Health & Wellness | Ascension Lifestyle

13 Jan 2016
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Have you ever asked yourself, What is my purpose? Awakening Your Potential with Corey Sheikh

This year we are pleased to announce our collaboration with a unique individual who is helping people on their path to ascension. About a month ago we had the pleasure of meeting Corey Sheikh, a young introspective entrepreneur who is the co-founder of the Ottawa Wellness Center located in Ottawa Ontario Canada. After hearing his story, we learned that he overcame tremendous obstacles meanwhile going through a transformation process prior to getting to where he is today. We caught up with Corey and conducted a brief interview with him to help you understand his world a little better. Press play above to tune in to the podcast.

Sheikh, a young spiritual visionary entrepreneur, leading along with his team of fellows leaders, a movement that helps individuals who are going through their process of inner and outer transformation. After co-founding the Ottawa Lifestyle Center at the age of 20, Sheikh faced countless business obstacles leading to a profound spiritual awakening. Sheikh’s life took a massive turn from the otherwise traditional “young man’s” path – opening into a world of expansive esoteric, metaphysical and spiritual study & introspection. A process that unfolded at a blistering pace, opening up a new world of intuitive insight along with the download of the INFINITE Vision in which encompasses a number of initiatives. Sheikh and the collective community in which he is connected are focused on creating.

The Ottawa Wellness Center is the only holistic wellness center in his area that authentically helps their clients develop themselves, physically, mentally, and spiritually. It is truly a one of a kind business that is changing the face of conscious capitalism both from the business to consumer relationship, as well as the business and employee relationship. The relationships with his clients and co founders come first above all aspects of his business. Armed with an ambition to change the world, he is well on his way to raising the consciousness of the collective through the lives his wellness center has changed.

Corey believes that everyone has an inner potential that can lead them to accomplish anything they desire. With a holistic approach to health and lifestyle his wellness center offers group exercise and personal growth classes, specialized programs, and 1-on-1 personalized services ranging from personal training to holistic healing based services. All in an environment built for anyone, to thrive and evolve physically, mentally, and spiritually.

Using a combination of martial arts, fitness, body movement practices, personal growth, lifestyle principle and meditation based techniques in his growing programs. He has created a space for anyone, with any goal to feel confident with the support, guidance, and tools given to them along their journey of Transformation.

In the city of Ottawa Ontario, he has developed the city’s first holistic transformation program. Taking into account all aspects of the mind, body and soul to enable individuals to reach any lifestyle goal.

The work environment at his center operates more like a family, yet still maintaining high quality professionalism. His fellow lifestyle leaders are of the highest caliber, ranging from top tier health and wellness experts with backgrounds in fitness, Muay Thai, Nutrition, Meditation, Healing modalities and more; to experienced, customer service and care professionals looking to make the experience of his clients as memorable as possible.

corey sheikh ayp team ascension lifestyle Having learned first-hand how to overcome his fears, Corey has become passionate about helping others cross the bridge to reach their highest potential. In addition to his holistic wellness center, Corey will be embarking on transformational coaching that specializes in helping others enhance their well-being, remove blockages, reconnect with innate self-knowledge and self-healing, as well as help people through the process of transformation.

In the companies next step, they step into their new campaign “Awaken Your Potential”. A campaign focused on documenting the journeys of individuals going through their journey of personal transformation and release of their collective “INFINITE” vision. Bringing their vision to the world of a conscious lifestyle center, leader university and online platform they will look to bring their programs worldwide through the networks of conscious individuals moving through their personal journey of awakening.

If you’re in the Ottawa area, stop by the Ottawa Lifestyle Center or visit them online at: umtbc.com

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02 Jan 2016
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Beyond the Brain to Inner Wisdom

In my last essay, The Evolutionary World Inside Our Brains, I explained briefly the amazing complexity of our brains as they regulate our internal homeostasis and coordinate functions throughout the body, while simultaneously creating our three-dimensional world as we perceive it. What I presented just barely scratched the surface. There is so much more, and new discoveries and insights come about every year. What I want to address this time is the amazing intelligence beyond the brain, what we CranioSacral Therapists call the “Inner Wisdom.”

Think about the miracle of one single fertilized cell growing into the complex body you inhabit at present, a cell community of somewhere between 50 to 70 trillion cells, all containing the exact same library of information we know as DNA. And yet from that first, single fertilized cell, your cells differentiated into such varied tissues as the retina in your eyes, the enamel of your teeth, liver lobes, blood cells, and toenails, to name a few. What guided the process of growth and specialization? What directed the body of a nerve cell in the spinal cord to extend its axon to exactly the same muscle in your foot as in mine?

At present we do not have a scientific answer. Whatever it is that directs our growth and evolution, it is not measurable with our present technology. Ancient wisdom traditions speak of the oak tree being already present in its entirety within the acorn. In modern terms we may think of it analogous to a hologram. Each fragment of the hologram contains an image of the entire picture, not just one aspect like a puzzle piece. So even at present, theoretically every cell in your body contains the blueprint for the entire body in its DNA. Yet under normal circumstances, the retina will not turn into enamel. It follows its own function faithfully for the benefit of the whole body.

Down to the smallest cell and its components, your body is processing information and making decisions. Intelligence is not the same as consciousness. So bear with me as I claim that Consciousness, or Inner Wisdom, is present in every cell of your body, without exception. This is opinion, not scientific fact. In my opinion, Consciousness is the basis of all being, and it presents itself in as many variations as the vibrational spectrum of the Universe. We experience just a fraction of what is there, but that does not diminish the value of that which lies beyond our perception.

If consciousness is the basis of every cell in your body, then each organ or tissue has its own, more complex consciousness. This in turn is part of the whole body consciousness. And extending outward in the human community, the individual is part of the collective consciousness of the family, the community, the culture and the whole of humanity. No one exists outside of the context of the whole, yet each may be addressed individually. As one bully can affect a lot of people in the neighborhood, one cell gone cancerous can affect the whole organ if not addressed appropriately.

So can we address a single cell or a specific organ that is acting up using not laser beams but consciousness, i.e. Inner Wisdom? As CranioSacral Therapists we say: “Yes, we can.”

In our normal waking consciousness we are mostly tuned to the outside world, hung up on the past, and projecting into the future. But in a state of grounded mental relaxation, we can tune into the consciousness of an organ, body part, tissue, emotion, personality aspect or archetype. In a state similar to visionary dreams or deep meditation, we can access Inner Wisdom itself, as well. More uniquely personal than any professional advice, our Inner Wisdom offers meaningful explanations and suggests plans of action that are in accordance with our soul’s purpose.

But how can we be sure that we are not just making stuff up when we are in a dialogue with our heart, the Wounded Child, or our anger, for example?

This is where CranioSacral Therapy (CST) has the most elegant and beautiful tool at hand, quite literally. During a treatment session, the therapist’s hands are monitoring the client’s body for the quality of what we call the Significance Detector (SD), which tells us what is meaningful and what is not. What is a Significance Detector?

The CranioSacral Rhythm (CSR) is a cyclical expansion-contraction motion of the skull and spinal cord, which is caused by a production-absorption cycle of the cerebro-spinal fluid inside the brain cavities. This expansion-contraction occurs normally with a rate of 6 to 12 cycles per minute. For a trained hand it is palpable anywhere on the body. During a CranioSacral Therapy treatment the therapist continuously monitors the rhythm. Occasionally, it comes to a spontaneous, abrupt stop. This is called a Significance Detector. At that point a therapist trained in Somato-Emotional Release may ask a question such as: “What are you noticing right now?” This is intended to bring conscious attention to what might be fleeting images, thoughts or feelings in this moment. Inner Wisdom is bringing them up from the non-conscious to the conscious mind. Like dream images, if you don’t catch them, they might be gone without delivering their message.

Many times, a novice client to this form of treatment will not be aware of anything happening other than feeling deeply relaxed and possible slightly annoyed by the question. But with a little experience, it becomes easier to catch the image or feeling before it is gone, just as the practice of dream journaling becomes easier over time.

The image, memory, words or feelings that came to mind at the instance the SD signaled relevance, may appear nonsensical, whimsical or meaningless at first glance. But exploring the image not through rational thinking but with intuition and an open mind will reveal layers upon layers of meaning, often times leading to profound revelations which in turn lead to healing.

The CranioSacral Therapist is participating in the process not as guide or counselor, but as observer and body worker. We are the hands of Inner Wisdom; we follow the Inner Treatment Plan. We do not attempt to direct where the treatment “should” takes us. We do not make value judgments, or suggest strategies and solutions. We do not analyze.

Our hands listen to the body tissues and the SD, and with the gentlest touch we follow the physical, emotional and energetic releases of tension that happen in the process from superficial to deep. We ask questions only if necessary to clarify messages, get into more detail, or focus attention back from distractions when the SD indicates that the dialogue is going off topic. When that happens, the silence of the CSR starts to waver and quiver before the rhythm comes back on. When our attention returns to the focal point of significance, the SD becomes still and deep again. Now we are tuned again to Inner Wisdom.

Messages from Inner Wisdom seldom appear without encountering some resistance from another aspect of the psyche. Otherwise we would never run into trouble. Until we have reached absolute enlightenment (if there is such a thing while in physical form) we will have to deal with resistance. This is not as bad as it sounds. Even resistance has at its core a positive intention. It means to do the right thing, and often is simply not aware that its actions are now obstructing growth and getting in the way of happiness.

Let me give an example: During treatment the therapist’s hands are guided to the heart. Instantly the CSR stops and goes into a profound SD. The therapist asks: “What is going on here?” The client responds e.g.: “I feel sad.” “Tell me more about sad”, might be the next question, or “What does sad look like?” The answer could be: “Sad is hiding behind a huge wall. I can’t see it, I just feel it.”

Further internal dialogue may reveal that the heart has been walled off for protection after a devastating experience years or decades ago. Now Heart wants to expand, open up, and let its light shine brightly. Resistance shows up as rage. Rage will not let Heart take down the protective walls. It is concerned about more damage and suffering if Heart is not guarded behind walls. In order for Rage to allow any opening of the heart, it first needs acknowledgment for a job well done. Rage kept the person from falling into a catatonic depression, or committing suicide. Rage provided the energy to move on and take a pro-active stance towards survival. It is not aware that circumstances have changed, and at this point it is acting like a bull in a china store. A new, potentially very supportive relationship with a gentle and safe person could be at risk if Rage does not scale down its presence.

Through skillful negotiations between one personality aspect and another, conducted by the client’s Inner Wisdom, a new balance can be found between the need for protection and growth. Rage may agree to step back from active duty, but remain on call for situations of true danger. It may actually be relieved to get a break, because it is exhausted from being on the job non-stop for years or decades. It might call in Discernment to take its place protecting Heart, while Rage itself gets ready for retirement in Florida.

Much of the inner dialogue may happen without a spoken word and at a pace much too fast for communication between client and therapist. The best we can do as therapists is to stay out of the way when Inner Wisdom is doing its thing, and only assist when the process gets stuck. It never ceases to amaze us how ingenious and effective Inner Wisdom’s solutions are to the most rigid blocks in the way of growth and personal evolution.

