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The World is Only as Mad as How You See it

Perhaps you read this title and thought, what’s this guy on about? Is he just trying to be provocative and controversial? Really I’m not, but let me explain a bit about what I mean here and hopefully earn your trust on this one!

There’s a lot of chatter around these days that the “world has gone mad”, or that things are getting worse not better all the time. It’s easy to get drawn into this way of thinking for a number of reasons, including the fact that we are given this message through social media and our news outlets all the time.

But determining if its actually true is much more difficult and not really the point of this discussion anyway.

It’s more about our individual viewpoint on the issue and how we affect the world around us.

I’m obviously not saying that you as an individual control how all the things happen in the world just by looking at them. No one person has that kind of power (luckily!). But as a collective we do influence each other, through our thoughts and actions. Every time you look lovingly at another person, or think highly of someone, or do something positive in the world, that affects your energy and that of the people around you.

It spreads from one person to the next, so in that way your way of seeing the world does have an effect that is greater than what you might think at first.

The other meaning in this title comes down to how you feel about your own life and your place in the world. Most of what actually makes up our lives: the day to day activities we take part in, our time at home with our families, even our jobs, are generally fairly insulated from “the madness” that we keep being told about. In fact it’s mostly just the chatter about the fact that it exists that has any direct influence on our lives. If you disconnect from that chatter, you may find that life seems better all of a sudden.

Our news media is full of sensational stories that are meant to titillate and provoke, and keep your attention as long as possible. Most of social media is designed the same way. Everyone is fighting for your attention.

Now you may argue that its important to be connected into what’s happening in the world. And that is true, but I would argue that the method of connection is key. Connecting into the sensational, the negative, is not helpful. Fostering connection through real social relationships and community, building strength through becoming more conscious of our connections to each other at a deeper level, connections that are often ignored. This is where we will truly discover what is happening in the world. This is where we will each stop playing a part in perpetuating the “madness”.

This madness we keep hearing about isn’t a permanent fixture of humanity. It isn’t inevitable and it isn’t our true nature. It can be reduced and then eliminated over time. That process starts with each one of us.

And its really quite simple. Think, act and be in a place of integrity. Be authentic and honourable in everything you do, say and think.

Your life will improve and then the lives of those around you will improve. And on it will go.

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Covid-19: Disruption, Anxiety and Growth

Everyone has their stories and experiences of these times of COVID-19. Many are stories of difficulty and hardship. I have a story too, one I’d like to share. Not that I think it’s more interesting or displays more difficulty than others might be experiencing, but because I imagine it is likely relatable to many. To me there is some comfort in the fact that this is a shared experience. That everyone throughout the world is affected to some degree or another.

The early part of the pandemic actually felt stimulating to me at first. Before the pandemic I had been feeling pretty good, but restless and unsatisfied with many aspects of life. The pandemic brought something new, a chance for change, a new way to look upon the world, and I wanted to absorb it and experience it all. I was relishing the novelty and things felt pretty good, until all of a sudden they didn’t.

A few months into the lock downs and “new normal” I suddenly started to feel uneasy, and it quickly turned into experiences of panic. I would wake up in the middle of the night with the feeling that I had to get up and move around. I was having physical symptoms that I imagined felt like a heart attack, although deep down I knew it was anxiety driven panic. I’ve had one other experience that I recall in my life that felt somewhat like this, but severe anxiety hasn’t been a common factor throughout my life. It was very disconcerting, and was affecting my day to day life. I became very irritable at times and it was having a negative affect on our home life.

It made me wonder what had changed – what was causing this? I have worked from home for many years, so that hadn’t changed, but now there were two of us working from home, and our 5 year old was home as well. I found many days overwhelming, trying to balance work and other commitments, and despite having incredible support from family. It had been building up and suddenly I was feeling the effects in a very intense way.

Eventually I decided I needed something to change so I arranged to take a leave of absence from my primary work. They were very accommodating of my needs during discussions in August and by late September I was off work. I found that after making this decision and getting the details finalized a weight was lifted and I felt much less unsettled. Perhaps the pandemic was the final straw I needed to push me to making that change. It’s something I had been feeling needed to happen at an intuitive level for years, but there was never quite enough of a push to go through with it. And then suddenly there was.

I’m now into the fourth month of the leave from that job, and overall I feel much more balanced than I did. There are still difficult days – we all have difficult days – but the overall feel is one of positivity, of moving forward, exploring and living. I’ve tried many new things and reconnected with activities I love. I’m grooming cross-country ski trails a couple times a week, studying different topics of interest, including Reiki, architecture, art and music, and doing more hiking and exploring around the area. Throughout the past year I have continued work through the Distance Energy Club and have found that to be immensely important to me, for how it’s helped me directly and how it’s allowed me to help others, which adds to my feeling of purpose.

