VOG ~ The Kingdom of Spirituality

[Barbara Ann Storrier]

As we near the last portions of the book, I will not be making a separate discussion for each week, as we are all in different parts of the book now. Whatever tasks or experiences you have had or are having in The Kingdom of Spirituality may be discussed here at any time ...

[Susan Hosken]

Barb, How many weeks will we be taking on the Kingdom of spirituality. I will try to get back into it and do some of the tasks. i have been rather slack the past few weeks. VOG is a very challenging book. I will need to revisit it in the future and do the tasks I missed.
lots of love from susan in australia

[Susan Hosken]

Fiona, I am hoping to spend more time on the Kingdom of spirituality. I'm hoping to do the tasks too.
love from susan

[Barbara Ann Storrier]

Susan, there's no time limit, really. I encourage you to revisit and do the tasks that appeal to you.

I did the first task in this part, list five examples of what could be divine guidance in your life. I realized I could list many more, and I will. I bought a couple of pretty notebooks that have black "velvet" covers with white designs on them, where there is no flocked "velvet". I used the one with the sun, the crescent moon, Saturn, and a rainbow amidst lots of stars, for this exercise. I am going to keep using this notebook for writing about similar themes. I just tried to scan the cover, but I recently changed back to my old printer in order to have some ink, and it sometimes doesn't want to scan unless I go through an unplugging and uninstalling routine, so I'll try it some other time.

The other notebook I got has the black velvet flocking too, and an image of a beautiful dragon. You can use markers to color in the white parts, and they come in various designs ... I bought them in the craft section at JoAnne's Fabric and Craft store :)

[Carol@Swallowcliffs]

Love the sound of the notebooks. Wish I had a JoAnne store in my life!

[Barbara Ann Storrier]

I'll send you a notebook, Carol :)

[MARY]

THANK YOU...task accepting help

whooaaaa Nelly..no no no no noooOOOooooo I don't want no friggin help...okay, okay...I'm bull-headed, obstinate, proud, independent and self-reliant. I have driven every husband, lover, companion and friend crazy with my steadfast belief that I can do it alone. Well, I can't. I never could and I hate that I can't. It was somewhere in the middle of Finding Water that I realized that I am not as great as I think I am. I broke halfway through that course. I hid under my blanket a lot (something I do seriously do) and became shy and withdrawn. It was called humility. At the beginning of each class we would chose an oracle card that would be our guide for that class. I chose the above...HUMILITY. I don't even remember which deck that was from. It was a whole new concept for me. The universe has blessed me with creativity, with insights, with guides, with beauty everywhere I look..and as much as it pained me, I did finally get to a point where I realized that I am not the great I AM. I simply am. Having RA gives me plenty of opportunities to accept help from others - - which I never did until the hard shell around me began to crack open and the gentle light within started to emanate...you see...self-righteous pride and arrogance does not light the world..gentle humility does. So the last year I do let my neighbors help carry groceries when I am struggling up the small incline to my apt. I genuinely thank people holding doors for me when I'm using my walker...I do use the handicap parking spaces (yep..I was that into pride that I wouldn't use them even though during flare ups each step is an agony), I allowed the wal-mart greeters to get me the ghetto buster (my name for those electric scooters) and to help load stuff into carts for when I leave...I'm a much nicer person now.

[Barbara Ann Storrier]

Yes, allowing others to help is something that pride doesn't much take to. I can still remember the first time a grocery store clerk said "Can I help you out to your car with these, Ma'am?" "Whaaaat??" LOL!

Thanks for a great post on the value of gentle humility, Mary.

Hugs

[MARY]

that is a beautiful card. In the class we interpreted our own cards. It seemed to me that the person was bowing in reverence to the journey that he had been gifted with. Humbly accepting the path and grateful for it. That resonated with me. My life has been a series of paths and journeys. I've approached them with anticipation, excitement and sometimes fear and trepidation. I'm not sure I'd ever approached the beginning of a journey with humility and gratefulness. That card still brings up so much emotion for me!

[MARY]

it's the reverence...that speaks to me in this card.

[Susan Hosken]

Mary, It is a great gift to someone asking and or accepting help. It gives them pleasure to give to you. Someone taught me that.
lots of love from susan in australia

[MARY]

EXPERIENCE .. DANCE YOUR TOTEM ANIMAL

I find that a lot of these tasks I already did on my own days before actually reading about them. Maybe I'm just in tune with Julia. I broke out in a very spontaneous dance a bit ago. a nekkidy dance...it just seemed like the thing to do...I was walzting and wiggling and taking huge steps and I even shimmied against a door frame...I realized what I was doing was being a bear. I had been ironing and my Creativity Altar lives in the bedroom with me. I have my animal totems on that altar and one of them is the Bear. I had stopped and looked at my altar and the bear and then walked toward the bathroom...it began as one step..then another and then I wanted to be free and the clothes came off and I let the spirit move me as the 'ole pentacostals would say.

This was a great task. I took a tarot class which was quite distinctive. We were exploring the basics of the tarot...and we each chose a tarot card and acted out that card in an improv moving our bodies. Excellent. Bringing a spiritual or intellectual idea into the physical realm through movement really brings home the reality.

[MARY]

you're gonna do the FOX TROT?! hehehe