Transformation and Evolution

Bhaksar & Sudha: Oneness Blessing Trainers 

Our theme for the month of April is "Spiritual Living Through Evolution and Transformation."
"We do deep inner personal work of self-discovery and healing to reveal the greater truth of our divinity, wholeness and freedom."

Coincidentally, I was approached by a woman last week to see if we would be interested in hosting a Oneness Blessing. Since I was introduced to the Oneness Blessing years ago, I was happy to give up my normal Sunday morning 20 minutes meditation time for them.

The Oneness Meditation is designed to give participants a deep experience of the Divine. The meditation originated in India but does not belong to any religion, faith or doctrine.

When I Googled Oneness Blessing the first article I acme to was on the website of Deborah Lindeman, a hypnotist from Fort Collins, Colorado.

"The Oneness Blessing is a process by which we are re-connected with this quiet, intelligent center of ourselves."

That sounded great to me and exactly the theme of our focus for the month of April.

Later in my research, I found some very negative articles about the founders and their character and motives. However, when you Google "Centers for Spiritual Living" the second item that comes up is "Centers for Spiritual Living Cult."

From my experience we are less like a cult than anything. We help people understand how their thinking has a direct influence on their lives. I leave it to the individual what it is they want to think.

If you intend to come to receive the Oneness Blessing on April 9th at 10 AM, please come a little early so you can be seated by 10 AM.

Here is another coincidence. This week in our history of the Science of Mind class, we are studying Ernest Holmes' book The Holmes Papers: The Philosophy of Ernest Holmes. 
On page 4, Dr. Holmes writes:

"In looking over these generations of teachings of India, we find a very great concept of unity of all life.  They believed in one god and only One; they didn't call it God; they called it the Absolute, or Brahma, but it doesn't matter what you call it. They believed in one Presence and one Power, and only One in the Universe. They believed (which later came out as a theosophical teaching) in the mind that sleeps in the mineral, waves in the grass, wakes to simple consciousness in the animal, to self-consciousness in the human and to cosmic consciousness in what they call the upper hierarchies, or ascending scale of evolution, ad infinitum."

I am very curious if my own experience will be different than it was the first one. Since I know that one cannot step in the same river twice I know it will be different, I am curious about how it will be.

By the way, I do not believe in coincidences! Everything is always perfectly unfolding as it should.

To Hell with Extraordinary, I'm Settling for Ordinary

Nature brings on pretty major revelations for me.

So, it's no surprise I had another one, but this one was so pivotal.

So pivotal, in fact, that I wanted to share it on this blog because I think there are many who could gain an awareness from my experience.

 I spent the day in Lewiston, CA…yeah, I didn't know where it was either, up until about a week ago.

 My mom and stepdad decided to throw their "balls in the air," sell everything, move from South Carolina to Northern California to live in an RV and see what life was really all about…in their early 60's, I might add!

I went on a 12 hour road trip from Southern California to Northern with my two boys to check out my mom's new digs.

It was COUN-TRY!

Up a mountain, 30 miles from the nearest town, BLACK as black gets at night, but the sounds of nature roaring outside.

Born and raised in the country, I spent a majority of my adult years living in cities to escape the past and be "born again" in city living.

That said, the minute I passed through Redding, CA and started up the mountain to Lewiston, I knew I was back to my roots….my innards just expanded with joy.

As I spent the last couple of days painting with deer grazing 20 yards away, journaling

The "she-Buddha" painted in nature with deer grazing 20 yards away.

and meditating by a river so crisp and clear, I forgot that rivers existed like that, I started to "download" some pretty clear messages.

 First, I realized how nice it is to be disconnected from technology.  I have no cell phone service and no wifi.

I am fully dependent on my own natural abilities to entertain myself and kids….who knew I had it in me without technology?!?

So, we painted. Searched for acorns then planted them. We waded in the crisp Trinity River.

We explored by driving up and down mountain roads to see deer, horses, sheep and other creatures living their own "ordinary" lives….hell, we even saw a rattlesnake basking in the afternoon sun totally freaking me out.

An "ordinary" deer that was breath-taking in it's natural environment.

Here was the realization that came to me…. Everything around me is so….well, ordinary.

 Every redwood tree looks like the next.

Every river, lake and/or tributary looks the same.

The deer grazing in the yard all look the same.

Hell, even the stars that cover the night sky, just like my MacBook desktop, look the same.

Why, then, are they so damned extraordinary?

Why, then, do they make me feel so alive?

Why, then, does my soul expand every time I change eye direction?

I find myself so consumed with the "ordinary" beauty around me. You see one mountain in California, you've seen them all. You see one deer, you see them all...right?

One would think.

 But, I am so moved, almost to tears, every time I see another mountain expanding into the sky around a bend in the road. I've seen the same doe with her twin fawns multiple times a day since we arrived here three days ago, yet, they take my breath away every time I see them again.

When did "ordinary" become so extraordinary?

My contradiction? I've been blogging, tweeting, and creating programs teaching people to go from "ordinary to extraordinary," yet, my realization in the last couple of hours was… …that ordinary is, in fact, perfect.

 It's exactly what we are supposed to be because ordinary is perfection.

The tree is perfect.

The deer is perfect.

The Trinity river is perfect.

All of them "ordinary" to many, yet so freaking extraordinary if you really see it.

My life is ordinary, yet so freaking extraordinary….because I saw it for the first time today....in a different light.

 The clincher for this realization was today's reading in Science of Mind magazine:

"…we release the obsession with being extraordinary to the extent that we realize that we are already Godlike."

Shazam! 

The idea that was brewing in my mind over the last couple of days hit me like a ton of bricks.

I AM extraordinary just by being ordinary me because ordinary me is part of that Infinite Universe that mesmerizes me with all it's natural creation.

 I work my ass off to "be extraordinary," and it's been so darn exhausting!

And, how do I know when I've gotten there…to extraordinary, that is?

I am here now….at extraordinary.

 …And so are you.

 I take back all the "forget ordinary, be extraordinary's" I've ever put out to the Universe…

 I don't make any apologies for misleading you or anyone else if I did because our "job," if you want to call it that, in this lifetime is to evolve our thinking, and that's just what I've done in the mountains of California.

 What an amazing realization!

Instead of busting our asses to be extraordinary, one of the easiest ways to be happier in life is simply to embrace or ordinary-dom! I have spent some time, back in my roots in the country, and have allowed the "real me" to stand up and exclaim…

"Forget extraordinary, be ordinary!"

...and I'll add, "...and be DAMN proud of it!"

Because ordinary is where it's at.

Let's rock out some ordinary and walk proud knowing we are Divine perfection!