Showing posts with label pseudo spirituality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pseudo spirituality. Show all posts
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Awakening from Spiritual Slumber
It's been a very unique time in this present world we live in. So many people are waking up from what seems like a long spiritual slumber to their true calling. It almost seems as if there is a great divide happening between those who are willing to awaken to their potential and Divine Guidance, and those who wish to continue sleep walking through their lives. Our world is becoming progressively more frightening with terrorism, rising oil and food prices, wars, and terrible storms the like of which hasn't been seen in this scope. In many ways it is forcing the issue in regards to waking up in time mentally, spiritually, and emotionally. I truly believe we are in a unique position to usher in a new world, but we need to stand in strength rather than fear. We have the opportunity to manifest a new destiny through our intent, and to see mankind progress if we only refuse to allow fear to take hold of us. These birthpangs on the Earth are a product not only of Man's need to head toward enlightment, but as well Gaia's rage and retribution against those who have so polluted and abused her. We have sown the seeds of natural disaster by ruining the ozone layer, destroying forests and trees, burning fossilzed fuel and the like. In this time we must lead the way in going green as much as possible. We must be spiritually prepared and emotionally ready to live in a world that will be far different than the one we currently live in.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
When One is Struggling
Recently someone I know had gone to a weeklong intensive residential class in "Shamanism" directed at healing and counseling. (I put this in quotes because the description after the fact would not be considered core Shamanism). Before they went they explained to the director that they had some physical challenges that had to be considered. A form was sent to them which they filled out, and they were then assured their needs would be met. The facility was a long way from home on the West Coast, so once the commitment was made there was no turning back. As well there were no refunds. When the person got to facility it became clear that there was no special consideration for them there at all. In fact the person had to hire someone at the facility to help them, and then go out on their own to get the things they needed.
What ended up transpiring is that basically the person was ostracized from the rest of the group. It was apparent this person was struggling, and it became clear that the others in the group were turned off by the struggles. In several conversations it was implied that perhaps there was something this person had "done" and that these struggles were "lessons" to teach this person or "correct" them in some way. This added a layer of stress to an already stressful situation. While the person got through the class, it was difficult and lonely emotionally for them.
My reaction to this is sadness and disappointment at the people involved with this. Here is a group of people who are in a class to learn how to heal and counsel, and right under their noses is someone they could both help heal and counsel! Instead of seeing this as an opportunity not only to learn, but to practice what they are learning, and in effect practice what they preach, they ended up ostracizing the person, and as well blaming them for their struggles instead.
I have spoken about this before but I will reiterate that pop psychology should not be excused or tolerated to shame, blame, or in any other way suggest that someone is responsible for their struggles. There is no excuse to ostracize, invalidate, or in any other way diminish someone simply because they are having challenges. In fact personally I applaud this person for their courage and persistence. They not only took a long airplane trip, but they withstood all that was thrown at them and stayed through until the end. They did not let their struggles stop them, nor did they give up. This is the mark of true courage. I do not believe that they did anything wrong. Furthermore I do not believe there was any reason or justification for the behavior of others in that group. If there was a "lesson" at all, it was not for that person but for that group of people. This group failed the lesson in my opinion. The lesson would have been to reach out to this person, to be a support, and to be humbled by the opportunity presented to be the healers they ostensibly were learning to be.
We must practice not only healing and compassion but common sense. Instead of pseudo psychology, blame, and shame, we have to practice unconditional love and acceptance. Common sense would dictate that if someone is having challenges, we should not add to those challenges but instead attempt to ease them with understanding and compassion. There seems to be this assumption that if one works with healing, then one must be healed themselves and have little to no challenges. This is an absurd notion and a harmful one. As long as we live in human form we will have challenges. Unless the day comes where there is no such thing as death, dying, decay, sadness, and challenges, we will all have our moments and battles with these things.
Let us then remember to practice compassion and leave pseudo psychology and the ideas of shame and blame at the door where they belong.
What ended up transpiring is that basically the person was ostracized from the rest of the group. It was apparent this person was struggling, and it became clear that the others in the group were turned off by the struggles. In several conversations it was implied that perhaps there was something this person had "done" and that these struggles were "lessons" to teach this person or "correct" them in some way. This added a layer of stress to an already stressful situation. While the person got through the class, it was difficult and lonely emotionally for them.
