Decisions

Some reflections on war and the conflict in Ukraine

War is the ultimate expression of accumulated individual and collective ‘negative’ emotions such as anger, fear, bitterness, resentment, regret, anxiety and insecurity. Such emotions trigger the well-known ‘fight or flight’ reaction, which we are currently witnessing on our screens at this historic moment in time. In this state, reason often goes out the window and we say and…

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Your A-Z Guide to Divine Virtues – Xenial

Xenial is the ability to live as a guest  – our mind should understand we have come to earth to live here temporary but we need to also have a way of living here? The way of being hospitable and friendly to our brothers and sisters who share the same earth. Friendship is one of…

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Your A-Z Guide to Divine Virtues – Victory

To be victorious I must understand what values I need and offer to others, when I do this I have a clear aim and direction. I ask myself which values I want to live with,  is it time, others, respect. According to my values so will be my qualities, this enables me to have peace,…

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Self-Soothing – Stillness in the Storm

Welcome to our Stillness in the Storm (SITS) blog. Each month we look forward to introducing you to one of the seven tools for coping with fear and uncertainty explored in our recently published SITS book. We aim to briefly introduce a theme and give you a selection of practices you can try out during…

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Your A-Z Guide to Divine Virtues – Accuracy

We are all made of innate divine qualities. These contribute to both our mental and physical well being. Understanding the importance of each of these allows us to start using them in our everyday activities. We will be exploring the A-Z of divine virtues in these series. Posted once or twice a month.   Todays…

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Compassion Challenge Day 5 – Giving

Giving Nature is always giving to us the support of light, food, water and a place to live in. It’s important to acknowledge how the earth has supported us. People around us are also giving, it could be through the services we receive or the support we may require. If you look at the bigger…

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Compassion Challenge Day 2 – Letting Go

Letting Go In order to bring about permanent change there comes a time when we need to look at what are we holding on to that is holding us back. Reflecting on this can allow dependencies to become supports to help us move forward instead. To be truly free there is a level of faith…

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Boundaries

In this time of the pandemic, boundaries have surfaced in public consciousness. Quarantine and lockdown have meant that we may no longer have private physical spaces to retreat to when we feel it is necessary to ‘step away’ for a moment. Having our physical movement confined and restricted has made us more aware and sensitive…

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THE ART OF NON-ATTACHMENT

How does the ego convince us that it is real? Emotions sustain the ego because emotions feel real. Emotions come from the ‘my’ value we project onto things or people but that value is not a part of the object or person we call ‘mine’. My car has value for me but that ‘my’ value…

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Freedom – Part 2b

Time Being present enables us to be contented all the time. Constant happiness can only be experienced when we are present. Why? All sadness/regret is based on something in the past that has already happened and all fear is based on something in the future that has not yet happened. If we are pre-occupied with…

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The Subtlety of Self-Respect

We create an external personality which we call the ego from the external and material influences of our lives and it is the ego that is the source of our sorrow and lack of self respect. The self, the soul, the real I, is already perfect, a peaceful, loving, wise and happy being, infinitely worthy…

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Freedom – Part 1b

Relationships We are all social beings and so we all interact with one another. It is helpful to adopt the attitude that we are all actors playing our different roles in the drama of life. I may be playing the role of a mother, a teacher, a householder and so on. This analogy enables us…

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Freedom – Part 1a

Possessions Everything out there in the physical world is neutral. It is what it is. A car is a car. A dress is a dress. Any value judgement is a projection of opinion. “This is a nice dress.” Nice is a value judgement which I have projected onto the dress. The “nice” value is not…

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Models Of Perfection Vs Authentic Living

Spiritual awareness enables us to stand back from any situation and not get caught up in temporary ideas of models of perfection, ie, an image of what the ego would like us to be. Examples might include a model in our mind of how a perfect student, or a perfect nurse, or a perfect mother…

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How to overcome adversity?

