the wakefield collection 2013.pdf

8/14/2019 The Wakefield Collection 2013.pdf

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The Wakefield Collection2013

By

Karen Wason


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Contents

Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 3

Feelings are powerful ..................................................................................................................... 4

Opening to more Love .................................................................................................................... 5

Changing our lives for the better ............................................................................................... 7

Waking up to more .......................................................................................................................... 8

Giving .................................................................................................................................................... 9

Midlife adventures ......................................................................................................................... 10

Unexplained experiences ............................................................................................................ 12

Saying No ....................................................................................................................................... 13

Saying Yes ...................................................................................................................................... 14

Not knowing ..................................................................................................................................... 15

Following the energy .................................................................................................................... 16


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Introduction

At the end of 2012 a few folk in the township of Wakefield, New Zealand, decided

to resurrect their community newspaper. They invited contributions of any kind

to which I responded. I wrote a monthly column about emotional life, love,

waking up to more of life, significant life adventures, decision making and living

life from an energetic perspective. This collection is the articles that appeared in

the first issue of October 2012 through to October 2013. I hope there is

inspiration here for you.


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Feelings are powerful

Understanding the power of our feelings gives us personal power that cannot be

gained through the mind and intellect. Our feelings come from our emotional body

which is of course connected in a dynamic way to our other three bodies, our mind,

body and soul.

In every moment our feelings bring us messages about what we are doing, who we

are with and how much the situation is in alignment with our soul self. Looking at

this simply we can say that when we feel joy we are in a situation that is right for us.

When we feel a discomfort the situation is less than good for us. We dont

necessarily need to change the situation but we can acknowledge it for what it is.

Feelings then are intuitive messages that tell us how much we are in alignment with

ourself in the present moment.

Feelings can also arise when we have an interaction that reminds us of something

that happened in the past that we have not yet fully integrated; perhaps it was too

painful at the time. Acknowledging the feeling will help us remember the originalevent giving us an opportunity to accept that it has been a part of our life but it is

now time to let it go. This brings about healing, a letting go of the held-in energy and

an opening of space for new things to come into our life.

Feelings are the language of the soul and they connect us with our heart and love.

Here we experience life differently; life slows down and we connect with ourself and

make heart connections with others. Somehow, life has more dimensions to it and ismore colourful and meaningful. Just imagine if we could live in this space all the

time. Oh thats right, we can!


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Opening to more Love

What is Love? How do we bring more Love into our life? How can we connect with

Love in a way that transforms our life? In recent years Ive been exploring Love in

search of answers to these very questions and Id like to share some of my most

exquisite findings.

We connect with Love by perceiving life through our heart, not our mind. Love is an

essence, an energy, a substance even, with which we connect. Our heart is the

doorway through which we can make this connection. We mostly know this but in

our society where the intellectual is applauded and the value of the emotional andspiritual is downplayed its easy to lose sight of what we know intuitively. Through

this doorway I connect with a Love of life, the Love I have for myself, other people,

my pets, humanity, the planet and more. There are no boundaries to Love.

Furthermore, when we surrender to Love, Love can live us! Knowing this reminds me

to trust and to let go. It reminds me to come back to myself. It reminds me that

when I feel overwhelmed with feelings and out of balance I just need to

acknowledge it, allow what is, and Love will attend to it. My experiences of allowing

in this way have shown me that Love has its own timeline and this is something we

can trust even when the timeline feels too long!

Letting Love live me reminds me that I am not alone and that when I seek to bring

something into my life I am supported by Love. Yes I have to be clear about my

needs and take action to ensure they are met. I need to be clear about what I want

to create in my life and take action in alignment with this. Yet if I stay too long in

action and try to force something, and keep on trying even when it feels too hard, I

know that I am getting in my own way, as well as the way of Love. Love cannot do

what Love does. Trying to control all aspects of our life turns out not to be the most

effective pathway to creating a joyful life.


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Letting Love live me is an invitation. It offers where would you like me to support

you today? We can respond by directing it with our intention. We can direct Love

and let IT attend to what is needed, because it knows, it really knows.

Letting Love live me reminds me that there is something very special about life. I feel

there is a part of me that is a song to be sung and a dance to be danced. Letting Love

live me reinforces that I am part of something so much grander than our physical

world. And with such power at its finger tips why would I not LET LOVE LIVE ME?


