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Elements of Everyday Enlightenment

heartwise

Aloha Dear One, 

I’ve been metabolizing a lot of grief lately. 

Recently, a beloved colleague, friend and sister-in-sobriety died of ALS. Diagnosed in January, her body shut down rapidly as I imagine her mind sharpened and her heart widened. She gave us, our family, all of whom loved and adored her, a tremendous and bewildering gift. The gift of her confidence. Her powerful knowing that, “in the bigger picture” she was okay.

That the insight of knowing that she is enough, this world is enough, and we are all enough was a powerful reminder of how much we, collectively, struggle with scarcity mindsets. Lack energy breeds fear and keeps us isolated.

I want you to know I see your brilliant sanity. Your enough-ness. And I’m ready to circle up with you virtually. Ready to meet regularly in Zoom through the end of the year?

I know I dreamed and dared to mention  in-person retreats in Hawaii, I’m just not ready to release dates or details. I’ve had no resources (literally or energetically) to put toward it.

Thank you for your patience. Stay tuned…

For now, let’s gather in my Zoom Room on Wednesday mornings at 9:30 – 10:45 Hawaii time.

Remember, my Zoom rooms are intimate gatherings where I ask you to be fully present and engaged. I’m looking for a minimum of 5 and maximum of 14 people to show up, starting next week, to do the deeper dive into extraordinary living.

Elements of Everyday Enlightenment is the lofty name of this gathering that I humbly offer to host as your guide from the side, versus pretending to be a sage from the stage.

More details:

Elements of Everyday Enlightenment, a 12-week virtual gathering

Based on personal experience

Contributed by Amy Elizabeth Gordon, M.A., Licensed Imago Therapist & Relational Health Coach

Shatter the Illusion

There is a pervasive illusion that enlightenment happens on a mountaintop for men and women who have taken vows of epic proportion and somehow float above everyday life. Let’s try the householder’s version of enlightenment. We can  practice the principles of our own chosen standard. We can determine what enlightenment looks and feels like for us. 

Everyday enlightenment is achieved through mundane discipline to spiritual practices. These practices are through my viewpoint and completely colored by my personal experience. It may be different for you. All I ask if for your open-mindedness to consider the possibility that some of these may spark your own brilliant sanity to shine forth a wee bit brighter. To shine your own inner light on what sparks enlightenment in your life.

Intention: Deeper Dive into 12 distinctions of an extraordinary life

Moving from despair to repair requires loyalty to an extraordinary way of living that uplifts the world through radical self-enlightenment and unconditional forgiveness. My intention is to provide the map of how I got where I am today, in hopes of inspiriting others to own their sovereignty and use their power as a strong inner guidance system to cultivate an extraordinary life of everyday enlightenment. We will explore in more depth the 12 distinctions of extraordinary life; these are the ideas I’ve contemplated and taught for years.

Need support?

Is doing what you’ve been doing getting you where you want to be? If you are anything like me, you come from hard times. Me? I’ve been robbed, raped and ridiculed; abused, abandoned and assaulted; kidded, kicked and kept. By myself. And by others. And yet all my lofty efforts kept me hustling.

Quite simply, I was creating a life of strife through positive intentions. Yet the non-stop striving didn’t get me where I wanted to be. Regenerating relationships through daily spiritual maintenance is what helped in my life.

Stop striving and surrender to thriving. That’s what’s worked for me. Thriving in everyday enlightenment, tolerating discomfort, and no longer manufacturing my own misery. This is for people who are not in crisis or dangerous circumstances. Reach out for help and contact me if you don’t know where to turn.

Each week we will explore a mundane spiritual practice. We’ll do a deeper dive into how the distinction can anchor our intentions. And we will ground in an elemental feature for additional inspiration. (see more juicy details below)

Satisfaction guaranteed

Our time together gathering in my Zoom Room will be uplifting, engaging, and energizing.

Cost: opportunity to pay what you can love offering:

suggested cost is $1200

this includes 3 private calls w/ me (if you desire)

Cost Objections: You may be quite cozy in your comfort zone with daily judgements and resentments brewing. Enlightenment has a high cost. And it’s not about spiritual materialism, like buying the right yoga mat or special aromatherapy.

It’s the cost of freedom. Releasing the toxic trio of shame, blame and criticism. Of self and others. Daily.  Investing in this Gathering is up to you. A love offering makes cost objection obsolete.

Mark your calendars:

  1. September 28, 2022
  2. October 5, 2022
  3. October 12, 2022
  4. October 19, 2022
  5. October 26, 2022
  6. November 2, 2022
  7. November 9, 2022
  8. November 16, 2022
  9. November 23, 2022
  10. November 30, 2022
  11. December 7, 2022
  12. December 14, 2022

TIME OF DAY: Wednesdays at 9:30 – 10:45am Hawaii Time. 12:30pm Pacific. 3:30pm Eastern. click here for time zone converter

Time Objections: You may be busy enough already and are cautious to not take on more practices in your already busy life (which is perhaps riddled with good intentions). I’m here to nudge you. Anybody has 20 minutes to do something. That’s what it takes, in my opinion, at a minimum, to do your daily spiritual practices.  After this weekly investment of an hour in our Gathering, you will have designed your own 20-minute practice that resonates in your tender heart.

Visualization

Imagine, if you will, stepping into your own sovereignty. Sovereignty in a pure sense of the word. To quit blaming, shaming and criticizing others. Watching what goes in your mouth, body, eyes, ears. Being fully responsible for how you show up to each day. Quitting waiting for time to show some better thoughts. 

Action

Sign up by sending me an email to [email protected] with subject line: Gathering.

First 14 responses fill this group’s capacity. Feel free to invite your beloved or friend. They will need their own registration, their own computer (or Zoom square).

