Vision Keeping

April 3, 2010:  Making New

Quotable quote:  The energy of a solution is different from the energy of the problem.  Oh, how true, how true.  As I think about the energy of a recent decision I’ve made to feel good and, as Abraham (see side panel) would say, “just get into the Vortex”, I feel good.  That feels definitely good.  And allowing myself to be in the Vortex where all solutions lie is freedom.

I anticipated, therefore created by my beliefs, that there would be a pull back to feeling crappy.  It’s become a habit, feeling crappy, especially over the past year.  And frankly I need practice with focusing on feeling good.   And there is nothing wrong with not feeling good because that just creates stronger energy of what is wanted.  Like if you know what you don’t want you know more clearly what you do want. 

So, I’m experiencing some familiar energy of doubt and fear that I won’t get to where I want to go.  But pushing against this feeling doesn’t help, does it.  It just makes it stronger.  Have you ever told yourself to stop thinking a certain thought and what happens…the thought just gets more obsessive.  So I acknowledge my not good feelings as just information that the Source within me does not see me the way I’m seeing me.   You see the Source within me is in the stream or Vortex of loving, creative energy that holds all solutions.  When I see myself as a problem, I’m spit out of the area of solutions.

So how do I get back in to the area of solutions?  Love myself  Ease up on myself.  Listen to my Inner Being telling me I’m doing wonderful and tune into that love that offers solutions.  That love feels so good and so much different from the problem.  I tune into that love and just allow that energy to Be with me and as I do that the solution will be clear.  Feeling good on the way.

Our brains get into the habit of certain neurological chain reactions which produce the chemicals.  In fact these chain reaction producing chemicals can be addictive.  It’s as if we cry out to feel a certain way, the way our bodies can cry out for certain substances which produce certain feelings.  We can be addicted to feelings.

I believe that I’m so in the habit of certain patterns of thinking that changing them, reversing them, developing new patterns of thinking takes strength of will backed by Love and repetition and success of developing different patterns.  It’s hard to think that it would take a lot of repetition to consistently feel good.  It does.  I know this by working with women in the criminal justice system.  Just as they begin doing well they become most susceptible to self sabotage.  Doing well doesn’t feel real and can be scarey.  I get it.

So, I will see myself with much tenderness and love and hold myself firmly and closely to my Source.  I can feel the anxiety when it appears and keep up a new repetition of feeling good and feeling good and feeling good until that part feels more like me than feeling not good.

I know this can happen.  The solution is in the Vortex of creation.  

Happy Easter.  It is a rebirth.  With Love, Connie

April 1st, 2010:  Making the Decision

Two days ago I absolutely felt like crap.  B.by the time I’d reached my therapy appointment that day I was feeling better.  That’s the good news.  The bad news was that after therapy I was REALLY feeling like crap.

So what’s that?  I knew.   Abraham (see side panel) says that our emotions are our guidance telling us if we are on track or not.  If we feel good then all is well.  If we are experiencing negative emotions it means that the Source within us does not see us in that moment the way that our physical self is seeing us. 

I had let something I heard coming from someone else’s mouth dictate my feelings about me.   You see the content isn’t important, the scene isn’t important.   The results are that I allow something outside of me to tell me who I am.  In this case it’s someone close to me.  This is when we are put to the test.  Can we hold our spiritual/emotional ground in love when our addictive chemical patterns want to carry us to somewhere ugly.  I had come to a watershed.  I was absolutely fed up with what I had done to myself.  It was unattractive to say the least and abusive to say the most and I felt DONE with it.  Enough already!

I made a decision yesterday.  I’ve made many decisions before on different levels but this one feels like an absolutely base line decision for me.  I’m going to know what I know about me , own it, and this is the challenging part, stay focused on what I know to be true about me even in the face of my own pull to self sabotage.

Sometimes its so easy to give in to the feelings of self doubt, victimization, whatever.  I’m not doing that any longer.  I know I will have to re decide and re decide and re decide but after awhile I will have a different belief about myself.  I know this because I have done it on other things.  I’ve developed new beliefs that have changed the way I see myself and the world around me. 

