awareness

Okay! Now that I’ve got your attention!
In this month of the heart.
I’m not talking about the symptoms of a broken heart, or a dis-eased
heart, but rather an attack of another kind, that of an open heart.

What are the symptoms of a heart opening attack?
Can you guess?
Do you think you’ve felt them?
Let’s see…

Unprovoked crying.
You know the kind, sentimental commercials, cute babies, puppies. And for the brave few that can walk the earth this way; any exchange with another human being. A smile, a nod, just looking into another’s eyes, can cause tears. These are tears of recognition. You see the Divine in that person, and it touches you with its ET finger. and goes straight to your heart,

Grace.
Your life is dry without it. Your heart must be open to attract it. May be mistaken for luck or some innate ability. Don’t be fooled. Grace, true grace, helps you navigate a heart opening.

Generosity. 
When in the midst of a heart opening attack, you may feel unusually generous. You’re thinking money, and it can be about giving money away.
Dr. Wayne Dyer tells the story, that on one of his recent birthdays, he gave away cash all day. He was compelled to do it, and reported that it was his best birthday EVER!
But generosity has many faces Time is a precious commodity these days and we can all get pretty stingy with doling it out. How about sharing time with your spouse, your kids or a friend. Really being present, listening and laughing together can go a LONGGGGGG way!
It also assists in opening their hearts.

Bliss.
Un warranted bliss. Now THAT’S an advanced symptom.
Feeling blissfully happy…for no apparent reason. Giddy, slap happy, giggly, with a silly grin on your face…like the Dali Lama.
Yep. All symptoms of a heart opening.

Touch.
A kind of secondary symptom is wanting to touch people. In a good way, in a kind way, in a loving way.
Hugging, hands on shoulders, holding their hand, even touching someone’s face, which is sort of social taboo. Have you ever marveled at how soft another person’s skin is?? Even a man’s? That’s crazy, isn’t it?…And pretty wonderful.
A shaman once told me that it was important to be touched by another human being every day if possible. Otherwise your skin does not remain soft, it starts to harden.
Touching people in a kind way, is a sign you’ve really turned critical.
Your heart opening attack is in full swing!

Vulnerability.
SO great that this way of being is getting the respect it deserves these days.
Thanks to the daring Brene Brown and others, it is becoming okay, and even desirable to show vulnerability. The ability to do so, shows you are in the advanced stages of your heart opening. It is not to be taken lightly, and is not recommended for the faint of heart (ha!). Once you commit, you can’t go back. You won’t want to.

It is a far better thing, to feel these symptoms of a heart expansion, rather than the constriction that leads to the other serious kind of heart attack. They can actually feel just as scary and uncomfortable to the uninitiated, but take the ride, it is well worth it.

There are more.
Will you share some of your symptoms?
XoxJanet 

I hate going backwards. Period! In life. In love. In careers.
Here’s how it manifests in the most aggravating way in real time.

I had a stretch of time a few years back, maybe 7-8 years ago, where I was incapable of backing up my car without hitting something. Seriously.

Small poles and such at first, and then the Pièce de résistance (thank you French husband), I backed my SUV up and ONTO the hood of a brand new Audi S6, with my trailer hitch acting as a can opener, as up his hood I went!

All this at the holidays, in a crowded Post Office parking lot that is literally the size of a postage stamp…(aren’t they all)? Hence the reason I couldn’t hear that guy’s frantic honking over all the usual holiday, postage stamp parking lot honking.

*Side note: I’ve always thought car horns should have different sounds to express different emotions, (I feel the same way about ringtones on phones). One could be a pissed off sounding HEY! for all the Prius drivers; another sounds like clearing your throat, to just get someone’s attention, you know, after the light has turned green and they’re texting. Another is so high pitched that only animals can hear it, for all those cats and errant squirrels that play chicken with my car.

But the one I needed to hear that day was the frantic horn.
Hey!!!! Beeeeeeepppp!!!!! Hey!!!!! Laaaaaddyyyyyy!!!! 

Cool idea huh? You can steal it, just give me credit.
And send big checks.

Here’s the best part. I did it in front of my husband, who was in another car, eyes wide, mouth agape in disbelief, trying to look anonymous even though he had just kissed me goodbye for all the world to see. 

He was also laying on HIS horn too! See?!! Too much honking!
Geez! How’s a girl to think?

So I carry with me to this day, a fear of going in reverse.
I will do anything to avoid backing up. I will drive around the block for hours, to find a parallel parking space.

I get jittery and leave the Trader Joes parking lot if it’s too crowded, and the spaces look dicey. I will NEVER back out of a driveway onto a busy street.
I would just as soon leave my car there and buy a new one.

I’m just so afraid I will maneuver my can opener, I mean car, up onto another unsuspecting victim.

Because I’m so nervous, EVERYTHING is drawn to behind my car! Isn’t that just the way it goes?! The second my backup lights come on, all manner of cars,trucks,scooters, ancient grandmas and grandpas, dogs, cats, children in strollers, ladies in rollers, kids on skateboards, twenty-something girls on their cell phones, and expensive sports cars, magically and instantly appear, (and closer than they really are) in my rear view mirror!

Because of this fear I have become a magnet for the slow and unaware among us.
If I honk to alert them to my presence, they flip me off. Grandmas give me stink eye.

I watch other people with great envy that can just put it in “R” and zip carefree
backwards and out, into traffic.

Remember my list of the things I’m not good at? I’m adding this, somewhere up near the top.
Quit your snickering, you’re all so smug…you can join my husband.

