Posts Tagged ‘Flying metaphor’
Tuesday, December 13th, 2011
Just because you are reading this, I think you deserve congratulations for taking the time to read something just for you! No matter what your holiday traditions, this is a busy time!
Which is why I ended up reading my own Flying Lesson #2 over again. It’s Bring Enough Fuel for the Journey. Here are some excerpts and thoughts that struck me all over again as good advice for the season:
It’s food for thought that even though there’s no excuse for running out of fuel in the aviation world, we consider running on empty a normal part of our culture. In some circles there’s even a sort of nobility attached to being such a hard worker that everyone knows you never sleep. Even when people refer to someone as being a workaholic, rarely do they shake their heads in sadness or suggest a good treatment center. In many cases, overworking and overdoing is considered the means to success.
But when we have the ambition to fly, to rise above the gravity of our current situation, self-care becomes a crucial function. If we are going to push the envelope and move into a lofty territory where humans have only dreamed of operating we’ll have to pay attention to everything we’re doing and be conscious.
Being conscious is what piloting our lives is all about. And the proof of the pudding (especially the Christmas pudding) is how well we manage our own energy.
Have you ever stopped in the midst of rushing around to listen to a small voice saying something like, “What AM I DOING?”
This is the same voice who might ask other wise questions, like:
- How about a 15-20 minute power nap?
- What if I just took a hot bath instead of…
- Is the food I’m about to eat truly my premium fuel?
- What if I went to bed at 9 tonight?
- Do I really want to go to that party?
- Is this conversation nourishing me?
Never running out of fuel is about taking 100% responsibility for not burning out, not depleting yourself, and for knowing and cultivating the kinds of premium fuel that truly give you energy. Who else will do this for you?
Hmmm, maybe Santa. On the other hand, why not put this present right in the center of your being this minute:
Peace.
Joy.
Freedom to manage your own energy.
May you find the generous heart within that wants to give you these gifts this season.
In love and light,
Pam
Tags: consciousness, Flying, Flying metaphor, holidays, inner landscape, inner peace, living today, managing change, managing energy, managing stress, musings, new life, perception, Photography, spiritual practice, The Beauty Way, winter
Posted in aviation, conscious evolution, consciousness, creativity and empowerment, Flying, health, inner landscape, loving ourselves, new life, nourishing ourselves, Photography, seeing oneself, self-healing, shifting how we see, shifting paradigms, spiritual practices, Tools for seeing ourselves | No Comments »
Monday, December 5th, 2011
How do we pace ourselves during this holiday season so that we can “fly” through busy schedules, family relationships, celebrations and sometimes travel? After all, the body doesn’t know the difference between “good” and “bad” stress. What it does note is an imbalance.
To fly a plane, a pilot has to master the controls of four forces of flight that act on the airplane: thrust, drag, lift and gravity. The engine can provide the thrust, and power also provides lift. But we don’t want to overdo it, either in the air or on our holiday rounds.
If it’s all thrust, we’ll burn out our fuel and be too speedy to be in control. If we let drag take over, we won’t have the speed we need to fly. Lift is wonderful, but getting too “high” isn’t always wise. Gravity, on the other hand, can bring a body down too quickly, whether it’s made of metal or flesh.
Piloting is the art and science of managing our energy so that our vehicle–whether it has wings or not–can operate with the most ease and efficiency possible. After all, that’s what it was made to do.
Here are some tips for managing your energy so you can soar through this season:
1. Use your mental “dipstick” to mentally measure the energy you have every day, on a scale of 1-10.
2. Decide what your personal minimum should be.
3. How and when will you pause to re-fuel? Schedule breaks.
4. What is your premium fuel? Is it solitude? Prayer? Family? Nature? What have you learned about this?
5. Discipline yourself. Does that seem dreary? It won’t if it means you get through the holidays with your well-being and cheer intact.
6. Joy is the key word for this time of year, but sometimes it’s hard to come by. Track your joy. Pursue it. Treasure it. Give it. It’s good for you!
Tags: consciousness, Flying, Flying metaphor, living today, managing change, perception, Photography, spiritual practice, winter
Posted in aviation, coaching, conscious evolution, consciousness, Flying, happiness, healing, health, nourishing ourselves, Photography, seeing oneself, self-healing, shifting paradigms, spiritual practices, Tools for seeing ourselves, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Monday, March 14th, 2011
What form or figure do you see in this photograph? Yes, it’s just sand and pieces of seaweed. And no, I did not arrange them. Nature did!
Some people see a flower. Others see a pregnant woman. I always see an archer, whose bow is drawn, the arrow ready to fly. All the answers are RIGHT! What you see is the whole point of the Sand Spirits.
