Happy Yule!

Well what a year it has been - so many changes for so many and so many more on their way. The moon is definitely shifting things for us as it nears towards its 18.6 year major lunar standstill in June/July.

I am so grateful to all of you who have supported Beinspired this year. Our community has grown in ways I could never have imagined with so many of you finding the courage to deep dive into the various spiritual practices and come to know yourself on a deeper level, letting go of unhelpful conditioning, habits, beliefs and thinking patterns (Samskaras) in the process. It has been an honour and a privilege to witness the transformation. 

We can expect more light flooding in now with Yule upon us (thankfully!). The sun has reached a standstill and won’t continue rising/setting any farther south, and will start swinging more northerly instead. It will rise higher in the sky too, bringing much needed light and warmth to the northern hemisphere, and energy to all those dormant seeds.

The annual solar movements along the horizon from one solstice to another describes a year. Thus the winter solstice, known in the olden times as Yule, celebrates the return of the light, from now onwards the hours of light lengthen each day.

This is a time for us to begin to tend to our seeds too, taking little steps in the direction of our hopes and dreams. The path ahead may not be clear and this can be scary - the unknown and the uncertain have a habit of bringing up fear - but we are asked to trust the light as it appears, just taking one step in front of the other, following the nudges and signs from the universe while balancing the heart and discernment. 

Ultimately this is a time to open to greater trust. We trust the sun will rise in the east and set in the west each day. We trust that the inhalation will be followed by the exhalation. And so we must trust in our intuition, inner guidance and inner knowing - we always know what to do, even if the self deprecating ego tells us otherwise or makes us doubt ourselves. 

If this does happen - if we get in our own way - then we can ask the question,

“If I keep doing this, how will things be in three months? … in six months? …in a year?”

Typically things will have come worse, sometimes much worse. Let this help to inform your choices and the decisions you make as you head increasingly towards the light, enlightening yourself in the process.

Happy Yule all of you and thank you from the bottom of my heart for the love and the energy which you each bring to Beinspired - even if it is simply reading these blogs!

As a gift, please find another video so that you may practice at home. This is for you Helen and all the rest of you who might explore the letting go that emphasis on the forearms brings. A huge thank you to my teacher, Louise, for helping me appreciate just how amazing the forearms are in helping us breathe. 

Thank you too to Helen for all the philosophical sharing and the pranayama practices too. 

I look forward to seeing some of you over the festive period and more of you during 2025.

Love Emma x

Stepping forward

Well that was another potent full moon asking us to let go and move forwards in our life. It wasn’t comfortable for many of us because of the courage needed to do the letting go an the faith needed to overcome the fear of stepping forward into the unknown. It reminded me a little of a quote from one of Rebecca Campbell’s books:

“In order for the new to arrive, we must first allow the old to shatter. Sometimes this happens on its own. And sometimes it requires that we do the smashing. To tear apart what we’ve built because things have changed, including you. To admit that while it was once aligned, now it no longer is. This smashing requires both courage and faith. Courage to let go and faith that the pieces will come back together again in a way that was more aligned than it was before”

I certainly seem to be going through a re-alignment in my own life as the moon follows its major lunar standstill pattern and I know many of my clients are in a similar position. What fascinates me is the manner in which my menstrual cycle has shifted, so like when trying to conceive, evaluation occurs around the creative potency of the full moon, as if allowing more energy to make the changes which need to be made, to allow the potential birthing of a new way…the menstrual cycle never ceases to amaze me with its moon connection and it’s inherent wisdom.

For those new to the idea of working with your menstrual cycle as a spiritual practice to greater levels of consciousness, then take a look at our resource section on this website and have a read of our free Menstruation and Moon Pack. I also highly recommend Lisa Lister’s book called Code Red. If you don’t have time then just remember that the moon is always communicating with us and our menstrual cycle too will allow you to understand where you are out of alignment with your truth - it literally helps you to navigate your life in a more conscious way. I wrote about this in my own books, available on Amazon, called Dancing with the Moon and From Darkness Comes Light.

On a completely different note, but talking of consciousness, I recently watched The Corporation, a documentary on, well, corporations, and their impact on consumerism and greed, and this at the exploitation of people and indeed this beautiful planet. I am sure you know much of it already, but it clearly hammers the message home - that if we want to see positive change on this planet, then we need to make those changes individually, this is where the true power comes. I am always reminded of Gandhi’s famous quote,

“Be the change you wish to see in the world”

Really though, this was the theme of the moon and will be as the lunar standstill unfolds; to step into our power individually and indeed collectively. I feel that we have a really good chance of changing things, lessening our grip, our greed then, on consumerism and making different choices, which are more aligned with heart and the needs of this planet, our real needs too, not the ones we have been conditioned towards, but the ones that truly make us thrive as a spiritual being having a human experience on Planet Earth.

The documentary will remind you to choose your products carefully, to be mindful of the impact of their production on this planet and indeed the many humans involved in the chain. It is very easy, especially at this time of year, to turn a blind eye and just buy for the sake of buying without considering the welfare of the workers who produced the product, or the implications on the planet, but we have to try to be conscious because everything has a vibration and you are bringing that vibration into your home or into another’s.

This isn’t just the big things, but the little things too. What toothpaste do you put in your mouth and what impact is that having on your health and energy field, let alone the planet? What about the deodorant you put on your armpits, is it full of chemicals? Where was that crystal mined? Did children manufacture that football kit? How was the cocoa for that box of chocolate’s grown and collected? What about that tree, where was it cultivated and at the expense of what land? How many chemicals were sprayed on the food you will eat? Were those prawns farmed in really crappy (literally) waters? And what about that turkey, how much did it suffer?

Of course there is no perfect. We have to weigh it all up depending on our economic position as much as our level of integrity and general awareness and access to information which might allow us to make a more informed decision. But we have to remember that it does all make a difference, not least to us individually, but to us collectively too. If we just go along with what we’re being sold by marketing companies and those who are trying to be ‘in control’, then we can just expect more of the same, we always have a choice…but we don’t always realise this.

So choose wisely. And yet know that your choices will change as your level of consciousness shifts too. We cannot regret, because decisions made in the past were made based on our level of consciousness at that time, and all changes, including us.

