Trust in The Universe

Spirit message for the day, "If everything feels like it is crumbling to pieces and the pain is too much to bear...surrender. There is a reason for this. Trust that the Universe is working for your highest good. Falling apart may just be the one thing that puts you together again." 

10 Protection & Cleansing Tools!

With so much negative energy in the Universe, we must all discover ways to protect and cleanse our physical, emotional and spiritual bodies. Overwhelming toxic energies can deplete our energy systems, leading to illness, anxiety and depression.

Here are a few of my "go-to" protection and strengthening tools!

10 Protection & Cleansing Tools

1.) Essential Oils- For protection and purification use Frankincense, Cypress, Myrrh, Palo Santo, Peppermint, Rose, Sage, Cedarwood, Cinnamon, Rosemary, Lemon and Basil. These are just some of the potent  oils that can help shield you from toxic energies! Go to: www.youngliving.org to learn how to 'safely' utilize essential oils!

2.) Smudge Stick- white sage is incredible for purifying energy. Light your stick and circle it's smoke around your entire body. You can also smudge every room in your home, your jewelry, computer, phone, wallet, furniture, etc. EVERYTHING carries energy. Safeguard yourself against draining energies with sage's healing smoke!

3.) Tibetan Singing Bowl/Bells- Sound tools emit certain tones which can instantly shift your energy promoting a calming effect. Reduce stress, harmonize and balance your physical body by playing your bowl any way you'd like! These soothing tones can boost your immune system and rid your space of dark energies -especially if used during meditation.

4.) Stones/Crystals- The energy of stones is very powerful They are wonderful for cleansing and balancing your energy! Hold, carry or place these stones near you for your energetic protection: Black tourmaline, black onyx, black obsidian, amethyst, malachite, smoky quartz, citrine, topaz, turquoise, aventurine, etc.! To learn more about stones and crystals, read 'The Crystal Bible'.

5.) Drums/Rattles- The beat of drums breaks up toxic energy and offers a harmonious rhythm to the environment!

6.) Salt lamp- Place a salt lamp in your home/office. It dispels negative ions and balances the energy in any space.(Available at Vitamin Cottage, Whole Foods and online!)

7.) Candles- Use your intention to 'cleanse' a space with candles. White candles symbolize purity. You can ask the energy of candles to help you release negative energies that may be stored inside of you. Also, green candles promote healing and pink ones represent self-love. Light them any time during the day/night!

8.) Lemons- yes, lemons! Citrus fruit placed in the four corners of any room absorb negative energies. When they shrivel up, replace with fresh ones! Also, drinking warm lemon water can clean out your insides...thus, balancing your immune and promoting health!

9.) Nature- Collect items that you find outside in the earth’s natural habitat. It can be a feather, leaf, rock, flower, grass, tree branch, etc. Nature instantly transforms your energy space.

10.) Sterling Silver- Protect yourself from negative energies by wearing sterling silver on your left wrist or finger at all times. If your bracelet falls off or breaks, that means it is time for a new one! The silver absorbs all of the toxic energy and eventually cannot hold anymore.


Use the above healing tools to protect and cleanse your home, office or car! Start off with setting your ‘intention’ by saying an affirmation or prayer to bless your sacred energy and space. Then, utilize whichever tools feel ‘good’ to you.

There is no right or wrong way cleanse your personal energy or your environment. Go with your gut!

9 Ways To Stop Absorbing Other People's Energy!

9 Ways to Stop Absorbing Other People’s Negative Emotions

Emotions such as fear, anger, frustration, and immobility create their own energy. And, you can potentially ‘catch’ these energies from other people without realizing it.

If you tend to be an emotional sponge like me, it’s vital to know how to avoid taking on an individual’s negative emotions, or even how to deflect the free-floating negativity in crowds.

Another twist is that chronic anxiety, depression, or stress can manifest thick, heavy energy, that completely depletes your defenses. Suddenly, you become hyper-attuned to others, especially suffering with similar pain. That’s how empathy works; we zero in on hot-button issues that are unresolved in ourselves.

From an energetic standpoint, negative emotions can originate from several sources: what you’re feeling may be your own; it may be someone else’s; or it may be a combination.

Here is how to tell the difference and strategically bolster your positive emotions so you don’t shoulder negativity that doesn’t belong to you.

Stop Absorbing Other People’s Emotions 

1. Identify whether you’re susceptible. The person most likely to be overwhelmed by negative energies surrounding you is an “empath“, someone who acts as an “emotional sponge”. Signs that you might be an empath include:

•     People call you “hyper-sensitive”, “overly sensitive”, etc., and they don’t mean it as a compliment!
•     You sense fear, anxiety, and stress from other people and drawthis into your body, resolving them as your own physical pain and symptoms. It doesn’t have to be people you don’t know or don’t like; you’re also impacted by friends, family, and colleagues.
•     You quickly feel exhausted, drained, and unhappy in the presence of crowds.
•     Noise, smells, and excessive talking can set off your nerves and anxiety.
•     You need to be alone to recharge your energy.
•     You’re less likely to intellectualize what you’re feeling. Your feelings are easily hurt.
•     You’re naturally giving, generous, spiritually inclined, and a good listener.
•     You tend to ensure that you’ve got an escape plan, so that you can get away fast, such as bringing your own car to events, etc.
•     The intimacy of close relationships can feel like suffocation or loss of your own self.