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Changing our lives for the better

New Year is always a good time for us to reflect; to consider what we no longer want

in our lives, to change those things that arent working for us, and to bring new

things into our life to give it more meaning and joy. Of course letting go isnt always

easy. We may feel afra id because it has been in our life for ages and we cant

imagine life without it. We may feel afraid because there will be a gap and we may

not be sure what to fill it with. We may feel sadness and regret and a raft of other

feelings. Yet when the energy for something is no longer there, trying to keep it alive

simply becomes more difficult. If we take a try harder approach by staying in action

we may find that problems emerge where they hadnt previously existed. This is asign to let go.

The act of letting go is an act of the heart as well as the mind. It is an act of

acceptance that this particular aspect (or perhaps stage) of life is now complete. We

can connect with what we are letting go of by feeling it in our heart, feeling its

essence, knowing its beauty, thanking it, celebrating it, and allowing its departure

with deep gratitude and love. If we feel grief then we allow ourselves this too, until it

is ready to move on. This is a natural process; we are not meant to stay in sameness.

Letting go creates energetic space inside of us. We may feel this as a discomfort at

first and be tempted to rush out and fill it up with action. Yet if we allow this space

to be, new opportunities will start to present themselves, synchronicities may start

to pla y out in our life and we are invited to make new choices. We can say yes

please to those things that resonate with our heart and soul, and no thank you to

those things that dont. We can play a little with those things that we are unsure

about until we are clearer about their rightful place in our life; or not.

How do we know if a new something is right for us? It FEELS GOOD and our heart

sings!


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Waking up to more

Most commonly much of our every day focus is on the physical and mental aspects

of life. This is reinforced in a myriad of ways through our history and culture, our

institutions and media and our social connections. The emotional and spiritual have

been downplayed, even diminished and sometimes ridiculed. This can lead us to

deny our wholeness, and discourage exploration of these other aspects of ourself. In

time life can reveal this imbalance in very uncomfortable ways.

It seems to me that our heart and soul work together in a fine and glorious

collaboration, to nudge us every now and then to open up more to these otheraspects of ourself. Of course we are not always aware that our experiences may be

our heart and soul sending us a message. Even if we are aware we may feel that we

have a choice whether we listen and respond.

Yet if we keep denying ourself these opportunities for expansion, life can eventually

bring us experiences that are less nudge-like and more like a big old shove! We can

be thrown into chaos on the inside and out and we are left with little choice but to

listen to our feelings and the whisperings of our heart and soul. Our emotional and

spiritual selves are asking for more attention.

We are drawn inwards and perhaps for the first time in our life we feel the need to

put ourself first. Not in a self-centred way but in a way that acknowledges that we

need to care for ourself as well as others. As we continue to look within we can find

ourself on a journey that embraces reflection, letting go, transformation and

expansion. And, despite the bumpy roads we may travel, we find the journey a

magical one. We find we are waking up to more of ourself and to more of life.


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Giving

Giving is a form of loving. When we give to someone with heart felt intention just

because we can and because we care, we are sharing a part of ourself without

limitation. From an energetic perspective the love we are sharing has a direct route

to the recipient and there is potential for the love to be received in all its fullness and

goodness.

Of cou rse giving isnt just about buying gifts. Its also about giving our time and care,

home grown things such as food, flowers and crafts, and sometimes just our

presence and conversation. Each of us has our favourite ways of giving. Of coursethis means we need awareness to recognise when others are giving to us.

When we give from a place of duty, obligation or because we feel we should, the

energetic route to the recipient is less clear; it may be filled with emotion or

agendas. Such barriers can be felt by the recipient, perhaps not always with

awareness, but something will just not feel quite right and a discomfort can be

created.

Sometimes we may expect that our giving will be reciprocated by the person we are

giving to, and when this doesnt occur we ma y feel disappointed. Yet creating a life

where giving is part of who we are does indeed create a life full of opportunities to

receive but these do not necessarily come from those to whom we give. The giving

receiving equation is more of a flow forward t han a to and fro kind of movement.

Sometimes when we feel a lack inside of us we may feel a need to give more to

others. We hope that this will fill the emptiness inside. And of course to a degree it

does. Yet if we are only giving and not receiving we move out of balance. In time we

must accept that we need to give to ourself too. This is an act of self love and helps

us to be open to receive more easily from others.


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Midlife adventures

There are many examples of midlife adventures: menopause; midlife crises;

separation; spiritual awakening; falling in-sync with the moon; buying a sports car,

having an affair; and many more. Interestingly none are presented in a good light.

