Regeneration—Your Way

I spent some time on the phone with a healer yesterday and part of our conversation was about how I regenerate myself. How do you regenerate? Do you do enough of it? In fact, do you even know how to regenerate yourself? A lot of people, if my clientele is any indication, haven’t a clue about self-regeneration.

For me, I have to be alone. I have to have silence. No TV. No radio. No music, even of my own choosing, although sometimes Baroque music will help. I can be reading, writing, playing solitaire or just sitting. Time spent with people doesn’t regenerate me; it costs me. It took me years to figure this out.

Everyone has her or his own style of self-regeneration, and it is mandatory that we find it, and use it. When we don’t, the consequences are too high. We make choices we have to unmake. We say yes when we mean no. We end up in situations we know don’t nurture us.

Exercise regenerates a lot of folk. So does music or a personal hobby. Sleep is a big one, and we don’t get enough of it. Travel can be regenerating, even for me, even with people. Reading is always a good one. Writing in a journal or on a blog. The point is to seek until we find what works and then do it.

Making a difference in our world is important, but without regenerating the self, we burn out. I think there’s too much burn-out in our world because we don’t take/make the time. Everyone has the same number of hours in a day all over the world. How we spend those hours is up to us.

If you are already a regenerator, bravo! If you’re not, take it as an assignment to begin to learn how to regenerate yourself. Then do it! The world is depending upon it.

Computer Purgatory

I really tried to be smart about it. I waited a couple of years before venturing to buy a new computer. A generous financial gift allowed me to do it at all. I’d had a Dell for several years so I maintained my brand loyalty and went for a new Inspiron 1720—it has the largest screen I’ve ever had!

It also, however, has Windows Vista for an operating system which is why, after a few days of working to climb in to the new machine, I had a list of questions about the new Windows Email which replaces Outlook Express and about Word. Welcome to Computer Purgatory!

I spent hours on the phone trying to get answers to my very simple list of questions. In the process, I also spoke to several friends who share my operating system. To a person, they said, “I hate it.” Wow. And, drat. Hate is not something I want to participate in on our planet. Hate, actually, I’d like to do away with completely.

I got great, helpful attendants on the phone in India willing to answer my questions. Both of whom couldn’t answer them. I spent a long, long time on hold whilst they called Microsoft on some special Computer Purgatory numbers, and I talked both of them out of charging me for their services. (So much for the hardware warranty. . . it doesn’t include set-up.) This could be read: Oh! Did you want a steering wheel with that car?

Part of the reason I stay loyal to my old computers is because the climb to get into each new one is steeper and steeper. I have to calibrate myself to willingness even to begin, let alone get it done. My helpers solved one problem and gave me a workaround for another.

The thing this experience makes me want to ask is . . . why is newer necessarily better? Works did all the things I needed it to do, but I wasn’t even given the option (and now I have to go get the disk back that I gave away because Word won’t read my old database files and neither will the much-touted Excel). Outlook Express worked swimmingly, but now I get the less-than-totally-functional Windows Mail.

Complaining isn’t my point. My point is: what, really, is progress?

Ultimate Concern

Seeds X, 17

Seed: Ultimate Concern

Margaret Storz, writing in Science of Mind Magazine, suggested Ultimate Concern as a name for Divinity. She also suggested Prime Value. Betty Conrad Adam calls her Divinity the Mysterious More. A beloved friend is happiest with the All In All. I call my god Mom or Mary Mags.

You know I think of God as the biggest diamond in the world, the diamond with the most facets through which light can pour. Each facet has a name. One is named Susan Corso. One is named your name. Each facet also has a divine name. There are as many facets as there are names, and as many names as there are facets.

I like Ultimate Concern for one of those names. Ultimate means last. The bottomline place. The end of the line. The final final. The other thing about this name for god is I know that I hold a prime value to the Ultimate Concern. I can bring Her anything, and She’ll help me deal with is, just like a good mother.

What’s your favorite name for Divinity?

Be content,

Susan Corso

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.

Inspiration? Or Madness? Perhaps both.

I’m reading a wild book at the moment by Richard Tarnas called Cosmos & Psyche. It’s taking me a long time because it’s so dense, but wow! He’s making me think just like he did with his last tome, The Passion of the Western Mind.

Richard Tarnas is a scientist of thought. He looks at history, trends and ideas and attempts to discern pattern. His latest book has a fascinating premise . . . that the disorientation and apathy of our species is due to the feeling that we have lost our place in the cosmos; or, rather, that we have lost the feeling and awareness of our place in the cosmos. Further, that the study of astrological transits will restore the feeling to us that we belong here. Wow.

The thing that nabbed me this morning was two words: Cold War. Remember the Cold War? From the end of World War II until the early 1990s, about 44 years, there was a HUGE build-up of nuclear arsenals, principally by the United States and the then U.S.S.R.

