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Articles: Sacred Relationships | Focus on Forgiveness Features | Departments | Articles | Alternative Health | Home   Articles Sacred Relationships by Maureen Moss Maureen Moss is the author of The Nature of Bliss: Balance, Love, Integrity, Sexuality, Soul, and Commitment To Love: Transforming Human Nature Into Divine Nature. She is also the producer and co-host of The World Puja Network, broadcasting live weekly in over 80 countries. We are living in a sacred time, together. We are at the threshold of a New World. This is not spiritual malarchy or New Age prophecy. This is the Truth. We are not watching our old lives fall away for no reason. We are not watching our jobs, our interests, and our friends changing for no good reason. We are not watching the demise of ill-kept and mean-spirited relationships in order that no relationship be had and we are not witnessing the expansion of our hearts and our compassion for no good reason. No, we are being made ready to bathe only in the waters of that which brings us joy and comfort. We are being beckoned to sacred relationships of all kinds in the world internal and the world external. Truly we are in the midst of God's Holy Laboratory and we are being prepared to live in a way that we have been told exists for us and that we have dreamt and read about. When Jesus said, "these things and more shall you do" he was not kidding. We are in the midst of being groomed to greatness through our obvious discomfort. And that's ok and we can do it, because of who lives and breathes and sets up Her mansions through us. Kahlil Gibran said, "it is only the ones who lose their way a thousand times that shall ever experience a homecoming." We agreed that we would take on the momentum of discomfort so that we could bring forth a New World laden with love. And we knew that we would never be forsaken through any single experience or circumstance of our precious lives. Never. And we agreed that we would take on the task of proving ourselves worthy Ñ not just proclaiming ourselves to be worthyÑ and by that we would literally be lifted into a New World, where peace and love and grace and community and sacred relationship would reign Supreme. We are in the process of being transported to a New Mansion of God's Creation to live in and to love in. This New World, Gods New Mansion, will not allow us to enter without sacred relationship created with ourselves, each other, God and all of the Hosts of Heaven. We will not be allowed to enter The New World with any vestiges of anger, shame, blame, judgment or criticism of ourselves or another hanging on to any part of ourselves. It is not our task to tear down another. It is not our job to relentlessly tear ourselves apart. There is nothing sacred about either. Certainly, we are accountable for our actions and God knows exactly how to balance our own respective scales, which is why so many are in pain right now. The scales are being balanced and it's ok and we will all be ok as long as we take it upon ourselves to be responsible in course correcting ourselves when we are dancing with our minds and egos instead of our hearts and souls. We must remember that everyone and everything, both animate and inanimate that we are in communion with is a relationship and once in relationship we are called upon to make it sacred (devotional). This is a golden key that will open the gates to the Emerging New World. Once we tune out the pleadings of the mind and egos need to be right or to be comfortable we will begin to merge with our Divine Natures. Like Jesus we arrived on Earth to play the roles of both the sons and daughters of human and the sons and daughter of God. Now we are asked to choose only one. No longer can we play both sides against the middle. It will not gain us passage into the New World. We are the modern day disciples of the Holiest of Holies and we are being asked to turn our fascinations away from the contents of our minds and from the momentary self-gratifying, half-hearted attempts at relationships that we are prone to. To enter into this New World, with sacred relationship in tact, we must be being willing to face the fears of our lower natures. Let us enjoy a more Divine perspective on the unique constellation of skills and attributes that we each have, along with the strange character twists and quirks we've developed as we have unfolded our human natures. It is our moral responsibility to transform the subtleties of our own deceptions into the Truth of Who We Really Are. In doing so we make a commitment to love and sacred relationship. The time is now to put fear on notice that its days are numbered and sacred relationship is taking it's rightful place. Copyright 2006, all rights reserved. E-mail Maureen@maureenmoss.com or visit www.maureenmoss.com to receive transformational newsletters, calendar of events and inspiration and keys that will transform your life! Visit www.worldpuja.org for live and archived interviews with world leaders, pioneers for the Emerging New World and for global events and conferences that are changing lives worldwide.   