So I can make this very pivotal new decision which is a door to freedom.  I alone can decide who I am.  No one else knows me like I know me.  No one else knows my particular reality but me.  No one else knows why I do things the way I do or make the decisions I make but me.

I’m going to know what I know about me and step more fully into that energy.  It is powerful and when I speak of it I feel good and so I know that my Source or my Inner Being is agreeing with me.  Yes.  It’s time. I’m feeling good enough about myself that feeling ugly just doesn’t get it anymore.  Way last year’s news.

It’s a beautiful day here in Milwaukee.  I cannot get my Harley out of it’s winter quarters for two weeks!  I shall survive. 

With Love, Connie

March 29th, 2010:  Trusting Guidance

Looking back I can see that the switch was slow in coming.  The switch being thinking what was next was a new career path.  Well, isn’t that what we’re supposed to DO.  After all we been so trained to the doing and not the being.  Doing is important, productive, in God we trust.

And then I began to see less doing in my mind and more Being.   When I was on the cruise I met John.  John lives in Sydney, Australia and had a job he liked but he decided he just didn’t want to work anymore.  Now, you must take into account the setting…we are on a cruise with nearly 700 “Abrahamsters” who see life as an abundant adventure that will give you whatever you want.  The catch is you must believe and surrender to the total Well Being of the Universe to give it to you.

John’s story was spell binding and he was living his dream.  Whenever he got in a financial “pinch” money would manifest for him.  John is a bright star of a human being, radiating love.  I told him he was my hero.

Actually I think John plus others I met who were pursuing their own dreams created the room to shift within myself.  Clearly I returned home different from when I left.  I knew I wanted to pursue finding a partner to share the kind of life and love I’ve been wanting.

A friend from long ago told me, “You can’t walk and chew gum at the same time.”  She is right in the sense I’m a passionate person who focuses all of me in the direction I’m pointing.  I don’t think I could be moving towards partnership and a career at the same time, especially since partnership may involve a physical move for me.

It’s difficult for me at times to trust this guidance and think myself totally worthy of preparing for love and being loved.  And relax and allow myself into that space.  Doesn’t that seem selfish.  Abraham would say that unless we are willing to be selfish about giving to ourselves, we really do not have anything to give away.

What is really convincing about this guidance is when I think about following my heart it feels good.  Not doing it feels bad.  Case closed.

Have a wonderful week.  Love, Connie

March  27^th, 2010:   Match?

 Until about 3 years ago I never imagined I would want another relationship after being married for so long.  My role model, my mother, lost my father when she was 64 and I think the time after that when she was on her own was perhaps some of the happiest times of her life.  So I really hadn’t put much thought into another partner.

Until one day, I remember I was on my motorcycle and I thought “why not?”  Why not another partner.  It’s not too late to have a partner to match the person I had become.

That was a very liberating thought but one I wasn’t willing to act on.  But the thought began the creation.  Everything is thought before it is manifest.  So that thought just cooked and simmered until now.

So, folks, I’m on Match.com under visionkeeping.  If anyone out there has just been waiting for this moment of opportunity, now’s the time!  I know the website will probably crash under the weight of the traffic.  I like entertaining myself.

But I have a hobby for now and it’s time.  It has taken me until now to be ready for the next thing.  Even before I left for the cruise I still doubted now and then…would there be a next thing?  And now at least I know that, yes, there is a next thing and this is it.

I am counting on my intuition on this one, big time.  There are literally thousands of men in my age group looking for partners.  It’s fun looking…I can lose tract of time and then look over and realize I haven’t fed the dog as he’s looking sadly at me.  He isn’t the pushy type.

I’m still keeping my guidance open for other next things.  I also believe that my finding a partner may mean a geographical move for me and that’s exciting to think about…  I would love to find someone in Colorado, British Columbia.  But not Ontario.  There was this very nice looking man standing in a wheat field in Ontario and no thanks.  I need more warmth in my life.  There was one man who lived on a boat in the Padre Islands.  Nice but not a match.

So many choices.  I’m going to enjoy the buffet and let Law of Attraction do the work.

