It was about 15 years ago that I was first introduced to the Hindu deity Ganesh. As it turned out, my across the street neighbor in New Jersey came over to apologize for her son who had dented my garage door with a baseball. Although I had lived there for several years, we had never spoken to each other. Within five minutes of speaking, however, we found out that we were both born on the same month on the same date and even in the same year (albeit she in Bangalore, India and myself in Opelika, Alabama). This bit of coincidental information began a wonderful friendship.

Lucky for me, I became the frequent beneficiary of Amita’s mouth watering Indian dishes. I was amazed at her garage full of imported aromatic spices, quite a departure from warming up frozen meals in the microwave! Amita and I would be playful and laugh about the intersection of our two cultures. When she told me that her husband was from the highest caste in Indian and her caste was one below, I reminded her that she could date and marry anyone she wanted because she was hot stuff. 

I had always been interested in Hinduism, which is Amita’s religion, but I often felt confused by the many nuances, social structures and references that comprised this ancient religion. I was very blessed to have Amita to ask questions of and who was in appreciation of my interest. One day I noticed a statue of an elephant in Amita’s front garden. I had seen this representation before, but was unfamiliar with its meaning.

The elephant deity Ganesh is the great remover of obstacles. When we are feeling trapped by our circumstances, we might choose to call on Ganesh as a symbol of inspiration. Ganesh is often portrayed as dancing or enjoying day to day life activities. Ganesh reminds us that we won’t be able to move beyond our circumstances if we are weighed down by the heaviness of our day to day burdens. Ganesh’s playful appearance reminds us that if we would like to remove obstacles in our life we must step into an expanded and hopeful consciousness to absorb and move beyond our life challenges.

A Course in Miracles (ACIM) reminds us that miracles can change physical laws. Miracles, according to ACIM, are shifts in perceptions. Perhaps a representation of Ganesh in our life can help us to remember that shifts in awareness are always possible and available to us. My friend Lauren has a statue of Ganesh is her kitchen behind the sink. Ganesh is always there for her to offer encouragement.

ACIM also offers, “There is no order of difficulty in miracles.” While this idea may be challenging for us to get our minds around, I find it to be very empowering. The idea is that If you can shift your mind about anything, for example, forgiving someone who has been unkind to you, it is just as possible (no more difficult) to heal illness, to eradicate poverty, to stop hatred, racism or war. Some people may feel this to be a naïve perspective, however, many will give testament to the validity of this law.

Next time find we are feeling trapped by life, perhaps collectively we can look to Ganesh to remind us of our Divine truth.

(c) 2011 Jeanine Marie Austin, Ph.D., C.Ht.
Doctor of Life Coaching, Certified Hypnotherapist
Simply Divine Solutions
Life Coaching and Hypnosis Worldwide

http://www.SimplyDivineSolutions.com

480.491.007
Free Consultation Available

Be Kind; Everyone You Meet is Fighting a Hard Battle Philo of Alexandria

When I was in my early 20s, a bright eyed and eager social worker just out of college, I took a job in a skilled nursing facility. The nursing facility took patients from its nearby mother hospital who had long term care needs. The job was previously held by two mastered leveled social workers but had been narrowed to one when they couldn’t get along with each other. Unbeknownst to me, the facility was in economic straits, they saw energetic, bubbly me coming from a mile away.

This was not my first social work job, I had worked in a community child abuse center and had done other volunteer work. However, this was my first job dealing intensely with death and dying and its consequent suffering to date. Clearly, many patients were there to die. We served every walk of life including prostitutes, the chronically drug addicted (mostly long time heroin users) and the homeless. Although completely mired down in psychosocial assessments, I made it a point to do rounds everyday.

Many days I would get calls from patients who were dying and the most I could do was literally run upstairs, dressed in a white medical coat and be with them as they died. One woman I remembered so well struggled for months before she died with unrelenting bitterness and a deep desire to forgive. We talked and talked about the power of forgiveness. Although I was young and green, the gravity of the healing process was not lost on me.

