Been there, done that…

It isn’t that you are doing anything wrong, but that you are doing things the same way you always have…

Yes. Yes, indeed…change, evolution, things that are different….all scary. We do not like the idea that life itself is a process of evolution much more than it will ever be a process of elimination. We think in terms of the here and now, and that is all fine and good, but the fact remains that while we might choose to buck change and stay with our heels well dug into the ground, life changes. Life evolves and no matter what it does for or to or with us, change is inevitable. Can you imagine what it might be like if babies never grew, and if those who were meant to go Home into the next level of Being never left this physical life, just how packed this place would be? Can you even begin to ponder the idea of what would happen to every single life form on this planet if everything that showed up in this lifetime never ceased to be?

It would be a mess, and toilets would be overflowing with the remnants of the madness of days and nights of parties gone by. The streets would be filled with cars being driven by people learning to drive alongside all those other people who are very well versed anymore in cursing the very existence of same said new drivers. Our neighborhoods would be filled with the ruffians who all of us try dearly to ensure remain in their own environments.

And do not get me started on our pets….not enough litter boxes, guys….think about it…

…change is not what I am talking about only today…read on…

It is not change that I am writing about, or the idea that we have to change, no matter what, but more, once it is that we know the changes are taking place, we are left with the thing in front of us, and usually the thing in front of us is the thing that we wanted. The pain in the okole of it is that we get to that point, and while that thing that we wanted is ultra cool and awesome, we find that even though it is everything we thought it would be, it simply no longer applies and no way does it any longer belong in the list of the things that we want to see in our lives.

And the fun part of this is not that we hear our own voice saying, or rather, asking “AGAIN? REALLY?”

Yes. Really.

We are the ones who, without our consciously knowing it, call into being the repetition which prompts the questioning of Spirit to gain clarity on something that we thought we knew everything about. It can drive a person nutty if they stop and think about all the things that we are doing and going through, over and over again, until one day we answer that “WHAT? REALLY?” ourselves by FINALLY accepting that we now know that not only is it impossible to try to change something the same way that did not work in the past, but more, we are putting more and more energy into it, thinking that we are not trying hard enough, when in fact we are trying way too hard for that one thing to not work again.

We silly human types ridiculously choose the way that our lives end up being. We do not realize that truly, just as my pal Melody who writes the Deliberate Receiving Blog , it is not only the thoughts that we think but more the vibration of our own energies behind it which brings into our awareness EVERYTHING, yes, even the things we would rather not have there. And we do what we did, over and over again, with the thought at the front of our mind being that this time will be different, all the while that at the same time, our gut instinct is screaming at us “that’s not iiiii-iiiit!”

Thought + Energy+ Intention = Results

How much energy are you investing into the thoughts that are becoming your reality?  How much time and effort are you putting into the same damned thing and how much would you like to bet that you are going to also go through the same frustrations all over again because the result at the end is going to be the same as it was when you had the thought that you were not going to go through this crap again? You can…we can tell ourselves all we want that it all won’t happen again, and in the pit of our Soul we know, too, that since we are doing the same thing again, the same outcome is what we can expect.

We put SO much energy into things, things that we should just forget about, and things that frustrate us and things that make us go nutty and instead of looking at all the things from the vantage point of observer, we take it all personally and find out through trial and error that the things that we did over and over again have, again and again, brought us right back to square one. This is the point at which we begin to hear our own voice asking why it is that we have to keep going through these things. The reason that we “have to” keep going through these things is simple – we keep doing the same things about the same things over and over again, expecting that our energies and our efforts will produce a different result.

We know better than that. We know truly that the things that we do that are similar to the things that we did for this thing that is in front of us will probably produce the things that we do not want, again even !!

It begs the question of how much more of your time, your energy and your emotions are you going to bother with putting toward a thing that, from the historical point of view, that is, never turns out the way that we hope it will? How many more times are you planning on throwing at a thing that makes you crazy, angry, hurt, cry, get emotional over, fight with your loved ones, think like people are against you…when all you really need to do is think in an overall manner about the one thing that you know needs doing, and the one thing that you alone can change? How much more of your precious energy and positivity are you planning on burning through just so that you can end up right back at square one where you started out at so that you can look at the situation, see where it is that you keep making this happen (at the very first thought of how to fix it? Duh!) and choose to do it all over again, or, to do it different?

How many more times are you going to sit there, angry at the world, and not because of anything more than that you went through what you went through, again, and again, you tried to fix it by using a method that was not the correct method, and again, you sit there, wondering why it is that you feel like the butt-end of the bad joke that Spirit is playing on you?

You really don’t need to lose your mind or your cool.
Really, all you need to do is accept that the way you are going about the things that drive you crazy is the wrong fit for the thing at hand.

It’s like that thing about a fish climbing a tree…not gonna happen…

All in what you are willing to accept, guys….

As always…I Love You All !!

Aloha
ROX

Reverend Roxanne Cottell is the Kumu Hula and Creator of the Spiritual Hula Program for Women and the Co-Founder of Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘Ui. She is a blogger, book author, choreographer and Spiritual Consultant, an advocate and public speaker against domestic violence and emotional abuse, both of which she is also a survivor. If you would like information about Weddings or simply just to contact Roxanne for information about the Spiritual Hula Program for Women or information regarding private hula or Spiritual Guidance sessions with her or would like to book her for a speaking engagment please  feel free to send her an email.
(c) 2013 Roxanne K. Cottell. All Rights Reserved

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Pele’s Rage…"Dear Washington, DC"…

No matter who says what – HAWAIIAN IS HAWAIIAN ! 

People do not like to make sure that their facts are straight, and while I may not now nor ever have the entire truth about just how we got to this point in history, the fact of the matter is that no matter how many times you want to put us – the Hawai’ian People – into another subset of ethnicities or into another origin all together, you cannot. We will not allow it. We are Hawaiians.

We are Hawaiian, dammit, and proudly so! And how dare anyone in DC try to take that away from us, and the likelihood of it being over money, or even the idea in my head that the person who made the statement about our origins, being over someone’s laziness or even someone’s under-handed motives….Hawaiians, no matter what, will always be Hawaiians, and while we are not the warring bunch, I cannot sit here and write that there is truth to the idea that there will not be a whole lot of people on the planet of Hawaiian ancestry who are going to tell me that I am wrong. Not one of my fellow Kanaka Maoli will ever, ever tell you that they disagree with me.

For too long now, the folks who are in power have been choosing for us who we are, and for a long time we have, at least in the state of California, enjoyed having the box to check that reads “Pacific Islander,” and “Native Hawaiian.” For a long, long time, the only box that any one of us could check on a form was called “other,” and for a long, long time, we have been pretty well put off at the idea that the whole world knows about Hawai’i, that the whole world knows where Hula comes from, that the whole world knows the song “Tiny Bubbles,” but that it seems as though some folks in Washington, DC, even as they know better, for the good of their states finances, have chosen to try NOT to get the facts straight. And while it is that nothing is nothing without anything being in writing, we do not know that our status in one of the states in these here which are united has not been changed.

They can’t do that. We are Hawaiians. Hawaiian is Hawaiian, dammit!

HAWAIIAN IS HAWAIIAN !!

Let me make one thing very clear to anyone who is not clear on this one thing yet – Hawaiians are Hawaiians. While we might be able to be called “Native Americans,” the bottom line is that we are Hawaiians. We, at one point in history, were ruled by a Monarchy, and like our Native American Ohana, we also, to this day, are dealing with the idea that too many people want to turn us into something that we are not. You cannot turn a cat into a dog, and you cannot get mad at a fish because it is not able to climb a tree – we are Hawaiians, and for the life of me and a whole lot of other people like me, this is an issue for us.

We are all taught to be very proud of our roots, and we are all told that we have to respect other people and who they are and where they come from if we expect others to do that same thing for us, but when the rubber hits the road we find that we have only been being told that things are nice and have only been lied to, over and over again, so that someone in Washington DC can score points with whoever it is that they are trying to score points with.

Well, lemme tell you what – it ain’t gonna happen. It ain’t gonna happen because all of us combined will never let it happen. Those creeps did this back in the late 1800’s, when they jailed the most rockinest royalty – and in fact the ONLY royalty that these United States has ever had the HONOR of being able to say she was a part of this entire nation’s history. We are a stand alone people. We are unlike any other people on the planet, and there is not another combined group of people of other origin who would not also stand up for who they are and mostly, stand up for everyone else who is just like them. For a lot of years it was that Hawaiians were divided – it was us on the mainland separated from them on the ‘aina, and there has always been a little piece of me that has believed that this was some sort of conspiracy created by the very same people who want to take away our identity, even if said identity is no where near being scratched onto a piece of paper in some politician’s office in Washington DC.

