2024-AddictionBlogRetread-featured

Where are you on the addiction spectrum?

by Energy HealingFeaturedHealth

Today is election day in the United States. It’s an election that impacts the entire world. So, it’s no wonder that many of us are sitting glued to our TV screens, scrolling social media, or refreshing our favorite news site.

Election season no longer seems to be just election season anymore. It’s constant. The 24 hour news cycle and the proliferation of social media has made it an ever present aspect of our lives.

Which begs the question: just how big a part of your life is it? How far on the spectrum are you?

No, not the autism spectrum. I’m talking about the addiction spectrum.

Everyone’s addicted to something. We hear the word “addiction” repeatedly in the news, referring to horror stories about opioids and other prescription drugs. And let’s not forget about the stalwarts of addiction: alcohol, smoking, gambling, promiscuity (sounds a little like an ad for Las Vegas).

And in today’s society, “doom scrolling,” fear, and outrage are all actually enormous sources of addiction. And election day brings peak symptoms with it.

Instagram or TikTok all day?

But what about other, seemingly more benign addictions. Social media all day? Wine every night? Shopping online incessantly? Marijuana to put you to sleep? Hoarding up to your eyeballs? Overeating that same food again and again and hating yourself for it?

Growing up in a family of alcoholics, I definitely had the calling. By 18, I was addicted to alcohol, Valium, weight-loss pills (okay, speed, but it was legal back then), and over-exercising coupled with under-eating so I could stay model-thin. I was running ten miles a day. I was a lawyer with substantial caffeine and smoking habits. And a bottle of vodka in my desk drawer, for emergencies only, of course.

When I was diagnosed with cancer at 25, I had to stop killing myself in order to get better. Not only from the cancer, but also from the stranglehold the addictive substances had on me. The trouble with addiction is the anxiety or depression or extra pounds or whatever the problem you were trying to fix by turning to the substance or behavior, brings with it a whole new exponentially bigger (addiction) problem that is much harder to manage.

You can’t beat addiction without community.

The first thing I found on the road to recovery was community. AA was a life saver. The 12-step program held many of the keys I needed. “Recovery” is the balance, the scale on which you measure your addiction and vow to win.

If you’re trying to shake something, I promise you will be stronger within the AA network. Without someone saying every day “you can beat this disease, we’re in this together,” your chances of success are much lower. Community offers the truth-telling, sharing, and not holding it inside, all so vital to you on your path.

The Recovery Village website lists 32 different 12-step programs, chances are there’s one for you: they range from alcohol to cocaine, clutterers to meth, and on to co-dependents, sex addicts, debtors, food addiction, gamblers, heroin, marijuana, narcotics, nicotine, gamers, pills, under-earners, and, my personal fav, workaholics. You name it, we can get addicted to it.

The community I’ve founded, the Deborah King Center, is based on energy medicine and is similar in many ways to a 12-step program, offering a community of like-minds as well as a host of tools for you on your journey.

I also offer a year-long Masters-in-Training program that is limited to 20 people that I meet with every other week and give intense direction and support as together we work on their personal goals, which often include addressing a behavior they’d love to permanently put behind them.

It matters who you hang with.

“Birds of a feather flock together.” So annoying that old truism is correct; that we can indeed become like our (worst) friends. Sadly, I had to take a lengthy sabbatical from my rollicking Irish family, all high-functioning drinkers who also popped pills at the least discomfort. I left criminal law and the courtroom with its insane stress, where lunch was liquid, and segued into real estate law, where the lawyers at least left the office for the night before hitting the sauce. I had to let my witty assistant go as she was knee deep in cocaine and I was afraid I might join her.

Sadly, my brother, my best friend, didn’t quit drinking with me, and, today, he so regrets it, as he deals with significant alcohol-induced dementia, can occur even with just social drinking.

How heartbreakingly sad for a man who single-handedly escalated to the top of his field; so successful he bought his own jet at 25. Now not even all his millions can free him from an addiction that is rapidly killing him.

And then there’s the recent study, talk about a wake-up call, that reveals that even moderate drinking can make you more likely to develop Alzheimers.

Overeating yet again?

Food (too much or too little) is undoubtedly the hardest addiction to manage. It’s tricky, because you can’t stop eating altogether. You actually need to eat, but moderation—there’s that word again—is the key. I mastered food by studying nutrition and focusing on a healthy diet. There are ways to get a grip on the weight issue, don’t lose faith; use the tools I’m outlining here. And don’t forget to eat a little something every couple of hours; keeping your blood sugar even is crucial here.

Marijuana is not a panacea

The latest craze to legalize marijuana ignores the science that pot is a gateway drug, profoundly damages the young brain, and can trigger mental health issues.


More significant for you, dear reader, is that it fogs the heck out of the adult brain and limits spiritual advancement. When I look deeply at someone (with their permission, of course), the pot user will have a telltale gray fog in their personal energy field that prevents them from stepping up another level in consciousness. Before you light up next time (or hit the edibles), ask yourself if you want to remain stuck in the same old narrow mindset, or are actively working to transcend; if the latter, try meditating next time in lieu of pot, it works way better.

The tools of the recovery trade.

After a few years, I was able to manage the drinking, drugging, smoking, under-eating, and over-exercising. The tools I used? Community (AA), meditating, getting plenty of sleep, super nutrition, energy healing, and spending a lot of time out in nature – each step helped me kick my unwanted behaviors to the curb.

But it’s still “one day at a time” as I battle the ever-present tendency to become addicted to the next compelling thing. I only have two buttons: on and off. On the spectrum, that’s the far extreme of the addictive personality. Moderation is a foreign concept, in my mind lumped together with boring, bland, and banal. Once an addict . . . those tendencies never go away.

One day at a time, forever.

The hallmark of the addict’s world is getting through one day at a time. You can make it through one day. The thought of a week or a month or, my God, a year, is impossible to contemplate. But you can get through one day. And the amazing thing is when you string together just 30 days of “one day at a time,” you can change any behavior. I promise.
Now nearly 50 years later, I am still (proudly) clean and sober, but watchful every day for addiction to raise its ugly head; it’s never far away. And on my end of the addiction spectrum, that’s a win. It can be yours too.

2024-BecomingtheRealYouBlog-featured

Top 5 Steps to Becoming the Real You

by Energy MedicineFeaturedHealthSelf Love

Do you remember the first time you consciously told a lie, even though you knew it was wrong? Most likely it was to a parent, teacher, or other authority figure, and it was probably triggered by fear. How did you feel after the lie was told? Guilty, shameful, scared? Did it fester inside you until you admitted the truth, or did you stay with the lie?

Lying is a Defense Mechanism

As a child, you probably lied to protect yourself; you lied to a parent to get out of trouble or to a teacher to avoid public ridicule. As an adult, you may have lied to your partner, usually about either sex or money. But lying to others is only half the equation; that defense mechanism also includes lying to yourself. You may tell yourself that you’re fine, even when you feel crushed. No, that rejection didn’t hurt. I didn’t really care about that promotion or that relationship anyway.

You may tell yourself that your feelings are “unacceptable,” or that you “owe” it to a loved one to behave a certain way or follow a certain path. You may even convince yourself that someone else’s dream is really your own. But all of these lies create little pockets of darkness inside; they’re like cancer cells that fester and multiply until the truth comes out. That’s what happened to me: the sexual abuse that I couldn’t acknowledge even to myself became a diagnosis of cancer in my twenties.

Live Your Authentic Self

When you suppress your true feelings or follow a path that isn’t really yours, you aren’t living your authentic self. Your soul made a plan for this life before you incarnated, and that plan is your true life purpose. Acting in line with your life purpose is one way to live in the light, another step on the path toward expanded consciousness.

As an energy healer and spiritual teacher, I often see students doing their best to live in the light, but they keep hitting roadblocks. These students may practice meditation, they connect with nature, they participate in energy healing, but they may still not get the results they desire. When I look at their energy field, I can see that they are living a lie.

Perhaps they are gay but keeping it a secret; perhaps they want a divorce but are too afraid to upset the family; or their career was the dream of a parent and not what they wanted for themselves. As soon as they can admit the truth to themselves, the real healing can begin.

Unmask the True You

One of the greatest gifts of energy healing is its ability to reveal the true you. Just like those students, you, too, can admit the truth and take a big step toward living authentically.
Here are five ways to live your most authentic life:

  1. Find your authentic self.
    In order to live as your true self, you first have to find out who that is. There is an entire spiritual practice based on a seemingly simple question: Who am I? Are you really any of your labels—daughter, partner, mother, sibling, teacher? Are you your job? Who are you if you are not any of your societal roles? As the practice takes you deeper and deeper into meditating upon who you are not, eventually you come to realize that who you are is a soul, a spiritual being connected to Source. Indeed, you are Spirit. This is the deepest level of understanding your authentic self.

Even knowing you are Spirit, you still need to live in the world as authentically as possible. Ask yourself: what makes you feel joy? What are your passions? Your strengths? Your weaknesses? What qualities would you like to cultivate in yourself? What do you want? What makes you feel free? What would you fight for? What values are important to you? This last one is particularly important, as your actions should be in line with the principles you want to live by. When you know what you want and what you care about in this world, then it’s much easier to be authentic.

