October 2010

What's in a name? Anagramming for Self Discovery

The End of Death As We Know It

Using The Secret For Successful Marketing

Her Perception Upon Dying

From This Moment On

Andrea's Articles 1997

Andrea's Articles 1998

Andrea's Articles 1999

Andrea's Articles 2000

Andrea's Articles 2002

Andrea's Articles 2001

Andrea's Articles 2003

Andrea's Articles 2004

Andrea's Articles 2005

Andrea's Articles 2006

Andrea's Articles 2007

Listen FREE: Connecting with your Angels, Guides and Teachers

Hello and welcome to the October 2010 edition of Horizons Magazine. Just in time for All Hallow's Eve, we're seeking a pagan calendar writer for 2011 . Roger Coleman, principal minister of the Church of Iron Oak, longtime friend and author of the monthly Solar and Lunar Celebrations of the New Age, has his hands full with more pressing projects and he's scheduled the October 2010 column to be his last. Read his calendar on page 24 entitled October 2010, The End of Days. Second only to the horoscopes by Barbara Lee, Roger's calendar is a monthly favorite and he will be missed.

I will continue having a monthly calendar of pagan holidays celebrated by different cultures around the world. The word count is under 500 words, which is mostly the date and one line or two lines about each. I know. Low word count. The challenge is always to capture the reader's attention in a fabulously interesting one or two lines, isn't it? Please email your samples to me at andrea@horizonsmagazine.com. I would have to have 3 months ahead at a time. You have a 50 word bio to tell who you are and where you can be contacted. For style, please see Roger's column on page 24.

I've been cleaning my floors like a mad man.
The past couple of weeks I've been cleaning my floors repeatedly. Moving furniture to clean the floor beneath it, taking everything away from the wall and away from the corners to get the entire floor's surface. My typical m.o. is a quick sweep, vacuum and swipe with the Swiffer Wetjet. But lately I've been cleaning it more often and more thoroughly. I love how Mop & Glo puts a nice teflon shine on the floor, but I really need to clean the floor really well first or it's going to get that waxy build up. As a test, I tried a patch 3 tiles wide by 3 tiles down with a solution of ammonia and water. I used a scrub brush for one minute and I was shocked at how much it lightened it up. The longer I left the solution on, the lighter it got. I'm considering renting a floor scrubber or asking a friend to do it for me. I don't know why it's suddenly more important now than it's ever been to get the floor clean, but it is.

During meditation last week, I reflected that so often in the past I've made do with a surface clearing of my thoughts and behaviors and beliefs. I'd make room for something new, but not completely replace the old. I'd let myself walk between the worlds, so to speak, until I got used to the new ideas and until they ultimately replaced themselves. Now something is clearly happening, and being reflected in me being obsessed with getting my floor clean. I have something I want to strip away, to get at the bottom of, to make new and fresh with a clean start, to get in on the ground floor with. I look forward to the unfolding. When I get to the bottom of it, I'll let you know.

How do you know if you're part of the problem or part of the solution? The way you know whether you are part of a problem or part of the solution of a problem is how you feel about it. If you feel hopeful, if you feel things are under control, if you feel God/the Universe has a handle on what's going on and is even now formulating solutions, then you are part of the solution. If you find others feeling angry, sad, desperate, hopeless and vulnerable, and you try to point them in the direction of better feeling thoughts and useful activity, then you are part of the solution. If you feel upset or angry or anxious over "bad news," if you pass on bad news links on Facebook and forward them by email, you're simply adding your friends to a chain of pain they may not otherwise be involved in. So, when you think about, well, anything, how do you feel? Are you part of the solution? Or do you need to change your focus to become part of the solution? As Louise Hay says, "As hopeless as any situation feels, it's really only your thoughts that you're dealing with. And you have the power to change those."
 

YOGA:
(1) A discipline aimed at training the consciousness for a state of spiritual insight and tranquillity.
(2) A system of exercises practiced as part of this discipline to promote control of the body and mind.

As a Yogi, Yoga is my Lifestyle, not an Exercise Class
A Facebook friend wrote the other day. In my profile, I say I am a yogi and he wanted to know what kind of yoga I practiced since he was newly interested in it. I replied to him: "Hello, in years past I went through all the forms of yoga: raj yoga, bhakti yoga, jnana yoga, kriya yoga, karma yoga and studied many texts by many other yogis. That was in the 1970's when there were not many books on the subject, but the books that were available were powerful. Paul Brunton's Search in Secret Egypt and Search in Secret India were early favorites. Now there are so many writers and so few really good books. Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda was the first text I read of that sort, and it awakened my consciousness and led me to read other books. So much is available to read for free online.

I don't now name or label the type of yoga I do. I don't do any of the newly trademarked names of hatha yoga styles. I do hatha yoga twice a day, and do a class now and again. I did regular classes at Yoga Shakti Mission (see page 39) and other ashrams for several years. I recommend doing some classes and you'll run across either a teacher that clicks, or other students that turn you onto different books and classes and information.

For me as a yogi, yoga is a lifestyle. I feel a union with everything around me. That includes not just people and animals but plants and minerals and the car I drive and the door I open and the shoes I wear and the house I live in. I recognize in my interaction with these items that they have a life of their own and more importantly, they all want to please me. The flower wants to bloom in the courtyard and the squirrel wants to delight me with his antics and even the sunshine comes out just for me.

This isn't just entertainment, it is evidence that what I think about and how I feel about what is around me affects how I experience it.

That means my thoughts are affecting the molecules of the things around me. That means I can direct my thoughts so that I can have maximum enjoyment and personal fulfillment in my life. When I'm having a good life, I attract more people who have a good life and more sign posts directing me further on my path." "Keep me posted!" I wrote him. "It's always nice to have a brother on the path." ###end of email

Finally, a friend send me the below Tale of Three Hairs and told me it reminded her of me. High praise for sure!