There is no way that the whole of us will ever allow this…violation of our ancestry and the right to being who we are and more – our birthright to being called “Hawaiian.”

NO one has the right to tell anyone else who they are, and no one in Washington DC either has the right to strip, again, an entire populace of people, of their rights to be who they are. In my global ohana, the energy is that we are mad and like Dee Snyder sings, “WE’RE NOT GONNA TAKE IT – ANYMOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!!” 

We are SO not takin’ it anymore…’auhea wale ana ‘oe – PAY ATTENTION !

When you take away what is someone else’s, you take away a piece of them, and in this case, in the case of my people, of my own Tribe, that of the Peoples of the Nation of Hawai’i, you are stripping me and many other people like me of who we are. Millions of people worldwide know who we are for the wrong reasons…because Dawg the Bounty Bonehead chose to show the world my island brethren and sisters in the ugliest of lights, and because the government has chosen to make sure that like our Native American Ohana, we, too, must struggle for the right to call ourselves “Hawaiian.” We are tired of the battle, and we are tired of you folks not listening to us. There is a reason that ours was a warring people, long before we were a peaceful lot who only seek to maintain that which is still ours – the right to be who we are, and no matter what, as I have said, over and over again, you can change what you want to on your paperwork, but we are always going to be Hawaiians.

No matter what…HAWAIIAN IS HAWAIIAN and you cannot change that.

“Hawai’i Aloha”

(Rev. Lorenzo Lyons)

E Hawai`i e ku`u one hânau e
Ku`u home kulaîwi nei
‘Oli nô au i nâ pono lani ou
E Hawai`i, aloha ê

E hau`oli nâ `ôpio o Hawai`i nei
`Oli ê! `Oli ê!
Mai nâ aheahe makani e pâ mai nei
Mau ke aloha, no Hawai`i

E ha`i mai kou mau kini lani e
Kou mau kupa aloha, e Hawai`i
Nâ mea `ôlino kamaha`o no luna mai
E Hawai`i aloha ê

Nâ ke Akua E mâlama mai iâ `oe
Kou mau kualona aloha nei
Kou mau kahawai `ôlinolino mau
Kou mau mâla pua nani ê

O Hawai`i, o sands of my birth
My native home
I rejoice in the blessings of heaven
O Hawai`i, aloha

Happy youth of Hawai`i
Rejoice! Rejoice!
Gentle breezes blow
Love always for Hawai`i

May your divine throngs speak
Your loving people, o Hawai`i
The holy light from above
O Hawa`i aloha

God protects you
Your beloved ridges
Your ever glistening streams
Your beautiful gardens

Hawaiian is Hawaiian…no matter what you say to me….we know who we are, and we are not about sit here and let anyone tell us who you think we should be.

There is a reason that the motto on the Hawai’ian Crest is what it is…and it reads, ” ‘Ua mau ke ea o ka ‘aina i ka pono o Hawai’i Nei…”

Simply stated, it means that the life of the land is preserved in righteousness, and if you have been reading anything that I have written over the years in regards to my beautiful and mysterious ancestry, it is that we are the land, that we must malama the aina, and take care of the land. We are Na Mamo, we are the chosen precious ones onto whose shoulder the burden is not too great to carry, because it is our Kuleana to care for and malama the culture, not just for this present generation, so that the future generations will not have to depend on reruns of “Lilo n Stitch” to find out about who we really are and where it was that they came from…

Hawaiian is Hawaiian…get it straight, yeah?

Aloha oukou….I Love You All !! 

ROX

Rev. Roxanne K. Cottell is a book author, healer, Spiritual Consultant. She is a public speaker who advocates for victims and survivors of domestic violence and emotional abuse. She is the Co-founder of The Sisterhood of the Soul and the creator of the Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘Ui  healing with hula program. To contact her regarding booking  speaking engagements, to inquire about writing for you or for creative coaching sessions for business, “Corporate Soul Coaching” or for guidance to any of the Fires of Life issues, please contact her via email by clicking here
(c) 2013 Roxanne K. Cottell . All rights reserved

Hawai’i’s beloved Maestro of the Lens, my friend and Soul Brother, Mr. Randy Jay Braun 

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Our Shared Native Kuleana

A Message to my Global Island Ohana (and the rest of you, too!)

There is a time when we must realize that truly, enough is absolutely enough. It has come, the time, for us – all of us, but namely those who share ancestry with me, to stop only looking at what is different between us and to embrace that which is the same. While this message is meant for those with whom I share a collective ancestry with, it is also for the rest of the world of peoples, and not only the indigenous type….read on…

A wise man once said, “I do NOT judge a Hawaiian by his blood quantum, nor the location of their home. Hawaiians are Hawaiians are Hawaiians whether you have 1% or 100%. I just care about how much a Hawaiian cares for Hawaii. You may live in freakin Russia…but you are still Hawaiian by blood. However, if you deny being a Hawaiian, or if you look down upon your own people…well then…you are who you are…Keep reading up on the issues. Education is the power. Enlighten others, even haole about us. We need more allies and not enemies. Choose to educate rather than intimidate. Remember that the person with the loudest voice is not necessarily the “winner.” Love Hawaii, no matter where you may be. K? ‘Nuff said.” (Clifford Nae’ole)

I could not have said that much any better myself, and it is a sad, sad testament to our position in life regarding who we are, not just in the world, but more importantly, with one another.

The Life of The Land…

It is our very rallying cry to the masses, to remind them just how Sacred the Land of Aloha truly is, and even while many of us leave the Mother Land for other shores, the idea that we are different or even damaged because of where we were born is the thing that is separating us, and this is the collective self-imposed ideal of who we truly are in the world that too many of us have carried on through our lives and have chosen to impart onto the generations which follow our own. It is very easy for anyone to quote that the life of the land is preserved in righteousness, in the pureness of thought, in the very Aloha that we are all and each so very lucky not only to be a part of, but more than that, that we are tasked with the Kuleana to pass on that Aloha to our children. We are not only the messengers, but are the very message itself, of Aloha, of all the things which embody us as a people who were placed into this lifetime and on this planet to preserve our roots through measures of sharing that which is Aloha, and Aloha, I find, is free…just like we should be.

Free of the thought that we are different, and free of the belief that we should ever believe that somehow, we are not the same because of whatever it was that someone else told you was the truth. While that truth you were told might be someone else’s, it never had to be and never has to be yours. It will never be mine, and that is a promise.

Very dearly, we must think about and ask ourselves the question that the song, “Hawai’i ’78” cries out ” “AUWE!” to us, and not only because of the railroad tracks and highways which cut through our Sacred ground, but because in all of the thinking throughout the history of ourselves, we have managed to find ourselves on two different sides of the ocean, fighting with one another, and not because of how much we all – every single one of us – Loves that little island chain which is in the middle of the sea, but because we simply do not understand each other.

My thinking is that it is time that we learned to know one another, because the truth is that we all already know each other. We know that we are strong in the shared effort toward solidarity, toward Lokahi, and we know that our collective heart is broken just as is that of our Native American Nations Brethren and Sisterhood, and all for some of the shared same reasons. It is in the failure to realize that it is not the government who has made us hateful, but our misunderstanding of that anger that has been left to fester for many generations. We must turn our hearts and our minds away from those things which anger us about ourselves, and know that our anger is expected, but it is misplaced. We should be more inclined to turn that anger and that rage, that historically there collective tear stains which mar the very face of Aloha, from those things which continue to divide us into the blended heartache that will save us, if not from the assumptions that others have of us, but more, the thoughts that somehow, we should be against one another, with one set of us in the Mother Land, and the rest of us here on the Mainland.

We should be, but we are not. 

While I know that the collective of parents who have brought into this lifetime the new generation which seeks solidarity, there still is the rest of us, the rest of us who learned from the generations which preceded our own how to choose to Love rather than to hate or to be angry with our very selves, because when we are able to hate others for no reason at all, we are also more inclined to only see what is collectively “other than good” about us all as a whole, and this self-hatred is where who we are and what we do are not aligning correctly with who we need to remember being. We have been blessed with the gift of being the purveyors of the Aloha Spirit, and instead of embracing the part of us which is all Love, we chose, instead, to take up the sword of historic anger and resentment and make it our own. Do you not all see that this is not what we were meant to do with this birthright? Are we all so very jaded by our shared and ancient past and what we each think or have thought about ourselves that we cannot begin anew with the idea that we can let go of the past and embrace the future which together, we cannot miss the mark.

Together we cannot miss the mark of showing to those among us that this is who we are, and that this is what we are all about, and that no, we do not hate you because you were born elsewhere instead of in the islands. Together we can keep the good energy that is meant to be our own so as to be out in the world, showing  the Light of Aloha and shedding the hatreds of the past. There is no more need for hatred and there never was, no more need for the massive and collectively felt inferiority complex that we ourselves have brought to our own lives. Where we are meant to be strong and together in thought is where we come to a place within us that we cannot see past those things which have blinded us all the way back to the cave, and if you have not seen so lately, we were outta the cave a long, long time ago.