Articles: Sacred Relationships | Focus on Forgiveness Features | Departments | Articles | Alternative Health | Home   Focus on Forgiveness by Ana Holub Fear binds the world. Forgiveness sets it free. — A Course in Miracles What is Forgiveness? What do you mean when you say the word "forgiveness"? For me, it means surrender, letting go, allowing, and acceptance. Acceptance of what is, of what has been, and acceptance of ourselves just the way we are. Forgiveness means that we choose to love Love more than we choose to hate the world. Traditional Forgiveness There are many ways to define "forgiveness". Traditional Forgiveness implies that even though something really terrible happened, we stop obsessing over it. We "let bygones be bygones" and we allow the passage of time to help soothe our aching hearts. We may even move toward a kind of partial compassion with the thought, "he or she didn't know any better" or "they were doing the best they could." With Traditional Forgiveness, there are distinct roles that we and our adversaries play, which usually take the form of victim and perpetrator. Sometimes we are the victims, and the other person is the perpetrator. In these cases, we often feel anger, fear, betrayal, jealousy, disillusionment and hatred when we contemplate what happened. In other situations, we are the perpetrators, and we feel fear, guilt, shame and despair when we think about what we did to our victim(s). Reactions and responses to pain Distressing situations often happen during childhood. Developmentally, we must respond from a child's innocent point of view, and most people retain both the pain and the beliefs that were triggered from painful family and social interactions. We also feel the deep impact of societal conditioning, and we take on ideas about who we are vis a vis our gender, color, appearance, intellect, economic status, sexual desires, etc. Each traumatic event stands out in our minds, illustrated by many colorful details. We remember what happened (or, to be more accurate, we conjure up a current version of our story about what happened) and we begin to feel the familiar corresponding painful emotions of fear, loss, abandonment, helplessness and hopelessness. When the thoughts that we attach to our memories stir up uncomfortable emotions, we often suppress them deep into our subconscious minds. Our minds think, "If I feel that much pain again, I'll die. I can't handle it. If I go in there to explore it, I'll never get out." In reaction to the painful events of our lives, we form conclusions about the nature of reality. We attach our life essence to certain unconscious beliefs about what is real, about the way life works, about who, what and how we are. Some of our favorite beliefs are: I'm not good enough, I'm unlovable, I must have done something horribly wrong, I can't do it right, I'll never be good enough, Everyone will leave me, The world is a dangerous place, I can't trust, God hates me. Sound familiar? Sometimes we are not aware that we are actually harboring these beliefs about ourselves and about life. Well, unless we are living in absolute unity with the Oneness at every moment of our existence, some of these stowaway beliefs may still be crouching in the recesses of our minds. We can tell if they are around by listening to our thoughts as we go about our day. If we hear any complaining, self-righteous, irritated, judging, blaming, self-hating or denial thoughts, and if we feel their corresponding emotions, we can be sure that we are not alone. Our "hit-man" is with us! Perhaps these thoughts are more familiar: It'll never turn out right, Those people are idiots, Watch your back — you never know what's coming, They don't like me, Those people always get the breaks (and I don't), Money is filthy and unspiritual, I hate my body, Old age is a drag, I can never decide, The weather sucks, I can't do it because.... We carry on with life, not realizing that the suppressed emotions, which stem from the beliefs we carry, are actually at work behind the scenes. Our physical bodies are also excellent barometers. The quality of our thoughts directly affects our brains, hearts, blood and overall health. Aches, syndromes, diseases and physical weaknesses of all sorts are indications of what is going on in our minds. Even the way we breathe and the way we relax (or don't relax) give us hints about the inner workings of our thoughts and emotions. The more we invest our life energy into consciously or unconsciously thinking about the upsetting events that have