With Love, Connie

 March 26th, 2010:  A New Set Point

I feel different.  Since returning to Milwaukee after the cruise and then the trip to see my brother, I feel different.  It’s hard to describe.  My intention in going to see Abraham (see side panel) on the cruise was to make solid a sense of expansion that I was feeling internally.  Well, I guess it is mission completed.

Abraham said that the cruise attendees were there with very powerful intent and I could certainly second that.  The energy that 650 people with powerful intent could produce was awesome.  At the close of the cruise Abraham said that we had all expanded and that we could expect changes in the coming days. 

As I sat in my bed the first day home and felt some distinct new energy I thought of that…changes that I could expect.  I feel as if my vibration, my energy is faster, lighter, brighter, higher.  Something like that.

And also I feel something emerging that was in the wings but moved to the center of my attention.  I feel that it is time for me to be open to a new partner.  When I thought of that I was excited.  As excited as I had been when the thought of writing this memoir came to me.  I haven’t had such strong guidance since that memoir moment last August.

I’ve learned to listen and to trust this guidance.  The guidance that really feels good inside. 

I believe that when I meet the right person I will know it and he will too.  I must remind myself of that when I’m looking through profiles.  If I don’t feel a strong pull even though some other factors may look good it’s not for me.  That intuitive pull must be there.

I’m so appreciative of this insight of the right time to allow.  I was ready to move forward.  I knew that.  I just didn’t know what I would be moving forward to…and this was a surprise, a pleasant one at that.

So, those emotions you have inside you…they are much much more than just a chemical reaction…they are the Source connection to you letting you know if what you are thinking and feeling are aligned with your greater Being.  If you feel good, you are in alignment.  If you feel negative emotions you are not aligned with how the Source within you is vibrating.

I will keep you posted and have a positive day!  With Love, Connie

March 22^nd, 2010:   Peace with Family

On the cruise I heard many amazing funny/sad family stories.  Stories that were clearly that now…just stories.  Stories that had spawned the creation of wonderful human beings and for that reason were honored with respect as well as laughter.  When, as an adult, you can take a situation born of great pain and end up entertaining a loving group of friends in hysterical laughter, you have grown up.

I have spent the past two days with my big brother.  We didn’t get close until well after we had both left home and found our individual paths.  Now that our mother has made her transition he and I have become closer and I love visiting him and my sister, his wife.  She’s the only sister I will ever have.

I came here fresh from the cruise ship and a day of travel.  My heart full of tears and of fearing a trip home to the same state of emergence of my next life that I left.

For so long I had looked forward to the cruise but not to the what –comes- next after the cruise.  I had left for the cruise in the middle of an anniversary of what brought me to my knees one year ago.

But I’ve had a chance to know who I am with my family of roots before I return and it has gently allowed me to climb back into my skin after orbiting in the stratosphere with 700 other Abrahamsters.  That’s a very intense vibration.  And even in the loving of it there was an excited stress that rattled my cage which has known more sturdy times.

Now I’ve had two days to weep, write, share, prepare.  Prepare to return to my life, return with everything I’ve gotten since I left and that’s a lot!

With family I’ve been fed, treated to movies, been brought breakfast in bed, listened to, laughed with, shared with, driven around, hugged, and loved.

And…get this…we were at the Central Market, one of my favorite places here and Big Brother bought me this Whoopie Pie.  It’s a cake sandwich with the outsides being red velvet cake like bread and the inside is vanilla butter cream!   And it’s shaped like a flower.  Love and a Whoopie Pie.  It doesn’t get better.

I’m showered, packed and ready to return tomorrow to Milwaukee.  I’m not sure what will await me…more adventures and more shall be revealed.   I am sure that I am better off for this side trip to family.  I realize that not everyone can say that.

With Love, Connie

March 21^st, 2010:  Post Cruise Texas

I can’t believe I just left the ship yesterday morning.  It took the entire day to arrive in Dallas where I’m stopping off for three days to see my brother and sister-in-law before returning to Milwaukee.  It snowed last night here…about 4 wet inches on the ground.  Just unheard of here but there it was…and I came from the Caribbean for this?  Egads, it’s supposed to be full blown spring here now.

 I swear I was so weeping on the last day of the cruise…and then today as well.  I’ve had post cruise let down before and I hope this is what it is.  It’s evening now and I’m feeling better. 

