“The family…that dear octopus from whose tentacles we never quite escape nor, in our inmost hearts, ever quite wish to”. Dodie Smith

As I reflect on week I spent with my family celebrating holiday season I am awed and humbled by precarious balance of emotions when family comes together. I was looking forward to my parents, children and extended family gathering at my newly renovated home to spend a few days of laughter, connection and great food.

My parents came a few days earlier than rest of gang. It had been a while since we’d seen each other. I have a close relationship with my parents and I was excited to be with them.

We spent first few days together happily catching up, laughing and thoroughly enjoying each other. Amidst sweetness of visit I remembered a quote I once heard by Ram Dass who said something to effect of, “If you want to find out how evolved you are, spend a week with your parents”. It made me wonder how I would pass test.

Predictably, at around day three ice began to wear thin. Suddenly familiar family dynamics began to show their first signs, particularly with my mother. She and I, both bright women, who have each done lots of inner work, began to subtly play out our “roles” with each other. Before I knew it I turned into struggling to be a grown up kid full of reaction, and her, afraid to let go mother full of control and fear. Yikes.

It was stressful and I could feel my energy draining; yet I got caught up in busyness and fun of rest of family arriving and didn’t deal with underlying, growing feelings of frustration.

Then there were amazing moments. Three generations of women in kitchen preparing dinner. My mother, my daughter and myself tied together by birth, all engaged in a dance of past and present, tied to our roles yet curious and exploring who we all are as women in world. I was witnessing family legacy; I wondered how was I doing with my daughter, will she feel same inner conflict with me when she is grown?

The visit had come to its end. In last bittersweet hour we were together my mother and I hit an iceberg. We had a difficult interaction that we couldn’t quite resolve before she had to leave. It felt like a bucket of cold water got thrown on an essentially successful visit.

Do your best to accept this or do your best to fight it: but, "You are a mind with a body". Because you are, you have spiritual powers. And, Spirit man (person) inside you contains powers known and unknown. Discover what they are!

Ignorance, who me?

Anything that seems logical to a person, who is ignorant of facts, may seem stupid to person who knows how to do it and does know facts. If you make decisions because you refuse to learn truth, that is called ignorance. But, none of us would ever do that, would we?

You just might be surprised how many grow fat on ignorance. And biggest cause of ignorance is…..you guess? Ok, it is Inertia. A person may not know facts but he should understand that truth is truth and never false regardless of his lack of knowledge.

An open minded person will continue to learn and not succumb to immobility. He will base his conclusions on knowledge that he has. But, always ready to change them as he becomes more enlightened.

It's time to explore powers of your mind.

These powers can help you to achieve success, wealth, happiness, love and all you desire. Learn to use these powers. Don't be afraid of them. And, it is not at all difficult. No more difficult than turning on your computer for first time.

Consider this. When you turn on your computer, you may not understand all intricacies that make it do what it does. You don't have to. You just need to know how to flip switch.

The same thing goes for most intricate machine that has ever been conceived. Although this machine is Divine work of God, you can learn to use it very easily.

The Wild Wild Brain!

This machine is; your brain. Your brain is made up of two parts, your conscious and sub-conscious and they work together. We know a lot about conscious, but sub-conscious is still a vast unknown territory.

One of greatest powers of sub-conscious is its ability to use power of auto-suggestion. You can become rich by learning power of and employing auto-suggestion.

Conscious suggestion is mechanism of feeding sub-conscious mind thoughts of a creative nature. I.e. Positive affirmations that make their way into deep fertile ground of sub-conscious. Or, through neglect and inertia permit thoughts that are destructive to desires of your heart.

When you read out loud a written statement of your desire for whatever you want, everyday, several times everyday, and do it with emotion and concentration on your desire, and, see and feel yourself already in possession of what you want, then you are communicating (self-suggesting)your desire directly to your sub-conscious.

What? Brain Food!

When you do this through repetition you create a thought pattern that will voluntarily feed your sub-conscious food it wants to eat. Foods that will help your sub-conscious translate your desire into reality. And, I'm not talking about thanksgiving turkey.

The Food that sub-conscious feeds on is: WORDS! Words are only food that sub-conscious is capable of digesting. You say "yes", it knows what that means and doesn't care what results become. You say "no", it knows what that means and doesn't care what results become.