Be here now!

Happy new year to all you lovely souls reading this, and actually even to those of you not reading this! Happy New year to everyone!

It does feel like a happy new year too, with the new moon today presenting a fresh start and the beginning of another cycle.

We ended our year interestingly, yet another family death and more illness too. I went to bed at 8pm that evening, with the boys, I was done with 2021 and wanted to awake refreshed on new year’s day. Which I did and celebrated in my own joyful way. It was lovely to share yoga and Reiki with some of you that afternoon, albeit online, but still a welcome connection and way to begin the new year, with that sort of intention.

Actually it was in planning that class, that I was reminded of a quote from Jack Kornfield, a Buddhist teacher, from his book A Path with Heart :

“Every spiritual life entails a succession of difficulties because every ordinary life also involves a succession of difficulties, what the Buddha described as inevitable sufferings of existence. In a spiritually informed life, however, these inevitable difficulties can be the source of our awakening, of deepening wisdom, patience, balance and compassion. Without this perspective, we simply bear our sufferings like an ox or a foot soldier under a heavy load. Like the young maiden in teh fairy tale “Rumpelstiltskin” who is locked in a room full of straw, we often do not realise that the straw all around us is gold in disguise. The basic principle of spiritual life is that our problems become the very place to discover wisdom and love”.

I have read that quote on retreats and at the end of class many times over a good many years, but it was only this time, when it felt as if life has presented a succession of difficulties, that i truly appreciated its wisdom. I also almost laughed out loud. For a while now, I’ve been praying for greater love. Greater love in all its guises, towards self, towards others, in the world I inhabit, love. It seems that the Earth would like greater love. That’s become my dream. I forgot though, that sometimes to find greater love, we have to suffer, simply because suffering brings with it the opportunity for so much surrendering and opening…

And this reminds me of another of my favourite quotes, from Rebecca Campbell, in her book Light is the New Black: A guide to Answering Your Soul’s Callings and Working Your Light, in which she writes:

“Believe that your tragedies, your losses, your sorrows, your hurt happened for you, not to you. And I bless the thing that broke you down and cracked you open because the world needs you open”.

I know this, my own experience of life has taught me this, depression cracked me open (touched on in my book Namaste), so did having to go through IVF and surrendering to Caesarean Sections (written about in my book Dancing With the Moon). These poignantly sorrowful and challenging moments in my life, actually turned out to be the most momentously life changing for I learned the power of surrender (to what’s happening now) and the deepened experience of love that they gifted in return. There is always a blessing in the burden, a silver lining in every cloud, a gift to be found when we surrender to something greater than ourselves.

I enter the new year remembering all this. There is something humbling about it.

Which leads me to another quote that fits well here, that kind of sums up all I’ve been reading and listening to recently as I’ve ventured down a Buddhist path for a while. This is from Eckhart Tolle, which writes (and I can’t be sure where…sorry):

“Always say “yes” to the present moment. What could be more futile, more insane, than to create inner resistance to what already is? What could be more insane than to oppose life itself, which is now and always now? Surrender to what is. Say “yes” to life - and see how life suddenly starts working for you rather than against you”.

The message recently is simply ‘Be Here Now”. Ram Dass wrote a beautiful book entitled exactly that. It’s worth a read.

So here’s to a year of BEING HERE NOW and of greater love. The new moon has provided the clarity to see it all a little more clearly and I am grateful for that. We’re casting our spells the boys and I, and making fires, it’s definitely the year of connecting with the elements!

Keep doing what you can to support your immune system and enjoy living for each moment as it arises.

Love Emma x

Endings and beginnings: Dreaming a new dream

We are fast approaching the end of 2021 and what a year it’s been! Another year of learning to live with Covid, and another year of significant change for many.

I always had a sense that 2021 was about stepping up and i certainly felt that in my own life. As a friend, I had to step up as my good friend, Marie, died from cancer and try to be there for her and later for her husband and boys. As a Mum, I had to step up when Elijah’s separation anxiety got critical and I fought for his exit from the school system, something that should have happened a long time ago. I had to step up in letting go as my youngest, Eben, settled into the school system and I realised I was holding him back.