Out of the Cave and into the Light that is our Shared Kuleana of Aloha

This part is particular to all tribes, no matter the origin, and most notably the tribe called “humankind.” We need dearly to stop seeing that which is not the same about each other, because in that lack of sameness we are negating the other parts, the parts that tell us we have more in common than we don’t. We have been trained so well in the idea that we have to be the best, have to be better than anyone else, even and especially including those to whom we refer as being “our own,” that we cannot see past the judgments that have been passed down through the generations that bespeak only that we are to perpetuate the things that break the collective heart of us, and crush the collective Spirit within the Tribe called Aloha.

The Tribe called “Aloha.”

This is simple – Love each other.

Love each other because we are the same, prone to all the same heartaches and triumphs, and all that which makes us crazy, all that which makes us cry, seethe, laugh boisterously or cry quietly. Love each other because in truth we are each other, and love each other because truly, no matter how much stuff we each have, all we really and truly have is one another, and the more that we close our eyes to this one truth, the more “hamajangs” life becomes for us, all of us, as no one is immune to that which is not Love as much as we are meant to embrace what IS Love.

There is no more reason that we have to do anything that will hurt the very collective Soul of us. We were never required to see our differences, never needed to know the very distance across thousands of miles of ocean from “91768” to “96813,” ever, and the longer we choose to only move ahead with the hatreds of the past and carry those same hatreds into the future, and the more that we impart these lessons to our collective Na Mamo – our own cherished ones…the keiki who we brought into the world…the longer and more these things which mar the very face of Aloha that is ours, the longer we stay saddened by the death of the Aloha within, and it is the Aloha within that is meant to be shared, not the guy down at the grocery store on Ventura Boulevard whose boss told him that “today is Aloha Friday! Today we wear our flowered shirts and today we wear our Bermuda shorts and today, yes, today, we shall opt to wear long black dress socks with our sandals…yes, that day is today!” for whom the Kuleana is most dearly important.

We need to live by the words we speak, and we need to start the delivery of that combined energy of Aloha now. We cannot do this on “Hawaiian time” anymore, and no one but us is meant to fix the energy, to live the Kuleana that tells us all and each that we are the very embodiment of the Soul of Aloha, that ours is the Kuleana which tells the keiki in our lives that they, too, must carry this very torch that we are so very and dearly wanting for the flame to never be extinguished.

It is up to us, folks, to see to it that we take care of one another, that we Malama the ‘Aina that is ourselves, that is one another, that is truly the very heartbeat that is that of the People of Hawai’i…

As Hawai’ians, it is our duty to portray the beauty that is the Soul of Aloha. As Human beings, it is our duty to the very global Tribe, the Ohana that we call “ours” in the global sense, that we care for one another, always, because without each other, we do not exist.

Without Aloha, we are not ourselves.
Without Aloha, the Hawaiian race has no claim to fame.
Without Aloha, the Human Race ceases to Be.

Any Questions?

I thought not….

I Love You All !!
ROX

Reverend Roxanne Cottell is the Kumu Hula and Creator of the Spiritual Hula Program for Women and the Co-Founder of Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘Ui. She is a blogger, book author, choreographer and Spiritual Consultant, an advocate and public speaker against domestic violence and emotional abuse, both of which she is also a survivor. If you would like information about Weddings or simply just to contact Roxanne for information about the Spiritual Hula Program for Women or information regarding private hula or Spiritual Guidance sessions with her or would like to book her for a speaking engagment please  feel free to send her an email.
(c) 2013 Roxanne K. Cottell. All Rights Reserved

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Act Like a Human (Think Like a Genius)

Act Like a Human…

When talking in terms of business and running one, we must choose to think in the manner that is give and take, in the manner of reciprocation. When we reciprocate our energies with other people, no matter why or how, we are acting like a Human Being.

While I am sure that no one needs to be told this one thing, I am also sure that there are a whole lot of people who behave in their working lives like something that is no where near “human.”  We want to separate who we are and be a bad person when it comes to our money, failing to the idea that in order to achieve, someone else must fail. This is not the truth. This is the most ugly thing that any one of us has ever been taught, and there are not a lot of people who were not taught that in order to make it in life, someone else can’t. This is wrong. This is hurtful. This is one napoleonish thought that does not have to be, the idea that someone must lose.

No one has to lose. No one has to hurt. The only “has to” that anyone has to really truly even think about doing is changing your thoughts to match the thing that you want it to be, and in doing so, while you are so not thinking about someone else NOT making it so that you can, you will also be sending out that same energy that is nurturing your ideas and everyone who will ever have a thing to do with it. There is no need to think that you need to do more than just be you. And you are human, and most of the time human beings are such lovely carbon life forms that to NOT behave like one seems almost as though all of us are somehow trying to be the Terminator or perhaps some other fictional character that all little boys are told and taught is a “real” man, and ain’t it about a bitch that the Terminator is a fictional ROBOT??? Quite telling, the way that we behave, right?

Acting like a human means simply to live with empathy for others, to give what it is that you intend to receive, to be of good cheer, and to always, always be mindful of the way that we treat others. This is not hard to do, but for a lot of people, it is the choice to not get railroaded, to not ‘lose’ anything and to be ahead of the rest of the crowd. For a lot of people too many are still stuck in the 80’s, and by my count, while the 80’s were a lot of fun, other than the music, I am glad they are no longer here. Back then it seemed that people were behaving like bad humans, taking advantage of every little thing they could and giving nothing in return. Everything was hoarding, was the mindset that in order to get ahead, you had to hurt others. This, my friends, no longer applies and anyone who thinks so is about to get the rudest awakening they have ever had to go through…yes, go through, and it is because all that time you did not know that you were creating your own Karma through all those things that you did that may have looked a lot like cutting corners for the good of the company, but when you think about it a little bit more, it was all about how much more money each individual had so they could go out into the world and show people how much more they had, how much more they could afford, and dammit if they were awful to other people about it.

Our accomplishments are not meant to be worn on our sleeve, and hell no they’re not meant for us to go out into the world and prove to anyone else that we are better than others – we aren’t better than anyone. We might be better at doing certain things than others might be, and they might even have things that they do that they are better at doing than a lot of people are, but not one person on this planet is better than anyone else. This is not my rule, but it is a fact – we all eat, sleep, excrete, and procreate the exactly biologically same way that anyone else will.

And like anyone else will, all humans tend to get hurt when others are not mindful of the things that they are conveying. Acting with Love tends to make it almost impossible, even when the message that we have to give is not the sort that makes a person feel all warm and fuzzy. Remembering to exercise empathy is an important skill to hone. It makes us remember that even though some of us might be at the pinnacle of success in our lives, we are yet still human, as is everyone else on the planet.

…think like a genius…

You may be wondering what behaving in a manner that tells us that we know other people exist has to do with thinking in a genius type manner…that much is simple – once you have allowed yourself the luxury of no longer behaving like a creep with no ability toward empathy you open wide the doors to receiving, and by this I mean that it is in the energy of acceptance and release that we are more able to expand our thoughts, to be creatively inclined toward making things in life a lot nicer for the world at large. We are all prone to bouts of genius-like thinking, all gifted with the ability to tap those reserves within where our own sense of compassion, empathy and where the “help a brotha/sistah out” gene is inside of all of us.

When we are able to free our minds from the thoughts that we have to get ahead no matter what, we are not more inclined toward setting ourselves up for the limited behavior that is setting lofty goals that, while they might seem like a great end result, while we are thinking about these lofty goals we are not thinking about the time between that it will take to see those results to fruition. When we are thinking in a genius-like manner, simplicity is key, because we all know that it is in the simplest things that the greatest thoughts help to form the greatest outcome. Thinking like a genius frees us and opens us up to more options and allows us to create new avenues in our thoughts and in our lives which will also allow the entry of those manifestations that we “see” with our minds’ eyes.

When we think like a genius, we are basically taking what we have available to us and at our ready for our use and putting that energy of what we know we are able to do toward the things that we know we are prepared to have and to accept, including the acceptance of the truth at the onset of the genius-like thinking.

To think like a genius, as I have already stated, means that we are open to reexamining all of the things that we know we are able to do and that we would like to ponder how these tools can be used in a manner that is not like that which is typical for us, not like that which we always do. Genius-like thoughts come in the form of the answer, the goal in mind, and takes us backward in that thought process so that we can see how it was that we came to that “rough draft” of the goal, because as we all know the goal is never truly what we hope for and if we are open and willing, we will find that what we end up with is not only more appropriate for what it is that we are seeking to do, but more, what we end up with, even if it does not seem that way at the time, is exactly what is needed for us to move ahead on our Path.