A compassionate attitude towards even the peskiest resistance will make it easier to integrate the whole into a situationally appropriate support system without the bull in the china store. This is an ongoing, never ending process, and a life skill. Like any other skill, it grows with practice. With endless patience Inner Wisdom presents us with just the right circumstances for practice, again and again, until we get it.

Treatment with a CranioSacral Therapist trained in Somato-Emotional Release is a way to open the door, but we all have to go on our own journey. Ultimately one learns to apply the inner awareness of what is significant and real, along with the inner dialogue skills, without dependency on the therapist.

The ultimate goal of CranioSacral Therapy is Self Realization. To me that means being tuned into the Inner Wisdom and the Wisdom of the Universe continuously, not just every now and then, but as a new state of “normal”.

CranioSacral Therapy is one of many, many paths toward that goal. It happens to be the path I was guided to travel, with great results. For that reason I became a CranioSacral Therapist myself, and it is my pleasure to open the door for my clients to go on their own journey towards healing and personal evolution.

Shana Dieterle, PT, CST, is a CranioSacral Therapist practicing in Missoula, MT. She has trained with the Upledger Institute International and is presently working on her Diplomate certification. It is her pleasure to explore the amazing health benefits of light touch therapy to optimize brain function and self-healing.

For further information and contact information, go to www.ShanasHeartofHealing.com

24 Dec 2015
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Infinite Intelligence / Opening The Channel

Spirit Guidance.

I have always known for as long as I can remember that there was a presence around me. It existed at that time as such an integral part of my subjective experience, that I never questioned its validity. It was that presence that always sent me impulses, nudges, inspiration, insight and the guidance by which I chose to move through my every day experiences. It was that presence that often told to me pick up the phone before it would even ring. In fact it would often tell me who was going to be calling. And when I say “tell” what I mean by that is somewhat misleading. This communication never happened with any language other than the subtle knowing that I would receive.This presence loved to guide me through the massive forest that sat directly behind my back door during chlidhood. We would go on adventures to find treasures, eat berries, catch turtles, and even find secret pathways that led me through to the other side of my little neighborhood. Each time the path would be different but it never mattered because I trusted that I was being “guided”. I can’t remember what age I realized that not everyone has invisible friends. Eventually it became more appealing, as a very shy reclusive child, to play with my “real” flesh and blood friends. I abandoned my relationship with what I later came to know as my guides and guardian angel without even understanding who they were. Like so many other children with psychic gifts I eventually grew up and decided that it had all been in my imagination

There are times now that when I look back and I’m aware that this presence never left my side. It (they) have always been there with unconditional love and support despite my lack of acknowledgment or conscious participation. It was only when I began my commitment to my spiritual path that I again opened up the channel consciously to the relationship between myself and my Spirit guides.What a beautiful and joyous life it has become thanks to them.

What is Spirit Guidance?

Spirit guidance is direct contact with nonphysical energies that exist in the spirit realm who are able to offer you wisdom beyond your five senses. Everyone has a spirit guide (or several spirit guides), and each of us has the ability to listen to them. They communicate with us in a variety of ways that we must become aware of because they are at a higher frequency. We have to be very still, silent, open and accepting. Spirits Guides, Angels, Deceased loved ones, Totem Animals, elementals, God(desses) are always near connecting with us. Many of us experienced a deepening of our supernatural and spiritual gifts over this past year and what came through so clearly is our ability to communicate with beings in the subtle realms. The veil is thinner than ever. Given the nature of the mass spiritual awakening that is happening throughout the Earth now is an amazing time to develop that intimate relationship with the Spirit Realm.

Those in Spirit, even without physical bodies, still have energy bodies all of which carry a certain vibration and resonance. Thus, without words, emotion, or thought, the presence, the feeling, of a Spirit can still be identified. Spirit Guides and Angels are often referred to as Beings of Light, and as such, they have a very high, elevated, lifting feeling, when one is present. Often, the presence of a guide will feel like a tingling sensation indicating simply a presence stepping close to you. Depending on the guide or angel that is visiting you, in addition to the slight tingly warmth you feel on your body, you’ll also pick up a unique ‘fingerprint’ of this being. For example you might also get a sense of protected and safeness. Or such as fairies and other elemental spirits like sprites that tend to be very playful and childlike. This will become familiar to you over time just the same way that specific friends have different energy that you can recognize.

Spirit guides are not the same things as ghosts (earthbound souls). What we refer to as ghosts are confused and often times, they don’t even know that they are dead. They continue to wander around in a type of purgatory because they don’t know how to cross over. Often it’s the devastating emotional circumstances that surround their death that keep them stuck. True spirit guides respect you and your right to choose your own path. Real spirit guides are wise, compassionate and often amusing. If you are ever aware of a spiritual being who does not respect you and others, it is not your spirit guide. Tell any less evolved beings to leave and call in your real spirit guide. You can simply ask, are you my true spirit guide.

Spirit guides are souls with the intention of offering support and guidance on the spiritual path to those who have chosen to experience life in the physical realm. Whenever a soul incarnates into a physical body there is a great amount of insight lost about who that being truly is. Your spirit guides can keep you tuned into your souls divine plan because they never lose sight of the path. In fact they can often see many things that are approaching before they happen. They will always respect your free will and offer you guidance based on the direction that your life choices have taken you in. They can help you to recognize signs and interpret synchronicity from the universe which can indicate what choices are serving the highest good for all parties involved. If you decide any course correcting is needed they can help support the steps needed to come into alignment as well.

Whenever you engage with a spirit guides, angel, ascended master god or goddess, or the Holy Spirit realize you are touching the face of the One Most High. While it is possible for humans to go to God directly in prayer and meditation, s/he often invokes helpers to work directly with us. All beings were created to with specific gifts, talents and skills. Each being (including you) has a purpose, part of which is to help bring balance and harmony to the universe. Many people may not be able to connect to the idea of gods, goddesses and other such concepts and therefore it would be entirely appropriate to refer to this presence as Infinite Intelligence. This simply acknowledges that our own perspective is limited, yet there is a higher intelligence that is available for us to access which can lend us greater understanding and awareness at all times. You may chose to call on any force in the universe within or without that resonates with your belief systems.

How does one connect to Infinite Intelligence (spirit guidance)?

Intention. Set the intention that you wish to connect to the benevolent beings who will guide you towards your highest good and the good of all that is. Question your perceptions and be open to believe that there is more to see than meets the eye.
Get into the vibrational alignment. In other words tune in. As previously mentioned this presence that we refer to as Spirit Guides exists on a higher dimensional plane of existence. In order to receive the insight and inspiration that is available to us it’s most imperative to raise the vibration. For the most part being in the range of your joy and following your bliss naturally will set the mood for receiving clarity in all forms.
Plants have a wonderful way of fortifying our connection with energetic realms not of our own. Inherently they are able to boost your energy to bring it closer to those of Spirit, Loved Ones, and Angels. Below you can see a list of the herbs and essential oils included in this month’s Spirit Medicine kit if you wish to work more intimately with these tools.
All the chakras are infinitely important in establishing a healthy transmission back and forth. Try a guided meditation that is meant to open, clear and balance your chakra’s and stimulate your senses.

Spirit guides come to us in many ways. Spend time in silence, meditation and just listening. In those moments of complete stillness, you will receive messages. Guidance may come as images in your head (clairvoyance), a feeling (clairsentience) a sound or voice (clairaudience) or even just clear insight and knowledge (claircognizant). They also come through in dreams, numbers(1111, 1234, 777, 333, 444, 555) are all angels codes, books, smells, songs, electricity(turning lights on), mind to mind communication and so much more. You may see a feather to indicate the presence of a guide. Even animals, insects, and plants can be a form of spirit guidance. I have had angels show themselves to me on a perfectly clear day in the form of a rainbow before. The possibilities are endless.
You can try automatic writing, by meditating and asking your spirit guides to come through you. Automatic writing is the process of writing material that does not come from the conscious thoughts of the writer. The writer’s hand forms the message, and the person is unaware of what will be written. It is sometimes done in a trance state. Another way is instead of going unconscious while another entity writes with your hand you could listen and write what you hear. In this way, you are simply listening to what is being said and writing down what you hear. To accomplish this it is best to be in a meditative state. This is an intuitive process and there is no right or wrong way to do it.
Keep a journal. Write down everything you see, smell, feel or hear, because these are intuitive messages from your guides. You guides can also send you so much creative inspiration which can be applied to every day problem solving or used for art, music, writing or other creative projects. They may guide you to meet someone or to a specific opportunity that can open up your path for you in countless ways.
Follow the impulse. Once you receive the gentle nudge from the subtle realm respond appropriately. As you make discoveries about yourself, take action. As you receive answers to your prayers, take action. Find ways to change that will bring you closer to the truer part of yourself and your soul’s purpose where happiness and fulfillment lies.
Create an altar or place where you can go to feel the presence of your guardian angel. Put objects that remind you of your soul’s desire on the altar. Write letters to your angels and add your letters to your altar. Pray here. Listen for answers. Light a candle and find a feeling of peace. Make this place a living presence in your life.

HAPPY WINTER SOLSTICE!

By: Ascension Lifestyle Contributor Hasnaa

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06 Dec 2015
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The Evolutionary World Inside Our Brains

It is true that the greatest miracles generally go unnoticed. This is certainly the case for most of us when it comes to the complex function of our brains. Like every other body part, we mostly pay attention to it when it hurts or quits working. Just to give you a few ideas to help increase your appreciation of the amazing stuff that happens between your ears:

Modern physics has established that the world around and within us is made up of energy, rather than “things”. Even the smallest particles, such as electrons and photons, are “quanta”(meaning a certain amount) of energy. These quanta can appear out of, and disappear into, nothingness. And even if they were “things”, the empty spaces between them are vast. If the nucleus of a hydrogen atom were the size of an orange, the only electron of the atom would be the size of a cherry circling the nucleus at a distance equivalent to the length of a football field.

So modern physics has to agree to some extent with the ancient Buddhist teaching that form is emptiness, emptiness is form. No-thing-ness is the basis of existence.

It does not feel that way, though, when you hit your thumb with a hammer. So what is actually there? Electromagnetic forces that strongly repel each other. They give us the very convenient appearance of solid matter.

Your skin has built in sensors that respond to their electromagnetic interactions with “things” and report them to a specific part of the brain through electrio-chemical nerve conduction. The brain now creates an image of hard, soft, hot, cold, rough, smooth, and so on, out of nothing more than impulse computations.

What you see is what you get, but it’s not what is actually there. What the sun provides us with is light rays, vibration, radiation. Only a very small spectrum of this radiation is interacting with the sensors in your eyes, which translates into electrical impulses sent to another specific region of your brain. Color, shade, 3D depth perception, recognition of shapes and faces, finding meaning in little black scribbles on a piece of paper as “writing”, “seeing” a big black bird in your mind’s eye when you recognize the 5 letters on your computer screen that add up to RAVEN, all of that is a function of the brain’s perception.

When a tree falls in the forest, and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound?

Actually, it does not. What it does is create shockwaves in the air. Only when some ears are present to translate the shock waves hitting the eardrum into electrical impulses sent to yet another highly specialized region of the brain, can we reasonably speak of “sound”.

And naturally, it is the brain that allows us to convey meaning through consecutive noises we make and call language. If you don’t believe me, travel to a country with a language completely foreign to you and ask where the bathroom is. Even understanding universal body language requires very complex brain functions.