More juicy details

Gathering 1. Practice: Arriving Here. Distinction: trust. Element: sunrise

Gathering 2. Practice: Nurturing Sovereignty. Distinction: focus. Element: ocean

Gathering 3. Practice: Learning to Listen & Finding Forgiveness. Distinction: repair. Element: clouds

Gathering 4. Practice: Metabolizing Grief. Distinction: faith. Element: earth

Gathering 5. Practice: Eliminating Excess. Distinction: clarity. Element: air

Gathering 6. Practice: Releasing Resentments Distinction: openness. Element: fire

Gathering 7. Practice: Titrating Anxiety. Distinction: Reactivation. Element: water

Gathering 8. Practice: Pacing Oneself & Surviving Stillness. Distinction: energy. Element: moon

Gathering 9. Practice: Cultivating Serenity & Silence. Distinction: interdependence. Element: stars

Gathering 10. Practice: Embodying Enough. Distinction: Responsibility. Element: sunset

Gathering 11. Practice: Generating Gratitude. Distinction: generosity. Element: trees

Gathering 12. Practice: Celebrating Completion. Distinction: consciousness. Element: planet

These gatherings are live. Please commit to at least 10 of the 12 sessions. No recordings.

Email me with your questions, concerns or commitment.

Your matter. 

Your relationships matter. 

Warmly,

Amy  

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On the State of Open Doors

openness

<this post is a featured guest blog from my beloved friend, Deva, who is traveling from Georgia to Lebanon>

OPEN

Open. It’s a very physically descriptive word that has a whole lot of metaphysically descriptive meaning. The physicality of, say, a simple open door is what we’re greeted with on this plane. But when we dive deeper into all that open door can stand for and allow for, well, there’s an infinite realm of possibilities to explore.

SUMMARY


And I do want to elaborate on that open door in this moment. As human creatures we can more easily discuss things that are tethered to this tactile world. Openness as a state of being may be less relatable in moving through. Secondly, I want to discuss that door as our very own door, again, not to make it otherworldly and distant. It is our door right here in this moment. Thirdly, we can’t speak of closed doors without reflecting on states of distrust and when we speak of open doors we are also speaking into trust.

PART I


In first considering the open door in relation to ourselves, consider the world and the inflow of the world into our open door, into our lives. There is verdant growth and tragic wars and endless waves crashing, and these things carry on outside our doors, so to open our door can lead to welcomed beauty just as easily as it can to unwanted misery. Do we trust to open our door to all of this? Sometimes it’s not even about trust, the door just slams open and in comes a surprising windfall or an unwanted atrocity, or both packaged as one.

TRUST


How do we get to the place of trust where we’re ready to let the world in through our open door? Well, that’s enough for another essay. But, yes, trust in self, other and source, as dear Amy always says, is a great place to start.


As I write, I am in Lebanon and here, and all across the Arab-speaking world, you greet people coming into your home with ‘marhaban bikoum.’ ‘Marhaban’ is the ‘welcome’ part of the greeting and ‘bikoum’ is essentially ‘you’ in plural form. This plural you is used no matter whether you are welcoming one person or many.

When I first studied classical Arabic in Fez, Morocco, my teacher told us that the plural you is always used. This is because culturally they recognize that everyone on this planet is walking around with two angels. Your good graceful angel on one shoulder and your dark little sinning angel on the other shoulder. No matter which one happens to be speaking into the ear of your guest, you welcome ALL into your home. When you can say ‘marhaban bikoum’ to any guest, you’ve built the just right amount of trust and courage to go through your open door and out into the world.

But if the world is too much, stay a while longer inside. Be tender. Be patient. Brew or stew. Do what needs to be done or undone until the world is not enough. Then the hunger and confidence and trust are all overflowing to the point you’re ready to burst. Then go be out in the world.


INTERLUDE


I like how if you let your eyes go soft and blur across the word ‘OPENNESS’ it almost reads as ‘ONENESS.’


PART II


That’s the second part of what our open door allows for; it doesn’t just let the world in, it also releases us into the world. We can show ourselves – any version – and grow tall as the eucalyptus in the sunshine. Or slither under a dark casino table. Going out through that open door often requires a full belly, a loudly thumping heart and fists full of courage. But it can also be as simple as sleepwalking, youthfully tumbling out with your lover’s palm in yours. Or a daring leap over that threshold. You certainly don’t want to be dragged out that open door. It can happen but if we’re not ready, it’s too raw and intrusive. We’ll go right back in, likely slamming the door closed behind us until trust can grow back again, if ever.


PART III


As with all things, the open door offers us a metaphor. It is both two converging and two opposing forces we are constantly dancing with. You can choose to see all negativity with going out into the world, and also see all negativity with eternally staying inside your dear door. Every moment we find ourselves with one foot in or one foot out, and then pivoting endlessly. And, in the end, it’s likely that there’s door after door, after door, eternally, not just the one. Realms and multiverses of them, enough for a Harry Potter-Inception hybrid brain explosion. Phew!


But navigating the eternal state of openness, whether easy or hard, with whatever angel on your shoulder is loudest, is best done, in my opinion, with trust in one hand and courage in the other.

Marhaban bikoum!


~ M. Deva Jebb-Albaba
Wednesday, June 22nd, 2021
Tripoli, Lebanon

Here are some more ways to connect with this beautiful soul, Deva:

Here’s her LinkedIn profile linkedin.com/in/m-deva-jebb-albaba

Join us each Wednesday on Instagram Live for our weekly Pause. Breathe. Reset. https://www.instagram.com/amyelizabeth.gordon/

PBR is a 10 minute breath practice. Here’s one from the past. https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/461123829


To see my most recent recorded discussion with Deva, check this out: https://vimeo.com/536994662