Tool Kit

• Awareness
• Choice
• Heart Tenderizer
• Detachment
• "Flip-flopping" energy

Awareness is the major, number one tool. All other tools depend on awareness in order to be usable. To understand awareness, a good place to start is with consciousness. Consciousness is sentient, and so, I am physically responding to my environment whether it is third dimensional Earth or soaring in other dimensions. Seems like consciousness should be enough... Well, it is not if I want to awaken to who I am spiritually. To awaken, I need to be aware that I have choices about how I experience my moments. What separates consciousness and awareness is the ability to choose how I will be in any given moment.

Consciousness tells me I am alive and if it is raining, sunny, cold, or warm. It is the domain of the mind. Awareness allows me to go beyond being whatever I am conscious of and to choose a different way of being. If it rains (consciousness) then I can choose how I relate to the rain. Am I angry because I am wet? Do I rejoice that the Earth is receiving needed moisture? Am I fearful that there will be too much rain and create a flood? There are many “interpretations” of what the rain means to me. Being a fixed way with the rain is an act of consciousness. Realizing that there is more than one way to be with the rain is awareness. Choosing the interpretation with awareness gives me power in the moment to either create karma (fear-based interpretations) or release karma through loving acceptance. Same rain, two different responses. It is not what I do, but why I do it that shapes the quality of my spiritual life.

Without awareness, I am bound to react to what happens around me as a powerless leaf is blown about by the wind. With awareness, I control the wind to create what I need. Most of us spend most of our lives consciously reacting instead of using awareness to be proactive. When I use my awareness, then the door to spiritual evolution opens and many, many opportunities are presented as I walk my path.

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Choice is a companion tool to awareness. Awareness enables me to have choice, but how do I use choice? Choice is an attribute given to humans by God along with free will and self-determination. To use choice, I must first accept choice as really existing. Many people believe that life is pre-determined and that choice is an illusion; we may think we have choice but we really don’t. Personally, I do not think this is the case for it makes no sense to me to live out my life as a virtually mindless robot executing some divine program that directs me from cradle to grave. So, if you truly believe that you do have choice in your life, read on.

Here is how it sets up… Life is composed of moments. In each moment, I am in one of two states or modes: fear or loving acceptance. The most fundamental choice I have in life is that of the state that I am in. If I am in the state of fear, I will add to my karma; if I am in the state of loving acceptance, I reduce karma. Even if the situation in which I find myself in a given moment is full of danger, I can still choose loving acceptance and deal with the danger. I do not have to let fear run me – I can literally be facing death and do so with loving acceptance instead of fear. Is it not better to leave this life in a state of grace and loving acceptance than create more karma with my last thought? When people speak of having responsibility for one’s life, then always having choice, moment by moment, is one interpretation of that statement.

There are many more choices that I have beyond how I am going to experience each moment. At a superficial level, there are the ones around daily living. What clothes will I wear today? What to have for lunch? Which insipid TV shows will I watch tonight, and so on? At the level of the big picture, I make choices surrounding work, home, partners, beliefs, and who will run the country where I live. I make many choices every day, some conscious, some unconscious, but I cannot cop out on the unconscious ones by saying, gosh I didn’t know I was making a choice when I ran over the baby carriage, or the ever popular, “I didn’t know the gun was loaded!”

OK, it’s great to have choice, but there is downside. Each time I take an action or think a thought, I am making a choice. The only actions I can take that are not subject to choice are physiological ones, e.g., being hit on the knee with the little hammer to determine if I have a reflex. Try as hard as I may, I cannot keep my knee from jerking. Those are the only “knee jerk” reactions that are not subject to choice. The downside to making a choice is that I am also responsible for the consequences of my choice. Bummer!

It would be great to make a choice and not have to be responsible for the consequences – a politician’s nirvana! Unfortunately, everyone has responsibility for his or her choices. This is one of the small set of spiritual laws. When I take responsibility for my choices, it is not possible for me to play the role of victim or martyr. Interesting how that works, is it not?

