Time for a Prayer Box

In the past week, three different channels have recommended the creation of a prayer box of one sort or another. Three’s the charm.

First, I read August Gold’s and Joel Fotinos’ delicious new book, The Prayer Chest. It’s about a family that is blessed for generations by an oft lost and oft found prayer chest.

Second, Abraham recommended creating a box with these words on it:

Whatever is in this box—is!

Third, last night a dear, dear friend brought me a Christmas gift of a necklace of blue crystals with sterling silver beads. At the bottom of the length is a prayer box inscribed with the Sanskrit symbol of Om on both sides.

Time to consider a prayer box, wouldn’t you say?

One of my latest policies for organizing my life is to wait for a triple mention of anything before I act. There’s too much information flying toward me always to discern what’s best for me and what to leave behind. Three mentions of anything tell me I need to pay attention to whatever has been drawn to my attention.

The most important thing about a prayer box is not its size, shape or color, although it’s best to use something that appeals to your senses. No, the most important thing is what you put in it! And why.

I am posting this on New Year’s Eve, that hopeful day when the promise of letting go and starting anew is tangible to most of us. Is there some issue in your life—something that’s bugging you because it won’t go away or something that’s bugging you because it won’t come to you?

Put THAT in your new prayer box! The real magic of prayer boxes is the magic that comes from letting go, and letting the Universe do what it does to make real magic of your prayers.

Happy 2008!

A Charmed Life

Seeds IX, 52

Seed: A Charmed Life

Once the Satisfaction Factor is in play, you have the option to lead a charmed life. The third OED definition is below.

3. Of persons or lives: fortified, protected, rendered invulnerable, etc. by a spell or charm

Do you lead a fortified, protected, rendered invulnerable life? You can.

The first two definitions of charm are:
1. Influenced by magic power, bewitched, under a spell.
2. Affected with a magic spell; enchanted.
The Latin root is carmen and it means a song, an incantation.

What song are you singing about your own life, dear one? What incantation are you using? Do you realize that prayerwork and spellwork are both incantation?

Do you want to lead a charmed life? By all means, go ahead, charm us all.

Happy New Year!

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

Relationship Glitches & The In Between

Everything was set. All the gifts bought, wrapped, under the tree. The tree was a masterpiece—even if I say so myself. A silly misunderstanding over the television on Christmas Eve almost ruined everything.

The misunderstanding was so silly that I won’t tell you what it concerned, but it did cause us to go to bed angry, feeling separated and not okay with each other. There is tension at Christmas time unlike any other. We repaired to our separate corners, licking our wounded egos, and sulked the night away.

In the morning, we were tentative with one another, aware of the delicacy of both ourselves and the other. Like a neck with a kinked muscle.

Slowly, over the course of the morning, through tea and breakfast, and presents the kink unkinked itself. How?

We returned to the love we have for one another. The way we did it was to assume the love was there. Hiding perhaps, but there, between us. We repaired to the space in between our egos, the space in the middle, where our true relationship lives.

May I paraphrase the marvelous Rainer Maria Rilke? I’ve substituted the word glitches for his questions.

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the glitches themselves... Do not now seek the answers which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them and the point is to live everything. Live the glitches now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."

Glitches are usually about me, me, me or you, you, you. The place where solutions to glitches are found is the place in between. The place of us. If you’ve encountered some glitches this Christmas Day, consider a gift you give yourself—a ticket to the place in between . . . glitches no more.

A Young Country

We just saw the new movie Charlie Wilson’s War. Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts and Philip Seymour Hoffman were stellar. If you get a chance, do see it.

The movie left me with a question about the United States, the country where I live. It’s not even three hundred years old. There are countries with millennia more history than the U. S. Could this explain our foreign policy to date? Go with me.

It has been said that U. S. practices are “benevolently predatory.” We go in at the beginning, supply all the guns and butter that are needed to keep our interests handled but don’t do the things required to finish the job. Could it be that it’s just that we’re a young country?

We know about big beginnings. Being born. Setting things up to work. But we don’t know much about reconstruction. Setting up workable infrastructures. Getting the day-to-day to work after destruction. Look at what’s happened with New Orleans.

We’ll spend a billion dollars to protect our interests, but we won’t add a million in to protect the interests of those who have done our bidding.

Hold an idea with me in prayer? Let the U. S. finish what it’s birthed.

Happy 10th Birthday, Sanctuary!

Beloved Sanctuary Member,

Ten years ago today, on the Winter Solstice, thirteen people met in a living room on the upper west side of Manhattan on a sunny, wintry Sunday afternoon. That day Sanctuary was born.

In those ten years, Sanctuary has done and been different things. For a while, we met monthly in members’ homes. Eventually someone loaned us their office space, and we met weekly. Someone created a website. Time passed, things changed.

For all these years, one thing has remained constant: Seeds. Seeds has been written and sent weekly for ten years. Some people have been on the list the entire time; others, for just weeks.

This year, thanks to the magical assistance of our members, Sanctuary has taken a big techno-leap forward.

Constant Contact

The member list—now numbering in the hundreds and never shared with anyone—is registered with Constant Contact, an email delivery service. It allows for simple management of member information. As a member of Sanctuary, you are always encouraged to invite your friends! If anyone is interested in the service, let me refer you to Constant Contact. Sanctuary earns credits toward its fees that way.

Seeds for Sanctuary: omnifaith spiritual insights for seekers and finders

Through the good offices and coaching of a patient Sanctuarian, we now have a blog called Seeds for Sanctuary: omnifaith spiritual insights for seekers and finders. Another member helped add a free, invisible, statistics counter this month. In the first week of counting, we had visitors from five of seven continents. It’ll be a big day when we hear from Africa and Antarctica! Sanctuary will be worldwide.

Guest Blogging Opportunities

ANNOUNCEMENT: Guest blogging opportunities are available to all Sanctuary members. Regular posts are Monday, Wednesday and Friday. If you are interested in writing a guest blog post please contact me at seedsdrcorso@comcast.net and details will be provided.

Beliefnet.com

This year a great connection happened with a lovely editor at beliefnet.com. She gave Sanctuary some marvelous opportunities. She commissioned and published a Gallery called “10 Spiritual Ways to Deal with Money.” She created a great chance to stand in for a week as a substitute blogger on Amy Cunningham’s wildly popular blog, Chattering Mind. At the time, Beliefnet was in the process of building their Preachers & Teachers library as well. When they sent a crew to Boston to tape the segments, we had a blast. Web addresses for all these goodies appear below.

New York House & Ode Magazine

The opportunity to do some fun freelance writing for a magazine called New York House came through another member. The back page contributions were fun to write. Ode Magazine proposed a great writing gig as well. I’m a Charter Member of their Readers Blog. Every Monday, our wonderful editor posts a new blog—always on the subject of Peace. These are just a few of this past year’s opportunities to highlight and publicize Sanctuary. None of this can be done without your support! Sanctuarians are what Sanctuary is all about.

Of course, we still do all those ministerial things that call: weddings, funerals, christenings, ceremony, healing, counseling. Lately requests from writers for coaching and Chief Spiritual Officer consulting for businesses have been knocking upon the door.

One of Sanctuary’s initial supporters insisted we apply for federal not-for-profit status. It was quite a process. After eighteen months, we did it! Sanctuary has its own 501(c)3 status. Lots of not-for-profits write year-end appeals, but that’s not what this is. It’s a . . .

Happy Birthday, Sanctuary Appeal!

