The following is an article written by my friend Bev Hitchins of Align, a unique and integrative approach to clutter and balance. I offer what she has written as insight into one way we may prevent ourselves from letting go of the past, even while the future can hold fertile new possibilities. As Bob Dylan sang in the 60s, “the times they are a changin’!” 

Bev can be reached at info@alignyourlife.net or visit her website at www.alignyourlife.net.

A student in my “Clutter Clearing is Spiritual Business” class was struggling with an area in her laundry room.  The area was filled with materials and tools to make stain glass art.  She admitted a substantial financial investment in an avocation that in the end she only initially dabbled in.   

She shared a photo of the area with the class.  Everything was so neatly arranged and organized on shelving.  In fact, it was so trimly placed that to take anything out would have probably dislodged the order she had taken pains to devise. 

It had been years since those objects so neatly arranged had been touched–yet she was struggling to let go.   

Her situation reminded me of the box of fine yarn, needles and knitting directions my mother bought me when we took a vacation to Quebec City. I was 16. The sweater would have been exquisite had I knitted it.  Instead the box and its contents sat in my closet, and I dreamed I would knit that sweater one day.   

That day never came.  When I was in my 30s or maybe even 40s, I let it go with some pain.  How can a box of yarn, needles and directions cause pain?  I think it was the dream I ascribed to it.  I would make a beautiful sweater, wear it, and feel accomplished.  Maybe I would even get compliments! 

It was a fine idea when I acquired my mother’s gift.  Once I returned home, however, I had moved on.  Other achievements were in my line of sight, and knitting wouldn’t get me there.  The dream had evaporated though the reminder of failing to live the dream lingered as long as I held onto to the box of yarn.  

What temporary dreams are you holding onto?  Perhaps you’re ready to release those that no longer serve you, so you can move more fully into the here and now.  I encourage you to let them all go and make new dreams that you can fully embrace.

While having breakfast this morning, my husband and I were sharing and discussing some differences and issues that have come up recently between us. Just as all relationships have moments of stress, there are times that even my relationship with my beloved Chuck can get intense.

It was after some very good sharing and processing that the following words came out of his mouth:

“The things that I don’t like about myself are the very things I don’t like about you.”

What an amazing awareness! Actually, I consider this the basis of most conflict in the world. Those things we don’t like about ourselves are what trip us up when we interact with others.

I have long believed that the way to world peace is through finding harmony and inner peace with who we as individuals. The work of world peace is the work we must do to really know, love and appreciate who we are.

So my task (our task) is to become conscious of all the things about others that bug me and turn that awareness around 180° back toward myself.

What part of this annoyance that I find in others is really an unhealed or unloved part of myself? That is the real work toward enlightenment!

 I will be presenting an overview of 2009 with thoughts about how to thrive.  See the details below:

Free Conference Call - What’s up in 2009?
Mon Jan 5, 7-8 PM ET 

Dial (218) 844-8230, Access Code 293632#
Curious about what the New Year might hold? Pay only your telephone charges, if any. Not a convenient time? Llisten later by dialing (218) 844-8799 with the same access code.

On the eve of a New Year, many astrologers post predictions for the 12 zodiac signs. I do not. My reason is that whatever I could say for one sign (1/12th of the population) would be so shallow compared with what could be said about a person’s personal year ahead shared in an annual update with your trusted astrologer. I would much rather you seek an astrologer for your most accurate understanding of what lies in the year ahead.

That said, however, there is a colleague of mine, Robert Wilkinson at AquariusPapers, who does a nice job of making general comments of that are of maximum usefulness. Here’s what he says for each sign (if you know your rising sign, read it too):

Aries - A year of building friendships and group work. Take care of your health, open to more efficient ways to work, and see the bigger picture of what your skills can contribute to a greater form of service to your world. Adjust to a bigger picture.

Taurus - A year of professional recognition, high visibility, and/or advancement. Take care of your children or creative disciplines, and see the bigger picture of how to implement the specifics of your truth to bring your future into greater clarity.

Gemini - A year of travel, education, and opening to alternative futures. Get an integrated vision of what’s possible, be willing to create new foundations by eliminating old negative memories, and stop worrying about the details. Get organized.

Cancer - A year of getting rid of the old while opening to a larger vision of truth and work. You could get very lucky in the area of shared or collective values if you train your mind and speech and value those close to you. Bring things to completion.

Leo - Major new opportunities are coming to the fore, as well as more adventurous relationships. Manage your money, be discriminating about what you value, why you value it, and how you use what you have. Expect major partnership renewals.

Virgo - You’re in a long term rigor that will yield new forms of self expression. Take responsibility, open to new forms of being trained to actualize a larger ideal, and your relationships could become more ideal than you’ve thought.

Libra - Play, create, see a bigger picture, and do whatever closures you need to in order to embrace a larger life. Clean out old karmas by showing discrimination about what’s lesser and greater, past and future. Your children begin a grand adventure.

