Chapter 1 Take a Chance on Love Exercise Prayer is to link hearts to expand your heart to meet the hearts of others. For one week, read this prayer every morning upon awakening while breathing into the center of your chest, which is Zero Point (more about that later). One of the most important qualities that you can cultivate toward yourself and others is the powerful quality of compassion. It will help you in the darkest and most stressful moments to step back and relate to yourself as if you are a dear friend. Prayer for compassion I know there is one power, the source of life within me. This power is the creative principle of the Universe, the wholeness of life s perfection, the free flow of love expressing itself as compassion.
I (your name) am now aligned with this power. I open my whole being to allow its gentle waves of wisdom to roll through my consciousness and enfold me completely. With the power of love, I claim divine compassion for myself. I allow the most gentle, loving, and tender emanations of compassion to cradle me. Compassion in its own peaceful way now dissolves any judgments I have upon myself and my experience. Divine compassion relaxes all my tendencies to lay blame, find fault, or condemn my reality. I now surrender any beliefs in my unacceptability, as compassion sweeps through me and carries them all away. In the currents of compassion, the strength of self-worth, knowledge, and confidence is revealed. The infinite, patient kindness of my Inner Source elegantly returns me to clarity, with which I perceive my true path, my real purpose, and my natural beauty. With the power of compassion s guidance, I declare my unconditional commitment to actualize my soul s purpose on Earth at this time. I consciously open myself to whatever unlearning is necessary for me to fully live my life as love. Divine compassion carries me in waves of peace through the next gateway of growth. I joyfully see all beings as my brothers and sisters through the lens of compassion, to feel our hearts and minds joined as one.
Willingly, I let compassion nurture my life on the planet. I accept its presence with gratitude and humility, knowing that the Source within me holds me always in its loving embrace. In perfect peace I rest, knowing that this is done, and all is well.
Chapter 2 Where is My Loveseed Hiding? Exercise For one week, begin each day looking into the mirror until you deeply connect to your own loveseed, your own innocence. Recognize this in yourself, remembering who you are. Look deeply into your own eyes until you feel the connection. You can add the powerful practice of Ho oponopono, which is an ancient Hawaiian practice of reconciliation and forgiveness, by saying the following words to yourself: I am sorry, please forgive me, thank you, I love you. Say them several times, with sincerity. This will begin to strengthen your connection to your own loveseed and remind you of your innate worthiness. I have used it for many years since meeting Dr. Len, who taught me this simple and yet so very powerful prayer.
Chapter 3 Receiving the Precious Gift Exercise Seeing with the eyes of the heart If you want to connect to your loveseed, see the loveseed in others. The Divine is in drag everywhere. I cannot overemphasize the benefits of this practice. If you truly want to know yourself as awake, see others as awake, regardless of any evidence to the contrary. You cannot receive a gift you are not willing to give, otherwise you will still be forcing your mind into the "ego's theory of separation." It is not real, for only the Love of God is eternal.
Spend an hour a day seeing the Divine in others, no matter who they are and no matter what they are doing. You will find that both the upper and lower heart will expand beyond anything you have known before. You do not need to say a word to anyone about this, and in fact it is better that you do not. Only give. Only love. Your own Sacred Heart will then explode with Light the Light that is your Home. The instructions are simple: Spend one hour a day for a week consciously seeing the loveseed in the people around you. Vary this by practicing in the presence of people you know and love, as well as strangers. Begin by breathing into the Sacred Heart in the center of your chest and toward the back of your spine. Soften your gaze as you look at people and create the intention to energetically connect to their essence. Be quiet about this, as you enjoy seeing others light up as they are seen by you. By doing this with intention, you will strengthen your ability to see the good in others in times of conflict and tension, thus being a light in the darkness.
Chapter 4 Getting to the Heart of the Matter Exercise Thinking with the heart 1. Think of something you feel unsettled and uncertain about and have not made a decision about yet. It s better in the beginning of learning to walk this path or thinking with your heart to choose something of medium to light importance, rather than whether you should leave your marriage or get a life-saving surgery or leave your job, 2. Rather than pushing the difficult choice to the side, put it right in front of you, so that you clearly see what your choices are. Notice any feelings that may arise as you do. Do you feel uncomfortable, afraid, angry, sad? Just notice without judgment. 3. Begin to breathe into the center of your chest to the back, and at the same time, begin to gently thump on the center of your chest, where your thymus gland is located. Allow the thoughts about the decision and the
feelings that go with it to simply drop into the space you are breathing into, and let those thoughts and feelings be breathed by you. 4. Empty your mind of them and let them float in the space around your heart, as your breath makes that space wider and more spacious. This is the beginning of surrender, where you allow your mind to come to Zero, trusting that your heart will reveal your own truth to you. Just listen. You may have clarity right away, or it may take some time. Just keep breathing naturally and normally and declare your intention to come to know truly. 5. Then let it all go and go about your business. The clarity will come when you least expect it.