My reaction to this is sadness and disappointment at the people involved with this. Here is a group of people who are in a class to learn how to heal and counsel, and right under their noses is someone they could both help heal and counsel! Instead of seeing this as an opportunity not only to learn, but to practice what they are learning, and in effect practice what they preach, they ended up ostracizing the person, and as well blaming them for their struggles instead.
I have spoken about this before but I will reiterate that pop psychology should not be excused or tolerated to shame, blame, or in any other way suggest that someone is responsible for their struggles. There is no excuse to ostracize, invalidate, or in any other way diminish someone simply because they are having challenges. In fact personally I applaud this person for their courage and persistence. They not only took a long airplane trip, but they withstood all that was thrown at them and stayed through until the end. They did not let their struggles stop them, nor did they give up. This is the mark of true courage. I do not believe that they did anything wrong. Furthermore I do not believe there was any reason or justification for the behavior of others in that group. If there was a "lesson" at all, it was not for that person but for that group of people. This group failed the lesson in my opinion. The lesson would have been to reach out to this person, to be a support, and to be humbled by the opportunity presented to be the healers they ostensibly were learning to be.
We must practice not only healing and compassion but common sense. Instead of pseudo psychology, blame, and shame, we have to practice unconditional love and acceptance. Common sense would dictate that if someone is having challenges, we should not add to those challenges but instead attempt to ease them with understanding and compassion. There seems to be this assumption that if one works with healing, then one must be healed themselves and have little to no challenges. This is an absurd notion and a harmful one. As long as we live in human form we will have challenges. Unless the day comes where there is no such thing as death, dying, decay, sadness, and challenges, we will all have our moments and battles with these things.
Let us then remember to practice compassion and leave pseudo psychology and the ideas of shame and blame at the door where they belong.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Keeping a Balance
Abiding Reiki Newsletter for Octobber
As Energy workers we all are working daily not just in the realm of the seen, but the unseen. Because we have a foot in both worlds we have to avoid the pitfalls that come with that and remain grounded. For example recently there was a healing circle that I attend. One of the people there were prone to seizures, and had been on medication for grand mal epilepsy. The man got on the massage table and a few practitioners began to work on him. In the middle of the work he began seizing. Having some presence of mind I stepped in to make sure he did not fall off the table and that he was safe until the seizure passed. I could hear the other Practitioners talking among themselves. They were either pointing fingers at each other wondering who had sent the "negative energy", or blaming the man himself insisting that he must not have really wanted healing. In truth no one was responsible for the man's seizures. This had been a lifelong issue, and he happened to have a seizure. It was not due to anyone's negative energy, wrong mental state, or negative faith. I call this response the hyper faith response. This response is based in fear and misunderstanding and it reflects a lack of balance that needs to be addressed. It is not based in reality, and certainly not based on fact. In fact I would call this harmful faith because in this belief system the person who does not receive healing is often shamed blamed, then ostracized for their lack of healing. Sometimes the Practitioners involved are also blamed. I've heard other Practitioners try to use pop or Freudian psychology to try to lend credence to their stand. For example, such and such Practitioner must have a lot of underlying rage, therefore she/he then channeled that rage instead of healing. The hypothesis goes on to say that such and such a Practitioner obviously is not safe and had they looked inward perhaps they would have seen the "negativity" within and this wouldn't have happened.
This is erroneous on many levels. Reiki is one of the most noninvasive modalities one can facilitate. It is for the highest good of every client. Rather than create a problem Reiki will shut itself off. It’s first motive on this planet is first to do no harm. If a Practitioner tries to channel anything other than light and love, the Reiki simply ceases to function.
Many Reiki people also are aware of the “healing crisis” that can sometimes occur when a client is worked on. However I have also noted that sometimes creating such a crisis seems to almost be an issue of pride. We have to remember that just because we can doesn’t mean we should. It would be similar to a brain surgeon deciding to go around opening up people’s heads simply because they have the skill to do so. If we are careful and cautious there should never be a healing crisis to contend with. Again as Reiki shuts itself off and is for the highest good of every client. We must be aware of how we use energy then and make sure our energy is always Reiki and not invasive energy that can cause issues.
Blaming oneself or the client is emotionally and spiritually damaging. We have to get ego out of the way and not allow pride to insist we have failed in some way. We must not blame ourselves or others for what appears to be a lack of healing in that moment. It is easy to point fingers when things do not go well, but as energy workers we are ambassadors for our craft. If we do not seek to channel love, compassion, integrity, and healing mentally, spiritually and emotionally who will? As a Reiki or any other energy practitioner, it’s also important to remember that we are not allowed to diagnose people. In fact a statement that involve any sort of psychological diagnosis, physical diagnosis, etc, is practicing medicine without a license and could lead to serious legal troubles. Secondly unless we have psychiatric degrees, making any sort of diagnosis about a person's emotional health could have dangerous repercussions.