This is a time for taking a deep breath and stepping forwards. It does take courage and faith because we don’t always know where we are headed and that is when the fear comes in. But we have to dig deeper into trusting ourselves and the messages we might be receiving from the moon and the stars and the universe at large. We just have to take that first step and allow the light to unfold bit by bit, making the path ahead clearer as we embark into the unknown and the uncertain but knowing and being certain that we are held and protected in the process. It is in this way that we will reclaim our power and experience greater love.

Happy realigning and conscious buying as we head towards the solstice.

Love Emma x

Grounding ourselves in these shifting times

It would appear that we are being asked to release and let go whatever is holding us back and is unhealed from our past, at the exact same time as being asked to step into our future self. It is discombobulating and a little overwhelming as I know some of you are feeling too.

The energy is intense, we are being upgraded for want of a better word, our hearts are being cleared out and old patterns are being brought to the surfaces along with the related thoughts, emotions and conditioning. Forgiveness hangs in the air and a release of anger and frustration and indeed sadness and grief that underlays this.

Guilt and shame are in the ‘field’ too. We are beginning to see more clearly through our own stories and narratives and the ways we may have taken responsibility for others’ poor behaviour or inability to do the work on themselves and we are realising that we don’t need this additional weight in our life and on our shoulders.

We are beginning to feel our auric holes too. I stumbled up against my own around guilt, for example, and how we may have taken on such a detrimental emotion since childhood and because it is there - because we take on the blame (or whatever the emotion is) - we attract more of it, allowing others to dump their blame or shame or whatever it is on us. It’s funny really because during this revelation, I had a few missed calls from the police station and immediately felt guilty, even though I had done nothing wrong, proving my point to myself!

Shame is popping through too and I know I am not the only woman who has had to work through this. We can’t win in our society, we experience judgement whether we are a stay at home mum or one who works all hours she can, same with termination, there is still so much stigma so that many women suffer intense feelings of guilt and shame, even though it takes two to conceive, and the other option, of potential single parenting isn’t received well either.

We have to remember that our emotional states are often linked to a sub-conscious thought or thought pattern. Whenever we are pulled away from our natural state of being to a more contracted state of being then we can be sure that we are thinking about our reality in a way that allows a particular mood to arise. Disliking the mood or yourself for having the mood is pointless. This because the mood expresses our need for self-reflection (Kriya yoga).

As I have been reminded, nature never acts without reason. Therefore every form of disease, physical or mental, encourages reflection. There is a note of caution here - we must not fall into patterns of thinking that we deserve whatever is happening to us as this is nothing more than a form of self hatred. Nor does it mean that the universe has it in for us, and is trying to show us something, This follows on from my previous blog post in that we still subject ourselves to the Judeo-Christian god of judgment under a different name (be discerning about new age spiritualism as it encourages this judgement with its emphasis on only perceived positive emotions and states of being, we have to move away from this conditioning).

If we are honest with ourselves - and this current energy is helping us with this - we will find that our ‘bad day’ (or weeks, months etc!) was/were probably caused by a negative thought-pattern, which we may not have noticed at the time, but which we believed and spun into a story about our reality, which is actually untrue and merely disempowers us.

Nothing exhausts us more than our well-spun stories which are not in alignment with reality.

Do we really need to feel guilty or shamed about what happened? Is the story we have created around the emotion and/or the thought true?

The trouble is we don’t realise our stories because we are so immersed in them, which is why it is helpful having someone mirror them back to us or question us on them (spiritual life coaching is brilliant for this btw), or for us to take time for self-reflection through various yogic practices. This is the joy of yoga. It has been prod for thousands of years and understand ALL of this and the ways we create our suffering and certainly the ancient texts offer our grounded guidance in how to set ourselves free. This is another reminder not to fall victim to new age approaches which are not grounded in any ancient wisdom.

We also have to be very mindful of the patterns we have created to avoid the self-reflection. Say we have a bad day because we feel we did something wrong, perceived a criticism from a boss perhaps and even though the boss didn’t mean it that way, we internalise it so, and while the boss moves on with his/her day, letting go of the moment the caused us to enter a bad mood and begin our bad day, we take it home with us and reach for wine or TV or social media or tub of ice cream to buffer our mood rather than feel into it.

What really happened was the interaction with our boss reignited our persistent and incessant subconscious story that we “always screw things up”, or we “are not good enough”, or we “should have known better”, which creates deeper self loathing and hatred. This negativity, buried deep within us, creates our experience of reality. Especially as we will see evidence of it everywhere now in our reality. This like my experience with guilt - because I was so used to feeling it, I called more of it, from the police who never did call back btw, once the lesson was learned - a cosmic joke to highlight my unhelpful and outdated pattern.

All of this of course, removes us from our natural flow and presence.

So the energies currently are helpful in that they are helping to bring the sub-conscious to the conscious so that we can let go of unhealthy stories and move our lives forward in a more positive direction.

It’s an amazing opportunity really to be the change we wish to see in the world.

The more of us who can find the courage to dig deep and shift the stories, the more this will influence the whole and the more we will let go of our disdain for self and our fears and become increasingly self-loving and whole.

Generally people have had enough of the patriarchal crappiness, of world leaders behaving like boys in a playroom with their missiles and guns, playing our their unresolved inner child. So we must look at our unresolved inner child too.

The pace of life is too much for many, but the only way this will change is if we step off the treadmill and draw a line in the sand. Increasing numbers are choosing simplicity and shifting their understanding of abundance away from material gain at the expense of everything (including the planet and their fellow man) and realising the abundance in walking in nature, or being quiet at home with children, or watching the sun set, or any of the other gifts we experience in our lives which we don’t always value because they are not material (and we have been conditioned to the material).

Increasing numbers are questioning our education system and the confusion over gender identity that our children are having to navigate, let alone the damage caused by online living and social media, and the detrimental vibrational effect of holding mobile telephones and iPads endlessly (I see how jittery the later makes my boys, displacing their Vata), and the manner in which they cause a loss of ability to focus and concentrate.

More are seeing through the many ways that we are being harmed by the big companies, and the drive towards profit at whatever cost to us as an increasingly sick society.