  1. Express your truth.
    The first step is admitting your truth to yourself, and the next step is expressing it. Even if you can’t yet speak your true feelings or beliefs aloud, write them in your journal. Eventually, you may be able to say what you think and feel to the important people in your life. A heavy weight lifts when you admit your truth. Imagine how great it feels to have your loved ones love the real you! A friend of mine recently admitted, first to himself and then to his family and friends, that living as a male was a lie, and his most authentic self was really female. It took a lot of soul searching and bravery, but decades of unhappiness lifted as he started his transition, and now “he” is happy and proud to be a “she.”
  1. Confront your fear.
    Often, the truth that you keep hidden is directly related to fear. Maybe you worry your loved ones will reject you or cut you from their life if they know the truth. You might fear isolation, loneliness, anger, or even attack, but if you keep repressing your feelings, they can become lodged in your chakras and create mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual problems much worse than the possible repercussions of expressing the truth. Many students come to my healing courses and workshops looking for relief from pain, but what they also find is relief from the constant struggle of dealing with fear.
  1. Discover what you truly believe. Energy medicine will help you dig down and discover what you really believe, rather than what you were taught to believe. As a child, you soaked up every tidbit from your parents, teachers, and the culture at large. You learned things like “boys don’t cry” or “girls must be seen but not heard,” or more personal messages, like “you must follow in the family business.” A large part of becoming your true self is figuring out what it is you truly believe, and what beliefs are not true for you and should be discarded.
  1. Trust your gut. The messages you get from your gut come from your higher self, which knows your soul purpose in this life. When you need to make a decision, listen to your gut. Your body doesn’t lie, and following its direction will steer you toward the course you are meant to travel.

Bonus: Find Your Supportive Community

Embarking on the journey toward your most authentic self can feel daunting, but you don’t have to do it alone. A supportive community is essential for your transformation. Surrounding yourself with like-minded individuals who understand and support your journey will amplify your healing and help you stay aligned with your true path.

By joining the LifeForce Energy Healing Level IV program, you not only receive expert guidance from Deborah King herself but also become part of a community of healers and seekers who are walking the same path. This year-long program is designed to help you shed the false layers, heal from past traumas, and step fully into your life’s purpose.

If you’re ready to embrace the truth of who you are and be supported by a community committed to growth and transformation, click here to learn more about joining Level IV.

2024-AreYourGenesWhoYouAreBlog-featured

Are Your Genes Who You Are?

by Energy HealingEnergy MedicineFeaturedHealth

Or are you much more than just a biological entity?

Everywhere you look these days, there is a new study coming out on how your inherited genes affect your health (and everything else). Ever since the human genome was sequenced (the human genomic project was completed in April 2003), there has been a huge surge in research based on the information carried by genes, from how you look in your jeans to your propensity for becoming an alcoholic or coming down with a rare disease. These little packages of DNA have been given a god-like place in our understanding of who we are.

Just a few short years ago, a diagnosis of cancer took you straight to Western medicine’s tool bag, which held only three major tools: surgery, chemo, and radiation. If cut-poison-burn didn’t work, you were left with alternative approaches that weren’t covered by insurance. (I’m not knocking Western medicine, just the limited technologies and the limitations of our present health care system.)

But things are changing. Today there is personalized medicine available in cancer treatment, based on your genetic makeup and the composition of the tumor. It’s a giant leap beyond the standard “one size fits all.”

There are other emerging scientific fields that are looking at your genes for other reasons, like nutrigenomics, which is aiming to reveal the connections between specific nutrients and diets, genetic expression, and your health. Soon you may be able to find out why you can’t tolerate bread or cheese while your sibling practically lives on pizza. Diabetes, Alzheimer’s, autism, longevity, digestive disease, cardiovascular disease, all sorts of cancers, obesity, even tooth decay are all being examined in light of an individual’s DNA.

It’s an exciting time to be checking up on the latest scientific research.

Even spirituality has gotten into the gene pool, with the idea that one particular gene, called MVAT2 (vesicular monoamine transporter 2, the “god gene”) is what turns a person inward towards mystical experiences.

And more and more, science is finding what deep meditators have known all along: it’s all one. The hip bone isn’t just connected to the thigh bone; everything in your body is connected to everything else. The way genes express themselves can affect myriad pathways in the body.

The genes you inherited from your biological mother and father, the life factors that have turned some genes on and turned others off, the interlocking connections between how gene expression affects different bodily systems—all this is being looked at through the lens of science, which is beginning to understand the reality and importance of a holistic approach to health.

But before we begin to think that genes are the be-all and end-all of who we are, remember that genes don’t explain the mystery of life itself, and who we really are. Your genetic makeup is the blueprint for your biology, but sages, shamans, and healers who work with energy medicine know that who we are isn’t based on physical matter, like genes, but on spirit.

This is the truth taught by the Vedas, and by all the ancient spiritual traditions—the body you inhabit in the three-dimensional physical world is not the whole of you, but merely a vehicle used by your Higher Self in order to experience the lessons that are to be learned in this lifetime.

Spirit, consciousness, or whatever term you want to use, is what permeates all life. You can’t smell it or taste it, you can’t use your physical senses to capture it, but you know when you are connecting to it. It may be when you’re out in nature and the quiet and peacefulness or the grand vistas and raw beauty elevate your consciousness, relax your rampant thoughts, and you touch that place of expansiveness and peace within yourself.

t may happen when you’re having sex or in nature or having an out-of-body experience. You may be sitting quietly at home, staring off into space, your mind a million miles away, when you are suddenly engulfed in light and you enter a state of inexplicable love. That’s not genetics; that’s grace.

So learn all you can about new genetic research in the areas that affect your life, but remember, whether your genetics turn on or off does not determine who you are at heart, in your soul, and at the very deepest level of your being.

{This article originally appeared on Psychology Today}

If you want to take control of your life, your being, and your time on this Earthly plane, a great step would be to join a community of like-minded seekers and healers that are on the path towards truth, healing, and uncovering their true purpose. Right now, the doors are open to our most transformational program: the year-long Master-in-Training program. You can learn more and register for it by clicking here >>

2024-StPatricksDayBlog-featured

From Captivity to Liberation: St. Patrick’s Influence and My Own Transformation

by Energy MedicineFeaturedHealthSelf Love

In the vibrant tapestry of global celebrations, St. Patrick’s Day stands out with its distinctive emerald hue, echoing the rich history and folklore of Ireland. It’s a day when the world, regardless of ancestry, embraces the Irish spirit.

This time, as I adorn myself in green, paying homage to both the saint and my Irish lineage, I’m compelled to delve deeper into the roots of this day, intertwined with my personal journey of transformation and healing.

“May God, Mary, and Patrick bless you.”

This traditional Irish blessing captures the essence of St. Patrick’s Day, a tribute to the saint who wasn’t born Irish but became an emblem of the nation’s identity.

My connection to this celebration is twofold: honoring St. Patrick, guided by his inner visions, and acknowledging my own battles, including overcoming alcohol addiction—a shadow that contrasts sharply with the day’s festivities.

St. Patrick’s tale begins in the late fourth century in Britain, where he was born into affluence. His life took a dramatic turn at sixteen when he was captured by Irish raiders.

This period of captivity in a land then unfamiliar to him sparked a profound spiritual awakening. His writings recount visions that led to his escape and eventual return to Ireland as a missionary, a story of resilience and faith that resonates with my own path towards healing.

Contrary to popular belief, St. Patrick’s mission in Ireland wasn’t about expelling snakes—a metaphor for indigenous practices of the time—but about spreading Christianity.

His legacy is a testament to the power of transformation, a theme that deeply influences my work in energy medicine and personal growth.

St. Patrick’s Day, marked on March 17th, commemorates his passing but is celebrated with much more than a nod to Irish history. It’s a day when prohibitions are lifted during Lent, allowing for feasting, dancing, and, historically, a lot of drinking.

This last aspect hits close to home, as alcohol once played a significant role in my life, a facet of my Irish heritage that I’ve since learned to view through a lens of awareness and self-care.

Reflecting on my own journey, I recognize the fine line between celebration and excess. My battle with cancer in my twenties was a wake-up call, highlighting the destructive path I was on due to alcohol.

Addiction is a struggle many face, and in the spirit of St. Patrick’s Day—a day of transformation—I share signs of alcoholism, hoping to offer guidance to those who might see themselves in my story.

  • Worry from loved ones about your drinking habits.
  • Drinking alone is a common practice.
  • Drinking despite promises to stop.
  • Being late to work because of drinking.
  • Feelings of guilt related to drinking.
  • Experiencing headaches or hangovers after drinking.
  • Morning drinking to ease hangover symptoms.
  • Irritation at comments about your drinking.
  • Thoughts of needing to reduce alcohol consumption.
  • Experiencing blackouts.

For those recognizing these patterns, I urge you to seek support, as I did with Alcoholics Anonymous—a decision that transformed my life, allowing me to embrace each day, including St. Patrick’s Day, with clarity and joy.

