Dear Friends,
it has been several months since I’ve connected with all of you. During this time, I have been busy buying and selling a home and setting up my new space and yard. It was an extremely busy time that took much effort to create. But overall, I felt there was a flow to the experience and to how things opened for me. I was meeting many neighbors, getting out and exploring the area, finding people to help with my yard and home. I was feeling a lightness I had not felt in a while.
Then COVID hit me. For most of July I was sick with fatigue and a cough that lingered. The beginning of August I woke to my eyes and face swollen and burning. Years ago, I had developed a histamine intolerance and became sensitive to just about anything. Finding myself back in this place did not make me happy. I just started healing from this issue, when this past week, I reached down to pick up the dog’s dishes and my back went into spasm, That really took me by surprise as I had been diligent with my yoga practice and my body had been feeling good and moving with greater fluidity. Ok geez, what was going on?
The old part of me thought: “I shouldn’t’ have moved, I should have stayed where I was. Maybe l am not really being supported with this change.” But luckily, I have wise friends to help me challenge these thoughts, and I have developed enough wisdom to do it for myself but sometimes I fall into the victim role again before I even know it is happening.
After contemplation and discussion with these thoughtful beings, I realized that somewhere in my consciousness, and ancestor energy, I was still buying into the notion that there is only so much happiness we can have. Only so much joy that is allowed. Only so much comfort can be experienced. My ancestors and probably yours too, lived a life of struggle. Life was about surviving, not thriving. This energy gets passed down through the family lineage until someone challenges that thought and belief system to transform this energetic pattern.
I was feeling lighter than I had in some time and then somewhere in me an alarm went off. Danger ahead, too much joy on the horizon. Time to scale it back to a safe place!!! And even though these last 3 months have been challenging, it still felt comfortable on some level. How many times have you found yourself in a situation in which you started to feel happy, content, like life was really opening for you. And then, you have an argument with a loved one because the intimacy is too intense and good, something you haven’t experienced before. Feels scary. Or you finally have a chance to buy your dream home or start a new business that you have wanted to create in a long time, and then something prevents you from moving in that direction.
Those things that get in our way are only roadblocks if we let them be roadblocks. Or we can look at them and say, “okay, I’ve temporarily forgotten that my joy cup is not full yet. I’ve just reached back to a place of comfort. And that is okay. I’ll rest here for a bit but then I’m going to allow my cup to get fuller!” Here is a fun exercise. Ask yourself, if a cup Is the full experience of joy you can have, how full is yours currently? When I asked myself this question, I realized mine was only 40 percent full. And that is where I feel comfort. Anything over that, panic on some level sets in. Danger ahead, too much happiness on the horizon!!
The good news is that if I were to have done that exercise 20 years ago, I bet my cup was less full. And 40 years ago, probably even less full than that. Don’t’ get me wrong, I know things are going to happen in life that are less than optimal in which we have no control over. But I do believe, that even within those difficult times, we have the capacity to find some joy to fill our cups a little fuller. I have often spoken of the joy of simple pleasures. Watching birds in the feeder, deer meandering around, children playing, can all inspire happiness.
I think sometimes it’s difficult to find joy when we know so many other people in the world are experiencing great suffering. Or it could be someone we know is also having a very difficult time. It would be easy to default to finding some suffering in your own life to commiserate with that loved one or with the world. However, it is much more valuable to stay in a place of higher vibration of love, joy, peace and contentment. It is that energy, ultimately, that will help lift others with their suffering and raise the vibration of the world.
My reason for sharing this with you is to not only help myself to grow and open up to more joy in my own life, but to ask all of you to witness for yourself your joy limits. How full is your cup now? The world needs us to help raise the vibration of this planet for all sentient beings. The best. way we can do this is to reach to fill up our own cup and share our higher energy with another. I am not suggesting you share your energy in a gloating, “I’m luckier than you way”, but rather in a way that inspires others to reach for greater levels of wellbeing. When we see our loved ones happy, our own cup becomes a little bit fuller. If you are feeling good, content, and light, you will mirror this for others. However, ultimately it is up to them to choose this level of experience for themselves.
My challenge to all of us today is this: Can we choose a greater experience of joy this day, this moment. And will you share that joy with others?
Namaste,
Rosemary
Very nice
Thank you Steve.
You are a beautiful soul. I enjoyed reading this and like the % of the cup being full imagery. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and experiences.
Thank you dear Joy! You are a beautiful soul too.