At the end of the day we have to take responsibility for us and our healing and certainly the powers that be are encouraging this. We can do this! We can make the positive changes, to free ourselves of patriarchal, Judeo-Christianity and new age conditioning, so that we can increasingly see reality as it is and free ourselves from our false stories and narratives, and ease our self-inflicted suffering simply because we don’t see ourselves - our true Self -clearly.

Yoga helps, Reiki too, but any spiritual practice grounded in reality, will give us the support we need at this time. The word to really drop into is ‘grounded’. Our grounding, our base chakra, our being in the body, our attending to our basic needs for sleep, good food and healthy relationships, our hands ion the earth, salt baths, baking with love, walking in nature, sea swimming, all of this will help enormously.

Sending love xx

Interdependence in community

We’re deep diving people. Pluto has entered Aquarius (which appears to be a big deal) and Mercury is retrograde, but that aside the moon has also entered its major lunar standstill year and the last two weeks especially have been intense - well since the eclipses in September/October.

And you can expect more as the energy is really ramping up ahead of the peak of this 18.6 year major lunar standstill which takes place in June and July of 2025. This when the moon will rise its lowest in the sky, and up in the Outer Hebrides, for example, the full moon nearest the solstice will only be present for a few hours - the stones of Callanish have been aligned with this so that on the major lunar standstill it appears as if the full moon rolls along the hills.

The last time we experienced the major lunar standstill (which basically means the moon rises and sets the most extreme of the sun, and will be super high at full moon around the winter solstice rising and setting the opposite of the sun, so more northerly and then around the summer solstice it will be very low in the sky, rising and setting most southerly, again the opposite of the sun) was 2006, which funnily enough was the year I set up Beinspired.

In fact it was the year that yoga really exploded into the world. It moved away from being practised in church halls by ladies wearing leotards, into the huge billion dollar industry it is today where commercialism encourages us to invest in expensive mats and yogis clothing to realise our inner nirvana - or not, as the case may be.

In fairness here in Guernsey we are protected a little from what it has become elsewhere in the world, and the pandemic sorted some of it out in any event, because yoga started losing its widespread popularity and yet those committed went deeper - at least this was my experience and with my students too; my student base is vastly different now to how it was pre-pandemic, there is much greater commitment, students are in it for the long term, not just as a fad.

Anyway the point in sharing this, is to highlight that the year that the moon does her major thing, is a year where things are renowned for changing, like significantly, like we take a step forward in our individual and collective evolution, consciousness then. How this manifests remains to be seen, but I do have a sense that increasing numbers of us are called to play our role in making holistic therapies and alternative healing practices more available to the populace to allow greater opportunity for healing.

I am always reminded that we are not in control, that despite our best planning, sometimes things are just not meant for us. I am always reminded too that we don’t create alone - sometimes the universe’s plans for us are indeed very different to our own idea of where our life is going - a reminder not to plan too far ahead (but we do this because we want things known and certain). Ultimately decisions are often made for us if we give them the space, if we don’t restrict their freedom by over planning our life and making it rigid instead.

I have done my fair share of over planning and pushing and of using will power alone through ambition, desire and impatience, but it never quite turns out the way I had hoped, and I then have to unpick what was created, and allow something greater to enter in. Maybe it was always meant to be that way. There is no perfect either and the only way we learn is through our mistakes. This is where forgiveness is helpful. Forgiving ourselves, letting go and moving on.

I don’t feel we know yet where our lives are headed or what it is we should do. Instead our focus might be on knowing what not to do. .Thus we might start asking ourselves, what can we discard? What emotions are we holding onto which can be let go of now? What belief systems are we still buying into which limit us? Which negative thoughts still shape our reality? What are we carrying for others which is not ours to carry?

As I know only too well myself, a degree of honesty is required.

And being present to ourselves.

For me that means being very quiet on my mat and allowing my body’s intelligence to reveal more of the stuckness and holding. It means being in nature as much as I can be so that I can hear more clearly and recognise increasingly that I am part of the whole, not separate from it. It means communing with standing stones and the moon to elevate my perspective.

At times it is scary.

At other times I am filled with deep love and gratitude for this process.

But mainly I am grateful to receive the support of all the wonderful beings, Earthside and Ethereal, who support me, the people, the birds, the plants, the guides, all are there, communing with us, reminding us that we are not alone, that we are part of this whole wonderful dance of creation…and destruction…and creation again.

I have also become increasingly conscious of something that seemed important to me when I set up Beinspired, but without really knowing the reason: the idea of creating a Beinspired community where people could feel safe being themselves without fear of judgment, has always been one of Beinspired’s main intentions, but it is only now, all these years on, 18.6 in fact (ain’t that funny, a whole lunar standstill cycle) that I can see how that has finally manifested (reminding us of the need for patience!) into something rather magical.

I have never loved teaching and giving treatments more than I do now, with such a beautifully dedicated and committed community of clients and students who are truly committed (there’s that word again) to their healing and ongoing spiritual and personal transformation. We have a laugh. It’s fun. We care about each other. Being in community really does enhance each of our healing and transformation in ways I never imagined.

My Mum shared this beautiful quote by Ernest Hemingway this morning, which sums it up well, how a hand can help:

In our darkest moments, we don’t need solutions or advice. What we yearn for is simply human connection—a quiet presence, a gentle touch. These small gestures are the anchors that hold us steady when life feels like too much.

Please don’t try to fix me. Don’t take on my pain or push away my shadows. Just sit beside me as I work through my own inner storms. Be the steady hand I can reach for as I find my way.

My pain is mine to carry, my battles mine to face. But your presence reminds me I’m not alone in this vast, sometimes frightening world. It’s a quiet reminder that I am worthy of love, even when I feel broken.

So, in those dark hours when I lose my way, will you just be here? Not as a rescuer, but as a companion. Hold my hand until the dawn arrives, helping me remember my strength.

Your silent support is the most precious gift you can give. It’s a love that helps me remember who I am, even when I forget.

Then I read the I Ching, and I loved what it said in the translation I use:

“It is the nature of being human that we are dependant in many ways; dependant on water, air and food for nourishment; dependent on shelter for warmth and protection; dependent on each other for family life and friendship. We are also spiritually dependent: when challenges arise, each of us must have some place to turn for guidance and support”.

