Surviving Christmas day with Bach Remedies

We all hope for a joyous Christmas filled with magic and laughter but sadly for some it never quite meets expectations or hopes.  For those times, as always, there are Bach Remedies that can help with every situation.

Elm - Do you find that the cooking, presents, noise, and people just a little too much to deal with?  Elm is the remedy for being overwhelmed, helping us focus on the task at hand with a gentle knowledge that we can cope with whatever happens.

Rock Water - If your dinner isn't cooked to perfection or the gift wrapping isn't just right Rock Water can help calm the inner perfectionist allowing things to be as they are, perfect in their imperfection.

Holly - Often you hear about feuds and disagreements that come to the fore when the family is crowded together in one place.  Holly helps us put aside resentment or jealousy and begin to build bridges.

Beech - Is there one family member that just annoys you?  Not in any major way, they just rub you up the wrong way.  Beech helps us be more tolerant of differences and allows us to accept people as they are.

Centaury - Are you always the one that does the cooking?  Or maybe you always seem to end up the designated driver when really it would be nice to let your hair down and have a drink.  Centaury can help you stand firm and ask for what you need without causing conflict.

Heather or Water Violet - For some Christmas is a lonely time and these two remedies can help us reach out in a healthy way and come together with other people.

Sweet Chestnut - We don't like to think of people in deep despair at a time when there is so much laughter and fun, but for some this is a reality.  The festive season can be a dark and depressing time when we look ahead in our lives and see nothing but darkness.  Sweet Chestnut holds a light in that darkness allowing us to see that we are able to carry on and better times will come.

Christmas doesn't have to be a difficult time and the remedies are here to hold your hand as you navigate the pitfalls.

Wishing you a blessed Christmas and a peaceful New Year from all at Crystaloak.

Visit my website to learn about my healing practice  

http://www.crystaloak.moonfruit.co.uk/

Elm - A remedy for the season

Are Christmas preparations getting too much?  Do you feel that you have taken too much on once again?  Is it possible that if there was less to do you would be able to handle each of the tasks well?

This is where the remedy Elm is helpful.

The Bach Centre say about this remedy; "[Elm]...is the remedy for people suffering a temporary loss of confidence
due to the overwhelming amount of responsibility they have taken on."

When you are struggling with the number of things you have to get done and that fear is stopping you getting anything done a few drops on your tongue could make all the difference.

Bach remedies are safe to take with medication and have no negative side effects.

Visit my website to learn about my healing practice  

http://www.crystaloak.moonfruit.co.uk/

We can all do something, no matter what we are told

I saw this meme today and, although I have no idea whether the beloved Jim Henson said this it got me thinking...

We live in a time when we are bombarded with the woes of the world.  Whether it is the horrific acts of Daesh, the ever present threat of global warming, or problems closer to home in our own country with financial and housing problems.  Our news feeds are filled with big problems and it can become overwhelming.  We fall into "what can I do?  It's all too much" and because of that we are paralysed from doing anything.

Me being a lover of food I tend to think of these issues as being like a burger (veggie in my case) that is just too big to get into your mouth.  It's full of lovely things that you would love to get to but there is just no way.  What do we tend to do in these situations?  Well, you could get a knife and fork but, for some reasons, burgers just don't taste the same that way.  No, we start to take it apart and we eat smaller pieces.  Maybe a bit of the burger with some bread.  Then we have some of the pickle (yes, I am one of those that likes the pickle) with a bit of lettuce and slowly but surely you are able to eat the delicious meal.

We can do this with the world too.  Of course we can't solve the refugee crisis, of course we can't fight Daesh or change the tax evaders, but we can do something small.  At the very very least we can smile at a passer by, we can donate just a pound or two to a charity, we can volunteer with charities or we can make sure that every message we give out over social media is one of hope.

One small ant can't make much of a difference... but how much do we fear a swarm of ants entering our home...

Visit my website to learn more about my healing practice  

www.CrystaloakTherapies.co.uk/

 

Accepting our reality - we are here, we need to accept it

When I first started on this spiritual path and learnt about being a lightworker I became aware of a deep and desperate need to "go home"; to return to Spirit.  I found the place I connected to in meditation and when I was doing healing work was so blissful and held so much love for me at a time when I was surrounded by toxic people and a world intent on destroying itself.  Why wouldn't I prefer to be "up there" rather than "down here".