Chapter 5 On Being Enough Exercise What would love do? As a form of contemplation, every night for a week (and preferably for the rest of your life!) take an inventory of your day before sleep. Think of the things for which you are grateful from that day. Note the moments you are proud of your responses and the points at which you acted out of fear rather than love, and about which you may have feelings of guilt or shame. Witness even that, without judgment. Forgive yourself in this moment. Next, note any unfinished business where you must make choices. Review points of conflict or discord you have experienced, simply noting each issue, and then pause. Breathe into your Sacred Heart in the center of your chest several times, and then ask for each issue: What would love do?
Pause and listen, and if nothing occurs to you, indicate that you are open to know, and then move onto the next issue. You may have a dream or suddenly realization in the shower the next morning. Trust your inner wisdom to give you the knowing. Ask for the courage to do what love would have you do.
Chapter 6 Make Your Life a Large Enough Myth Exercise Tonglen The practice of sending and receiving helps us to get in touch with the obstacles that prevent us from understanding and caring. Through our own experience with suffering and cultivating an atmosphere of openness toward it, we can begin to accept and be with others and ourselves in a more open, kind, and understanding way. Our own personal challenges then become the bridge that leads us to compassion for others. Gentle loving-kindness toward ourselves is what it takes to be present for our own suffering. We need to learn to stay with our own suffering without trying to change it or fix it.
Meditation: Giving and receiving To begin, sit comfortably, close your eyes and let your body and mind settle. Allow yourself to feel relaxed and open. Set an intention or say a prayer that you may be of service as you open to your own suffering and that of others. Begin by breathing in whatever you are feeling fear, agitation, anger, resistance and accepting it. On the exhalation, breathe out wellbeing. Clear your mind by bringing awareness to what is agitating you and breathing it in, accepting it with kindness. Then, as you exhale, give yourself some spaciousness. Do this breath until you are calm and alert. When you feel settled, begin the second stage of the practice, which is establishing a rhythm of breathing. On your inbreath, imagine that you are inhaling heavy, hot, black air into your open heart. On your outbreath, visualize exhaling light, cool, white air. Continue with this pattern breathing in heaviness and breathing out lightness through your open heart. The heaviness is suffering; the lightness is well-being. Now bring your awareness to the suffering of the many others who find themselves suffering in a similar way. In the same way you did for yourself, imagine that you are inhaling heavy, hot, black air into your open heart. On your outbreath, visualize exhaling light, cool, white air. Continue with this pattern breathing in heaviness and breathing out lightness
through your open heart. Return to your own suffering again, breathing in the pain and breathing out the lightness. This practice takes a lot of courage. You might find yourself resisting breathing in the suffering. If so, you can breathe in your resistance as hot, heavy smoke. You can breathe in alienation, pity, boredom, arrogance, confusion, grief, or clinging whatever flavor your suffering of the moment takes. Then breathe out willingness, softening, peace. Greet all of it with loving-kindness and acceptance.
Chapter 7 Transcendence: Moving Through the Layers Exercise Welcoming the shadow home 1. Make two columns on a page and list as many people as you can who rub you the wrong way. These would be family members or associates who trigger you to feel irritable or judgmental. 2. Next to their names, list the qualities about them that irk you.
3. This part is best done out loud: Name the qualities, one at a time, and say after each one, Welcome home. Each time, take a breath into your Sacred Heart and expand your chest to make room. Example: Manipulative Welcome home. Undependable Welcome home. Critical -Welcome home. 4. Breathe slowly and deeply, saying Welcome home.