occurred in our lives, the more we actually create experiences of fear, defensiveness, attack and withdrawal that tend to reoccur as patterns throughout our lives. These themes are usually easier to see in the lives of everyone else, but as we sharpen our desire to live in the truth of what is, rather than the illusion of how we wish life would be, we begin to honestly look at our own discordant patterns. It is at this point in our development that forgiveness begins to shine like a warm beacon of hope and new possibilities. When we forgive, we don't need to condone the actions that were done by ourselves or others. We can still empower ourselves and we may choose to use the legal system for support in seeking justice. These are all activities within the World of Humanity, where we exist as individual human beings. On this level, we can — if we choose — take responsibility for ourselves, our actions and the impact we've had on other people and the world at large. This is the arena in which apologies, reconciliation, compensation, mediation and other conflict resolution techniques are helpful and appropriate. Radical Forgiveness With Radical Forgiveness, we explore the deep pain that we feel when we perceive that we are being attacked or betrayed, or when we attack or betray someone else. We also honestly touch upon the places where we have attacked or betrayed our divine Self, our true knowing, our essential nature. This is the pain and sadness of the human condition, of feeling separate, alone and afraid. It must be acknowledged and accepted if we truly want our blocked energy to be released and our vibrational patterns to be realigned in health. Radical Forgiveness adds another element to the picture: the World of Divine Truth. This is not a religious idea; rather, it is an awareness that who we are is not just physical, emotional and mental — in addition, we are all sacred spiritual beings, having a temporary human experience. When we incorporate the World of Divine Truth into our existential understanding, we realize that on a spiritual level, no one is ever hurt or healed. We are in a state of perfect wholeness, in unity with our Creator, at all times. From this vantage point, we see that we are eternal. If this is so, then what is the purpose of this human life? Perhaps we are participating in an Earth school for our souls, so that we can expand our awareness of the Oneness that we are. If this is true, what do the patterns of trauma and heartbreak mean? How can we understand the lessons we have come to learn? This understanding is the mission of Radical Forgiveness, and it leads us to a compassionate experience of love and acceptance. We begin to understand that everyone who has played a part in our individual dramatic play was there as a purposeful, eternal friend. We start to take responsibility for everything that we have created, knowing that we also — simultaneously — played an essential part for everyone we have ever touched. As souls, we needed to bounce off the other players, and they needed to bounce off of us — in order to learn the lessons planet Earth has to offer (which are often the reverse of what life seems to be teaching!). With Radical Forgiveness, we realize, "So life wasn't out to get me after all!" There are tools to help us, including worksheets (available for free at radicalforgiveness.com), books and coaching. The tools give us an opportunity to reach into our past, healing and reweaving the lost and lonely places back into our lives as we are living NOW. We learn to include ALL of what has taken place, no matter what it felt or looked like. Sometimes, a breathwork session supports us to bring this new vitality all the way into the physical cells of our body, washing away the old beliefs with loving, forgiving compassion. Then, the revolutionary, evolutionary kindness of the universe becomes poignantly alive within us, and we cry tears of joy, feeling the tenderness of it.... Find your freedom by forgiving your world. Ana Holub is a certified Radical Forgiveness coach, teacher and mediator. She holds a B.A. in Peace Studies and an M.A. in Dispute Resolution. She has also been a healer and Breath of Life breath facilitator for over 20 years. Contact her at 530-926-4639 or go to anaholub.com for more information.   Articles: Sacred Relationships | Focus on Forgiveness Features | Departments | Articles | Alternative Health | Home   Home | Back Issues | Advertise | Subscribe | Reviews | Cyber-Meditate! | MS Mystique | Links | Contact Info All information and graphic content © 2008 Mount Shasta Magazine. Written or verbal permission from the editor is required to reproduce any material contained in this website. Website maintained by Danielle Signor Digital Studio. No layout graphics, page graphics, backgrounds or buttons may be used without permission.