Yes, it really is that simple…now, get your okoles out there and practice being human…see how wearing your own proverbial skin feels for a little while, and find out that you never needed to be that greedy prick who thought that there truly was just not enough of anything on the planet to go around…

You no longer have to fool yourselves into thinking that you are the only person who matters, and you no longer have to sweat it in terms of your ventures failing and you no longer have to deal with the idea that indeed, you have been a creepy prick for a long, long time…

Have you not heard yet? The business world…hell, the whole world…has become like California not being a smoker friendly state…the world has become a “Prick-Free” zone…

Stop being a prick already.

Seriously

I LOVE YOU ALL !!
ROX

Rev. Roxanne K. Cottell is a book author, healer, Spiritual Consultant. She is a public speaker who advocates for victims and survivors of domestic violence and emotional abuse. She is the Co-founder of The Sisterhood of the Soul and the creator of the Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘Ui  healing with hula program. To contact her regarding booking  speaking engagements, to inquire about writing for you or for creative coaching sessions for business, “Corporate Soul Coaching” or for guidance to any of the Fires of Life issues, please contact her via email by clicking here
(c) 2013 Roxanne K. Cottell . All rights reserved

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Circumstances

Our Circumstances might be similar, but…

We humans have a bad habit of thinking that since our own personal circumstances are a lot like someone else’s, that how we handle our own stuff is how everyone else will be able to as well. I am a sinner in this church, and these days I try dearly to remember that while what I have gone through might be a story that someone else could tell and said story would also be their’s, how we each handle our own lives is up to us and what will serve us rather than make things harder for us. 

Don’t assume that you know how to handle someone else’s circumstances, not even if you have “been there.”

While we might “get it” in terms of being able to relate to someone else due to the similarities in circumstances, it is arrogant that any one of us would believe that since something worked for someone else that the same measure of what worked for them will also work for anyone else. While we humans have mirrors to our own selves all over the planet, the fact remains that we are each different from one another and that no two ways that any one similar circumstance will be alike because if we bother to remember so, it is because no two people are alike.

People are different. While we each may have things in similarity to others, we are each markedly different. We are each made up of many, many different things – yes, DNA and genes and blood and skin and bones and tissue – but also we are each made up of our personality, our likes and dislikes, the things that scare us, that make us angry, and of course, the things that make us happy and the things that warm our inner selves. Couple all of these things that we already have in common with all of the experiences that we each have had to this point and we find that there are a whole lot of things that bind to one another, but just as well there are a whole lot of things that make us each very unique and this is where the thinking that “To each his own.” 

“To each, his own…”

If you want people to think for you, then go ahead and try to think for them, but I promise you that you will be met with a degree of displeasure, and simply and only because we do not all handle our stuff the exact same way anyone else will. While I cannot be too sure of it, it is said that Einstein stated that “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” 

While I cannot prove that Einstein is who coined this thought, I can say that it is the truth. Think about it for a minute and you will come to the same conclusion that while one thing worked for you, it may fail horribly for another. This is part of why some children do not do as well in school, or we think, as do others, and why it is that hiring a group of people to come up with marketing ideas does not need someone in finance to help them unless the ideas have anything to do at all with finances. We cannot all do everything that we need to have done, and when what we need to have done is a personal thing for any one of us, we also cannot tell other people that they should do things the way that we did them because they might not be able to do things the way that we do them. For instance, when we are teaching our children to do anything at all and they are not “getting it,” the most fail-safe thing that we can do at that moment is NOT to judge the kid because he or she cannot do this thing the way that we do it, but to allow them to take a look at whatever it is that they are trying to do while we step away for a moment so that we are not only not getting their way, but also, our own. 

We are highly emotional when it comes to doing things correctly, and we are more so when it comes to an issue that is highly personal for us. When it comes to the most sensitive of topics and situations that we share in common with others, the hardest thing in the world to NOT do is give anyone instructions on how to do things our way. I said it. Deal with it. We humans are such an aggravatingly arrogant lot that we really believe that if our methods do not work for people who are not us that THEY must be doing things our way, wrong. 

Really? You mean to tell me that you know what WILL work for someone else and that you know that without a doubt it WILL work for them and if it doesn’t work for them that it is THEIR fault?

Okay…while you might be sorta right, that you would blame the person who was not you for screwing up what did work for you is not their fault. What is their fault is not replicating the thing that you did, which was think about a way to come up with something that they COULD do, but what is not their fault is not being able to do what you did to come up with an agreeable resolve at the end of it all.

We cannot hope, even pray, that someone else will be able to do what we did, ever. When are we going to learn well enough that just because something works for us that it might not be the same for everyone else? Think back to when you were a kid and all those times that your parents showed you how to do something and while you tried, over and over and over again, you still could not have the same end result, making many days and weeks of your not being able to go outside and hang with your pals because you screwed up something that you thought you did right, but it was not right enough.

Well, that is because the instructions for having done it right were not you enough. This is the thing about showing others – we have to remember that we can suggest, and we can show, and we can teach, but we cannot learn, and we cannot force to learn, and that when we force to learn, and we force to agree, we are not in the energy of right thought. While it is technically right action if you got it right, there can never be any such thing as “right resentment,” because resentment is a naturally occurring human emotion and we need it as a gauge for our own Path, it is not something that needs to be permanent, and we all know that more often than not, resentment is a big fat deal of a problem. Resentment is bred, I have observed, more than not, because of something that we are not allowed to have or do, or worse, something that we tried to have or to do and could not because we were shown someone else’s right way to do it without regard for our own way of doing things. 

The onus can be put on both parts of this equation, but again, I must to defer to the idea that fish do not climb trees and no matter how much you can train a fish to do anything, the one thing that it cannot do, no matter what, is climb that tree like a cat instinctively just knows to. In that same light, we have to be able to perform our own healing, even when we have a healer we must, because a healer’s job is only to guide our clients to that healing. In the case of The Sisterhood of the Soul, our healers live by this “einsteinian” thought about fish not being able to climb trees. We know each of our clients are unique, and we give respect to the idea that since a fish cannot climb a tree, that also must mean that each person on the planet is unique enough to come up with some sort of something resembling relief for their own lives. 

We can point out anything we want to anyone we want to, but unless we are also sensitive to the idea that people have to be able to learn to come up with their own way out of anything, and unless we realize that we just have to accept that even our own kids are unique to who they are and that not another soul on the planet can do things the way that anyone else can, we will continue to live with the frustrations that we know we can live without in our lives. If we are just more willing to see that we are different, that some folks take longer to get through their stuff, that even though something worked nicely for us that it might not be the same for someone else, we, too, will remain in the energy that other people, because they did not do something the same way that we did, are not as good as we are.

We will stay with that wrongness of thoughts that tell us that we are better, stronger, wiser, smarter, prettier, whatever…than anyone else is.

And y’all gotta know already that to expect someone else to behave in a manner that is outside of themselves that already, and on your and your ego’s behalf, they have possibly hurt themselves more, and all because of what?

Oh yeah…so YOU could go out into the world and tell people that you were the reason that they succeeded….

Kinda makes it all different for ya when I put it in those terms now, doesn’t it?

Yup yup…I said it, now deal with it…I promise, cookie, you will be just fine !!

That is, as long as you pursue your own ways and not try to impose them onto someone else as being the ONLY way and the ONLY RIGHT WAY.

Think about it…the last time you did something that was way, way important, and you did it someone else’s way and it did not turn out well for you, how did you feel after the fact? Not too good right?


Riiiiiiiight !!! 


I Love You All !!
ROX


Reverend Roxanne Cottell is the Kumu Hula and Creator of the Spiritual Hula Program for Women and the Co-Founder of Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘Ui. She is a blogger, book author, choreographer and Spiritual Consultant, an advocate and public speaker against domestic violence and emotional abuse, both of which she is also a survivor. If you would like information about Weddings or simply just to contact Roxanne for information about the Spiritual Hula Program for Women or information regarding private hula or Spiritual Guidance sessions with her or would like to book her for a speaking engagment please  feel free to send her an email.
(c) 2013 Roxanne K. Cottell. All Rights Reserved

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Kuleana…(Responsibility)

Kuleana means “Responsibility”

Leslie Morgan Steiner’s Video Tells more than only my own story, almost verbatim…

I am addressing those who are in the position to say something to people, and the “say something” that I am talking about is domestic violence. The cause that I have taken up is my own, and while I know that there are many who also have taken the reality of domestic violence and emotional abuse and run with the idea that something needs to be said to many people at one time, there are still people for whom the reality that was theirs and the reality that is that of so many others’ are starkly, markedly different.