This is what Beinspired is all about. We are deep diving. It is tough. Endings. For the new beginnings. Emotions are coming up, deeply buried ones too - anger, sadness, grief, the heart is releasing, lightning itself so that more love and compassion can enter instead, the centre is feeling the fear but encouraged to rest more easily into it, not numb or run from it - we are being asked to transform, to let go over and over again without falling into patterns of victimhood or revenge. We are being asked to take responsibility and compassionately find a new way forward, independent and yet dependent, on our own and yet together, interdependence perhaps. It is the paradox of life to be able to hold both sides of tension and allow something else.

Please do reach out if it all gets too much. Know that you are not alone, that we are here at Beinspired to help, that we can be interdependent within community.

And thank you to all of you for taking responsibility, allowing your vulnerability and being part of this magical little community by just being your beautiful selves with warts and all!

Love Emma x

Happy Samhain!

Today is Samhain, the day of the dead and the dying parts of us that now need to be let go so that we can make way for the new beginnings that the new moon may usher in tomorrow. It’s a poignant time, the veil is thinnest between the worlds, a great day for meditation and communing with other realms, entering them if you can.

At Samhain the dark half of the year commences. It is a truly magical time. We have to remember that death is always followed by rebirth and I love that the new moon appears so soon. Tomorrow then really does mark the beginning of a new year. But remember celebrations today begin at sunset, when the darkness arrives. Light is always born out of darkness. We must remember this. Darkness is fertile with all potential - embrace it!

My concern these days is that new age spiritualism rejects the darkness and the darker parts of ourselves, in its quest to fulfil the light and love potential. Yet we do not know light an love without darkness and dismay, without the anger and the frustration and our sheer rage.

Today offers you the chance to rest and reflect on the past and to dream new beginnings. The seed now hidden in the earth let us not forget, will germinate in its season. So we look for seeds within ourselves. Yet, we also have to remember that there is a timing to everything and certainly the rug was pulled and doors closed for many of us with the recent eclipses and it may be just a little bit too soon to know where we are heading. We might just have to sit in discomfort of the not knowing for a little while longer yet, and that’s OK too.

What’s called for is patience. This is a word which is coming up a lot for my clients lately. Sit patiently and wait. This is a time to rest, renew and clear out the old. The new will appear in just the right time.

Enjoy it all!

Love Emma

That annoying thing called imposter syndrome

I have many talented clients who are keen to offer Reiki or other holistic and trauma-based therapies, teach yoga and/or write books, but let the imposter syndrome get in the way.

This is a syndrome which essentially tells you that you are not good enough to offer whatever it is that you are wanting to offer, that you don’t know enough, aren’t clever enough, expert enough, knowledgeable enough, that you don’t have the right qualifications, that you won’t be able to do a good job, that compares you to others and concludes that there’s too much competition anyway and that you will never be able to make a go of it etc.

But really when it boils down to it, it shows that you just care too much what others think of you and that you don’t recognise your own magnificence.

It also shows that you don’t trust spirit and/or have faith in whatever it was that gifted the idea in the first place.

And that you are Ok about selling out on your heart.

It might also indicate that you have forgotten that we co-create in this life and it is about so much more than you.

We let our ego get involved.

This is the self-depreciating ego which tells us that we are not loveable, or good enough, or enough of this and that, or too much, or whatever other negative self-depreciating inner narrative we repeat over and over again and make manifest in our lives simply because we are always seeking validation of this negativity and embedding it deeper into our psyche and belief system.

If we look for trouble, we will see only trouble.

If we look for love, we will see only love.

If we look for validation of our uselessness, we will see it everywhere.

It is all about perspective.

And we have a choice.

We can keep limiting ourselves with all this negative crap, or we can choose to shift our mentality to something far more positive and expansive and live our best life.

It’s not our fault. We have been conditioned since birth to question ourselves, to doubt ourselves and to be down on ourselves.

We are constantly criticised for not being intelligent enough, or quick enough on the sports field, or arty enough, or musical, or thoughtful enough, or kind enough or polite enough, or not wearing the right clothes, or saying the right thing, or walking down the corridor correctly, or sitting still, or any of the other many, many ways that we are told how to be and judged for behaving differently.

No wonder so many are so tired.

This trying to be what others want us to be and this caring what others think and the hyper vigilance this requires, is really rather exhausting. It creates so much insecurity, anxiety and depression. It causes us to lose our centre, close our hearts and, at times, think we are negatively losing our mind.

Consumerism thrives on this insecurity. It thrives on our externalising of our worth. Of caring too much what others think. People make millions selling products that we are told will help us feel better about ourselves. Even in yoga, it has become all about the building or the mat or the clothes we wear, and this when yoga is absolutely an internal practice.

But that aside, it is crazy isn’t it, to base our self-esteem and sense of self on other people’s fleeting thoughts. Watch your own mind and ask yourself, “what thought will I think next?”, and watch the constant stream of thoughts that appear from the ether in all their randomness. Thoughts come and go. The trouble is we give them far too much energy and believe that they are a concrete representation of reality. They aren’t. So why on earth we care what other people are thinking about us or the opinions they hold one us (which are just thoughts) is quite beyond me.

If we don’t care about our own thoughts - and we really shouldn’t, especially those self depreciating ones, then why on earth should we care about other people’s thoughts? And this to the detriment of our experience and quality of life.

Because when we care too much, it stops us fulfilling our potential, it limits us and it keeps us stuck. And slowly a part of us begins to die, to give up, to feel hopeless, to accept our miserable lot. We close down to excitement and joy, we let our head drop, we drink more wine, eat more junk food, watch more TV, spend more time meaninglessly scrolling through social media, we might manifest illness and we tell ourselves all sorts of stories to justify why we won’t bother trying to move our life forwards and step into our power, share our gifts with the world, just yet.

Sometimes we are scared of failing. Or scared of our potential success.

Somewhere though, we have forgotten that there is a bigger picture.

You see spirit works through us. It wants to co-create with us. It needs us to be the channel and vehicle to bring more heart and soul onto this planet. The trouble is we block this flow by getting in our own way.

We make it all about us, rather than the people who may benefit.

We forget our place in the cosmos.