Here’s a promise: one letter like this per year. That’s it. If Sanctuary’s Seeds or other services have nourished or sustained you over the years, would you consider making a tax-deductible gift? The particulars appear below for financial contributions, but the opportunity isn’t limited to money. If you are moved to help advance Sanctuary, consider gifts of your time and your talent as well as your treasure, Beloved.

Contribution Particulars

Should you choose to make a financial contribution, please make checks payable to Sanctuary, and mail to Sanctuary, c/o Dr. Susan Corso, 101 School Street #3, Somerville, MA 02143. In January 2008, you will receive an official letter to document your tax deduction.

Wish List

This tenth year of Sanctuary, we have a wish list—another quantum techno-leap. Won’t you hold these ideas with me in consciousness? Together, it ought to be easy to manifest them.

We want to create a new website for Sanctuary so that . . .

All Seeds can be posted and visited online at your leisure
Including special editions, that’s 446 so far!
Prayer requests can be posted and answered.
The Site can host Seeds for Sanctuary blog.
And, dream of dreams we want to begin podcasting!

We are thick in the season of light. This day is the day that the light, metaphorically speaking, returns to the world. Technically, even though we can’t see it, it means that day begins to be longer than night.

May your days, through the holy days and every day, be merry and bright!

In joyous world service,

Susan Corso

Dr. Susan Corso
for Sanctuary

Contribution particulars: Should you choose to make a financial contribution, please make checks payable to Sanctuary, and mail to Sanctuary, c/o Dr. Susan Corso, 101 School Street #3, Somerville, MA 02143. In January 2008, you will receive an official letter to document your tax deduction.

URL Adventures

Seeds for Sanctuary, my blog: http://seedsforsanctuary.com
Money Gallery: http://www.beliefnet.com/index/index_200.html
Chattering Mind starting 5/18/07 through 6/7/07: http://blog.beliefnet.com/chatteringmind/2007/05/dr-susan-corso-sits-in-next-week.html
Preachers & Teachers (right after Deepak Chopra—not bad!): http://video.beliefnet.com/av/PreachersAndTeachers.aspx?v=jl1f878l
New York House: October 2007 issue http://www.nyhouse-digital.com/nyhouse/200710/?pg=134&search=Susan%20Corso&per_page=5&results_page=1&doc_id=-1
Ode Magazine Readers Blog: http://www.odemagazine.com/people/Susan%20Corso/blogs

Satisfaction

Seeds IX, 51

Seed: Satisfaction

Poor Mick Jagger. He’s famous in part because he “can’t get no satisfaction.” What I wonder is: can you?

What would be required for you to have a life of satisfaction? In 25 years of doing spiritual counseling with people, I’ve listened to problems for a long time. After the litany, I often ask, “Okay, if you could have your life any way you wanted it, how would you have it be?” I’ve not yet had a client who could answer that question. Not one.

Part of the reason is because we tend to share a collective guilt that we’re not doing enough. How that can be I don’t know. People are, as I’m sure you know, so over-scheduled that they can’t think much of the time, let alone do.

May I make a suggestion as we approach the end of this year? Consider what I call the Satisfaction Factor. Satisfaction comes from Latin roots; satis- means enough, and facere means to do. The Satisfaction Factor means that what you’re doing is enough.

Ask yourself, what would satisfy me in each arena of my life? Spiritual. Health. Wealth. Relationship. Work. Society. Planet. Do you know what would satisfy you? Excellent. Do it, and please, let the rest go.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my peace blog at Ode Magazine.

Name That Character

Many of you know that I write spiritual adventure stories about a character named Mex Stone. I’m in the midst of writing the sixth one. (They will be published this year—I’m determined!)

I’ve just spent two hours researching names. Their actual meanings. Their implied meanings. Their associative meanings. Their emotional meanings. Names, especially when it comes to characters, matter.

I can probably never have a character in one of my books named Buffy. It has too clear an association.

I can probably never have a Romeo either.
Or an Eloise. Or a Clark, as in Kent. Or Dopey, or Snoopy.

In every fairy tale I’ve ever read, the ability to name someone or something gives one power over that thing.

Naming characters can be challenging. I haunt my own bookshelves considering author names. I put surnames as given names. I try odd spellings. In my latest novel, an exotic dancer is murdered. One night when I was writing, I named her Shelley in the early evening. By the end of the evening, she’d become Shelby. In the morning, after sleeping on it, I knew. Sheba.

That’s the way it goes sometimes. When you’re naming things in your life, don’t hurry. Take your time. When you do, you’ll get the exact right one, and that should make all the difference.

Pomegranate Wisdom

My beloved has been away a lot this year. One of our habits is that she fixes breakfast. That’s my prayer time so I appreciate it. With her absence, I get to fix my own breakfast. This time of year we eat pomegranates. One quarter each day for each of us.

Have you ever had to divest a pomegranate of its luscious seeds? It takes dedication. You have to really want those seeds. Really want. This morning I was doing pomegranate duty in my own behalf when it dawned on me that pomegranates make a wonderful metaphor for a dream-come-true process.

First you have to decide you want them. Then you cut open the hard, protective shell. Choose your dream, dear one, then cut open all the hard shells of your disbeliefs.

Peel back the shell. You can see the fruit but you really have no idea how to get to it until you begin to excavate for fruit. Scrumptious flavorful fruits. We see indications of dreams come true as we begin a manifestation process but they don’t come to us until we begin. Begin something, anything. Action forms the path for the energy to manifest.

There are surface seeds, the obvious ones, but if you’ll look deeply into a pomegranate you’ll see many more delicious fruits. These are the one you get to dig for, and you don’t know how to get to them till you’re in the digging. Dig deep. With dreams come true, we can’t possibly know the path until we’re on it. A wonderful irony, no?

Pomegranates require perseverance. Like I said, you have to want those seeds. Dreams come true? Same thing. Follow the energy and watch the stepping stones of your particular path to that particular dream come true appear before your very feet.

The final triumph with a pomegranate is a small dish of ruby ripe fruit bristling with life force. There by the grace of your own effort, and good for you besides. Dreams come true follow the same winding paths.

According to the OED, pomegranate comes from a long etymological lineage boiling down to an apple with many seeds. Aren’t seeds what germinate in our souls that cause us to know that we have dreams which can come true? The next time you consider the pomegranate use it as a spiritual lesson to follow the wisdom paths which fulfill your soul.

Acts of Peace

Dear Readers, this is a special post. Some of you know that I am a charter member of the Ode Magazine Readers Blog. This is the post that will run on Ode tomorrow. If you're a blogger, dash one off for Kindness, will you please? Susan

Acts of Peace

Sometimes just thinking about world peace is enough to make me want to take a nap. It’s such a big job and, I know this is an illusion, but sometimes I feel like I’m carrying the ball all by myself. Anyone else feel that way?

Enter Blog Catalog on my Sunday morning email telling me that there’s a movement in the blogosphere called Bloggers Unite: blogging for hope. http://unite.blogcatalog.com/ Its purpose is to use the sheer numbers of the blogging world for good works. The latest date we are invited to join together is today, December 17th, 2007 to do some Act of Kindness and write about it. All of us, on the same day.

What, I asked myself and the universe, might be a good work, an act of kindness, an act of peace?

What I heard might surprise you. It did me:

Take that nap you want.

Naps for peace?

Not really, just do the things you do with peace in mind.

My teacup, really more a bowl, sits to my left right now, even as I type. I have a cup of Earl Grey tea every morning liberally laced with hazelnut cream. It’s divine. I don’t know exactly how many sips I get out of each bowl, but I’d bet at least fifty.

What if, with every sip, I held a thought for peace?

