory. Many believe that the unconscious is in fact the wellspring of our personal reality and this is why visualization, which uses imagery and feeling to communicate with the unconscious, is so effective

However, when we understand that visualization is a tool that can help us shape our reality, it becomes clear that it is important to use it wisely. Unfortunately, for a majority of adults’ imaginative skills are most often used unconsciously, in conjunction with worry.

While it is important to allow feelings to be expressed, and a little worrying is part of a balanced approach to life because it can act as a trigger to propel us into action, all too often it is given so much energy that it becomes a destructive force in our life. If we see visualization as a tool to magnify our desires and communicate with our unconscious, we can see why it is so important to avoid coupling it with worry. Instead of floating down the stream of our imagination on the boat of trouble and trepidation, we would be better off using it consciously and constructively to reinforce a desirable outcome.

One of the most important conditions for successful visualization is to cultivate a relaxed state of mind. When our brains are operating at the soothing alpha level we are less likely to feel stress or engage in negative thinking. When we combine the relaxed alpha state, which encourages our brains to produce ‘happy’ chemicals (endorphins, serotonin etc), with vivid imagery and feeling, we create a powerful tool for making our dreams become reality.

Tips to Help You Visualize

Focus on the feelings (e.g. how do you feel being successful at a particular venture), as this is where the key communication is taking place. The more we can cultivate real feeling the more powerful the exercise will be.

Include as much sensory information and details as possible. Use smells, textures, colours, emotions to enrich and deepen the experience.

Repetition is helpful as the unconscious responds to the messages it receives consistently. (Which is why habitual negative self-talk can have such damaging consequences on what we create in our reality). However, make sure not to just go through the motions in your mind… remember that rich feeling is key.

Alpha states, which create ideal conditions for visualization can be encouraged through relaxing activities such as listening to soothing music (binaural beats are particularly effective), walking in nature, meditating, and dancing.

from:     http://www.zengardner.com/visualization-using-imagination-wisely/