{"id":14208,"date":"2022-12-31T11:39:31","date_gmt":"2022-12-31T00:39:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/?p=14208"},"modified":"2022-12-31T12:11:24","modified_gmt":"2022-12-31T01:11:24","slug":"gratitude-the-path-to-spiritual-alchemy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/?p=14208","title":{"rendered":"Gratitude – the path to Spiritual Alchemy"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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As the old year ends, I tend to reflect on the year that\u2019s been with a mixture of gratitude for places travelled, fun times, great food, joyous occasions, or treasured family moments. As a lifelong practitioner and interpreter of Mother Gaia\u2019s energies, I pull a few cards for myself and the collective and shine a guiding light on the infinite possibilities in the timelines stretching into the New Year.<\/p>\n

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For those who don\u2019t know me, it\u2019s possible my reflections may seem like fluffy, empty, shallow, well-worn platitudes. Others that do know me, know my gratitude is real. The words I write, ripple from a painful past, traumatic experiences, lost love, separation from family, disappointments \u2013 and let\u2019s just say \u2013 times when life did not ‘align’ with what I had envisioned for myself.<\/p>\n

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For me, the cards are an extension of this \u2013 they help show the timelines possible in any given moment \u2013 the promise of a future \u2026 the opportunity to create a life you have<\/em> always <\/em>wanted by embracing or transmuting the energies around you.<\/p>\n

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Gratitude reminds me to actively see the good in each day, week, month or year we are gifted. It\u2019s also worth noting for those more \u2018scientific\u2019 amongst you, practicing gratitude has been proven to rewire our brains!<\/p>\n

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This year, however, as I reflect my mind alights all too easily on the pain, grief and such sorrow. I know it\u2019s been the same for many of you too. It\u2019s difficult to find the ‘Gratitude’ in amongst the empty shells or the raw, real pain.

Loss in all her forms<\/strong><\/p>\n

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My good friend Bernie passed away at the end of May and I was physically unable to move after surgery to be able to attend her funeral. But I had visited Bernie in hospital shortly before she passed. She wanted with her whole being to get out of hospital. To be amongst her own things and be surrounded by those she loved. She sat there in her rainbow-coloured dressing gown and pink hair saying, \u2018this isn\u2019t how I wanted it\u2019.  Being the pair of witchy woo woos we were \u2013 we decided we needed to manifest some magic.<\/p>\n

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As things transpired COVID shut the ward down and she was sent home. I still smile at the memory of that message she sent me \u2018You\u2019ll never believe it, I\u2019m being discharged \u2013 I\u2019m out of here\u2026\u2019 We \u2018woop-wooped\u2019 with joy and our own self-belief in the magical art of manifestation. I messaged her to say \u2013 \u2018well you got your wish beautiful. You\u2019re going home\u2019. <\/p>\n

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Bernie and I were able to say our goodbyes in person. We held each other\u2019s hands and we spoke with our eyes. We were able to say all the things we wanted to say, and we shared a magical connection that is still with me now. We were kindred spirits and yes, while I miss her sunny laughter, I can still hear her, and I can still see her face. But at least on some level, I was prepared for her to leave her physical body. And I find comfort in knowing Bernie at least got to go home \u2013 just the way she wanted. Yes, there is sadness and grief \u2013 but in amongst it, smiles and profound gratitude.<\/p>\n

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None of us were prepared for the utter shocking devastation of Eric\u2019s passing. I will never forget that phone call from my daughter. It\u2019s seared into my soul and, as I write this, I am back there in that moment. I will never forget these past 6 months \u2026 the past 9 years he was part of our lives\u2026 I will never forget \u2013 any of it.<\/p>\n

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As a mother, to witness my daughter suffer the insufferable – her sheer resilience through her pain has been nothing short of humbling. But she is processing it all and feeling \u2013 or not feeling \u2013 in any given moment, day or week. As many of you who are well versed in loss, grief is not linear. Five months on I can see my daughter navigating a life that was not of her choosing\u2026 every day she is having to experience a life that\u2019s \u2018not what she wanted\u2019. When I tentatively talk about the future \u2013 she makes decisions based on \u2018what sucks the least\u2019. I have always loved her direct honesty and ability to cut through the fluff. She\u2019s not pretending life is anything other than what it is at that moment.<\/p>\n

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We are living in a place that\u2019s not of her choosing at this moment in time \u2013 it\u2019s our in-between place until we decide where we all want to be \u2026at this moment in time \u2013 this is not what she wants. She wants to be close to her old life \u2013 her friends \u2013 and her Eric. The person she was \u2018before\u2019. Or at least to fast forward another few months down the line. Just not here. For fellow empaths and Readers \u2013 this is her \u2018Hanged Man\u2019 moment.<\/p>\n

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Yet through it all, I am grateful for the operation I had earlier in the year, I ended up flat on my back for weeks, then dealing with all the work we had to sort the house out for sale (through various floods and various obstacles that kept popping up). I had a strong intuition we were actively being \u2018slowed down\u2019. We were being kept in that house longer than we had planned. I am so grateful for this \u2013 because otherwise, I may not have been there when my daughter needed me most \u2013 and I may not have had a home to bring her back to, to cocoon her for 4 months.<\/p>\n

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Amongst it all, I lost my much-adored chickens. I never mentioned it to anyone because of the scale of what was going on elsewhere in our lives \u2013news of their demise may have seemed insensitive and insignificant. But their little feathery lives mattered to me. Earlier in the year, one was put down because of illness, then some months later, another fell ill with a completely different illness. We had tried vet visits and various medications, but the illness re-occurred. Her sister passed away soon after in grief and then our final chicken Maggie was adopted by one of our neighbours as I couldn\u2019t have a lonely chicken. She too would have surely died too. I had to give her away to save her. I was so sad at the loss of my chickens and the dream and joy of keeping them. It was a notion of the life I wanted \u2018ending\u2019 albeit short term. Tending them was so therapeutic to me. A joy I really hadn\u2019t anticipated. Yet, I was grateful to be able to give them love all through their lives \u2013a peaceful ending – and to have a neighbour so ready and willing to step in to provide Maggie with a home and new sisters.<\/p>\n