As we celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, let’s remember the deeper meanings behind the revelry—the stories of change, the strength found in faith, and the personal battles fought and won. It’s a day that reflects not only the spirit of Ireland but also the universal capacity for renewal and healing.

In this light, St. Patrick’s Day is more than just a cultural celebration; it’s a reminder of our ability to overcome adversity, much like St. Patrick himself, and to find strength in our convictions and the journey towards healing and transformation.

Perhaps this St. Patrick’s day will be the day you decide to take the first step on your own personal healing journey.

One step we might recommend is an introduction to energy healing via our bestselling LifeForce Energy Healing Level I course, which you can access by clicking here. Through this course, you can learn a number of techniques to begin to overcome the traumas that may be holding you back and start stepping into your true self.

But whether or not this is the right step for you at this time, we wish you a St. Patrick’s day full of love, positivity, and movement towards your destiny.

2022 BFS
2024-WomensDayBlog-featured

A Holistic Approach To Women’s Wellness

by Energy MedicineFeaturedHealth

International Women’s Day on March 8, 2024, is when society reminds us to celebrate and honor women and their achievements. I say we do that every day. We honor the special women in our lives who have gone before us and paved the road, fighting for women’s rights, and modeling what empowered womanhood stands for.

On a spiritual level, this means celebrating the Divine Feminine in every woman and learning about how we can access and embody this vital source of energy every day.

In our busy and chaotic world where demands and responsibilities often feel overwhelming, it is critically important to empower women to take great care of their health and well-being.

Women are the nurturers, the caretakers and they can only give to others when their cup is full and running over. For centuries, our health choices as women have been under attack. This war on women continues to rage on today putting your health at risk. It is time for us to make our health a top priority not only on a day when society reminds us to celebrate but every single day!

A holistic approach to women’s wellness includes physical, emotional, and spiritual support. We tend to put our well-being last while we struggle to balance career and family needs. This often goes on for years and even decades.

When a woman’s health is being neglected like that, inevitably there comes a breaking point. Society has coined it “Burnout.” That’s when her system shuts down completely and she becomes unavailable to everyone because, on her list of priorities, she has not put herself anywhere.

If this is you, here are some potent tips about how to fill your cup and take better care of yourself and the other women in your life who are close to reaching their breaking point.

Physical Well-Being: Look After Your Body

  • Make regular health checkups and preventive screenings non-negotiable and encourage the women in your life to do the same.
  • Embrace an active lifestyle. Take up mind-body exercises like yoga, and Pilates, or commit to going on regular walks. This way you are more grounded and feel better physically while improving your emotional well-being.
  • Eat healthy, non-processed foods and drink plenty of water throughout the day. Our body is 80% water, so keep it that way by staying properly hydrated.
  • Avoid unhealthy habits – say no to smoking, alcohol, drugs, and other self-destructive behaviors.

Emotional Well-Being: Look After Your Emotion

  • Incorporate meditation into your daily routine to cultivate inner peace and self-awareness. Once a day even if it’s just for twenty minutes. You will notice an enormous difference. And if you don’t know how to meditate, or would like to learn a simple yet amazing meditation technique, please check out my Vedic Meditation available here.
  • Prioritize getting plenty of quality sleep to manage your stress level effectively. By the way, if you are falling asleep during meditation, you are not getting enough sleep. Your mind and body need rest to recuperate before you start conquering your day and tackling your busy to-do list. So, take care of yourself and make sure you are getting enough restful sleep.
  • Avoid stress by setting effective boundaries. Learn to say ‘No’ to prevent overwhelm. Hint: NO is a complete sentence. It does not require an explanation.
  • Bring joy back into your life. Start engaging in activities that fill your heart with joy and happiness. That could be a hobby or people you love to spend time with because they make you feel happy. Make this commitment to yourself and be sure to follow through on it. Having joy in your life is vitally important to your emotional health.

Spiritual Well-Being: Look After Your Higher Self and Connect to Your Source

  • Reconnect with your Higher Self by grounding in Mother Nature. Take walks on the beach, or in the park, embrace forest-bathing, hiking, or swimming in the ocean; those are all wonderful places to be in tune with the Divine and Mother Nature.
  • Sleep under the stars, under a canopy of trees, or underneath the billowy clouds to fill yourself up with a big dose of nature. Let Mother Gaia hold you gently in her soothing arms while feeling deeply connected to Source.
  • Journal about your thoughts and emotions. The act of writing is one of the most powerful and uplifting tools to discover your inner truth. It’s your opportunity to be 100% honest with yourself and get to know yourself better. When you are more honest with yourself, you can be more honest with others. This creates deeper, more meaningful relationships and draws you closer to Source.

Make your wellness a habit today and every day. A wonderful way to take care of yourself is to retreat from the world and go within to experience deep transformation and healing. This Spring, I am hosting a powerful spiritual retreat in the desert where we do just that: connect, heal, and transform. You can learn more about it here.

2023-FluBlog-featured

Worried about the Flu?

by Energy HealingEnergy MedicineFeaturedHealth

Stress can make you more vulnerable.

Tips to keep your immune system hopping!

We are officially entering flu season. And without fail, each season introduces a new reason to panic (such as the recent surge in child pneumonia in China). And while we certainly hope there isn’t going to be another global pandemic, one fact remains inevitable: illness will spread this season.

But there are a few things that you can do to get through this flu season with your health intact.

The number one best preventative measure against the flu is Vitamin D, also called the sunshine vitamin. It protects you from colds and flu and works to boost your immune system. Good quality vitamin D is easily available. I take approximately 5,000 IU of Vitamin D3 a day during the cold and flu season (check with your health care practitioner to see what level is appropriate for you). Our bodies produce vitamin D when we are exposed to the sun, so getting out in the sun every day—always a great prescription—also helps. And some foods, like salmon and sardines, naturally contain vitamin D. Maintaining healthy levels of Vitamin D in your body can also protect against cancer!

Another important factor in maintaining your health and keeping your immune system in fighting mode against infection is to get enough sleep. Go to bed in a totally dark room to ensure melatonin production. Melatonin not only helps you sleep better, but is also a powerful antioxidant—more protection against the flu.

And finally, try to stay emotionally balanced. If you are living in fear of getting the flu or worrying excessively about your health (or anything else), the stress leaves you more vulnerable to infection. Do whatever works best for you to maintain balance—exercise, meditate, journal, get out in nature, do creative projects, and find the inner joy and happiness that will sustain you through the winter months ahead.

Ayurveda diet

Eating with the Seasons

by Energy MedicineFeaturedHealth

 

Your Ayurveda guide to healthy eating for your body type

Ayurveda is an ancient energy medicine protocol based on the idea that the universe is composed of five elements — air, fire, water, earth, and ether — and so are humans, and all other life forms and matter, as living progeny of the universe.

The rishis (accomplished and enlightened seers) proclaimed that, as microcosms of nature, all five elements exist in each of us and are represented by three doshas (energies).

Ayurveda diet

VATA (air and ether) is the force that directs nerve impulses, circulation, respiration, and elimination.

PITTA (fire and water) is the force that governs digestive metabolism and organ and tissue systems.

KAPHA (water and earth) is the force responsible for growth and structure (protection and integrity of the being or element).

These three energies are where your body connects with your mind—the place where your thoughts turn into matter that affects how well balanced you are as a being. When any of these three energies  go out of whack, Ayurveda offers specific lifestyle and nutritional guidelines to help reduce the turbulence so your body and mind can be restored to balance. In Ayurvedic terminology, a healthy person is defined as “she whose doshas are in balance, appetite is good, all tissues of the body and all natural urges are functioning properly, and mind, body, and spirit are cheerful.”

Your unique mind-body constitution is called prakruti, which means “nature”— your individual nature and body type. It is immensely helpful to learn what your mind-body nature is — which of the three energies are most prominent in your make-up — so you know how to keep them in balance.

TAKE STOCK OF YOUR MIND-BODY BASELINE

By looking closely at your tongue, face, eyes, nails, and lips over a period of  time, you can learn which of your energies need to be adjusted. Ayurvedic practitioners can also determine which of your energies are on overload by taking pulses similar to those acupuncturists consult to determine how strong, weak, flat, fast, or shallow these indicators are.

Ayurveda diet

DIET, EXERCISE, DAILY, & SEASONAL ROUTINES DETERMINE LEVELS OF WELLBEING FOR ALL THREE MIND-BODY ENERGY TYPES

If you’re principally Vata, your key to optimal wellbeing is regularity. If you’re experiencing poor digestion, if you catch colds easily, or if you develop insomnia and fatigue, you’re likely experiencing excessive oppositional energies.

If you’re quite Pitta, your key to optimal wellbeing is moderation. When you find yourself flying off the handle or experiencing inflammatory conditions, or if you’re  a super-stressed workaholic or overachiever, your energies are out of balance in this area, and need a tune up.

If you’re mostly Kapha, your key to optimal wellbeing is stimulation. When your energies are out of balance, you will most likely experience sinus congestion, poor circulation, and sluggish digestion which can lead to obesity and depression.

Ayurveda diet

Ayurveda outlines a set of seasonal guidelines known as Ritucharya. The guidelines serve as prescriptions for diet and lifestyle changes throughout the year to help  keep your mind clear, lift and fulfill your spirit, and help ensure vibrancy within your entire body.