Picture those words with me here: COLD WAR

Maybe it was because I was sitting on the porch in the early morning sunshine on a new spring day . . . . Maybe it was where the outer planets sat . . . . Maybe it was just time, but I saw two other words form on my mind’s screen right after they clocked Cold War:

GLOBAL WARMING

Now I know the politically correct term isn’t Global Warming any more. It’s Climate Change, but Climate Change doesn’t begin to show the opposition I saw between COLD and WARM.

My inspiration was this: Could it be that we will experience Global Warming to counteract the karma of the Cold War for as long as the Cold War went on?

I checked out the scientific info on Global Warming. According to the weather wizards, Global Warming (i.e. temperature rising) really began to be recognized in 1980. We’re actually 28 years into our awareness of it, and isn’t it amazing how many people are FINALLY focused on the problem!

Maybe it takes the collective of humanity years to figure out any global trend? In Gematria, the Hebrew science of numbers, the number forty actually means “as long as it takes.”

The Cold War is over. What if Global Warming will reverse itself as more and more of us take action to be responsible for our carbon footprints? Wouldn’t that be an inspiration!

A Mexican Passover

My sweetie and I were invited to a Mexican Seder this weekend. Our hosts meant a Seder for Passover—with Mexican food for the menu. I told some Jewish friends of mine about it and they were disbelieving. Mexican food is not, as a rule, kosher food. How does one have a Seder without kosher food? It’s easy, you serve what you feel like serving.

The point of the Seder wasn’t the menu. The point was the gathering of friends and family to recognize a significant tradition: the passing over of the plague which killed first-born children. It got me thinking about Passover.

Is there something in your life at this moment that you would like to have pass you over? A disease? A relationship? A choice? A responsibility? A debt? Invite it to pass over your life.

We read from a modern Haggadah, taking turns. It seemed significant to me, who read what passage. Mine were the Candles and Miriam’s Cup.

Candles. Fire. Flame. I am mindful that the Divine Spark of me is wanting to burst into Divine Flame. Fire and passion for the things, people, places, incidents of my life.

Miriam’s Cup is a newish tradition in Reform practice celebrating the contribution of Miriam, Aaron’s sister.

In our Seder, we passed a red wine glass and each person at the table added a soupcon of water from his or her own glass. Water represents emotion in the understanding of the mystics. To me, it signified that we all feel things together on this planet, and our feelings, both personal and collective, matter.

Miriam’s Cup celebrates Miriam’s Well. I was more than willing to celebrate the “Well”ness of all of us present, and in the world.

Holidays or Holy Days are wonderful opportunities for a full stop and recognition of your own spiritual process. No matter the menu.

P. S. The Mexican food was exemplary!

Happiness Sneaks

Seeds X, 16

Seed: Happiness Sneaks

For my sweetie’s birthday, a friend sent her a lovely rainbow-colored heart pin with a door ajar in the center of it. The tag said, “Sometimes happiness sneaks in through a door you didn’t even know you left open.”

Have you ever thought about being a happiness sneak? What would that entail? What kind of happiness sneak might you be?

Would you pick up litter when you see it? Just because it makes you happy. Would you compliment strangers? Just because it makes you happy. Would you give anonymous donations? Just because it makes you happy.

This week become a happiness sneak for just one hour. Do something sneaky that makes you happy!

Be content,

Susan Corso

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.

Right or Wrong?

In the past week, I’ve spoken with several clients whom, at bottom line, were consistently making themselves wrong for all sorts of things. I kept asking them to tell me what was right instead of what was wrong.

At one point in my life, I spent a lot of time sighing. Every time, my partner would ask me what was wrong. I finally hollered that the question itself was forbidden! “From now on, you’re only allowed to ask me ‘What’s right?’”

We like to make these two ends of a spectrum so black and white. Is it right? Is it wrong? Fifty years of life experience tell me that there are thousands of shades of grey and that right and wrong fit in that spectrum.

Right for whom? Wrong for whom? Right and wrong when it comes to hurting others is simple and clear to me. But continually living focused on what’s wrong is a recipe for wrongness as far as I’m concerned.

So I’m asking you, What’s right?

Keep focusing on what’s right, and a lot more will be right very soon.

What's Your Story?

So, of course, since I’ve been writing about story, a Citibank ad grabbed my attention. Their tagline was . . . What’s your story? We’ll help you write it. The ad depicted a woman under a car in the traditional “mechanic’s position” wearing a pair of gorgeous red high heels.

Her story went like this:

“As a little girl, I didn’t play with dolls. I played with carburetors. So when I found a beat-up old classic in the newspaper, I knew what I had really found was a new project. I grabbed my Citi CashReturns card and headed for the auto store.

“I bought a new axle, an engine block and brake pads. And then with the cash I got back, I bought myself some new heels. Because there’s no point fixing up your car if you can’t fix yourself up a little in the process.”

Amazing, isn’t it, how story sells. Truth is, we sell ourselves stories all the time. A colleague is rude to us at work or doesn’t copy us on a group email, and all of a sudden, explanations are required. Explanation is a code word, dear one, for a story. We tell ourselves stories to explain why.

The thing with story is this: story can create either pain or pleasure, and we get to choose which we want. I’ll say it again, we GET TO CHOOSE what stories we tell. Myself, I like the pleasure stories, so I tell myself happy ones most of the time.

