Compassion

I’m a bit under the weather today with a high fever and a very sore throat.  Thank goodness my kids are here to help me with my rambunctious toddler.  I have had the luxury of being able to “crash” in bed for a few hours while my Motrin kicked in.

Today I want to share with you my second insight from our Sacred Ceremony this weekend.  This one is a little more personal and I hope that it speaks to your heart.

The first day of our ceremony, we went down to the ocean in Galveston, Texas.  We started at Galveston State Park, a reasonable developed ocean front park.  The park has toilets, “rinse off” showers and a nice little headquarters.

While Jim was filling the pipe and saying his prayers, a fledgling bird landed on the fence by us.  He was scraggly and kind of ragged looking.  He appeared hot and parched and when I observed him I was immediately reminded of the horrific photos I’ve been watching on the news about the drought and famine in Africa. 

It has been estimated that over 600,000 children alone will die from starvation and dehydration.  Many mothers will make 100 mile treks while significantly weakened by starvation and thirst with babies on their backs seeking resources to keep their children alive.

I’m not feeling well today and taking care of my child feels very difficult.  Can you imagine trying to carry a hot, hungry child across the desert while you yourself are barely able to move…?

During the ceremony I watched my own little daughter dance and leap around in the waves, her chubby, healthy little hands wide open, welcoming life into her heart and spirit.  When we were done playing in the waves, she took an almost 10 minute “rinse off” shower, enjoying the fresh water running over her head.  Then we returned to the car and drank fresh, cool water from clean water bottles.

Even though we are facing a serious drought, water is everywhere.  So is safety, food, shelter and air conditioning.  We are lavishly abundant, even if we believe we’re struggling economically.  We live in a reality that is extremely supportive, privileged and safe by global standards.

But we are going to have to make some radical changes if we want to keep living this way.  Balance and respect for nature were the messages that Jim got and shared with us in yesterday’s video and this is crucial.

But there is another piece that is also important if we are going to create a new Era of Sustainable Peace. 

We must be actively compassionate. 

I was reading a Facebook post yesterday that said something to the effect that “I’m happy now that I’ve stopped reading the news.” 

I agree that being happy and sharing a joyful abundant vibration with the world is also an important part of making the world a better place. Let’s face it, the world doesn’t need any more suffering.  But, ignoring reality isn’t going to change the world.  If you are solid in your joy, your inner harmony will not be destroyed by the truth of the outer world.  In fact, you could use “negative” news to serve as a catalyst for creating something different…something better.

I often tell my students that if you don’t know what you want in life, take what you don’t like right now and imagine it 180 degrees different. 

You can do the same for the news.  If you don’t like what you see on the news, imagine it 180 degrees different.  What would the world look like if we were all well-fed, educated, safe, healthy and supported?  Take a minute and imagine it. 

In my book, Inside the Body of God, (http://www.amazon.com/Inside-Body-God-Karen-Curry/dp/0982780346/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1313514823&sr=8-1)  I write about how the human body is a perfect metaphor for the Divine.  There are parts of our body that are “helper” cells and other parts that are here to “detox” and “clean up” what is not healthy in the body. 

We are all like cells in the God Body.  Each one of us has a specific role and function and each one of us is equally important.  What if our role as lavishly abundant people on the planet is to “help” some of the other cells in the God Body?  What if we are to “detox” and “clean up” starvation, drought, war and poverty? 

The body is only as healthy as its sickest cells.  When we are ill, our body reacts to remove the sickness in order to restore health. 

In truth, we are not abundant until we are all abundant.  Starving, dying children on the planet need our help.  For example, f they are not given foot, they may become vulnerable to militant groups who WILL feed them.

And train them to shoot guns and commit terrorist acts.

The pain and suffering of a mother who loses a child or children to starvation impacts us all, even if we are not aware of it.

How different would all of our lives be if the whole planet was abundant?

As lavishly abundant people with water bottles and “rinse off” showers, we have an obligation to do what we can to share our abundance with the world.  In a world where water and rice are precious, precious commodities, a dollar can save a life.

We must take care of each other.  We cannot turn away from our Divine Siblings. 

If you’d like to start making a difference today click here:

http://www.wfp.org/

More soon!

Love,

Karen

Surrender!!!!!

The call from Spirit is powerful and always exciting when it’s confirmed and echoed by other people.  I was first inspired to invite Jim Tree to Texas to conduct a sacred pipe ceremony after receiving a very powerful dream.

In my dream I was standing on top of a mountain plateau overlooking a lush green valley.  My two-year-old daughter, Ayelet, and Jim were with me.  We were standing around a large fountain that we could not possible reach across, yet, in my dream, the three of us were able to reach across the circumference of the fountain and as soon as our hands connected, water began flowing from the center, overflowing the edges of the fountain and creating a waterfall into the valley.