Chapter 8 Love Itself Exercise True giving First read and allow yourself to be inspired by the story below: A wise woman who was traveling in the mountains found a precious stone in a stream. The next day she met another traveler who was hungry, and the wise woman opened her bag to share her food. The hungry traveler saw the precious stone and asked the woman to give it to him. She did so without hesitation. The traveler left, rejoicing in his good fortune. He knew the stone was worth enough to give him security for a lifetime. But a few days later he came back to return the stone to the wise woman. "I've been thinking," he said. "I know how valuable the stone is, but I give it back in the hope that you can give me something even more precious. Give me what you have within you that enabled you to give me the stone." "The Wise Woman's Stone" Author Unknown
You want love, give love. You want money, give money. You want joy, do something to bring joy to someone else. You want success, help someone be successful. It is said that as each human soul is about to be born, an angel whispers one word into his/her ear. That word is give. It is that simple. Most of us have learned that well, whether we have followed through or not. For this exercise, take out pen and paper not an electronic device. Read it all the way through first, then proceed. 1. Sit for a moment and begin to breathe into your Sacred Heart. Breathe with awareness until you begin to feel the flow. Relax. Open your eyes once you have a quiet breath. 2. Now begin a letter to yourself, beginning with Dearest, telling yourself what you know you have been withholding from yourself. Be very thorough and honest, making a list if you need to.
3. Tell yourself what you imagine that other part of you feels as a result of your withholding. Be as empathic as you can, offering compassion to the self who has unmet needs, whatever they may be. 4. Tell yourself who you would need to become in order to give these things more freely. Who would you be if you had that capacity within you? 5. Call on the willingness to allow that person who can live and give more freely to come forth. 6. Choose the most important three items you listed and make a commitment to yourself to be generous in your giving to yourself by making those changes. Set a time for each one, with enough time that you can be successful in fulfilling your promise. 7. Sign the letter with LOVE, put a stamp on it, and address it to yourself. Make sure it gets into the mailbox.
Chapter 9 The Fear Factor Exercise The gift of imperfection Take a moment to read the following story, which has many versions from many different cultures, author unknown: An elderly Chinese man had two large pots. Each hung on the ends of a pole, which he carried across his neck. One of the pots had a crack in it while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water. At the end of the long walk from the stream to the house, the cracked pot arrived only half full. For a full two years this went on daily, with the man bringing home only one and a half pots of water. Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection and miserable that it could only do half of what it had been made to do. After two years of what it perceived to be bitter failure, it spoke to the man one day by the stream. "I am ashamed of myself, because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your house." The old man smiled. "Did you notice that there are flowers on your side of the path, but not on the other pot's side? That's because I have always known about your flaw, so I planted flower seeds on your side of
the path, and every day while we walk back, you water them. For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate the table. Without you being just the way you are, there would not be this beauty to grace the house." Now take a pen and paper or journal (not a computer) and write the story of one of your imperfections and the good that has come or could come from it. In other words, rewrite the story of one of your worst failures, from the point of view of the gift that you or someone else has received from it.
Chapter 10 A Knowing of the Heart Exercise Feeling into forgiveness This is an exercise I developed during a time when I felt defeated by life and found myself gripped with anxiety and sinking emotions on a daily basis, even though I had been teaching people for years how do deal with anxiety and sinking emotions. I was judging myself for making so many mistakes, even though I had been teaching for years that there are no real mistakes, but rather mis-takes to teach us. I was in need of my own medicine, so I decided to take it. The following is what I did that began a process of deep body forgiveness: 1. Light a candle and set an intention to fully face how you feel, and then easily let the energy of the feeling go.
2. Lie on your side in bed in a fetal position and hug a pillow. Yes, you heard me. Curl up. 3. Begin your moaning about your life. Really moan. Say your mistakes out loud and really embellish them if you are so inclined, then sigh deeply as many times as it takes to release the energy of that issue. Cry, laugh, or both, then let it go. The poet Theodore Roethke says, I teach my sighs to lengthen into songs. Do the same with each one of the heavy thoughts or feelings or situations after the other. Just give yourself time to be a Drama Queen or King and moan your heart out for real. If you find the pleasure in having no resistance, that is a benefit. You may find yourself laughing after a while. 4. Extend tender, unconditional compassion to the one who is suffering, saying things such as: There, there, I know you made mistakes, I know you feel like a failure. I totally get it. It s okay. You don t need to be perfect. I know you are angry about so and so. You have a right to be angry. Just feel what you feel. It s okay.
5. Replace all guilt and or remorse with an abundance of gratitude by doing the Take Nothing for Granted exercise where you sit and consciously say thank you for one thing after the other. Use your hands or even walk through the house. Thank you for this bed, thank you for this house, thank you for my wife, thank you for my dog, thank you for my children, thank you for my mother, thank you for my friends, thank you for the woman who told me about the best vet, thank you for the vet, thank you for the people who grew the food I am eating... thank you, thank you, thank you. I am so blessed. Thank you. I am so blessed!