Scorpio - You should experience more freedom in your home and family while getting clear about who your friends really are. Reconsider your goals and ambitions while seeing a bigger picture of your family and possible futures already opening.

Sagittarius - A very high profile year, be willing to take responsibility and do whatever you must to consolidate your authority. Use your experience to teach others while offering a larger integrated view of what’s possible.

Capricorn - Work, see the bigger picture of how you can expand your influence using what you have, and eliminate what is outmoded while persistently pulling in what you need to fulfill a promise. A whole new cycle begins in January, so get it in gear!

Aquarius - It’s an expanding universe the entire year, but you must open the door and greet the guest. Be responsible regarding details and obligations in relationships, and focus on how free you are to pursue your dreams and visions. Opportunities are endless.

Pisces - As usual, you’re caught between what’s ending and what’s appearing. Close out old ambitions, do not seek to control or allow yourself to be controlled by circumstances, and reap the rewards of long term efforts toward larger goals.

May you all find undreamed of happiness and fulfillment in 2009!

Last night while fixing supper I heard a TV pundit from a program my husband was listening to make a statement about President-Elect Obama’s cabinet selections. Remarking how three of his choices were actually also prospective presidential candidates with him during the primary seasion, he states something to the effect that he was apparently following the adage to “keep you friends close and your enemies even closer.”

I was repulsed! What makes someone you once ran against your enemy? That statement to me was just more of the old Saturnian separative thinking which make everyone with a different view-point, even every to slightly different, into an enemy.

The Aquarian approach that is now being highlighted by Uranus in Pisces opposing Saturn in Virgo recognizes that in everyone there is wisdom derived from life experiences. Since we do not all have the same life experiences, there will be different points of view. And that is a good thing.

Obama apparently has responsed with a comment that indicates he intends to listen to his friends, but listen even more to those who disagree with him. Obama is that secure in who he is and that humble to know there might be more he could learn even from those who don’t agree.

A Light Omega email this morning put it beautifully…

A person who can embrace others who disagree with them while remaining humble in attitude and inclusive in behavior would create the possibility for peacemaking in the world.

I am hopeful that we may not find out what it means to have a President that leads by example, an example that appeals to the “better angels” of our nature as Americans and as citizens of planet Earth - a true leader for the 21st century.

While traveling this weekend, I passed a sign on I-295 in rural South Jersey that triggered a deep pondering and produced new awareness. Funny, how even the simplest everyday experience can bring out inner wisdom.

The sign read: If money is burning a hole in your pocket, it’s not new pants that you need.

It flew past fast enough so that I wasn’t able to read the small print below it, which might have revealed the sponsor of the message. But it was my perception of the message and not the intention of the sponsor that really matters anyway.

First, I thought, does money burn a hole in my pocket? Sometimes, yes. Have you ever felt the need to spend? I mean, have you ever been compelled to go shopping as a diversion or as an activity to take away boredom or unhappiness? I have.

I have a friend who measures her self-worth by the clothes that she wears. Her time is spend on Ebay getting bargains, more and more bargains, so many more than can be worn in a month.

When we spend to sooth our ailments around self-worth and unhappiness, we will never be able to save or maintain a ”nest egg” that offers security and resources for the future. We are too busy looking for healing in the wrong places.

The phrase - “it’s not new pants that you need” - begs the question. What is the deeper need when it seems that money burns a hole in your pocket? Here’s what came to mind for me.

…I need to count my blessings and value my relationships, recognizing I have everything I really need in this moment.

…I need to do something that really doesn’t take away unhappiness by creating just a differnt need for healing. I could take a walk in the woods, soak in a bubble bath, fix a meal and take it to a sick friend, give a neck massage to my beloved, or read an inspiring book.

…I need to write down my personal goals and what resources I need to achieve them, then prepare a budget and keep to it. Writing a plan brings a sense of empowerment.

…I need to stop getting caught up in the never-ending search for happiness in things outside myself and find my own inner place of Peace within through meditation or contemplation.

All this came from a highway sign, which just proves that whenever we are ready to learn Life can teach us in the simplest ways, but we first need to be open. Open to viewing Life as the Message from the Source of our life.

My recent trip to India made me aware of the importance of getting my priorities straight. It is not the world that gives us life us but the inner spark of the Divine that lives through us. Why then do I go to the computer to answer my email the first thing in the morning? My mind gets caught in the outer stuff before I remember my Source.

The visible rituals in a Hindu’s life can be quite mundane and yet they are done with a reverence and remembrance that makes simple things sacred. Standing at the banks of the Ganges River at dawn I observed a simple bathing ritual that probably originated at the beginning of time. But this was not just a cleaning of the body, but a purification ritual done with sacred devotion to the Divine Source of life.

Living from the inside out makes me conscious of my own inner peace no matter what is happening around me. It results in greater awareness and guidance for taking wise actions in every moment.

How do I know this? I was able to maintain my inner awareness through much of our India journey and for a couple weeks afterward.