To sum things up, the world “out there” only exists as we know it because our brains make it so. As humans we generally perceive the same events “out there” because “in here”, our brains are built and wired in roughly the same way. We have different filters that decide subconsciously what is worth noticing and what is mere background noise, but we generally agree that a tree is a tree.

A bee creates visual images by processing the ultraviolet radiation spectrum. Its world looks vastly different, and we can barely imagine how our tree appears to a bee. A bear has very poor eyesight but one of the most sensitive noses on the planet. Its reality is made up of entirely different sense integration skills than ours.

Creating a meaningful experience of the world “out there” is only half the task of our astonishing brains. There is also the world inside our skin that needs to be monitored and coordinated. Our conscious thinking comprises only a minute fraction of the brain’s information processing at any given moment. It is truly a blessing that we don’t have to make decisions regarding our blood acidity levels for effective oxygen bonding and release into the tissue, for example. It would be difficult to concentrate on reading this article while simultaneously having to focus on micromanaging our liver functions and hormone cycles.

Think about the inconceivable amount of computations the brain has to accomplish for a tennis player to hit the ball across the net. She has to perceive the speed and movement arc of the ball while rushing to the right place at the right time to hit the ball back with the most efficient muscle action of her upper body, and she has to calculate the exact angle, speed and force to connect the center of her racket with the ball to get it over the net to a location within bounds but preferably out of reach of her opponent. Her split second visual computations have to create an instant response of extremely fine tuned muscular coordination, balance, heart rate, blood pressure, breathing, internal heat regulations, and much more. All of our most advanced supercomputers combined could not handle a task like that.

Since our conception, our bodies have grown from one single fertilized cell into a complex community made up of roughly 50 to 70 trillion individual cells. By the time we are born, these cells are specialized and functionally grouped together into most of the basic structures necessary for life on land: Bones, muscles, skin, connective tissue, organs, glands, blood and lymph vessels, body fluids and the immune system. But the nervous system requires another couple of years to fully develop and master skills like the ability to walk upright and language development.

Keeping our inner maintenance up and running non-stop requires so much information processing that it would be too slow and inefficient to do it all in one fairly remote location. Therefore our internal organs have nerve plexuses connected to them where functional monitoring and self-correction takes place on the spot. The heart itself is actually not just a muscle but is made up of 60% neurons like those in the gray matter of the brain. So we speak of a heart brain, a gut brain, and immunologists speak of the immune system as a mobile brain.

However, if our individual organs only look out for their own function and growth, without consideration for the needs of the whole, what we get is cancer. So it is absolutely essential that the activities of all of our body parts are connected, monitored and coordinated. That is what our central nervous system does.

The survival of the individual entity we call a human being depends on the willingness and ability of the individual cells and organs to communicate and cooperate for the good of the whole. When the whole dies, so do the cells and organs. This is not rocket science, but it is something the cancer does not know or chooses to deny.

Just a thought: what would happen if we applied the body’s wisdom to the whole of the human race?

In the past 100 years we have had two competing economic ideologies.

Communism was all about absolute, central control. This lead to a huge, bloated head and atrophied, non-functioning organs. The body was ultimately not able to support the head, and it fell.

Capitalism is all about the individual organ-(ization) taking whatever it needs to grow and prosper without regard to the consequences for the rest of the body. “Off with the head! It only gets in the way!” Has anyone seen the headless rider lately?

There is a third option. Our body proves it. But we have not seen it in action yet. Could it be that the human race is still so young that the nervous system of our collective body is still growing into its full function, and upright gait plus communication skills are just around the corner? In our previous attempts to get on our feet we fell on our behind more than once, and throwing tantrums has not been very effective in communicating our needs. But considering the age of our universe, the human race was only born a few seconds ago. So there is hope.

There is one more admirable capacity of our brain that I still need to mention:

Our ability to dream, imagine and visualize possibilities that have yet to be created. Our head-, heart-, and gut brains are capable of receiving information – inspiration directly from the Field. What is the Field? It cannot be described in terms of space and time, it cannot be measured, and it is an inescapable necessity for our most up-to-date observations of quantum physics to work. It is a concept that tries to explain the inexplicable: How can information travel faster than the speed of light?

It does, and not at random.

Switching from physics to metaphysics: there appears to be an Intelligence or Collective Consciousness that is in charge of our personal, collective and universal evolution. I am convinced that it is this omnipresent Intelligence that allows our individual Consciousness to inhabit a complex body grown from a single fertilized cell. It is also in charge of the growth and maturation of the human race as a whole. It has purpose and patience. Yes, we are facing a crisis, and the growing pains are profound. But the Intelligence that came up with this brilliant way of expressing Consciousness through physical form is certainly capable of guiding our continued journey from evolution of consciousness to Conscious Evolution past the present crisis. It is a journey worth taking!

For further information and contact information, go to www.ShanasHeartofHealing.com

23 Nov 2015
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The Science of Personal Growth – An Interview With Dr. Kevin Fleming

We all strive for high achievement, and when we get there, we want to continually maintain and improve it, as well as avoid obstacles that hinder our growth. But what about the default patterns of behavior hard-wired in our brains that keep us from becoming the greatest version of ourselves? Regardless of how successful one becomes, we can all benefit from someone who can reveal within us the mechanisms to achieve peak mental performance and the fortitude to persevere through difficult circumstances. Life will always have unique challenges and working with someone who can reduce the psychological problems that interfere with our performance achievement is an expertise highly coveted among successful people.

The problem with many psychotherapists, mentors, coaches, psychologists, etc, is that they often adhere to very rigid protocols and procedures that barely scratch the surface, nor do they have the type of human connection needed to break through to the client’s core. There are many layers and modes of operation that the brain employs to make decisions and feel at ease. Within those layers, are functions that can also hinder the process of change, which require a highly skilled practitioner to navigate effectively. This is crucial when getting to the source of the what’s holding us back from living the best version of our lives.

Enter Dr. Kevin Fleming, an expert in his field with a distinct and genuine approach to maximizing human potential. He is the founder of Grey Matters International, an exceptional behavior-change consulting firm with a neuroscience-based decision-making process. His proprietary approach to helping his clients is in high demand and continues to change lives worldwide. He has traveled the world to see clients in 5 continents, interacting with people from diverse backgrounds and industries. His methods yield results where shortcomings are common in traditional practices.

A seasoned professional, Dr. Fleming earned his B.A, M.A, and Ph.D from the university of Notre Dame, doing his postdoctoral residency in Behavioral Medicine. This background and experience adds to his impressive credentials and has helped him revolutionize how common issues of the human condition can be addressed. He brings together cutting-edge neuroscience with a concierge model of care, working one-on-one with a wide range of personalities to carefully tailor the perfect mental wellness solution for every client, some of whom include cabinet members of the King of Jordan, Fortune 100 executives and NFL players. He is a knowledgeable resource who has been cited in the New York Times, Fortune Magazine, Newsweek, CNN, The Huffington Post, and his work has received praise from the faculties of Harvard Medical and Business Schools.

Dr. Fleming’s company, Grey Matters International, is a change agent, revolutionizing the way people see and conduct themselves while navigating both personal and professional relationships. His expertise fills a void, addressing those who are tired of conventional “feel good” coaches, trainers and self-help experts, many of whom have little understanding of the high-performing brain and the real catalysts needed for lasting improvement.

We caught up with Dr. Fleming and asked him a few questions about his profession, as well as what makes his consulting firm different from everyone else in his field.

What is unique about your personal development consulting verses other personal development programs?

Grey Matters International is a unique neuroscience-based platform of technologies, insights, and behavior change strategies that are brought to client locations, in the form of intensives or private retreats, for the purpose of making sustainable transformations, not just in “superficial mood” but in actual decision making. Our company assumes irrationality of human beings as a “norm” and works hard to go beyond mere motivational trite mantras and into the contradictions within all of us. Unlike other personal development approaches which assume what you say is what you want, we know the brain is full of self-deceit at the worst, and maximizing efficiency at its best. Most self-help programs assume too much rationality and it’s why most of those programs don’t stick.

What motivated you to get into this line of work?

It was organic and not something I chose consciously….I knew helping people was always in my DNA and shrinks were the cornerstone to that….but I quickly learned that there I fell in love with the work around illusions and half-truths of those of us “doing” the helping work and that was what prompted Grey Matters Intl to be formed.

Why did you move away from a clinical practice to a consulting role? Did you feel the clinical approach was too rigid and unable to address key issues?

I invite people to download for free the Half Truth High, which explains a lot of this exodus from that side of things and over to this new model of work. You can do that from my homepage at: www.greymattersintl.com

Can you provide an example of how your program uses the power of neuroplasticity to change behavior?

Our private, concierge level retreats are always for one person (or couple) and with this personalization, we have the ability to do multiple, concentrated neuroplasticity methods. For one, we will measure neurochemistry and neuroregulatory hormones (If it’s applicable to their goals, of course) and be able to give them an actual analysis to view their levels, something most psychiatrists and other medical professionals sadly never do. We then are able to use this mapping as a guidepost for an all-natural, holistic roadmap of medicinals to repair the delicate balance again. We also have a neurotechnology that is quite profound in the neural network aspect of changing the brain fast and effective. Networks are where most of our patterned behaviors “rest” and we have an innovative way of astronomically balancing the brain and rebuilding neural pathways. Stories of change are unbelievable from this: www.greymattersintl.com/company/testimonials

You’ve said that “true inner change cannot occur when the approach is based on nothing more than thought and perception.” How can we break our negative patterns without rationally attempting to do so? Is this more of a challenge for the subconscious mind?

Great question. Yes, the stuff of “The Secret” and all the “just think it and it will happen to you”, are all half-truths at best. Sure, encountering the reality of the consequences of your thinking is a necessary but not sufficient condition for change. I have tons of examples of people who have radically changed their mood, behavior, and decisions without ever consciously changing their thoughts, and others who have worked so hard at trying to change their thinking that they get tripped up in it and paradoxically create more thinking traps from this practice. It was once said, “Happiness is in the waiting room of happiness”. This is profound, for it speaks to the balance ontologically around how we get to this state of fulfillment. Many times it is about paradox, and not only that, especially for first to second order change situations which is what most of my clients are actually seeking; they have consciously tried MANY self-help strategies and if anything they are at that place where their solutions are now the reason they are perpetuating their problem. Grey Matters International is a master at helping people see how we all can solve the wrong problem really well 🙂

Is emotional processing incorporated into your method of behavior change? Walk us through how are you able to help your clients process emotional trauma associated with the root cause of the behavior.

Yes and no. Emotions are always a part of what we desire to have change or shifted in our lives when we are stuck or have a goal to change, but I do feel we have overdone this….no, not in the value or importance, but in the misapplied strategies we use to get these shifts. I use the neurotechnology FIRST to repair emotional imbalance primarily for no amount of ’emotional processing” will fix a hole in a cup. All the water you pour into it will go out. One must fix first the capital F part of FEELINGS (ie: valence, arousal level) before getting into actual content of feelings and moving that to “small f” feelings. They merge and mingle too much and in my experience that confuses “emotional processing” work when done in talk therapy fashion which makes all words equal in valence and meaning.

“Medication or therapy are the cornerstones of traditional psychological enhancement.” Can you explain your position on this?

