Tag Archives: Parenting

Blending in gray areas with Fox

Posted on by under Consciousness, Native American, Shamanism, Uncategorized

Foxes are good role models in that they teach us how to effectively blend in to our surroundings. Moreover, they teach us how to adjust our Auric energy fields to effectively connect with our peers in community. Foxes typically backtrack, so it can be difficult to understand the timing or direction of their travels. Although they are members of the Dog family, Foxes also exhibit characteristics of Cat. Symbolically, Fox radiate the darkness of feminine energy. Given their keen sense of smell, we learn a sense of discrimination and discernment in our relationship with self and others.

In our work with children, we know the job of parenting is no easy task.  Such as with Life, balance is key. Being too permissive or too rigid might be a receipt for disaster.  Maturation does not kick in until our children learn to effectively pass through developmental changes.  Most parents want our children to have a better shake of it than we did and protect our children from pain and suffering. In that primal desire help them grow and connect with our children, sometimes we enable them and teach them ways that we did not intend and backfire. Our children frequently show us reflections of ourselves, sometimes without our awareness. When we are unconscious to this process, we tend to react to what we see them doing–often in negative ways. Those of us that feel we are more “spiritually enlightened” than our parents were, might act on the strong impulse to minister spiritual values to our children through lecture. But modeling is the most powerful form of teaching. We want our children to behave when we are not around in a similar way as when we are. Thus, it’s no secret that when an autocratic parent or teacher leaves the room, the ballyhoo starts when the dictator energy is not in the immediate area to “rule with an iron fist.”

In our global village, we are curious to see whether our Imperial friends in Congress will vote for discrimination or level the workplace playing field for our GLBTQ brothers and sisters with the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. Will current leadership vote for more of George Orwell 1984 like technological surveillance in our lives or will we see more transparency in our relationships with business and government? Regarding the Monsanto Protection Act, our hats off to Connecticut when our beloved Constitution State became the first state to pass a GE labeling law. Before we proliferate Frankenfoods, shouldn’t we plant seeds into more organic farming methods, where we pay our environmentally conscious farmers a livable wage for doing the right thing that is in alignment with Mother Nature? And let’s call a spade a spade here . . . Dumping raw sewage in any community on Earth is discriminatory. Why do we still have communities divided by railroad tracks and other barriers to equality? “Can’t we all just get along?” We humans have really struggled with coexistence. It is time to move forward into an awareness of mutual aid in our relationships with one another. Imagine a foxy world where a freedom fighter like Natan Blanc can freely come out into the open field for being a conscientious objector, rather than be locked up in prison by a criminal Empire.

When we respect our self and others, we disarm our entanglement with ego and allow Spirit to manifest in our physical vessels. Being with Fox is not about hiding or being sneaky, although that is working its energy in the negative. Rather, working with the energy of Fox in the positive is staying on track and being discrete within our own footsteps, without stepping on the toes of another. When we wake up to the reality of inner peace, we know a Higher quality of respect than what the lower vibration of what fear and violence yields. Becoming an embodiment of inner peace sows the seeds of love that cross-pollinate across the plane of our beloved Mother Earth.

See you further on down the trails,

Ari

Communicating with Catbird

Posted on by under Consciousness, Native American, Shamanism, Uncategorized

Last week, we traveled with Duck as a spirit guide to help us effectively navigate our emotional waters. This week, Catbird facilitates our effective language and communication skill development. Given human relations are complex and multidimensional, learning to communicate effectively with one another is no easy task–especially when a cat’s got our tongue. Be that linguistical challenge as it may, Catbird helps us understand variation in sound and teaches us new forms of communication. Sometimes speaking with one another feels like trying to speak a foreign language that has not yet been learned. An important component to our program development as clearer communication channels, is our shared empathic connection to one another. While this phenomenon takes place in our hearts, communication through language amplifies from our throats. However, as we transition into an New Age, our ability to communicate through telepathy and other psychical mediums is cross-pollinating in our flowering blossoming. Catbird helps us be mindful of what we say, how we say it and who we say it to. Its medicine can help us discern what we publicize and what we hold within our secret gardens. At the end of the day, it is probably good medicine to express, rather than repress or build bricks around our hearts as self-defense mechanisms. The trick is to be respectful in our authenticity and not be too over the top with our self expressions during the emoting process.

Are folks unnecessarily meddling in the affairs of others or do you have a propensity to gossip around the water cooler? Sometimes, those of us finding ourselves in the parenting role get lost in it. And we can get good at enabling our children, while perceiving we are helping them. Of course, it is seductive to do that in any relationship, so it is wise to ask ourselves where we are on the map with that? It is also sound intelligence for parents to ask ourselves when setting a limit, we ought to be asking ourselves why? Avoiding power struggles is good medicine. At the end of the day, children need clear limits set and follow through with both logical and natural consequences. Balanancing structure, consistency, predictability and also bringing in novel experiences is the spice of healthy parenting and child rearing. Some folks feel disempowerd when physical force is taken away as an option to control children. But punishment is merely a way to instill fear into our Being and thus, teaches avoidance of getting caught. The old ways of “spare the rod, spoil the child” are now becoming recognized as globally ineffective, as while true discipline–which is the Latin derivative of teaching, is how we learn to evolve in our human family.