2. Seek the source. First, ask yourself whether the feeling is your own or someone else’s. It could be both. If the emotion such as fear or anger is yours, gently confront what’s causing it on your own or with professional help. If not, try to pinpoint the obvious generator.

•     For instance, if you’ve just watched a comedy, yet you came home from the movie theater feeling blue, you may have incorporated the depression of the people sitting beside you; in close proximity, energy fields overlap.
•     The same is true with going to a mall or a packed concert. If crowded places upset or overwhelm you, it may well be because you’re absorbing all the negative energy around you.

3. Distance yourself from the suspected source, where possible. Move at least twenty feet away; see if you feel relief. Don’t err on the side of not wanting to offend strangers. In a public place, don’t hesitate to change seats if you feel a sense of depression imposing on you.

4. Center yourself by concentrating on your breath. Doing this connects you to your essence. For a few minutes, keep exhaling negativity, inhaling calm. This helps to ground yourself and purify fear or other difficult emotions. Visualize negativity as gray fog lifting from your body, and hope as golden light entering. This can yield quick results.

5. Flush out the harm. Negative emotions such as fear frequently lodge in your emotional center at the solar plexus (celiac plexus).

•     Place your palm on your solar plexus as you keep sending loving-kindness to that area to flush stress out.
•     For longstanding depression or anxiety, use this method daily to strengthen this center. It’s comforting and it builds a sense of safety and optimism as it becomes a ritual.

6. Shield yourself. A handy form of protection many people use, including healers with trying patients, involves visualizing an envelope of white light (or any color you feel imparts power) around your entire body. Think of it as a shield that blocks out negativity or physical discomfort but allows what’s positive to filter in.

7. Manage the emotional overload. You don’t need to be beholden to your ability to absorb other’s emotions; turn the curse into a gift by practicing strategies that can free you:

•     Learn to recognize people who can bring you down. People who are particularly difficult for emotional empaths include criticizer, the victim, the narcissist, and the controller. Judith Orloff terms these people “emotional vampires“. When you know how to spot these behaviors, you can protect yourself against them, including removing yourself from their presence, and telling yourself that “I respect the person you are within even though I don’t like what you’re doing.”
•     Eat a high protein meal before entering stressful situations such as being part of a crowd. When in a crowd, find places of refuge, such as sitting on the edges, or standing apart.
•     Ensure that you don’t have to rely on other people to get you out of difficult situations. Bring your own car or know how to get home easily when needed. Have sufficient funds to be able to make alternate arrangements if you start feeling overwhelmed.
•     Set time limits. Knowing how much you can stand and obeying that limit is vital to ensure your mental well-being. Also set kind but meaningful boundaries with others who overwhelm you; don’t stand around listening to them talking for two hours when you can only cope with half an hour.
•     Have your own private place in a home shared with others. Ask others to respect your downtime during which you can rejuvenate. This is especially important to prevent you from taking on your partner’s feelings too much. A study, man cave, sewing room, reading nook, etc., all offer your own space.
•     Practice meditation and mindfulness.

8. Look for positive people and situations. Call a friend who sees the good in others. Spend time with a colleague who affirms the bright side of things. Listen to hopeful people. Hear the faith they have in themselves and others. Also relishhopeful words, songs, and art forms. Hope is contagious and it will lift your mood.

•     Cultivate positive emotions that boost your inner strength. If you’re surrounded by peace and love, you’ll flourish as strongly as negative emotions cause you to wilt. Respecting your own needs through healthy self love will increase your ability to respect others.
•     Learn to use compassion as a way to defend yourself against overwhelming emotions. Compassion allows you to be empathetic to the plight of other people but also requires that you are compassionate toward yourself. This means that you don’t need to feel guilty about seeking respite from being overwhelmed; doing so ensures that you can be more engaged with others in the long run, rather than less so. It also means that you keep yourself whole by not immersing yourself in the world of negative people.

9. Create and maintain a haven for disengagement. Leave many paths open that lead to communing with the resonance of nature. Returning to your rightful home as a creature of nature switches off your victim mentality and recharges you energetically and spiritually.

•     Keep a picture of a waterfall or a lush forest with you and look at it when overwhelmed.
•     Step onto the quiet of a forest path or absorb the coolness of a gently babbling brook from beneath a weeping willow.
•     Maintain a your personal space of cozy retreat where you hook into your own personal power and energy.
•     Practise Yoga and breathing techniques. These draw upon emotional centering and provide safe harbor in times of storm.

Like this article? Then join the Conversation with many others in EWAO !

By Judith Orloff MD, in5d

**Site referrence: Mindful Meditation on Facebook

Choose To Love Yourself More

Spirit message for the day, "We give ALL of our power away the split second we meet anger with anger. Walking away isn't just a symbol of strength, it is an act of loving yourself in a moment of great weakness." 