Yet, that is not my “thing” right now, and no matter who tells me what and for whatever their reasons may be, the truth of the matter is that the message is not getting out there and it is not getting out there simply because we who are Ordained, some of us anyway, seem to think that it is somehow not okay to give the clue that we should be giving to those who are about to make the biggest decision of their lives in marrying the person who could become their abuser by our not saying even the tiniest little thing about what can happen. I know what can happen. I lived through what can happen, and it was not fun and neither was it easy and the affects of that sort of thing happening to a person are the kind that just will never go away. I keep being asked why things are one way when someone else’s way worked, and I am sure that it did work, but not all abusers are the same, and when that one truth hits anyone’s eyes or ears, we are all hopeful that somehow, the clueless will get it, but sadly, they don’t.

A Call Out To All My Fellow Clergy Folk…

At this moment, I am sure that there are words being exchanged about my own take on how we as ministers should take the time to tell those who are about to be joined legally (unless they divorce) that there is the very real chance that there will be abuse, and no, I don’t expect anyone to just blurt it out just like that. No way! That is offensive and that is hurtful, and no, it is not my intention to hurt anyone at all. It is my intention to make it clear to ANYONE WITHIN MY REACH that this horribleness happens everyday, and sometimes, it happens within the confines of our own lives and we haven’t the tiniest clue that it is happening.

While I am not sitting here telling anyone how to run their lives or their businesses, I will sit here and ask many of you reading this to please not take offense to the things that you are reading right now, as they are not meant to offend, only to inform.

If you are not looking for the signs of abuse, you will not see them, no matter what, and not a whole lot of us even knows what those signs are, because none of us enters into any kind of agreement where we will lose and the other party will win and we are just happy and greatly satisfied with it. If you do not know what to look for, how will you know what you are looking at? These are the things that are specific to abuse victims and survivors, and these are the things that we need to make known to the world of people that abuse is not a form of Love – it is abuse, and no matter who tells me that they disagree with the things that I say or do, no one, only I, will know how to deal with it. But there is a way to at least try to prevent it.

SAY SOMETHING, DAMMIT !!

Yup…I said it, now deal with it – we Ministers, Clergy folks, Wedding Ministers who only do weddings, Celebrants…whatever it is that you call yourself, listen up!! You can help prevent these things by simply saying something about it to your charges. I know, I know….there are some of you reading this who are tired of my message about Domestic Violence and Emotional Abuse, and I know, too, that there are very few of you who know my entire story, and why would anyone want to hear about that when instead it seems like a better idea to grab a clue about things, and who better to grab that clue from than someone who has been there, who has survived the ugliness of her own “There” and who has come out on this end, scarred, yes, but very, very informed, if that is what you want to call it, about the things that happen to a person – male or female – when they are in the middle of a hell that they may not have known was in the making because they had no clue how to call it.

When we are children we are warned against the bully in the sandbox, but the confusing message that we get from our parents, sometimes, at least from what I have heard, is that if the person we are interested in is the grown up version of that same bully, that as long as he makes enough money, it makes it a little bit tolerable because it – the money – makes it all okay. Well this is the biggest lie of all! There is not one thing that makes abuse on another person okay. There is nothing in my own memories that tell me that you have to go through someone else’s imposed-upon-you hell so that you can have some coin in your pocket.

Yeah yeah… I know… I was raised to Love for Love, not for Love that came in the form of someone else’s ability to make a whole hell of a lot of it. The truth is that I know now that I am worth more than I was told I was, that I am as wonderful as I have been told, and that I am more Loved than I even will ever know, but at least I no longer believe the things that I was told by the one person who I volunteered to trust, and I could, when we were dating, because he was not violent when we were dating. I took his jealousy as his only loving and being devoted to me, but the truth was that he was so worried that someone else would be better than he was that I would leave him for that person, and well, emotionally, I did – I left him, but I left him for me and me alone.

It is not a dead horse, and it is not being beaten to death…nothing should ever get beaten to death, at least not something this important

 Rather than sitting here and talking about the uglies any further, what I want to say to you all is that if you are in ANY position to help another person out, it is not your place to tell them what you would do if you were or even when you were in their shoes. As a minister, my own thought is that it is not only your place, but your Kuleana to at least say something, even if you have to make the message more palatable by changing the language you use – say something. In saying something you are doing something, and in doing something you are preventing more heartaches from a situation that needs nothing more than the Love between two people. If you say nothing, you are not drawing on that experience that you had, that was actually given to you to find your way out of, on your own and through your own means, and that is a waste of the time that you took in order to figure out your own way out, even if your own way out means that you escape in your mind because life circumstances and who you are will not allow it to be another way.

Auhea wale ana ‘oe – please kokua me and pay close attention, namely if you yourself were abused at one time during a Love relationship. You were brought to the position of Minister and it was not a mistake that you were. You went through the things that you did and survived. You are now the person who those getting married are paying the most attention to who is not the bride. Take advantage of this knowledge and take advantage of the rapt attention you are getting right now and let go of your title, because you title means nothing if you do nothing with it that leads to a greater understanding of the words “By the power vested in me.” There is a lot of power in your position, in the position that I also hold, and it is my own opinion that we should be giving back to the rest of the world the thing and the person who we are, and if we have been taught about the ugliness in married life through the stain called abuse, then of course – take your silly asses out there into the world and go tell it on a mountain, and tell it to whoever will listen – no, not only your own story, but also, your message of Love and that you do not want anyone to hurt, and to please, watch your asses, all you newly married folks, because there is always the chance that things can turn ugly, and who is really going to marry a dangerous person if they know that the person is dangerous?

I mean really…we are not  Malory Knox…we are not Mickey’s demon bride who likes to go out into the world and take life away from others….and we are not all abuse statistics waiting to happen.

Just imagine the things that we can help to avoid by simply just saying something…anything, at all, about the reality that is domestic violence within marriage! Within life!

Come on now…you can do way better than that, can’t you? You can do better with your piece of paper that endows you with the power to put two people together in holy matrimony…or holy hell…

You choose…say something and you have done EVERYTHING that you can do.

…but choose to say nothing?

That is for another blog…

Until next time, know that this one thing still always will remain as the Truth of me, and that one thing is

I LOVE YOU ALL !!
ROX

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Mirror, mirror…our Kuleana about our own "stuff"

Heart ache can be crippling 

Heart ache is part of Life. We can do nothing to avoid it. We can expect to have our hearts broken again and again, and for the most part, almost all of us will choose to sit in that energy until something outside of us comes along to comfort us. The thing about things outside of ourselves, and this includes the things and energies which we find in other people when we are in the middle of our heart ache, is that they are not there forever.

We are the Savior we are each looking for

We don’t know it when we meet them, but the people who come into our lives are meant to be there and with a good purpose, or they are there to bring to us the “study materials” that we need for the lessons at hand. Many times, I know, I have not been the only one to bring to the material world for people who need to know it, that thought that is my own opinion that they need to see, not for anything other than that it is the Truth, and the Truth, at least out of me, is not something that I readily reveal for people. The Truth revealed is not mine to reveal but everyone else’s to discover.

The Truth revealed, usually, is not what the most of us want to know, want to see, want to hear, want to know, but it is something that we cannot avoid. We can fear it. We can choose to ignore it, even when we know that ignoring it is not the thing that we need to do. Normally, the Truth hurts. That it hurts is one thing, but that we are more willing to look away from it, more willing to think of other things that we know will not change things for us at all is quite another. We keep believing that maybe there is a small glimmer of anything resembling hope for the outcome that we want, pursuing only the outcome we want to see that we have created in our own heads, and without the idea and the absoluteness that is also the will of others, if it so applies.

And we try  dearly to not have to look at the Truth that hurts us, and the more we avoid it the more it is in our faces like so many petulant children. The Truth, as I know it to be, is not made up of all the fancifulness and all of things that we tell ourselves are the things that we want to have as our Truth, even though our soul tells us to run the other way – fast.

We avoid our Truth and ignore the thing that keeps telling us what we need to hear and to know, and we want so badly to manipulate it all into the thing that we are wishing it will be, when in fact and indeed, we know, for sure, that it will never be what we envisioned. As well, it should not be, because if we got everything that we think we want, we would be a different sort of heart broken, and that different sort comes with all kinds of Karmic imbalance that we have to balance out prior to our heart being no longer broken.

The things that we do in order to make the hurt leave us usually only leaves us with more hurting, and that is what we are tying to get through – the hurt. We don’t realize we are just hurting ourselves more when we try to push it to the side and not look at it. It is still there, always, like the “gifts” our dogs leave us in the backyard when they have finished the treats and the table scraps we have given them…and we like to look at those “gifts” and think about what we should do with them and not do anything about them anyway.