Today this image speaks to me of focused intention. The archer concentrates and narrows her view to the target, asking her body and mind to focus on directing her energy and her arrow in exactly that direction. We can do this.
I’ll give an example taken from a blog I just read by coach and author, Cheryl Richardson. She pointed out that we have a choice of how to react to the tragedy in Japan. She suggests that every time we think of the pain and suffering, we do the following: open your heart and imagine a stream of loving, healing energy flowing out of your heart, all the way to Japan. See the energy flowing all over the country, enveloping everyone and everything.
Now, remember that we are in the midst of great change on the planet, and so pain and suffering will probably persist and even intensify. How will we handle it over time? There are many ways, but the question is, how can we serve others?
We can serve best not by adding to the negative energy, but by forming a positive intention to pray or send love and healing to those who suffer. We can do this by contributing money, by volunteering and by being like the archer, focused on sending our best and highest energy right to the target.
We can continue to feel compassion for all who suffer without being overwhelmed so that our lights are dimmed. Instead we can be disciplined and while we feel compassion we can act as healers of the planet.
Thank you to Sand Spirit #6!
Tags: consciousness, creative imagination, Flying metaphor, managing change, perception, Photography, Sand Spirit Insight Cards
Posted in caring for the earth, consciousness, creative imagination, Guided imagery, healing, Imagination, nature as mirror, Photography, Sand Spirit Insight Cards, shifting how we see, shifting paradigms, Tools for seeing ourselves | No Comments »
Tuesday, September 21st, 2010
Sand Spirit Insight card #1
It doesn’t feel at all like fall yet in Tucson, but they tell us that the fall equinox is Wednesday, September 22. This marks the beginning of fall in the northern hemisphere. So I drew a Sand Spirit card, asking the question in the title: how do I best get ready for fall?
I drew card #1, which looks to me like a being who is very still and focused inside. I see the hands in prayer, and I see another being or energy in the lower right hand corner–perhaps another person or issue that is in the outer world. What do you see in this image?
This being tells me this is a good time for me to be focused inward, to remain calm and remember who I truly am. What does your image have to say to you?
Fall is a new beginning for many of us who grew accustomed to school beginning, and thus entering a “new year.” I used to buy day timers that went from September to September. Does a new chapter begin for you in fall?
I’ve recently gotten a little more interested in numerology and how it relates to the Sand Spirits. #1 is all about new beginnings. And September, being the 9th month, is all about completions, prior to October, being a #10, which reduces to a #1. So the message I get is, focus inside and find that still place, that place of reverence and prayer and solid ground–so that you can be calm as you complete things this month and prepare for new beginnings next month.
Finding the still place resonates with me, because I’m finishing the editing of the first of the seven lessons in my book, Flying Lessons. The first lesson is “Know Where You’re Going to Land.” It’s all about finding solid ground inside.
What is your safe landing space in life? Do you look to relationships? To your job? Do you have a still place inside that is there despite outer circumstances? Surely we all need this in times like these.
I wish for you that you see something inspiring in this message and that you use it to get yourself ready for fall, for new beginnings, and for strengthening that place within you that represents solid ground.
Tags: autumn equinox, centering, centering techniques, consciousness, Flying metaphor, inner landscape, inner peace, meditation, Photography, Sand Spirit Insight Cards, transitions
Posted in centering techniques, coaching, conscious evolution, consciousness, Flying, Imagination, inner landscape, managing change, meditation, nourishing ourselves, Photography, returning to essence, Sand Spirit Insight Cards, self-healing, shifting how we see, shifting paradigms, spiritual practices, Tools for seeing ourselves | No Comments »
Thursday, September 2nd, 2010
I love using the Sand Spirit Insight cards to reveal a personal myth that might give you insight into a theme in your own life.
Choose three cards from the pile face down, or just think of three numbers between 1 and 36 and pick those. I chose #33, #16 and #11.
From a completely intuitive place, use the three “illustrations” to stimulate a story that pours out with the least amount of thinking possible. Here’s mine:
One day a mother was thinking hard about how to juggle all the activity and all the dynamics in her family. She had a very colorful, very vibrant family, but sometimes they all were confused and troubled by the changes among them and in the world. They were looking for signs about the Divine path they all might follow.
At times the mother despaired, feeling the grief that surrounded her own helplessness, and wondered if all her experience counted for anything.
Into her dreamtime flew a strange and comical bird, who in his serious form showed her how hunched over she might become if she took all the weight of the world upon her shoulders. Another way, he pointed out, would be to take it all lightly, like a sweet and funny story that was really based on love and on how alike we all are.