Professionally I had to step up too, making some ruthless edits to my new book, From Darkness Comes Light, as well as letting go of The Family Yoga Book (now available on Amazon!), so it could find it’s own way. I aligned with Guernsey Mind too and had to step up my healing work. I stepped up my medicinal plant growing too and have added tinctures to my repertoire. I have also stepped up my Reiki practice and have qualified recently as a Karuna Ki Reiki Master Teacher.

But really none of that matters, not in the grand scheme. Maybe that’s the greatest stepping up of 2021, has been the shift in my perspective of how I see the world and my place in it. I realise that no amount of achieving will ever give me the inner fulfilment that I seek, just as no amount of money will ever replace the gift that is time with my children. In a round about way Covid has been a blessing, not only bringing me back to basics, but back to myself, beyond all the external stuff that seems so important two years ago. This is a changed world and I feel positively changed by it.

I also realise that we are at the end of a big chapter in each of our lives. I knew my chapter was coming to an end with the final proper edit on my book and this ushered in a big heavy heart and a period of grieving for that life now lived. It was time to let it go. Its weight was beginning to exhaust me. But I have never been good at letting go - this is the tendency of those of us who have experienced depression, we lug our past around with us and wonder why its gotten heavy. Those who suffer anxiety and fear are more likely to be future orientated, stressing about some unknown moment ahead.

I knew it was time to let go, that there was no need to keep holding on. I’m grateful for all that I have learned, for all the experiences lived, but it is time now to dream a new dream, whatever that may be. I know I am not alone, many others are also experiencing this dying to what has been and opening up to the possibility of the new coming in. Life is like this, it is one of cycles. As difficult as it has been to witness friends and family members dying this year, I am aware that it is all part of our individual journey as a soul incarnate but also part of the cycle of life, each passing brings new beginnings, whether we like it or not.

This in-between time is always difficult, caught between two worlds. I feel adrift without a future orientation, living now the life I once dreamed and without another one yet clear to me. I have a feeling though, that is is about the Earth. Maybe we will start dreaming the Earths dream of greater harmony and alignment, of co-creation and respect for nature’s inherent wisdom - our own inherent wisdom if only we could access it beyond the noise of the thinking mind and demands of the ego.

The ancient yogis, the ancients themselves, they all knew how to live in harmony with nature and with their own nature too. They saw the sacred in everything, and this was reflected back at them. It’s such a shame that our ways of control and manipulation, of greed and materialism have taken us so far away from our very essence. But times are changing. We are awakening and realising how far we have fallen. We are even beginning to realise that while it is about us individually, it is actually about us collectively. Deep within us, we know there’s another way, a far more heart based and sacred way and we are being called to connect with it.

I have found myself increasingly drawn to spiritual communities, such as Embercombe and Findhorn. Findhorn especially excites me, not least because of it’s amazing growing capacity (the soil is said to be spiritual and ethereal beings assist…) but because it is guided by three simple practices, inner listening to the sacred, co-creation with the intelligence of nature and work as love in action. Their vision is of a radically transformed world embodying the sacred, honouring each other and co-creating wisely and lovingly.

I have a feeling this will underpin my approach to 2022 - embodying more of the sacred, co-creating with others wisely and lovingly and within all this, opening to greater love. I have another feeling that this in turn may lead to a radically transformed way of seeing the world, which will literally change the world, simply because of the changed perspective - if there’s one thing I have learned this year, it is that in freeing our mind from more of its conditioning, the more our perspective shifts and the more we see everything differently, we actually start Seeing!

Thus it’s clear to me that the more we can embody the sacred, the more it guides us and the more we enter into greater harmony with it and the more everything changes. It’s a radical approach in itself. Nothing to do but undo, and nowhere else to be but here now. There’s nothing to achieve. Only a life to be fully embraced, experienced and lived. Easier said than done. Being HERE now is not always easy. I hear myself often wanting to be somewhere else. So this is where the practice is needed. In being in the discomfort of the NOW moment.