According to Ayurveda, each year is divided into two periods, each covering three seasons:

Uttarayana, the cold months, containing the seasons Sharath, Hemanta, and Shishira

Dakshinayana, the warm months, containing the seasons Vasanta, Grishma, and Varsha.

Why eating for the season is crucial to greater wellbeing

If you’re a nature lover, as I am, you have probably noticed how differently wild ones behave and eat during the four seasons we usually think of: spring, summer, winter, and autumn. Their bodies, like our own, instinctively recognize and respond to seasonal environmental cues and conditions by processing nutrition so their bodies can prepare for the upcoming span of time that lies directly before them.

Ayurveda diet

Meat-eating mammals become voracious as the cold winter months begin to announce their arrival. The bodies of bears, raccoons, wild cats, and wild dogs in their hemispheres begin to fill out as some species ready their bodies for hibernation and other species prepare their bodies for days or weeks of starvation. It’s almost as if Nature/Source has placed a calendar in their craniums that prompts them to consume as much as they can find.

Well, surprise, surprise, surprise (as Gomer Pyle would say)!  We humans have the same internal promptings.  As the cold months approach, we begin to crave foods that help calm us even as they pack on extra fat, even though you aren’t environmentally bound to seasonal deprivation, as were our ancestors, not long ago, before refrigeration and mass transportation. But our bodies are still designed to operate the way they were back then, so eating in opposition to your promptings can set you up for a compromised immune system, unhealthy weight gain or loss, less healthy and robust skin and hair, and some illnesses. So, eating with the seasons does two things: It makes you feel good and it’s a powerful way to help ensure your wellbeing physically, mentally, and emotionally.

In the West, the Ayurveda practice of Ritucharya is characterized by four seasons, unlike India where there are six. In both countries, though, the energies go through a cycle of accumulating, aggravating, and palliating during the seasons, so our goal is to keep them as balanced as possible by way of lifestyle and diet.

Ayurveda diet

In the U.S. and in Canada, Vata season runs from autumn to early winter, mid-September to January, Kapha season happens from February to May, and Pitta season goes from June to mid-September. But, depending on where you live in the U.S. or Canada, always take your cues from your natural surroundings and fellow creatures. Up against and above the 54th parallel (the border between the US and Canada), the winter season is considerably longer.

Balance your diet by way of opposing energies. What I mean by this is that,  during Pitta season, as just one example, the weather is frequently hot, dry, light, and sharp, so counter those with cool, heavy, and bland foods; avoid sour, spicy, salty, and overpowering foods.

DIETARY INSIGHTS AND INFORMATION

Meat

Beef increases Pitta and Kapha but reduces Vata. It is heavy, thick, tastes sweet and its post-digestive effect is sweet. Eating beef heats your body. Beef increases Pitta and Kapha and reduces Vata.

Chicken is moderately okay for all three mind-body types. Sweet and astringent, its post-digestive effect is pungent (stimulating). It is strengthening.

Fish increases Pitta and Kapha but reduces Vata. Eating fish heats your body.

Dairy

Unsalted butter is sweet, astringent and cooling. It promotes intestinal absorption. It increases Kapha and reduces Vata and Pitta.

Unsalted cheese is sweet and sour and cooling. It increases Pitta and Kaphs and decreases Vata.

Cow’s milk is sweet and cooling. It increases Kaph and decreases Vata and Pitta.

Eggs are sweet, astringent and heating. Post digestively, they are pungent. Eggs increase Pitta and Kapha and decrease Vata.

Ghee is sweet and cooling. Taken in excess, it increases Kapha. Taken moderately, it is good for all three energies. It promotes digestion and strengthening.

Goat’s milk is sweet, astringent, and cooling. Post digestively, it is sweet. Increases Vata, decreases Pitta and Kapha. Relieves cough and fever.

As always, consult your health care provider before you undertake any new health regime.

Ayurveda diet

It’s important that your routine, diet included, fits your doshas – the combination of three energy sources that create your unique makeup. When you don’t align with the energy that is unique to you, that is when you feel out of balance. To get started on a deeper exploration of Ayurveda and the wisdom it holds for your health and well-being, take my Dosha quiz to find out which doshas are most prominent in you >>

body image weight

The Healthy Way to Get That Summer Body

by FeaturedHealth
body image weight

Memorial Day is the unofficial kick-off to summer, so chances are you’ve already been bombarded with images of perfect bodies in perfect shape in perfect locations. From bikini-clad girls and shirtless men like in those sunscreen commercials, to ads for fad diet products or lose-weight-fast exercise programs, the emphasis on bodily perfection this time of year can make you feel overwhelmed and depressed, which is never the right mindset for meaningful change.

It’s perfectly okay to want to get in better shape—as long as you do it in a safe, healthy way and for the right reasons. Energy medicine can be your guide to both the how and the why, and not only will you look great, but you will feel great too — and even more importantly, find confidence in your own body, just in time for swimsuit season. 

body image weight

Weight Loss Starts Within

How many times have you tried to lose weight? If you’re like millions of other people, probably quite a few. I can’t tell you how many crazy and unhealthy weight-loss tactics I’ve heard from attendees at my energy healing courses  and in my years as a spiritual teacher. Everything from cabbage soup diets to napping through mealtimes to hypnosis. But like you, none of my students found success with any of these methods because they weren’t really addressing the deeper problems.

The attitude that if you simply try harder—eat less and exercise more—you will look svelte and ready for Baywatch is a devastating lie. It’s true that eating well and exercise are an essential part of being in good shape, but that is not the only part of the equation, otherwise all my followers who starve themselves and live at the gym would have the bodies they desire. There is something deeper going on here, and recognizing that fact is the first step to getting and keeping that summer body.

Your Weight Is Not Just Physical

Losing weight and getting in better shape is not just an issue of physicality. Western medicine tends to treat healing as solely a physical process, and this culture treats weight-loss the same way. In both cases, the true healing needs to happen on the energetic level, which is where energy medicine comes in.

body image weight

The blueprint for your body is stored in your energy field, which means that if your energy field is distorted, your body can become out of balance as well, causing problems from headaches to allergies to weight gain. Energy healing addresses the health of your energy field, clearing blocks or imbalances in your chakras and directly influencing the health of your body. If there are energetic causes for your inability to lose weight or get in shape, until you address those, all your efforts will be undermined and less effective.

Here are a few ways you can begin the process of using energy medicine to heal your whole being, including your waistline.

body image weight
  1. Express Your Emotions, Don’t Eat Them
    As a child, were you given sweet treats or candies as a consolation for grief or disappointment? You may have created an association between comfort and food that has stayed with you into adulthood and is thwarting your weight-loss efforts. To combat that food-to-mouth response to emotional pain, be aware of when you are eating your emotions. A few tell-tales signs are mindless binge-eating and urgent and sudden cravings for sweet, salty, or fatty foods.
  • Drowning your sorrows in ice cream is bad for you in two ways: you ingest unnecessary calories while burying those feelings. When you don’t process negative emotions, they become lodged in your chakras and create blocks in your energy field. So eating your feelings creates current weight gain and can cause further weight gain down the road—a two-fold attack on your attempts to lose weight. Journaling your feelings will allow you to release them in a healthy way and keep your body from absorbing the emotional damage.
  1. Stress Less You probably know by now that stress takes a big toll on your whole being, but did you know it can also lead to weight gain? The stress hormone cortisol has been linked to belly fat, stress hampers your sleep which you need to maintain a healthy weight, and stress can lead to anxiety and depression which can make you lethargic. My first recommendation for stress reduction is always meditation. Meditation slows your mind and body down, allows you to connect with Source, and brings a sense of peace that lasts for hours beyond the meditation itself.
body image weight
  • Along with meditation, deep breathing techniques are helpful for lowering your stress. Try to inhale and exhale through your nose, and maintain fluid, regular breaths. This practice can help boost metabolism, and aid the body in removing toxins. Breathing deeply also helps you use oxygen more efficiently, which improves your ability to exercise. Exercise is a bonus weight loss technique since it burns calories and relieves stress.
body image weight
  1. Examine your intentions.
    Losing weight is a noble goal if your motivations are pure. Do you feel sluggish and tired? Has your doctor warned you of health complications from your weight? Is your figure causing you to miss out on things you enjoy or making you feel too depressed to spend time with other people? Do you just want to have more energy and feel better? These are some examples of healthy reasons to begin the process of trying to lose weight. Being motivated by a true desire to be healthier for yourself will keep you on the path when the work gets tough.
  • If you’re more motivated by the societal pressure to be thin, or by someone who has told you you aren’t beautiful, or a general shame about your body that will never truly be satisfied no matter how skinny you become, then you might not be as willing to put in the work needed yet, but energy medicine will help you with that. Not only will energy healing help you shed pounds, but it will help you to go deeper into your psyche so you can get to know yourself.

Losing weight is just one of the many ways energy medicine can improve your life and lead you on the path of discovering your true self, the self you came to Earth to become. To learn more, please join my LifeForce Energy Healing® I Certification Course.

