Years ago, I was invited to officiate at the wedding of an MD, Dr. John Ryan. The spiritual connection I experienced with him and his partner was immediate. Dr. John had written and self-published a book, The Missing Pill, which he gifted me with. No longer in print, the book has been re-printed by a publisher, revised, and also translated into French; the book is now called, Unity Field Healing, Volume One. John began offering these energy medicine programs a few years ago. While two of my clients attended them, it was never the ‘right’ time for me. This past weekend it was.

I have known ‘things’ most of my life. If I had the language to speak it, so often I was reticent to express it. And, as often as I knew that reticence as a truth, it was as if I was being ’saved’ from expression when I had no language for what I have so deeply known.

We like to believe that it is eclipsing the big traumas in our lives that ignites transformation. Yet for me, it is the subtleties of the seemingly smaller life events that so often ignite the greatest change. One such event for me was celebrating my birthday at age 8. My aunt who lived with us arrived home late from work when the birthday dinner was over. I remember sitting on the couch and looking up at her as she entered through the front door to our home and asking her, Hi. Did you get me a present? She did not smile. Instead, irritation appeared on her face. Her response was, ‘NO, I did not.’ In that moment, I knew immediate rejection and felt that I had done something really wrong by asking the question. I curled in on myself and withdrew. A while later, my aunt called me into the kitchen and presented me with a present along with the declaration that I should not , I should never expect to receive. The feeling I had was, How dare I? Expect nothing and you’ll be on your best behaviour. I learned that I was expected to not expect. I also learned the receiving came with expectations (strings) to not expect attached.

This is the moment that you may feel, within you, your own determination percolating to stay awake and aware, for your own sake… for the reverence of fully living and fully dying, We are at a critical point in our lives where we must become buck naked to our own Selves, if we are going to choose joy as THE valid path for living... which also means that it is THE valid path for dying. Living and dying: these are the front and back of the same hand. As a species, we have become so afraid of dying, that we have forgotten how to live…. and that we CAN live.

Choosing joy does not distract from, deny, negate, ignore or avoid the ugly truth of the world that we have created. Instead, it directs our attention of focus toward a resilient force that cherishes our minds… and, ultimately, our hearts. This is when we own the truth that each one of us is whole, unique and essential to our worlds. We can't not be that!

Guilt: the gift that keeps on giving. While it is likely an old expression, it is one that I have heard my daughter state with both humour and chagrin, whenever it’s ugly head rears up.

Every day, it seems that I am further awakened to what I call another green-dot moment; you know, one of those epiphanies that wake you in the middle of the night or stop you in your tracks as you open a cupboard door… just thinking about something which, on the surface, seems to have no relevance to your life at all, yet, contextually, has significantly underpinned the structure of your current reality outside of your conscious awareness.