Menopause, perhaps the most commonly discussed, has been medicalised and we

have received consistent messages that something is wrong. Id like to present a

different perspective.

In numerology the number five holds the energy of change and so it is not surprising

that we might begin our midlife adventures early in our fifth decade and by the timewe hit the big 50 we are experiencing an urge to bring change into our life. Or

perhaps changes have been thrust upon us and we are already banging around

trying to make sense of what is happening. It doesnt feel so long since we fe lt sure

that by midlife we would be settled in all the ways that we felt were so important in

our 20s and 30s; mortgage free, career sorted, kids off our hands and happy,

overseas holidays, money invested for old age, and an enjoyable social life. But no, it

would seem that the template for life on planet earth holds much more excitement

than such a cozy and familiar road home.

And so how might we respond when the call for change turns up, particularly when it

does so with feelings of urgency and perhaps e ven physical pain? First, dont resist

what is occurring; it is a natural process. While you may feel as if you are going mad

you can be pretty sure that there are others around you going through something

similar but no-one is talking about; it can be too hard to put into words. Second,

dont over -react and dump everything and everyone despite the urge to do so.

Feelings of panic, claustrophobia, frustration, anger and deep boredom are

messages from your soul telling you its time for change. If the feelin gs are getting

really loud its just because you havent been listening or perhaps you have but

havent taken any action. If the feelings dont settle find someone you can trust to

talk to; sharing in itself brings relief. Third, take lots of deep breaths, take time out

for yourself and listen to what your heart is saying. Put your mind on the back


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burner, if you can, it will only get in the way of you finding out what it is you really

need.

Midlife is about giving birth to our true self. While we had intended to do this as weset out in our adulthood the pressures from schools, religions, business, government

and a myriad of other social pressures have had us take up beliefs and positions that

despite good intentions arent our own. We did our best to adap t but now our soul is

taking charge and encouraging us to let go of that which no longer supports and

inspires us and to go seek that which does. This is an internal journey that requires

stillness, reflection, connection with self, reclamation and eventually the courage to

bring our new-found self out into the world - HERE I AM, THIS IS ME AND I AM

ENOUGH! Many liken it to the transformation of caterpillar to butterfly and I like

that. What kind of butterfly are you?


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Unexplained experiences

We are very good at explaining our life experiences, both to ourselves and to others.

We dont tend to do this in the moment but rather in retrospect. In the moment we

seem to have an expectation that we will experience something that is similar to

what weve exp erienced before. Even when we know we have had a rather different

experience, we endeavour to make sense of it with our rational mind and within the

framework weve created for ourselves.

Yet occasionally we can have an experience that is so far outside of this framework it

can shake us to the core. Despite all attempts to rationalise it and place it within thecontext of what has gone before, it just doesnt seem to fit. We continue to question

the experience and being of an elusive nature we might wonder if it occurred at all.

It may feel it was so extremely different that we cant share it with anyone for fear of

what they might think of us. We may even feel that we are on the verge of losing it.

Unexplained or mystical experiences might include seeing or sensing light beings,

remembering a past life, seeing something change its shape and form, or having an

out of body experience. Some experiences are much more vague and elusive; we

may sense a change in our energy or a sense that the energy around us has changed.

This can be very emotional with heightened feelings, often of deep love but

sometimes acute fear. It may feel like walking through a portal to another world

where life works differently. After any of these kinds of experiences ones perception

of life can change significantly and the world may never quite feel the same again.

They can bring about profound shifts within.

One of the big questions to arise is why am I having this experience. After many

such experiences, my own conclusion is that I am being shown that I am more than

who I previously thought I was and the Universe is a much more interesting place

than Id been led to believe! Some experiences have brought healing. I have been

nudged to read of other peoples experiences and found myself in good company. It

seems that such experiences are becoming more commonplace.


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Saying No

Isnt it strange that it can feel so hard to say No to people and opportunities that

come our way. Youd think we are pre -wired to say Yes to everything. Yet if we

want to create a life that feels like our own and includes lots of fun and satisfying

experiences, we do have to say No occasional ly, perhaps even often.

If we always say Yes to things we dont want in our life we can end up with a life

we dont want. If we say No to things we dont want in our life we are more likely

to end up with the life we want. Of course sometimes we can be uncertain because

on the face of it the invitation may look rather good. When doubts arise its helpfulto go into that place of stillness within and truly listen to what our feelings are saying

to us; there we find our truth.