On another level I’m grateful to the changes that Elijah’s schooling situation has ushered in as we take a more nature based approach to learning. I’m blessed with some wonderful unschooling friends and their children who see life similarly. This has opened up a whole new way for me, which i am keen to embrace in 2022. Children have screwed over by Covid. It saddens me the manner in which Eben has had to settle into Reception Year at School, let alone the way he had to manage the changes at pre-school. We have let our fear override our compassion at times and I do believe it is time to put children’s wellbeing at the forefront of our hearts and minds. I’m keen to do what I can to support children’s spiritual growth as the year unfolds…I have a few ideas in mind.

But for now, we did our bit, my boys and I today, enjoying more of a NOW experience as nature tends to encourage. We headed out west for sunset and managed a fire in the process, using their new fire strikers (thank you Leo!). Elijah tried to whittle a wand and we had great fun with the stormy seas and casting spells towards it. There was the inevitable fighting as there always is, but there is something about letting boys be boys in nature that is hugely heartening. We were much more present moment. Time lost meaning, just as it usually does at spiritual sites. It certainly lifted our spirits before we turned home to a poorly daddy.

I hope the end of the year is kind to you and you are kind to yourself too. Do away with the new year’s resolutions that set you up for a fall and embrace more of who you are and give yourself a great big hug in the process. 2022 is truly a year for loving more of the Self and letting this energy of acceptance and love, of inner harmony, ripple through the planet and help us to love more of each other in the process. Here’s hoping anyhow!

Love Emma x

Karuna - compassion

I hope you all had a good Christmas. Here ours was as manic as usual, our youngest is hyper at the best of times and was on another level the last few days, rather exhausting at times, especially the ‘opening present obsession’, but we survived!

As much as I love the build up to Christmas, as soon as Christmas is done I am done with it too and fortunately Ewan feels the same so our decorations were taken down yesterday and the cottage sighed with the relief of the clutter gone. I sighed too, I love clear space!

I spent the last few evenings studying to be a Karuna Ki Reiki Master Teacher with a lady with whom I studied an advanced Reiki course during the last lockdown. It’s one of those things that just kind of happened. I was looking at some of her other courses and then decided just to go for it. I was always resistant to online Reiki courses until undertaking the one during lockdown and deriving great benefit from it. It really changed things for me, drawing in a new Reiki friend and spiritual teacher, who shares a mutual love of ancient stones and landscape.

It was this experience that made me change my mind about running my own online Reiki attunement sessions. I suddenly saw it differently, had a shift in perspective, and recognised the benefit and the way I had been limiting myself previously by holding into a particular opinion. In fairness 2021 has been all about that for me - shifting perspective. Well that and cultivating greater compassion for self as much as for others. Not easy at times, the universe has certainly thrown in some challenges to test, but I feel better for it.

In Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra, 1.33, we are introduced to the notion that a peaceful mind results from:

1. A mental attitude of friendship towards those who are content (i.e. not being jealous of them or threatened by them for it!);

2. Compassion towards those who suffer (and let’s face it we all suffer in some way, accepting this is one of the foundation’s in Buddhism)

3. Joy towards virtuous individuals (good actions);

4. Indifference/do not be disturbed/drawn into judgment or contempt by/for those who act poorly (don’t let your peaceful mind be disturbed by others and their poor actions, just let them go).

Essentially Patanjali is encouraging us to cultivate the four great attitudes of the heart, friendliness or loving kindness (maitri), compassion (karuna), sympathetic joy for others (mudito) and equanimity (upekshanam).

It seems appropriate then, to end the year studying Karuna Ki Reiki, Reiki of compassion, essentially. Not to say that Usui Reiki isn’t also about compassion, by its very nature Reiki does encourage greater compassion for all sentient beings, including ourself, but this approach is simply more focused on that.

It’s been an interesting enquiry, because I have found that it is always easier to cultivate compassion for others, than it is for those whom I love dearly. Its nonsensical in many ways, but when the heart is involved and our inherent vulnerability, it is sometimes easier to reject those who have the potential to hurt us the most, and switch off our compassion towards them and their suffering, than it is to be open hearted to those who are less likely to break out heart if that love is not reciprocated. The mind is a tricky old thing, the heart trickier still!

But we have to go deeper into that place of vulnerability, the spiritual path demands it of us, especially if we have welcomed Reiki and yoga into it. It is ALL about the heart. The Yoga Sutras send us to the heart in 1,36, where we are encouraged to focus on the light in the heart, this as a way of calming and centering the mind. It’s true. I have found that if we can re-orientate our awareness to the heart when we have dropped into anxiety or fear, or somehow lost our centre, then this can be extremely comforting.

