Lisa Overman

The house is warm and comfy. The living room has a fire in the fireplace. I can hear it crackle. Grandma Mom is in the kitchen baking something that smells wonderful. I smell cinnamon so it is probably apple pie or cobbler. She loves to bake and there are several fruit trees in the yard including apple, cherry and pear along with current and raspberry bushes. Grandpa Pop is in the kitchen with her, sitting at the small table and they softly talk to each other. If it wasn’t for the refuge I find being in this house I know my childhood would pass with little joy.

The house is a two story Dutch colonial that was built by Uncle Art. I didn’t know him but Mommy and Mom say a lot of good things about him. I love this big old house. It has three bedrooms and a sewing room on the second floor. There is also a large bathroom. A door in the sewing room goes out onto a small balcony. The stairs to the attic go up from Pop’s bedroom. The attic holds all kinds of treasure that I love to go through.

My favorite is an old chest full of movie stars pictures that my Aunt Joyce and Aunt Shirley have collected over many years. There are dozens of them. Shirley is married now but Joyce still lives here. She is only six years older than me. I am ten. Sometimes Joyce lets me try on her formals. She has such pretty ones with lace and taffeta, satin and light netting. The skirts flared out and I twirl around and Joyce laughs at my antics.

As a metaphysician, I believe we are spiritual beings having a human experience, rather than human beings having a spiritual experience. There have been so many firsthand accounts of life after death that we can no longer deny it. There is more, so much more than what we see on the surface. People that have been “awakened” to the idea of their spiritual connection to the Earth and each other are called Lightworkers.

A Lightworker, as defined by Doreen Virtue in Archangels & Ascended Masters, is “A living human who feels called to help Earth and her inhabitants in a way that uses spiritual energy. For instance, a lightworker might feel called upon to engage in healing, teaching, or artistic work to help make the planet a better place.”  What Lightworkers do best is to shine their light.

Are you interested in learning how to work with Feng Shui in your home?  If so, a good place to start is with your front door. In this post, you will learn how to assess the Feng Shui of your front door, then apply Feng Shui cures to correct any problems you discover.

Your front door is one of the most important parts of your home from a Feng Shui perspective. It is your connection to the chi (life force energy), which ultimately is responsible for creating all the good things in your life – love, career success, money, health, etc

Considering how important it is, you may want to use the following Assessment to determine if your front entrance needs some Feng Shui help.  The front door and entrance area should be clean, well lighted, welcoming and visible from the street. 

Right now I am feeling overwhelmed by issues and many illnesses within my family. I am being torn in several directions by indecision as to where I am needed most. This is a decision I can only make myself and I will through weighing the issues and priority of each individual needing help. As I was looking for spiritual guidance I found the following poem in a book I was reading at the time. I think it is worth sharing.

As I gazed up at the mountains, I was awed by their majesty,

Part Two My Mother

By: Sam

This a continuation of the post I made about my mother on May 11, 2008

Mom was at Westminster for 5 ½ years. At first she hated it but then she adapted. She had a bare place where the workers had taken out a dead tree right outside her window. I took her to Willow Tree nursery and she bought a truck full of annuals and perennials and turned that bare spot into a lovely garden. Residents and caregivers walked past her villa just to admire the flowers. It was such a pretty garden and how she loved that bright colorful spot she created. Every season Mom and I would go to the nursery for the periennials of the season. Pansies were her all time favorite and she loved Christmas because that is when the pansies started showing up in the nurseries.

 Then, in 2005, Mom lost her beloved companion Beau and she gave up on life. She never stopped grieving for this dog that gave her so much joy for 16 years. I watched her slowly fade away and my heart breaks for all the losses she has had and borne so valiantly, until now.

Today is Mother’s Day and this is my 25th celebration of this day. Each and every Mother’s Day has been a joy, thanks to my wonderful daughter Monique. She has been a blessing and I often wonder how did I get so lucky to wind up with her. 