I struggled for years with this homesickness, I just couldn't handle being in such a harsh environment when I knew somewhere else was so much nicer, but the only way to get there was to end it all... and I knew that would not solve the problem.  Believing in reincarnation does that to you, I knew I'd only be back and would have to face it all again.  So I realised I had better get on with learning how to be down here.

So what has changed?

Looking back I realise that there was a paradox at play.  In having a strong desire to be elsewhere I was metaphorically hiding under the bed.  I was using my connection to Spirit to take myself off the earth energetically in the hope of not having to deal with the problems around me.  Rather than helping this actually made me weak and even less able to cope with what life threw at me.

For maybe 5 years now I have been working on being more grounded, more connected to the earth.  I didn't want to do it, I wanted to escape, but I knew that if I was going to progress I needed accept it.  It has been a tough journey at times, many buttons have been pushed and many fears triggered.  I know I have a lot of work still to do, but I realise it has dulled the desperate need to go home.

It seems crazy, working to get closer to the thing that challenges you the most.  When something hurts we are programmed to recoil, to move away from it as fast as possible.  With this we have to face the fear and learn that we are stronger than it.

So how do we do this?  How do we find a way to make being down here easier?

Step 1 - Turn off the news and put the magazine down.... just for a while
Every day we are flooded with messages about how terrible the world is.  We are also led to believe that in taking this on we are somehow helping make a difference. 

I want you to think about one particular thing that is bothering you at the moment in the world.  Maybe it's the immigrant crisis; people drowning in the Med or dying in lorries.  It could be the war in Syria and Iraq or it could be the shrinking of the ice in Alaska.  What are you going to do today that will make a tangible difference to that problem?  How are you going to solve it?  Are you going to donate live changing amounts of money, go and protest, sign up to fight oppression? I don't mean to be harsh but I doubt you will be doing anything.  So what does knowing about it actually achieve other than making you miserable?

I understand we need to know what is happening around us but when it paralyses us with fear it is not helping.  So, for 1 month unplug.  I promise, in that time you won't have made any situation worse but it gives you a clear space to start work.

Step 2 - Remove as many toxic people from your life as possible.
There will always be those people that we are stuck with such as family members and work colleagues, but there are others that we do have a choice about.

This can be a tough one, many lightworkers don't believe they have the right to stand up for themselves and have low self esteem but it is something that has to be done.  You have every right to choose your friends and walk away from anyone who hurts you or makes you feel inferior.  If you can't remove them, like the media, take some time out to give you breathing space.

Step 3 - Start looking for the positive things in life; they are there if you look hard enough.  Websites such as Positive News only report good news and it's quite an eye opener seeing what is happening that the mainstream media is ignoring.

Step 4 - Work on grounding and your lower chakras.
Most lightworkers live in their upper chakras and the chakras below the heart are almost completely forgotten.  It sounds counter intuitive but in working on these and using other grounding techniques we become stronger in our presence down here and more able to handle what the world throws at us.

One of the first things I did was meditate to meet Gaia; the Earth Mother.  In the past my meditations had always focussed on reaching up to that blissful Spirit energy where I could hide from the horrors.  The grounding process had always been a simple hand shake, a necessity because I was taught to do it, there was never any desire to linger before I dashed up out of my body and into that blissful light. 

In meeting, embracing and truly accepting Gaia I found loving, safe energy that I didn't expect.  It was like being held by the most compassionate mother and it brought me to tears.  Although Spirit energy is still the most amazing feeling, knowing Gaia is on my team made a big difference.


I also believe that in starting to learn tai chi and chi kung has helped as that most definitely focusses on being grounded, connected to the earth energy and becoming immovable.

Just recently my guide has changed from my beloved "boy next door" who has been with me all this time to a strong female African warrior.   She challenges me to embrace my strength and physicality in a loving but strong way.

I still have a lot of work to do before I can say I am fully in my body and happy to be here.  Learning to stay grounded and connected to the earth brings challenges but at least I am no longer hiding under the bed desperate to go home.

Visit my website to learn more about my healing practice  

www.CrystaloakTherapies.co.uk/

 

Working with crystals... throw those books away

I have written about this before but I thought I would revisit the subject to possibly explain why I don't work with books that list the attributes of crystals.

Some years ago I joined an online group run but an amazing guy called Fabeku Fatumise.  His passion for working with crystals on a deep level inspired me and I set to learn from him.  Although he used to write at great length about the energies and attributes of what he called "stone spirits" his underlying message was that your personal intuition was more important than anything anyone else could tell you, including books.