Later that day, Ayelet, who is by nature a precocious imp, began to chant, “Jim Tree is coming.  Jim Tree is coming” over and over.  When I shared all of this with Jim, he decided that, in spite of the warm temperatures, it was time to fly to Houston and get to work. 

The prospect of ceremony is sometimes tricky.  There is a temptation to want to direct ceremony, to use it as some form of “magic” to create what we want.  But the true purpose of ceremony is not for us to dictate the end results, but rather for us to align with Divine Order. 

It’s kind of ironic that as our consciousness evolves, we move from being “victims” of our consciousness to surrendering to Divine Order. 

There are four stages in consciousness evolution. While we like to think linearly, the truth is all of us go back and forth through these stages of consciousness evolution and it is quite normal for you to experience several stages of consciousness simultaneously. 

This is the nature of evolution.

The Four Stages:

Stage One:  Your Reality Creates You
In this first stage of consciousness, we are deeply conditioned by the collective, the world around us.  Our beliefs, our thoughts, our actions all flow from a belief that our creative capacity is limited to creating a reaction to the world around us. 

Our creativity is in navigating our way through challenges and situations that we feel powerless to control.  Who we are, what we feel, what we create is dependent on luck, fate and is all determined by a source outside of ourselves. 

For most of us, our conscious evolution journey begins here.  Our goal in this first phase of awareness is to begin to clear our conditioning, old patterns, thought forms and habits that keep us entrained to a powerless mentality.

Stage Two:  You Create Your Own Reality
During Stage Two we begin to remember our true creative capacity.  We learn that our thoughts, our emotions, our mindset, our beliefs and our expectations create our reality.  Using the basic "grammar" of creation, we begin to create something new and desirable in our world.

This is the phase taught to us in the movie "The Secret".  It is during Stage Two that we focus on our personal reality and move more deeply into a state of abundance consciousness.  We learn to focus and control our minds and master our emotions and use both to deliberately and consciously create.

Stage Three:  We Co-Create Our Reality
During Stage Three, after experimenting with deliberate creation, we begin to realize some very important things:

1.   There is a greater force helping us create and sometimes things work out bigger and better than we intend.  Miracles happen to us every day and we give up having to know "how" something is going to happen.  We begin to take bigger leaps of faith with our creative capacity.

2.  Sometimes things don't turn out at all like we intend but there seems to be a Divine Plan playing itself out.  Sometimes we don't know why a creation "fails", but we begin to understand that, in spite of this, the Divine Plan is good and the results are part of something bigger than ourselves.

3.  Our awareness of our creative capacity deepens and we realize that everything in our outer reality is created by us.  The things in our personal reality are personal creations and the things in our global reality are a result of projections in collective consciousness. We co-create our reality with our Divine Siblings.

4.  We come to realize that, as creative beings, if we don't like our collective creation, we can join together with our Divine Siblings and with intention, co-create something different.

This more expansive understanding of collective consciousness and the power to co-create, compels us to join together in the face of challenges on the planets, like earthquakes and oil spills and co-create in consciousness a different and more abundant outcome
.
Truly, this is an exciting stage for us to enter into.  Just go to Facebook or any of these social media forums and see the growing quantity of opportunities for you to join with your Divine Siblings and co-create an abundant New World.

Stage Four:  God Creates Reality Through You
The fourth stage marks a complete return to your natural state prior to being conditioned.  It is a state that is created after all your old beliefs and conditioning is released and is maintained by three key creation tools:

1.   Meditation is vital for Stage Four.  Meditation, in whatever form works for you, keeps your channel to your expanded awareness and Divine Intent open and flowing.

2.  Maintaining a prayerful state is also important in Stage Four.  Each moment can be expressed by gratitude and an acknowledgment of Divine Order and abundant perfection.

3.  A clear intention to allow the Divine to work through you helps keep your energy and attention focused on being present to the Divine working through you.

In the Fourth Stage, you realize that you are a uniquely created being and that your highest purpose in the fulfillment of the Divine Plan is to express the truth of who you are in the fullest way possible.  The Self in its pure, unconditioned state is intended to serve God by manifesting its full potential into form.

Each moment in this phase is a moment in the flow.  You know that you are fully supported and you simply obey the truth of the moment and your awareness if finely honed on the Now.  There are no worries, no fears, no lack, only faith and complete surrender.

A sample prayer for Stage Four might be:

I am an emissary of the Divine.
I am a child of Light.
I am an unlimited aspect of the Universe.
Because G-d is abundant, I am abundant in all ways.
Because G-d is powerful, I am powerful in all ways.
Because G-d is creative, I am creative in all ways.
Because G-d is all-knowing, I am always clear.
Because G-d is omnipotent and omnipresent, I am always in the right place at the right time fulfilling my Divine Purpose.
I pray that each moment, my hands, my body, my mind, my spirit, my Light and my essence be used in the service of the Divine.