See how this story might have helped me? What do you see in the three cards? What story would you tell? Myths, especially when they come from ourselves, give us the gift of the big picture, the universal. This takes us out of the small world that entraps us when we forget that we are all connected and part of one Creation. The spirits from the sea evidently want us to remember that while we are all drops, we are part of the great ocean!
Tags: consciousness, Flying metaphor, inner landscape, living today, managing change, musings, perception, Photography, Sand Spirit Insight Cards, transitions, ups and downs
Posted in bringing out your gifts, coaching, conscious evolution, consciousness, creative imagination, creativity and empowerment, Guided imagery, happiness, healing, Imagination, inner landscape, managing change, nature as mirror, Sand Spirit Insight Cards, seeing oneself, self-healing, shifting how we see, shifting paradigms, Tools for seeing ourselves | No Comments »
Tuesday, August 10th, 2010
Guanacaste sunset
When we were in Costa Rica last month, I had some heavy things on my mind. Despite the fact that we were so fortunate, despite the profusion of juicy jungle life all around us, I was burdened. (I’m probably not the only one who has had things changing, falling apart and challenging me lately!) So my vacation To Do list had just one thing on it. It was one of the 7 Flying Lessons from my forthcoming book. It was easy to pick the appropriate one: Remember Why You Long to Fly.
As if I had called on her, Nature helped me with this lesson. For most of the first week it had been too cloudy for any sunsets. So when we had a clear evening, we planted ourselves on the beach. It was quite a show. The cloud blanket that had been providing the overcast lifted just enough to be completely lit up, creating a rose glow on everything and everybody. Nothing to do here but point, laugh, exclaim. Pure, unadulterated beauty.
Being on that beach was like flying. I felt lifted, transported. In the presence of something wondrous and magical. It rendered any of my own concerns small…or perhaps it just bathed them in a rosy light and made me see that all will be well. All is already well, I remembered.
What do you think happened in this scene? I believe I finally re-opened my heart. The beauty had been all around me the whole time, but this overwhelming scene just cracked my heart open, and I remembered.
I want that feeling of flying, that ecstatic feeling, because it re-connects me with the truth. The truth that I am a spiritual being capable of great flights, and that I am connected to everyone and everything.
What makes you remember why you long to fly? What lifts you and transports you and opens your heart and causes you to remember All That Is?
I wish you that experience of soaring. Why not remember today?
Tags: beauty, consciousness, Flying, Flying metaphor, inner peace, living today, perception, Photography, The Beauty Way
Posted in aviation, consciousness, Flying, Imagination, nature as mirror, nourishing ourselves, Photography, returning to essence, seeing oneself, shifting how we see, shifting paradigms, The Beauty Path | No Comments »
Tuesday, April 6th, 2010
Are you a woman leader looking for affordable, practical tools for women at a crossroads? You already have a tool you can teach them that is absolutely free and accessible by birthright. Surprise! It’s the creative imagination!
You want tools of hope for women facing the gravity of life’s challenges, and what I’ve seen is the best approach to that is to show people how to let the creative imagination take flight. When you learn how to speak the language of metaphors, symbols and images, you are learning the language of the soul. When the woman who feels victimized by outer circumstances connects with her soul’s true power, a door opens. Are you willing to help her open that door?
The creative imagination has so many benefits, both for you and for those you serve. Not only is it free, but the more you use it the more powerful it becomes. And, it’s easily accessible. Just try accessing it by looking at the photo above and then closing your eyes and seeing if you can “see” the image. Now allow the image to change. The woman with white hair appears to be helping the other woman open the door. Does she succeed? What happens next? What is inside that door?
The stories we tell in our creative imagination determine our reality. When we can expand what we see and shift the lens we use, our lives expand and change. This is a practice everyone can learn.
The final benefit is for you as a leader. People spend a lot of effort trying to step into a greater role as a woman leader, when often they could be better served by focusing on embodying their soul’s true power. That way they not only accelerate their progress, but they end up being authentic and able to connect in a deep way with others.
How do you open the door to your creative imagination? Nature is one great portal. Guided meditation. Poetry. What are your favorites?
Tags: consciousness, creative imagination, Flying metaphor, inner landscape, perception, Photography, poetry, practical tools for spiritual leadership, Self, shifting paradigms, soul, spiritual practice, women leaders
Posted in authenticity, conscious evolution, consciousness, creative imagination, feminine leadership, Guided imagery, Imagination, inner landscape, nature as mirror, Photography, self-healing, shifting paradigms, spiritual practices, women's empowerment | No Comments »
Tuesday, March 16th, 2010
In the fall my husband Jon and I flew our Cessna 182 from Tucson to Taos to visit friends who have a wonderful mountain cabin. On the way, we saw fall leaves coming to their peak, almost as quickly as time lapse photography on the Discovery Channel. By the end of the long weekend when we returned, spots of gold like this one had spread, and whole swatches of forest were brilliant gold and orange. Superimposed on it all, I would see a moving shadow of our little plane, projected onto the screen of nature.