Because the facility was near gang territory, it wasn’t unusual for us to hear gun shots being fired. One day we admitted a young man, about my age, to the facility. He was a John Doe who had been dropped off at the entrance of the mother hospital two weeks previously by his fellow gang members. He had been beaten in the head with a baseball bat. Hauntingly, even two weeks after the attack, no one came to claim him. Somehow, it became my job to see if I could find out who he belonged to and where he was from. He wore nothing but a diaper as I checked his body for tell tale tattoos which might give more information. I knew that a young man my age would be mortified to have a young woman see him in a diaper. I sat in his hospital room staring blankly at him for hours wondering how someone could be discarded without anyone to mourn him. We never did find out who he was. He died after his second day with us.

As I contemplate this young man and so many others who I’ve worked with over 25 years, the developmentally challenged, the abused, the elderly, the chronically drug addicted, the incarcerated, decades later, I wonder about alleviating suffering, both existential and “naked” (chronic or abiding).

As a teenager, I started off working in classrooms and later parlayed my experience with children into child abuse focused social work because I wanted to work with problems of suffering in what seemed to be a more direct way. I later pursued life coaching because social work seemed to take place only as an adjunct to the big institutions (the church, the school system, the welfare system, etc..). It seemed to me those institutions with their red tape, mind numbing bureaucracy and lack of belief in the value of the individual seemed to cause as much, and at times, more problems than were there in the first place. Presently, it seems life coaching gives me an opportunity to help clients utilize all of their natural strengths, use tried and true tools or philosophies such as positive psychology, personality measures and hypnosis and even the clients own spiritual perspectives to ameliorate existential suffering.

However, as someone who wrote her dissertation on suffering, I am often haunted by whether or not I am doing enough to ameliorate it. Certainly, life coaching is not associated with deep suffering. That is psychotherapy’s domain. However, I once read a story whose origins I don’t remember, about a therapist who traveled to a war ravaged country. She felt inadequate to deal with such depth of suffering. To her surprise, a majority of her client’s angst had to do with the same things she dealt with her clientele back at home: romantic challenges, self loathing and feelings of alienation.

After contemplating over two decades in people helping professions, I have come to somewhat of a conclusion. We can all strive to help that person in front of us, whomever that might be. It is obvious that some people are suffering and we can and should do what we can. But it was Henry David Thoreau who acknowledged that “Most men lead lives of quiet desperation.” Certainly, it is important to help all who suffer and surely that is most of us. Mother Teresa offered “We cannot do great things on this earth, only small things with great love.”

Some people ask me why I would sponsor children from other countries (presently I sponsor children from India and Ecuador) when there are children that are impoverished in the United States. My response is that to me it doesn’t matter where kids are from, they just happen to assign me those children. I try to serve who shows up including those who I become aware of in seemingly random ways.

I am so moved by Father Gregory Boyle who started Homeboy Industries. He didn’t speak Spanish when he started working with gang members from Boyle Heights, California, but he showed up for them. Initially, when he was assigned to that parish, he felt hugely inadequate but he has brought untold healing to that community. Just like Father Gregory, right here, right now, may be the place you can do the most good in alleviating suffering.

(c) 2011 Jeanine Marie Austin, Ph.D., C.Ht.
Doctor of Life Coaching, Certified Hypnotherapist
Simply Divine Solutions
Life Coaching and Hypnosis Worldwide

http://www.SimplyDivineSolutions.com

480.491.0770
Free Consultation Available

Many of us have come to believe that our worldly experiences are born from our perceptions. Moreover, many now believe that it is the inner world which is mirrored in the outer world. While some people believe that we create by doing in the world via outwardly motivated strategy and effort, perhaps because of the metaphysical ideology explained in the movies The Secret and What the Bleep Do We Know? , many people now desire to shift their attention, awareness and ultimately awaken their consciousness to affect a divinely inspired life.

There is a metaphysical principle which states that the highest level of consciousness is surrender. This idea seems to be in conflict with the idea of actively creating our reality. In fact, it was a personal challenge for me to get my mind around this concept. I have enjoyed creating affirmations and having my desires manifest in the world. When I discovered this idea about 24 years ago, I was excited to find out how easily I manifested my desires into being.

However, when we align ourselves with God, Source and Divine desire, however we conceptualize it, we can manifest love-based forms and situations which are often better than what we could have imagined. We really are already one with all that we desire. These desires and outcomes impact the whole of humanity, not just our individual lives. Of course, we all have personal preferences and desires, and there is nothing inherently wrong with personal desire. We can always intend our desires. But often we forget to “release” them to God. Many who are working on affirming may state their desire and also add earnestly “this or something better”. When we release we are surrendering to the fact that we may not know what is best and may not know what exactly will serve the higher good. The adage “Be careful what you wish for” is addressed by this action.

