Are You Being Honest in Who You are?

When you are content to be simple yourself…

everybody will respect you.

Verse 8 from the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu

We can usually detect when someone is “faking” it. We can feel when they are putting on an act, when they are being phony. Sometimes it may just be that feeling of unease when around the person. It could also be a dislike or intolerance of them. However it shows up, a person can tell when someone is not being honest in who they are and it usually has that person running for the hills.

There are many reasons that we may learn to put on an act. We could have been taught that who we are is not enough. We may have learned that only strength is respected or we might have been taught that showing emotions and feelings is a weakness. We may be afraid that someone won’t like who we are and reject us, so we are afraid of being hurt. So we put up a front and create a mask to fit in and soon the mask fits so well we are not even aware we are wearing it. However, there will be those who will sense it, who will know we are not being true to who we are. The question is: if you never show who you really are, you will never learn that the fears that created those masks are false. You will also never know the peace and serenity of being true to yourself.

Notice the questions that those who are close to you are asking. “Are you OK?” or “Are you feeling well?” from someone who knows you well, might be a sign to check and see if a mask has slipped into place. “You don’t seem yourself.” might be a clue to check in and see if one of your acts has come out and you are pretending for whatever reason. Maybe your acts are so good and so firmly on that even those close to you might not know they are in place. So then what? How do you know? The disquiet within yourself, the unhappiness that sneaks in for no reason, the melancholy and feeling that there must be something more could be signs that you are playing a part and not being true to yourself.

How do you find out who you truly are? How do you know when you are being your true self? When the opinion and comments of those around do not affect how you act and be. When we are operating from a place of true being then the words of others will not push us from the truth of who we are. They cannot shake the foundations of our core. It will not turn us from our path. Most of all follow your feeling and heart. The sense of peace and completeness that comes over you when you are walking your own path and being grounded in the truth of who you are can’t be denied. As with most things, follow your heart and the truth will be revealed.

In love and light



Is There A Gain When At the Expense of Others?

It has no desires for itself;

thus it is present for all beings.

Verse 7 from the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu

The Tao has no desires for itself. Being completely free of self desire allows it to not have any judgments about you and any other person in this world. To the Tao we are all equal and present within it. There is no better or worse, no greater or poorer, no good or evil. No judgments. We are all equal. We are all the same. We are part of the same whole. It is present in all beings.

Being part of the same whole, when we hurt or judge someone else, we are hurting and judging ourselves. When we blame and seek revenge upon another, we blame and seek revenge on ourselves. When we are kind and loving to another, we are kind and loving to ourselves. It is all connected.
Not only are we connected to each other, but to all that exists and everything that is. Thus if we strip and abuse this earth, we strip and abuse ourselves. If we pollute the waters and destroy other species, we strip and destroy ourselves. When we live in balance and peace with our environment, we are in balance and peace with ourselves.

As the Tao becomes more and more the way that you walk everyday, more and more you will realize that you can’t gain more for yourself at the expense of your neighbors, or of this world. The more you become one with the Tao the more you realize that every action you take affects everything around you. That your wants and needs are not more important or less important than anyone else’s. That to squander your resources while those around you struggle to survive is not the way of the Tao, because that means you are squandering resources from yourself. It is present in all beings; we are all the same and this world is meant to sustain us all.


In love and light


The infinite power in you.

…it gives to infinite worlds.

It is always present within you.