Plato saw reality in a way similar to this, as I recall–shadows projected on the back of a cave, like a camera obscura. Is everything we are so attached to a moving set of illusions?
Part of the Flying Lessons process I teach is the notion of seeing that we can move our vantage point around, seeing ourselves and our lives from above when that is helpful, defying the gravity of events on the ground level.
Another flying lesson is about opening our hearts to the beauty and wonder of nature, and to the beauty and wonder of our inner words as well. After all, we are part of the creation, and when we see that we are full of gratitude and a sense of connection to the whole web of life. The stories that fill the “middle world” which we usually inhabit are like this shadow of a small vehicle moving across the canvass of nature.
The key here is that we can observe all this. We are the first species that is conscious of ourselves. We have choices no part of creation has had before. What will we do with this awareness? Where will we travel on our journeys? What will our relationship be to the planet? What will our exclamations be as we observe our interaction with the planet; will they be utterances of wonder or cynicism? Small views or large? How curious are we to see what the extent is of our powers? How will we use them?
Or is the plane shadow just a “plain shadow,” just an illusion, just a passing image that no one saw anyhow?
What do you think? If, like me, you are a “philoser,” as I used to call myself when I was a child, and you too are sipping from a pot of tea, drop in and share your observations.
Tags: afternoon tea, beauty, Flying, Flying metaphor, inner landscape, musings, non-attachment, perception, Photography, relationship, Self, The Beauty Way
Posted in aviation, conscious evolution, consciousness, Flying, Gaia, Guided imagery, Imagination, inner landscape, nature as mirror, Photography, returning to essence, seeing oneself, shifting paradigms, The Beauty Path | No Comments »
Monday, March 8th, 2010
OK, so actually this was taken from our Cessna 182. Which is a balcony of sorts. From the window of the airplane, I look down on the stage of life, where stories are being played out. I wonder who lives in that house? What is the red building and what goes on there? What dramas have been played out in full view of each other, and what has gone on in hiding? What are the interior lives like of the people who live within that fence?
Many times with clients, I have them shift to a lens where they look at their lives as if from a balcony–or maybe a Cessna 182. Looking down on our lives allows us to see the big picture. You might ask yourself questions in the third person as you look down on your life, like:
Who is this person? Where did she come from? Why is she here?
How have his surroundings affected him?
What are her relationships like and where do they seem to be going?
What is his life work and is he doing it?
What needs to change to make her happy? What inner resources does she need to bring out to help her?
What is this person “growing” on the ground of their being? What is their life about?
What do you see from the balcony and how is it different from what you see when you are on the stage, in the middle of the action?
Tags: Flying, Flying metaphor, inner landscape, living today, musings, non-attachment, perception, Photography, seeing oneself, Self, shifting lenses, winter
Posted in Flying, Guided imagery, Imagination, inner landscape, Photography, self-healing | No Comments »
Saturday, February 20th, 2010
What gives you fuel for your life journey? If you’ve seen my website, blog page and gallery, you already know that one source of fuel for me is photography. I love immersing myself in the study of light and the continuous discovery of how light reveals the ever-changing forms in nature.
Looking at this agave plant makes me think of other things that fuel me: a refreshing rainstorm; the healing touch of softness against my skin; the depth of the mysteries hidden among the events of my life; and the beauty of the contrast of light and dark within myself and my life. These things along with sitting with husband and our dog and cat by a fire; riding our horses out into the vast desert garden outside our house; reading to my small grandchildren; watching my daughters bloom as powerful women; and a glass of good red wine. And the list goes on.
If you’re making your own mental list now, check to see if you visit this list often enough. I love making art, but I don’t do it often enough. Playing piano and singing have delighted me all my life–so why have I stopped? When we don’t drink from the well, we begin to wither and become dry and brittle. We begin to mistake duty for real life and to cling to a mythical future time when we’ll live, instead of plunging in right now.
What makes your eyes light up? What brings you alive? What stirs the god or goddess within? What makes your heart beat a little faster? These things fuel the life force inside–the creative power that causes us to truly feel and be alive. So what will you choose today as fuel–so that tomorrow you’ll spring out of bed feeling grateful for the journey?
Tags: Flying metaphor, food, grandchildren, inner landscape, perception, Photography, Self
Posted in inner landscape, nature as mirror, Photography, self-healing, spiritual practices, women's empowerment | 3 Comments »