The metaphysical textbook A Course in Miracles has students ask “What would you have me do?” This form of release and surrender creates a powerful flow in our lives. Our mission becomes “How can I serve?” rather than “What can I get?”

There is nothing wrong with desiring the new job, relationship, car, or the perfect state of health. But beyond these personal desires lay the opportunity to act from compassion and recognize that we are all a part of the holographic whole. Many spiritual teachers believe that compassion is love in action and is the highest form of love. When we act from compassion we are aligned with our inner being, acting from our essential self and our most awakened consciousness.

To deliberately act from the awakened or conscious mind we might start by intending it. We can align with a capital “S”ource perspective rather than a small “s”ource perspective. For example, if we wish to buy a home, but the prevailing thought of those around is that this is a bad time to buy, we can remember that this is a little “s” perspective. Our source of information in this case is those around us. They are responding to their reality based on fear or thoughts that “what is” isn’t enough. Aligning with Source, gives us an empowered perspective. Our source is not other people’s ideas, fears or perspectives, but in fact, the abundance which is of God.

It is true that the mind cannot serve two masters. We must choose our allegiances. We can choose fear based thoughts or love based thoughts. If we live in duality we may try and choose both and end up confusing and frustrating ourselves and those around us.

We may have to be deliberate in order not to buy into the thought patterns or race consciousness of the world. It may be highly important to seek support to stay on the path of love. Because we live physically in a temporal world, we are often seduced into believing that the world we experience with our five senses is the whole enchilada. However, the more we operate from an expanded and awakened consciousness the more we begin to see clearly that there is a universal intelligence which will help us if we allow for it.

(c) 2011 Jeanine Marie Austin, Ph.D., C.Ht.
Doctor of Life Coaching, Certified Hypnotherapist
Simply Divine Solutions
Life Coaching and Hypnosis Worldwide

http://www.SimplyDivineSolutions.com

Free Consultation Available

jeanine@simplydivinesolutions.com
480.491.0770

For many, Our Lady of Guadalupe is thought to be an aspect of Mary, the mother of Christ. She is said to have first appeared to Mexican Indian Juan Diego on December 9, 1531 and appeared four times over a period of four consecutive days. Her visits with Juan Diego took place on the hill of Tepeyac near Mexico City, Mexico.

Juan Diego, know as Juanito to his family, was walking from his village to the city when he first saw La Virgen Morena (the brown skinned virgin). She requested that Juan Diego ask Spanish Bishop John to build a church in her name.

Being a Mexican Indian, 57 year old Juan Diego did not have great deal of pull with the Spanish run Catholic Church. Guadalupe appeared to him four times and four times he appealed to the Bishop.

On his forth visit with Bishop John, Juan Diego brought Castilian roses that Our Lady had arranged for him in his tilma (a multi-purposed cloth wrap that is often used by Indians to carry food or children and perhaps to keep the beholder warm). The Spanish roses are indigenous to Spain not Mexico and in addition were believed not to grow in wintertime. The roses were to signify a miracle to Bishop John in order to prove Juan Diego was telling the truth. Juan Diego unwrapped his tilma of roses in front of Bishop John only to discover that there was a perfect image of Our Lady of Guadalupe on his garment. This iconic picture has been photographed and can be found in the Basilica of Guadalupe in Mexico City, Mexico.

The image of Our Lady of Guadalupe seems to represent the very essence of unconditional love. For many of us, Our Lady represents the Divine unconditional mother.

When we study this iconic picture of Our Lady of Guadalupe we might wonder about the relationship of this aspect of the Virgin Mary, Mother of Jesus, to the indigenous Mexican goddess and lunar deity Tonantzin. Certainly, native imagery is represented in this iconography. Moreover, it is theorized that Our Lady may have used the Aztec Nahuatl word coatlaxopeuh (pronounced quatlasupe) which sounds like the Spanish word Guadalupe. In any case, the integration and inclusion of different cultural and religious references for the Divine feminine invites us to see ourselves in her representation.