Verse 6 from the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu


Think about these lines for a minute. The power that has created an infinite amount of worlds, since the beginning of time, across this vast universe– it is always present within. At all times, in every moment, present within YOU! That amazing power is within you! So… what are you doing with it?
Are you using it to worry over paying the bills, berate the other driver who cut you off, tuck your child in at night, write a symphony, read to someone? Are you using it to curse at the cashier because you got the wrong change, smile and say hello to those you meet, create a business plan, walk the dog, demand more and more things to satisfy your need for instant gratification? Are you comforting a friend with it? Is it helping you to be creative or destructive? Whatever you are doing in your life, that awesome power is within you, it resides within you, and manifests itself into your life – everyday. However consciously or unconsciously you are using it, it is being used.
That power resides within you, the power to birth worlds, and you are using it. How do you begin to use it consciously and for the greatest good? How do we become a more conscious user of this power? How do you create your own infinite worlds in total awareness and deliberateness? You have already begun. By asking the “How” questions, you have taken the first step towards deliberate creation. Awareness that it is there and it is being used is the first step. Another step is to align yourself with your greatest and highest good. For each person this will look differently. There are no concrete answers. I think each person must feel their way to their highest good, into their true calling, into their dharma. Each person must seek what gives them that connection to source. And it is a connection. It is not you demanding, begging or persuading. It is a connection, a co-creation, when you and this power are aligned and working for a single purpose, your greatest good. Together as a single aligned being.
I, too, am still discovering the connection and how that looks for me. I would love to hear how you connect to source. Meditation is one way for me, walking is another. Listening to different music or seeing an amazing piece of art are still others ways that I can connect. The sounds of the ocean or moving water can also place me in that place of connection. Being completely in the moment of whatever you are doing, whatever that may look like, is a great way to connect to source. Each person will find different ways that work and even different things that work on different days. Remember it is always present within you, so you are never disconnected. The more you become consciously aware of that connection the easier it will become to create, deliberately, using this amazing power.
How will you know? When you have lost the sense of time moving, when you are immersed in pure joy and peace, when you feel bliss and stillness and wholeness. That is when you know you are within that power and that power is there to create your greatest good. As more and more people align themselves to their greatest good, the more this world will become aligned and we begin the walk toward lasting peace.

In love and light


What Defies Explanation, Yet Is So Simple?

The more you talk of it

the less you understand.

Verse 5 from the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu

I remember training someone who would be taking over the details of some of my everyday tasks at this one job I had a couple of years ago. I was moving up to a different position and he was learning the details of his new position. Before he would begin to learn what each task entailed, he had to know what it’s purpose was and why it had to be done this way. It was always the first question out of his mouth. He could not further into the training until he knew why. Luckily, since I had designed most of what he was doing, I always had an answer for him. I don’t know if the training really would have ground to a halt or not if he didn’t get his answer, but he was much more comfortable after he got his answers. Not everyone has to know the “why” before they can go on but there are some people who do. They have to understand the whole picture before they can grasp the tiniest bit of it. For me, most of the time, I only want to understand what I need to know so I understand how something will function in my life and then let the rest go. Every once in a while my curiosity gets peaked and I want the “why” also. At those times I want to have it all defined, categorized and filed just so, so I understand all of it. I can get where it’s coming from then. I can relate to it.

We like explanations. We like to understand. Have you ever been on the opposite side of a conversation and just not gotten what the other person is talking about? Not matter how much they keep talking and how much you try to understand you just DON’T GET IT! The more and more they spoke, the more and more you got lost and the more frustrated you got. They want you to understand, or be converted to their thinking. The distance between these two people will become more and more vast the more the words are used to explain. If it kept going it would seem like an insurmountable distance, like nothing that could be bridged.

So here I am every week, using more and more words, to explain. categorize and define the Tao to you. The Tao is something that defies explanation and yet it is the simplest thing in the world. It is you and it is everyone. So I write and write, hoping that what I am relaying makes sense and brings the Tao into clarity for you. In the end, words are not the way to explain. The Tao just is. The best way to understand it is to just be present every moment of every day in your own life.


In love and light


How Hard Are You Working to Avoid Your Truth?