Yesterday, after two or three days of feeling like I had not gotten much done, I realized I was back in the old rut of piling too much on my “to-do” list and then plowing forward haphazardly seeking to cross of the most items. Priorities were not necessary considered and I got sidetracked by lots of little distractions. In fact, I was once again putting email ahead of my meditation and journaling time.

When I start my day with meditation and journaling, begin with a reminder that all the energy and answers I need for my life lie within. Conversely, when I start with email, I get drawn into fighting fires or simplely reacting to outer stimulus, like a floating leaf dashed about in a raging stream.

Our current times are chaotic – just follow the stock market or the presidential race for example. With Saturn and Uranus facing down each other for the first of five stand-ofs on Election Day, we will all do well to remember that our good does not come from any outer source. Our good comes from our relationship to our Divine Source or Higher Self within.

Perhaps you would consider joining me in placing the highest priority on our inner world so we can face what the outer world presents with greater confidence and peace.

It’s a quiet day. I have several projects that are necessary to complete before flying off to India a week from tomorrow. Fortunately, it seems like I have enough time to get it done without getting harried at the end.

We return on Monday, Sept 29…that is our body will. Not sure how even the body will acclimate going and coming as I have never before taken a 14-hour flight. Yup, we fly from Reagan National to Newark and the flight directly from there to Delhi is 14 hours. Whew!

All the travel literature suggests not sleeping more than a couple hours at a time because it’s necessary to get up to stretch and exercise your leg muscles to avoid deep vein thrombosis (blood clots that can go to the lungs). That’s already…I have never perfected the art of sleeping on a plane before anyway.

I can feel my inner being going deeper and feeling more at peace as each day passes. There’s no doubt I am being called there. Will discover what that means and let you know when I return. In many ways this trip feels profound.

There will be no blog entries from me in September. Hope your month reaches your expectations! “Til October….

As a child, my Dad was the most powerful person in the world, my world. In any circumstance - what I ate, when I went to bed, who I could play with - he had the last say. I knew power was a force outside myself that I would do best to respect and obey.

The more I have become self-aware and self-directed, the more I realize that power comes in many forms all of which only influence over me because I choose it so. In most instances, external people or circumstances only have power because of my fear.

Without fear, nothing and no one can have power over me. It seems, therefore, that I am the source of all power, even power that seems to be external to me since I choose to fear it or not. Even laws have no power beyond the concent of the governed.

It was a shock recently when my father (now getting up in age and still try to make sense of life without my mother who passed in April), actually admitted to his own fears. He is planning a trip to see his grandson in Texas, but shared a need to work up his courage to make the trip.

This revelation is totally inconsisent with my view of my Dad’s power from my childhood. Yet, rather than disappoint me, it has only deepened my love for him. I long ago stopped fearing him and needing his approval for my life and behavior (well, not really so long ago). Still it is quite astounding that, like the Wizard of Oz, there is really only a human being behind the image I had of him.

Hum? How many other places in my life did I give away my power to the appearance of more powerful people, when in reality their power was a result of my own perception, flawed and immature to be sure.

How about you? Where have you given away your power due to fear? Is it time to acknowledge the powerful person you are and that all power originates from within you.

I suspect each of us has a long-standing issue in our life that drains energy like a hole you your tire or covers over your joy like a wet blanket. It is hard to believe that I have spent 90% of the last 50 years disgusted with my body and worried about my weight.

Writing that last sentence shows me how familiar I am with body self-hate. You can imagine how shocked I was a couple days ago while showering when I heard an inner voice say “How would your life be different if you no longer had to worry about your body?

Now that is a shocking statement. Wouldn’t it be so for you? Is there a self-critical aspect of your life that you have been burdened by for many years? It doesn’t have to be a weight issue. It could be anything. What if you just gave up the story, the struggle, and the complaint?

That’s what I have been pondering. You see I have through various methods lost 30 pounds over the last six or so months and am as close to normal as I have been in many years. I feel good, people (and my hubby) say I look good, and I am back to doing yoga better than ever.

However, even with arriving at a comfortable weight, or perhaps because of it, I have noticed how darn much time of my day I spend thinking about what I eat, how I look, if my clothes fit right, blaa, blaa, blaa…

What a waste of energy! At the age of 62, it just isn’t so important any more. I am not trying to snag a mate. I have the best possible partner for me and he loves me and my body (even at many pounds more). So why do I still torture myself with critical thoughts about my body?

It’s the “monkey mind” again. The mind is like a machine that once programmed perpetuates the same function until something powerful comes along to reprogram it.

How would my life be different if I didn’t perseverate on my body all day?

My mind would be free to create, imagine and explore new ideas, new possibilities and new actions. I will start today to stop every time I become aware of another “body thought” and replace it will a thought about something I like about myself, something I have done for another or something I will do to make life a little better. No more wasting energy as in the past.

Got something you’d like to reprogram? Join me.