Casual Dress

I am of the age

That dress casual refers to

Just how much

Cat hair 

Is on my particular outfit

In the moment.

Psychic Healing Project

For this project, I decided to practice exercises from The Psychic Healing Book by Amy Wallace and Bill Henken. Specifically: grounding, clearing and aligning the chakras. I worked on myself three times over three days, then with regular clients over two weeks. All of us found it very useful, energizing and powerful.

For my self, I found it best to do the exercises while sitting outside on the deck in the fresh air, aware of the blessing of California sunshine, drawing its energy deep into my being. Afterward, I would do some weeding to literally touch the earth.

In the grounding exercise, I noticed that sending energy down the tailbone was very different from sending in through my legs and feet. There was a tingling in my sacrum and I could feel the earth energy rise with each inhalation. In the clearing and aligning exercise, I found that sending orange light into each of the chakras felt quite refreshing. At the end of the meditation, I pushed the energy out my crown chakra to create a fountain of light around me, visualizing any chinks in my aura becoming whole and filled until I felt surrounded in a golden bubble. I noticed having lots of energy for the rest of the day.

The next two practice sessions each went a little longer, a little deeper. I experienced feelings of contentment and well being. I also experienced being able to stay in one chakra for a longer time, exploring colors, organs, smells, glands, feelings of imbalance and flashes of insight - that "aha!" feeling, of knowing what I need to do next for myself, spanning from going to acupuncture for a spring tune-up to including grapefruit in my diet at this time. It was a great way to start each day and set intentions for my self and my clients.

For the second part of the project, I worked with a good friend and an ongoing client of mine. This client has been a weekly reiki and hypnotherapy client for about 18 months. Six years ago her teenage son was shot and killed. Her affirmation is, "I had a life before, I will have a life again". The first practice went well, I certainly felt more grounded and present. The second session was really powerful.

Usually, I start at the client's feet and ground them to the earth. This time I followed the exercise from the book. After having my client take in a few deep cleansing breaths, I began by running energy from dropping down from the base of her spine into the center of the earth, while gently touching her feet. Here we invited the earth energy to rise up through these roots to the sole's if her feet, through her bones, muscles, tissues, atoms and into each of the chakras, along her spine as well as hands and feet.

In a regular chakra tuning, I would visualize the color that intuitively or traditionally corresponds to that particular chakra. This time I kept with visualizing the orange light from the center of the earth, coming up through the soles of my feet and through my body into my hands, and thus into the soles of my clients' feet. The energy was red and brown, and I had the impression of roughly hewn statues and carvings before my eyes, reminiscent of Mayan carvings, very tactile. When moving through each of her energy centers, I would experience visions that I would verbalize, all the while thinking, "just be an open channel."

When I reached the crown chakra, I had the client open to all of the celestial, universal and heavenly energies to meet with that earth energy and to pour its wisdom and universal healing energy through her in any way that would be beneficial now. At this point, I stopped speaking until the end of the appointment.

Normally, this client will talk nonstop the entire session. From the moment we began she was completely silent, following my words and clearly going deeper and deeper into a trance. I observed her eyelids flicker, breathing become more even and shallow, body clearly relaxing. I began to move up her body, moving from feet to knees to hips, touching lightly and feeling the pulses shift and change. My feet were tingling like crazy, as was my tail bone, with every inhalation I could feel pulling up that rich, red, brown earth energy and moving it easily into Joanne's body. With each exhalation, I felt the cool blue and violet, more wispy energies from the heavens, infusing her esthetic body. Behind my closed eyelids, I could easily see her aura, black to begin with then pulsing bright red.

When I got to her head, I sat down on a stool and place my hands on her face. I noticed I was pressing in a little, so consciously started to lighten my touch. The lighter my touch, the more I could feel our molecules melting away, and my fingers began to dissolve into her face. I had that moment of complete oneness, and as I breathed on her crown chakra I knew I was breathing into my self. I could scan down her body and easily see her skeleton, although bright green, with red spots flashing here and there. I wasn't aware of golden energy to send them, so just continued yo channel the reiki for the highest good.

I moved down her right side, touching her shoulder and hand. Here I had a vision that she was bailing out a life boat full to the brim with salt tears with a tea spoon. Suddenly she gabbed a toy bucket instead. The pint of view shifted, and you could see many people in the lifeboat, all helping her bail it out. Now her choice was whether to rejoin the cruise or head off to new waters.

I moved back down to her feet. I got down on my knees and held her ankles while sending orange  light down her body, which was appearing electric blue. I stood up and very deliberately began squeezing on her feet and toes, bringing her back into her body, waking up every part slowly and gently. I gave her a long time to reorient then checked in after she drank some water.