Carry on
Xox

So, it’s the fall of 1993, and there’s some weird shit going down.
My meditations are turning pretty darn mystical AND
I just had the experience in meditation of having a voice yell
“We have an agreement”…twice.
Now you’re thinking; “That’s impossible, it must have been a neighbor, or the TV”….but it wasn’t.

Now, I blame the fact that I was bored with my life back then.
Good job, great friends, travel, no man, but the looking was fun, but I was constantly thinking; “Is this all there is? Day in, day out? There’s gotta be more.”
I was by no means miserable, just bored.

I needed some ZaZaZu. Well…be careful what you wish for, because the Universe knows ZaZaZu. It created ZaZaZu, and it opened a giant can of ZaZaZu on me…because I asked.

I covertly put the word out, that I needed some answers to all my questions about the crazy that was happening nightly at my apartment.
That sent me on a sort of back alley, spiritual wild goose chase, with tarot card readers, and psychics and every shade of “woo-woo” character right out of central casting.
Which led me to wonder: “Are these my people? Really?!”

I finally remembered my channel friend, who I went to see over the years for relationship problems. I called her to book a session. 
As far as she knew, it was more “Janet boy trouble”, and on my way over I worried that this whole thing was above her pay grade, so to speak.
So you can imagine my shock when she answered the door and said “Sit down quick, you DO HAVE AN AGREEMENT!”

Shut up!

The session went like this: “They” talked a lot about my agreement and my destiny.
It went a long time. Two cassette tapes worth. It got dark out.
I just sat there dumbfounded, and cried. It was the pressure, you have a lot to live up to, being told your destiny!
And I was hungry.

A couple of problems arose. 
1) Back in those days we recorded these readings on cassette tapes. I usually played them in my car, obsessively, searching every word for meaning.
From that day forward, the tapes never recorded for me again…ever.
When I played it, it was gibberish. One of my music/sound tech friends said it sounded like it recorded backwards, which is impossible…right? WTF?
Anyway, they were unlistenable. Later when asked, “They” said I had heard it, and they didn’t want me to overthink it. 
Problem was: 2) After about 12 hours, I couldn’t and still can’t, remember a thing they said that day…it just felt big.

My friend was pretty out of it after the session, but as I left she invited me to meet her guru, which she explained she never did.
A week later, I met her at a house in the Hollywood Hills.
There were snacks, there were tapes of her guru playing on the TV and there was a healer/energy worker there that everyone was all gaga over. I tried to see who he was, but I couldn’t over the groupies. Everyone seemed really nice and relatively normal, but after staying an appropriate amount of time, I started the steep descent, (in killer high heels) down the driveway to my car.

About half way down I heard someone running up behind me. He was barley five feet tall and extremely out of breath.  
“Where are YOU going?” he gasped.
“Um…home?”
“I’m T, I do bodywork at the Ashram up north, but I’m in LA for a bit, and you need some.”
He hands me his card. Funny thing was that a really serene woman up at the house 
had given me her card for some bodywork also. Did I have a neon sign on my forehead that said IN DIRE NEED Of BODYWORK?
Yes, the answer is – yes I did – to the people that read that kind of invisible signage.
He stared at me with his big blue eyes, trying to see into my soul, but I was suspicious, and access was denied.

Three days later, the thought of bodywork would not leave my brain.
NOW I know when that happens to really listen, but it took three days, back then, for me to get out the two business cards and decide who to call.
What’s bodywork anyway, I asked myself. I was convinced it must be a really killer massage. Haha! That makes me laugh so hard…NOW!!

The woman’s card was sweet and pretty and smelled like lavender, I swear!
I knew I wanted to go to her. 
Great! Decision made.
So I was taken aback when a man answered, and I recognized his Australian accent. Shit! It was T the Ashram healer guy!
I had NO intention of calling him. None!
And yet, that’s who I dialed! Freakin’ Universe!

My first impulse was to hang up, but I didn’t, I made an appointment for the next day.
(To be continued)

XoxJanet 

When war is no longer needed
To settle a score
No more banging of the drum
Or pounding on the chest.

When a father’s grievances 
his rage and fear,
hold no weight with his son
for it is not his fight.

When mothers take a stand
and say “No more”!
“You may not have my son”
to fight your needless war!”

When the land of the earth,
under the feet of these men,
will not tolerate division,
then they will understand.

There will be no support,
moral or financial ,
for such endeavors that kill,
in the name of God ,
or his brothers.

Then THAT will be true freedom,
not the one that binds,
not the one that wants to own, 
and imprison,
but another kind.

This freedom does not say
“this is yours and this is mine”
It shares all its diversity,
the sum of the whole being 
greater than its parts.

This day will come,
in the not so distant future,
let the energy support it 
it will be your best future,
and the greatest legacy 
to leave your children.

I will devour this thing called life
In giant sloppy bites!
Because to nibble around the edges would be a crime.

I will take in every taste, feel and smell,
As it is offered to me, with mouth and hands and senses wide open,
Leaving no morsel of living left behind.

If you say you want to live a measured life,
Don’t come sit by me,
For the laughing will be as loud as the tears where I sit.
Things will appear messy and uncensored, and way too big at times.

But if you want to run through tall grass with bare feet,
If you want to stand on the beach with your face in the wind,
If you think you can handle both joy and despair,
Then take my hand.
For this is one wild and crazy ride,
Take all the chances, make every mistake,
Because you only get to be “you” once,
And you will not come out of it alive!

I Love this!

Rock, Paper, Scissors.