Insanely happy

How To Be Insanely Happy (Even When Everything Sucks)

by Energy MedicineFeaturedHealthSelf Love
Insanely happy

When I was in my last year of law school, my lawyer father, on whom I doted, was in his 70s. Hearing on the family grapevine that I was in some kind of trouble, Dad came to the law school one day and took me out to lunch, telling me he had heard “I was unhappy.” Had I had a clue what I thought back then, which I did not, I’m sure I would have said I was insanely happy. After all, I was a size 4, what more could any 20-something want? Plus, I was at the top of my class; I thought Dad would be thrilled. Now, if truth be told, I was pushing a few things “under the carpet:” although engaged, I was having not one, but two affairs, I had serious issues with alcohol, drugs, and extreme sports, and, oh, I forgot to mention, I had just found out I had cervical cancer.

Over the fish course, Dad, out of the blue, volunteered, “the secret to life is simple, just don’t think about yourself. If you are always helping others, you’ll be happy your whole life.”

At the time, I thought, what does he know? All I wanted was to get done with lunch so I could get out of there and have a drink! At that moment, I was in complete agreement with the comedian George Burns, who said: “Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family… who all live far, far away!”

But you know what? It turned out, “father did know best.”

Insanely happy

There’s an old Chinese proverb that says “If you want happiness for an hour, take a nap. If you want happiness for a day, go fishing. If you want happiness for a year, inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime, help somebody.” 

For centuries, the greatest thinkers have suggested the same thing: happiness is found in helping others.

So, let me ask you, how happy are you? Right this moment. Well, let’s think about it. For starters, chances are, like me, you’ve cut way back on your social life and your travels because of the pandemic. There’s a lot less getting together than before. Maybe you’re still working from home but you’ve got kids or other family members under foot. Or worse, maybe you’re alone and screaming for companionship. Or maybe your partner was laid off and you’re trying to hold it together to pay the rent and the two of you are practically at each other’s throats these days. And to top it all, maybe you’ve got some health problems that you’re worried about.

So that can mean that you are pretty focused on your personal happiness, right? Your health, your finances, your relationships. I mean, isn’t that what we’ve been taught culturally, to focus on our own happiness, right? Actually, though, focusing on ourselves doesn’t make us happy.

Now, I bet right now you want to remind me that Thomas Jefferson wrote about the “self-evident” truth of our “unalienable right” to the pursuit of happiness. Turns out, if you read about him further, that he didn’t mean you need that Tesla you’ve been dreaming about to be happy! In the 18th century, the happiness the founding fathers wanted us to pursue was public happiness. They were interested in something much bigger conceptually that personal happiness: they wanted a country that would allow all its citizens a good life.

Insanely happy

So what are the steps to that kind of happiness?

STEP ONE is giving – just like Daddy taught me.

Scientific research absolutely shows that giving to others is the path to real, permanent, happiness. In fact, the act of giving activates the same sweet spot in your brain that food and sex do. And we all know how good those two activities feel! Altruism is hardwired into our brains and giving to others does more than make us feel good; it turns out, it’s also the secret to a meaningful life.

If you look at history, you’ll find this theory born out, time after time, culture after culture:

Insanely happy

Let’s start by looking at my field of expertise, the Vedic texts of East India. In Vedic times, over 5,000 years ago, the Vaidas, or Vedic physicians, taught that being happy in life was the key; helping others related to doing our dharma, our life work. They believed the main way to reach a supreme state of happiness was to serve the gods, the ancestors, and all living beings.

Flash forward to about 400 years before Christ, to the Greeks; they had a similar concept of happiness. Plato wrote that happiness stemmed from fulfilling our role in society and that determined happiness more than wealth or pleasure. So again, the Greeks pushed public, not personal happiness. Aristotle, a great thinker at the time, called happiness “human flourishing.” One of the prime virtues was bigheartedness, meaning charity and generosity. Yep, giving.

The Mayan civilization, which was from about 2000 years BC until the Spanish pretty much took over around 1500 AD, believed that a thing could only be good as long “as it harmed no one.” Compare that to our current corporate greed! In the Mayan language, the word “happiness” meant “having a glad heart,” and showed their central belief that the happiness of the other was critical: they greeted each other by asking “how is your heart?” And unlike our superficial “hey,” “how are you,” they actually meant it! Or think about what Chief Maquinna of the American Indian Nootka nation said after he heard about the banking system that we white people have, he said “We Indians have no such banking; when we have plenty of blankets, we give them away to other chiefs, and by and by, they return them to us, with extras, and our hearts feel good. That’s our bank.”

Insanely happy

Interestingly, history shows us that up until the 1700’s, happiness meant prosperity, thriving, and wellbeing of the whole society, not individual pleasure. So, when did society move from Jefferson’s “public happiness” to the contemporary concept of individual happiness? That happened in the 1800’s, when “individualism” became the new way to look at things. Turns out, though, that worrying about ourselves does not make us happy; giving to others is what creates joy.

So, how to get started?

First, think about giving your time. Sounds weird, but giving money is actually a distant second when it comes to making you happy. Let’s face it, our time is our most valuable commodity, whether it’s an hour of giving, or a day, or maybe, you will find out, as I have, that giving turns into a lifetime. Give whenever and wherever you feel inspired, as your happiness set-point totally depends on your motivation. When you feel somehow forced into giving, you will find it doesn’t do much to boost your happiness. Find the person, place, or thing you are most aligned with— relative, friend, neighbor, an organization, it’s whatever calls to you to help—and feel the warm glow. I remember being just big enough to get up into Daddy’s pickup when he would drive around the small town we lived in after work on Friday nights, giving away the bags of oranges he raised to those who looked hungry. And every time he would come home without his coat, having handed it to some poor soul who looked cold. Daddy taught generosity in action, not theory. During the day, Daddy took me down to the State Capitol, to his job as a Democratic Representative, working comfortably across the aisle to build programs of social justice for the poor and needy of our state. Back home, Daddy teamed up with a couple of other town leaders to build a private school. He hired a headmistress and told her to admit as many children whose parents could not pay tuition as those who could. When I became a young lawyer and joined Daddy in his small-town law practice, he taught me that for every couple of paying clients, I needed to take in someone who couldn’t pay, and help them as well. Daddy was all about giving in action, and he set the bar high.

Insanely happy

Now, let’s talk about giving money, not as powerful, but another way to increase happiness. When we see people who have lost their homes in a fire or flood or hurricane, and we send money, it sure beats, as Will Rogers put it, “spending money on things you don’t want, to impress people you don’t like.” You can also give money to any cause that appeals to you, from social justice to the environment, to whatever inspires you.

Keep in mind, we do get something back when we give, and that’s OK: whether it’s social approval or a boost in self-esteem, or a new skill, or new friends. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, it’s part of why giving makes us happier.

STEP TWO to being happy is accepting what is.

I remember waking up one morning 5 years ago in a hospital in Mammoth after I fell mountain climbing, and learning that I was going to spend a year flat on my back, with both my arms and legs immobilized. For once, unable to work much, and forced, out of the blue, to just kick back, I started listening to music part of every day. My normal type A++ personality would have never allowed that kind of seemingly purposeless activity, but thank God, over-achieving Deborah had, for the moment, been taken out of the picture. I was so happy it was hilarious!

When you look in a mirror, does what you see make you happy? How much happier would you be if you looked in the mirror and accepted that yes, you are a certain age and shape and, over time, things happen to the body. And that goes for every aspect of your life that cannot be changed. Aging is inevitable. Economic upswings and downswings occur. Loved ones come and go. Accidents happen.

When I was that unhappy young 20-something, addicted to booze and pills, I joined A.A. as the first step in my healing. What I learned there I can share right now: it’s one day at a time. I know it sounds easy but think of all the times you don’t do that, instead obsessing over what might happen tomorrow, like what if you get Covid or the forest fire gets even closer, or you never find work. You get my drift. As the Serenity Prayer of A.A. goes, “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

I’ve worked my way through so many rough situations, one day at a time, from illnesses, to family feuds, to lawsuits, to a whole slew of hospitalizations, wheelchairs and walkers, hey, I’ve lost count! And I’ve been happy enough the whole time, by doing it one moment at a time. Just this week, I was helping a student with stage 4 cancer, helping her find happiness in the moment, and I totally forgot all about my own aches and pains. Let me help you raise your happiness set point right now, simply by making “one day at a time” one of your favorite mantras.

Insanely happy

Here’s a corollary to that idea, that comes from South African human rights activist Desmond Tutu, who said “the only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time.” If something is overwhelming, right in the moment, or even seems impossible, just use that one bite rule.

Another totally helpful trick to staying insanely happy in the moment is, believe it or not, through meditation. And I don’t mean guided meditations; they’re nice, but you need the real McCoy to get deep enough to eliminate all the stress and hassles from the day that keep you from feeling happy. These days, that means a mantra-based meditation, like the one I teach, so you get deep enough. Meditation allows your mind and emotions to quiet down and plants you squarely in the present moment. It may seem passive, but actually, meditation is an active way to clear out the imbalances of your energy system and to erase anything that may be holding you back from true happiness. It is there, sitting inside yourself, that you can come to understand your worth, your purpose, your self-respect… and allow you to feel the joy of connection to everyone and everything. It’s the real deal! I encourage you to try my meditation.

