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Stop Harboring Resentments – Free Yourself Right Now

Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. – Buddha

Do you have a friend who’s been divorced for many years yet still refers to the ex in the most disparaging terms? Or is there someone you know who keeps telling the same old stories about their terrible parents/ siblings/ bosses/ neighbors? What if the angry person described here is you? You may think you have good reason to continue being angry and resentful over past wrongs. It really hurt. But do you know how much it keeps harming you in body, mind, and spirit to stay in the world of “they done me wrong?”

Holding on to resentments and anger can ruin your quality of life. The only person who suffers from your failure to forgive is you. The other guy may have long forgotten—if they were even aware of the wrong or acknowledged it as something they were responsible for.  When you have suffered a wrong, or even a perceived wrong, the resulting hurt and anger you feel can burrow deep into your heart and energy field and cause great harm. And the longer you hang on to resentment and bitterness instead of forgiving the wrong, the greater the chances that those negative feelings will cause discord in your system, creating blocks in your chakras and eventually even physical symptoms and illness.

From energy medicine, you know that holding on to negative emotions, burying them deep in your subconscious and deep inside your body, can cause things to go wrong in your life. Relationships falter and fail, money issues pile up, your health can take a nosedive. It really matters that you face the anger and resentment, and the pain, and take steps to erase the negative tape loops in your head. When you acknowledge your feelings, you can begin to forgive and to release the positive, free-flowing energy needed for healing.

Here are 5 tips for setting yourself free:

1. Forgive yourself first.

You may be feeling guilty for your pain, wondering if you might have caused all the grief yourself. Self-forgiveness is more important than forgiving others. If you are constantly beating yourself up over past mistakes, that blame and anger can cause blockages in your personal energy field. There is nothing to be gained from wishing you could change the past. As a spiritual teacher and energy healer, I encourage students to learn from the past, forgive themselves, and let it go.

2. You aren’t condoning.

Forgiveness is not excusing what someone did to you. There are likely very real betrayals and traumas in your life that are not excusable, and you shouldn’t feel the need to minimize what happened. Forgiving is you letting go of the residual emotions like resentment, anger, hurt, and bitterness. You stop feeling hostile and release any need or desire for revenge. This is not weakness, but great strength. It takes a lot of courage to forgive and working toward it will aid your spiritual growth.

3. Focus on the positive. 

In forgiveness, remember that your goal is to release the negative emotions of anger and resentment. You can use your ability to focus on the positive, the light, the love, and the beauty in your life to let positive energy grow within you as the negative is released. Bring yourself into contact with the good and loving things you enjoy. Take a walk in nature, meet with friends, play with your pets, and speak in positive ways that reflect your hopes and dreams. Although forgiveness can be very difficult, it may be the most important thing you have ever done for yourself.

4. Remember to reach out.

As you seek to forgive, you have infinite resources to help and uplift you. You can go deep in meditation and ask your spiritual guides and angels for help. You can ask for help from counselors, therapists, or study energy healing so you can start to get your energy flowing in a positive direction.

5. Journal about your feelings.

Journaling sets your negative feelings free from your body and energy field, and allows for fresh universal energy to fill that space.

Let go of old resentments and you’ll be astonished at how much lighter and freer you’ll feel!

Learn more about getting in touch with your innermost feelings with a mantra-based meditation practice. Meditation is the key to self-discovery and healing those wounded parts of you that keep you stuck.

[su_note]There is no better way to overcome past traumas than a live event, surrounded by the powerful force of positive energy from your fellow attendees.

This positive energy force is increased exponentially when the event happens in a location known for its powerful spiritual vortex! And the Deborah King Center is holding a public retreat October 31st – November 3rd in Ojai, California (known for its powerful spiritual vortex).

Join us to connect with seekers of truth and light, get inspired, be uplifted, and let your light shine. Click here to learn more and to get your early-bird ticket.[/su_note]

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Why You Need to Awaken Your Soul

What do you know about the higher chakras? Though they are less known than the seven bodily chakras, these powerful energy centers are the links between your Earth-bound personality and your eternal soul, as well as your connection to the vastness of the greater universe. When activated, the higher chakras increase your spiritual awareness, unleash and improve psychic gifts, and give you access to higher beings and your higher self for valuable knowledge and guidance that can keep you on your true soul path.