You see, we have been brought up to trust the wisdom of others, teachers, doctors, scientists, and gurus and in doing so we have lost the most important trust; trust in our own wisdom and inner knowing. We have given our power to these people and forgotten that we are know ourselves best. In this instance we look to those we consider wiser to tell us which crystals we should use for our own personal situation.

There is one major flaw in this; not only do the books give us a tiny piece of information about the extent of work that can be done with any one crystal but the book doesn't really know what we are working on on a deeper level or what we need to make progress.

Take an example; we are struggling to sleep.  Books will suggest you use amethyst to help you sleep.  But there are so many causes of sleeplessness, the writer doesn't know what is causing your problem so how can they suggest the correct stone?

Another issue with looking to authors for guidance on which crystal to work with is that the writer is only sharing their personal experience of a stone, through their own personal filters and energies.  What another person experiences might be completely different.  You will notice that so many people love amethyst; it must be the biggest seller in the crystal "range" and yet I don't see what all the fuss is about.  Show me a fluorite and now we're talking.  I won't let myself pick up fluorite in shops because I guarantee it will come home with me.  Amethyst... meh?  It's pretty and it has it's value, but I'm no more fussed about it than a pebble on the beach (which I love btw, remember, I love working with all stones).

So, if the writer can't know everything about the stone, doesn't know what we are really dealing with and is writing only about their personal experience, how can we know which crystals we should work with at any given time?

Throw away the books and trust our own intuition!!

We all have an inner wisdom, an intuition about what we need and what won't help us.  The trick is to remember this and learn to use it.  It takes time to learn to trust our intuition and it can be very hard at times to take back the power we have given the "experts" but it really is worth it.

On a practical level, if you are either adopting new stone spirits or intending to work with the ones you already caretake, rather than reach for a book, simply spend a moment with your stones, think about what it is you would like to achieve and clear your mind.  Simply gaze at them, pick them up or listen with your inner ear to see which ones you are drawn to.  Some hear a strong "me me meeee!" from their stones, others simply pick one up and find it feel calming or they don't want to put it down.  That's the one.  Trust it, trust that feeling and open up to the stone that has spoken to you.  Work with it and see what happens.  You might just find something wonderful happens.

Before you actually bin your books though.. if you really want to use them, use them as a tool AFTER you have picked your stone friend for the day.  Look it up and use it as you would the book that comes with a tarot or oracle deck.  Look up your stone and see what the book says, but remember, if it doesn't mention the issue you are dealing with that doesn't mean your choice is wrong, it simply means the author hasn't experienced that aspect of the stone.  If you think you will lose faith in yourself leave your books to one side until you are able to trust yourself more than the book.

In the end, what have you got to lose?  Give it a go and see what happens.

Visit my website to learn more about my healing practice  

www.CrystaloakTherapies.co.uk/

Walking the path of humility

Humility is the ability to know ones own worth without comparing it to others.  It is a deep love and respect for the self but with the ego set aside.  When we let our ego control our self worth we use comparison as a tool: "look how bad that person is, see, I am a good person"?   Or conversely, "that person is so wonderful, I wish I could be as good as them."  Humbleness states "I know my strengths and weaknesses, and that is fine".  There is no comparison to others, just calm and simple self respect.  When we meet someone who has a skill we lack we honour them because we know it doesn't make them better than us.  When someone is nasty we are not harmed by them and we do not judge them because we know that we too have the ability to be nasty and we see the hurt person inside.

For me, learning this balance is a life long journey that I will be walking for some time yet.  Coming from a place of deep self hate and low self esteem it is a long and rocky road.  It started by understanding that not everyone hates themselves like this, and was closely followed by a second helping of self hate when I realised that I even failed at something that looked as simple as loving myself.

The journey brings the highs of realising that other people are less perfect than me and the deep valleys of realising that that simple comparison is also a failure.  There are the pendulum swings between "I am terrible" and "I am amazing" that never seem to pass through "I am enough" for long enough for me to understand how to stay there.

I started to emulate others, only to realise that was fake and would give a veneer of "ok" that would crumble as soon as it was tested.  I tried comparing myself with others so I could pitch myself on a league table of "goodness" until I saw that this was simply my ego taking control again.  And so the journey continues.