She said she had never gone so deep, but it felt like being gently cupped and supported rather than being dropped. Three days later we met again to check in. She was in good spirits and was involved in creating a memorial mural for her son the surfer as well as a blood drive in his honor.

Since then, I have had the opportunity to practice this technique with six hypnotherapy students, several clients and as a part of my morning meditation with my life partner. I have experienced the effects on all levels - astral, esthetic, physical, emotional, mental - and have been deeply grateful to do what I would consider a spring clearing of the soul, releasing emotional and mental clutter in particular, making way for increased energy and vitality.

Blessed be.

Hummingbird Magic

Hummingbird Magic

This morning I heard a noise in the hallway. My cat, the calico, had caught a hummingbird! I picked it up in my hands, went outside onto the deck, and did a backward count from a hundred. I could feel its' little heart against my fingers.

At about count thirty, the other cat came and rubbed against my legs. The hummingbird shot out of my hands, turned and hovered about two feet in front of my face, then shot up into the locust tree. There were a few feathers on my pant leg so I picked one up, held it for the last count down to zero.

When I opened my eyes, the hummingbird was still in the tree, then just zipped off into the sky. It felt like such a blessing. To me, hummingbirds represent joy, and I had this feeling of holding joy in my hands, praying for joy, and seeing joy have a new life. Extremely potent hummingbird magic!

Trichotillomania

Trichotillomania

Have you heard of trichotillomania? It is the compulsion to pull out your eyelashes, eyebrows or hair. I had a 14-year-old client come in, who had been engaging in this habit for about a year. Her smart parents decided to try hypnosis instead of putting her on medication. She stopped completely after just five sessions!

Hypnotherapy helped give her the insight that she was dealing with the stress of her parent's divorce (one year ago, hmmm) and she felt she was being "picked on". We discussed nervous energy being just that, energy, and she decided she'd rather pick on a guitar than pick on herself. She discovered she could take the turmoil in her heart and put it into words and music, allowing her an amazing way to share and express her feelings.

This is why I love what I do - guiding folks to discover their own solutions, for truly all healing is self-healing, and all hypnosis is self-hypnosis.

Pre-Surgery Hypnosis

Pre-Surgery Hypnosis

I worked with a client who had lost one of his eyes to cancer. He was going to have an intensive surgery procedure to seal the empty socket shut so that he could go back to surfing. He was going to be sedated for ten days and in the hospital for thirty days.

We did eight sessions of "acu-hyp" - hypnosis during an acupuncture session. He focused on letting go of his anger at the failure of his five past surgeries and the stress of his divorce, as well as affirming that he had always been a fast healer and that his body would respond to the new grafts.

Well, he was only sedated for one day and out of the hospital in ten days! You can imagine the enormous savings on the hospital bill. It is amazing to me that insurance will not pay for hypnosis when it is so effective in accelerating the healing process.

If you or someone you know is going into surgery, consider the benefits of hypnosis as a part of your process. Feel free to call or email with any questions!

Reclaiming Hypatia

I've been doing art projects that have been on my mind for years, including painting this statue from Philippa Bowers, which was part of a Goddess fountain when I had my cafe. About two-foot-tall, glazed in a matt green, cradling a large vibrant purple amethyst cluster, We named her Hypatia after the greek mathematician, who was killed by having her flesh flayed with oyster shells.

We would add a few drops of bleach each week to the fountain water, to keep down bacteria. After a dozen years, bleach deposit both built up and began to decay parts of her face and body, as well as loosening the crystals in her belly. After I closed Herland, Hypatia came to live in my garden, along with an assortment of other broken nosed and gently damaged goddesses. 

Being flayed was a feeling I related to, and during those dozen years, I got over a dozen tattoos. Much of this was a reclaiming of my body, my beliefs, and my standards of beauty. A way to be comfortable in my skin. Everyone has scars on the inside - mine are on the outside, and they are pretty, colorful, and make for good stories.

Now I'm experiencing a new body image issue, that of becoming the crone, the hag, the elder. What does it mean to age gracefully? What does it mean to express my authentic self? I am questioning dying my hair, working to accept my buddha belly (now I know why it's called "middle" age), while pondering the delight in creases, folds, and wrinkles. 

So I decided to paint Hypatia, to reclaim her as a symbol of my croning. Her hair is silver white, with a crown of pearls and roses. I will begin detailing more of her face and body next. I'm also painting a wooden stand to a marble table that she might sit on, and a ceramic cat from my daughter's garden. I like working like this, on a few projects at once, since as the paint is drying on one thing I can paint another one. 

Someday I'll invite you over to my kooky painted house. There are lots of murals, but also lots of furniture, lampshades, even the toilet is painted. Keep making beauty, keep making art!