May peace prevail on earth.
May there be peace in the Middle East.
May there be peace between my fighting next door neighbors.
May there be peace in the middle school down the street.
May there be peace in City Hall at the top of the hill.
May my brother, David, find peace in his soul.
May my mother be at peace wherever her soul took her when she died.
May I be at peace within my body.
May my sweetheart be at peace within her job.
May all financial need be met everywhere with supply.

That’s ten. 20% of my tea sips.

Thoughts, dear one, specifically your thoughts are actions. Dedicate your thoughts to whatever you choose. I’ll do peace seven days a week. Just like I do tea seven days a week. Do the math: 50 x 7 = 350 thoughts per week x 52 weeks = 18,200 thoughts per year radiating from me alone, and that only during tea time!

Think of what we could do if every time we swallowed, or chewed, or exhaled, or inhaled, or scratched, or smiled, or stepped or whatever, we added a thought for peace! I propose an act of kindness, an act of peace for every one of the over six billion souls with whom we share this planet. Take one activity in your day—one you do every day—and tilt your thoughts peace-ward during that activity.

I googled world population just now: 6,602,224,175 (July 2007 estimated)

18,200 thoughts per year x 6,602,224,175 = Plenty to create peace in our world. (And more than my puny calculator could handle!)

To quote the latest Citibank ads: “Let’s get it done.”

Four Square / Disney IV

Seeds IX, 50

Seed: Four Square/Disney IV

I have a file in my computer called Seeds Ideas. I add to it whenever something strikes me as a good idea for a Seed. Reading it this morning, I saw two “fours” that appealed to me.

The first is the work of metaphysician Florence Scovel Shinn. She calls it Four Square. The second is the work of Walt Disney. He calls it The Four Words to the Secret of Life. We’re going to explore Shinn’s and Disney’s four words a week at a time for the next four weeks. I think they link together nicely.

The last two are Self-Expression, and Dare. By self-expression, Mrs. Shinn means work, and work that’s creative, challenging and uses our gifts and talents. How many of us dare this in the world? Instead, I think we talk ourselves out of our own ideal self-expression. We tell ourselves we’ll never make a living that way. I think this habit causes us much grief in this world.

Instead, begin to dare like Walt Disney did, dare to tell, at the very least yourself about your perfect self-expression. Don’t go trying to figure out how. You can’t. Instead, dare to think, believe and dream the what. Dare your perfect self-expression, and then let the universe itself do its wondrous work in your behalf.

We have thought of Florence Scovel Shinn’s words as a square upon which to stand—the fourth and final side of the square is Self-Expression, and we have thought of Walt Disney’s as the actions to take to get to that solid square—in this case, Dare.

Both fours—Shinn & Disney:

Health/Think
Wealth/Believe
Love/Dream
Self-Expression/Dare

As Citibank’s new ads say, “Let’s do it.”

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

Remind Me

There is a story told of parents who were worried about some classical sibling rivalry between a toddler and a new baby. The toddler insisted on being left alone with the child. Wary, the parents allowed it and spied upon their offspring. The toddler fixed the baby with a pleading look and said, “Remind me what God is like. I’m beginning to forget.”

Nine out of ten clients I speak to are saying the same thing. Remind me . . . of who I am. I’ve forgotten.

It’s easy to forget. It can be hard to remind ourselves let alone remember for ourselves. This is what friends are for. To remind us of who we are.

A particularly conscious friend of mine called me just yesterday and actually said, “Remind me.” He’d lost sight of why he’d made the very good choices he had because the results weren’t coming as fast as his impatience wanted them. So I did. It was easy for me to remember his motivations for his choices. I have no impatience about his results at all. It’s my own that can cause impatience to flare in me.

We all need reminding. Consider that word!

Re-mind.

If ever you’re feeling out of sorts, call a close friend and ask, “Remind me please?” You’ll be astonished at what the people who love you remember in your behalf. And if you know someone who is out of sorts, the coolest thing is that if you’ll remind them about who they are, it will be easier for you to remember who you are.

Holy (Hell) Days

The holidays are upon us, dear one. Are your holidays holy days, as they’re intended to be? Or have they become holy hell days, as they have for so many?

I love the holidays because they let me slow down. Oh, I work and I live but I do my best savoring over the holidays. I enjoy particular movies this time of year. I play hooky. I do my best to get gift-buying, wrapping and giving done quickly and efficiently.

What could you do to slow down the holy hell days into holy days?

Always, always there is ritual. Decorating a tree. Having warm cider. Special foods. Lighting candles. Smells that come at no other time of year. Ritual is a slow-down of time, a be still and know time. Give yourself and those you love the gift of slowed time during this holy days.

Without this we miss the purpose of the holy days. They are days which are meant to remind us of who we are as light. Light started the whole shebang on this planet, and light is at the core of each being, each one, no exceptions. Bringing your own light to the fore by slowing down and looking for it will allow you to see the light in others.

The transformation of holy hell days into holy days hinges on but one thing: choice. No matter your circumstances, you do have a choice about the quality of your days.

Simplify. Relax. Enjoy. Savor. And let there be ever more light.

Four Square / Disney III

Seeds IX, 49

Seed: Four Square/Disney III

I have a file in my computer called Seeds Ideas. I add to it whenever something strikes me as a good idea for a Seed. Reading it this morning, I saw two “fours” that appealed to me.

The first is the work of metaphysician Florence Scovel Shinn. She calls it Four Square. The second is the work of Walt Disney. He calls it The Four Words to the Secret of Life. We’re going to explore Shinn’s and Disney’s four words a week at a time for the next four weeks. I think they link together nicely.

The third pair are Love, and Dream. Most of you know I’ve had a counseling practice for more than a quarter of a century. You can imagine I’ve heard a lot about love in that time. People often speak to me about wanting their soulmates. They make lists of characteristics they want in their paragon. They dream a soulmate into being. Sometimes it just stops there.

I can always tell when someone has done the true work for a soulmate. Here’s why: they’ve dreamed up this person, and then their focus switches from being loved by this wonder to loving this fallible human. When people are ready to love rather than be loved, a soulmate usually appears.

Think of Florence Scovel Shinn’s words as a square upon which you stand—the third side of the square is Love, and think of Walt Disney’s as the actions to take to get to that solid square—in this case, Dream.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my peace blog Ode Magazine.

I Thought I'd Already Done That!

I had another session with Peruvian healer Elena Radford this morning. Starting with the intention to cover one issue, we ended up working in a very different place in my psyche in order to get to the issue I wanted to work. Wildly to me, I thought I’d already done what I needed to do with the issue from my long ago past.

Instead of giving you the crusty details of the specifics, let me use generalities. I wanted to work on a health thing that I’ve struggled with for a long time. When we started our time together, she told me that we would be preparing to address the health concern at another time.

To my surprise, Elena raised an issue of financial betrayal from my high school days that involved a wicked stepfather and community property laws related to adoption. Now, my friend, I had done my work on this for plenty of years. I was sure I’d forgiven this man, and set him free. Certainly, I felt free of it.

“But I thought I’d already done that!”

What we feel consciously and what our bodies and subconscious minds know are often two vastly different things. Cells are the master encoders of information. There is such a thing as cellular memory. Otherwise how would we “inherit” dis-eases?

What Elena did was tap into encoded memories and set me free of the conclusions I drew about the man who stole from me thirty-three years ago. If you are looking for a fascinating Christmas gift to give your desiring-to-be-conscious friends this year, consider a session with Elena Radford. 435-649-4262. Tell her Susan Corso sent you.

I can’t wait to see what our session on December 15th brings to light.