Last year on December 12th, as part of my so far unending quest to learn Spanish, I watched the news in Spanish. I saw thousands of religious penitents traveling from all over Mexico and presumably the world, making a pilgrimage to Mexico City’s 17th century Basilica of Guadalupe, which is just one of many churches built in the valley where Juan Diego experienced the apparitions of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Perhaps, this annual ritual is a touching and heartfelt demonstration of the longing to embrace the Divine feminine.

Yesterday, I was driving my son to school and was stuck in bumper to bumper traffic. There was heavy construction and I was concerned we would be late. The level of frustration of those around me felt palpable. I look over at an adjacent car only to see a large decal image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. In the temporal world, where much of our emotional atmosphere can be aggressive and hostile, this image of Guadalupe as humble, patient, serene and gentle, certainly stood in contrast to the building road rage of those around me.

On closer inspection, Guadalupe’s eyes are cast downward in humility. In her famous image, Our Lady of Guadalupe has been depicted as standing on a half moon which archetypically represents the feminine. Her hands are clasped and beneath them is a cross representing the four directions, often utilized by First Nation tribes. Much of the symbolism represented by her clothing and surrounding imagery is archetypal symbolism that encompasses Judaic, Christian, Spanish and Indigenous representations.

We are often tempted to see ourselves as separate from others. When we believe in separation, we invite fear, hostility and perhaps ultimately, aggression. Remembering the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe on December 12th may offer us an opportunity to appreciate her unifying image and to answer the call to allow the gentle feminine principle into our lives, whether we are male or female. She is said to have told Juan Diego in one of her visits, “Expect miracles and you will find them.”

Resources: 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_of_Guadalupe
The Story of Our Lady of Guadalupe: Three People, four Days and Many Miracles by J. Janda. The Paulist Press, 1988.
 
(c) 2007 Jeanine Marie Austin, Ph.D.
, C.Ht.

Doctor of Life Coaching, Certified Hypnotherapist
Simply Divine Solutions
Life Coaching and Hypnosis Worldwide

http://www.SimplyDivineSolutions.com

480.491.0770
Free Consultation Available

“To everything there is a season, and
 a time to every purpose under the heavens.” 
~ Ecclesiastes Chapter 3 Verses 1-8

Several years ago I faced a devastating challenge. Before the onset of the challenge I had dealt with more than my share of challenges. Like many of you reading this, I had experienced break-ups, loses, failures and even natural disasters, but nothing had prepared me for this particular form of devastation.

As I had done somewhat successfully in the past, I tried to outthink my own suffering. I even wrote a 252 page dissertation on suffering. But we know as Einstein told us that “You can’t solve a problem with the level of thought that created it.” I tried to deny my suffering, but often burst into tears when anyone asked, “How are you, really?” I even tried to distract myself by taking up a hobby and keeping myself very busy.

No matter what I did, however, my singular bone chilling awareness was, “This is what is going to take me out. There is no going back. For all intents and purposes, my life is over.”

Some spiritual teachers have called this experience The Dark Night of the Soul. I knew that people often survived their dark night experience and sometimes even thrived afterwards. “That is wonderful for them” I thought, “but the truth is that I will never be truly happy again.”

What we can learn from the pattern of the spiral, exemplified by the beautiful nautilus or the Buddhist prayer wheel, is that life goes on, even beyond itself. We can be happy again if we choose to move up the spiral. Like the organic patterns of the nautilus, we will be supported by natural patterning if we will allow ourselves to be supported.

It turn out that what helped me move up the spiral and embrace happiness again was two people who came into my life, both who had lost children, in fact three between them. They were always there to support me and allow me to soak their shirts with my tears. I shared my feelings while they reminded me of my own divinity and the divine truth of my experience. Often they even made me laugh. Unconditional love can help us move upward on the spiral towards a healed perspective like nothing else can. What Americans call “mouth to mouth resuscitation” the British call “the kiss of life”. Certainly, love offers us the kiss of life like nothing else can.

While love offered me a profound healing, I certainly don’t want to sugar coat the experience of moving along the spiral of healing. To be honest, most people were not terribly supportive to me during this dark time. In fact, some were insensitive, some were indifferent and even a handful were cruel. This experience taught me that in these times whether we are nurturing someone else’s healing or are dealing with our own, one person can alchemize any situation, no matter how grave, with the gift of love.