The Things We Do

There are a variety of ways that we make our heart break worse on us, and then when we find that what we have done to make ourselves feel better does not work, we want to blame everything and everyone outside of ourselves for our pain, when in fact our pain and what we do with it is ours alone to deal with, and most of the time, we go right back to the start of the circle and we do the EXACT same thing we did the last time we tried to make what we were feeling go away. It does not go away without our at least thinking that we can do something about it that does not include getting other people involved with us. It does not leave us, ever, until we have taken the opportunity to look at it for what it is and try hard to look at it differently.

Looking at It Differently

This takes a little bit of practice to become good at, the looking at of things from a different perspective. It takes our being able to see ourselves from the perspective that no longer places us in the area marked “Victim,” and begins to move us to another place, another place called “Survivor” and from my own experiences, while we never truly ask to be the victim of or to anyone, the only one who makes us a Survivor is our own self.

Sure, we can look to others for guidance, and we can take their words to heart and utilize them, but we have to be strong enough, as well, to see the imperfections that are there, to know that we loaned our own efforts to the heart break and because of this we know that we are also going to have to be a large part of the effort to bring us to that place where Peace resides, and we all know where Peace truly resides, don’t we?

Peace Resides Within

Always and forever, peace resides within. Peace is not only quietude, and peace is not only that which we all seek out, but it is also the major definer of when we have chosen to become all we are supposed to become, because it is at that point when we have given in to and accepted what is ours that we will truly find peace. Peace is not something that can be had through doing nothing, because the “doing nothing” that too many experts and gurus want you to believe is that there is no work …inner emotional work, not physical work….and that is not the truth.

Think about it – it took you a little while to manifest all the “other than peace” that you currently have. It took a long time for you to dwell on a thing that you knew at the onset when it was presented to you that whatever it was that you were looking at became your focus, became the thing that you wanted so badly that it began to invade your every thought. Your every thought begets your every action. Within those thoughts that were other than peaceful, you believed that if you just DID more that you would be able to get other to help you bring you what you already have and that you already know is the truth, and also is that which you keep on avoiding. In your avoidance, you caused yourself more heartache and now there is double the energy, but not double the fun. This is not my rule (wait for it)….but that of the Universe.

We can no sooner believe that whatever it was that we have done in the past will also be the thing that will work now, and when it is that we figure out that all we are doing is running around in a circle chasing our souls in to the frenzied wreck that it becomes is when the reality that we are the ones who caused this mess through our actions caused with, and not by, other people. This is what is meant when Eleanor Roosevelt stated that (and I am paraphrasing from memory, guys) no one can make us feel inferior without our consent.
No one can make us feel or say or do anything without our making it possible for them. In order for us to hurt, we have to be open and willing to receive that hurt as part of us accepting the way that things are no more our control in regards to what others think and feel just as much as it is not their kuleana to feel or do anything about our pain. And that is a moot point, really, because no one else can do anything about how we feel. They may be able to empathize with us, and they Love us and that helps, but in the end, we are the ones who matter in regards to our own healing. We are who matters when it comes to how we feel and what we are willing to do about how we feel.

So, in the end, it really doesn’t matter…in the end, it is not anyone else’s stuff – it is ours.

I have met some very fine and wonderful people who are as equally angry and heartbroken as anyone could be. They are angry because they cannot get a tiny bit of empathy from another person, and they are heartbroken because they are not willing to get out of their own way and allow whatever the lesson at hand is to come into its own fullness. They know they do not have to be this way,and they know that there is always something that can be done to quell themselves.

Yet, they are helpless to really do anything about it, because they are also not willing to step aside and allow Spirit to work through them and reveal to them the things that they need to know and to see and to believe. It is not someone else who is at fault if we still hurt, but our own. It is not someone else who can decide for us which option to take, and even if they did that would tell anyone with any level of awareness that your heartaches reveal more about you than you are willing to let the rest of us know about – and we are finding them out through your words and actions that somehow do not match up. Always, there is a way for others to know when it is that we are being given something other than the Truth because the Truth is always going to reveal itself, no matter what.

In the end, when it is that we can no longer bear the pain and the shame of all that we have let ourselves believe is when the healing comes.It comes at that point when we are a wreck emotionally, a constant flow of private and silent tears come to us, and when we have given the child who still lives within us no way to grow out of the beliefs that no longer apply to our lives.

Take a moment today to look at yourself in the mirror and see what is truly there. Yes, you will see your own messiness, and you will see also the hurt…but you will also see the wounded child who you punish more than you care to Love, and that is really what you need – self love, because it is in that measure of Self Love that we are made whole, that we are made to see what we are for real, and in that one moment, we know the Truth.

The Truth is a Beautiful Thing.
I Promise.

I Love You All !

ROX

Reverend Roxanne Cottell is the Kumu Hula and Creator of the Spiritual Hula Program for Women and the Co-Founder of Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘Ui. She is a blogger, book author, choreographer and Spiritual Consultant, an advocate and public speaker against domestic violence and emotional abuse, both of which she is also a survivor. If you would like information about Weddings or simply just to contact Roxanne for information about the Spiritual Hula Program for Women or information regarding private hula or Spiritual Guidance sessions with her or would like to book her for a speaking engagment please  feel free to send her an email.
(c) 2013 Roxanne K. Cottell. All Rights Reserved

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Out with the old…In with the remembered

We all take the scenic route once in a while…

I am not perfect by any means. In fact, I am so IMperfect that to think of me being anywhere near perfect would send me back about ten years, when I knew better but was still kind of …I don’t know…foolish. And we are all prone to being very, very foolish from time to time, and in our working lives, we have all played the fool somehow, either by our own doing or because we have been “outshined” by someone else.

We are never really out-shined, shown-up, outdone…

Yes. This is the truth. What we rarely think about when our Ego is telling us the things that we already know way too much about is that underneath all of that whiny and feeling belittled exterior is the Truth, and most of the time the Truth about us, whether we like it or not, the truth, that is, is somewhat of a surprise. Even though we knew about it, we thought we could hide it well enough for us to not have to bother with because we really thought that no one else would know our dirty little secret. That is the fun part about our secrets – we do not realize that we give them away, because when thinking in terms of who we are and what we are all about, that part of us that is needy for the attention and more, the good word about the things that we do.

…okay, maybe “needy” is the wrong word….but you get it, I know you get it.

Everybody likes to hear good things about our selves.

I must tell you about my dear online friend, Ms. Melody Fletcher, (Hi, Snarky!) who is an expert on the art of utilizing thought correctly to bring about the situations, people, and things into our lives that we are most desirous of. In a nutshell, and very simply, Ms. Fletcher’s message, for the most part, and at least mechanically, is that the actual deliberate part of the receiving is contained within the vibration that we emit when we think about something. If we keep on thinking the thought that we want something, and we continue to want that something rather than forming thoughts that do not do anything more than raise our vibration about having that thing manifested into our lives, we will only have the experience of wanting that something. If you want to keep feeling like you are wanting that thing or situation, you are always and only going to have that experience. However, if you think about what it could be like…(because you know, it could happen) to actually be doing that one thing, or having that one thing, or being that person, or being with that special person…and have no feelings other than what that feels like right now, you will begin to see changes in your thoughts, which will bring changes to your life.

Did you get all of that? It really is very simple – just change your thoughts to more believable ones. Rather than thinking that you want anything, think about what it might feel like to actually have that thing, and then think about how your body feels physically and remember that feeling whenever you have a doubt about that one thing. I have done it and I know that she is telling us the truth. If we understood the mechanics of our bodies, and how it is that our biology is meant to be magnetic, meant to bring everything we want into our lives, no matter what it might be, we would have more of the things that we want in our lives, and really…very much less of the things we would rather see less of.

See? Easy, right?

Haha!

No.

Bahahahahahahaaaaaaaa….

Oh, HELL NO!

Changing clothes and changing beliefs about stuff are NOT the same thing. One is outside of us and the other is inside, and because we are taught to believe that what we look like matters most to the world, that how we felt about who we are mattered only by our manner of dress. Did we look well manicured, and did our clothes look just so, and did we remember to pop some gum into our mouths after we smoked that last cigarette….no judging…people have vices and smoking is a bad one…did we do things that we needed to do, or were told mattered, matter more to others than to us, and on that note, are these people before us really judging us?

And thus, the madness begins. We begin to judge ourselves and our choices and we begin to rely on everyone else and believe that without others there for us to expect them to understand us, we would not know ourselves. Then we go out into the big fat world and we pretend to be who we are not so that someone else will judge us. And this ridiculousness goes on for years and years, and then one day you find that your beliefs about a lot of things have changed, and that no longer are you that person who you were just six months ago. It is scary and beautiful all at once, and the changes, they HURT, because in those changes come also the people we have to say goodbye to, and our problem is not that we are saying goodbye to them, but more, to a little piece of ourselves that we no longer can grow from. It’s purpose – THEIR purpose – has been met, and we are now better and smarter and more grateful for their having been a part of our lives for however long they were there.