When To Let Go

Throughout the fall, I have been the project manager for a major renovation in our Victorian home. The porches were falling off our 1889 Grande Dame. As of today, they’re done. Much more solid. Beautifully constructed. Done.

I need to qualify that . . . done, except for the rotten paint job on the decks. The painter hired by our contractor was a little flaky, not too responsible, and delayed too long so the weather got cold and the paint wouldn’t dry. Now we have to wait till spring to have the decks redone properly. That’s the long and the short of it.

What I want to write about is: how do you know when to let go?

Here’s how I know:

When I’ve tried everything I can think of to create resolution, and the situation won’t resolve.
When all signs indicate that pushing isn’t going to resolve it.
When it involves things I can’t control (like weather.)
When I feel my energy flag every time I think about the situation.

Recently a dear friend went to New York City to visit and consider moving back there. I said to him,

“Follow the energy.”

It proved to be exactly what he needed to do. It’s good advice for everything.

Do what you can in any given circumstance, then honestly assess where you are. Things can’t always be resolved when I want them to be. But I can always be resolved when I follow the energy. It’s much less tiresome than pushing, and things get resolved peaceably.

As we approach the ever-stressful holidays, dear one, follow the energy. You will be delighted at how it simplifies your life.

When the weather becomes consistently warm here in Boston, come, say, April or May, we’ll have the porches painted and sealed properly. All is well.

Four Square / Disney II

Seeds IX, 48

Seed: Four Square/Disney II

I have a file in my computer called Seeds Ideas. I add to it whenever something strikes me as a good idea for a Seed. Reading it this morning, I saw two “fours” that appealed to me.

The first is the work of metaphysician Florence Scovel Shinn. She calls it Four Square. The second is the work of Walt Disney. He calls it The Four Words to the Secret of Life. We’re going to explore Shinn’s and Disney’s four words a week at a time for the next four weeks. I think they link together nicely.

The second two are Wealth, and Believe. Wealth is one of those words. Its roots are Anglo-Saxon and they mean wholeness. What makes you wealthy is up to you. Your own definition of wealth is more important than any other, meaning—what you believe about wealth is what makes you wealthy.

It’s always a worthwhile experiment to figure out what you believe about wealth. It can be measured any way you like. A home, friends, money, a partner, fulfilling work. What you value is your wealth. Your values come from your beliefs. Look there to find your own wealth.

Think of Florence Scovel Shinn’s words as a square upon which you stand—the second side of the square is Wealth, and think of Walt Disney’s as the actions to take to get to that solid square—in this case, Believe.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

Political Circus

Is anyone else wondering about the circus-like atmosphere that has “suddenly” hit American politics?

A headline today said, “Oprah is opening act for Obama.”
John Edwards is slamming Hillary Clinton every chance he gets.
Obama is doing whatever he can to discredit Clinton’s record.
Clinton is responding to Obama in kind.

I repaired to the OED to get my bearings around the word circus.

[L. circus circle, circus, ring, circle.]
1. a. Roman Antiq. A large building, generally oblong or oval, surrounded with rising tiers of seats, for the exhibition of public spectacles, horse or chariot races, and the like.

It’s a circle; that’s all.

In Roman antiquity, a circus was for the exhibition of public spectacles. Well, as we approach the ever-earlier primaries (shall we schedule one in early 2007? Just to beat out every state!) American politics becomes more and more a public spectacle. I, for one, am embarrassed—for the candidates, for our country, for myself.

I find myself wishing that instead of taking the definition from antiquity quite so literally current politicians (those who create policy) would take a page out of mega-entrepreneur P. T. Barnum’s book instead. Remember what he called his circus?

The greatest show on earth.

What could possibly make American politics the greatest show on earth? Well, how’s about these ideas?

Honor. Duty. Honor. Responsibility. Honor. Care. Honor. Freedom. Honor. Courage. Honor. Perseverance. Honor. Faith. Honor. Beauty. Did I say Honor?

Supporting Our Troops

I got an email from a dear friend a couple of days ago about something the Xerox Corporation is doing to support our troops. It touched me, and I went online at once and did as they suggested.

If you are intrigued, try this.





www.LetsSayThanks.com

Xerox is letting us send cards to our troops overseas at no charge. The images are children’s drawings and you get to choose your own message.

We’re approaching the myriad Seasons of Light in many of the world’s religions and to be away from all that is familiar has to be heart-breaking at some level whether one believes in the mission or one doesn’t. Holidays can be hard enough without the missing of friends, family, children and all things that mean home.

This little thing made me feel much less helpless about the war. Thank a soldier, a sailor, a marine, an airman today, and see how it makes you feel.

Four Square / Disney I

Seeds IX, 47

Seed: Four Square/Disney I

I have a file in my computer called Seeds Ideas. I add to it whenever something strikes me as a good idea for a Seed. Reading it this morning, I saw two “fours” that appealed to me.

The first is the work of metaphysician Florence Scovel Shinn. She calls it Four Square. The second is the work of Walt Disney. He calls it The Four Words to the Secret of Life. We’re going to explore Shinn’s and Disney’s four words a week at a time for the next four weeks. I think they link together nicely.

The first two are Health, and Think.

We don’t ordinarily associate health and thinking, but I have personal experience which attests to their connection. When I was a child, there was an inordinate amount of focus on my health. I grew up thinking I wasn’t healthy. As an adult, I have worked with this for years.

It matters to your health whether you think you’re healthy or not. Even if you’re not healthy, thinking you are goes a long way toward health. Examine your ideas about your health. What do you actually think about it?

I think you’ll be amazed. As a rule, if we train our minds to think we’re healthy, we are, no matter the challenges. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “The first wealth is health.”

In the next four weeks, think of Florence Scovel Shinn’s words as a square upon which you stand—the first side is called Health, and think of Walt Disney’s as the actions to take to get to that solid square, the first action is Think.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

Emotional GPS

Abraham, through Esther Hicks, talks about an emotional spectrum that all humans share and how to use it as a tracking system in creation. His premise is that how we feel indicates how much of Source we are allowing or resisting.

I got myself all tangled up in the notion of feelings. Not that I don’t have them, and not that they’re not valid, but I know myself well enough to be aware that I can resist my own feelings. I can manipulate my own feelings, and so feelings to me aren’t always a safe measuring stick.

The measurer I can always trust, however, is bodily sensation. My body knows and she doesn’t hesitate to tell me when something I’m thinking isn’t helpful to me or the world. These sorts of feelings are more akin to sensations. Body knowings.

But no matter, says Abraham, when in doubt or question about feelings, there’s a default position that always allows more Source than you were experiencing just the moment before, and that is appreciation.

So as we approach our national holiday of giving thanks, let us use appreciation as our emotional destination. For this holiday week, let everything you do be guided by appreciation. If what you’re doing takes you away from appreciation, do something different.

This Thanksgiving, put APPRECIATION into your GPS device, and discover where that takes you!

Outrageous Joy

I’m reading Ask and It Is Given by Esther and Jerry Hicks. It is a compilation of the teachings of Abraham, a non-physical family of energies determined to remind us all of who we are. I read a book of theirs years ago, and didn’t connect with it. This time I could underline every word. Readiness is everything.

Although I’m only a few pages into the book, the phrase in my title here stopped me in my tracks. Abraham says we’re all here to experience outrageous joy.

Outrageous joy!

Can you imagine what that feels like from your own insides to live in outrageous joy? Can you imagine what it looks like to live on a planet full of people living in outrageous joy? Can you imagine what a planet feels like when its inhabitants live in outrageous joy?