I believe all good things when misapplied to context or gone to an extreme become weaknesses, and meds and therapy are no different. It is a one size fits all kind of approach that I believe ignores the “every brain is a fingerprint” kind of unique way of thinking. Also, I do not feel processing of feelings over and over in therapy is good for a soul that is at risk of saturation of self.

What do your clients get from you that they can’t get anywhere else?

24/7 access to a renowned thought leader, done in a way that is quite down to earth, refreshing, psychobabble-free, and on demand to fit their lifestyle. A we-come-to-you model of care today is unheard of, especially in the many hats I wear fashion—from individual to couples work, to high performance work, to corporate/executive wellness, to team based facilitations. Also, fresh new thinking that is NOT being taught today in the medical and mental health circles around behavior change and transformation. Lastly, the most cutting edge neuroscience technologies is quite appealing to folks desiring innovation in their care.

“We must know our brain’s biases and errors in thinking, on a day to day basis, as well as the approaches being offered to us as brain changing.” Can you explain this statement in more detail?

Our own self-deceit and addiction to “being right” blocks all of us and the kind of sort of true solution we come up with to a problem and the actual full systems or maximally virtuous one BOTH get the same emotional response produced by the brain. The difference? Usually some sort of brain bias or self-protective quality at play. Being aware of this not only forces us to go beyond what merely makes sense; it allows a pathway to fuller truths and humility….something we don’t like to talk much about these days but is a cornerstone to lasting happiness.

‘Interrupting the decision-making process of the executive brain’ is something you have mentioned on your website. Does this interruption force one to think about how one is making decisions, therefore seeing the errors in the decision making process?

Well, disruption is the key to new transformative learning and breaking of new patterns. Many times my sophisticated or executive level clients’ narcissism blocks true growth and the best way to change these folks is causing “the right type of problems” instead 🙂 This can be done with accountability work in the realm of psychological boundaries, in a hard hitting no nonsense way, or via our neurotechnology which disrupts old patterns and creates new ones.

In your opinion, what are some of the root causes of negative patterns of behavior and thinking, and how does your consulting address this?

I would say 90 percent of this has to do with trauma. And I believe there are four types: Either acute or chronic, and either infringement based or abandonment based (so you can see a 2 by 2 matrix here is formed to create 4 types of individuals). Remember, trauma is NOT just something really bad happening to you. It is something violating to the brain’s predictive strategies around what a “normal, healthy expectation” is in this world of relationships and discovery. We ALL have been in these four boxes and to me that is where the core starts, from there, we create compensatory half-truth ways of living that eventually don’t take us to the finish line.

In a postmodern world full of multi-tasking and tight deadlines, it’s harder for people to have a linear focus on something. Our attention is inundated with multiple tabs, tight deadlines, and excessive work. What is your approach to performance enhancement in this scenario?

This is correct. While there are lots of neuroscience answers to healing a burned out/stressed out brain—and we certainly do a large amount of work in this area via our neurotechnology —the long term solution is really around boundaries and setting them inside a world that is essentially without boundaries. The brain was not meant to go 24/7 with no breaks. As Stanford neurobiologist Dr. Sapolsky mentions in his book “Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers”, unlike this animal in the wild who either enters or escapes immediate threat, we stay activated inside potential threats of urgency everyday, keeping us over stimulated. Without removing one’s self frequently for “little breaks” of non-work/non-engagement, this is all futile.

I did an interview on all this, with the technology expert for Today Show/CNN, Mario Armstrong: www.steinershow.org/podcasts/december-8-2011-hour-2/

Some of your past clients have mentioned that you helped them get down to their core values and find out what really matters to them. Sometimes what really matters to someone is not aligned with their career. Some people who are successful at making a lot of money aren’t necessarily passionate about it. As a mentor, coach, and consultant, how would you navigate this situation? Would you try to help them find meaning in their work or encourage them to take a new path?

We all make trade offs in life. I don’t “do” anything to my clients. All I do is invite them to explore their own personal cost/benefit ratios and take them through stages of change (precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, and maintenance). Most people try to take control of these people by telling them what to do just because there is some ambivalence and conflict. Each stage requires a different skill to engage in and through ambivalence, something we all don’t like because we are too busy being addicted to getting rid of dissonance in our life. Grey Matters International got its name not just because of the obvious brain allusions in the name, but because, philosophically, the greyness of life and the inherent unsureness of things “matters” in being as it is ….not to be therapized, medicated, persuaded away necessarily.

What are the most typical scenarios you find yourself consulting, example divorce, addiction, etc.

stress/burnout

addiction

relationship conflict and repair

high performance goals/issues

mood disorders

memory/cognitive/attentional goals

Traumatic Brain Injury and other post-concussive, or neurorehabilitation issues

Is your approach purely scientific? To what degree, if any, do spiritual or philosophical ways of dealing with life influence your professional career?

It is neurophilosophical and spiritual at its core, whether or not people “are” overtly spiritual or religious. There is definitely a contrarian common denominator to many not-of-this-world type ways of looking at life and solving problems. Take the idea of forgiveness and mercy. I can show this has neurophysiological benefits as well as functional outcome improvements in rational issues of life. However, the brain is addicted to one size fits all solutions and we many times ‘miss’ these counterintuitive aspects of healing as we are too busy holding a hammer and making the world a nail.

You work with a lot of people in high level positions, how do you think that level of responsibility and expectation effects those people?

In the 70’s a phrase called “imposter syndrome” was coined for an actual block that describes successful people’s inability to internalize their own achievements and integrate those into an identity that makes sense and is fulfilling. I believe this is a huge issue with today’s leaders who are working too hard at being someone they felt they were told to be and then having to try to “own” that life when all the rewards and pleasures are robbing their pleasure circuitries and confusing hedonism and happiness. I find these guys and gals are in a big work addiction cycle that is very tough to break, eventually all that “hard work” gets automatized and breaking from that lifestyle actually makes pain and suffering……just like withdrawal.

Can you tell me about the time you played guitar with a client? How did a decision like that end up creating a closer bond with you and the client?

It showed shrinks don’t always need to talk or work so hard at a verbal mode of listening together. Maybe we can radically disrupt the assumptions of “words” and use a whole ‘nother modality of connection and transcendence. That is music. And ego is removed and something greater is effortlessly created by just sharing notes together

You seem to have a balanced left and right brain way of solving problems. As a Jazz musician, what is your perspective on merging the analytical and the creative. Would you say that your methods are a little more unconventional, in a progressive way?

I am definitely an unconventional, renegade type professional, and able to smooth out all that roughness with Grace 🙂

You can read Dr. Flemings insightful articles by visiting: www.greymattersintl.com/blog, a blog dedicated to unraveling our cognitive and perceptual biases, and how our brain views what we think is true about change, success, high performance, leadership, and decision-making. His thought provoking blog reveals that we are all predictably irrational creatures who persist on a rational way of understanding achievement and the meaning of life.

www.greymattersintl.com

www.twitter.com/DrKevinFleming

www.facebook.com/GreyMattersInternational

www.linkedin.com/in/greymattersintl

This is an AscensionLifestyle Promoted Article

12 Nov 2015
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Before I Go: A Neurosurgeon’s Final Reflections On Mortality

Time warps for a young surgeon with metastatic lung cancer

In residency, there’s a saying: The days are long, but the years are short. In neurosurgical training, the day usually began a little before 6 a.m., and lasted until the operating was done, which depended, in part, on how quick you were in the OR.

Time at home. Time well spent

A resident’s surgical skill is judged by his technique and his speed. You can’t be sloppy and you can’t be slow. From your first wound closure onward, spend too much time being precise and the scrub tech will announce, “Looks like we’ve got a plastic surgeon on our hands!” Or say: “I get your strategy — by the time you finish sewing the top half of the wound, the bottom will have healed on its own. Half the work — smart!” A chief resident will advise a junior: “Learn to be fast now — you can learn to be good later.” Everyone’s eyes are always on the clock. For the patient’s sake: How long has the patient been under anesthesia? During long procedures, nerves can get damaged, muscles can break down, even causing kidney failure. For everyone else’s sake: What time are we getting out of here tonight?

There are two strategies to cutting the time short, like the tortoise and the hare. The hare moves as fast as possible, hands a blur, instruments clattering, falling to the floor; the skin slips open like a curtain, the skull flap is on the tray before the bone dust settles. But the opening might need to be expanded a centimeter here or there because it’s not optimally placed. The tortoise proceeds deliberately, with no wasted movements, measuring twice, cutting once. No step of the operation needs revisiting; everything proceeds in orderly fashion. If the hare makes too many minor missteps and has to keep adjusting, the tortoise wins. If the tortoise spends too much time planning each step, the hare wins.

The funny thing about time in the OR, whether you frenetically race or steadily proceed, is that you have no sense of it passing. If boredom is, as Heidegger argued, the awareness of time passing, this is the opposite: The intense focus makes the arms of the clock seem arbitrarily placed. Two hours can feel like a minute. Once the final stitch is placed and the wound is dressed, normal time suddenly restarts. You can almost hear an audible whoosh. Then you start wondering: How long till the patient wakes up? How long till the next case gets started? How many patients do I need to see before then? What time will I get home tonight?

It’s not until the last case finishes that you feel the length of the day, the drag in your step. Those last few administrative tasks before leaving the hospital, however far post-meridian you stood, felt like anvils. Could they wait till tomorrow? No. A sigh, and Earth continued to rotate back toward the sun.

But the years did, as promised, fly by. Six years passed in a flash, but then, heading into chief residency, I developed a classic constellation of symptoms — weight loss, fevers, night sweats, unremitting back pain, cough — indicating a diagnosis quickly confirmed: metastatic lung cancer. The gears of time ground down. While able to limp through the end of residency on treatment, I relapsed, underwent chemo and endured a prolonged hospitalization.

I emerged from the hospital weakened, with thin limbs and thinned hair. Now unable to work, I was left at home to convalesce. Getting up from a chair or lifting a glass of water took concentration and effort. If time dilates when one moves at high speeds, does it contract when one moves barely at all? It must: The day shortened considerably. A full day’s activity might be a medical appointment, or a visit from a friend. The rest of the time was rest.

With little to distinguish one day from the next, time began to feel static. In English, we use the word time in different ways, “the time is 2:45” versus “I’m going through a tough time.” Time began to feel less like the ticking clock, and more like the state of being. Languor settled in. Focused in the OR, the position of the clock’s hands might seem arbitrary, but never meaningless. Now the time of day meant nothing, the day of the week scarcely more so.

Paul Kalanithi savors moments with his daughter, Cady.

Verb conjugation became muddled. Which was correct? “I am a neurosurgeon,” “I was a neurosurgeon,” “I had been a neurosurgeon before and will be again”? Graham Greene felt life was lived in the first 20 years and the remainder was just reflection. What tense was I living in? Had I proceeded, like a burned-out Greene character, beyond the present tense and into the past perfect? The future tense seemed vacant and, on others’ lips, jarring. I recently celebrated my 15th college reunion; it seemed rude to respond to parting promises from old friends, “We’ll see you at the 25th!” with “Probably not!”

Yet there is dynamism in our house. Our daughter was born days after I was released from the hospital. Week to week, she blossoms: a first grasp, a first smile, a first laugh. Her pediatrician regularly records her growth on charts, tick marks of her progress over time. A brightening newness surrounds her. As she sits in my lap smiling, enthralled by my tuneless singing, an incandescence lights the room.