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We sold beautiful Lorikeet Lane in November, and that has felt like a huge and symbolic loss \u2013 though this was of our choosing. Still \u2013 I do wish we could perhaps have stayed a little longer and perhaps waited another year to put our house on the market once we had all had a chance to regroup after the events of the year. Tread water if you will. But (resigned sigh) I have learned to trust the Universe and the timelines she unfolds before our eyes.<\/p>\n

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So we find ourselves here – the year\u2019s end in Long Beach, North of Batemans Bay. It\u2019s somewhere a bit random and not on our radar a few months before \u2013 but – there is something symbolic about being a few steps from the beach.<\/p>\n

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We lived a few steps from Bronte Beach when we first arrived in Australia 20 years ago. Though I had never really been a beach person \u2013 my fear of getting my face or head in water curtailed any swimming activities \u2013 I have always found the colour of the ocean in all its turquoises, greens and blues, deeply healing. So here we are again, the rage of moods conveyed by the waves and colours, a mirrored reflection of our own.<\/p>\n

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Breathing life back into ‘you’…<\/strong><\/p>\n

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My girl is taking the hound dog for walks on the beach, she is making her bed, she is eating, she is caring for her cat, she is doing what she needs to do to \u2018tread water\u2019 until she embarks on the journey that sucks the least. The sea air is cleansing her energy fields, whether she feels it or not.<\/p>\n

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I share these moments because I know so many of you have also suffered loss. Devastating loss and you have been carrying the grief and silent pain as you go about your life.  It seems, this year, more than any other, I am reading of your losses. I know you have lost mothers, fathers, siblings and loved ones -and you\u2019ve been reading about the losses of others through Covid, natural disasters or unprecedented weather events. I know some of you are worried about people in your lives. People you love and cherish, and you are willing them to go on.<\/p>\n

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I have discovered the nature of such loss, grief, worry, care and concern can be utterly exhausting and you no longer remember what life was like \u2018before\u2019. It\u2019s easy to lose who you are<\/em> in amongst those losses.<\/p>\n

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So, I urge you to remember to \u2018take care of you\u2019 and connect and sit with the \u2018realness\u2019 of your emotions as ugly or messy as you believe them to be.  It can be hard to see the gift in loss \u2013 though in the strange \u2018up\u2019 surges of grief and trauma \u2013 you may see those moments glitter like gold. While in other moments on that wave, you may crash to the shore, feeling with every fibre that life is hollow and pointless.<\/p>\n

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But if you can make decisions based on \u2018what sucks the least\u2019 rather than some disconnected, hard-to-reach notion of joy and happiness, you will be living authentically.<\/p>\n

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In time, you will be able to look at your day, your week, your month, your year, your life, and realise just how resilient you are. Even if at times you fear you\u2019ll get tangled in the seaweed and you fear you are losing yourself, know that it\u2019s ok just to float \u2013 to tread water.<\/p>\n

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Allow the waves to support you, until you know which direction you want to swim. In time, if you allow the ebb and flow, you may find yourself walking along the beach, exploring rock pools, discovering tiny fish, and the most beautiful shells \u2013 iridescent in all their hues \u2026 and for a split second you will ponder on the sheer beauty of something so seemingly simple in the shallows \u2026 From that moment, simple gratitude enters your life as a gentle, support of a lifelong friend. The friend who sits with you in the quiet moments of it all. The gratitude you experience in those smallest of moments, form under your feet and become your pathway to Spiritual alchemy.<\/p>\n

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I looked back on my Reading last year \u2013 it was all there. The loss, the ripping away of everything \u2013 the course reset. It occurred to me that yes \u2013 this year has indeed been a course reset. When all is lost, you begin again \u2013 you must \u2013 even when you don\u2019t want to. But you are enriched for the love and experiences you now carry within. Those are not lost. Love is not lost. You carry it within you always.<\/p>\n

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I am normally one for such big traditions at Hogmanay (the old year\u2019s end) but I think this year we will usher in the New Year gently \u2013 just as we did at Christmas. I\u2019ll pull a few cards and I\u2019ll make sure I tell all my loved ones how cherished they are. I’ll give thanks for what has moved through our lives and I will look to the future.<\/p>\n

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If you are not where you want to be right now \u2013 if you have lost someone or something dear to you this year, sit with it \u2013 look for the love that can be saved \u2013 taken \u2013 carried with you into the future. Let the love you have experienced help you build the foundations of a new life \u2026 and in time I promise gratitude will help carry you forward.<\/p>\n

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To all my friends and family who helped carry us through 2022, we will take your love into 2023. Thank You. So much gratitude for each and every one of you.  We are stronger because of you. And I hope you feel that love as you too turn to face 2023. Together we can take our pain of loss, sit with it, and then turn it into pearls of wisdom that might help others \u2013 that is the alchemy of gratitude.<\/p>\n

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Love and Light to you all.
Blessed Be in 2023<\/p>\n

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As the old year ends, I tend to reflect on the year that\u2019s been with a mixture of gratitude for places travelled, fun times, great food, joyous occasions, or treasured family moments. As a lifelong practitioner and interpreter of Mother Gaia\u2019s energies, I pull a few cards for myself and the collective and shine a Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14210,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14208"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14208\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14221,"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14208\/revisions\/14221"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightmygaia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}