Maybe I am lucky. I didn’t intend to teach yoga or Reiki or offer Ayurveda. I only signed up for my yoga teacher training course because I wanted to immerse myself in yoga. Together with Reiki it had quite literally saved my life and I wanted to learn all I could about it. I also wanted everyone else on the planet to practice yoga because I knew how much it might help to ease our individual and collective suffering.

It was the same with Reiki. My Reiki Master had to really encourage me along to the first attunement session as I didn’t feel good enough. I was quite sure that the Reiki wouldn't work for me and when I was the only one in the room who didn’t feel a thing during the attunement itself and certainly didn’t see colours or have a sense of energy beings, i concluded that I definitely wasn’t good enough.

But alas a seed was sown and I found myself attending the Level Two training. It was the pendulum dowsing that got me really. I just couldn't believe that it actually worked for me. It was life changing. I slowly started to connect with, and trust, my intuition. It helped that I had by then started receiving spiritual life coaching using Reiki and the Reiki had been working its magic in my life, this to the extent that I wanted everyone else on this planet to benefit.

It was the same with Ayurveda. It felt like magic. I couldn’t quite believe how changing my diet in such an ancient way and taking some medicinal herbs could create such a profound difference in my energy levels and my relationship with myself. The pre-menstrual symptoms which had plagued me for years dissipated. The cysts on my ovaries healed. My disordered eating eased. The overwhelm and accompanying depressive moments abated. I was sleeping better. My digestive system was consistent. I wanted to learn as much as I could. I wanted everyone to try Ayurveda.

And so I ended up teaching yoga and Reiki and becoming an Ayurvedic lifestyle and nutrition consultant simply because I wanted others to experience the benefits for themselves.

I felt as if I had been given these incredibly sacred gifts and the only way I can truly thank the powers that be, is to share these gifts with others. My teachings and sharing then come from a place of deep gratitude.

Not only that, but I realise spirit is just moving through me. I don’t own any of it. Even Beinspired is not mine. It came in at just the right time and it has shaped itself.

The moments when I take myself too seriously, make it all about me, or try in some way to control things, especially Beinspired, is the time it all goes to pot. That I have learned the hard way.

And yes of course, I too have suffered imposter syndrome. Every time I offer something new, I can feel a creeping of anxiety and start questioning my ability and hear myself saying something like, “who do you think you are offering spiritual life coaching, do you really feel you have the qualifications/training/knowledge to help coach others spiritually, and can you honestly charge people for what you are offering?”

I hear those thoughts.

But then I also know that the idea to offer spiritual life coaching was not about me, it was about the people who may benefit from my sharing my passion for yoga, Reiki and Ayurveda, and all the many spiritual practices I have explored these last 20 off years. That is not supposed to sound arrogant, as if I am better than anyone else, I am not. But with all that I offer, it just suddenly comes in as a possibility, I haven’t gone searching for it.

The yoga teacher training course was the first of its kind and arrived on my penultimate day in Byron Bay when I was wondering what to do next with my life, but knowing that I wanted to continue immersing myself in yoga (you can read more about this in Namaste and From Darkness Comes Light). The Reiki came in by encouragement from my Reiki Master. The Ayurvedic training was encouraged by my Ayurvedic doctor. A part of me was cynical - they just want my money. But I know now, as I do this to others, that it is never about the money, it's an intuitive nudge, because you know that other person will benefit - if I have been badgering you to come to class, or do a Reiki attunement or consult with me for Ayurveda, this is the reason, something is telling me that you will benefit!

In many respects I have felt that I have had little choice. My yoga teacher told me to go back to Guernsey and start teaching yoga. My Reiki Master encouraged me to establish Beinspired and start offering Reiki. My Ayurvedic doctor was super keen for me to offer Ayurveda and did all she could to help me. These people are conscious, they have benefitted themselves from these spiritual practices and they also see the bigger picture - that we are co-creating with the divine, we are playing our role in positively shifting the vibration on this planet. We have incarnated at this time in history for this very reason.

So each time I come up against imposter syndrome, I acknowledge it and sit with it. Where is it coming from? What is the fear? And how is my heart feeling?

And as long as it still feels aligned, my heart sings, my intuition is nodding, then I’ll go for it anyway.

I’ll put on my big girl leggings and I’ll face my inner demon.

I’ll trust in whatever it was that gifted me the idea or the nudge in the first place.

I have learned a ton of lessons along the way.

At my first yoga class no one turned up. I went home and cried on my Dad’s shoulder. But I didn’t give up because something was telling me that I just needed to be patient, that Rome was not built in a day, that we all have to start somewhere, that it takes time for people to find their way to you.

And they do.

I have learned to trust in that.

That the right people will find you. That the universe will connect you.

Sure, it helps to advertise, to make people aware you exist. But people will come when the time is right - and for both of you, because it’s a two way process - I learn something from every single client and students who has entered my life.

I have also learned that you can advertise as much as you like, but if you have some resistance within you because you are letting imposter syndrome get in the way then people will not find you because on some level you are blocking them, you are also manifesting the validation you need that you are not good enough so let’s back out now while you can. I have sene this happen lots of times, people make it all about them again.

We have to be careful with our thoughts as they do create our reality. So shift your thoughts. And pray. Pray for assistance. For the most perfect situation for all parties.

I have also learned that we are not in control.

And that we should never base our self worth on external validation such as the number of students in our class or our busy schedule.

Just like we should never look to someone else to make us feel whole.

Or look to love to save us.

Or someone else to make us feel safe.

Or assume we need a community or tribe to feel as if we belong.

Our primary relationship in this lifetime is with ourselves. That much I have learned.

We come in on our own and we will leave on our own. This is the journey of OUR soul.

I know this with absolute certainty.

We can hear the powers that be if we are still enough, quiet enough, gentle enough.

We just need to learn to trust in what we hear, and cultivate greater faith in ourselves and in spirit in the process.

We need to cultivate self-belief. We have to learn to love and accept ourselves. This takes hard work. No one else can do it for us. It doesn’t matter how much money you have, you cannot buy this. Sure others can help you, but only you can really make the inner changes.

We need to switch off and switch in. People love eating energy. Protect your energy. Don’t give it away or let others steal it.