Time for me is double-edged: Every day brings me further from the low of my last cancer relapse, but every day also brings me closer to the next cancer recurrence — and eventually, death. Perhaps later than I think, but certainly sooner than I desire. There are, I imagine, two responses to that realization. The most obvious might be an impulse to frantic activity: to “live life to its fullest,” to travel, to dine, to achieve a host of neglected ambitions. Part of the cruelty of cancer, though, is not only that it limits your time, it also limits your energy, vastly reducing the amount you can squeeze into a day. It is a tired hare who now races. But even if I had the energy, I prefer a more tortoiselike approach. I plod, I ponder, some days I simply persist.

Everyone succumbs to finitude. I suspect I am not the only one who reaches this pluperfect state. Most ambitions are either achieved or abandoned; either way, they belong to the past. The future, instead of the ladder toward the goals of life, flattens out into a perpetual present. Money, status, all the vanities the preacher of Ecclesiastes described, hold so little interest: a chasing after wind, indeed.

Yet one thing cannot be robbed of her futurity: my daughter, Cady. I hope I’ll live long enough that she has some memory of me. Words have a longevity I do not. I had thought I could leave her a series of letters — but what would they really say? I don’t know what this girl will be like when she is 15; I don’t even know if she’ll take to the nickname we’ve given her. There is perhaps only one thing to say to this infant, who is all future, overlapping briefly with me, whose life, barring the improbable, is all but past.

That message is simple: When you come to one of the many moments in life when you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more, but rests, satisfied. In this time, right now, that is an enormous thing.

By Paul Kalanithi

Paul Kalanithi, MD, was an instructor in Stanford’s Department of Neurosurgery and a fellow at the Stanford Neurosciences Institute. He passed away on March 9, 2015. More information about him is available at http://paulkalanithi.com.

Photography by Gregg Segal, syndicated from stanmed.stanford.edu

18 Oct 2015
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Encouraging Neurogenesis through Self-Care and Mindfulness

3 Ways Your Lifestyle Can Encourage Neuron Growth and Brain Health

There are trillions of cells in our body, and like us, they don’t live forever. Neurogenesis is the generation of new neurons (nerve cells that transmit information throughout the body). I’ll only briefly describe neurogenesis here; once you start to discuss the brain, there is labyrinth of questions and an abundance of new vocabulary around every corner. I’ll also share examples below of how to support this type of growth in your own noggin. Neurogenesis booms during pre-natal development, and in the 90’s Nature Medicine published a report stating that, contrary to previous understanding of neurogenesis, this process continues in our brains to varying degrees throughout our lives.

The Wellesley College Biology Department site tells us that “examples of neurogenesis are found in the hippocampus of mammals, song control nuclei of birds and the olfactory pathway of rodents, insects and crustaceans.” The hippocampus is responsible for memory and spatial orientation, and its ties to emotional behavior are being studied. For example, reductions of size in this area have been linked to depression. Neurogenesis supports neural plasticity, or the ability of our brain to change and adapt as part of learning, development, and even to recover from brain injuries. The current hope is that scientists will discover a successful and safe way to guide neurogenesis.

One of the key players in neurogenesis is a protein called BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor). If it’s been awhile since you’ve been in science class (like me) here’s a little re-fresher: proteins are large molecules which perform a wide array of functions. They consist of one or more chains of amino acids, which are organic compounds; the main elements of an amino acid are carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, though they can contain other elements. BDNF is called a neurotrophin; a type of protein that effects the development and function of neurons.

Not surprisingly, neurogenesis can have a positive effect on learning and memory skills while lower BDNF has been linked to Alzheimer’s, depression, and schizophrenia. Luckily, the gene that activates BDNF can itself be activated by our daily behavior. Below are 3 examples of things we can do encourage neurogenesis.

1. You guessed it: Exercise.
Exercise is important for so many reasons; it has a positive effect on mood and sleep patterns and reduces the likelihood of developing heart disease, cancer, high blood pressure, and diabetes. And, it helps us to produce more BDNF, which supports neurogenesis. In a study done in 2008, adults with mental impairment showed an improvement in cognitive function after 6 months of regular exercise.

Primary Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease with a Mediterranean Diet with Walnuts. (PRNewsFoto/California Walnut Commission)

2. Yup, Diet.
A dietary restriction involving reducing caloric intake within a balanced diet has been shown to increase neurogenesis. Green tea, salmon, and blueberries are all high on the list of brain-healthy ingredients. Also, two specific dietary ingredients that boost neurogenesis are listed below:
-The spice turmeric, composed primarily of curcumin, increases our BDF levels.
-Resveratrol, a chemical found in red wine, as well as being antioxidant (decreasing cellular damage) and anti-inflammatory, increases neurogenesis. Stephanie Liou of Stanford University reminds us that because alcohol can also damage the body, it is important to use moderation and weigh the benefits and costs.

3. And, Self-Care and Mindfulness.
Both getting adequate sleep and engaging in sexual activity, as well as being generally healthy, are good for neurogenesis (hooray!).

Neuroscientists have learned that chronic stress and cortisol (a steroid hormone released during stress) can damage the brain and reduce neurogenesis. Mindfulness meditation has been shown to reduce the amount of cortisol.

A study published in 2010 showed that participating in a program of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) for eight weeks was found to produce increases in the size of the left hippocampus (which, remember, effects our memory and mood and is a place where neurogenesis has been previously observed). This program was developed by Medical Professor and Author Jon Kabat Zinn, and I can personally also recommend his books, Full catastrophe living: how to cope with stress, pain and illness using mindfulness meditation, and Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life, as excellent guides to incorporating mindfulness into your lifestyle.

So in short, eating well and consciously, exercising, and practicing mindfulness, are good for your brain, and what is good for the brain, is good for all of you! These activities can even help the brain keep growing new cells as you age. Take care of yourself, and neurogenerate!

By: Ascension Lifestyle Contributor Julia Travers

https://juliatravers.wordpress.com/

https://twitter.com/traversjul

17 Oct 2015
Comments: 1

DOCUMENTARY OF THE MONTH (October)- Billions In Change

The world is facing some huge problems. There’s a lot of talk about how to solve them. But talk doesn’t reduce pollution, or grow food, or heal the sick. That takes doing. This film is the story about various groups of people trying to make the world a better place through the elegantly simple inventions they have made to change the lives of billions of people, and the unconventional billionaire, Manoj Bhargava spearheading the project.

Manoj Bhargava is an entrepreneur, philanthropist, founder and CEO of 5-hour Energy. When 5 Hour Energy was introduced to the market in 2004, retail sales skyrocketed to over $1 billion by 2011, and now the company owns 90% of the energy shot market. The genius of his innovation included the 2 oz. packaging, stating that people who needed energy were also not necessarily thirsty enough for an 8 ounce drink. The smaller size packaging enabled retailers to strategically place the product near checkout counters and point-of-sale locations.

Bhargava’s foundations include Knowledge Medical Charitable Trust and Rural India Charitable Trust. The charities have funded medical research in the United States and over 400 charities in India. Two of the major initiatives are hospitals for the poor and education for disadvantaged women in rural areas.

The Hans Foundation is solely supported by the Rural India Charitable Trust, and in five years it has given $48.1 million U.S. In November 2014, Bhargava committed $80.2 million to develop villages in Uttarakhand, India. In September 2012, Bhargava joined “The Giving Pledge” and has pledged 90% of his wealth to charity, with an emphasis on a common sense approach to philanthropy. Rather than simply giving money to charity, Bhargava believes that personal involvement is necessary.

The Center for Public Integrity dubbed him the “political kingmaker nobody knows” after finding out that “he makes donations through several of his more than 70 limited liability companies”. Michigan politicians have said that Bhargava has never tried to influence a piece of legislation nor has he asked for anything in return for the donations.

Check out his documentary above and leave a comment. If you want to get involved with his organization you can join the movement at:

billionsinchange.com

facebook.com/billionsinchange

twitter.com/billionsnchange

11 Sep 2015
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How To Be Spiritual In A Material World – 7 Simple Practices to Enhance Your Spiritual Life

How To Be Spiritual In A Material World

7 Simple Practices to Enhance Your Spiritual Life

1. Be Present, Be Mindful
2. Work With Your Energy, Mind/Body
3. Stimulate Your Pineal Gland
4. Practice Daily Meditation
5. Become More In Tune With Nature
6. Learn To Lucid Dream & Astral Project
7. Surround Yourself With Like-Minded People

Greeting Spiritual Seekers! This article is not meant to be an all encompassing guide for you to structure your spiritual life around. Rather, it is a resource you can use to quickly implement some of the foundational ideas that will help foster a well-rounded spiritual life. This guide is brief to prevent over complication and to focus your attention to the simple ideas you can implement into your life. You may not be able to master all 7 techniques discussed, but you should be able to digest and implement at least a couple of the ideas.

Be Present, Be Mindful

It’s important to have goals and ambitions. In fact, success in life requires them, but life isn’t only about getting to the next checkpoint. The demands of our daily schedules leave us preoccupied with future deadlines, situations, goals and fears. We worry about getting to work on time, getting the promotion, getting new business, making ends meet, and any one of a potential litany of vexations . Life can be hectic and complicated but if we can learn how to take time and slow it down we will be able to enjoy a much less stressful and more pleasurable journey. And you don’t have to bend the laws of physics to do it.

When you stop multi-tasking and purposely focus your normally scattered attention on only the present moment and focus on it, without judgment, you are being “mindful”. A key element of happiness is mindfulness because it supports many attitudes that contribute to a happier life. When you are mindful, you can savor the pleasures of life’s experiences as they unfold which helps you become more engaged in activities and create a greater capacity to deal with stressful situations.

People who are mindful find that they are less likely to get worried about the future or regret the past. They are less preoccupied with concerns about self- esteem or being successful and are better at forming deep connections with others. Mindful people can still have goals and prepare for the future, but they can also absorb the very moment that they are living in day to day.

There are many ways to practice mindfulness, but the goal of the following mindfulness techniques are to achieve a state of awareness and focused relaxation by intentionally focusing on thoughts and sensations without judgment. This means to be a witness to your thoughts, emotions and sensations without interacting with them, without labeling them as good or bad, as helpful or destructive, without placing them into any categories. It means to observe and acknowledge, but not attach any emotion to what you see. This non-judgemental observation will train the mind to focus on the present moment in full without emotional distraction. As your mindfulness techniques evolve, they will actually become a form of meditation for you.

One exercise you can use is to sit quietly for 3 minutes and focus only on your breathing or silently repeat a mantra. As you do this, allow your thoughts to come and go while repeating your mantra of choice.

You can also focus on your body awareness by noticing subtle body sensations such as tingling, itching, heat, heartbeat, stomach movement, etc, while observing all the parts of your body in succession from top to bottom.

While becoming aware of the sensory input coming from your surroundings, silently in your mind name the sounds, sights, smells, tastes, and touches you come across as you encounter them. Focusing on your senses for even 60 seconds brings you completely and fully into the Now. You can also do this with your emotions, naming them as they come and go; joy, frustration, anger, sorrow. Accept that these emotions are present, observe and acknowledge them without judgement and let them pass through. When you come across an addictive urge, or negative emotion, pay attention and be mindful of it, then let it go. Observe the way your body feels as the craving enters and disappears. You can make it go away faster by replacing the craving with the thought of it going away. Having trust and faith that the craving or negative emotion will pass, will help facilitate its actual passing.