Wipe The Chalkboard Clean in 2015!

Spirit story of the week: 

Wipe The Chalkboard Clean in 2015!

"Since my two children were in elementary school, I have always helped them hold onto HOPE with one sentence. 

If they came home crying, burying their little heads in the couch, I would hug them and say, "Wipe the chalkboard clean."

Maybe I told them this because, growing up, my Mother was a teacher. She gave me a chalkboard for Christmas when I was 11 years old. It was my absolute favorite toy. I would play school for hours and hours.

I LOVED the idea of writing and then being able to 'erase' whatever it was that I wrote so that I could draw something totally different within seconds.

The symbolism of this concept stuck with me.

Erasing and rewriting make believe stories up in the attic of my childhood home on that 3 x 3 ft. board, felt...magical.

So, when I would tell my children to 'cleanse their chalkboards' of sorrows, it was a simple reminder that they could ALWAYS wash away the yuck of the day and take with them only what made their hearts feel good.

No matter how bad things seemed, wiping the chalkboard clean, was their way of BELIEVING that the sun would, indeed, shine again tomorrow.

Just as I taught my children that they could always start over, I held on tight to the idea of new beginnings as the years flew by presenting great highs and devastating lows.

I 'needed' this gentle command and the promise of a fresh day/life/year for myself and for my family over the years.

This is because it is the ONLY thing that got me through my son's fight for sobriety and relentless battle of depression as well as my daughter's loneliness for friends.

In some way it gave me permission to heal from my physical and sexual abuse and not let it define my future.

It, also, allowed me to recognize that I was my own master creator.

That old chalkboard taught me that it was all up to the individual whether they WANTED to craft a happy or miserable life.

I even white knuckled this refreshing concept as I watched my Mom go through chemo to treat her ovarian cancer last year.

By washing away the worries and negative energy of a bad day/month/year, it allows us to create a fresh new slate.

Think of it...after you erase your chalkboard, you can pick up that same piece of chalk again and sketch ANYTHING you want!

You can produce EXACTLY what you desire for yourself on your own chalkboard of life.

Or you can choose not to erase your board. Not to move forward. Not to love yourself enough to design pictures of triumph and miracles.

The danger in retracing our pasts is that this simple act may subconsciously reopen old wounds, keeping you stuck in the vicious cycles of self-sabotage, unforgiveness, anger and pain.

By erasing your chalkboard at the end of each day, it doesn't mean that you did not 'feel' the pain or should 'forget' or minimize your personal history. Your life story is IMPORTANT.

It symbolically channels the POWER, FREEDOM AND HOPE for a better tomorrow."

My wish for all my Shamanic Mountain Healing friends this New Year is that you 'wipe the chalkboard clean' and begin a fresh, new start in 2015!

Spirit Message for the Day!

Spirit message for the day, "Give yourself what you are looking for in others, and you will never find yourself alone, let down, or lacking love."

The Power of Choosing LOVE.

Spirit message for the day "There is far more power in owning your behavior, than breaking people's spirits with the need to be right."

I married a 'right fighter'.

At first, I found this infuriating until I realized that 1.) I am a mirr...or for everyone that I attract into my life and 2.) This was his way of filling a void of pain from his past. If he was 'right' then, he found a false sense of control and didn't have to face the truth that he may of made some of his own, devastating mistakes.

It felt like that first year of marriage, I stomped my feet more than I spoke!

I had met my match. We were madly in love and this TERRIFIED us both.

He was fresh off of a divorce and I came from years of violence and betrayal. Oh, what a great combination, eh?!

I would scream, "Why is it SO important to be right instead of taking responsibility that YOU may be contributing to some of our issues?"

He would just give me this blank stare. Like it had never crossed his mind that he might be playing a role in our distress.

Out of habit, I would end up apologizing even if the fault was not all mine.

I didn't want to lose this man.

It wasn't worth it to me to fight anymore because I had fought my WHOLE LIFE.

I fought for my pride, my dignity, my freedom, my virtue, for the abused dog or child...and what I THOUGHT WAS THE TRUTH!

RIGHT??

Hmmmmmm, could I be a 'right fighter' too?

Fighting for my own rights and the rights of victims that no longer had a voice, was a WAY OF LIFE for me.

In the end, according to BOTH my husband's and my own life experiences, we were both 'right', were we not?

Our perceptions were based in our own realities.

My beloved husband was standing up for what HE KNEW, for how he was raised.

And, so was I.

So, was either one of us wrong?

Ohhhh, it's so confusing, is it not?!

This is when it struck us both, two years into our marriage, that being right or wrong is not worth losing each other.

We chose to grow up.

We figured out that it was more important how we made each other 'feel'.

If I accused my husband or he accused me of being wrong, we BOTH HURT.

This is when I understood that instead of being 'right', we would gift each other respect. We began honoring one another's thoughts, feelings and opinions.

THIS is when we both shifted into our POWER.

We CHOSE LOVE.

In the end, it was really that simple.

9 years later we are still writing our love story.