Burn, Baby Burn!? – I need your suggestions

Hey Friends

As you know, I practice GRATITUDE daily but I also have a weekly practice that I want to share with you.  I’ve been practicing this for over 15 years now.  

Every Monday morning, I wake up just a little earlier than 5am (which is my usual prayer and meditation hour).  The extra 15 minutes gives me time to time to write down stuff some.  

I look to the week ahead and ask for special help with all “challenges” that are imminent.  Deadlines, people, …things that I know are going to be hard!  I write them down and I BURN that piece of paper.  

The act of burning doesn’t make the challenges magically vanish! Don’t be silly.  It simply empowers me to see them for what they are. Things that can be sorted. Some by me, some by others, some in the skies in ways I may never understand.  Right?!

A Monday “ritual”

Here’s where I need your help, friends:
I’m looking for a NAME for this practice of burning the piece of paper.  
Let me know if you have any ideas.

And do let me know if you are going to try it too.  I would be so honoured! 

xoxo

Lee

Dear Kids (A reflection from a greying Mama’s Heart)

Dear Kids

Whilst no parent has all the answers and whilst this mama is constantly, still learning, know this for sure:

1. You are never alone
2. Travel is the best teacher
3. “No” is a good word. Use it often. It’s particularly lovely when there’s a dead silence and you offer no explanations
4. “Please” and “thank you” never goes out of fashion
5. Water heals. Oceans. Tears. 2 litres a day
6. You have a built-built in “people” radar. Please listen to its beep beep beep when something feels offish
7. Sleep is medicine
8. Play, play, play. Never stop playing
9. Less sugar, less screen time, more grass, more laughs
10. God is inside you and no one one has a special hotline that you need to go through
11. Betrayal is painful. Nothing can prepare you for that kick in the groin
12. Go out and explore. You can always come home to cry
13. Try and remember who you were before the world started pinning its labels on you
14. Your body is beautiful. Exactly as is. Explore it. Admire it. Treat it right and it will reward you so much
15. No one knows it all
16. Blood makes you related. Loyalty makes you family
17. Believe in magic. Those who don’t, never find it
18. Your word is your honour. Do what you say you will. Always
19. A grateful heart is a magnet for miracles
20. Give freely. Of what you have. Of your time. And quietly please
21. No one likes a show-off
22. Learn to listen. To God’s voice in the early morning. To yourself. Certainly to people who you trust
23. Shortcuts never work
24. People will forget what you say but they will never forget how you made them FEEL. Be kind
25. Books, music, thunderstorms and tea are good for lonesome days when you need your mama
26. Abundance and prosperity are your birth right
27. Look beyond the labels of race and religion, gender and social standing. How people treat people from whom they need nothing is where you should focus your scoring and grading
28. Jealousy is when you count other people’s blessings instead of your own
29. Love does not need to hurt
30. Speak your truth. Even when your voice shakes
31. What sets your soul on fire? Go there
32. Learning is constant
33. Messing up is okay. Intentionally hurting someone never is
34. You teach people how to treat you
35. You may have one “true love” or many or even none. Remember that you are whole anyway
36. You have a story that only YOU can tell

 

xoxo

Mama

 

© Aluta continua, as they say.  A Heart Full of Stories, 2017

Energy Don’t Lie (A reflection on how people make you feel)

I always remember how people make me feel.

I feel full of energy, light and vitality when I’m around some people.

I feel full of anxiety, fear, nervousness and lethargy when I’m around other people.

And, this month I’ve been paying close attention to those feelings.

I’ve noticed that it has nothing to do with the circumstances I meet those people in.  I could meet a woman who just lost her home in a fire she’d still have a calming energy.  Conversely, I could meet a holy man carrying meditation beads exiting a church and only feel anxiety after our exchange.

This fascinates me.

Quite intuitively then, I have been spending lots of time in introspection about this. It’s a perfect time too with the last days of Lent, the falling of brown leaves, crisper mornings, and the closure of a year-long period of mourning for me.  I am grateful that I have the time to go at this unusually slow pace (for me).

The penny really dropped on my morning walk in a nearby park yesterday when I went so far out that my sensibilities screamed red flags in many colourful languages, begging me to return to my car. Just then, a man approached me from the side and startled me.

Still, I felt calm. I felt energised.  Happy to walk, talk and share the path leading back to our cars, I was grateful. (I must admit it took way longer than I would have liked because he was…umm…rather heavy). I drove home feeling energised, happy, grateful for that energy exchange.

In gratitude, I thought I would write about it this week, looking to assure you that if you go slowly, listen attentively, allowing your intuition to guide, you will also gain insights into what and who lifts you, and who and what drains you.

Are you feeling me?  If so, I urge you to move softly, paying close attention to the energy of the people around you.  Where you can, surround yourself with the ones that make you feel like you’ve just eaten your favourite warm pudding.  

That energy is life.

Reflections of Lee-Ann Mayimele, All Rights Reserved