I’ve known for a long time that joy is our birthright. I’ve spent much of my life joyful, and a lot of it less-than-joyful. There are myriad reasons why. The reasons aren’t of value. They weren’t then and they aren’t now and they won’t be in the future.

What is of value is the idea that we can live in outrageous joy and that as we commit to the whole world living in outrageous joy, our personal joy will increase. There are actions to take to create joy. Simple ones. Daily ones. Useful ones.

The next time you’re inclined to give someone a compliment, even a stranger, do it!
The next time you see something beautiful, stop and savor it.
The next time you read a book that touches you, tell someone about it.

The fastest way to create joy for yourself is to give joy to others. Really. It’s true of all the outrageous wonder that is possible on Earth. Wonder. Joy. Peace. Love. Honor. Truth. Beauty. Freedom. Wisdom. Fun.

Outrageous joy! Give it and receive it now.

Earth Heart

Seeds IX, 46

Seed: Earth Heart

Unity makes me think of our planet, blessed Earth. We, as members of our nations, have a stewardship responsibility for our planet. Her resources are ours to use and we must be aware of how we use them

One way to be aware is to listen. Look at that word earth. See the ear in there? To steward the resources of Earth, we need to listen to what Earth is saying to us. I know this sounds a little woo-woo for some readers.

There’s another way. Earth’s letters can be rearranged to spell Heart. It’s what’s called an anagram. See the ear in heart as well?

Listening to your own heart about the earth is the first step to responsible stewardship.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

Conspiracy Theory

I have a pet conspiracy theory. Many of us who see meaning everywhere do.

Mine is that the universe is a conspiracy for our good.

Research for my books takes me all kinds of places I never expect to be consciously. The latest led me to researching soul retrieval. It’s a technique used by shamanic healers to reclaim energetic parts of ourselves that we need.

Let me tell you about the conspiracy.

I had a birthday weekend in New York this year. At Sunday brunch, a friend told us about a healing he had experienced with a woman from Peru who lives in Utah.

A week later, I decided soul retrieval was the healing modality I wanted to use in my next book.

I ordered the three major books on soul retrieval and waited for them to arrive from used booksellers.

I read two of the three books.

A book midwifery client, and the same friend who was a brunch with us, had a session. I told him I was studying soul retrieval.

Two weeks later, he put it together that the Peruvian healing woman was doing soul retrieval and he put us together.

I have had two remarkable sessions with her. And my book will be immeasurably richer for knowing her.

A conspiracy for good.

May I recommend to you . . .

Elena Radford?

Her sessions are 60-90 minutes for $90, and WOW. Already I feel a difference in my physical energy and my experience.

845-901-9986 (MST). Say I sent you!

No More Shame

In the past two days, I’ve read two “shame on you” blog posts. One was by Steven Weber on Huffington Post and the other was by Rocky Peterson on a Salt Lake City newspaper blog. Both were political, both were intended to shame “the American people,” whoever they are.

Both took the line that we need to do something about the political situation in our home country. Maybe we do. Maybe we don’t. That’s not the issue.

The issue is that shame never prompted anyone to make a positive change. I mean it, never. Shame comes from early Scandinavian roots meaning sham. When we feel shame, we feel like we’re false, fake, not real. How could behaviors based in a feeling like this possibly help us make new choices? They can’t.

So here’s the antidote to shame: pride. Not hubris, or pride that wounds, but genuine pride in our land, our people, our system of government. Pride comes from Latin roots that mean brave.

The USA is the home of the brave. Are you brave enough to care about our land, our people, our system of government? Do you follow politics? Do you vote? Is your vote something that makes you proud?

Pick one thing, dear one, one that you care about and do the thing that makes you proud. Voila! No more shame.

Unity

Seeds IX, 45

Seed: Unity

I had a strange introduction to politics, one I never would have expected. My sweetie bought me the DVDs of Aaron Sorkin’s, The West Wing. It was an hour-long television drama about a top team in the White House. Admittedly, Mr. Sorkin’s political bent matches my own quite liberal one, but that’s not what I got from the DVDs.

What I learned was how the process of politics works in Washington, D.C. It’s a fascinating, frustrating, valuable process. Learning about it has helped me get clear about what I value politically. It can be put pretty plainly in three words:

Unity, not uniformity.

I appreciate those whose ideas and opinions differ from mine, if only because they make me clearer about what my own are. What I want for our country is dialogue, interaction, a bigger solution than that of just one person, or one majority.

Not uniformity, unity.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog at Ode Magazine.

Diligence

I’ve written elsewhere that I’ve been the project manager for our porch renovation this fall. What a lot of work! I’ve been surprised.

Diligence is what has been required of me. Serious diligence.

I looked it up in the OED. 1. Of persons: Constant in application, persevering in endeavour, assiduous, industrious; not idle, not negligent, not lazy.

I decided, based on the experience of friends of ours, that constant in application meant two things to me: accountability and transparency.

Every single day of this project, I have written a report to the six Trustees about what happened that day. They were a little surprised at the reports at first, but now, thirty-seven days into the project, they're grateful.

Diligent comes from a Latin verb which means to value or esteem highly. An old adage of my mother's came to me as I wrote this: Whatever is worth doing is worth doing well. Turns out it wasn't my mama's at all. Lord Chesterfield get the credit, and the proper quote is:


Whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well.

What's Dear To You?

A dear friend of mine had an unfortunate, close encounter with a deer this week. He was driving and a deer leaped in front of his car shattering the windshield and bruising my friend mightily.

My friend will be fine. His car, bar the windshield, is fine. The deer will go on to its next incarnation.

When something like this happens, what are we to make of it?

In a phone conversation, I made my friend laugh by asking:

“What’s dear to you?”

We are surrounded by signs and messages if we’ll learn to read them.

The Symbolism of Politics

Seeds IX, 44

Seed: The Symbolism of Politics

It’s a few days before the one-year mark prior to the Presidential election in the U.S. as I send this. As I write it, though, it’s just after Summer Solstice. This Seed came to me via an article called “The Politics of Symbolism.” When I read the title, the words, as you can see, reversed themselves.

What does it mean that our current president has lower approval ratings than any president ever?
What does it mean that corruption is being discovered in the Justice Department?
What does it mean that an immigration bill has stymied the congress?
What does it mean that our country is still involved in a war that almost seventy percent of voting people disapprove?

Does any of this have personal meaning to you and me? I think it does. I think the government, in all its aspects, is a mirror to each of us. Want to help out our governing bodies?

Where within are you disapproving of your own leadership?
Where within are you corrupt or unjust?
Where within are you denying yourself amnesty?
Where within are you at war despite your better judgment?

Make peace, dear one. Make peace within yourself about all these things, and behold a remarkable change in our governance.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

All The Rage

I’m borrowing my title today from the cover story of this month’s Utne Reader. The cover read “Why Are We So Angry?”

The article was called, “All The Rage.” It detailed the growing evidence of rage in America.

We are in the midst of major climate change. Climate change used to have another name: Global Warming. I’ve already written about global warming as a global warning.

Rage, in the sense of temperature, is hot.

So what came first? Global warming? Or the rage?

It’s all a mirror, dear one. All.

13 Grandmothers

The International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers crossed my radar through Nina Rothschild Utne’s column in Utne Reader. They first gathered from all four corners of the globe from October 11 through 17, 2004 in Phoenicia, New York

Here is their Statement of Alliance.

Statement of Alliance

WE ARE THIRTEEN INDIGENOUS GRANDMOTHERS who came together for the first time from October 11 through October 17, 2004, in Phoenicia, New York. We gathered from the four directions in the land of the people of the Iroquois Confederacy. We come here from the Amazon rainforest, the Arctic circle of North America, the great forest of the American northwest, the vast plains of North America, the highlands of central America, the Black Hills of South Dakota, the mountains of Oaxaca, the desert of the American southwest, the mountains of Tibet and from the rainforest of Central Africa.