With clear, charged, and expanded higher chakras, you’ll experience a profound spiritual awakening that will reverberate to your core and change your life forever.

You Are Bigger Than Your Body

When I began teaching energy healing courses years ago, chakras were a hard sell—no one knew what they were! But now, chakras are relatively mainstream due to the popularity of other practices rooted in eastern cultures like yoga and meditation, and I’m getting more and more questions about what are now the lesser-known chakras, 8 through 12. Higher chakras can be difficult to explain, as they are more experiential than intellectual, but I have found through my years as an energy healer and spiritual teacher that the first step in beginning to open your higher chakras is simply to be aware of them.

The first thing to understand is that you are so much bigger than your body! Your energy field surrounds you, both above and around your physical form, and your higher chakras are lined up above your crown chakra at the top of your head, roughly following the path of your spine down which your seven bodily chakras are located. There are many spiritual chakras above the seventh, and as you rise to those levels, it begins to be a little disorienting to be so far beyond your body. A skilled spiritual teacher can safely carry you into these higher realms.

Prepare for Your Soul Awakening

For now, you can begin your journey to the higher chakras by activating your eighth chakra, which sits about two feet above your crown chakra. The eighth chakra, sometimes also called the “soul star,” is the first of these chakras, and the doorway through which your soul must pass in order to move into the rest of the higher chakras.

Clearing and activating the eighth chakra opens up your world, and carries your spirit higher than you’ve ever been before. You need to do the personal work required to clear, charge, and balance the seven bodily chakras through meditation, journaling, and other energy medicine techniques before you are ready to tackle the higher chakras. But once you are ready, here is what you can expect from your soul awakening:

  1. Connect directly to your higher self.

When your eighth and higher chakras are open, you will be able to interact with your higher self. Your higher self is you—the perfect version of you that you came here to become—and it has answers to all your questions. Your higher self has access to your Akashic records, which contain all knowledge in existence, past, present, and future, so the guidance you receive from this chakra is equal to no other.

Meeting with your higher self will also allow you to see your soul’s contract, which is stored in the eighth chakra. Your soul contract is what your spirit came to this earth to accomplish, your life purpose. So once you’ve opened your eighth chakra, you may feel a tugging at your psyche, a nagging resolution that it’s time to follow your true path and complete whatever task your soul set up for your life. Listen to that voice that tells you what your higher calling is; trust that higher plane understanding that you’ve received by activating your eighth chakra and awakening your spirit.

  1. Unlock your spiritual gifts.

With the magnified awareness of an open eighth chakra, you may discover new abilities developing within you. As you internalize and fully accept the truth that you are not only part of the greater universe, but that you are tapped into its power, psychic talents are likely to unlock. For example, with access to more information through the Akashic records, you will probably find your intuitive powers growing. There is also the potential for an activated eighth chakra to sprout the seeds of any dormant spiritual gifts and you might uncover such capabilities as astral travel, clairvoyance, telepathy, and energy healing! After all, these skills are in your collective unconscious; you need this soul awakening through your higher chakras to help bring them to light again.

  1. Rid yourself of karmic residue.

The eighth chakra acts as the bridge to the expanded universe, so it’s the last chakra that carries human information and physical plane baggage that must be discarded before you can move on. This means this chakra is where all your karmic residue gets stuck—the lingering karmic energy leftover from lifetimes of adhering to habitual patterns of behavior. These old and worn out patterns of energy are keeping you attached to the planet, unable to evolve until you learn the lessons you’re supposed to learn. When you open the eighth chakra, it allows you to start shedding the familiar-but-no-longer-needed patterns of behavior that keep you rooted to the physical plane. Activating the eight chakra frees you from those sticky karmic leftovers, so you can advance on your spiritual path into higher realms.