This week put me in a situation where I was given the chance to stay in that sweet spot for just a moment.  I won't go into details but I experienced what I believe was someone else going through a similar pendulum swing.  A person I believe is insecure who was acting the big guy to hide it.

Now, the ego would say "look at you, I see through your bullshit and bravado and see the small scared child underneath.  I am so much better than you".  This would be the me that is also the small scared child acting the big guy to hide it.  Instead I thought "oh wow, they're pretending to be big and strong so we don't see the small child.  I could choose to judge or I could choose compassion" 

The ego is still there, niggling, telling me how easy it would be to scorn this person for trying to pretend that they are amazing. But, because there is also the balance of understanding that I too have the same habits. I have hope that this shows I have made some progress.

I also had the chance of an ego boost for the simple fact that I saw what was going on with both of us, and you know what, I'm gonna take it.  Learning humility isn't about accepting how rubbish I am, it's about learning that there are things I am good at and celebrating them.

This is a winding path that forces me to take a cruel look at who I really am and what it really going on.  It shows when my ego had puffed up its chest to protect the rubbish little girl and there is no hiding from it.  The path is so narrow, an abyss of self hate ever present by my side but I am determined to walk it and find the true me that I can love and respect.

Visit my website to learn more about my healing practice  

www.CrystaloakTherapies.co.uk/

 

How to be successful without being amazing

Humanity is waking up to the idea that life doesn't have to be as it was in the past.  We are realising there is more to life than being a "slave to the man" with our brains shut off, believing what we are told and living our lives filled with obligation and drudgery.

This is a wonderful thing and it is great to see so many inspirational speakers stepping forward showing us the way it could be.  But, I think there is a big risk of us blindly following the brightest lights and still not thinking for ourselves.

The shelves are filled with books that promise to teach us to be able to follow our dreams and live our own lives, but scratch the surface and are they really telling us how to live our lives, or are they showing us that to be fulfilled and successful we need live the lives they believe are successful?

In the past being successful meant owning your own home, holding down a job and bringing your kids up to be good citizens.  Now we are meant to do this AND write a book, study a new course, run a successful business on the side, hold successful dinner parties, stay thin, sleep well, do yoga...... I could go on.  We think we are being liberated but instead we are being taken from one box labelled "successful" to another, and now the criteria is higher and we are more likely to feel we have failed.


The problem starts with the fact that many of these authors and leaders are Type A people.  They seem to magically have the energy to run from job to job, stay fit and eat healthy surviving on only 4 hours a sleep a day.  They are the special people, the geniuses, trailblazers if you like, and the thing they don't understand is how to be normal.  They don't understand that most of us just about have enough energy to go to work, deal with the kids and put a healthy meal on the table at the end of the day.

This lack of understanding leads to there being an unintended and hidden guilt trip that says "if you're not like me you're not good enough".

I am on my second book in an attempt to learn more about boundaries and assertiveness, something many lightworkers struggle with.  In both books there has been at least a section that talks about how to become successful and both have given lists of things you must do every day to achieve this such as meditate for 30 minutes, write a list of at least 10 ideas, go for a run, eat healthy, do something to make your dream come true, the list goes on and on.

Have we got to a stage where we can only be successful if we are managing to squeeze 26 hours into a day?

I want to stand here and tell you, categorically, NO!

In the end, for you to consider yourself successful at the end of the day you only have to do one thing.  Ask yourself the following question; "did I do the best I could today?" I assure you, the answer will be yes every time.  If it isn't work out what small step you can take tomorrow to do a little more.

If you want you can follow it up with; "Did I bring more light or darkness to the world?".  All it takes to bring more light is to stay positive, make someone smile or stay calm in a stressful moment.  Nothing more.

We are in a state of transition.  Those trailblazers have found their voices and they have found that people will listen to them.  However, these people are trying to wake us from our sleep by shining a bright light in our eyes, and for some that works.  But for many there needs to be a gentle dawning where the light enters our life slowly and compassionately and we find our own way of being successful, in whatever grand or subtle way that is.

I don't believe we are all meant to be grand healers, writers, painters or trailblazers.  I believe the majority of us are meant to simply hold the light, stay calm and gently improve the world with our compassion.  You can hit a rock with a hammer and you will make a difference, but if you want to make something beautiful you need to gently work it with small movements, tuning into what is really needed.  We are those small changes.

Do the best you can today, and at the end of the day, know that that is enough, you ARE successful!

Visit my website to learn more about my healing practice  

www.CrystaloakTherapies.co.uk/