Below is a great video by Alan Watts that eloquently sums up what it means to be present.

Work With Your Energy – Mind/Body

Another aspect of spiritual practice is to appreciate and enjoy not only being mentally present, but physically and energetically present. It helps tremendously if we allow ourselves to really feel the joy of being fully physically present, which is vital to a strong spiritual practice.

Many holistic activities can help you become more in tune with your energy. Physical activities and subtle exercises you can do that will help you work with your energy with mind-body activities such as Yoga, Tai Chi, Qigong, Acupressure, Reiki, Shiatsu or Reflexology, not only have preventative and healing qualities but they can facilitate a better environment for spiritual awareness. Your consciousness is temporarily housed in your body and if you treat your body well, (not just by eating healthy) via holistic practices such as those mentioned above you will have a stronger connection to the infinite.

Begin to see yoga, tai chi, qigong, or any other mind-body movement class as a vehicle to spirituality, not just a physical routine or an exercise. Incorporate movement into your own spiritual practice, even if it means doing a walking meditation every day along your favorite path. By setting an intention as you begin any of these types of practices, you’ll give your movement focus, changing the nature of the activity and gain a greater sense of connectedness and joy. When experiencing something such as Reiki where you are not moving and someone else is touching you, set an intention of what you want to be brought closer to and what you want to release.

Yoga for instance, unifies the mind, body, and spirit to work together. The word Yoga literally means “joined together”. A Yogi is someone who strives to unify all these life elements together to discover his/her fullest potentials, helping you to commune deeply with the infinite inside you.

Creating a practice of yoga will enable you to develop a strong energetic center, a resource to bounce back when you feel exhausted by life. It will give you a tool to help concentrate your energy toward your center, your foundation for living.

“You’re the Center and Your Always Free, In Every Direction” – Junip

Steady practice of a mind-body activity will allow you to master your inner alchemy. One can anticipate a feeling of deep centering of the soul and uninterrupted flowing of energy/prana. These are enlightening experiences that get better with practice and instill a blissful sense of peace.

Qigong and Tai Chi are useful on the spiritual level because the ultimate aim of Taoism is alchemical transformation of the mind, body, and spirit unifying the soul with the Tao. The energy of your thoughts and emotions are better understood when you are able to better feel the energy of your body, which leads to a more thorough understanding of your spirit energy.

The mind and body are laboratories of individual consciousness, which through QiGong and Tai Chi is continually refined to achieve ultimate health. In Taoist tradition, a healthy body and longevity is regarded as the foundation for spiritual realization. The longer one lives in health and wellbeing, the greater the potential for spiritual realization in their lifetime. Taoist view the body as an un-ignorable part of ourselves that we must refine and bring into the collective mind, body and spirit.

Whether it’s Tai Chi, Qigong, Meditation, Reiki, Reflexology, Martial Arts, Yoga or some other form of mind-body practice, you can really connect with yourself when you participate in these practices. They can make us feel more calm, invigorated and clear headed with a sense of renewal. These ageless mind body traditions help us on multiple levels.

Stimulate Your Pineal Gland

Many spiritual teachers like to refer to the pineal gland as the third eye, inner eye, all-seeing eye, spiritual eye, or mind’s eye. They often encourage us to strengthen the functions of our pineal gland, because this gland allows us to access healing energies that contain high frequency.

In spirituality it is believed that when the third eye is activated and functioning properly, it allows us to encounter more ethereal experiences, sensing what is beyond the physical realm.

The next time you go to bed, focus your awareness towards your third eye right before you start dozing off. Concentrated attention on it will stimulate it, helping it to “open”. By concentrating on this area as you fall asleep, you are stimulating the gland as your brain enters stage 1 non-rapid eye movement sleep, which is the in between stage of wakefulness and sleep. This is an important time because it is when our brains are operating in Alpha and Theta waves, the most powerful state for manifestation. Those who practice meditation, or deep prayerfulness, often “hang out” in Alpha. It’s a deeply restful place full of contentment as well as being the fertile garden bed where you plant seeds of change.

Another good time to activate your third eye is right after you wake up. Instead of getting out of bed, lie still and focus your awareness towards the center of your brain, the house of your third eye ,with the intention of opening it. Sound and light are both powerful activators of the pineal. Try making the sound ‘nnnnnnn’ while covering your ears. Move into the sound ‘mmmmmm’. Alternate back and forth between these two which will put a light, vibratory wave through your pineal, activating it.

You can also try a meditation visualizing a beam of light. Visualize sending beams of light to the following locations in order: forhead, back of the head, left temple, right temple, strait up through the top and the strait down your spine. Remember to breathe. The “ocean breath” is a wonderful tool of relaxation and can increase your levels of meditation immensely.

Ocean breath, or Ujjayi Pranayama, gives any practice extra power and focus.

1. Inhale and exhale deeply through the mouth.

2. On the exhales, begin to tighten the back of the throat, slightly constricting the passage of air. Emit a Haah sound as if you are fogging up a pair of glasses.

3. Once you are comfortable with the exhale, begin to apply the same toning of the throat to the inhales. This is where the name of the breath comes from: it sounds like the ocean.

4. When you are able to control the throat on both the inhale and the exhale, close the mouth and begin breathing through the nose. Continue applying the same toning to the throat that you did when the mouth was open. The breath will still make a loud noise coming in and out of the nose. This is Ujjayi breath.

The more you practice using your pineal gland to experience beyond the material world, the stronger it will become.

It is also important to physically take care of your pineal gland by watching the food you eat. Below is a list of 6 additional things you can do to help open and decalcify your third eye.

1. Balance Your PH Levels. Eat more green leafy vegetables, and start juicing to bring your body toward a proper pH balance. Other good superfoods include chlorella, spirulina, sea moss, and wheatgrass. An Acidic body chemistry is not healthy for the pineal gland. Heavy meat intake can create an acidic environment for you body. You don’t have to stop eating meat, especially if you are on the Paleo diet, but make an effort to add a lot more vegetables to your diet to balance the acidity of the meat.

2. Drink alkaline or distilled water. Alkaline water helps balance the body’s pH,which is usually acidic because of our high acid food diet, stress and exposure to environmental toxins.

Distilled water removes heavy toxins and metals out of the human body which can effect the function of the pineal gland.

3. Avoid fluoride & Chlorine. Fluoride is toxic to the human system and one of the main contributors to pineal gland calcification. You should be using non-fluoride toothpaste. Avoid swimming in pools that use chlorine.

4. Practice Sun Gazing. The pineal gland is crystal like and reacts very well to the sun. The safest time to look at the sun is when it is rising or setting. The amount of natural sunlight that enters your eyes and pineal gland is tremendously beneficial for the pineal gland and it’s decalcification. You can do this daily for 2-5 minutes. If you can wake up early enough try doing it in the morning and evening to get the full benefit from it.

5. Be Mindful of Your Thoughts. Try to keep a positive outlook on life and yourself. Your thoughts are powerful and having a strong mental attitude and belief in yourself and your locust of control will help you develop your pineal gland. Your thoughts are powerful!

6. Use herbs. Herbs like mugwort, wood betony, worm wood tea, and gotu kola have very good healing properties for the pineal gland. Worm wood, in particular, is one that is good at inducing lucid and vivid dreams.

Practice Daily Meditation

The goal of any meditation technique is to bring us closer to the infinite where we can listen to and align ourselves with it’s vibration. Our consciousness can be raised above the physical senses into the higher states of awareness. Meditation is about simply being, not seeking any desire, purifying the body through the emptying process. Once we remove our desires and basic lower animal drives, we can then begin to fill ourselves with the infinite.

Meditation is a process that involves the ability to get beyond our thoughts. When you meditate you are doing 2 things, observing the mind’s distractions which are thoughts, worries, feelings and you are also focusing your attention on the practice of meditation and being thoughtless. Don’t let the process become a struggle. When coming across a thought, gently redirect your focus. When our minds do not cooperate with this process, don’t condemn yourself or feel frustrated, just give yourself some time to get used to refocusing the mind.

An ideal form of this process is the repeated gentle and persistent returning of the attention to the act of contemplation. Some practitioners urge that you focus on nothing, or emptiness. Others urge that you should focus on breathing, light, mantras, or your heart beat. Do which ever works for you. Many who have a problem with focus and restlessness find that when focusing on one particular thing like their breathing, or heartbeat, they get better results.

Try meditating for at least 5 minutes a day, preferably in the morning or before you sleep. Start small and work your way up by increasing the duration daily. It is easier to practice for a short time every day than to try to practice for long periods of time with less frequency.

The demands of worklife and moving up the ladder of success create duality of personality. The person you are at home with your family or with friends is not who you are at work. Through meditation we can balance ourselves and bring more clarity and peace of mind into our busy worklife. Your authentic self is the person you will now take to work with a more calm and in control approach to handling challenges.

The simplest and easiest form of meditation is simply focusing on the breath.

“It’s a gentle thing, the breath: it fills you, then leaves softly, all without you noticing.” When you meditate, your breathe is the only thing you should notice. If your mind wanders, and it most always will, just pay deeper attention to the breath. Feel your chest rise and fall, your shoulders, if they move. Feel the chair under you, the position of your legs. As you notice these things, you are completely in the Now again. And right Now, everything is *always* okay. If anxiety or tension return, know that they are temporary, as all thoughts and emotions are. Acknowledge them, don’t judge them, and let them pass.. like waves flowing over you in the ocean. As you return to breath.. tensions melt.

Feel the gratitude as the moments between the waves teach us most.

This great little 90 second video is one that you can breathe along with and obtain powerful benefits from:

Become More In Tune With Nature

Most of us live in cities and although convenient and accessible, the stress and busy elements of the city can be draining. You don’t have to move to a rural location but take time to surround yourself with nature from time to time. Take time to hike, walk in nature, take your shoes off and feel the grass under your bare feet, meditate in the woods, be present in whatever form of wilderness you have access.

Our current culture has lost the sense of connection to nature. Before technology separated us from the wilderness we were a part of the heartbeat of the earth and in tune with our natural environment. Technology, an amazing gift – yet still a curse – has cut the umbilical cord that connected us to mother earth.

There are practical and fundamental skills that appeal to all of us when we learn to connect with nature once again. These range from studying natural medicine, natural navigation, foraging, tracking, creating art, building and much more. We can learn to see the natural world properly through these skill sets. The satisfaction that these engagements bring lead to greater appreciation for time and the power of our senses. Connecting with nature can be life changing and will make you view your previous life as one-dimensional.

For most of us living in urban settings, a deep understanding of nature is no longer as vital to our physical survival as it once was, but what it is most definitely vital to, is our spiritual survival. The side effect is a loss of our connection to the rhythm to the earth. Understanding the cycles of nature, our relationship to it, and conflicts the lack of our connection are causing will enable us to gain a better appreciation of the world and perhaps, even give us a chance to save it, and ourselves.