Traveling through the veil that separates your physical self from your immortal soul will open your eyes to the vast space and knowledge beyond our physical plane boundaries. As your higher chakras expand, you can integrate the understanding that you are a soul in a body temporarily here on Earth, which allows you to see the vast and interconnected community of souls on this planet, each doing their best to get back to the divine, just like you. This sense of oneness opens you up to the experience of unconditional love, and in turn, divine love, which is truly a soul awakening experience.

To learn about how to clear, charge and balance your chakras and experience a spiritual awakening, take a look at my Chakra Wisdom video course

The sun is healthy for you

Are You Shortening Your Lifespan by Avoiding the Sun?

(and Reducing Your Happiness While You’re at It)

A few weeks ago, I hosted a week-long workshop in Malibu and noticed how many of my students were avoiding the sun during the breaks on the terra cotta terrace outside the conference room. This kind of “sun phobia” is a common side effect from the 30 or so years of national guidelines from countries around the world that (incorrectly) stress the danger of the sun.

In fact, not enough sun may be worse for your health than too much sun.

In a recent study that tracked 30,000 Swedish women for over 20 years, they found that women who tried to stay out of the sun were twice as likely to have an early death as those who spent a normal amount of time in the sun.

Why? Researchers aren’t sure, but it’s likely because the sun stimulates Vitamin D production, which reduces risk for cancer, stroke, heart disease, and other common causes of death. The sun also reduces blood pressure, another beneficial affect. Plus, sunlight helps decrease inflammation throughout the body at the same time it’s increasing immune function, a double benefit.

There’s an interesting correlation in studies of MS that show that the more hours of sun you’ve been exposed to, the lower your risk of MS. You will also find your general mood improves after you’ve been in the sun; that’s because sunlight improves your endocrine system functioning. Finally, it may well increase DNA repair.

So how much sun is enough without being too much?

• Aim for at least 10 minutes (if you’re very fair) to an hour (if you’re darker) at least 3 times a week. No sunscreen is needed. If you’re going to be out longer than that, add a zinc oxide based sunscreen after that initial period of time. Don’t stay out so long you burn.

• Consider your skin, the time of day, the latitude and season. That is, use common sense. Before 8am is ideal in the summer; always avoid 10am to 4pm during the hotter months. Essentially, you need less sun time in the south than in the north.

• Before you slather yourself with a “safe” sunscreen like zinc oxide, know that it too may generate free radicals when exposed to the sun. Of course, I would assume you would never use a chemical sunscreen. Eeek.

The Sun and Health Concerns

The sun is not only a massive ball of atomic energy, it’s also a huge supplier of vitality—from photosynthesis in plants to your own ability to thrive. In the Rig Veda, it is said that the sun’s main spiritual principle is to energize all created beings. The Bible says the sun is the power of light to vanquish the darkness.

The more sunlight you get during the day, the more melatonin you make at night, and thus you have less stress and sleep better. The sun affects your mood and your ability to focus and stay alert. It decreases the risk of depression for folks who are prone to seasonal affective disorder (SAD). Environmental Health Perspectives journal published a study that linked exposure to sunlight to a reduced risk of prostate, pancreatic, ovarian, and colon cancer. Another, in the Journal of Human Resources, showed that students did better in tests if they got enough sun every day, and other research has shown a strong link between exposure to sunlight and a better quality of life.

And, get this, time in the sun may even reduce the risk of melanoma. A study in the Lancet Journal showed that skin that had been exposed to short wavelength ultraviolet radiation (UVB) was associated with less risk of melanoma. People in the study who worked outdoors had less risk of skin cancer than those who were “safe” from the sun in their cubicles.

But what about skin cancer? It turns out that around 99 percent of skin cancers are non-melanoma basal cell and squamous cell cancers. Getting rid of them may not be fun, but they are very rarely deadly. According to the CDC, melanoma and other skin cancers kill around 11,000 Americans a year in the U.S., while heart disease affects around 650,000. So if sun exposure helps reduce heart disease—and there are a number of robust studies that show that sunlight is good for hearts—the risk to benefit ratio seems clear.

It’s summertime. So get outside after the sun rises or before it sets and enjoy some fun in the sun. Let that magnificent ball of radiant vitality empower your health and happiness. The days are long past since public health recommendations severely restricted sun exposure. The latest advice is to get some sun, seriously!