DEFINING CHANGE
Change - the act or instance of making or becoming different - is a natural and inevitable part of life. Change itself isn’t good or bad; it’s simply a state of evolving from one thing, circumstance, or expression to another.

Change can be centered around something exciting and positive like starting a new job, buying a dream house, retiring, or welcoming a new addition to the family. It can also be prompted by more challenging situations like a medical emergency, a tragic loss, a change of role, or when a person or relationship enters a new stage of growth and development.

What does it mean to have identity? It’s a challenging concept to define because identity isn’t tangible. It is an essence. A quality of individuality.

Of youness.

Identity isn’t defined by something a person does. It is an embodied practice...

“When you get clear on how you want to feel, the pursuit itself becomes more satisfying.” -Danielle La Porte, The Desire Map

It’s the time of year when people talk about starting parts of their lives a-fresh and commit to New Year’s resolutions. Resolutions involve setting specific goals or commitments for the upcoming year. While these can be helpful for some people, they often focus on external achievements and tend to only address particular “symptoms” in life rather than the real goal of making change —

“With our thoughts, we make the world.” — Buddha

As a supportive supplement to last month’s article on The Law of Attraction, this month I’m sharing the basics of Sex Magic.Sex is an act of creation and sexual energy is one of many potent natural forces that can be harnessed to induce an altered state. You might’ve experienced this yourself already in the bedroom as a state of ecstasy, bliss, or euphoria, especially during or after sexual climax.

The Law of Attraction is a powerful spiritual concept that suggests that we shape our lives and experiences through the thoughts and emotions we cultivate.

This is built upon the premise that we are the Creators of our own realities.

Thanks to spiritual teacher, psychiatrist, and physician, David R. Hawkins, we now have evidence that our thoughts and emotions emit different vibrational frequencies. Drawing from the notion of “like attracts like,” the universe responds by bringing us circumstances and experiences that match those vibrations.

I believe that to be in-relationship, especially a romantic and/or sexual relationship, is to be on an ever-evolving spiritual journey of self-love, co-creation, and knowing the self more deeply.

Relationships are meant to reflect back to us the false stories we created about ourselves and the world as children (awareness), and to be the portal through which we let go of those stories (surrender and integration) and re-member ourselves as the divine Creators of our lives.

It is my lived experience and the experience of so many of the clients I support that our primal drive for sexual connection, erotic expression, and even intimate relationships actually have little to do with the sex, procreation, or even pleasure…

Now that I am on the other side of so many of my early traumas (childhood sexual abuse and incest, emotional abuse and neglect, codependence, poor boundaries, and more), I finally recognize that the pursuit of sex, connection, and the erotic has actually been about knowing the self more deeply –

Or about coming into a fuller expression of one’s unique divine essence.

If you’ve experienced any kind of trauma or other types of experiences that still intrude or interrupt your everyday life, this article offers some basics on how past trauma influences the present body-mind - and introduces you to some effective ways to bring yourself back into physical/emotional/mental balance when you’re in the midst of struggle.

Did you know your body remembers everything that has ever happened to you? And more than that, it stores memories from your ancestral line and even your past lives?

In a 2008 Review: The Effects of Trauma, with or without PTSD, on the Transgenerational DNA Methylation Alterations in Human Offsprings, they found evidence that trauma can be passed between generations epigenetically, which means that trauma experienced by an ancestor might be affecting the way your genes are expressing today.

Play is a critical part of learning and developing, both physically and mentally.

Pleasure and play do something really unique to the brain. They elicit chemicals that rewire it in ways that can help you:

-Make mental connections more easily
-Spark creativity and motivation
-Increase innovative thinking, and
-Open to new perspectives

We are born into this reality whole and complete and with a unique divine story to play out - but we learn from a very early age - through modeling, conditioning, and reinforcement - that it isn’t safe to embody all of who we are.

As we continue to be shaped to fit in and molded to become civilized members of society, we learn to only allow the (societally-sanctioned) good parts of our nature to be seen, and that the bad parts are to be rejected, ignored, and hidden.

This fracturing is at the heart of the shadow self.

WHAT UNCONSCIOUSNESS LOOKS AND FEELS LIKE

To be unconscious is to identify only with this physical reality. To rely only on the five senses to move through the world. To think you are your body, your emotions, your thoughts, your intellect. To believe your mind has no power over your reality and that what comes your way in life is simply a lucky or unlucky coincidence.