A sample intention for Stage Four might be:

I intend to joyfully allow the Divine to easily create through me each and every minute of my day.

We all bop between the different phases, but you will realize that as your consciousness evolves, you tend to spend more time in one particular phase.  

As we stand on the cusp of our time together in ceremony, let us keep in our awareness that we are in partnership with each other and our beautiful earth.  It is our responsibility to flow with the changes in a way that is harmonious and in alignment with what needs to happen to restore us all to balance. 

We might see rain.  We might receive messages that help us understand our role in serving as Stewards for a new Era of Sustainable Peace.  We might gain insights into what we need to do to take better care of ourselves, our earth and each other.

No matter what the outcome, we will be humbled by the magnificence of the Divine (as always…)

Please join us in consciousness on Sunday, August 14 at 10:30 am Central Time.  During this time we will be at Hamilton Pool in Austin, Texas finishing our ceremony.  Please hold the intention that we all align with restoring balance in our lives, our lifestyles and in alignment with the Earth and all of her precious resources and inhabitants. 

We’ll be sharing photos, videos and more insights and updates along the way!

Love,

Karen

The New Normal

We are 32 inches behind in rain fall here in Texas.  The weather people are calling it an “exceptional” drought.  That may or may not be true depending on which books about global warming you read.  Many experts say that this may be the “new normal” as we see shifts in global climate.

It’s hard when we face things that are “not normal”.  Our old patterns and habits often don't meet our new needs and we're left confused, frightened and overwhelmed.  


It doesn't have to be that way.  On Friday, Saturday and Sunday of this week, I will be accompanying Jim Tree-Gilmore as he conducts a traveling Sacred Pipe Ceremony.  There are many inspirations behind this journey that we will both share.  As we begin the preparation for this journey, we will be blogging as well as sharing video and photographic updates.  


On the final day we invite all of you to join with us in setting an intention to align with Divine Order as we seek new ways to navigate the "new normal" of our planet.  Our intention is to deepen within all of us the awarenesses and energies necessary to promote community, sustainability, compassion and a new era of peace on this planet.  


I hope you will stay tuned and join us!


Below is the first installment of our blog postings.  Today's message if from Jim.  Enjoy and please feel free to share with others!


*************

As we get ready to start on our journey across parts of Texas in response to a call for ceremony, to hopefully get assistance for the extended heat wave and drought that is currently scorching much of the central United States, I wanted to share some of the information with you all that will help you in your participation in this event.

First, why are we doing it? It is not just because there is a desperate need for relief here, that would apply to much of the US right now for many reasons. Drought, flooding, extended heat waves, (today we are at day 38 of continuous plus 100 deg. F in this area of Texas) destruction from winds, storm, tornadoes…and soon hurricanes. So, once again, why here and why now?

The answer is simple, but also the key to understanding the nature of all effective ceremony. This intervention was not instigated by me or any other human, but by Spirit through the messenger of the Sacred Pipe. As with all ceremonies that I conduct with this ancient Sacred Pipe, I wait until I receive directions and information before I attempt to set out on such a course. I began to feel the tug of the messenger about a month ago, a tug that I have become familiar with. Trust me, the last thing I wanted to do during August was to take a trip to Huston Texas…I live in the mountains of N.W. Montana where today the temperatures are in the high 70’s…not the 108 plus we are experiencing here today. But, when The Boss says go I go.

So I began to pray and ask for guidance as to the timing of the trip and through circumstance, coupled with inspiration, bought the ticket to fly down. There have been several confirmations to encourage me that we are at the right place at the right time to do this ceremony. (I want to invite you if you have not already heard it, to listen to my teaching about how to release the full power of ceremony. You can find a free recording to download or listen to at this web site, http://www.jimtree.com/booksandrecordings.html just scroll down to recording # 4 and enjoy)

So now that you know what is required to have a powerful and effective ceremony, let me give you some more understanding of the history and workings of a “Traveling Pipe Ceremony.”Remember, Nicholas Black Elk of the Lakota said decades ago, “The power of a ceremony is in the understanding of it.”

There are many different kinds of Sacred Pipe ceremonies; most where you smoke the Pipe right after you fill it. But there are some where you fill it and then put a plug in the bowl to protect the prayers that have been put into it because you will not be finishing the ceremony by smoking it until sometime later. 

Examples of this kind of ceremony would be during a Sundance, some sweat lodges and what we call a traveling ceremony. (In the old days it was called a walking ceremony because after filling the Pipe it would be carried to the final destination by someone who took special care to not let the Pipe come apart or that any of the mix in the bowl might spill out. The Pipe was not carried on horseback because of the increased chance of a mishap.)