 Returning to Milwaukee has it’s challenges for me.  I have not returned from vacation before to no job and I’m reminded what I’ve lost.  Buy that loss is receding in the past somewhat.  I can’t feel it so much anymore but what does that leave?  Me and me.

Still I take with me what I’ve learned on the cruise…1)I’m reminding myself that I know in my heart the answer to any question I want to ask or am asking.  I mentioned before but it’s worth repeating for me, many people told me…but you KNOW.  Yes I do know and when I allow myself to own that it does feel good…as in true…the Truth.

 2)  I chose to come here with the emotional apparatus that I have because I chose that contrasting situation from which to create my life.  And in doing this creating I’m taking this physical choice with its challenges and teaming up with Source energy which runs through me and is my life force.  That is the plan and I have done very well so far.

So that leaves me with going home and trusting that all is well and that I will find my way…that more will be revealed as my friend said.  More will be revealed.

I took some sand home with me from our last day at the beach.  This is the finest sand that I’ve ever felt…it’s so fine it feels like powder.  So I patiently stuffed an empty water bottle with this lovely white sand and had it in a carry on bag. 

I really got the attention of airport security.  They had me aside with this impressive testing kit and gloves and swabs and dishes and solutions.  And finally I was pronounced as being a terrorist free zone. 

 Another thing I was really grateful for was that I made it through the flight between Charlotte, NC and Dallas without committing homicide.  After my love fest at sea, there was a woman sitting in front of me…I use this term loosely.  There was so little room in this plane and when she let her seat back her head was practically cradled in my crotch and I couldn’t move.  I wanted to strangle her.  I nearly had a panic attack from feeling so smashed in but I slowed my breathing and believed that she wasn’t deliberately trying to piss me off.  Every time I moved my legs I pushed them as far into her seat as I could hoping she might get the hint…but no.  At least I could be grateful that I had the legs to smash into the seat!

 So, to all my favorite readers…good evening.  Love, Connie

March 19^th, 2010:  Waking to my Knowing

 It’s Friday and the last day of the cruise and I woke feeling sharp fear and then sadness and anger.  I don’t want to go home.  I’m afraid.  Why would I want to leave Paradise to go home to more of the unknown future?  I like this diversion.

 This has been an amazing week with Abraham.  They announced a cruise next January, a 12 day cruise in Australia and New Zealand which sounds amazing and I so want to go.

 But back to present time.  I have learned and stretched all week.  And as I feel my feelings I’m reminded of one of the people who asked Abraham a question..  He had a  “lazy” eye and flat corneas and Abraham reminded him that he had chosen that condition because he needed to learn to focus.  He had never thought of that. 

I took stock of my emotional self…the self I’m critical of, the strongly, sharply emotional self I came here with and I’m telling myself.  I chose this self, this package to come here in.  I chose this strong emotional self which I sometimes curse and sometimes revel in.  I chose this.

 And I would say I chose this so that I could now arrive at March 19, 2010 and know that I chose it so that I could more fully understand and learn to use strong guidance.  I bought the damn Ferrari, so I could learn how to drive it.  Just like I bought my Harley so I could learn to ride it…   So I didn’t want a powerful engine just to sit in the garage, I wanted to learn how to use it.  I wanted the ride it would give me…and what an amazing ride.

Something else I learned that was equally important.  I know…I mean I know.  People have been telling me for years that I’m smart, intuitive, and that I’m knowing.  On this cruise several people in response to a question I would pose just looked at me and said, “But you know. ´ Yes I do know.  And it’s something that I really want to own now…that I do know.  That I’ve always known and that I can trust that knowing and expand that knowing. 

 Knowing is a decision and one that I don’t just make once but over and over again.  Sometimes I won’t want to make it because not knowing has been comfortable…a bit of a victim stance that I take some sort of refuge in.  But I do myself a disservice in that.

And that’s what I’ve come to.  Abraham says we are so free we can choose bondage.  And my willingness to not know had been a sort of bondage.  And choosing that is just not an option I can live with for very long even if it’s attractive in the short term.

