Welcome to The Me-First School of Global Healing
A blog dedicated to exploring the experience of healing in all domains
Water Practices at 3%
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3o52yKG240M
Water Practices at 3%
You can't make wisdom happen. It's not like "Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work we go... onto the internet, to search 500 things..."
It doesn't go that way. It's a sitting in the dark that can't be hurried. But boy, we can sure slow it down. And so we're working with shifting the percentages inside of ourselves from being mostly actively slowing down our process of getting to the point where we know what to do.
I'm right here in this with you. There are many times when, as I inventory, "What am I doing? I am actively slowing down the process of getting to wisdom—by throwing fits, and doing this and that.
Start With Just 3%
Okay, at least we can ...
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Healthy Certainty
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIQVj_CZzYw
Healthy Certainty
Not Knowing
Not knowing is a skill. We can not-know in ways that destroy us. We can not-know in ways that just keep the balance. Or we can become spiritual athletes of not knowing. That's the Path of Endarkenment.
I'd love for you to take the time to notice, compassionately, from whatever your starting point is: How are your unknowing skills? How's your sitting in the dark? Where are you on the Path of Endarkenment?
If you are someone for whom certainty is very comfortable, and even admitting that the unknown is all around us is difficult, you may benefit from spending a little more time with "Okay, can I take a really deep breath and say 'I don't know' a few times, and see if I can sink ...
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Whole Heart Connection and the Origin of the Rubber Chicken
Why is Thea Elijah always holding a rubber chicken?
I often teach holding a rubber chicken in my hand, and gesture with it as I speak.
I tell people that the rubber chicken is my shamanic power animal, and that its spiritual power is the willingness to risk awkwardness or even absurdity in the name of love and healing.
It began as a gift from my son, then 5 years old, who noticed how nervous I was before teaching. He gave me the rubber chicken and told me, “Mama, take this rubber chicken with you when you teach. When people see you holding a rubber chicken, they will be smiling and happy, and you won’t be nervous.”
He was right! It worked like ...
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The Nature of Darkness
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=061l-6A1v4o
The Nature of Darkness
In response to my last blog about darkness and light, I was asked, “Is there a natural relationship between darkness and evil?"
I can see how it is confusing, in a culture that oversimplifies, to make it all seem easy by taking all the subtlety and nuance out of the picture, and just saying, "Oh light is good. Oh dark, it's not just bad; it's evil.
What I am putting forth here is from both the traditions of East Asian medicine—where Yin and Yang are both utterly necessary, and one is not more necessary or more beautiful than the other—and from Sufism, where there is both a holy darkness and a holy light.
When darkness is healthy, it ...
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Healthy Darkness, Healthy Light
https://youtu.be/ApmhmYVrnWA
Healthy Darkness, Healthy Light
Healthy light does not seek to eradicate the darkness. Healthy light has its place: I'm reading a book. I need some light. I'm sewing this curtain. I need some light. But I'm not trying to eradicate darkness. I can see the darkness across the room. There are sweet and subtle shadows everywhere.
Healthy darkness does not seek to eradicate the light, either. I will note that in this culture, when people speak colloquially of light and darkness, they often speak of light as good and darkness as bad. What a shame. What a shame for internal, external, spiritual, medical, and political reasons.
Yin and Yang are both blessings. Light and dark are both blessings. Night and day are ...
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What is Trust?
What is Trust?
Trust the Chair
In the beginning of my Whole Heart Connection workbook, and at the beginning of any Whole Heart Connection workshop, I do a lot of talking about trusting your chair—and about trust in general as a relaxed and expanded sensory mode. There has been some confusion around my usage of the word “trust,” and I would like to explore it.
Through a sophisticated research process (mostly interviewing my neighbors, who are used to my ruthless sense of inquiry) I am discovering that my understanding of “trust” is different than the norm, in ways that are completely typical of me. So… duh. As I explain, please keep that “duh” in mind.
I am discovering that for most people, "I ...
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What is Safety?
What is Safety?
Here is an excerpt from a recent Whole Heart Connection: Making Connections day. It was a revolutionary moment for us, and so I wanted to share it. The transmission is better if you watch the video while in your body, open and settled. It’s followed by an edited version of the transcript, where I completed some sentences more clearly and spelled things out a bit more than I was able to in the video. So it's worth checking out both.
https://youtu.be/YlU3syzhDp8
What is Safety?
Safety, for many people, means "I won't get hurt." The problem is, we've all already been hurt, so it's too late. From then on, we never feel safe, because, "Okay, it does already hurt. Therefore I'm not ...
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The Engine and the Caboose Part II
The Engine and the Caboose Part II
Top-Down and Bottom-Up Healing
This engine and caboose concept (see previous blog, The Engine and the Caboose Part I) is related to Top-Down versus Bottom-Up healing.
Top-Down Healing
Top-Down healing means primarily connecting with The Light or The Absolute, identifying with that as completely as possible, and moving from that perspective. The Infinite is certainly the most powerful resource for a complete healing! The trouble arises when we insist on Top-Down healing methods only, and decry any hint of Bottom-Up (pathology-focused) healing.
In examples of the most extreme viewpoints, adherents of only Top-Down healing consider Bottom-Up healing methods to be a waste of time that prevents you from actually merging with the Infinite and achieving Enlightenment right ...
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The Engine and the Caboose Part I
The Engine and the Caboose Part I
How to be NOT Helpable
In the context of healing and personal development, our experience is not necessarily a homogenous unity. It’s more useful to think of ourselves as being like a long train.
The Engine
Our engine is our leading edge—it’s us at our best. It’s our sanest, wholest, coolest self that we hope to be fully someday. Right now, though, it’s like a crescent moon of what we hope to become. It’s where we’re headed—but the engine of the train may emerge from a tunnel, or cross state lines, long before the rest of the train makes it to the territory that the engine has already passed through.
My engine self is what moves all ...
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Healing Our Willpower
https://youtu.be/Mtu8jxT1iXI
Healing Our Willpower
At the last Whole Heart Connection: Making Connections, a healing transmission came through that was powerful, and it felt as though it was meant for much more than just the people who were in that class. That’s why I am posting it here. It’s a transmission of the path to recovery of healthy willpower. Listen with more than just your mind; this is meant to heal your body and spirit. This is the Me First School of Global Healing, so please pass it on.
To learn more, join Thea at her upcoming live webinar Whole Heart Connection Intro on October 16-17, 2021. Or if you are already a WHC student, come join the next Making Connections gathering on Sept 11 ...
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