Chapter 11 From Karma to Dharma Exercise In 1952 the German Scientist W. O. Schumann predicted that there is a resonant frequency of the Earth s electromagnetic field that beats with a sharp pulse of 7.83 Hz. This frequency is known as the Schuman Resonance. It is no coincidence that the brainwave frequencies of humans are the following: Beta waves range between 13-40 Hz and are associated with peak-concentration, heightened alertness, and visual acuity. 40Hz beta frequency may be key to the act of cognition. Alpha waves range between 7-12 Hz. This is a place of deep relaxation, not quite meditation, where we begin to access the wealth of creativity that lies just below our conscious awareness and is the entry point that leads into deeper states of consciousness. Theta waves range between 4-7 Hz. Theta is one of the more elusive and extraordinary realms we can explore. It is also known as the twilight state, which we normally only experience fleetingly as we drift off to sleep or rise from the depths of sleep.
Theta has also been identified as the gateway to learning and memory. Delta waves range between 0-4 Hz. Delta is associated with deep sleep. In addition, certain frequencies in the delta range trigger the release of growth hormones beneficial for healing and regeneration, making it essential to the healing process. One of the best ways to find your own visionary resonance is to breathe with the earth. A side benefit is that it grounds you like nothing else and helps to offset the effects of potentially harmful EMF waves. Earth Breathing with the 1. Set your intention to become clearer about what you are called to do. This can be in the immediate future or as a larger question for your life. 2. Stand on the earth, preferably grass, dirt or sand, with your feel hipwidth apart. Place your right hand over your heart and your left
hand over your belly. Begin to establish a rhythmic breath downward into your belly. Receive your own breath deeper into your body. Feel where your legs meet the earth, sending down tendrils and roots with every breath. Reach deep deep deep into the hot, molten center of the earth. Continue with the intention to connect your own energy with
Chapter 12 The Misty Blue Planet of the Possible Exercise We must become aware that our mission and the mission of Spirit are linked. Sit quietly and breathe consciously for several long slow breaths. Become willing to see clearly. Are you living the life seeded in your soul in the beginning? Whose rules are you following? What is your challenge? What is your true mission? 1. Set your highest intention. Decide and declare what you want as the highest outcome or solution to the challenge you face. Breathe deeply and rhythmically, declaring that the mission is already accomplished. 2. Witness without judgment. Notice what is present for you around this issue. Be very aware of any and all forms of resistance, which can come in the form of fear, anger, sadness, shame, causing you to doubt, become inflated, overly critical, or to check out.
Refrain from judgment. Continuing to breathe deeply and rhythmically. 3. Feel what you feel. Let yourself feel what is there fully. Begin to breathe into the center of your chest. Let all the feelings float in merciful awareness, expanding and expanding. See the feelings as a ball of white light, and on the outbreath, breathe the ball of light into your mind. 4. Examine the story. With the ball of white light in your mind, notice what your mind is saying about the situation, and even about your feelings. Listen with curiosity to the story, breathing rhythmically. See and feel the ball of light looping from your mind into your heart and back into your mind and down into your heart, several times, in synch with your breath. 5. Surrender to Zero. On a big outbreath, drop the entire ball of light into the center of your chest and breathe toward the back of your spine,
Envision the violet flame of love, wisdom, and courage pink, yellow, and blue light. Let the ball of light merge into the violet flame. Keep breathing as long as it takes to let it all go. Let the feelings go, let the thoughts go. Allow the violet flame to transform them. You must simply allow. 6. Accept everything. Make room for everything. Breathe the feeling of total acceptance in and out several times. Feel the relief. 7. Receive the gift. Allow the gift. This is where you wait with expectancy and yet not focused on an outcome. You have left that up to the Universe, God, Spirit whatever that higher energy is that you know can handle the situation. The gift may come in the form of learning, a knowing, a vision, an idea you never had before, or a new way of seeing an old challenge. Be open and receive the gift. Write about it if that is what helps you. Be aware of what arises. Stand up and open your arms wide so that you
do a slight backbend and feel yourself embody light as you breathe. Take several breaths here, while speaking out loud: I know that I am made from love. I know that I am here to serve. I know that I am free to choose.