 I have one day left on the beach today.  It’s a cloudy day so far but a cloudy day at the beach in the Caribbean is better than a cloudy day in Milwaukee.

 With Love from my balcony on the Caribbean, Connie.

March 15^th, 2010:  Taking a Cruise Bounce

 ::Okay, so today I woke up and the self ass kicking began right away…don’t even wait for coffee or anything…just get on with the ass kicking.  Jesus!

 I was so frustrated I wanted to scream,  But I’ve been there and that wouldn’t help,  And I KNEW that the only way out was to focus myself elsewhere.

 Last night Jerry and Esther Hicks had left each cruise goer a gift of a notebook with “A list of Positive Aspects” at the top.  This is to help aid in lifting your vibration.  If you are irritated at a situation or a person, make a list of their positive aspects.  In this case the person who was driving me crazy was me. 

So I took the book and began writing sentence after sentence about why I liked my emotional self,  The exercise was successful and in the process I decided to write a not to Esther and Jerry and boldly request a meeting with Abraham. 

With that all accomplished I left the ship to explore Grand Turk.  It’s quite a small island, population 5, 800 and has lovely beaches.  I am so a beach person.  And then I got another case of the kick me’s.  OMG.  So, I figure this week will be an important week of focusing and acceptance of myself.  So, on the beach I focused myself into feeling good and was proud of myself for getting there.

Then back to my room and another kick me session.  I grabbed my Book of Positive Aspects and began to write thoughtfully again and it was a bit easier,  What I did was sense that I wanted to feel really good and with that wanting Source grants the request but I don’t take the bounce preferring to instead beat the drum of kicking my ass..  It’s just so familiar.and comfortable in a sick sort of way..

But I decided that I could expand myself to experience the excitement and joy of the cruise and if I fall I can take care of myself!  I know I’m not the only one who blocks good feeling energy from entering,   Sometimes I just don’t trust it.  But I refuse to have a crappy cruise so I’m going to do my part to enjoy it..

 Until I can write again.  Love, Connie

March 13^th, 2010:  Sail Away

This is the first full day of the cruise and also a full day of Abraham (see side panel)  Seeing Abraham in person is always a treat.  The energy in the room noticeably rises.

There are close to 700 people in the Abraham seminar.  This is the largest cruise attendance I’ve seen and we’re all over the ship.

Abraham begins a seminar by giving their schpeel  or their basic teachings about how we create our own reality.  Go to their website if you’re interested to order one of their books.  Ask and It is Given is probably my favorite and the most popular.  After they speak for about 30 minutes they just turn over the program for questions for the audience.  It’s in the questions that new ideas and ways of explanation are heard.

I loved the morning session and everyone left feeling really good.  We had a two hour break and I went on deck to enjoy the sun and to get lunch.  The day is beautiful and cool and the ocean and gentle rocking of the boat is really relaxing..

I was feeling a bit tired but the afternoon session began at 2:15 so I geared up for the afternoon.  Somewhere I tripped on myself and began to feel not so good.  I believe I was overtired and over stimulated from the trip with travel and time zones and excitement and it just came out in a basic anxiety reaction. 

Of course I did not want to weep in a room filled with high on life people and so I began flogging myself for crying.  That’s never a good idea, however.  My interest in the subject of tears just became more intense and the flogging worse.  I could not feel forward, take the fucking bounce or do anything I could think of to right myself.

 So we had a break and I found a friend, got some coffee and listened to the last session.  Then I came back to my beautiful stateroom and took a shower.  Always a good thing to do in times of stress.

 I know I’ve made great movement towards loving myself more and then, in the presence of Infinite Intelligence I k ick myself in the ass over and over again.  Perhaps I put Abraham in the context of a judgmental parent who would condemn my tears and less than perfect feelings…or better yet less than the perfect LACK of feelings in my parent’s case..

 We are sailing into Grand Turk tomorrow for the day.  No Abraham.  I’m glad.  I can regroup.

 You know what else just got to me…I looked like ass in my swimsuit.  Really depressed me.  Nothing like feeling like a whale when you’re on a cruise with food everywhere.  At least on a continuum I was on the thin side still overall.  A cruise is fat heaven.

 Love to all from the Caribbean:   Connie