Faith is our protection.

Discernment is our weapon.

I have also learned that we should never have an attachment to outcome. If we do, we will never write that book, or run that course, or offer that treatment.

We do what we do for the love of it, for the sheer joy of the creative process.

We leave others to receive our offering in their own way. We are not responsible for this.

We have to let go of our idea of success or healing or whatever it may be.

We cannot control outcome.

We cannot make someone better if they don’t want to be better.

And we need to remember that we don’t all think and feel the same. So just because we might feel a certain way after say a yoga class or a Reiki treatment, doesn't mean that others will feel similarly. Some may like it, some may not.

And the other lesson I have learned is not to personalise everything. Someone doesn’t come back to yoga. Big deal. That’s their choice. Maybe that one session was all they needed to move them forwards in their life, maybe they can’t get a baby sitter, maybe they have to work late, maybe yoga is just not for them. We don’t need to make up stories that revolve around us, “oh I don’t think they like my style of teaching, oh I am such a rubbish yoga teacher blah blah blah.

Who cares!

Do what you do, offer what you offer, for the sheer love of it.

Stop caring what others think.

And put your energy to loving yourself more instead. Of being your greatest friend.

I have spent thousands of pounds on various trainings, workshops, courses and treatments over the years, but one of my best friend’s gave me the greatest advice for free. He told me to stop caring what others think. No one had ever told me that. Not one single person. or if they did, I didn’t hear them. I started putting this into practice and I couldn’t believe how deep the conditioning around caring what others think. Every time I was triggered, when I traced it back to source, I realised it was always about caring what others thought. I cannot tell you how liberating it has been to work with this and stop caring. It automatically tightens boundaries and helps you value yourself - and - it increases interestingly your compassion not least for self, but for others, because you see how much they suffer by caring too much what others think.

To the extent they don’t live their best life.

And this, to me, is a real tragedy.

So too the fact that they are denying others the benefit of their gifts by not sharing them - it’s like a form of stealing.

If you are reading this, then the chances are that you too have something to share. That you have a passion for yoga or writing or holistic therapies or whatever it may be and that your life has been touched positively to the extent that you would like others to benefit from what you have to share, be that your healing hands, your story or just your ability to listen.

So my advice is to share it. Notice the self-depreciating and limiting thoughts and do it anyway. Dig deep. Find the courage. Trust in whatever it was that gave you the idea. Cultivate faith. Pray for assistance along the way. Please don’t deny others the benefit of whatever gift you are here to share.

If it helps then I am happy to work with you to move you forwards, but remember that I cannot do it for you. You have to do it for yourself.

To help others.

To liberate yourself. Fly free.

To raise the vibration on this planet.

And boy do we need it!

Love Emma x

Setting ourselves free of false ego identity

The moon has gifted many insights this cycle, but the one that has struck me the most is the reminder that we are not broken and don’t need fixing and that we need to shift this mindset if we truly want to thrive and appreciate our true divinity.

I have also been reminded that our mind is our worst enemy and creates our suffering through our forgetfulness that we are neither our thoughts nor our feelings. However, we have this self-depreciating tendency to allow both to run riot, getting caught up in, and stuck, the same mental and emotional patterns over an dover again, and creating our reality from this limited perspective.

We are not our thoughts and we are not our feelings. They come and go. You only have to ask your mind, “what thought is coming next”, to realise that you are not your thoughts. And you are not your feelings, because emotions are simply energy in motion. When we stop their motion and cling onto them, then we stop their flow and mis-identify with them as who we are - “I am sad”, I am depressed”. Not, you’re not! You are merely feeling sadness and depression. But they are not you. It is important to realise this.

Same with your thoughts. Did you know that ego simply means , “What you think you are”. So it’s just your ego that says, “I am fat”, “I am thin”, “I am a victim”, “I am clever’, “I am stupid”, “I am unloveable”, “I am ugly” and every other “I” statement. The collection of these thoughts creates our ego identity, so the ego is nothing more than a raft of self images bound together by your belief in them. Thus the way you identify with yourself is nothing more than fictitious construct, consisting primarily of self-images that exist because of your belief in them and attachment to them.

What is crazy is that each self image is based on a particle moment or moments of past experience that created a mental construct, “a story”, that was taken as static reality. For example, the moment you were praised or punished for something, told you are this or that, you believed it to be so, you bought into the story and by buying into the story, you acquired a self image to add to your forming ego that became a static reality - you believed it so and in believing it so, you made it so.

I have lost count of the number of clients who are stuck in mis-identification, believing they are this or that, usually something negative because of what has happened in their past. Not only does this keep them locked in the past, but it prevents them from expanding because they have limited themselves to the thought, “I am unloveable”, “I am unattractive”, “I am fat”, or whatever it is. The more we keep buying into these false identifications the more we make them so. We believe them into reality and create our own prison bars in the process.

It doesn’t have to be like this! Every moment of every day offers us the opportunity to remove the prison bars and set ourselves free. We choose how we relate to ourselves. I cannot tell you how liberating it is to bat those thoughts away, like they are tennis balls, to challenge every single idea we have about who we are, and to let our feelings flow, see them quite literally as the energy in motion that they are.

Yesterday we had an incidence at the beach where a very important person got annoyed at us for dumping our bags near to her shoes and towel. We’ve spent hours at Fort Grey this summer, hours an hours, and everyone has been really friendly, it’s one of the reason we love it there so much, let alone the opportunity for jumping, kayaking, paddle boarding, rock pooling and just absorbing it’s sacred energy, so it ws quite a surprise. It wasn’t until we got home, E told me that the lady in question, who actually accused us of intentionally leaving our stuff near her stuff to annoy her, is a reputable lawyer on the island, recently returned.

I realised then the reason for her reaction - she has over identified with her job title and believes herself better than everyone else, she has that entitlement that certain occupations encourage. This is not to say she isn’t divine, she is. We are all divine. But her ego has made her believe herself to be better than everyone else. But one day she will retire and what then? What identity will she take on. The lawyer that was? This is the reason so many company directors have heart attacks following retirement - they lose their job title and with that their identity and they no longer wield the same level of power that they did in the organisation.