In this particular traveling ceremony, we will fill the Black Thunder Pipe, a Pipe that is directly connected the the Thunder Beings who control the weather for the Great Mystery, at the Gulf of Mexico near Galveston, TX., where the bowl will be plugged with sage after it has been touched to the ocean. This is to connect the ocean water with the Pipe which will, as we travel on, connect to the sky water and then to the earth water. (The ceremony ends after we smoke the Pipe near Austin on Sunday morning and touch the tip of the bowl to water that comes up from the aquifer there in a special sink hole that has been a sacred site for centuries.)

It is important that we know who we are teamed up with in the spirit realm when we are doing ceremonies like this. In this case the spirit that has been assigned by the Great Mystery to assist us is one known as the 5^th wind, or the whirlwind. The Thunder Beings are in several different forms, all being what are often called contrary spirits. There is a name for them in every tribe,The Lakota call them Heyoka, the southwest tribes call them Hohocum, the Tsalagi (Cherokee) call them the "Ayvdaqualosgv". No matter what the name, they all work with the weather in various capacities. The whirlwind is the younger brother to the 4 winds of the 4 cardinal directions. Those winds are stable and only come with specific jobs from their assigned direction. i.e North wind brings the winter wind, etc.

The 5^th wind however has no assigned direction or defined action. He comes in the form of the dust devil, the tornado, the cyclone and the hurricane. He comes from where ever he wants and travels in whatever direction he wants. I believe this is why he has been assigned to help us. We need unusual intervention with the weather. We need gentle continuous rains and winds to cleans and refresh the scorched land. We do not need, from our human perspective, a hurricane but it is not up to us what to even pray for. This is directed by Spirit as well. So, we do not come to the ceremony with preconceived ideas of the outcome, but to take our part along side of the spirits that will attend, the 5^th wind in particular, and add our part of being in harmony with the great circle of life.

As a form of confirmation and encouragement from the Great mystery, there is a group of people up in Montana that held a drumming group last Sunday. At my request they drummed the prayers for the ground water in Texas and asked for assistance from the 5^th wind. They were in a teepee up in the mountains and there was no wind outside. As they drummed the prayers into our mother earth there was a dust devil suddenly just outside the door of the Teepee, a very good sign.

So as you prepare to join in on the privilege of being part of the traveling ceremony I want to remind you to have a humble attitude and be sensitive to nature for direction in your individual part of this ceremony. Follow your intuition and the confirmations shown through nature all around you. It takes all of us doing and saying the right thing at the right time to have a good effect on this situation. Please be encouraged to write in your comments and massages received to this blog site so we all can share in your contribution.

In closing I will share a bit of the recent history of the Thunder Pipe and some traveling ceremonies that we have done.

7 year drought in Colorado, Montana and Arizona. In the spring of 2003 I was directed to do a traveling ceremony for Montana because of the drought there. I loaded the Pipe up on the Flathead reservation at the canyon where the Thunder Bird has her nest, plugged the bowl and traveled 200 miles south to a spot on the Bitterroot River just south of the Great Medicine Tree of the Salish. I finished the ceremony there by smoking the Pipe while standing in the river then touching the bowl into the river and pointing the stem to the sky to re-connect the earth water to the sky water. I was told that it would start to rain in 48 hours and would continue until fall. It did.

In the summer of 2005 the Midwest was in a drought. I was told to go to the annual Gathering of the Pipe keepers in Pipestone Minnesota in late July and teach anyone I met who were called by the Thunders the ceremony I was given to seek for rain. Usually at a gathering like this there might be 1 or 2 people who have been called by the Thunders, through dreams or being struck by lightning or who have died and come back. There were 11 there! We gathered by the 3 maidens at the sacred quarries and I passed on the template of the ceremony as it was given to me. 

We all filled our thunder pipes and then plugged them to travel back to our home in every direction, one all the way to Hawaii. The clouds formed as we left and it rained for some days in Minnesota, but the clouds also followed every one home except for a woman who lived where they were having flooding. In her area the rains stopped and the floods went away, in every other case the rains came to the drought areas and refreshed the land.

Of course there was the big drought in Australia several years ago, the worst in over 100 years. I suggest you watch the u tube video about that one to save my poor fingers from typing anymore. http://www.jimtree.com/australia_video.html

The point is that this ceremony today is another that the great Mystery has called for and we are being asked to take part. Let’s do our part and contribute the unique gifts that we have been given to bring balance out of chaos, if it is not too late.

In closing I feel I must say that even though we are asking for rain and cooler temps, also for moderation in the upcoming hurricane season, it must be realized that the weather over the last 2 years in now the new NORMAL! We will have to adapt but this is also a way for us to learn how we as a race can help shape the new normal.

Blue Sky!
Jim Tree-Gilmore