STEP THREE is to develop strong intentionality.

I teach intentionality the way other people teach reading and writing and ‘rithmetic. It’s absolutely essential to your forward progress in life. If you intend to to be happy, you will be. It’s that simple. As Abraham Lincoln put it, “Folks are usually about as happy as they make their minds up to be.” In other words, it’s your own state of mind, not what’s happening in your external world, that determines whether or not you are happy. And the best way to enter that state of mind is by staying in the present. Not reliving the past; not fearing the future. Intend to live in the moment.

The Dalai Lama tells the story of how he became the head of his country, Tibet, when he was a teenager. And how the Chinese then overran Tibet and killed millions of Tibetans, making him run for his life. So, they took away his country, his people, and the entire plan for his life. When asked if he was angry about it, he said, “Why should I also let them take away my happiness.”

Focused attention is how you create healing; that’s what I teach in my energy healing school. There, I teach you how to use your intentionality to attract the light, then run it through your own energy field and body, and then conduct and transmit that light to the person who needs it. Remember that acronym: ACT – attract, conduct, transmit. It’s all based on intentionality. I remember the first time I actually got it to work and saw a woman’s broken wrist heal before my eyes, wow, that was a super powerful moment, and taught me the incredible power of intention. We can actually can move mountains if we want to!

What is your role? How do you shift your focus from your own problems, to what is happening with others, and actively give in a way that will make you happy?

Stop for a moment and think: What are you most passionate about? What news items really catches your attention? Which threads on social media do you notice? What is calling you? What do you enjoy doing? Do you slog through your work-day and light up with pleasure when you enter the kitchen to bake that perfect loaf of bread? Maybe you could take that passion and that bread and whip up some hearty sandwiches to take to the firefighters battling a blaze near you. That’s activating your passion. Turning what you love to do into a way to help others.

And, at the end of the day, let’s all go with the advice of Charles Schulz, the father of Peanuts, who summed it up by saying: “Happiness is a warm puppy.”

Pets
Collective Unconscious

The Collective Unconscious – Our World Tree of Emotions

by AdvocacyFeaturedHealthSocial

I was driving through Colorado last year, on my way to a wedding. I love weddings: young love in full bloom, familial love growing stronger; weddings are beautiful celebrations of love’s connectivity. The love is infectious.

As I was driving to the wedding, driving away from Denver and into the thin air of the Rockies, I passed groves of aspen trees. Thin, white, spindly. Like a whispering wood of spirits that guarded over the mountains themselves.

I had seen these groves before, and I certainly wasn’t the first to be moved by their quiet gravitas – John Denver beat me to it in Aspenglow by a few decades. But as I passed the aspen, I couldn’t help but feel that there were fewer groves than I’d seen previously. Where once there were ranks of groves of aspen – like a silent army of trees – there now appeared sparser outcroppings – a scouting party of aspen.

It turns out that aspen trees aren’t individual organisms. In a grove, each “tree” is a genetically identical “shoot.” All shoots are connected through an extraordinarily rich and detailed root structure. When you look at a grove of aspen, what you’re actually seeing is one giant organism – one giant tree dispersed among the thousands of shoots.

Aspen have been fading in Colorado mostly due to severe drought. When the waters dry up, the aspen die. Because they are interconnected, death affects the entire grove. The pain is experienced by the whole, connected organism – not just the individual shoot.

We wouldn’t know this simply by looking at the trees. We’d simply marvel and wonder how all these individual trees died all at once. Because we’re only looking at the surface. It’s only when we dig deep enough to see the vast, collective consciousness of these aspen can we see how they live and thrive and wilt and die as one.

I am reminded of the retreating aspen when I think about us today. We, all around the world, are hurting. Many of us are sick. Many have died. And many of us mourn the loss of the ones we love. We’re suffering. And while we know that there are millions around the world – just like us – carrying this burden of suffering, we somehow believe that our pain is contained only within ourselves. Our sickness is contained in just our own little shoot. Even though the shoot next to us is also in pain. All the shoots are sick. But we believe that the pain, the grief, the anguish is individual.

Carl Jung, one of the founders of psychology, posited that there existed a vast collective unconscious. Each individual’s psyche was a persona that emanated from this collective unconscious. This “world spirit” was the birthplace of our archetypes of father, mother, safety, danger, hero, and countless others. We, then, are primed to analyze our world through these hard-wired archetypes.

I want to take this one step further. This collective unconscious isn’t merely responsible for how we perceive the world; it’s a profound energy feedback loop that connects us all with each other. It’s our aspen root network. Look around: even in people who have been lucky enough to avoid the coronavirus, rates of mental illness have been skyrocketing. Anxiety, depression, and substance abuse have all increased. As individuals, we suffer when the whole of the world suffers.

There is a blight upon our connected unconscious – a blight that began with a virus whose initial pain sent shockwaves and secondary tremors through our collective psyche. We’re feeling the anxiety of the world.

Why is it hard to recognize this? Perhaps it’s because we’ve come to respect our own crucial roles in this pandemic. Each of us knows to mask up, wash our hands, stay six feet away from each other. We’re critically in tune with our own, singular bodies. But because we’ve been so focused on how we operate as individuals, we’ve lost sight of how we operate as a collective. And therefore we get surprised and confused when anxiety or depression is upon us. “I’m healthy,” we think. “I exercise, I wash my hands. I do yoga and take my probiotic. So why am I so scared?”

We’re scared because the grove is scared. We’re anxious because a soul we’re connected to is anxiously awaiting to see if her mother will make it off a ventilator. We’re depressed because another connected soul can’t see his grandchildren for the holidays. We’re sad because our collective soul is sad.
So what do we do when we know that there is a blight upon our grove?

I think back to my trip to Colorado, about driving away from the aspen and up to the wedding. I think about all the smiles, the tears, the dancing, the kisses, and the relationships strengthened at this celebration of love.

And I remember feeling invigorated and filled to my fingertips with love and generosity.

So my answer is to love. Love yourself, love your neighbor. Love your dog, your cat. Push the love out there like rain in a drought. Replenish your grove, because it’s the only grove we’ve got.

Join me, if you can, on a journey where I show you how to focus the energy of love and light into healing. Our medical intuition course will help you activate your higher heart, so that you can share that positive healing light with the world. Our class just began, but there’s still time to jump right in! We’re saving you a seat!

Connect with yourself. Connect with the world. And let the healing begin.

walk exercise

Today Is Take a Hike Day!

by FeaturedHealth

Nietzsche said “All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking.” Going beyond the 19th century philosopher, I would add that walking will not only let you think great thoughts, but will also relieve you of the stressful ones. And who doesn’t need that these days?

You might be having trouble sleeping these days, with all that’s happening in the world with the pandemic its personal fallout for you. You’re stuck at home a lot—hunched over a laptop, sitting in front of the TV, sitting around the table eating more than you should. Sitting, sitting, sitting.

Where are you going to go? You used to walk through airports on your way to someplace other than home, but not now. No walking up and down the aisles of the grocery store: your groceries get delivered. No walking even from the car to a restaurant, as meals get delivered right to your car or your home. Amazon delivers everything and anything; all you have to do is walk to your front door. Doctors get delivered to your screen for telemedicine, and you only have to move as far as your computer to sit in front of Zoom for a business meeting (remember, you can be seen!).

Do you know what’s happening to your body as you sit, sit, sit? According to studies analyzed by the Mayo Clinic, those who sit for more than eight hours a day without much body movement have a similar risk of dying to smokers and the obese. Sitting for long periods increases blood pressure, high blood sugar, abnormal cholesterol levels, and leads to excess fat around the waist—all together, it’s known as metabolic syndrome.

The good news, from studies of more than 1 million people, is that 60 minutes of moderate physical activity each day can counter the problems posed by too much sitting. Stand up every 30 minutes—stretch, walk around for 5 minutes. Stand a bit when you are on the phone or watching TV. Look into whether or not a standing desk would work for you; they are very affordable. 5 minutes here, 5 minutes there, and voilá, you’ll have an hour by days-end.

You’ll burn calories (in studies, women who walk had less body fat than those who don’t), maintain your muscle tone, and improve your ability to move as you age as well as your mental well-being. As researchers at NMHU (New Mexico Highlands University) found: “The foot’s impact during walking sends pressure waves through the arteries that significantly modify and increase the supply of blood to the brain.”

Walking is a cardio exercise that is low-impact on your joints. If you haven’t been much of a walker before, start slowly, going just a block or two. Work up to 30 minutes a day of walking, less time than it takes to cook a meal. Even a short walk each day strengthens your heart and lungs, and reduces your risk of heart disease, diabetes, and osteoporosis.

And it reduces stress. Walking releases those natural painkilling endorphins, lifting your mood and making the day sunnier inside you. And you’ll be far more able to do away with insomnia if you’ve had a good walk.