And we cannot know anything other than that on their side of things, they are just as sad, and they hurt  just as much, but like we know, they know too that it is just time, and this part of the Path is done for now between us. Nothing is ever truly goodbye in the world of Souls. We always have that Love, those memories, and this is where I tell you about remembering…

Remembering Who We are Comes at a Cost but it is worth it

We recall who we really are when the time is right and we are ready. Most of the time we cannot handle it, because it came at a cost to us, and the cost is always personal. When we grow, we hurt, because we lose a part of ourselves, but the truth is that we have just outgrown that part. We know when people have been a lesson in our lives, and we also know when it is that those who go away and return do so because they are meant to. There is no such thing as goodbye, I said, in the world of the Soul. We are all there, all of us, all the time, and always we can connect, in a thought, in a remembrance.

We remember being this Loving person, and we know that we cannot go back, even though we know that now and then, we will look back and recall what we put ourselves through, some of us for years, because we believed someone else’s thought about us was better or more right than our own. This is not to say that it is okay to hurt, because hurting for no reason never happens – we always hurt for a reason. We become our true selves through our pain and we recall a time when we had something as harsh as Now is for some of us, and realize that we got through it, again, and this time, we believed differently, and this time, everything just sort of gelled together. It sort of just started to fit.

Quite well, I might add.

It is not easy, but all the way around…

Seriously, if you want to think about your future, no matter what you are doing in what area of your life, you have GOT TO let go of your past. I have had a very big turn around. I used to wield my creative nature like a sword, and then one day I hurt someone’s feelings, badly, and meant to. A few times, but it didn’t matter to me then. I made amends and we went our separate ways. And I still Love them. The know I do, but I cannot hang, so …you know…they just kinda went away, too.

And I think about it now, and I know who matters, and those who matter the most to me know that this is the truth of me, and more than that, the one thing they needed to know the very most of all is that of course…

…yes, Loves…

It could also be called the very real and seriously true Truth of You, as Well. I Promise.

How are you financially right this moment than you were at this time last month? How about in your relationships (ugh! So heavy a word!) ? How are your children’s lives? How is your pet? Do you have a roof over your head? Do you have ANY income at all? What are the things that you know you DO have?

Yup…that easy, or so it would seem, but it isn’t. It is though, the very foundation for your success, not just in your work, neither school, but mostly, in your life, period. Once you can change one thought about one area, the others seem to be a little easier than the last time. You should try it…just one time.

What part of your life do you need to see a change in?
How does that affect the other parts?

Answer those two things, and be honest with you, about all of it. Then ask yourself how you feel about all of those things that you wrote, and pay attention to your body’s response to your thought, because your body cannot lie, ever…it knows what is best for you…

…all the way around…so trust it. I keep on telling you all how magnificent we are, and you just keep on getting sick….knock it off, would you?

Yeesh !!  Haha !!

I Love You All !!
ROX

Division Between Us

It is fine to disagree, but it is not fine to act as though things just don’t bother someone…the truth is that it does…

I think I have had just about enough of the idea that anyone has the right to say, write and post things that are of an offending nature. While it remains that yes, it shouldn’t affect me the way that it has, reminders of the fact that we are not able to see past what is ours alone that somehow will offend another person have the very propensity to do just that, and it has.. I will not sit here and pull people apart, because that is what has been done to me since roughly 10 A.M., pacific, and no, it is not about just a post that I happened upon on my own Facebook wall, but also, the very thought in anyone’s head that somehow, it is okay to say and that since it is that we ourselves tend not to allow things to bother us, we assume, too, that it will not affect others. I am very sorry to inform a whole lot of people of it, but I am not the only one who takes things that they read and see, hear and then know, lightly, namely NOT when it is something that is not controlled by the media or by the thought that we need somehow to just get over ourselves…really?

It is not that easy

It started earlier today, when I was coming out of the grocery store for the second time, minding my business as normally I do, and there he was in his suit and his crooked smile and his handshake offered to me. When the conversation turned to the idea that I am somehow going to go to hell because I refused to stand there listening to this person telling me that I am wrong, that how I believe is going to send me straight to hell and that the only redemption was my buying into the man’s crap, and when it was that I told him that I was offended at the idea that since it was that he did not understand my point of view, that what he was doing was so far removed from the God he was trying to get me to believe (mind you – I accepted that he has his beliefs but he made no effort to accept mine, which is cool – he didn’t have to and I truly did not expect him to) in and when he outright told me that I was breaking my mother’s heart by denouncing his version of Christianity, I turned back toward him and told him that HE was the one who was divisive, that no one needs to be scared or told they are wrong because they do not believe his way was the only way.

Then, later, it happens again, and you bet your okole that I am offended by the idea that what we look like, even as vain as I am, somehow has anything to do at all with what it is that I see rather than what is intended. When the hell was it named today as being “let’s do some divisive stuff today” and why is it that people want to believe that I should just take it like it is? I am sure that were it something as big a deal globally that the thing that also set me off has nothing to do with beliefs in a spiritual sort of way and everything to do with beliefs in the way that I have managed to make it known by everyone within my reach that no matter what anyone says, no matter what it is that bothers other people about themselves, it does not need to be made known, discussed, and then expected that most people would not be offended. If you hear things, see things, read things enough, and you have had to hear, read, see those things throughout the bulk of your life, and you have remained closed mouthed about it, and then one day you let loose, not because of anything other than that people remain to behave as they will because not a lot else has changed but the vocabulary, you bet your ass I am going to say something about it. When the hell did certain demographic groups have the right to hate on other groups simply over something as not as big a deal as I know I am making of it all is? Why should anyone in one group NOT get offended?

Sometimes, you will be offended, and while it is that I make it very clear to MANY people that I try DEARLY not to have a thing to say, when it is something that needs to STOP? Yeah…you bet I am going to say something, and you can also bet your ass that I am NOT going to be very quiet nor calm about it. It has NOTHING TO DO with what many probably think is my reason, and if people bothered to think past what is on the top of things – ALL PEOPLE – and no, I am not pointing anyone out – there would be a whole lot less to be offended about. I am clearly, and angrily stating that in order for ANYONE in this lifetime to be able to GET OVER ANYTHING, there needs to be a semblance of something called empathy.

Empathy is a big fat deal to me, and I say so because empathy is the thing that not a whole lot of folks have for anyone or anyone else’s situation. When was it made okay for one group of people to point out their own perceived flaws by making another group the group that the other group feels somehow has always had the upper hand? I refuse to make it seem as though the ills and the ails of the Native Americans – ALL native groups – STILL be the problem that a white person has to deal with. It is not the white man’s issue to salve us, but our issue to fight and come back from the depths of societal pariahs to the respected people who we all are these days? Why do we choose to close this division with more hate? What is it useful for?

Another thing that bugs is the idea that your God is bigger and has more influence in my life than does my Goddess? It is the SAME energy. The very same energy of Love and of Light and all that other good stuff – why hate on those who are NOT like you? Why band together against one thing, one group? Why not take ONE THING IN COMMON and make THAT our mission? This same thing goes for women’s body types. And yes, this is yet one more thing that irritates the hell out of me. I am GOING TO GET offended, f*cking ass hurt even, every time I see something that divides women. I do no differentiate women. We are all the same – all beautiful, no matter what. So you can imagine the dismay I feel, the very sickening within me that tells me once again, I have to, of all things, make it very clear that there is NOTHING IN THE WORLD which bothers me more than do things that I see, read and hear about women of this body type and women of another body type – who really cares? Are we not all the same? Why bother with making people feel like this is an “Us versus them” thing? It ain’t.

It is very much a thing that bugs me as it has always, because while I enjoy being my size and my build, there are a whole lot who do not. This is the thing that I teach about – that we are all the same, that our body shape is irrelevant to anything else if we ourselves are not able to love who we are, and I love who I am, and I am remiss to think about the fact that there are a lot of photos out there on the internet that people just cannot see in them that the things that they post are of a divisive nature. I am not calling out anyone, and if anyone feels like I have, that is on them. Just as I was not called out – I am allowed to be my opinionated self about this, because I am that woman who was lambasted, a lot, for being my size, was ostracized for it, was constantly called “SKINNY AND PRETTY, ” and while that might be okay for many women, it is not okay for me. It is nice to be complimented, but when you know that it is not a compliment, that it is one more person’s way of telling you that you are the reason that they feel like they are not good enough, pretty enough, this or that enough…yep- I have a big fat problem with that thinking and with you, too.

It is not okay to divide us when we try so hard to be united, and no matter who tells me what – this is my real feeling.

