Julia: March 2010 Archives
I talked to a friend yesterday who
was overwhelmed and conflicted. Why? She'd been listening to the
so-called experts who had been outlining all the things one HAS to do
to be a success as a spiritual author.
She was conflicted because she has finally, after a life of struggle, had a taste of living a life of peace and harmony, and all the hard work and continuous travel they'd been insisting was necessary sounded completely opposite of the joyful life she had felt herself moving toward. And yet, she still has a burning desire to share the book she feels wanting to be born through her, and share it in a big way. Must she give up one to have the other?
This, of course, hit me where I live, so to speak. I believe one reason it's taken me so long to get to the point where I'm ready to "play with the big kids" is because I haven't really found a lot of the game the big kids are playing to seem like that much fun! Only some of it seems to match up with my desires.
For one thing, I desire to have the opportunity to reach the multitudes with my message without having to be away from home all the time. Though I love to travel, I am, at the same time, a homebody. I love spending time with my husband, my dogs, and my garden. I love being able to take a nap when I need or simply desire one. I love being able to follow the natural flow of my thoughts to do what appeals to me in the moment instead of being scheduled in so tightly there's no time for that. I do not thrive when I have to be constantly "on." A balance is required for me to embody the very message I have to offer.
If the experts are correct, I will be a miserable failure at being a spiritual author, much less, one with a best-selling book, and yet, I intend to be one. So what's the answer? Easy World, of course. The stuff that the "experts" have been espousing is old paradigm stuff. It's the Difficult World perspective. Difficult World rules do not apply to Easy World and they do not apply if an aligned, Easy World life is what you seek.
If I have a desire as strong as mine is to achieve success as an author and teacher, and a lack of desire as powerful as the one I have (and the one my friend has) not to stress myself out fulfilling that desire, both are totally valid and totally doable! It's the success-seed my Spirit has implanted in me. One of my most re-tweeted Twitter posts is "A desire is a message from your Spirit that something you'd love to have is ready to be delivered." And it's so, so true. If you fail to honor your true desires--and part of your desire is peace, joy, and harmony along the way--you'll be in Difficult World.
If you want to create true success, which I define to be the fulfillment of your desires, you're going to need to stop letting external authorities cause you to doubt the possibility that you can have what you desire in the way that you truly desire it. If someone is saying or implying "You HAVE to do this" just know that it's the Difficult World Dictator behind it and if you buy into it, you will be led further into Difficult World. The fulfillment of your authentic desires will be found in Easy World, so get yourself back there a.s.a.p.!
Speaking of fulfilling my desires, I received a shipment of ARCs (advance reader copies) of Choosing Easy World last night from St. Martin's Press. They look and feel like real
books (though Choosing Easy World
will first come out in hardcover and these are paperback). They are for
sending to reviewers, etc. and for me they are a grand visualization
tool and an affirmation of how far choosing Easy World has brought me so far. The Difficult World-based experts would have said that with my
limited platform and relatively low visibility, I'd never be able to
get a big New York publisher to take on my book. But I did--and with
ultimate ease--because I didn't follow the Difficult World rules.
I choose to live in Easy World where everything is easy!
She was conflicted because she has finally, after a life of struggle, had a taste of living a life of peace and harmony, and all the hard work and continuous travel they'd been insisting was necessary sounded completely opposite of the joyful life she had felt herself moving toward. And yet, she still has a burning desire to share the book she feels wanting to be born through her, and share it in a big way. Must she give up one to have the other?
This, of course, hit me where I live, so to speak. I believe one reason it's taken me so long to get to the point where I'm ready to "play with the big kids" is because I haven't really found a lot of the game the big kids are playing to seem like that much fun! Only some of it seems to match up with my desires.
For one thing, I desire to have the opportunity to reach the multitudes with my message without having to be away from home all the time. Though I love to travel, I am, at the same time, a homebody. I love spending time with my husband, my dogs, and my garden. I love being able to take a nap when I need or simply desire one. I love being able to follow the natural flow of my thoughts to do what appeals to me in the moment instead of being scheduled in so tightly there's no time for that. I do not thrive when I have to be constantly "on." A balance is required for me to embody the very message I have to offer.
If the experts are correct, I will be a miserable failure at being a spiritual author, much less, one with a best-selling book, and yet, I intend to be one. So what's the answer? Easy World, of course. The stuff that the "experts" have been espousing is old paradigm stuff. It's the Difficult World perspective. Difficult World rules do not apply to Easy World and they do not apply if an aligned, Easy World life is what you seek.
If I have a desire as strong as mine is to achieve success as an author and teacher, and a lack of desire as powerful as the one I have (and the one my friend has) not to stress myself out fulfilling that desire, both are totally valid and totally doable! It's the success-seed my Spirit has implanted in me. One of my most re-tweeted Twitter posts is "A desire is a message from your Spirit that something you'd love to have is ready to be delivered." And it's so, so true. If you fail to honor your true desires--and part of your desire is peace, joy, and harmony along the way--you'll be in Difficult World.