Being present in nature cultivates both a sense of mystery of and sense of gratitude for the natural world. It brings about a feeling of awe. When a strong vibratory harmony is found between man and earth, a profound experience of transcendence happens. People who regularly engage in nature activates not only appreciate natures beauty but become deeply aware of a power greater than themselves. Inner peace is fostered by placing yourself in nature’s presence and it is both a humbling and healing experience that will teach you innumerable life lessons.

Some recommended books to help you along the path of forging a relationship with nature are:

Nature as Teacher & Healer by James Swan
Wild Communion by Ruth Baetz
How to connect with Nature by Tristan Gooley
The Wild Within by Paul Rezendes.

You can try the following exercises next time you visit a place of nature. Doing something as simple as standing still and breathing deeply, meditating, or loosely moving your body with warm up exercises can help you connect with your body while in a natural environment. Further explore with your senses the smell, sounds, feeling and taste (where appropriate) of nature. Don’t worry if you live in the city. A park will work, a garden. Anywhere you can have even a small space to experience the life of planet Earth with your senses. Find a special place in that resonates with you and spend more time there. Take a notepad and pen and write down how you feel, document it with pictures (I know that’s a form of technology but we can make an exception in this case).

Learn How To Astral Project

“As long as there is breath in my body..
I will never ever cease to be a seeker after truth.”

Have you ever been dreaming and then suddenly you became aware that you were, in fact, dreaming? When the dreamer is consciously aware that they are dreaming, this is called Lucid Dreaming.

“Lucid dreaming is a state of consciousness where the dreamers are fully aware that they are asleep, and that what they are experiencing is a state of reality completely manufactured by the dreaming mind. At its best, lucid dreaming is a completely conscious state of mind where the doors to the conscious and unconscious minds are fully open to each other — available for exploration, examination and to be fearlessly embraced.”

As you hone your practice of being in the present moment and noticing your surroundings as we’ve been talking about this entire article, your ability to ward of sidetracking thoughts becomes stronger and stronger. The number one concept that spiritual teachers from wisdom traditions from every part of the world and from every time period all talk about is the importance of truly BEing in the present moment, with no worry about the past and no anxiety about a hypothetical future. This is the very foundation of lucid dreaming. Being aware of the present moment with more than just the physical body, more than with the conscious mind.. but with the higher self as well. Mind, Body and Soul.

There are many spiritual benefits to lucid dreaming. It is another direct path to becoming more enlightened, it enhances creativity, helps you acheive greater self- confidence and awareness, garners a stronger sense of self-control, it improves memory, creates higher energy levels, you’ll be better able to face your fears, have fewer nightmares, obtain more restful sleep and even solve some of your life’s challenges.

Lucid dreaming shows us that the world we know is still only a construct of our minds. When we are able to grasp this concept we realize that there are many fewer obsticles in our way. It is one of the greatest stepping stones into transcendence and spiritual ascension.

“Lucid dreaming is a skill that anyone can develop with motivation and effort. The enjoyment and benefits are well worth it. What could you do with the third of your life that is spent sleeping? How could you use it to benefit the other two-thirds? Through lucidity the line between the dream world and the waking world begins to blur, providing unique opportunities to interact consciously with your subconscious mind.”

Here are some tips on simple ways to enter the world of lucid dreaming.

Try to remember all your dreams by playing them back in your mind as soon as you reach the first moments of consciousness.
Keep a dream journal. Write down as many details about your dreams as you can remember. Even if it’s just key words, places, colors, sounds, smells or feelings you can recall.
When dreaming, attempt to ask yourself, “am I dreaming” so you can begin to break through the barrier of the awake/asleep mind.
Attempt to return to your dreams if you wake up in the night. Consciously try to stay in that state without coming completely back to waking reality.
Practice, practice, practice. The more regular you are in your practice, the better you’ll become and the longer the effects will last.

“Lucid dreaming has considerable potential for promoting personal growth and self-development, enhancing self-confidence, improving mental and physical health, facilitating creative problem solving and helping you to progress on the path to self-mastery.” ~Stephen LaBerge

Mastering the art of lucid dreaming comes with a great side effect, opening the gateway into astral projection. You learn how to wake your mind up while keeping your body asleep, which is a skill you need for conscious astral projection. In order to separate out your consciousness from its shell (your body) you need to learn how to move your consciousness out of your body.

Astral projection tends to be an advanced concept for most people and requires a lot of practice, although there are some people who seem to have been born with the gift and have always been able to project with ease. Learning how to astral project will leave you with a greater awareness of reality. It provides a unique experience of our ability to exist outside of our physical body. Realization that we are more than physical beings opens new levels of personal development. Once we consciously access and explore our nonphysical self, we can unlock deeper knowledge of our subconscious mind and harness our ability to explore reality much more deeply. Your conscious potential is dramatically expanded beyond all current concepts and comprehension.

Fear of death is noticeably reduced when we experience ourselves consciously separated from our physical bodies. Once you separate from your body, you will be assured that you still exist, therefore eliminating the fear of the unknown, the fear of death.

You will begin to look at yourself as a soul temporarily possessing a physical body. Unproductive habits will be easier to break free from once your perspective of yourself and your limited time in this physical dimension shifts. Experiencing yourself outside of your physical body can provide you with a more enlightened perspective of your own existence and meaning of your life. New levels of personal growth are fostered by the expansive vision of yourself.

We as humans have always had questions about our existence. What is our purpose? Is there life after death? What are we? What exactly is reality? Deeper insight to these questions can be sought out through our astral projection experiences.

There is a certain excitement that reaches deep into every core of your being when you have an out of body experience. Deep down we realize that we have become the ultimate explorers and life itself becomes a more vivid journey.

There are a plethora of resources for those who wish to explore more deeply. “Journeys Out of the Body” by Robert Monroe and “Astral Travel for Beginners: Transcend Time and Space with Out-of-Body Experiences” by Richard Webster are just a couple of examples.

Surround Yourself With Others

On The Same Path and Vibration As You

“Lately I’ve been feeling isolated. I have a very spiritual way of thinking. I’m in the process of awakening myself, however, I’m being distracted by the people around me and my current living situation. I’m in need of people who are also spiritual and who’s thoughts are similar to mine. I want to be around people physically like that. I want a friend who I can spend my time with, share spiritual thoughts with each other, meditate with. Just someone who shares the same ideas as I do. I need a spiritual friend.”

Have you ever felt like your consciousness level is higher than the company you keep? Have you ever felt somewhat alone as a result of this? People have many different views and opinions but being spiritually alone in this world can often feel like you are the only one who cares about the deeper meaning and mysteries of life while everyone else around you is absorbed in the superficial.

When you find other people in your life who are on the same path as you, it feels like a breath of fresh air. The world feels more real to you and you don’t feel so alone anymore. It is also an amazing opportunity to grow as an exchange of wisdom and understanding will take place the more you interact with people who are on your path.

It doesn’t mean you got to cut everyone who is not like you off, but you are who you surround yourself with, and the more you associate with people who can accelerate your journey, the more you can develop as a person.

Life is an exchange of information and feedback. Our environment is constantly giving us feedback and shaping us into who we are becoming. Putting yourself in an environment where you are connected with people who seek the same things as you will continue to shape and define who you are spiritually. Like-minded people support and inspire you to push yourself beyond your previously-known limits. I don’t advocate living in a bubble and only associating with people who are exactly like you. I do however, strongly support nurturing friendships with people of similar interests to advance your involvements and understanding of those interests. So much of what I have learned on my journey was through other people. Coming across information and experiences that they shared with me.

“Your Vibe Attracts Your Tribe”

You are more likely to become like the people you associate yourself with. If you want to expand your consciousness, it is important that you let the right people into your life who are on a similar journey as you. You and your friends will benefit and learn from each other, pulling you higher up the ladder towards spiritual ascension.

Keeping an awareness of these practices can help you move into resonance with the infinite. There spiritual path is much more complex and never ending but these 7 practices should be enough to move you into a deeper space within and expand your conscious potential. Consistently applying these practices into your daily life will bring growth in your personal development. We hope you found value in this.

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About the Authors:

Ascension Lifestyle Staff Writer John Baran

http://www.JTwiz.com
http://twitter.com/JTwiz

Ascension Lifestyle Staff Writer Genevieve Elena

http://www.originseducation.com
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01 Sep 2015
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Spiritual Practices of Awakening

Awakening

We live in a time of accelerated change and transformation. There are many names for this time period. Some call it, The Great Awakening, The Rebirth, New Earth, The Second Coming, The Golden Age, The End Times, The New Millennium, The Age of Aquarius, The Return of Christ, The Rapture, The Apocalypse, Armageddon, The Quickening or Planetary Ascension. Regardless of what you call it we are entering the most intensified purification process the Earth and humanity has ever experienced.

In every choice in life we must be mindfully aware of the ebb and flow of energy. Is it time to absorb energy, to dispense it or to conserve it? Your feelings will soon become your primary guidance system for navigating through our experiences. In order to tap into the the highest potential of all life has to offer, energy needs to be maintained in a balance of external energy and internal energy production. We need a certain level of energy for our very survival. If your timing is not in alignment with the natural rhythms, you may be losing valuable resources. These resources can be in the form of energy, as well as time, money, or other valuable tools. Our sources of internal energy come from producing vibration. This vibration is that of purity, lightness, happiness, truth, understanding, and most of all love. We are increasing our vibration to higher frequencies that absorb energy at the DNA level.

Absorbing the wrong energy around us can often deplete our ability to produce internal energy. It is often necessary to clear out these energies before we can begin to truly tap into our own power. This may mean removing yourself from certain energy entirely or learning how to shield yourself properly. It is imperative to learn practices for how you want to manage yourself around energies that vibrate at a lower frequency. High vibration comes from a pure source that rejuvenates and creates energy without depletion. It is renewable and endless. It has the ability to heal and expand in ways that can transform all that comes in contact with it. We may see a glimpse of this energy in times of great joy, however unless we are able to change our vibration at the DNA level, it is most difficult to maintain. We will not see permanent changes in your lives nor the world around you that reflect your state of being.

Changing the frequency of our DNA is the process of clearing out dense energy that no longer serve us. It is the process of infusing our body with light. This can transform our physical bodies and elevate our consciousness. By reaching for the light and transforming our being we can begin to understand the realms of the beyond and step into our infinite potential. What I am speaking to is indeed a lifestyle change. It requires mindfulness with every aspect of our being including what we eat, who we spend time with, what we expose our senses to, how we spend our time, what we think, what we speak into creation and most certainly healing our emotions and forgiving our past.

When you make a commitment to this process of raising your vibration expect to see dramatic changes. You may see all of your relationships transform. You may be surrounded by people who do not understand this process, whom you may need to take space from or even eventually let go of. You may feel compelled to move out of the environment that you are living in. It all depends on your own soul’s personal journey. For me this has been a five year process that required me learning to trust the urges inside of me that were calling me deeply into the unknown. For the most part, my primary support was all in the unseen realms. There were many times that I questioned and doubted myself as it would feel I had stepped into an entirely new world alone. However it was my purpose to serve as a teacher of alignment, ascension and ultimately everything happened exactly as it needed. Only now in hindsight I can say that with confidence. I can truly say there is nothing more beautiful than being alive and awake right now with this level of awareness. I have guided many people to transform their state of consciousness and their life circumstances from all walks of life because this is my highest passion. Please enjoy the following which are many of my favorite practices for raising your vibration.