The last point about choice… there are no good or bad choices, just choices. God doesn’t judge our choices; we do, God does not. The power of choice is not in making “the” choice; it is in having the awareness to make “a” choice. In making aware choices, I know if I am increasing or decreasing my karma, and taking the responsibility for my actions and either one is really all right. How about you?

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The Heart Tenderizer is an exercise to release tension held in the heart or fourth chakra. It is a specialized form of clearing the heart chakra that I find very effective.

Please note that this exercise should not be done in lieu of any treatment prescribed by a physician for any form of heart or circulatory condition. It can be done in addition to any such treatment as I do not believe that it is contraindicated with any medication or other treatment.

Having said that, here is the exercise…

In a prone position...in the tub, bed, sofa, chair, car (in stopped traffic)...utilizing 1 minute or 20...just be comfortable and open to spirit...place your right hand over your heart, your left on top of that hand...take as many deep cleansing breaths as is necessary to calm yourself...speak to spirit and voice your intention to clear your heart of heavy emotion and negativity....holding your final breath...force a tightening of the stomach muscles and press down from the throat...as if you were preventing yourself from throwing up...consciously forcing your air down from your diaphragm and up from the groin...which results in an 'expulsion' from the chest area as you release the breath...as if the energy is being expelled from the center of your chest between your breasts. You will feel a palpable lightness in the area of your heart each time this is performed (remember, it took years to build this wall and it will not dissipate in an exercise or two)...do this several times...when a considerable (or any feeling of) lightness of being is achieved...in your own words, invite spirit to fill the void with love and light...do not forget this step because the void that you have just created will be refilled with negative energy if you forget to invite love to fill it instead.

Performing this daily is helpful...you may not feel any benefit for days...possibly weeks...depending on the quantity of negativity stored within your heart center. It is with love and hope that this exercise is presented to you. Never forget that you are loved unconditionally by spirit regardless of your direction.

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Detachment is a tool that I only recently (late 2003) came to understand because I was so attached to so many things and beliefs that I did not know that I was attached. In fact, the January 2004 PlanetLightworker editor’s letter is all about detaching from attachment. I am including detachment in Tools because not everyone will read that editor’s letter and treating detachment as a tool is a different task than using it as the focus for the editor’s letter.

What is an attachment, how do I know that I am attached, and how do I detach?

• Attachment: an attachment is anything I fiercely do not want to be without. It can be a possession, an idea or belief, a person, a job, a lifestyle, a pet, and so on. In the most extreme, the potential loss of an attachment can cause illness, emotional trauma, or even death. The stronger the attachment, the more pronounced my behavior is to hold on to it. I could lie, cheat, steal, and commit violence to keep the object of my attachment, if it is powerful enough.

• Attachment Test: If I want to be sure that I an attached to something specific, the test is to imagine that I suddenly lost whatever I think I am attached to and check in with my emotions. If my emotions are powerful and heavy (grief, anger, sadness, and so on) then I am attached. If my resulting emotional state is mild to no emotion at all, then I am not attached. When I applied this test to a number of things in my life, I found that I was powerfully attached to a number of them without realizing it. Unless I apply this test, I am not aware of an attachment until I am threatened with its loss and then it becomes difficult to detach. So, my counsel is to start testing for attachments and then detach from them. It will make their eventual loss a lot easier to be with.

• Detachment: For me, learning to detach was not easy. I thought that I knew how to detach, but it was only at a superficial level. It was not until I was faced with detaching something very precious that I learned the true power of attachment. Sometimes we lose something precious and we have no say in the loss, such as a death. The attachment can remain even when the object of attachment is physically gone. The real test of attachment for me occurred when I had to choose between my dogs and the woman of my dreams. She has an acute allergy to dogs and become terribly ill if she is around them for only a day or two. It was literally she or the dogs. I was heartbroken for I did not want to give up either, but I had to.