If you want to create true success, which I define to be the fulfillment of your desires, you're going to need to stop letting external authorities cause you to doubt the possibility that you can have what you desire in the way that you truly desire it. If someone is saying or implying "You HAVE to do this" just know that it's the Difficult World Dictator behind it and if you buy into it, you will be led further into Difficult World. The fulfillment of your authentic desires will be found in Easy World, so get yourself back there a.s.a.p.!
Speaking of fulfilling my desires, I received a shipment of ARCs (advance reader copies) of Choosing Easy World last night from St. Martin's Press. They look and feel like real
books (though Choosing Easy World
will first come out in hardcover and these are paperback). They are for
sending to reviewers, etc. and for me they are a grand visualization
tool and an affirmation of how far choosing Easy World has brought me so far. The Difficult World-based experts would have said that with my
limited platform and relatively low visibility, I'd never be able to
get a big New York publisher to take on my book. But I did--and with
ultimate ease--because I didn't follow the Difficult World rules.I choose to live in Easy World where everything is easy!
Nettie (Annette Funicello, pictured below as a youngster) breathed
her last today, and it has hit me hard. She was the last survivor out of the 3 baby mice
we brought home in the summer of 2008, and the 
one I grew closest to.
It's not just her death that I am grieving, but the passing of an
era--however brief--and the loss of 3 tiny, but bright, lights in my
life. As Rick said, "They were fun." They were, indeed.
But to be perfectly honest, they were a hassle, too. Cleaning their tank, etc., was a weekly chore we had come to dread. Making sure they had fresh water and healthy, fresh fruit, nuts and mouse food every day was yet another responsibility. And from the moment we brought them home and I read how female mice need companionship to be happy, the spectre of what was to come has hung over me. Logic told me that unless we wanted an endless line of mice throughout the rest of our lives, some mouse was going to be the last and was going to live alone for awhile.
That was Nettie. Since Tina died February 2, Nettie, an old lady according to mouse life-expectancy, has hung in there, but her physical and emotional decline has been hard to witness. She had taken to staying in her sock for all but a few minutes in the middle of the night when she'd come out and consume just enough food and water to make it through the next day,not even coming out to eliminate, so I don't have to tell you what was in her sock with her. The last 4 or 5 days, she had not come out at all when I was awake to see her, and every day I'd talk to her in her sock and plead with her not to die without saying goodbye; not to die in her sock where we wouldn't even know it was happening.
Last night, as I was about to go to bed, I looked up as I had done hundreds of times lately in hopes of seeing her, and amazingly, she was there. She didn't want food or water--not even the almond butter from my finger that used to be her ticket to Nirvana. I knew for sure then that she had come out to say goodbye, just as I had asked her to. When she seemed too weak to move further, I made a nest of fluffy Kleenex and placed her in it, gave her a washcloth as a blanket, and began the death watch. When she was still breathing a couple hours later, I knew I needed to go on to bed and let her be.
This morning, we found her with her head resting in her food bowl (a jar lid, since her "official" bowl was too tall for her anymore), still breathing, but obviously most of the way gone. Somehow, she'd rallied enough to make it to the food, even though I doubt she had been able to eat. After a couple of hours, she slipped away. As Rick astutely observed, "She died with her head in the food bowl--a true Hamrick!" I guess there are worse fates. Nettie did love her food, having been obese for much of her life though she had, since September, shrunk to a fraction of her size.
Anyway, as I have said so many times, it's not the size of the package that determines the size of the Spirit or the size of the impact a being can have in your life. I am deeply grateful to have had 3 tiny family members in Britney, Christina, and Annette. I will never forget them. The hassle was worth it for the joy they brought. I still have a lot of crying and releasing to do, but as Rick said, if I didn't, he wouldn't know who I was. Letting go of those you love may just be the hardest part of being human.
Here are the Three Mousketeers as babies (Nettie's on the bottom, Britney's the white one, and shy Christina, the caramel one is hiding in the back as usual):
one I grew closest to.
It's not just her death that I am grieving, but the passing of an
era--however brief--and the loss of 3 tiny, but bright, lights in my
life. As Rick said, "They were fun." They were, indeed.But to be perfectly honest, they were a hassle, too. Cleaning their tank, etc., was a weekly chore we had come to dread. Making sure they had fresh water and healthy, fresh fruit, nuts and mouse food every day was yet another responsibility. And from the moment we brought them home and I read how female mice need companionship to be happy, the spectre of what was to come has hung over me. Logic told me that unless we wanted an endless line of mice throughout the rest of our lives, some mouse was going to be the last and was going to live alone for awhile.