If we pay attention to the gifts of the spiral we can see its inherent wisdom. What doesn’t get healed or what feels like the end will often come back around to be healed. An old boyfriend of mine who I hadn’t talked to in over 25 years contacted me several years ago. He was still in some pain around our break up many years ago. I got to apologize for my abruptness and insensitivity during the break-up and he was relieved to find out I hadn’t ended our relationship because I thought he was inadequate, but in fact because I was afraid.

When we are feeling lost or in despair we might meditate on the peace and pattern of the spiral. The shifting contours of the spiral offer us in every movement a chance to heal, reconnect, renew and to be reborn.
 
(c) 2008 Jeanine Austin, Ph.D., C.Ht
Doctor of Life Coaching, Certified Hypnotherapist
Simply Divine Solutions
Life Coaching and Hypnosis Worldwide

http://www.SimplyDivineSolutions.com

480.491.0770




With the popularity of The Law of Attraction, many of us are confused regarding how to deal with aspects of our life that persist, despite our best efforts. Do we accept what is? Do we deny what is? By trying to change what is, are we putting our attention on what we don’t want, thereby creating more of what we don’t want? Do we try to tease thoughts free from our sub-conscious minds and tackle the intransigent that way? Or, do we keep focusing our attention on what we actually do want?





These questions call to mind something that happened in my life a few days before Thanksgiving last year. It was evening and I was headed to karate class with my boys. As I was backing out of the driveway, I noticed in my rear view mirror a BIG black goat right behind me. I was concerned for the safety of the goat, because it was growing dark, and she, being black, was very hard to see.

I know very little about goat wrangling, and despite living on a horse property, fancy myself a sort of Ava Gabor “Lisa Douglas” from Green Acres type character. 



Lo and behold a Good Samaritan woman and her daughter driving down the street came to the rescue. They helped me pull the goat into my backyard (no mean feat!). I headed down the street and let my very popular neighbor Teia know about the goat. She promised to spread the word and I assumed the goat would be claimed by the time we returned. My kids were disappointed the goat wouldn’t be there when we got back. However, she was there when we returned; no one had claimed her.





Two days and a lot of goat poo on the patio later, the goat was still with us. Despite the novelty of having her, she was getting to be a lot of work for me. I was anxious to return her to her home. We made phone calls and posted notes, but no one called. She didn’t seem very pleased to be with us either. She madly butted her head at the kids and the dog and she slammed the glass window doors so hard in the evenings, I was afraid she would break them. She even managed to find her way on to the safety pool cover and it jiggled like Jello as she walked on it. Poor thing! It was as if she had found her way to an alternative and highly unpleasant universe. Clearly she was missing home.





Despite the challenges of the children’s and the dog’s safety and the stinky goat poo of course, I started to think about the concept of acceptance. I began to see this goat as a metaphor for some things in my life that weren’t changing, despite earnest efforts. I recently heard a healer say to a woman, who despite diligent metaphysical practices was still legally blind, that her gift was her vision because she wasn’t restricted by her physical eyes. Sometimes, we can’t see that our challenges are our greatest gifts. Consequently, I began to think about keeping the goat. And besides, who am I to argue with a goat?





Should we keep focusing on what we want? Of course. But if what is persists we resist we just may create more of what we don’t want. What we think about expands. And maybe, just maybe, this thing that we don’t want really is a gift. My kids loved sharing at church that the thing they were most grateful for that Thanksgiving was the goat they found. Children and adults alike laughed, as they had never heard of such a thing! Who finds a goat walking down the street?





As soon as I accepted the goat as part of the family she left us. As it turned out, the owner had been on vacation and his goat had escaped. He was never really friendly to me before, but now I was in his good graces as I had saved and cared for his much loved goat! Maybe the most powerful part of the lesson for me was that as soon as I found acceptance, the goat’s owner was found. I no longer had attention on how it should be. I had come to accept what was. 



Sometimes it may be best to love what is. I invite you to tap in to your own truth about this and see what your answers are.

(c) 2007 Jeanine Marie Austin, Ph.D., C.Ht.
Doctor of Life Coaching, Certified Hypnotherapist
Simply Divine Solutions
Life Coaching and Hypnosis Worldwide

http://www.SimplyDivineSolutions.com

480.491.0770

Free Consultation Available