True, the democratic process can be messy, but not with positive long-term effects. This is why we look seven generations ahead in our actions. National security and Global security really starts within the Soul, in the home and beyond. We know that there is order in chaos, the Chinese symbol for crisis and opportunity are the same. Rather than looking at our plight in a problem-oriented lens, where crisis’ are “averted”, we step into the realm of Infinity and allow ourselves to see solutions. Teachers still have control in their classrooms, as parents still have control in their homes, but it is a more organic process, where our children tend to behave and do the right thing even when you are not around to come down with a heavy hand. Adults that do not learn to balance freedom and responsibility really struggle with governing themselves, unless they learn to integrate this knowledge into their Being. On some level, Malcolm X woke up while he was in jail and then woke up even more deeply after returning from Mecca–just before his physical death. The Rapture is not about doom and gloom, it is an internal experience available to all of us, if only we allow for it. The Kingdom of Heaven is an internal state of consciousness free for all to experience. In this sphere, we are without fear of exclusion from a private membership that has its privileges for a few elites to indulge in. The “Rule by Secrecy” mantra is waning.

With the wings of Catbird, we are weaving the energies of fertility and creativity into our daily Earthwalk. This spirit animal guide is good medicine to consume when opening up to new relationships wanting to awaken in our lives. Are you ready to allow for development in the area of communication? As multidimensional beings, perhaps meditation on Catbird’s lesson plan will reverberate sound and crystal-clear communication with our Universal brothers and sisters that want to reveal themselves to us, while co-creating a New Earth together. With today’s Full Moon and final eclipse of this powerful Spring Eclipse season, may we “ride the incoming energies of this lunar eclipse with the solar winds at (our) back” in our ascension onward. Maybe it will blow your mind, but our minds are designed to be like wizardly parachutes that appear out of this world.

See you further on down the trails,

Ari

How far down the Rabbit hole do you want to go?

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As deeper souls, the leaps we take in our creative development are not without moments of stopping on a dime, hopping around and sometimes having an effective exit strategy.  Rabbit medicine reminds us to harness our creativity by getting in touch with our own fertility.  Further, our business can be our pleasure, while Rabbit helps us bring play into our work.  When our avocation is our vocation, we paradoxically notice results even though we have let go of outcome, through learning the process of investing in loss.  Given their 28 day birth to independence cycle, the energy of Rabbit symbolically links us to the Lunar calendar.  Rabbit embodies the internal martial arts by modeling quickness and defensive action.  Given that rabbits are most active at dusk and dawn, their spirited teachings serve as a portal to the Faery realm, or the space between the material and spirit realities.   

Climate Changes today require that we face great developmental challenges during the transition into a shifting consciousness and New Age.  Our friends in Congress act as roadblocks by enacting back door deals that cut entitlement programs, while boasting like thieves after a looting.  Their gall to give away the niceties of Democracy to protect their own egotism is alarming.  Palestinian activists were bullied off their tent villages by Israeli soldiers, in much the same way our Native American brothers and sisters were by American troops at that time.  But today, our weaponry is more sophisticated and concentrated than it was back then.  With women’s rights on the rise, how do men redefine masculinity in a way that moves beyond wimp or Rambo?  Given the education to prison pipeline that exists in modern America, how do we discipline our children effectively so that they learn from natural and logical consequences, so that they become more inner-directed and self-governing?  Otherwise, our children will look forward to society making decisions for them by locking them up in institutions like prisons and mental hospitals.  This starts in the womb of the home.  Parents need to understand that by giving our children too much freedom, but without setting age-appropriate limits is a receipt for disaster.  I have a brother in jail who is a poster child for this manifestation and will essentially spend his 30’s locked up, provided he exhibits good behavior.  If we do not teach our children the skills to handle the accompanying price tag of responsibility, then we set them up for failure.  I know past students who have fallen prey to mental illness and criminal behavior because they did not learn to take ownership for their actions, make amends and move forward.  Instead, they have given away their power by becoming victims.  In many cases, bad parenting, disability advocates, lawyers and school boards only concerned about the bottom line help perpetuate this vicious cycle.  What we have here is systemic toxicity that certainly isn’t healed by more offshore drilling, drone strikes, manufacturing pesticides that are killing bees and the US Navy decimating our oceans with sonar military might.  Is this not a developmentally delayed value set?

With Rabbit as Animal Spirit guides, we can acquire the skills of gentleness, versatility, quickness and creativity when studying their lesson plans.  Do you need to slow down?  Have you been too busy hopping from one project to another?  Do you need to bring more compassion and modesty in your relations with others?  Are you unconsciously asking Great Spirit to bring more of what you are afraid of to your waking reality?  Remember the wisdom of what we resist persists.  Remember to breathe in your feelings, while allowing yourself to experience and embrace them running through your Being and then releasing them to Mother Earth for healthy compost.  As we transition closer toward the Spring Equinox, it becomes clearer that our growth may arrive in leaps and hops.  When we pay attention to the signs and attune to the Moon, we become more equipped to snatch up the carrot of opportunities that briefly arrive in our field of vision.

See you further on down the trails,

Ari