That was Nettie. Since Tina died February 2, Nettie, an old lady according to mouse life-expectancy, has hung in there, but her physical and emotional decline has been hard to witness. She had taken to staying in her sock for all but a few minutes in the middle of the night when she'd come out and consume just enough food and water to make it through the next day,not even coming out to eliminate, so I don't have to tell you what was in her sock with her. The last 4 or 5 days, she had not come out at all when I was awake to see her, and every day I'd talk to her in her sock and plead with her not to die without saying goodbye; not to die in her sock where we wouldn't even know it was happening.
Last night, as I was about to go to bed, I looked up as I had done hundreds of times lately in hopes of seeing her, and amazingly, she was there. She didn't want food or water--not even the almond butter from my finger that used to be her ticket to Nirvana. I knew for sure then that she had come out to say goodbye, just as I had asked her to. When she seemed too weak to move further, I made a nest of fluffy Kleenex and placed her in it, gave her a washcloth as a blanket, and began the death watch. When she was still breathing a couple hours later, I knew I needed to go on to bed and let her be.
This morning, we found her with her head resting in her food bowl (a jar lid, since her "official" bowl was too tall for her anymore), still breathing, but obviously most of the way gone. Somehow, she'd rallied enough to make it to the food, even though I doubt she had been able to eat. After a couple of hours, she slipped away. As Rick astutely observed, "She died with her head in the food bowl--a true Hamrick!" I guess there are worse fates. Nettie did love her food, having been obese for much of her life though she had, since September, shrunk to a fraction of her size.
Anyway, as I have said so many times, it's not the size of the package that determines the size of the Spirit or the size of the impact a being can have in your life. I am deeply grateful to have had 3 tiny family members in Britney, Christina, and Annette. I will never forget them. The hassle was worth it for the joy they brought. I still have a lot of crying and releasing to do, but as Rick said, if I didn't, he wouldn't know who I was. Letting go of those you love may just be the hardest part of being human.
Here are the Three Mousketeers as babies (Nettie's on the bottom, Britney's the white one, and shy Christina, the caramel one is hiding in the back as usual):
Here's the trailer for Eat, Pray, Love! At first I was challenged to imagine Julia Roberts as Liz Gilbert, but I think it works--what do you think? So eager to see the movie!!!
Back in 1982, when
I was in my twenties teaching in Japan, I
was many thousands of miles from home, seriously ill, and at the end of
my rope.
None of the multitudes of allopathic drugs and treatments I'd been
prescribed by
the many specialists I'd consulted had been effective, and I found
myself out
of viable medical options.
It was then I
surrendered and turned the situation over to
what, at that time, I knew only as "God." And I began listening
intently for divine guidance.
Stories of other
people's encounters with God and their
subsequent triumphs over adversity played a huge role in seeing me
through this
scary time. An anonymous angel kept putting copies of a little magazine
called Guideposts in my mailbox in the
teachers' lounge, and I devoured them like they were the very medicine
that
would save my life. In a sense, they were.
Filled with
stories of the miracles that occur when people seek
help and communion with the Divine and the amazing results of doing so,
reading
them reinforced my budding relationship with my Spirit. It helped me be
open to
hearing the guiding God-voice within me, helped me expect
miracles, and provided the support I needed to keep the
faith.
My faith led me not only to physical healing, but to a literal and figurative mountaintop experience of cosmic consciousness, of Oneness. (This is described in the Introduction to Recreating Eden, available to read f'ree online.) That experience provides the foundation for everything I write about and teach today. I'm so grateful to that anonymous angel and to all the people who shared their uplifting stories in those magazines!
Stories of Ordinary People Who Have Received Divine Guidance and
Wisdom.
I have read excerpts from it and can testify that it features powerful
stories from real people just like you and I whose lives have changed in dramatic ways
from listening to Spirit.Click This Link to Learn More
I was recently interviewed about Easy
World by Isabel Morales and it's now in the archives at Joy Vibe Radio
and ready for listening! I think you'll enjoy the energy--truly a "joy
vibe"!
Isabel is one of several who hosts on Joy Vibe, which was started by Sierra Goodman, the amazing woman who runs a dolphin and whale sanctuary in Costa Rica and who lost 180 lbs. through using LOA principles. Isabel, who I met through the old Powerful Intentions community, and I have great chemistry and she is very attuned with Easy World, so that made for a really fun time.
Living
in Easy World with Julia Rogers Hamrick on Joy Vibe Radio
Enjoy!
Isabel is one of several who hosts on Joy Vibe, which was started by Sierra Goodman, the amazing woman who runs a dolphin and whale sanctuary in Costa Rica and who lost 180 lbs. through using LOA principles. Isabel, who I met through the old Powerful Intentions community, and I have great chemistry and she is very attuned with Easy World, so that made for a really fun time.
Living
in Easy World with Julia Rogers Hamrick on Joy Vibe RadioEnjoy!