Affirming our relations with traditional medicine peoples and communities throughout the world, we have been brought together by a common vision to form a new global alliance.

We are the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers. We have united as one. Ours is an alliance of prayer, education and healing for our Mother Earth, all Her inhabitants, all the children and for the next seven generations to come.

We are deeply concerned with the unprecedented destruction of our Mother Earth, the contamination of our air, waters and soil, the atrocities of war, the global scourge of poverty, the threat of nuclear weapons and waste, the prevailing culture of materialism, the epidemics which threaten the health of the Earth's peoples, the exploitation of indigenous medicines, and with the destruction of indigenous ways of life.

We, the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers, believe that our ancestral ways of prayer, peacemaking and healing are vitally needed today. We come together to nurture, educate and train our children. We come together to uphold the practice of our ceremonies and affirm the right to use our plant medicines free of legal restriction. We come together to protect the lands where our peoples live and upon which our cultures depend, to safeguard the collective heritage of traditional medicines, and to defend the earth Herself. We believe that the teachings of our ancestors will light our way through an uncertain future.

We join with all those who honor the Creator, and to all who work and pray for our children, for world peace, and for the healing of our Mother Earth.

For all our relations.

Prayer, peacemaking and healing.

I can’t tell you how relieved I am—our grandmothers know one another and are at work! Thank God/dess.

Busy-ness

Seeds IX, 43

Seed: Busy-ness

The number one cause of death in the world these days is heart disease. Consider this: the Chinese pictograph for busy-ness means heart-killing.

I can’t be the only one who gets it. Let me lay it out in no uncertain terms: we, as a race (race!), are too busy. We over-schedule, under-perform and wonder why we’re disappointed a lot of the time. Why is because we don’t give ourselves the time truly to experience what we’ve chosen to do.

Years ago I had a friend who loved to “fit things in.” She was notoriously late, so not only was I fit in, but because she was almost always late, I missed the first fifteen or so minutes of our time together. One night, I’d had it. I left before she got there. After a quick, clear conversation, she was never late to meet me again.

If busy-ness really is heart-killing, are you really all that interested in being so busy you can’t stop and enjoy what you’re actually doing? Get out of the heart-killing business and make the switch to heart-filling.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog at Ode Magazine.

Bush League

One of the things that delights me in this life is to be surprised by a new way to look at an old word. Yesterday’s New York Times crossword puzzle sent me a doozy. The date is October 23, 2007 if anyone wants to check.

The across clue read: 20. Amateurish

There were four squares, meaning I needed a four-letter word.

I was almost through the whole puzzle before I got it.

The answer was: B U S H

I burst out laughing. Then I sobered almost immediately.

The word amateur means one who loves. See the Latin root, amat, in there?

I looked up bush league in Wikipedia:

“Bush league is a general term used to describe an action or thing as being amateur, inferior or crude. In a literal sense, it refers to a low quality minor-league in baseball not associated with any of the major league teams. The term originated from the state of minor-league fields that often were ringed with shrubs and bushes."

There is a predominant Bush in the reality of the Western world at the moment, that being of the George W. Bush variety. The puzzle made me think of our Bush as being bush league when it comes to war. Amateurish. I think President Bush loves playing war.

He’s given us a gift as well. He’s made us all look at how we feel about war. Seventy percent of the American people want out of this war.

Let’s graduate to the majors, vote our genuine convictions and get out of the bush league once and for all!

A Hole in the Bedroom Ceiling

There’s a hole in our bedroom ceiling right now. During the day, I can see a bona fide beam of sunshine in a room that usually gets very little sun. It’s disconcerting. Not only that but, in a way we paid to have that hole put there.

Mystery solved. The porches were falling off our 1889 Queen Anne Colonial Revival house so our condo association is hip-deep in a renovation project. In order to hang the new, sturdy floors on the building, the crew made a hole in our bedroom ceiling.

Sometimes renovation is like that.

Especially when it comes to self-renovation.

Think of the last time you had a big, rock-your-world realization about some aspect of yourself, or your life, or your past. Didn’t it take time and space to integrate it?

Our crew needs to integrate the porches onto the building. There’s a cost to integration. Namely, sometimes it makes holes in your ceiling. This week the crew will patch and repaint the hole in the bedroom. Next week the porches will be integrated in full.

Give yourself and your process a break. If there’s a hole in your ceiling, enjoy the beam of sunshine while you can.

Breath to Complain

Seeds IX, 42

Seed: Breath to Complain

Mattie Stepanek was one of former President Jimmy Carter’s best friends. President Carter was Mattie’s hero. A desperately physically ill young man, his dream was to meet Mr. Carter. He did. They became friends because of their shared commitment to peace. They even wrote a book together.

One of the hardest things about Mattie’s disease was breathing. Something he wrote puts life into immediate perspective.

If you have enough breath to complain,

then you have enough to be thankful for.

The next time you take a breath, which should be pretty soon, think before you speak. Were you about to complain? Why not skip it and go straight to gratitude?

Gratitude that you can breathe. Some people can’t.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.
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When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my peace blog Ode Magazine.

Fear—Who Cares?

I read the words of my title in a brilliant book entitled Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. Her prose is delicious, her insights better.

The words come from her unnamed guru who is, without doubt, Gurumayi Chidvilasananda of the Siddha Yoga lineage. I like the words because they encapsulate a freeing truth.

Human beings experience fear.

Stating the obvious has become an art these days, and Gurumayi got it in one. So okay, we are afraid. Does fear always matter? I don’t think so. Oh sure, in the Serengeti Desert facing a hungry mama lion, fear is an instinctual, natural human response to a life-threatening situation. Sure, in a dark alley hearing heavy anonymous footsteps in counterpoint to gunshots, of course there’s fear.

But what about our small, everyday fears? Fear of humiliation, fear of being wrong, fear of making the wrong choice, fear of the dark, fear of the monster under the bed. Who cares?

“Who cares?” is a good, healthy response to fears which can paralyze us but in the long run aren’t really important.

The next time you’re caught in the headlights of fear that is not life-threatening, ask yourself, “Who cares?” I think you’ll be delighted to find that you, for one, don’t.

A Good Place to Stop

I’ve spent the last few months working with an editor on my novels. We’ve cleaned up some less-than-ideal writing habits, fixed some unclear plot entanglements, changed some overused words. I was working on the third book when I realized that I’d changed the same thing three times.

Then I remembered something my favorite ex-husband, a painter, said to me years ago.

“A good painting is never finished; there’s just a good place to stop.”

I stopped editing. I’ll let the book sit for a few days and then I’ll reread it to be certain I got to that good stopping place. I think I did.

The thing is, in creating anything—dinner, a novel, a painting, whatever, there does come a point in the process when one reaches a good place to stop.

The art is to know when that place is.

The next time you’re working on anything, if you find that you’ve made a change, then changed it back, then changed it back again, that’s the place. Stop. Do something different and let it sit. Go back to it when you can. My guess is that you’ll discover your own delightful stopping place.

Wild Rebirth

Seeds IX, 41

Seed: Wild Rebirth

Today I am reborn . . . into the second half-century of my blessed life. Happy Birthday to me.

This past Easter we were invited to Easter dinner with precious friends. Our place cards were provided by another of the guests. She set these words in front of each place.

May the season of wild rebirth remind us
to renew our passions, hopes, loves, struggles, ambitions, and adventures.
May our thoughts, words, and actions reflect
the ancient festival of reawakening.