Last, but far from least, walking gets you out of the house and into the natural world. If you’re in a rural environment, take note of the rhythms of nature—the colors of fall leaves, the crisp air, the flight of birds. Even in an urban area, you can still find trees and plants. Connect to the natural flow and beauty around you. Walk in the early morning to sing along with the birds. Walk at sunset to bathe in the glory of colors. Walk at night and absorb some lunar energy. John Muir, the great naturalist, said, “In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.”

It takes no special equipment. It doesn’t cost anything. It doesn’t require a lot of planning, or athletic ability. As an old proverb says, “one step at a time is good walking.” Just get up, grab your house key, put on a hat and mask, and go for it!

True Joy Happiness

The Secret of True Joy

by FeaturedHealth

The secret of true joy is that it’s not actually tethered to outside circumstances. It has little to do with what’s going on around you. In fact, true joy is a well that you can fill with your internal perspective, thoughts, and attitude, and you can draw from that well to fill you up, especially in times like these.

Recently a student who heard I was working on a presentation on happiness shared the following with me. It’s from a post that’s been circulating around the internet for awhile.

Meet Mrs. Jones, who models the well of joy:

This 92-year-old, petite, well-poised and proud lady, who is fully dressed each morning by eight o’clock, with her hair fashionably coiffed and makeup perfectly applied, even though she is legally blind, moved to a nursing home yesterday. Her husband of 70 years recently passed away, making the move necessary.

After many hours of waiting patiently in the lobby of the nursing home, she smiled sweetly when told her room was ready. As she maneuvered her walker to the elevator, I provided a visual description of her tiny room, including the eyelet sheets that had been hung on her window.

“I love it,” she stated with the enthusiasm of an eight-year-old having just been presented with a new puppy.

“Mrs. Jones, you haven’t seen the room…. just wait.”

“That doesn’t have anything to do with it,” she replied. “Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn’t depend on how the furniture is arranged, it’s how I arrange my mind. I already decided to love it. It’s a decision I make every morning when I wake up. I have a choice; I can spend the day in bed recounting the difficulty I have with the parts of my body that no longer work, or get out of bed and be thankful for the ones that do. Each day is a gift, and as long as my eyes open I’ll focus on the new day and all the happy memories I’ve stored away, just for this time in my life.”

She went on to explain, “Old age is like a bank account, you withdraw from what you’ve put in. So, my advice to you would be to deposit a lot of happiness in the bank account of memories. Thank you for your part in filling my memory bank. I am still depositing.”

And with a smile, she said: “Remember the five simple rules to be happy:

1. Free your heart from hatred.
2. Free your mind from worries.
3. Live simply.
4. Give more.
5. Expect less, & enjoy every moment.”

Isn’t that beautiful?

I would add that when you find what you’re meant to be doing on this Earth, you’ll have no shortage of fulfillment, joy, peace, resiliency, love, and everything else your heart desires.

Remember that true happiness and abundance is what you feel in your soul, and what you create with your mind, your heart, and every molecule of your being.

If you want more happiness in your life, the answer is to identify your unique gifts (the things you’re good at that make you FEEL good), to stay connected to Source, and to focus on service. With this knowledge imprinted in your heart, there’s no limit to what the universe can provide for you and for all the things that matter.

If you’re attracted to this kind of insight, I hope you’ll join me right here for my talk this coming Sunday on How to Be Insanely Happy — and invite your family, friends, coworkers, and community to join you!

7 ways to get grounded indoors

Can’t Go Outside? 7 Ways to Get Grounded Indoors

by ChakrasEnergy MedicineFeaturedHealth

Have you noticed that being outside lifts your spirits?

Take a deep breath and picture yourself in your favorite landscape. Imagine the warm sun on your skin, the twittering of birds in the trees, the smell of pine, flowers, or maybe the ocean in the air…are you smiling? Do you feel more relaxed?

The great outdoors is called that for a reason: spending time under the sky rather than a ceiling just makes you feel good. Mother Nature is full of healing power, and connecting to that earth energy can have incredible benefits for your mind, body, and soul.

But what if you can’t get outside?

Right now, as we are in the midst of a pandemic that has many frightened to go outside (and others legally prevented from doing so), how can you get the same benefits, the same feeling of peace and wellbeing, without leaving your house?

What is Grounding?

Your ancestors had no trouble connecting with Mother Nature, and getting grounded. They were outside every day, all day, rain or shine. You are lucky to have a roof over your head but the downside is a loss of that daily interaction with the earth, and a corresponding lack of grounding.

Grounding is the practice of energetically connecting to Earth. This releases negative energy from your field into the ground, and draws positive energy from Mother Nature into your field and chakras, which replenishes and recharges your whole being.

Feeling a Little Fuzzy?

Your first chakra, also known as your root or base chakra, is the foundation for the energy flow in your body. This chakra keeps you firmly in your body and grounded, and if it needs cleansing or charging, you may feel a little “spacey” or somewhat out of your body. Additional symptoms of a dysfunctional first chakra can include: lightheadedness or a “floaty” feeling, forgetfulness, clumsiness, a feeling of being lost or actually getting lost, having trouble staying focused or present, fatigue, and a general dazed sensation. With an imbalanced first chakra, your other chakras are likely to be affected and become dysfunctional as well.

Indoor Grounding 101

The best ways to strengthen your bond to Earth is to spend time outside—walking barefoot on sand or grass, swimming in the ocean or a lake, taking moon baths, and hugging trees. But as the weather shifts from the heat of summer to the crispness of fall and then the deep chill of winter, you are less likely to be spending time barefoot or sleeveless outside your heated indoor space.

So how can you stay grounded?

1. Sit in sunlight

If you’re lucky enough to live in a home that gets plenty of sunlight, take advantage of that!

Not only does the sun provide natural vitamin D, which boosts your immune system, it also charges and replenishes your energy field. Sunlight is like natural rays of energy healing from the heavens, so soak it up as much as possible.

Like a cat curling up for a nap in the window, have a seat in a patch of sunlight coming through a window and let it radiate into your skin, into your chakras and energy field. Twenty minutes in the early morning or late afternoon would be perfect!

2. Keep a stone handy

Stones are direct conduits to earth energy. They are literally earth, so they can help ground you just by touching them. Kyanite, hematite, and garnet are good choices for grounding crystals, but any piece of rock will do.

Be sure to bless it for the purpose of keeping you centered and connected to Mother Nature, and then keep it in your pocket for quick access anytime you start to feel disassociated from the earth or your body.

 3. Exercise

Getting out of your head and being present in your body is an important part of grounding. Physical activity can help to shift your energy from your thoughts to your body as you focus your attention on your body and the world around you.

Yoga, pilates or martial arts can be particularly effective because they center your mind, body, and spirit simultaneously.

4. Eat

Like exercise, mindfully eating brings your attention to your body. Gaining sustenance from the earth also helps to connect you to it—to remind you of that fundamental truth of energy medicine: you are connected to everything.

Try to eat as many fresh cooked vegetables as you can, and especially root vegetables which grow under the soil and carry strong earth energy.

 5. Take a salt bath

Salts have natural healing capabilities, as does water, so when you combine them in a warm tub, you take cleansing to a spiritual level. This helps to heal and cleanse your body, mind, and soul, including stripping unwanted negative energy you may have stuck to you from someone else.

Salt baths simulate swimming in the ocean, which is one of the best ways to ground yourself.

6. Visualize

There is an easy visualizations you can do from home that will help to connect you to the earth. Picture yourself as a tree, with roots growing from your feet. Feel your roots sinking into the soil, extracting nourishment and energy that you can bring into your body making you healthier. Imagine your roots sinking deeper and deeper, giving you a stronger foundation, a sense of calm, and a greater bond with nature.

7. Take a healing course

Healing courses are always a good way to get grounded: being in the presence of others and working on grounding exercise help you be in your body and connect to the earth.

We will hopefully come out of this soon (and hopefully stronger than ever before). But in the meantime, look at this is a great opportunity to learn a skill that will ensure you are grounded, happy, and healthy year-round, no matter where you are.

Dream journaling

Dream Journaling: Tap Into Your Inner Wisdom for Guidance & Healing

by Energy HealingEnergy MedicineFeaturedHealthSelf Love
Dream journaling

Your dreams are filled with wisdom to guide you through every aspect of your life.

They give you access to knowledge beyond your ordinary, everyday awareness. They can show you the future, preparing you for challenges and opportunities. They can speak to your past, providing you with clues for healing old wounds. And they can guide you in the present, offering you wisdom for making the best decisions and honoring your soul’s desires.

A powerful way to start tapping into the wisdom of your dreams is to keep a dream journal.

Why you should keep a dream journal

The benefits of dream journaling are as vast as the realms your dreams take you to. Here are just a few of my favorite reasons to keep a dream journal.

Healing, transformation, and growth:
When you look back on your dream journals, you hold up a magic mirror that can reveal patterns in long-standing challenges. Your dream journal can even serve you as a data log that gives you insight into themes regarding your attitudes, beliefs, experiences, and actions.

You can also get precognitive glimpses of things that appear in your waking world later on. Dream journaling helps you develop a sixth sense, opening you to correct a course you’re on, restore your inner compass, expand your consciousness, or develop telepathic or clairsentient skills.

