Notes from 11/30/11

Today was the first meeting of the ‘Communion of Souls’. We gathered, communed, prayed, meditated together, and shared. There were three of us who met together. We began the session by greeting each other in the kitchen. We then moved into the dining room where we gathered in a circle of chairs. We took a moment to contemplate what we felt we needed to pray for, have answered in our lives, or what we felt others may need. We then wrote these thoughts down on paper, folded them up, and placed them in a crystal bowl into the center of our circle. We held hands and began our mediation/prayer time. I opened the circle with an invitation to God to hear and answer our prayers. We announced our names into the circle that we created and spoke of our thoughts and desires for ourselves, our families, and our community. As we spoke of our prayers there was a comfort and compassion that came over each of us knowing that we are not alone and that many of us have the same thoughts and concerns and desire for our wishes to be listened to and answered. We also knew that we did not have to speak our thoughts out loud and that writing our requests down on paper was good enough for our hearts. There is a peace in knowing that all it takes is for you to make the effort to show up and commune with others that creates the power for miracles to occur. We took 20 minutes to commune in silence and then ended the session. Some of us spoke of what they ‘saw’ during the meditation and some of us listened. After the circle ended I took the crystal bowl outside and sacredly burned our prayers with the knowing that we completed our circle and sent our prayers out to the universe trusting that they are answered. This was a wonderful hour of time spent in the presence of compassionate and loving energy. I look forward to more circles in the future and will continue to gather them here in my home. I will always hold the space for those that come and do not come. Knowing that each Wednesday morning is sacred time for your soul in the presence of others is a fantastic and wonderful experience. Holding this space for you in my home is an honor. If you feel that you would like to make the next circle or would like more information on other groups I will be starting in the future please send me an email to add you to the email list. My email is Jen.Burkhart@comcast.net
Jennifer

Our New Home

Sunday, November 27th, 2011

We’ve been living in Chicago for about 3 months now. We left Michigan due to a job transfer. My husband received a job promotion and we decided that this would be the best for our entire family. My husband works for a large corporation and has done very well for him and for us. This is an exciting opportunity. We found a place to live in Libertyville, IL which is about an hour north away from the heart of downtown Chicago. Thus far, all my kids have found their place in school and with sports. The elementary school is very good and very accommodating for all my children’s needs. Aiden and Eleanor play ice hockey. Aiden, our 8 year old, was even chosen to be on the ‘select’ ice hockey team that takes the best of all the players out of his age group and puts them on a team together. They won their first tournament today and played one of the hottest teams out here, called the Falcons. Aiden had the winning goal of the game. It was pretty exciting and intense. My husband and I cheered, hugged, and jumped up and down for joy at the sight of our son winning the game for his team! Eleanor, our 5 year old, is thrilled to be playing ice hockey as well. She is a mini might and enjoying every moment of this empowering sport. Ethan, our 10 year old who was born with a condition called spina bifida, has continued playing sled hockey out here. The team is 10 minutes from our home, as opposed to 45 minutes out in Michigan. His team is a lot larger than his previous team, more organized, and a lot more focused on building true sled hockey skills. He has found his passion when it comes to sports and gets very excited about playing each Sunday when we come out here for a 2 hour practice. My husband, Andy is not only busy with his job building relationships and a successful work team but he is busy coaching Aiden’s ice hockey team and Eleanor’s ice hockey team as well. He seems to be taking coaching for fun and in real life very seriously. It is certainly inspiring to see my kids and my husband thrive. This is truly the space that we need to be in at this time in our lives.

The past 5 months have been bitter and sweet all at the same time. We decided in July that we would come to Chicago and by the 3rd week in August we had found a house, packed up a home, elongated our friendships out from Michigan, and were living in an apartment in Chicago starting the kids first week of school. 4 weeks later we obtained our home, had some extensive work done on the new/old home we bought (101 years old) and moved in. Now, the last week of November, I am sitting at the Falcons ice arena, in Lake Bluff, IL watching my oldest son, Ethan practice sled hockey on a very organized team. Through it all we certainly had our moments of doubt, we had our moments of sheer confusion, frustration, anger and passionate consideration as to, “what did we do?” But now, looking back on it all, how much we have grown, how much we have learned, I would not turn around and go back. We are here for phenomenal reasons and it has been nothing but GOOD for us all. Yes, we have had our hiccups along the way but each of us is growing because of it. When faced with turmoil in your life it is all about the perspective you take on the position you are on and what you can make of it. There are some things we have just had to let go and many new and better things we have been able to embrace. Working together within our family and the new people we meet we have been able to take each situation that seems insurmountable and turn it into a fantastic learning experience.