It is true that in life challenges and adversity are a certainty, but do they have to overwhelm and overpower us? Some respond to adversity incredibly well, dealing with them skillfully, optimistically, enthusiastically and appropriately. Whilst others often feel disheartened, perhaps defeated, disempowered – with feelings of “why me?”, as though life holds a personal…

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Overcoming Temptation

Question: How to overcome temptation? Answer: An attractive proposal that I can’t take up. A bar of Belgian chocolate that my aunt just gave me, even though my doctor prohibited chocolate only last week. An alarm clock trying to wake me up at 5 a.m. after I got to bed at two. Dilemmas and temptations…

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Overcoming Negative Influences

Question: How can we stop the negative influence of people who are close to us and enable them to change their thinking pattern? Answer: This is a curious question. I don’t know if you have ever made the attempt to change anyone.  I don’t believe I have met anyone who has been successful in that…

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The power of the soul

“Ninety-five percent of our time is wasted on thinking about others; we go on and on with a string of expectations, which becomes like a hammer of demand on other people’s heads. Take a combination of expectations and demand, and what does it equal? Conflict!” At this time in the world Drama, everybody has some…

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Experiencing the Power of Silence

In my free time I am practicing silence more and more. It is helping me to stay peaceful and calm my mind. As relationships, health and wealth are not a reliable source of happiness, I am finding more and more that spending time with the supreme soul the highest energy in silence is my main…

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Creating Heaven on Earth

Yesterday I had a great time at work and managed to create a peaceful environment for others. The return of that was my colleague seeing me as a “special soul”. I work with children so it is no easy feat to create peace for others. Here are my top tips for creating heaven in your…

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10 Best Steps on Overcoming Anger

  Recognising First Signs Don’t do anything. Don’t act on the angry feeling. This is just an emotion. You can feel it without turning it into a behaviour. Response Try to step back from this feeling and label it, seeing that it is, in fact, separate from you. Notice its strength and how it pushes…

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The Way of Effective Communication

Effective communication is probably the most important of all life skills. It helps us in every aspect of life, from our professional life, to social gatherings and everything in between. Good communication is about showing meaning in what we say and how we say it. A common cry heard in many interactions is: Say what…

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Strengthening Mental Health

I woke up this morning with a promise to myself that my negative thoughts will not defeat me and I am to work on strengthening my mental mind (health). However, very quickly, I found myself tangled in my morning routine, in judging, the right and the wrong and not what was wrong about me, but…

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An angel cares, shares and inspires

“Every two hours I will put a brake on my mind and my tongue. I step inside myself for a minute and become quiet; I stop, relax and observe. Once my understanding is clearer, I can re-enter the flow of daily activities with new-found direction. As soon as I notice myself complaining and blaming I…

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People dealing with Cancer

The BBC has reported that NHS patients in England should get results for cancer tests within four weeks of being referred by a GP by 2020 under new plans to improve treatment. In 2012 there were an estimated 14.1 million new cases of cancer worldwide and 8.2 million deaths worldwide (taken from Cancer Research UK).…

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International Yoga Day – 2015

Well, I didn’t see this one coming, did you? But, what a brilliant invention. The 21st June, which is the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, known as the Summer Solstice, marks the transition from Uttarayan to Dakshinayana. Uttarayan, which begins on the shortest day, the Winter Solstice, marks the turning of…

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Making a small change everyday

Have you noticed how time is flying these days? It never used to be like this, did it? There seems to be an acceleration or quickening each day, and that’s why I feel  it’s more important now than ever before, to make a small change, for the better, every day. (That’s Every Day) I ask myself at…

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If You Don’t Mind, Then It Doesn’t Matter

Isn’t the mind a devil at times; conjuring up a conspiracy against our peace, positivity and well-being! It can draft up negative or wasteful thoughts from simple situations and convince us to react rather than to respond. We need to befriend and bend our own mind if we are to steer it clear of making…

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