Brain balance:
Dream journaling can benefit your corpus callosum — the part of the brain that joins the right and left hemispheres, physically connecting your intuitive abilities with your analytic abilities.

In “Dreams Make Me Smarter,” one of our students wrote: “I let the dream images come to me, then write the dream in my journal, which engages my left brain. I pay close attention to any right-brain feelings about the dream. Then I brainstorm about any associations with those images or feelings. Working with dreams is a whole-brain exercise!”

Creativity:
Dreams offer you a treasury of images and symbols that can light your creative fire if you’re an artist. And even if you’re not, recording your dreams can inspire you to tap into the creativity inside you that yearns to be expressed.

Sketch that mountain or underwater temple when you wake up, then turn it into a deeply expressive painting or sculpture! Write down a dream-encounter as a short story, or see how it’s a clue into how to finish a scene you’ve been working on for your novel. Record that guitar line that came to you in your dreams. Whatever ways you express yourself — or would like to express yourself — journal your dreams to ignite your imagination.

How to keep a dream journal

Choose a notebook or a specially-crafted dream journal with thick, high-quality paper that you can joyfully write and sketch in.

Keep your journal near your bed and write your dreams in it as soon as you wake up. If you find that your bedside notes are barely legible, try transcribing them into a Google Doc later in the day.

While I suggest charging your phone away from your bedroom at night (so you can get a nightly retreat from constant digital clutter and melatonin-disturbing blue light), another option is to record a voice note as soon as you wake up. Then use a voice-to-text program to transcribe your dreams.

Ready to start recording the wisdom of your dreams?

Here are 5 journaling prompts to get you started:

  1. When was the dream? Note the date (including the year) so you can look back on the entry in the context of what was going on in your life and the world at the time.
  2. What happened in the dream? The key is to record your dream in as much detail as you can. Where were you? What was it like? What were the events? What did you do? Was anyone else there? What did they do or say? When did the dream take place? What did the events remind you of? If a detail seems too trivial or obvious to note, write it down anyway. When you look back on your dream entries, you’ll find that what might have seemed like useless details are highly significant in retrospect.
  3. What did you think or feel during the dream? Your internal experience is one of the most (if not THE most) telling aspects of your dreams. Did you feel elated, joyful, rejected, connected, relieved, anxious, relaxed, fascinated, blessed? Did you think “This reminds me of the time I…” Or maybe you thought “This is a place I’d love to….” Whatever your interior response was, make a note of it.
  4. How does the dream connect to your highest desires? This year, Spirit is really calling us to focus on what we want to create in our lives on this beautiful planet. We all long for something. Look back on the things you’ve desired in your past that you’ve manifested. That’s evidence that goals come to fruition, that “dreams come true”! So think about what you want at this point in your life. A new house? Healing from an illness? A fulfilling relationship? A rewarding career that suits your soul? Clean waterways? The end of injustice? Jot down anything about your dream that seems connected to your longing.
  5. What do you think the dream means? Don’t worry right away about dream interpretations like “owls represent wisdom” — you can look those up later if you’d like. For now, focus on writing down what significance the feelings, events, people, and images of the dream have for you. Because it’s your dream, you have the most insight into what it’s telling you.

 

Tap into the creative, healing wisdom of your dreams now!

If you want to start journaling right now, write down your response to one of these prompts:

  • Last night I dreamed…
  • When I was a child, I dreamed…
  • The best dream I ever had was…
  • A recurring dream I’ve had is…
  • The other day I had the strangest dream…

Start writing now or when you wake up tomorrow, and watch the wisdom flow from your soul, through your pen, and into your life.

Dream on!

To learn more about tapping into the power of your dreams, you can checkout my course on Astral Wisdom here.

astral wisdom course
Attached by an energy vampire

Do you have an ‘Energy Vampire’ in your life?

by Energy HealingEnergy MedicineFeaturedHealth

You are born pure light…

In childhood, your light is vulnerable to the energy of those around you. If you experienced trauma as a child or were raised in a dysfunctional family or with an unhealthy parent, this changes your energy, and can even “darken” your light.

This sensitivity likely developed as a way to stay safe and get your needs met — scanning the energy of the room or the energy of your caregivers, and calibrating your energy and presence to match what was appropriate.

Over time, this way of being in the world can diminish your essence — diluting what makes you “you,” and negatively influencing your emotions, your health, and your ability to authentically live the life you were meant to live.

And now, likely a caregiver yourself, you’ve been conditioned to bond with others by taking on their energy, so loved ones can perpetuate this pattern even if they’re not an “energy vampire.”

Today, you can begin to clear out other people’s energy from your ENTIRE system, and call your energy back to yourself. The first step is to understand the types of “energy vampires” and how to establish boundaries to protect yourself.

And actually, the step before the first step is always meditation. If you feel like you are “under attack” from other people’s energy, spending time in prayer and meditation is the fastest way to reconnect to yourself and strengthen your grounding — the first line of defense against other people’s invasive energy. I recommend meditating twice a day, using a mantra, that I provide.

Energy follows thought. As you bring your attention back to yourself (with loving kindness!), your energy will follow.

Imagine that you are a big magnet, effortlessly drawing your energy back to yourself and then running that energy down through your grounding, expanding your base and strengthening your energy field around you.

Here are a few insights on energy vampires…

In general, energy vampires drain your energy. They are often creating or contributing to “drama” and often take a negative, “glass-half-empty” approach to life. They can be very critical and judgmental — of you and others.

They also tend to be filled with worry and anxiety, and look to you to fix them or solve their problems. And, of course, you’re quite good at calming them down and finding solutions!

They need you and suck your time, attention, and focus away from your priorities. Even when you’re not with them, you are thinking about them or their needs.

These exchanges can leave you feeling tired, melancholy, even depressed — even if you think you are being of service and helping at the time.

When your energy is depleted by others, your sleep can be disrupted, you feel sluggish, and lack mental focus. You become vulnerable to illness, poor eating habits, and even addictive behaviors.

Recognize anyone on this list?:

  • “Betrayed” energy vampireThis energy type, along with many of the energy vampire types, can feel like an “old” relationship or like there is more history to the relationship than this lifetime. Karmic ties likely keep you tethered to this person, and the dynamic is one of “winning the fight.” Their energy field can be highly charged and they can feel aggressive or like an invasive weed in your garden.It’s essential to reinforce your energy field and grounding when interacting with this type. Imagining a waterfall between the two of you will help protect you and neutralize their energy coming at you. Take slow deep breaths, lower your voice and slow your cadence.Dealing with this type involves an Aikido-style approach where you step out of the way of their incoming energy bombs.
  • Fear-based energy vampireThis type is full of fear and insecurity. They are unable to fully inhabit their bodies and connect to their own grounding. They are disconnected from their emotions and are difficult to have linear conversations with, they are “all over the place.” Being kind and helpful, you want to reassure them, troubleshoot their problems, or calm their anger. You become ensnared in their energy field.To care for yourself in this dynamic, will require you to have very firm and clear boundaries. You will need to maintain conscious awareness that their needs and feelings are never ending and you cannot fix or help them. If you cannot maintain your own energy and grounding separate from them, you may need to avoid this type.
  • Insecure energy vampireThis type holds the worldview of scarcity. There is not enough for them and they’re in fear that their needs won’t be met and they’re driven by a fear of abandonment. It is sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy, because they are afraid you will abandon them, yet they are so needy, you have to remove yourself to replenish your energy.The intensity of their “lack” is projected onto you with the expectation you’ll fill their bottomless cup. They are often compulsive, jumping at any chance to fix their problem (which is generally other people) or chase after the “next best thing” that is “going to change everything” and solve all their problems. Between managing their expectations and their irrational schemes, you become lost and massively drained.Similar to the fear-based type, to care for yourself in this dynamic, will require you to have very firm and clear boundaries. You will also need to increase your self-care routine to ensure that you are mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually fit to be around them without losing yourself. Again, if you cannot maintain your own energy and grounding separate from them, you may need to avoid this type.
  • Passive-aggressive energy vampireThis type brings lifetimes of victimization into this lifetime. Their worldview is one of victimhood and everything happens “to” them. They are unable to take care of themselves and they rely on others to do for them. They don’t communicate their needs or wants and then project that others are not caring for them or helping them. They blame everyone but themselves, however most of this is unspoken so it is through their energy and nonverbal communication. They are very manipulative and use a dynamic of switching between appreciation and validating how much they need you, with guilt and scorn. You are either helping or hurting, and everything is about them — from their perspective.Recognizing that this is not about you, that you have done nothing wrong, and that this is their storyline that they are living out, will help you stay sane and keep from merging with their energy trying to “prove” yourself and your intentions. Remembering that there is nothing you can say or do or explain, can shift this dynamic within them. Amplifying your own energy within yourself and deepening your grounding will turn up your vibration and keep you immersed in your own essence and anchored in the center of your energy field.

Understanding your role in these relationships will also help you to shift the dynamic from your end. Energy vampires will always “suck” so it’s up to you to put a stop to it and protect yourself.

If you’d like to learn more about how to protect yourself from other people’s energy, and turn your sensitivity into a healing tool, check out my signature LifeForce Energy Healing IV® training here.

Work one-on-one with Deborah