As for me and my practice and what I left in Michigan and how I am going to develop that and more out here. It is a passion in progress. All doubt of the miraculous that ever remained in my body has disappeared. I firmly believe that the answers to life’s most pressing and heart wrenching questions always remain in the heart, no matter what. This move has brought me to this belief without a doubt. I now know that anything is possible and that miracles are always happening in all ways. Every prayer, every thought, every idea is always answered. Always in all ways. Our job is just to remain clear and open to the insights and answers that are always there. Now that I am feeling settled in this miraculous place where I live I am beginning several main areas of practice. The first is to bring soul groups together to invoke the power of prayer, the power of intention, and the power of one’s intuition. Prayer circles are being established as well as the Healing Intuitive Circles. I am also working 1:1 with clients helping them to heal past physical and emotional traumas. These two areas, individually and collectively are very important to me. My phone line will be open on a regular basis for intuitive readings. I will have a separate line for parties to call.

Honestly, when I left Michigan I was unsure as to whether or not I would still be doing this work when I came out here to Chicago. To be honest, it seemed a little intimidating with all these experienced folks out here who all seem to be practicing the same things I do. They even have firsthand experience with pretty awesome gurus and have spent a lot of money educating themselves. But, to only light a candle to what I do is not fair to me, my soul, or the people I touch. It doesn’t manner how much money you spend on education or what kind of gurus you have studied with, it only matters if you are staying true to your heart and following the whispers of your soul. I am.

This move has taught me that I needed to learn many lessons before I began my work again. I needed a refocus, a reigniting, and a reinvigoration. One of the largest lessons I learned is that this work is part of my soul, it is in my bones, and to not do this work would be to suffer. So, now I have lit the fire and am allowing it to burn within my soul. I keep adding to the fire allowing soul to show me where to go and what types of classes to build next. For now, it is prayer that we all need to ignite in our hearts. Prayer within the presence of others is necessary with the knowing that where 2 or more have gathered, miracles can happen and will happen. Finally, I invite you to these prayer circles if you can come and lastly I invite you into my life. Life is a masterpiece in progress. We get to paint and paint again whatever we want on our canvas. I would be honored to share it with you.
I will continue on my blog, as always, because there is so much to share.
All my love, Mother Love…Mother Light,
Jennifer

The Waters of Change

In the past several weeks it has become very apparent to me that there is something that each of us struggles with on a daily basis. In small and large quantities we are faced with this one thing that challenges us daily. It is a constant in our world. It is change. Change is around us all the time. Basically, we make assumptions on the way things are supposed to be or are supposed to work out, we count on these things to work out the way we ‘think’ they should. Something may change and the scenario that we assumed in our mind has all of a sudden changed into something else that we now have to ‘think’ about accepting. Few…this can be a difficult and aggravating process if we are constantly trying to control what happens. Then we try to come up with other ways to make things work out the way we ‘think’ they should so that we can be happy the way we ‘think’ we can be happy if the things we want to happen work out the way we want them to work out. Got that? That is the way a lot of us go around in our heads working out life and making sure life works out the way we want it to. Seems to me that this can take a lot of energy, a lot of work that can be exhausting. So what do we do about this? Hmmm…it can be fairly simple if we ALLOW it to be. I invite you to read on and open your intuitive imagination up to what you are about to read…I invite you to open your hearts and FEEL another possibility that does not involve thinking and attempting to control. It involves announcing to the universe what you would like to have happen, what you feel in your heart brings to your life happiness and then letting go of the outcomes… It involves embracing CHANGE.