It’s about compassion though really. All these practices encourage us to cultivate greater compassion, yoga, Buddhism, Reiki, Ayurveda, it’s underpinning all of these practices. But it’s not easy, the path is not straight, it’s not clear, we have to come face to face with all the many ways we deceive ourselves, all the ways we blame others and victimise ourselves, the many ways that we -ironically - protect our heart. The trouble is the greater our defence, the less compassion we have for others, let alone ourselves.

The more, too, we retain the idea of separation, them and us, needing to protect ourselves in the first place. We’re kind of doing this with the whole covid drama. It’s offering us a wonderful opportunity to shift our perspective and let go of our fixed mind, cultivating greater compassion for ourselves and others in the process…if only we can get out of our fear and see the bigger picture, stop taking it all so personally, viewing life from a soulful perspective, the continuous cycle…

I’m only grateful that I did shift my perspective on the online Reiki courses and embraced the offering that came to me form the universe. I do feel greater compassion for having gone through the mill with it, never easy, one has to break down to break through and there’s been a lot of this this year, of having to go deeper into the heart, death and illness of friends and family encouraging this, the eclipses, the covid changes, all of it has played it’s own beautiful role. So here’s to ending 2021 in the heart, with greater compassion - karuna, Sanskrit word worth remembering.

You can access the online Reiki Level One course through this website. For those based in Guernsey, the attunement can be in person or by distance. Having experienced distant attunements myself, I know that these do the job perfectly - in fact I’m amazed by the potency of them, mind blowing in itself, that Reiki can be sent by distance like this. It might be the best decision you make, to bring more Reiki into your life.

Love Emma

Yule blessings

Wishing you all joy and much magic at Yule. Today the sun is at standstill - its reached its most southerly sunrise, and its lowest height during noontime, making it the shortest day of the year. The winter solstice sunrise was celebrated at new grange this morning, and the winter solstice sunset was celebrated at Stonehenge. I’d love to have been at both, regardless of the lack of sun!

Here on Guernsey, i was lucky to see the sunrise (with the moon still in the sky) and set in a special way, avoiding the crowds at one of our local dolmens, which has a winter solstice alignment. We’re spoilt on Guernsey, it was once awash with dolmens and menhirs and the sites still hold some of the frequency, just got to answer the call of the Goddess in aligning us to them. We were lucky with a beautiful fire at my folks’ stone circle yesterday and the sun today and I was lucky that I also got to hang out in numerous dolmens and spiritual sites with the children’s playdates, burning our home made organic beeswax filled walnuts (more on them another time!).

I keep saying it, but these are difficult times, and if ever there was a time to dig deep into nature and into our practice then it is now. I have no idea how people are faring without! So if it is all getting too much for you, especially after Christmas has passed and the dark winter evenings drag on, then please don’t forget to roll out your mat, even if you just lie on it and put on one of my free guided relaxations. but of course the website is packed with free content to help you to help yourself.

This is my greatest wish this solstice, that we all start taking greater responsibility for our health and wellbeing, and our healing and transformation and our consciousness. No one can do it for us. No amount of reading or thinking about yoga and Reiki will change things. These are both spiritual practices and we need to therefore practice. The website has been focused on helping you do exactly that, on your own, when you can.

I hope to have some more free yoga video content for you soon, mindful and grounding practices to see us through the media storm that is currently upon us with yet more fear of Covid variances. This is a reality we must continuously face. I have found switching off from all media, including all news channels, incredibly helpful. So too, getting on my mat and out in nature with the boys every day. The fear will likely kill us before the virus!

If you’re reading this and feeling the overwhelm and anxiety, then do just get close to the ground and listen to your breathing, before popping on something from the website. Don’t forget that there’s online training now too, learning more about the menstrual cycle and the moon which comes with various free yoga and meditation practices and also the new online Reiki Level One attunement, with attunements taking place in person or by distance. There’s also live workshops and trainings and of course the free online Reiki each week (albeit not staring back now until 9 January).