The Way

Learning to find ease in every situation becomes a major tool in managing energy. We refer to this as the path of least resistance. This is a path of being true to yourself, listening to the heart and living in the here and now fully. Trust the divine plan. Master the art of Allowing. Surrender to the flow and know that All That Is truly is working to support your wellbeing at all times. Recognize the importance of divine timing and understand that sometimes there are certain pieces that must line up before life can play out the way that it is destined to.

Sunlight
Currently, we are in the photon belt, entering a 2,000- year cycle of en-lighten-ment receiving the transformational and transmutational energies of Christ consciousness. Encodings that activate our memory and DNA are sent through the rays of the sunlight and solar flares that are encouraging us to spiritually evolve beyond our current state of consciousness to a more enlightened state of being.

High vibrational food
A much as possible try to nourish your body with highly energized alive alkaline food and beverages. This means more plants that have an abundance of life force energy. Equally importantly as what you eat however from my experiences is the intention and energy that you infuse into your food and water. Speaking prayer and blessings into your food can raise the vibration to nourish your body, mind, spirit. Bless not only the food but also the hands that prepare it. Drink as much charged water is humanly possible.

Cosmic and Natural cycles
All biological processes are a function of electromagnetic field interactions, which are the connecting link between the world of form and resonant patterns. When we align our energy with the nature that surrounds us, we are replenished in myriad ways. Like a wise teacher, the earth uses her seasons to model when to rest and reflect, when to cleanse and activate, when to create and when to return back to self. Ancient cultures lived in accord with the movements of all of the celestial bodies. They knew that tapping into these forces gave them access to supernatural power. They used the movements of the Sun, Moon, the stars and planets to gain insight into the higher dimensional realms. Spending time in nature restores our own biorhythms and brings us deeply into balance. Living in harmony with the cycles of nature we can find the gifts and opportunities that each season offers for deepening our spiritual practices.

Sound healing
A variety of sources throughout history have insisted that vibration is primary to form. The Bible, for example, tells us, “In the beginning, there was the word… and the Word was God. All things came into being through Him.” [John 1:1-3] Long before the written word, music, sound and healing were inseparable in the practices of ancient civilizations. Mantra was considered a musical prayer for healing. The creative and transformative potential of sound has been scientifically verified although these sounds are found in nature and are nothing new. Sound vibration actually changes the structure of matter. Ancient civilizations constructed sacred temples based on the perfect mathematical proportions of sound. Cave paintings were found to have been created in places that had natural sound resonance, supporting the theory that decorated caves were backdrops for religious and magical rituals. These findings indicate that the acoustics of these spaces played a major role in their ability to invoke spirits and other higher vibrational energies.You can tune yourself to the perfect rhythm with specific harmonic tones. But as we learn that everything is vibration we learn that our entire life can become a practice a tuning into the frequencies around us that create harmonic resonance. Cymatics from the Greek word for waves, is the study of wave phenomena and vibration. This science visibly demonstrates the power of sound to “shape, transform and destroy the seemingly solid structures that we see all about us.” Some examples are Tibetan singing bowls, crystal singing bowls, Didgeridoo sounds, gongs, flute, drums, tuning forks, Solfeggio frequencies and Binaural beats.“Divine sound is the cause of all manifestation. The knower of the mystery of sound knows the mystery of the whole universe.” – Hazrat Inayat KhanEarth Medicine
I created Resonance Apothecary based on the principal of divine attunement. Like any instrument, our bodies require regular tuning in order to play in harmony with the delicate orchestra of existence. Keeping ourselves finely tuned is our most fundamental tool for health and well-being. These tools come directly from Mother Earth herself. As mentioned previously the basis of all wellbeing is vibration (sound) the primary building blocks of creation. Given that sound vibration is said to be the primary mover underpinning all of creation, it seems only sensible to appeal directly to that source if we seek the deepest healing available. The tools that I create are based on the vibration of plants, flowers, crystals and stones. Creating harmony involves recipes that include not only high vibrational plants and oils but also raising the vibration with sound, intention, ritual, and prayer. These become allies that we can bring with us throughout the day us that can bring us into alignment at any time. Wherever you are these tools can help you find your rhythm and surrender to the sonic flow.

Brain Entrainment/Hypnosis

These are powerful tools for helping to let go of limiting beliefs and healing mental diseases. Many of the deeper layers of beliefs that we hold true have been programmed or conditioned into our subconscious early during childhood in the formative years, when people of influence around us imprinted their understanding of reality deep into our minds. These imprints evolved into our subjective reality long before we had access to tools such as discernment and have stayed with us as our default “program”. These programs are projected out into the hologram that we refer to as our reality without most of us being aware. Ultimately many of these beliefs have a profound impact on our lives yet they truly do not serve us nor match the true nature of our infinite selves. This is part of the game of this earth realm. Working to remove these beliefs is one of the most important healing practices on the path of nurturing spiritual wholeness.

Movement.

It is no secret that regular exercise helps to maintain a higher vibration and healthy lifestyle. During and after a workout you enjoy a buzz of endorphins that your brain releases. Take a moment every day to stretch, build your endurance and strength, and feel your heart becoming stronger. Practices such as somatic therapies and trauma release exercises are amazing tools for helping to move old stagnant energy from the body. Along with movement incorporating appropriate breathing techniques and breath work into your daily practice can completely transform your health.

Emotional Healing.

I will be covering this topic next month in detail as we move into a new chapter on learning how to heal the heart and tap into our emotional guidance system. I will be teaching Taoist practices for how to transform negative emotions with inner alchemy and how our organs are connected to our emotional essence. Stay tuned for more on that topic.

Fortifying the Aura.

Your aura is an extension of you. Or rather it is the electromagnetic field that surrounds you, in other words it is you as energy. When strong it acts as a protective shield.When fragile or damaged it can leave you drained, unwell and feeling disconnected from yourself. Cleansing and nurturing the aura for the overall integrity of our health and wellbeing is an essential practice. Many ancient cultures believed that illness first starts with a weakness in our auric field. Many of the practices mentioned have a deep impact of the aura. In addition, cold showers have the ability to clear away negativity in your auric field, remove toxins, improve circulation and draw out tension from your body.

A powerful exercise that follows can be used in any challenging interactions

Put your tongue on the roof of your mouth.
Invoke.
Create an intent to close your aura to all negative thoughts, emotions, and words.
Cross your arms. (This closes the upper half of your aura.)
Cross your legs. (This closes the lower half of your aura.)
This posture automatically closes your aura to negativity. It also makes you more naturally resistant to people trying to influence you.

Meditation and Prayer.

The Practice of tuning into the Source within is my most fundamental spiritual practice. The frequency of Source is a guiding light. When we shift into the receptive mode we come into communion with the God(dess) within and invoke Spirit. This allows us to receive guidance and strength to further us along each step of the path. The Omnipresence of God(dess) means that there is a presence in the midst of every time and every point in space. Begin to realize that this divine Presence is in you and that everything is an expression of this power. Worry is due to a lack of faith and this can debilitate our entire system. Every morning when you wake turn to prayer and meditation and remember that you are a channel for Love and the Divine.

Setting Intention and Visualization.

Recent studies have shown that sending a directed thought generates palpable energy that is measurable. Attention, belief, focus, motivation, and mental state intensify effect. A big reason why people fail to manifest the things they want is because they never actually intend for their dreams to come true.They believe their desires are inconceivable or impossible, or that they are unworthy of happiness, so they simply never ask for what they truly desire. Many are so out of touch with manifesting their desires and their true feelings that they actually do not even know what they truly want. Learning to properly set intentions is key to tuning into the divine principal that creates worlds. Here are a few techniques.Set your intention first thing in the morning.
Write your intentions down on paper. There is something quite powerful and magical about the focus required to actually write something.
VISUALIZE. Use your imagination to actually see yourself experiencing how it would feel to have what you truly want.
Bring in as much emotion and feelings as you can possibly create.
Tell people about your intention
Act and speak as if what you wish is already on the way to you.
Spend time in the evening expressing gratitude for all of your life’s blessings.

Ritual and Ceremony.

Throughout history there has existed an ancient and ongoing tradition of sacred action performed with the aim of improving not only our lives but the condition of the universe itself. Any action that is repeatedly energized with thought and intention gains power, thereby becoming a ritual of sorts. In fact, all our actions have a ritualistic orientation, because action tends toward repetition and reinforcement, thereby gathering specific energies that connect us with certain forces in the world. The power of using magical ritual or ceremony does not rely on the props used however. It depends on how well you use the props to create a psychodynamic change to occur in your own consciousness that then leads to you being able to influence physical reality.

Positive Affirmation..
Last week’s article listed the many amazing affirmations that you can work with daily. If you missed it you can review it here.

Soul mate relationships.
A Soulmate can enter in our lives at any time in different types of relationships from our family, friends to love relationships, even people we refer to as enemies. Many soul mates remain in our lives, others will pass through and then leave once the energy upgrade is complete. Soulmate connections are more than a physical relationship.Of course there is a deep attraction between Soulmates but this connection is much more than just sex. A soul mate can actually be represented through a strong repulsion to someone as well. Again this is about the energy between them two souls. The key to finding true love, the version of soul mates that we often dream of, is to keep your vibration high. This allows you to attract high soul mates rather than the type that are based on karmic debt and soul contracts. When you maintain a high vibrational state you are a magnet for love because you radiate peace, love and joy. Examples of affirmations for attracting a soul mate include: Love is my divine birthright, and I claim it now. I give and receive love fully and I release the past and let love flow into my life.

Radical Forgiveness
This article would be incomplete if I did not include a process for how to learn to let go of anything from our past that is keeping us vibrating in dense emotions such fear, shame, guilt, disappointment, victimhood, or lack of self worth. It is possible to recognize the purpose of events that have caused us pain in our life and to forgive the person we believe has wronged us. The following is a process that can be used in order to call back all of the rejected, suppressed and abandoned parts of our unconscious shadow in order to become whole once and for all.

Describe the situation and allow all of the feelings to come to the surface. You want to let the feelings come up so that they can be expressed. Just let them be exactly what they are. Do not try to judge or suppress them.
As you get in touch with your feelings you might become aware where the emotions are located in your body.
Ask yourself are you willing to be open to the possibility that your higher self created this situation for your ultimate growth?
Are you willing to accept that your feelings are a direct result of something that needs to be healed, even if you cannot see it?
Are you willing to release your judgement of the situation as right/wrong, good/bad?
Are you willing to accept that what upsets you about the other person is that there is a part of you that is crying out to be recognized that they are mirroring?
Are you willing to unconditionally love that part of you that you have rejected? If so welcome it back and love it unconditionally right now.
Are you willing to accept that you unconsciously attracted this person in order to see a part of yourself that is longing to be accepted?
Do you recognize that in forgiving them you are forgiving yourself?
Are you willing to connect to the divine love behind the situation and let go of the story that was attached to this situation?
Your power within is activated when you are willing to let go of the power that the story has over you. Notice any sensation in your body that indicated this has occurred.
You can repeat this practice for as many situations as you feel are holding you back.
I recommend connecting with this practice of radical forgiveness during the full moon which is a powerful time of release, purification and letting go.

By: Ascension Lifestyle Guest Contributor Hasnaa

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