Change encompasses our very being. It constantly is asking us to dance. It challenges us and invites us to embrace the world. Change wants us to accept and love each other exactly where we are in this moment. It speaks to us wherever we are and with whatever we are doing and tells us that all is right and good in the world. Change wants us to understand that “It’s All Good” and to “Embrace the Chaos” because everything will always work itself out in the future.
Change is much like water. When you are in a body of water, let’s say a river or the ocean, it is very often difficult to resist the directions that water wants to take you. Many times we have to paddle very hard, or swim very confidently in order to break the pattern of where the waves may be trying to take you. This can all be very tiring after awhile and we often find ourselves needing a place to rest if we do not want to go where the water wants to take us. Water is a life giving element that we cannot live without. It is a force that we learn to work with every day. Water cannot be made. It cannot be grown, shaped, or formed just as it is. It must be accepted. Our job is to embrace the water and use it to help us out in so many conventional ways. We have learned how to put it in tubes and contain it is large bodies so that it flows directly in to our homes to be used to feed, clean, nurture, and embrace our lives. Then we see that water is untamable and comes on its own with a powerful force that can knock down villages, destroy cities, homes, places we grew up. Sometimes we have no control and we must learn to accept.


This is the same for change, wherever you are in life, whatever it is that you may be doing; stop resisting. I encourage you to imagine yourself loving where you are, accepting, and going with the flow. Allow the waters of change to help you to learn to ride the waves and trust that they will take you to extraordinary places. For this to happen, you must open your heart. Open your heart to love and with love you cannot fail. With love, the waters will flow easier and change will come easily. Accept the flow of change and miracles begin to blossom all around you. Your heart will enlighten every situation in your life. It will allow you to see with new eyes, new light, and a newness that is so enlightened that the darkness has no option but to fade away. I can tell you this because I have seen decades of darkness in my life and the only way I was ever able to see light again was through acceptance and riding the waves of change. I encourage you to ride the waves, get on your surfboard, and see yourself coasting on through. You may have to jump off from time to time, you may crash, and you may find yourself falling many, many times, but the nice thing about riding the waves of change is that every time you fall there is always a place to catch you. Water is all around you and what better place to fall than into a pool of welcoming water. There is nothing that will hurt you; it’s like landing on a soft mattress.

This is what happens when you trust and go with faith that you will be carried exactly where you need to be. The water catches you, it embraces every part of your body, and when you learn to trust it allows you to come to the surface and float. You are carried on top of the water instead of sinking to the bottom out of fear and the need to control. When we feel that we must control, we tread water so that we don’t sink for fear of dying, we attempt to swim to the shore or find something to grasp onto to hold us up, we use all of our energy out of fear that the worst will happen. Eventually, we can not work so hard to keep ourselves alive. Eventually, we become so tired that we have to take a rest. When there is nothing around that we can see to hold onto and when there is nothing around us to keep us from drowning, what do we do? Sometimes we panic...and sometimes we remember that all we have to do is allow ourselves to float, to trust, and allow a greater force to take over and carry us wherever we need to go. This is when we must allow faith to carry us, we must allow the waves of grace to carry us to the shore, and allow us to find a place to ground our feet in the sand, rise up and walk out upon the shore. We will always be carried to safety, we will always make it to the shores, we will always be taken exactly where we are meant to go, all we have to do is open and allow, put resistance aside, trust, and watch as the waves carry us through. Every storm will pass, every mountain was once carved out by the sea, and everything on this earth depends on the one element that keeps us alive. Embrace the changing waters and you will bring in everlasting light into your life.

Yes, it can be that simple.

Intuition and Your Heart Song

My intention when starting this new blog was to find ways to inspire those around me. Inspire those around me to do what? Inspire you to just be in the moment, that’s what. Now why would you want to be in the moment? Because the present is all that we have. Every moment we spend enjoying where we are and what we are doing right now is a gift we get to open continuously. When we truly stay focused on the now and enjoy what we are doing we get to feel what it is like to listen to our heart’s song and tap into our intuition. As I had mentioned in my previous blog, an ice hockey player just knows exactly when to ‘take the shot’ and he/she instinctively knows how to angle the hockey stick in such a way that will get the puck in the exact corner of the net so that the goalie cannot block. She does not stop and think…”What do I do now?” “I wonder if I paid my Master Card bill? Did I forget to take the lasagna out of the oven again?” Could you imagine that? No, he is expected to do only exactly what he is doing in that moment. Play ice hockey. If that person playing, is doing what he loves to do, then he is listening to his heart’s song. Whether he wins or loses the game he is still loving what he does and following the passion of his heart. Then in every moment of the game, what does he get to do? Listen to his intuition and live instinctively in the moment. He is living life through his heart.