To everyone who has a birthday this year, let this be a reminder.

Be reborn this year. Be wild.
Renew yourself this year. Be passionate.
Remember to wake up this year. Be part of the ancient festival called Life.

Happy Birthday to you.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

Spectator Sports

I recently bought a t-shirt from an online merchandiser. Their company had a tagline by its logo that has stayed with me:

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

In fact, none of the things that really matter to us in life are. None of them.

Peace is not a spectator sport.
Beauty is not a spectator sport.
Prayer is not a spectator sport.

Neither are eating, sleeping, loving, wondering, growing, learning.
Nor are healing, enjoying, asking, receiving, reading.

Spectator sports have value without doubt. Football, baseball, and my favorite, basketball, are fun to watch, but life itself demands that we participate. That we be participants and not spectators.

Is there somewhere in your life where you’re watching instead of playing? Go ahead, jump in.

Herding Cats

Some of you may know this already but I live in a six-unit condominium in a beautiful Victorian house in Boston. Our Grande Dame is 119 years old.

This summer the spacious, elegant back porches decided to fall off the building. This is a problem. It took us two months of solid, daily work to figure out what to do. The learning curve was so steep as to be perpendicular to the lift-off platform. No one who lives in the building is a builder or a contractor. Every contractor had a different idea about how to fix/replace/repair the porches. We had no idea how to make the decision.

Add to this that no matter what we did, the cost would be at least five figures and more probably six, AND that all six Trustees, one for each unit, had a different idea about what was expensive, what was not, and what was appropriate to spend to fix the sagging porches.

I was the point-person on the project and I felt like I was herding cats most of the time. Ever tried it? Cats are not herd animals, dear one.

Not to worry, I still have my beautiful red hair but it was touch and go there for a while until I let go and let the process happen. I disagreed strongly with some penny-pinching that won out. I was annoyed that people couldn’t be bothered to read or, heaven help me, answer emails. You get the picture.

What I got to let go of was the need to herd cats.

The process continues apace. The contractor and his crew are noisy, enthusiastic and efficient even as I write, and the cats have settled down in patches of spotty Boston fall sunshine for their afternoon naps.

Walls & Bridges

Seeds IX, 40

Seed: Walls & Bridges

Sir Isaac Newton (1643-1727) was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, and alchemist, regarded by many as the greatest figure in the history of science. I read this quote by him and it startled me to quietude.

“We build too many walls and not enough bridges.”

I don’t think of myself as someone who builds walls. I like to think of myself as open, welcoming, affirming, generous. Sometimes I am. Other times, though, I build a wall around my heart or my self so I don’t have to deal with things or people I don’t want to face. I feel it most often when I watch the political news.

How can I expect to have an effect on the politics of our nation when I’m building walls around my heart to hold the politicos away from myself? I can’t. I have to build bridges to them. Wynona Judd sang a song on an episode of Touched By An Angel years ago called “Love Can Build A Bridge.”

Here’s how to transform walls into bridges: let love, no, Love, dismantle the wall, one brick/stone/plinth at a time, and stretch the wall out toward the things you’ve fortressed yourself against till there’s a two-person wide bridge you both can cross and meet together in the middle.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog at Ode Magazine.

More Naps!

Alright, we have it on the Highest Authority—Harvard University—that it’s okay—no, essential—to nap at work.

A Higher Authority than Harvard says it’s okay, no, essential to nap whenever you’re tired.

The Harvard Nap Wizards say that napping doesn’t really prevent fatigue, but it does manage information overload.

Has it dawned on anyone else that we might need fewer naps if we curtailed our information overload?

More naps! (See you in an hour.)

No Longer Immune

Has anybody else noticed that it’s chronic diseases that are rising dramatically on the planet? Even stranger, most of them are auto-immune imbalances.

What’s going on with the collective human immune system?

I’ll tell you what I think it is.

We’re no longer immune.

More, we can’t be immune any longer.

Immunity is a fascinating word. It comes from Latin roots. Im-munis means ready to serve. In the word lies the antidote to the epidemic (as is so often the case.)

The message seems clear to me.

It’s time to be ready to serve.

Think on this, dear one. It’s no mistake that AIDS is called what it is, and it’s no mistake that its acronym is also an English word which means helps.

What better way to help one another than to serve one another?

To Be List

Seeds IX, 39

Seed: To Be List

Overheard in a public conveyance recently: a pissing contest (there are no other words so apt) between two women over their To Do Lists. Escalating voices. Animated faces. Super-sized gestures. “Well, I have to do this!” “Really? I have to do that!” Are we suffering from To Do List hubris? I think we are. I was glad to get off the bus.

Yes, dear one, too much to do is a part of everyone’s life at different times. Too many things scheduled too close together. Deadlines at work and at home. Promises made and promises we want to keep. Emergencies. Exigencies. Life has a certain amount of stress, I’ll give you that.

My question today is: do you have a To Be List? I read about this idea on beliefnet and the two bus pugilists reminded me of it. A To Be List is very different from a To Do List. What a To Be List does is give you opportunities to practice how you choose to live your life.

My To Be List includes: Peaceful, Loving, Patient, Kind, Joyous, Gentle, Sweet. I almost never cross things off my To Be List. Why? Because each thing on it is about me learning to be a better, wiser, more open person, and I only ever want more of that.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

Advice

I have been in the advice-giving business for more than a quarter of a century, although I never set out to give advice. Not when I started, and not now.

In my experience, ninety percent of giving advice is listening. Deep listening. That’s what I do when people tell me their stories. I listen—to them, and within myself. More often than not, clients solve their own troubles just because someone is listening to them.

When they don’t, it’s usually because they’ve gotten too far away from what they truly want. Finding this quote from Harry S. Truman made me smile. It’s as true for clients as for children.

I have found the best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it.

This is why I listen within during a session. To reach the inner truth that someone is perhaps dancing around (or kicking around) or resisting. Sometimes I’m blessed to be able to say: “Do you want me to cut to the chase?” No one has ever refused.

If I’m quiet enough within, I can come up with the bottom line. The solution, the action to take so that change occurs. This is what everyone wants when they seek advice. They want to know what to do in order to change what’s so.

What this means is that my practice is eclectic. People reach out to me, we work intensely for however long it takes­—sometimes one session, sometimes twelve, it all depends—and then that client goes her or his merry way until the next time they want advice.

Try it for yourself sometime when you’re stuck. Tell the story of what’s going on. Then listen within and see what sort of advice comes up. You could get to the bottom line on your own. If you’re still stuck, be in touch by all means. I love nothing more than deep listening.

(Can't resist.) The Doctor is in. Five cents, please.

A Lesson in Intention

Marcel Marceau died this week. He was a world-renowned mime who created a melancholy mime-clown named Bip.

Many years ago, when I was a student at National Theatre Institute at the Eugene O’Neill Memorial Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut, I was privileged to take a class with this master of gesture.

Marcel Marceau’s artistry is where I first encountered the idea of intention.

His class was full of silence. Without ever speaking, he set us each a task, an exercise, to establish the fact of a wall in front of us. He put his expressive hands in the air and felt a wall, and then, through gesture, encouraged us fledglings, wannabes, to do the same.

We felt for the wall in front of us for about an hour. An hour!

Occasionally, the master would come to discover the wall we had created, and we would have a wall dialogue. Eventually, he visited every wall in the room. When he would work with a student, the wall became much more real, more solid, more . . . well, wall. He had been establishing walls in the air for decades by then.

After the silent work, he spoke in his rich French accent.