Yet I know from experienc e that saying No can feel pretty jolly hard especially

when we arent used to it or what we truly want is really important to us. We need

to find courage and trust that all will be well. And if we make a decision that IS right

for us, all WILL indeed be well, even if others react to our decision at first. Miracles

can happen!

Saying No can leave a space because instead of taking up an invitation we find

ourselves thinking about what we might do as an alternative. This can feel

uncomfortable and it is at this point we can relent and change our mind and say

Yes after all. Yet this space is in itself an invitation to focus on what we really want

and open to the possibility that it might just turn up if we put our energy there

rather than on what we said No to.


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Saying Yes

In my last column I wrote about the value of saying No. It feels right to follow this

up with something about saying Yes. So here it is! First, I wrote about saying No

because I had just had an experience where I was offered something that was nearly

what I was looking for. On the one hand it was so tempting to say Yes but I knew I

wouldnt be happy with myself if I accepted less than w hat I was seeking. And in my

heart of hearts I knew that if I held out and stayed in alignment with my intentions

the right opportunity would eventually arise. And so it has. Yes there has been a lot

of trust and patience needed in the interim but I believed, really believed, that

somehow what I was seeking would turn up.

When the right opportunity did come along there wasnt really a question of having

to consider the option before saying Yes. No sitting down with a bit of paper to

work out the pros and cons or benefits and disadvantages; I just knew (felt) it

would work for me as a next step. And I know there will also be another next step

turning up on the horizon soon; I just need to stay open up to the flow that is the

river of life. As long as I stay true to my intentions those things I really want will turn

up in ways I cant personally plan or control. I know this is true surrender to the

Universe and so much more powerful than anything I can muster myself. Viewing it

this way, you could sa y that saying Yes is never really an absolute and we never

quite know what it is we are saying Yes to. Its like the Yes is more of an

invitation to more than it is a response to a question.

Some people have always operated this way but there are many of us who have

routinely said Yes when we really wanted to say No, when we felt we should

because we felt it was our duty or maybe we felt concerned about what other

people might think of us. What I know now with great certainty is that when we say

Yes or No because it works for us personally the outcome always ends up being

right for those affected by the decision, even though they may react at first. Its

more a matter of giving ourselves permission to do what is right for us.


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Not knowing

In the last couple of columns Ive discussed some of the value and adventure in

saying Yes and No. Of course when opportunity knocks we dont always know

the fullness of what is being offered and sometimes we cant respond with a simple

Yes or No. We can find ourselves muttering around the edges and feeling

indecisive. Yet this isnt necessarily a bad thing.

A common response to such a situation is to take more time to consider what is in

the offering and this is common sense in many situations. We might do some

research, the pros and cons exercise, and ask others for advice. Of course gatheringinformation may be needed but there does come a point when what we read or hear

is only confirming what we already know. Carrying on with our search for the answer

out there can start to feel pointless. The question arises from the deep where do I

go from here?

Well, oftentimes the answer isnt out there; it is inside of us. It comes through

stillness and openness to all possibilities. It arrives out of acceptance of our not

knowing. We wait. Becoming comfortable with being in a state of not knowing is a

great gift to ourselves. Full acceptance brings our energy back into our body allowing

more wholeness and more power. This allows life to come to us in ways we may not

have considered, or even known was possible. The decision to not decide is indeed

a powerful one in itself.


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Following the energy

Ive been thinking about the song To Everything There is a Season where we are

reminded that our seasons do indeed turn, turn, turn. And yes Ive got a definite

sense that Im being moved into a new season. We like to think we are in control of

our life and that we only move on when we feel so inclined, but there are times

when we know with certainty that this isnt the way of things. The energy we had for

something starts to wane, disinterest may set in or perhaps something new comes

along and takes our focus elsewhere. We can resist and hold on for a bit but in the

end staying with the old feels too hard and the results feel less than satisfactory.

Yet this is a good thing for embracing life and all it has to offer requires us to let goof old energy and follow the new.

Writing for Window on Wakefield has been a joyful experience, I have loved it. But

now my focus is being redirected elsewhere, a new chapter in my life is about to

begin. And so its time to say good -bye.

.A time to be born, a time to die

A time to plant, a time to reap

A time to kill, a time to heal

A time to laugh, a time to weep.

THE END

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