What do animals in the wild do? They live in the moment. Nature has a lot to teach us about loving and enjoying life. Geese instinctively know when to fly south, squirrels know when to gather nuts for the coming winter months, birds know how to catch their food, they all just follow their instincts. They don’t think about whether they should or should not grab the worm needed to feed the baby birds in the nest. They do what they feel is needed. They listen to their instincts, to their intuition. They, “Just Do It”. You don’t need to teach a seed to grow or when a salmon needs to swim upstream. It all happens naturally. Naturally, they listen to their heart’s song.

We as human’s have a song inside that is just waiting to be sung. This song, when it is sung allows for the other moments in your life to all feel like beautiful present’s just waiting to be opened one by one. When you tune into to what you love to do the rest will follow. The days will seem brighter, the sky may not seem so gray, and all will fall into place. So listen to your heart. It is your intuition talking to you. It is your intuition knocking on your door wanting you to open it and come on in. Sit down and have a beer with your heart, a glass of wine, a cup of coffee, or a glass of water. Find out what you love to do, what makes your heart sing and you will begin to find your song in life, your intuition.

Of course we have bills to pay, chores to do, deadlines to meet, and stuff to get done. There is a time and place to do that too. There is a time and a place to put our energy towards the stuff that we feel we must do to pay the rent, get the food on the table, and make sure we have clean clothes to wear. But is all that worth doing if we don’t have sunshine in our heart’s as we are doing it? Does life seem any better if all we do is worry about what is going to happen in the future? What if we could bring the sunshine in right now, in this moment, as much as possible throughout our days? Even when the sunshine doesn’t seem like it is there, what if we could just know within our heart’s that the rain will pass and the sun will come out? What if? Wouldn’t our lives change in ways that we never would have been able to experience before? Wouldn’t we be able to embrace our heart’s song on a daily basis and just know that “Every little thing, is gonna be alright?” Bob Marley knew a lot about listening to his heart’s song.
I challenge you today, to find the beat of your own drummer, the tune of your soul, the masterpiece of your heart. Go out and do it too. Find your heart song and make a point to do it every day, then watch your intuition grow and life all around you change for the better. Watch as your heart sings even when life doesn’t seem to be alright. Because, every little thing is REALLY gonna be alright. There is a video on you tube that my husband had me watch when the sunshine in my heart was not too bright one rainy and dreary day. I encourage you to watch it too, it speaks volumes on the importance of singing our own tune. See below….

Honey Bear
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oQfagXfBqE&feature=youtube_gdata_player

What is Intuitive Muscle?

What does it mean to use your intuitive muscle? Let's begin with breaking up the words. Dictionary.com defines Intuition as...

1. The ability to understand something immediately, without the need for conscious reasoning.
2. A thing that one knows or considers likely from instinctive feeling rather than conscious reasoning.

When you are using your intuition you are taping into the part of you that just knows something without any rational explanation. It is the feeling part of you. It is associated with the feelings you get when you know something to be true without any doubt in your mind and body. This is a laywoman's way of defining intuition. For many people it occurs when they are deeply engrossed in something they love to do. The activity is similar to a meditation type experience. They become so involved in their activity that certain knowledge just comes to them without any explanation as to where this information is coming from. Answers to problems, answers to questions they have been pondering, answers to life long struggles just come to them like a light bulb turning on. They automatically know what to do in that exact moment of their life either about what to do instinctively now or about something they have struggled over that concerns the future.
Intuition speaks to us in so many different and interesting ways. It speaks to you when you meet someone for the first time and you feel like you have known them for years. Or when you meet someone for the first time and you just feel that there is something about them you do not like. You are not sure what it is but you know that you just do not want to be around this person. Intuition speaks to you when you are on the basketball court and you automatically know that if you position yourself in a particular corner of the court at the exact moment that your opponent has the ball you'll be able to block him, steal the ball, and carry on to score in the game. Intuition comes to us without thinking. It is not an activity of the mind but a knowing, feeling, and doing of the heart & body. Intuition is present when we relax into the ebb and flow of life and allow life to emerge all on its own instead of trying to control how and the speed of which life unfolds. Intuition is how we practice listening to our heart and body instead of our minds. It is about letting go gracefully while still holding onto the reigns with a comfortable grasp that allows us to steer in tune with where life is directing us to go and with where you feel you would like to go all at the same time. It's about allowing life to unfold with its own beauty and grace that we can not comprehend when we attempt to control the hows, whys, and how longs. It's about having a birthday everyday and unwrapping the gifts one by one as they are presented to us and as we allow them to emerge before us.
That's intuition. It allows us to relax into the unknown, knowing that we always have choices in our lives. It allows us to be in the moment joyfully sharing our experiences with others and allowing the synchronicity of life to commune with our spirit.