It is easy to see "entities" around every corner and even easier to get into pseudo psychology based on "spiritual" knowledge. The problem is our knowledge is at best faulty. Lives hang in the balance, and it is important that we do not go stepping outside our boundaries. We must maintain a balance. We cannot just run around doing invasive or even harmful things with energy just because we "can". We must be sober, vigilant, and understand that we are not to play with forces we don't fully understand. We must leave the diagnosing to the professionals, and leave fear and pseudo psychology, or pseudo spirituality out of the equation.
As Energy workers we all are working daily not just in the realm of the seen, but the unseen. Because we have a foot in both worlds we have to avoid the pitfalls that come with that and remain grounded. For example recently there was a healing circle that I attend. One of the people there were prone to seizures, and had been on medication for grand mal epilepsy. The man got on the massage table and a few practitioners began to work on him. In the middle of the work he began seizing. Having some presence of mind I stepped in to make sure he did not fall off the table and that he was safe until the seizure passed. I could hear the other Practitioners talking among themselves. They were either pointing fingers at each other wondering who had sent the "negative energy", or blaming the man himself insisting that he must not have really wanted healing. In truth no one was responsible for the man's seizures. This had been a lifelong issue, and he happened to have a seizure. It was not due to anyone's negative energy, wrong mental state, or negative faith. I call this response the hyper faith response. This response is based in fear and misunderstanding and it reflects a lack of balance that needs to be addressed. It is not based in reality, and certainly not based on fact. In fact I would call this harmful faith because in this belief system the person who does not receive healing is often shamed blamed, then ostracized for their lack of healing. Sometimes the Practitioners involved are also blamed. I've heard other Practitioners try to use pop or Freudian psychology to try to lend credence to their stand. For example, such and such Practitioner must have a lot of underlying rage, therefore she/he then channeled that rage instead of healing. The hypothesis goes on to say that such and such a Practitioner obviously is not safe and had they looked inward perhaps they would have seen the "negativity" within and this wouldn't have happened.
This is erroneous on many levels. Reiki is one of the most noninvasive modalities one can facilitate. It is for the highest good of every client. Rather than create a problem Reiki will shut itself off. It’s first motive on this planet is first to do no harm. If a Practitioner tries to channel anything other than light and love, the Reiki simply ceases to function.
Many Reiki people also are aware of the “healing crisis” that can sometimes occur when a client is worked on. However I have also noted that sometimes creating such a crisis seems to almost be an issue of pride. We have to remember that just because we can doesn’t mean we should. It would be similar to a brain surgeon deciding to go around opening up people’s heads simply because they have the skill to do so. If we are careful and cautious there should never be a healing crisis to contend with. Again as Reiki shuts itself off and is for the highest good of every client. We must be aware of how we use energy then and make sure our energy is always Reiki and not invasive energy that can cause issues.
Blaming oneself or the client is emotionally and spiritually damaging. We have to get ego out of the way and not allow pride to insist we have failed in some way. We must not blame ourselves or others for what appears to be a lack of healing in that moment. It is easy to point fingers when things do not go well, but as energy workers we are ambassadors for our craft. If we do not seek to channel love, compassion, integrity, and healing mentally, spiritually and emotionally who will? As a Reiki or any other energy practitioner, it’s also important to remember that we are not allowed to diagnose people. In fact a statement that involve any sort of psychological diagnosis, physical diagnosis, etc, is practicing medicine without a license and could lead to serious legal troubles. Secondly unless we have psychiatric degrees, making any sort of diagnosis about a person's emotional health could have dangerous repercussions.
It is easy to see "entities" around every corner and even easier to get into pseudo psychology based on "spiritual" knowledge. The problem is our knowledge is at best faulty. Lives hang in the balance, and it is important that we do not go stepping outside our boundaries. We must maintain a balance. We cannot just run around doing invasive or even harmful things with energy just because we "can". We must be sober, vigilant, and understand that we are not to play with forces we don't fully understand. We must leave the diagnosing to the professionals, and leave fear and pseudo psychology, or pseudo spirituality out of the equation.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