So we have to be careful. One day we will die and we will become nothing more than dust or compost. There’s this lovely bit in Hamlet, in scene 3 of Act IV, when the King asks Hamlet where the late Polonius is, Hamlet replies, “At supper”. The king, knowing that Polonius is dead, asks Hamlet what he means, to which he curtly gives this riposte:

“Not where he eats, but where ‘a is eaten. A certain convocation of politic worms are e’en at him. Your worm is your only emperor for diet. We fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots. Your fat king and your lean beggar is but variable service—two dishes, but to one table. That’s the end…A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of the worm.”

Hamlet is very clever as he skilfully catches the audience off guard with his initial reply, “At supper”. This because we tend to think of the phrase, ‘at supper’ as, as meaning a person eating a meal. However Hamelt is referring to the person being eaten and emphasis with force the upheaval of hierarchies - the fat kind (and the lean beggar) serve the appetites of the imperial worms, “two dishes” end up on “one table”.

I’ve always thoughts this quote really interesting, reminding us that we are essentially all the same, and all part of the whole - of the continual cycle of life and indeed death on planet earth. Also a reminder that we are no better than each other. In death and indeed in life, we are essentially all equal. Admittedly some are more evolved than others, born with different karma and special qualities, but in terms of our treatment of each other, it is only our ego that says we are better, or indeed worse.

Anyway my point in all this, is to remember that we are not the stories we create about ourselves. Which is the reason I have some concerns about our over identification with labels, because we then make it so and again limit ourselves in the process. We over identify with our states of being too and continue to perpetuate the story, buying into victimhood at times, and keeping ourselves stuck.

At some point we have to realise that we are more than our thoughts and feelings and the stories we tell ourselves - or the stories others tell us. We have to remember that other people’s opinions of us - which they share readily with us, especially when we are children - are just thoughts. They are just someone else’s perspective. They are not true. They are not based on a divine reality but on someone’s judgement which is based to their conditioning and way of seeing the world and our place in it.

I have lost track of the number of people who suffer simply because of being told they were lazy at school, or sloppy, or whatever it may be, that they have taken with them into adulthood and believed it to be a truth. Who cares what other people think?!

It’s our conditioning actually that needs shifting. We have layers and layers of it and much of it patriarchal and christianised. This is something else that has really struck me lately. As women especially we talk of being empowered, yet we are still subjected to our conditioning that tells us we can only be empowered if we dig into our masculine energy and do it like the men. We still buy into the idea of power and money equalling success. We still pedestal masculine traits of achievement, outcome, rationality and consistent and linear ways of being in this world over the feminine qualities of empathy, intuition and cyclical ways of being.

We still pedestal science as if this is King. Nothing is believed if it hasn’t been proven by science. Yet science in itself is so limiting. The ancient Rishis knew the workings of this universe and the teachings have been shared for thousands of years. But unless science proves it so then we are not to believe it. Of course science has its place, but our intuition cannot be proven, nor our empathic feelings, but that doesn’t make them any less meaningful or important. We also have this annoying habit of reinventing the wheel and then commodifying it.

We strip the sacred out of everything. We are hell bent on externalising our view of the world. It doesn’t become about your meditation, it becomes about the cushion you are sitting on and the room you are sitting in. Even yoga has become less about recognising our divinity and more about how your body looks in a certain pose. We have to be careful what we buy into. In my day you didn’t need a particular water bottle to remind you to drink water. You drank water from a water fountain when you felt thirsty and I am still here to tell the tale. I’m actually honoured by the many ways we buy into commercialism.

Furthermore, so many women I see are still beholden to feelings of guilt and shame for wanting to step into their sexual energy. This because the christianised concept of purity runs deep in our DNA. We hold ourselves up against values which were forced upon our ancestors. They didn’t have a choice. But were do. We don’t need to keep perpetuating the story that we are good or bad, pure or dirty, virginal or whore, pretty or ugly, success or failure. All this duality kills the soul and keeps us trapped in our ego identity.

We are EVERYTHING. Our spiritual practicer can be anything because everything is essentially a manifestation of the Goddess. One of my friend’s loves playing AirSoft. He takes his spiritual practice seriously. Seeing an AirSoft gun hanging on his wall, someone made the comment, “well that’s not very spiritual is it!”. but actually why is yoga spiritual and playing AirSoft not? What differentiates the two. If they both serve to take us deeper to the truth, and into this present moment where we realise our divinity, then why is one good and the other bad?

It is from this understanding that the Tantric tradition arose. Tantra teaches that even the most mundane actions like washing the dishes and hanging out the washing are opportunities for experiencing the joy which flows from being truly present - of being in full Presence. We don’t limit ourselves then to our spiritual evolution, our recognition of our divinity, arising only on say our yoga mat or meditation cushion. For me this is incredibly liberating, to realise my deeper Self by being immersed in the world, rather than separate from it, of being deeply in the body, not denying it, of feeling pleasure and pain and not making one good and one bad.

The other point here is around evolution. My use of that word is perhaps not helpful as it implies moving outside ourselves and leaning into our existing conditioning that we need to do more/acquire more/fix more/future orientation “to be ……”. We have to remember that we are already perfect in our divinity and that all our spiritual practice is doing, is helping to remove the layers which prevent us from seeing this clearly. Our suffering arises because we have forgotten our own true nature and we buy into our thoughts and feelings as real.

This moon is gifting us the opportunity fort greater freedom by acknowledging all that has been and letting it pass into the ether, loosening our attachment to it. What is done is done. We have all suffered trauma - the trauma of incarnation is felt widely, for example. We have all made senseless decisions at one time or another. We have all held false views and perspective which we have shared with others. We have harmed and been harmed. But at some point we have to let it all go. We have to wipe the slate clean and realise our inherent divinity and allow more of this to shone forth in the world. We are EVERYTHING. Our playing it small, our not loving ourselves, our giving ourselves a hard time is really pointless. We have one life. Let’s live it well - kindly, loving and compassionately.