So I hope you’ve enjoyed this descent into the darkness and can embrace the uncertainty as we approach the end of the year. Who knows what 2022 will bring, but I do know that there will be more light coming in!

Solstice blessings!

Love Emma xx

The impending darkness of the solstice

I LOVE the winter solstice, and while I’d really love to be at Stonehenge celebrating, I am happy to be celebrating here too. There are various alignments locally, and I was lucky to be on Sark this weekend where I was curious to find some alignments there too.

I was lucky actually, a full moon traipsing the land at night alone, always a blessing, especially on little Sark, which is simply alive with energy; the capstone at the Sark southern dolmen was literally glowing in the moon light, to say nothing of the menhir a little up the road.

The next morning I was fortunate to see the moon set to the north of Guernsey/Herm and I even managed to make it out to the southern dolmen to catch sunrise on my yoga mat, a few sun salutations, trying to avoid all the sheep poo littering the place! We found more special stones later, and the Buddhist carving.

I love Sark as you know and it was magical this weekend, with the light’s being turned on in the high street on Friday evening, which look absolutely magical. It was well worth the rather challenging boat journey on Friday, with the aborted harbour drop-off and into le creux instead! And there I was naively assuming it would be calm simply because the sun was out. Well you know what they say about obstacles along the way, and tests too. We passed that one, just!

I took my dad with me this time, and the two boys, we had fun, managed to meet my Sark soul friend and her daughter and explored more parts of Sark previously not seen. Sark never fails to amaze me, it just keeps giving. Even the walk back to the boat was a new one for me, along the cliffs, a new perspective and way of seeing things.

I’m still stuck on that in the yoga sutras, the idea of cultivating a different perspective, especially when one is in a state of confusion. This full moon being in gemini, an air sign, has highlighted confusion. I feel confused too. Not sure the future direction, everything still up in the air, in between one way of being and another. It’s lovely to have a few days off with the boys, back here on Guernsey, to truly celebrate the solstice and immerse ourselves in fires and the land, and of course some sun-orientated worshipping!

Yesterday I led the annual yoni yoga candlelit class to celebrate the solstice and go deep within to see what the darkness is trying to reveal. I love these sessions and the group energy, and I am grateful for the opportunity too keep going with these, despite the fear permeating so much of our community.

I was listening to one of my Ayurvedic Buddhist offerings last night and the Buddhist monk was saying how fear underpins anger and I see this playing out all around me, people acting out of fear with anger, especially when it comes to the whole boring vaccine debate. One time on Sark someone spoke with anger about the unvaccinated making the virus worse. Fear underpinned his comments. Fear of not knowing how it’s all going to turn out and needing someone to blame.

We always need to blame. No one talks of taking greater responsibility for our own health and wellbeing, or seeing the bigger picture, about the way we are living and our attitude to nature, our own especially. Everything has a right to be here, including a virus. It’s a shame we can’t find a way to live in greater harmony. The more we resist something, the more it grows. We resist and repress our anger and it’ll one day catch us out, exploding out of us. I wonder how long we’ll keep resisting a virus. Maybe when we accept it, things will change, who knows, I’m certainly no expert.

But I do know that it is fear that motivates so much of our response to covid. Fear of death ultimately. I’ve said it before but even the wisest are scared of this, the Yoga Sutras talks about it. But it’s not just fear of dying, fear of illness, fear of not working, fear of losing something. And the response is often from a place of anger, whichever side of the fence you sit. I find it easier not to have an opinion. Opinions change anyway, depending on the perspective. I’d rather just make a choice based on how I feel in any moment and maybe that’ll change as the moment too changes. Being fixed is not helpful, allows little flexibility, or opportunity to see a different perspective. Creates fear and anger too as we hold on tightly…

With luck we can all put our differences aside and enjoy time with loved ones and remember what it’s all about as we descend into the darkness tomorrow. Love. It’s always about love. And loving compassion. A work in progress! Often our vulnerability is our greatest obstacle. We will do all we can sometimes to defend this. but if we can enter into vulnerability, be OK with it, allow it, well it changes everything, it opens our heart to the world, and the world definitely needs more hearts opening.

So on that note, happy solstice tomorrow, enjoy the magic of the darkness!

Love Emma xxx