How did I detach? I “energetically” journeyed to the spirits of my two dogs, and I told them how much I loved them, how well they had served me for so many years, and now I needed to release them to serve someone else who needed their love and loyalty. When I did this from my heart, not my head, it was OK with them and me. I miss them, and I will never forget who they were for me, but I have detached from them. I realize that this not very specific, so here is a more nut and bolt process:

1. Relate to the attachment at an energetic level. It is possible to energetically relate to anything for we are energy as is everything. It is at the level of energy that we can always relate. (There is another portion of this website that deals in detail with energy – energetics.) How you do this is whatever is comfortable for you. One suggestion is that you be physically present with your attachment (or if you cannot, then imagine the image of your attachment).

2. Connect with the energy of the attachment. This is not as woo-woo as it sounds. Simply and positively state that you are integrated with the attachment’s energy such that the two of you are one. If you state it with intention, you will be connected and allow that to happen. Find your own way of doing this – you will find that it works in many other ways besides detaching.

3. Communicate with the energy of the attachment and tell it whatever you need to create your detachment. It may be (and often is) that there is some aspect of fear that keeps you attached. Release the fear and you will detach. Thank the energy of the attachment for its service to you and release it to go anywhere other than staying in your energy.

Following this process, you may feel a bit emotionally “tender” for you have detached from something that has had a strong emotional hold on you, and just like ripping off a sticky bandage, it hurts for a while. That will pass, and you will feel much freer.

“Flip-flopping” Energy is a simple and relatively easy technique to use anytime, anywhere. It is a great counter to many instances where negativity seems to have the upper hand, and my, doesn’t that seem to happen a lot – at least it does to me. I think it is easier to give an example of this before explaining it.

I am thinking about doing something that I believe is difficult. Most of the time, my thoughts are something like, “This is tough, but I will try to do it.” Now, that used to seem like a pretty positive statement to me, then I began to realize that when I thought “try,” I was leaving myself a “backdoor.” Heck, if I worked really hard and didn’t accomplish whatever the task, I had a ready made excuse – I “tried,” but my effort was not good enough, so I and anyone else would understand that I just could not do it; after all, I did “try.” I suspect that some of you have had this inner (perhaps outer as well) dialogue.

I think that I patterned this type of thinking on an unfair interpretation of Miguel Ruiz’s fourth agreement: always do your best. What I did not realize that trying hard to do something is not necessarily doing my best. Maybe it is and maybe it isn’t. Instead of making his fourth agreement a powerful tool, I perverted it a bit to give myself a preordained excuse. Okay, well, what is the point?

The point is what I now think of as “flip-flopping” energy – changing the polarity from basically negative (trying) to positive as in, “How can I successfully accomplish this?” This kind of statement (the flip-flop) invokes some powerful stuff. First, it is request to the Universe to give me a hand: “How can I…” Second, it sets an intention to accomplish, to manifest, not a ready made excuse for not accomplishing.

How does a flip-flop work? It is really pretty simple and easy. When I catch myself (that old awareness thing again) creating a backdoor to slip out of if I am not successful, I reverse the energy with two simple guidelines:

1. I ask for help howsoever it appeals to and works for me. Examples are: How can I…? I need help to…” “This is going to take more than I have so…” “Hey, let’s make this a team effort and…” – Who you ask for help is up to you. It could be a co-worker, a neighbor, a stranger, or maybe even the One, Source, God, the Universe, or whomever or whatever. The point is that none of us is here alone – it just seems that way.
2. I view the object/goal of my effort as an intention that is stated without expectation. State your intention, get into action, and accept what happens as being in your highest and best interest. The ironic thing is that we think we know what is in our best and highest interest (the expectation), but often it is something else, so I release to it whatever happens. Admittedly, this is not always easy for me to do, but I am getting better.

In the above example, my intention was stated as “…successfully accomplish this…” It’s a very simple one, and simple works great.

One last thought if you are still with me… the above reference to Miguel Ruiz’s fourth agreement is from his incredible book, The Four Agreements which is reviewed in the Readings section of the website. Click here to read more about it.

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Watch for more tools to be added soon.