From the beginning I knew her name was Monique and she had to be born. I wasn’t disappointed. The little lady I envisioned with style and attitude is  exactly what I got. From the beginning she had her own sense of self. She had her own mind and was determined to have things her way, regardless of what others may think. If Monique felt right she would argue her point tirelessly. I remember at the age of 5 or 6 she would sit around the dinner table and join in on the discussions of news and current events.

Monique has always been mature for her age. We always spoke to her as an adult, so her vocabulary was always several years ahead of other children her age. We spent a lot of her formative years living with my parents, so she would serve as the “legs” for her grandparents, never complaining. My parents also served as co-parents; they loved, educated and nurtured Monique just as I did.

We all made it through her teen years without too much pain. I was diagnosed with a chronic illness when she was in the 7th grade and there were times when she had to take care of me.  I would often feel bad that she had so may adult issues to deal with and felt it unfair for her. I beat myself up for years hating the direction my life had taken. My parents had given me such an abundant life and I could not do that for my daughter. She never did without, thanks again to my parents, but there were times when finances were tight and we would not go to my parents for help. Years later she told me it helped define the person she would grow into and made her mature beyond her years. She never begrudged her life and I had to learn not to begrudge mine.

More Snippets on Life

By: Sam

In 1983, after 11 years alone with my two sons, I found my high school friend Richard, actually he found me. I had thought that love was no longer a factor in my life but we got married and after the kids left home life just seemed to be getting better as we grew older together. Regretfully he died at age 60 after a two-year battle with an inoperable brain tumor. My life as I knew it ended.

Right before Richard was diagnosed, my mother had taken her first fall off a chair while dusting the top of her refrigerator; she broke her hip. The anesthesia from her hip surgery took its toll on her memory and for three days she did not know any of us when we went to visit her. She did regain most of her cognitive powers and recovered from the hip surgery in time. She had gotten her driving privileges back and was home again and things went well until the second fall she took while walking home from my house with her beloved companion, Beauregard, her Bassett hound.

I am delighted to join with the other writers on this site to share my ideas on healing and on living a happy fulfilling life.  My perspective on healing is seen through the lens of the energy flow in our lives.  As a Feng Shui consultant, I’ll be writing about how the energy of your home impacts your life as you work with healing and change. As an astrologer I’ll share how the energies of the planets bring opportunities to heal and also to transform your life. And finally as an Energy Body Worker, I will discuss ways you can work with the body’s energy system to create healing and peace in your life.

Photo credit:Flickr: by Pi c’s

JOY is knowing that God loves me.

JOY is having a child hug me and say “I love you Grandma”.

JOY is just hearing the voice of one of my sons.

JOY is having friends that I know will always be there for me.

JOY is watching the sun rise up over the top of the mountain on a frosty morn.

JOY is burying your face in a cluster of flowers and feeling intoxicated by their fragrance.

I began my spiritual journey over 30 years ago. From my first memories I felt ugly, stupid and insignificant. As a child I didn’t understand why. The contradiction was that I was intelligent, cute and loved. I came from two college educated parents who loved my younger brother, Brian and I, as well as our extended family. There was plenty of love, nurturing and support. My mother came from a total of 12 siblings, and she, my father, and two of the older siblings helped to raise her younger brother and sisters when their mother died at a young age. So my younger uncle and aunts were more like my brother and sisters. We had big holidays with my parents, travelled on family vacations, and were exposed to much of what the “good life” had to offer. In many way we were over-indulged, yet were taught that we were fortunate, and everyone didn’t have the opportunities we had. Dad was a community activist and both parents made sure we didn’t forget how blessed we were. Yet, I still felt insignificant.

I wanted to die at an early age and just couldn’t understand why God would make me stay where I didn’t want to be. I was just taking up space and would wallow in feelings of uselessness, hopelessness and sadness.  My parents did all they could for me, but they didn’t know just how bad it was for me. I learned how to mask my feelings and put on that “good little girl” mask. My parents were attentive, yet I hated myself. I was always sad and believed my parents only loved me because they “had” to. Suicide was often on my mine. I would be another 25 years before I would be able to understand the root cause of my “why”.