It doesn’t matter,” he said… but in his heart he knew that it did matter. by Paulo Coelho in The Alchemist

With these lines we get a glimpse of the beginning of the boy’s journey. Here he starts out by stating, out loud, something he knew to be untrue. He was alone, except for his sheep, and yet he declared this out loud. I believe this was in an effort to convince himself of the truth of the statement. Still, his heart whispered it’s secrets to him and, even though he did not want to admit it, he still heard the whispering of his heart. As he progresses on his journey he will learn more and more to heed to the voice of his heart.

I have only recently learned to heed the voice of my heart. I’m still learning. I had no compass, no idea, no understanding of how to do this. I had learned, through example, that feelings were bad things. They were things that caused weakness and disrupted logic. This world loves a logical person. As a woman, if you show emotions and feelings, your ideas are dismissed and disregarded as useless or silly. So when I began to realize the power of my heart with it’s emotions and intuition, I had no idea how to heed it’s voice and incorporate it’s wisdom into my life. It was outside of my training. Often time I could not even identify what emotions I was feeling. This was because in the past I had denied so completely what I was feeling that my emotions were unrecognizable. The more I listened to and heeded my heart, the more I realized how truly powerful it was. I also realized that my greatest power was in getting my heart and my head to work together as a team. That power lies in the passion and inspiration of my heart, working in conjunction with the logic and problem solving of my head. Together they could change the world. Well, at least my corner of it.

When you find yourself caught in a logic loop, when you can completely justify each decision in prefect logic, or when you can’t seem to find an answer that works because they are all right, just step back for a minute. Take a deep breath and let your head have a break. Then check in with your heart. Put your attention into your chest and listen for your heartbeat. Stay that way for a minute. Then think about the challenge and see what you are feeling about the choices. Consider each option and see what your heart feels when you think about them. The more you practice this, the easier it will become. Each time it will become easier to distinguish what you are feeling. It may be frustrating at first, because you may be unsure of what you are feeling. Stick with it. Practice on little choices and work your way up to the bigger ones. Stick with it. They are an amazingly powerful team, the head and the heart. Well worth the effort it takes to train them.

In love and light


Where Are Ideas Born?

It is like the eternal void:

filled with infinite possibilities.

Verse 4 from the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu

Creation and creativity are what I think of when I read these lines. That place where all ideas and inspiration are born before they are manifested into physical form. The place where creativity resides before it comes and like a beautiful butterfly, lands lightly upon your shoulder and awaits your notice. It is the place before action, before thought, before even inspiration. The eternal void is where nothing exists and yet all things and more are present.
Think about a blank piece of paper. It is just a plain piece of paper, nothing on it. Nothing really special about it except for the possibilities of what it may become. Imagine all of the various things that this simple piece of paper could become. It could become a drawing, a marriage certificate, a homework assignment, a love letter, an origami crane, a piece of trash, or a representation of a cherished memory. Those are just a few of the things. Another person can come up with other ideas. Someone else will come up with a whole other set of ideas. On and on, there will grow an endless list of possibilities for just this one single piece of paper. The moment you take that paper and write on it, draw on it, print on it or fold it, all of those endless possibilities now narrow and collapse into a select few. Eventually all those possibilities will collapse down into one. It will remain like that until something else shifts or changes.

The eternal void is that paper. You can dip into it, dip into all that endless potentiality, and bring back pieces of it to manifest into this reality. Once you place your thoughts and actions upon that potential, it is molded and formed into a few likely scenarios. Before that…. before that it was vast, unknown, wide, expansive, so very big and enormous. The only limitations upon it were the limitations placed upon it by our own imaginations. The limitations that exist within our own heads. It is our thoughts and ideas and structures that cause the possibilities to collapse. It is our own imaginations that limit the potential of the eternal void.

Now imagine, if you can, that you find a way to be within the void, to exist within the endless possibilities, and not have the possibilities collapse around you. What if you could merge yourself into the void, exist within those endless possibilities, tap into that power and magnificence, and have it flow through you bursting spontaneously into creation and form and energy? What if? What could this world become with that? The possibilities are endless. Only limited by our own imagination.


In love and light