I could continue, there’s a theme around pain and suffering bubbling through but I will leave you with a quote by Christopher Wallis, a Tantric scholar, which is food for thought on this full moon:

“The great master Abhinava Gupta suggests to us that if you practice from the perspective that you are not good enough as you are, or that there is something wrong with you that needs fixing, then your yoga cannot fulfil its ultimate purpose because it is a practice founded in wrong understanding. It can only go as far as fulfilling the limited purpose that has been conceived by your limited ego-mind. However, if you undertake the practice of Yoga with the right View of yourself, that you are doing yoga to realise and then fully express what is already true, then you have empowered your practice to take you all the way”.

Happy full moon!

Love Emma x

But it is more than that. We have to stop believing all we have been told about ourselves and buying into it as if this is a truth. Our teachers, caregivers, friends, family members, general public, all will have had an opinion about us at one time or another, but it doesn’t make them real or concrete, they are just someone else’s thoughts. Yet our whole life can be based on these thoughts, because we ignorantly take them on as a truth and then make them so - creating our own reality in the process.

My other concern is our over identiifcation with

Why yoga?

Why yoga?

“The success of Yoga does not lie in the ability to perform postures but in how it positively changes the way we live our life and our relationships.” Desikachar

Yoga firstly helps us to gain clarity and reduce our suffering. Then eventually it helps us to overcome that suffering and realise our true potential.

When we comment on the world being chaotic etc., we are really talking about ourselves. We need to change. It is only when we change ourselves that we change the world. 

Yoga changes our life in a more positive direction. That is the potential it offers ALL of us. 

Although the teachings of yoga are over five thousand years old, they’ve never been needed more than now to bring stability and clarity into our lives and to this Planet. 

The very first sutra of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, is written:

Atha yoga-anuśāsanam

Atha means ‘now ‘and ‘now’ is very significant. 

Yoga is practised NOW. Not tomorrow, not next week, not when we can be bothered. It means yoga is practised in this moment. It means ‘Now I am going to follow the path of yoga, now I am going to follow the teachings’. 

The only reality we have is THE moment as it unfolds.

The past has passed and what we call the future is no more than imagination. The only reality we have is the moment we are in.

I need to start NOW and I need to continue in each moment, breath by breath, movement by movement and moment by moment. Yoga is not something I can pick up and put down. If I really want to enjoy the fruits of yoga, I have to make that commitment to yoga. I have to start now and each moment that follows, I need to be present.

Historically yoga was not practised alone. Any of us who have practised alone will know how easy it is to switch off, for our body to be doing one thing and our mind quite another. There is a lack of presence. The mind is usually caught thinking about the past or planning into the future. A whole thirty minutes can pass. The box for ‘yoga practice’ is ticked, but the effects are much less than when you are practising with a teacher and are encouraged into the body and to the breath.

If a guide takes me over a mountain on a particular known path, then that is going to help me enormously in navigating the mountain. So it is the same with yoga; a teacher can act as a guide in helping me navigate the path. I have two teachers for this very reason, because it would be much more challenging to navigate the path without them. They pull me up when I need pulling up, and provide a point of reference, bringing light when it is otherwise dark.

But a teacher cannot make us commit. We need to find the strength to commit ourselves, not least to a teacher, but to a practice too, we need to trust in the process. 

Practice (abhyāsa) should be anything which takes our mind to a place of stability and clarity, to a state of yoga.

Patanjali qualifies this practice as follows:

• Practise for a long time;

• Practise without interruptions (so don’t take time off from practising, there should be a regular commitment);

• Practise with a positive attitude;

• Practise with enthusiasm.

He stresses that yoga is not going to be a quick fix or an easy journey. It has two main drawbacks in that it requires time and effort. However if you are prepared to put in the time and effort then many things are possible. 

But you have to participate! Yoga – like Reiki – doesn’t just miraculously land on us. These are spiritual PRACTICES, they demand that we practise. Sure, we can read about them and acquire knowledge on them, but it is not until we actually practise that we experience the benefits and come to realise the potential of yoga, and even then, we do this with increasing detachment.

The practice will help us to increasingly let go of things we no longer need - including behaviour patterns, mental conditionings, limiting beliefs and ways of being - which are no longer helpful. These will drop away gradually. This is the benefit of a regular yoga practice. We put in the time and effort but we begin to feel lighter, there is more stability, clarity and joy in our lives.

It helps that the practice will make our body, mind and breath healthy. But at its essence, yoga offers us much more than this – it offers us a way of living, which supports our self -realisation, we are gifted the opportunity to see our eternal self, to literally realise that we are indeed a reflection of the highest power, that we contain the whole universe within ourselves. 

The problem, particularly at the start is that it is very easy to forget the support yoga can give us. It can also be hard work – we are encouraged to look at ourself more truthfully, and release our long held tensions and the accompanying emotions and thoughts, which no longer serve us and cause a loss of wellbeing. 

All you have to do is practice. 

“Practice and all is coming.” Pattabhi Jois 

Certainly my life has changed beyond recognition since I brought yoga into it, 20 years ago now. It is a way of life with a philosophical underpinning, not an exercise regime, albeit it can be met solely on this level. But to be truly changed by yoga, one has to surrender to it and trust in the teachings, which is the reason it is so important to be guided by a teacher, to truly know its essence.

I’m delighted to offer you the opportunity to practice, with a dedicated Yoni Yoga class for women each Tuesday evening starting 9th January, upstairs in St Martin’s Community Centre, 6-7pm. This will be a drop-in class, no need to book, £12 drop-in or buy 5 tokens in advance for £55

This is a gentle and introspective class using Tantric techniques to essentially help you to come home to yourself, to deepen into the loving guidance of your heart and the power and wisdom that comes from the pelvis. This is also a very healing session, incorporating various pranayama (breathing exercises), asana (postures), yantra (visualisation), mudra (hand gestures), mantra (sound) and a yoga nidra (deep guided relaxation/meditation).

The Friday morning Tantra class starts again Friday 5 January from 9.30-10.45am upstairs in St Martin’s Community Centre, £12 drop in and £55 for 5 tokens payable in advance. All welcome, no need to book.

I will be teaching a Monday evening Tantra class from February, 6-7pm, at St Martin’s Community Centre (upstairs).

Jo teaches two Hatha classes a week, please view the calendar below for specific class details.

“Yoga is good for man because the physical body improves, the nervous system improves, the mind improves, the intellect improves—so, how can yoga not be good?” Desikachar