“There is only a wall if you intend a wall.”

I walked around for a full week with that sentence echoing in my head. I suppose it was a roundabout introduction to the philosophy that would eventually guide my life, metaphysics.

There is only a wall if you intend a wall.

There is only a connection if you intend a connection.

Intention is everything.

Merci beaucoup, M. Marceau. God-speed.

Happiness Heard Your Name

Seeds IX, 38

Seed: Happiness Heard Your Name

Listen to these words from Sufi poet Hafiz:

Ever since happiness heard your name,
it has been running through the streets trying to find you.

Imagine that! Hearing your name, no matter what street you’re on, anywhere in the world. It’s Happiness, calling to you, you personally.

What is your answer? Yes? No? Maybe? I’m too busy? Not now? Later? Some day? Perhaps? For real? C’mon? What?

Listen for a moment, deeply, interiorly, as quietly as you can. Happiness is calling your name. Please hold still and answer Yes.

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog Ode Magazine.

Which Model Did You Choose?

We got to laughing at the breakfast table this morning over bodies. My sweetie teased me that I’d chosen The Reading Model this lifetime. She chose The Playing Model.

Which model did you choose?

Here are some options; dream up your own! I’d love to hear from you.

The Foreign Language Model
The Finance Model
The Art Model
The Athletic Model
The Healthy Model
The Serious Model
The Anxious Model
The Fun Model
The Peaceful Model
The Daredevil Model
The Intellectual Model
The Soul Model
The Spirit Model
The Kinesthetic Model
The Whatever Kind of Model You Need in Any Given Moment Model.

Did you know that you actually can choose to have the kind of body you need in any given moment? You can. Bodies are meant to be pushed, explored, heard, gentled, honored. They’re infallible—in the sense that your body can never lie to you.

Check out which model or models you’ve chosen so far. Do you like them? Cool. If not, choose again.

Chants for Peace

The words of urban shaman Donna Henes inspire this post. She staged a 911 Emergency Call for Peace vigil on 9/11/07. It was raining. The dedicated souls were few. She called it “optimism in action.” Her report included these words:

CHANTS FOR PEACE * CHANCE FOR PEACE

I’ll let Donna tell you the rest:

“Though we had gathered to mourn the tragic death of nearly 3000 people, it is important for us to celebrate the 57,000 miracles that occurred on September 11. 60,000 people worked in those buildings. 57,000 of them were saved.

If we dwell on the loss, it perpetuates an atmosphere of fear, anger and revenge. An eye for an eye until the whole world is blind. An exercise in futility.

If we concentrate on miracles, we see that anything can happen. Anything at all. Even peace.”

I’m with Mama Donna. Anything can happen. Her report closed with:

"There IS a chance for peace. And we are that chance!”

We are that chance, and I’m so grateful that Donna stands with me for peace.

For your further enlightenment, please read Donna’s magical book, The Queen of Myself, available from Amazon.com or through her website, http://www.thequeenofmyself.com/

Goin' Courtin'

Seeds IX, 37

Seed: Goin’ Courtin’

Courtin’—that’s a really old-fashioned concept, isn’t it? I wonder if anyone goes courting any more. I was thinking of this song from the movie of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers because of a headline in Science of Mind magazine. It read:

I’m being courted by God, and so are you.

How cool is that? Did you ever think of a relationship with the Divine that way? The OED says that courting means the paying of courteous attention. Certainly the attentions of the Divine to us are courteous, at the very least. Probably more like fascinated, entranced, delighted, wondrous. Bask in that kind of attention for a sec.

Now, just for fun, consider turning that courteous attention around.*

Court the Divine!

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

*P. S. Some of us call this meditation.

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my blog at Ode Magazine.

Ambassadors Extraordinary & Plenipotentiary

As a child I told my mother that I was going to be an actress, a doctor or an ambassador. Actress, I’ve done. Doctor, well yeah. Just not M.D., D.D. (My Jewish grandmother is the proudest of that! Go figure.)

I’m still waiting to be appointed an Ambassador Extraordinary & Plenipotentiary. It means a representative of a sovereign nation with all the powers the pertain thereto.

Then I read these words by Celeste Frazier, “Smiles are peace ambassadors.”

I thought, I can do that! I decided there was only one thing for it: to appoint myself an Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary. Especially if smiling is a contribution toward peace.

Mother Teresa said something similar to Celeste Frazier. “Peace, my friends, begins with a smile. Just as simple as that. A smile. So greet one another with a smile.”

Can you smile? Could you make your smiles a peace offering? Come be an Ambassador Extraordinary & Plenipotentiary with me.

The Story of Your Life

My sweetie and I have been playing with an image lately about the stories we tell ourselves. It started because of something we joked about feeling like we each had a newsroom in our head.

Remember those wonderful old Rosalind Russell/Cary Grant movies where they play reporters? You hear the typewriters and tickertapes clicking and clacking in the background. The dialogue is staccato, rapid-fire. The picture is filmy.

What if you do have a newsroom in your head?

In the newsroom sit as many different typewriters as you tell yourself different stories about any given thing. Let’s try an example. You get a scary health diagnosis.

Which typewriter do you choose?

Do you sit down at the one which tells you that a diagnosis is not a prognosis?
Do you sit at the one which tells you your parent died of the same thing?
Do you sit down at the one which tells you friends are praying for you?
Do you sit at the one which tells you a nightmare story about another person’s
medical challenges?

You get my drift. Here’s the bottom line:

You are the proud owner of two major kinds of typewriter.

The better one touts love.

The lesser one touts fear.

Which tells the story of your life?

P. S. Remember that it’s your personal newsroom. Think carefully, and choose before you sit down to type!

Too Big or Too Small?

Seeds IX, 36

Seed: Too Big or Too Small?

Life is really all about perspective. I mean it, really. Brian Judd writing in Beyond the Bookstore says, “Some people looked at Goliath and thought he was too big to hit. David looked at him and thought he was too big to miss.”

Perspective is dear to my heart because I spent many years seeing physically without it. I’ve had four eye surgeries, and usually, depth perception was the last thing to return to my experience after surgery, hence my inordinate fondness for depth.

Depth is often what I bring to my clients. I am able to pull away from the emotional closeness that someone is experiencing and bring perspective to the situation. It’s often all that’s required for an end-of-the-earth situation to become a blessing-in-disguise situation.

Next time you face off Goliath, give yourself the gift of perspective, and if you can’t (if he’s too big to hit), get some help (turn him into too big to miss.)

Be serene,

Dr. Susan Corso

Seeds are remarkable gifts. Sown in consciousness, they bring you to the most important part of your being—your Divine Spark.

When you have friends you would like added to the Seeds e-mail list, send their addresses to me at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net and please visit my other blog Ode Magazine.

Details, Details

In the past week, I’ve read two quotes about the details.

The first one is credited to various sources: architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and author Gustave Flaubert, amongst others

God is in the details.

The second is credited mostly to that noted author Anonymous, but also German pop star Blixa Bargeld.

The devil is in the details.

Which is it?

I have to answer yes to both.

This is one of those luscious paradoxes which arises in a world of constant polarity. Of course God is in the details. Someone planned orangutans! Duck-billed platypi! Octopi! Not to mention babies, the human genome and Rodgers & Hammerstein.

What about the devil and the details? Well, the maxim actually means that if there is going to be a problem with a project, it will be the details that are problematic. Could be.

Here’s the message of these two statements:

Sometimes it’s best to take the larger view of things. Other times it’s best to take the detailed view of things. The quest is to determine which time requires what attention. That’s known as the gift of discernment, and we’re all learning this skill all the time.