It is not, in my book, okay to point out what is physically wrong with other people, no matter what. It is not okay to make a bigger gulf of division in the minds of the whole of us that we are one side against the other, and really, that more than much else is my reason for speaking out. I do not like divided wholes. I do not like the idea that we need to look at each other and not take into consideration the actual “luckiness” factor involved and no, it is not okay to make a stand against another person because you think that this is a personal attack. It is NEVER a personal attack and more and only a defense mechanism that I hate to use. But use it I must from time to time, because that is how I roll.

It is offensive NOT to look at things from someone else’s point of view, and where some might think I am whining, I am actually speaking out against something that should not matter anymore, even though I know, even in my case, it matters. It matters what we look like, but that does not mean that we need to choose one versus the other. It matters that some of us refuse to look at a person from the outside and not even bother with thinking about the things that offend anyone else. I have been told over the years that I should think before I post anything at all, that I should consider that there is more than only one demographic of any sort of person, or even group of people, and that more than anything else, there need be no feeling that one group has the right, by whatever means they feel it is their right, to point out another group without considering that there are many who are not going to be okay with what you have said. It is one thing to believe it and live it, but when you start dividing us…well, you figure it out.

I do not come unglued like I have for the bulk of today unless I am given a good enough reason.

I think that dividing groups of people, not even if they are your own stated words, is a good enough reason.

Enough, already…

I Love You All.
ROX

Reverend Roxanne Cottell is the Kumu Hula and Creator of the Spiritual Hula Program for Women and the Co-Founder of Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘Ui. She is a blogger, book author, choreographer and Spiritual Consultant, an advocate and public speaker against domestic violence and emotional abuse, both of which she is also a survivor. If you would like information about Weddings or simply just to contact Roxanne for information about the Spiritual Hula Program for Women or information regarding private hula or Spiritual Guidance sessions with her or would like to book her for a speaking engagment please  feel free to send her an email.
(c) 2013 Roxanne K. Cottell. All Rights Reserved

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THE VEIL BETWEEN !! 

Enough with the bullsh*t…let’s get this party started already

There are a lot of blogs that explain how someone else became successful, but not a lot that glorify in the “almost there.”

As anyone who knows me well can tell you, I am the one friend who is going to support you if your dreams are not so outlandish that there is a modicum of “it could happen” to them. I am also that one friend who, no matter what, will tell you when you are making a complete ass out of yourself. Of late I have been more the one who will tell a friend when they have other options, that they do not have to hurt the way that they have been, and that more than anything, please, just don’t give up. Never give up on something that means anything to you at all.

Let’s get this party started…

Enough already with the “this is where you f*cked up really good!” and time for “hey! look at how far you have come ! Come on! Keep going!! You are doing great!” We have all been going through a mess of unclear clarity, where we know that we have to keep on going because without our keepin’ on that for real the dream which is alive and well within us cannot become what it is meant to become if we just give up and give in. Yet we are told, endlessly even, by many an untried “guru” that we can do whatever we put our minds to and that no matter what, we can keep going.

Well, my thought about it all is that you have the very audacity to dream, so you best not have the idiocy to not follow through. Yes, I said “idiocy,” because only an idiot would not follow the dream that he or she knows is alive within them and is so for a good reason. We don’t just fart these great ideas that we have – great ideas come from somewhere. We don’t just imagine that the new people in our lives are somehow there without purpose. Contrary to the thing that you are willing to believe is the idea that you have no choices, no options, that your dreams will not ever be because you are not good enough, smart enough, this or that enough.

I am sorry, but I have a different thought, and that different thought is meant to be the thing that makes you realize that who you are is divinely powerful in that you had the very thought in your head to do something very magical with your life and with your time, and my friends there is no better time than right now for you to  make sure to it that your Soul understands that after all we have each been through, that there is no better time to start realizing the dreams which have waited for so long to become the reality. The reality is that there are a lot of folks right now who have these magnificent ideas and have these thoughts that, on paper, would rival that of ANY Forbes Fortune 500 lister’s ideas. The reason that there are people whose ideas get “found” by those companies are many, but the reason that anyone would have those ideas and the inclination to make their own dreams possible…well, now, that is the stuff that everything that you think is cool is made up of.

Steve Jobs was not an innovator only – he was a dreamer. I understand dreamers. I am one. I know the thrill of coming up with a new marketing idea, and I know what the elation is that is borne of one more sales call being made from a new customer because of something that I wrote that was the catalyst for a relationship spawned from the Dreams that some folks believe are too lofty to have, and on the other side of that thought, that the person dreaming it believes will never become the reality that they see in their heads as being also possible to be the reality they know as tangible. The impact the man made on the world and how we communicate is bigger than we think it is, and while he is no longer here with us, still, he lives.

And this is the main thing that I wanted to tell you all today – that no matter what happens in our lives, we have the chance, everyday, to begin to live the dream, begin to see the things that we want so badly actually become, all we have to do is believe it…that way, we will see it. If we can see it, we can also feel like it can happen.

“WRITE IT DOWN!”

Up there…there where the title of this blog is at, where I say that it is time to get this party started, I mean that we need to learn to write things down. Many of my students and healing clients want to know why I have them write things down. It is simple, really…a thought is a thought, and while our thoughts become things, waiting for a thing to come to us is maddening if we cannot see it for real. I have these people write things down for many reasons, with the main reason being that when you write down your thoughts, automatically, that thought has become a tangible thing, because you wrote it down, and that is what I call immediate proof that we are all magically inclined in a sense that not one of us realizes is far more powerful than our human brains can handle. This is the reason that I write everything down – not only because I have a million other things floating around in my thoughts at any given time of day, but because sometimes I need proof that we are responsible for the things that we manifest in our lives.

The things that we manifest in our lives, when we manifest them, are awesome and the moment that it happens we become a new person.

Yes, a new person, because at that point we find out how miraculous we really are. We find out that there is nothing in this world that we cannot have, or do, as long as we are willing to do the work involved. When it is that we wish for the immediate manifestation of a thought, I have my students and my clients write down their thoughts. No one ever thinks about it until after they have written their thoughts out that there are things that we think about that restrict our ability to see the miracles that we create. When we write out our thoughts, we are, in that moment, creating the miracle of manifestation in our lives. Writing things down brings the law of attraction to life for us and at that moment, we see our ability in full force and we know for sure that we are as powerful as we have always wanted ourselves to be.

What we never were told, or taught, is that we are magic in and of itself, that truly, we are the miracle which we are all waiting to have in our lives. What we are not given as the gift of freedom in thought is the idea that our power lies within us and that we alone are who is responsible for the things that we see in tangible form.

All it takes is that one little exercise – that moment that we write things down and see for ourselves the things that we think about, and we will know for sure that absolutely – it is high time to get this party started…

So what? What’re you doin’, thinkin’ about it?

Well, since that’s the case…go write it down…
Find out how powerful you really and truly are!!

I LOVE YOU ALL!
ROX

Rev. Roxanne K. Cottell is a book author, healer, Spiritual Consultant. She is a public speaker who advocates for victims and survivors of domestic violence and emotional abuse. She is the Co-founder of The Sisterhood of the Soul and the creator of the Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘Ui  healing with hula program. To contact her regarding booking  speaking engagements, to inquire about writing for you or for creative coaching sessions for business, “Corporate Soul Coaching” or for guidance to any of the Fires of Life issues, please contact her via email by clicking here
(c) 2013 Roxanne K. Cottell . All rights reserved

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PLEASE KOKUA!!

Please help The Sisterhood of The Soul raise funds, not only to send our staff of talented healers to the Big Island of Hawai’i to receive a Kahuna’s Blessing for our healing halau here in Southern California, but more importantly, to help our friend, Margo Lozoya who resides on the Big Island. 

Margo has been stricken with breast cancer, and she is at stage 4 level, but Margo is a fighter, and Margo refuses to just give in to this ailment. 

It is the Kuleana of The Sisterhood of the Soul to kokua those most in need of healing in whatever way that we can, and in this instance, we have chosen to help our sister, Margo, but we really need your help. 

At this time, we have decided that we will give to Margo fully 25% of the $20,000.00 that we have pledged to ourselves as a part of our own Mana’o, our own thought, not only to have a better means by which to be out in the world to do our work within our own communities, but more, within the global Sisterhood as well. Margo need us, all of us, to help her with this part of her Path. 

Again, please kokua The Sisterhood of The Soul and help us help our Sister, Margo, of Hawai’i…

Margo – we Love you, girl!! We know that you are not ready to leave us and we know, too, that when you are back and well again, that your life and your living of it will be the greatest testament, not only of the Aloha, but more, the Ikaika Woman who resides within.

Aloha Nui Loa

Rev. Roxanne K. Cottell

Co-Founder

Na Hula O Ka Wahine ‘ui – The Sisterhood of The Soul

of 

Southern California.