What I wonder is: how many of us know we are telling ourselves stories, and if we do know, are we choosing?

I liked the girl mechanic's story. Do you like yours? If you don’t, sit down and tell (and listen to) another one. And those shoes. I wonder if I can find them in my size.

Wall Plaques I Have Seen & Loved

Seeds X, 15

Seed: Wall Plaques I Have Seen and Loved


Be Yourself
Everyone Else Is Taken



http://www.pyramidcollection.com/images/P28869B.jpg

Be content,

Susan Corso

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 blogs Seeds for Sanctuary and Ode Magazine.

A New A.D.D.

By now I’m pretty sure that everyone who considers psychology relevant has heard of A.D.D.—Attention Deficit Disorder. It’s been the psych “flavor of the month” for a long time now just as hyperactive was back in the day. In my professional counselor’s opinion, it’s a catch-all diagnosis.

So, when I received my friend Barbara Winter’s latest newsletter, Winning Ways, with a new definition for the acronym, it made me laugh out loud! Her lead story is called “More Adventure, Please” and in it she diagnoses an epidemic of what she’s named . . .

Adventure Deficit Disorder!

The moment I read those words I recognized myself and a lot of people I know. We like our comforts, don’t we? It’s easier to stay put than venture out. It takes energy to have adventures! I’m too busy, we cry. Too tired. Too lazy. Too broke. Too whatever.

Dear one, there are all different kinds of adventures. All different kinds. I’d say I’ve been on a learning expedition ever since I left school. Oh, I learned in school, no question, but the real life learning began when I left the structures and strictures of academia and set one tentative foot into the realms where I wanted to learn. At 50, I consider a day when I haven’t learned something a waste.

Barbara says that her favorite definition is “an adventure is any undertaking the outcome of which cannot be known at the outset.” By this pithy wisdom, a new grocery store is an adventure! So is a new vitamin supplement!

I think we just need to be reminded that the people who have made the most difference in the world are people who venture into realms unknown to themselves. Then they live to tell the tale to others. How do you suppose trends are started? One foot out into the venture, one step, another step—soon you’ve crossed the Himalayas of your experience!

Humanity, as a species, are adventurers. We’ve just lost the thread of our adventuring souls. I double dare you to undertake an adventure in the next 24 hours! Any adventure, as long as it’s an adventure for you, will keep you young, flexible, learning and growing. That’s why we’re here!

P.S. I’ve been reading Barbara Winter’s newsletter for self-bossers, Winning Ways, for many, many years. It’s full of ideas for entrepreneurs and adventurers. Go to http://www.barbarawinter.com/ to subscribe.

How to End the Story Trance

So, here’s cool. A gentleman surfing the net came upon my last post, Talking Story, and sent me his e-book called End Your Story: The Revolutionary Practice That Sets You Free. His name is Jim Dreaver, and like the cover of his book says, he’s the real deal.

THE question of the spiritual life can be boiled down to one word. How? Sure, it’s a great idea to stop talking story, but how do I do it?

Mr. Dreaver teaches a practice that takes us into the how. I’ve only read the first few chapters of the book, and I can already tell that he knows how. He’s lived how, and he practices the how.

Nothing like putting something out into the universe and getting an instant reply!

May I recommend his book to you? http://www.endyourstory.com/ and his personal website http://www.jimdreaver.com/

His basic premise is that we have to welcome whatever comes our way. The way I teach this is the Practice of Yes. Yes, this is happening. Period. Not whether I like it or I don’t. My opinion doesn’t matter. Mr. Dreaver would say that the story I tell myself doesn’t matter. What is happening is what matters.

I won’t give the rest of it away—seekers, seek for yourselves! But I do recommend his book.

Many years ago, I realized that the word transcend sounded different to my ears than most. When we transcend something, we end the trance that we’ve allowed to enchant us. Mr. Dreaver really knows how to end the story trance.

Talking Story

Seeds X, 14

Seed: Talking Story

Talking story is an expression from an Hawaiian healing technique called ho’oponopono. It addresses the stories we tell ourselves.

The thing about our inner stories is that we do tell them to ourselves. Our stories are made up of memories, past experiences, judgments and opinions. Do you like the stories you’re telling yourself?

True confessions. I don’t always like the one I tell myself. There’s a particular one I tell myself about the war in Iraq that really makes me squirm. Talking story is about looking at the stories we tell . . . to ourselves, about ourselves to others, about others to ourselves.

Consider adding a question to your experience this week. Ask yourself when something upsets you . . . are you talking story again? If you are, tell another one!

Be content,

Susan Corso

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.

American Peace Flag

The coolest thing happened the other day. I went to check my Seeds email and received a communiqué from Rivers Brown, the creator of the image you see here. It was drawn soon after 9/11 and means to integrate peace with our nation. Isn’t it beautiful?

There’s a lot I could write about it, and I will on my Ode blog next week, but instead I invite you to let the image soak into your being.

If you want to know more, go to http://www.americanpeaceflag.com/