At this point I still don’t entirely know what the future holds for me personally for my work/career. I’m focusing on the little things each day, taking small steps and trying to always be thankful for what I have and the opportunities that come to me each and every day. I’ve had some pretty low days this year, but I’ve also had amazing moments of clarity and joy, the likes of which I don’t remember experiencing in years. This, I believe, is the value of disruption – it leads to healing. In other ways healing itself can cause temporary disruption, but they are often inextricably linked.

This past year has had major challenges for most of us, but many times we need to experience something disruptive in order to move forward and achieve growth. We’ve had that in spades and I have a feeling this monumental disruption is leading up to other giant positive changes in our societies around the world. I want to, I have to, believe that is true.

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Ancestral Healing

A study was done with mice where a pain stimulus was paired with a sound, so every time the mouse experienced the pain the sound was heard. After time the sound alone caused the same response in the mouse as when they had felt the pain. This is fairly standard stuff, but the interesting part is that they waited for two generations later (the grandchildren of the mice that had the initial experiments done) and low and behold those mice reacted to the sound the same way the original mice did, but they had never been exposed to the pain. It’s believed that the trauma that the mice felt was encoded into their DNA and passed down to their offspring and then to their offspring.

This area of study is called Epigenetics and I find it very fascinating. It also has a very important connection to energy healing, in that Reiki can be sent to ancestors in order help them and to affect change in the life of later generations. This is due to the nature of time and space and how energy transcends these. By engaging in distance energy healing and sending that energy to the ancestors who may have experienced trauma in their life, we can help initiate healing that might help reduce the blocked energy at the source, and hence minimize transfer through DNA encoding to current generations. The implications of this are both fascinating and mind-boggling!

If you’d like to explore this more it can be helpful to draw out your family tree going back three generations (starting with your great grand parents) and then start making note of any traumatic events or situations that any of those ancestors experienced in their lives. You may start to notice trends of higher levels of trauma in certain lines (direct off-spring) and this could indicate a good area to focus on in your distance energy sessions, directing healing to those people who need it the most.

And if you are a member of the distance energy club feel free to provide details that you would like addressed in our group sessions. That’s a great time to have some healing energy sent to your ancestors!

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My Reiki Journey

My first experience with Reiki was having a hands on treatment from a Reiki Master. That was over 15 years ago, and just before that time I had decided to make a drastic career shift, giving up the security of full-time employment and launching a business in an entirely different field. It turned out that I wasn’t ready for the change – my body, my mind, my whole self. I became very anxious and felt like I was having a nervous breakdown. I had trouble sleeping, and felt truly awful. Until then I didn’t know it was possible to feel that much pain without having some sort of physical trauma. My doctor prescribed anti-depressant medication to help with the anxiety/irritability, as well as sleeping pills to take as needed. The anti-depressants became something I relied on for many years, but more about that to come.

The new business I had attempted was very short lived because of this. At that point I decided to take a few months to just try to recover. I had met a Reiki Master (Alex Baisley) through a business networking group I had been attending where I was living at the time (in Guelph Ontario), so I decided to make an appointment. I had no experience with this type of thing, and was pretty skeptical, but I figured I didn’t have much to lose in giving it a try. I felt pretty desperate after all.

After just one session I was already convinced of the value that Reiki healing was providing to me. By the end of the session I felt much more relaxed and had experienced something that I knew deep down was very special. I didn’t know exactly what it was yet, but it felt great. I attended many more sessions over the months, and Alex also sent me distance energy at times between our in-person sessions. I remember sitting at my desk in my home office and suddenly feeling sensations through my body – often like the feeling you might get when seeing something wonderful (taking your breath away!), or tingling/movement in the body. It felt amazing and I knew instinctively that Alex was sending distance energy.

Since that time I have moved to Northern Ontario, but I’ve continued working with Alex on various projects over the years that he does through his Big Dream Program (highly recommended by the way!!). I’m now settled in Sault Ste. Marie and one day, while visiting a local mall, I noticed a poster advertising Reiki training. It really stood out to me and I knew that I needed to sign up and take the course. Since then I’ve taken 3 levels of Reiki training, becoming a Reiki Master Practitioner, as well as numerous energy related workshops and Reiki Shares through The Healing Loft with Anne-Marie Caicco (also highly recommended for those in Sault Ste Marie!!). In addition, for the past year I’ve been working closely with Alex, reaping the benefits of his combination of energy work and coaching through online sessions. All of these experiences, as well as daily meditation and self care, have added up to big changes in my life.

Here are some of the things I’ve noticed that have happened since adopting regular Reiki practice over the last couple of years:

  • Better sleep – Previously I would wake up at 3 or 4 am and have trouble falling back asleep – this rarely happens any more
  • Clearer thinking – I can accomplish more at work in a shorter time and memory is improved
  • Back pain and misalignment issues in back reduced
  • Reduced irritability and eliminated the need for anti-depressant medication
  • Get sick much less often
  • Over-all feeling of well being and connection to community

So that’s my story! I’m so grateful for everything I’ve experienced (yes, even the hard parts!). It’s been an amazing journey so far and I know that it will only continue! I look forward to sharing what I’ve learned with others for years to come!