Now, why do we call it a muscle? Muscle is defined as..."A tissue composed of fibers capable of contracting to effect bodily movement or maintain position of parts of the body."
We know that in order to keep the muscles of our body in shape and serving the purpose to help us move easily through life we have to practice stretching and strengthening them on a daily basis. It is often recommended that we get in 20 minutes of exercise everyday in order to keep our mind and our bodies healthy. Imagine if we gave the same 20 minutes to our intuitive muscles daily what kind of difference it would make in facilitating the ease of our lives. Like our muscles, the more we practice using it the stronger and more supportive it becomes. This muscle is strengthened by placing our intent into the universe, allowing ourselves to quiet our minds, and opening up to the possibilities that our hearts and bodies know best. Instead of controlling the ebb and flow of life, we ride the waves and co create peacefully. Faithfully, we allow life to unfold naturally. There is no anger, no fear no resentment, no confusion, no disappointment, no sleepless nights, or unhappiness associated with this type of living. It is about setting your intention as to what you 'feel' you want out of life and allowing it to become your reality. It is about faithfully walking in the moment of life and allowing guidance to take you where you would like to go. If you happen to be taken another direction then you thought you were supposed to go then it is about allowing yourself to receive all the gifts that have taken you on this alternative path. You may never have received any of these gifts if you had not decided to follow the path that has been laid out before you. If you are used to controlling your life and laboring over every decision you must make in your life; then this can be a somewhat challenging way to begin living. It means that you must trust that everything will 'work out' and unfold exactly how it is 'supposed to' in the exact moment it is supposed to be revealed. For many, it is extremely difficult to do this and it is harder than anything they have ever done before. Many do not come to the point in their life where they are willing to live life intuitively until they have become so exhausted from trying to control everything in their lives that they feel that they cannot go on 'doing' anymore.
Fortunately, there are so many different ways to exercise this muscle that it can be easier than one may realise. Like many techniques in sports it is all about the way you perceive the situation. It's all in 'the wrist' for a tennis player or ice hockey player, it's all in how you keep your 'eye on the ball' for the batter or the billiards player, it's all in how you allow the information to flow for the intuitive. Just like a runner practices running, a yogi practices yoga, and a writer practices writing. An intuitive practices using intuition. It is that quiet little voice in your heart that used to be very loud when you were a child. It's the voice that makes your heart sing and allows you to have fun. It's the voice of incredible wisdom that knows the peaceful path to take in every situation. Once we tune in and allow this muscle to speak and expand it keeps becoming louder and stronger until we realise one day that we are listening and following automatically, without hesitation and that life seems to be flowing without distractions or distortions. Similar to what happens when you drive the same route everyday and you find yourself at your destination with no recollection of the route you took to get there. You drove without thinking about the turns, the stop lights, the other traffic, or the radio playing in your car. You were in the flow of life and you automatically knew what to do. Life is like that; it just knows how to unfold. So, set your intention today to begin building your intuitive muscle. Begin taking note of the beauty of life around you and how situations and events reveal themselves to you exactly when they should. Follow the path and allow yourself to be. It is an amazing way to live joyfully and peacefully all at the same time.

(I encourage you to come back and visit this site for inspiration on how to build your intuitive muscle. I'll be sharing my experiences living life through intuition and how simply I was lead to live life in this way. I hope you can find peace wherever you are and joy in every moment.)