You know how violinists can boast on having a real Stradivarius?
Well….my dog is a real Pavlov.
Pavlov, for those not familiar with the researcher who tied his name to dogs drooling at the sound of a bell indicating food was on its way, was a scientist who in fact studied human behavior, but felt dogs would serve the purpose of evidence too.
Personally I find the ease with which science compares rats and other animals to people often questionable,
but Pavlov I must admit had a point with his claim that living beings in general tend to respond to programmed impulses.

Taking my dog as an example, she responds like a prototype should.
When I call her name, she stops in her tracks, turns around and looks at me.
When I place her food tray on the floor, she immediately comes to the kitchen to eat (also when the food tray is empty)
When I put my shoes on to go out, she runs to the front door to get there first and sits till she’s figured out whether she’s allowed to come or not.  She even does this when I put my house slippers on, which proves it’s my  ‘when I put things on my feet’  behavior that triggers the dog’s pattern.

Now as with many humans, the dog funnily enough doesn’t really know why she is doing what she is doing.
She has been programmed to behave this way, it is her pattern.
Us human beings also live by a lot of patterns and after a while also tend to forget why we do what we are doing.
Patterns create an illusion of safety. They dispense the necessity to be on our guard, as patterns tell us ‘this is the way we do things around here’. Yet ask your Self this:

Are patterns in fact a reflection of reality?

 

The 4 of Challenges: Patterns. (click on the card to learn more on its meaning.)

Patterns are tricky habits, making us believe we have everything under control. They are rules to live by. We believe they will keep us from missing out on something; while meanwhile we miss out on everything that takes place outside of these patterns
Patterns are like strongly embedded bob-sledge-trails in our brains, which we follow as fast as possible, not out of mindfulness but out of ‘pattern-fulness.’

Now consider this:
Do your regular sledge – trails really serve you?
What would it be like to take a relaxed stroll in the park and have a change of scenery?

In fact, with Christmas coming up, let’s make this a personal casestudy.
Dive into your subconscious and see what you would really like to celebrate this year surrounding the holidays and most importantly  how you would like to celebrate life.

Step outside the Xmas comfort zone and do something totally different for a change;
a bit like Scrooge who had a life changing experience and saved the life of little Tim by listening to the inner voices of Christmas Past, Present and Future. Scrooge after all, is nothing but an Archetype, or prototype if you will, mirroring how we tend to live by following patterns…

Celebrate this year’s Christmas as if you are celebrating for the very first time in your life.
Explore what you see happening around you, discover what you can mean for others at the same time asking yourself what would serve you in the present circumstances the best.
Have yourselves a merry conscious christmas holidays…

Some more on the Nan Yar – Who Am I number 4 card of Challenges:
The Suit of Challenges are all about the development of the I-consciousness, the divine center traveling with us from experience to experience within one lifetime;
and from lifetime to lifetime and the intermissions in between.

The 4, is the number of balance, the comfort zone in which we like to reside. However there is more to life than the 4, such as proceeding to the 5, the number of the essence of being human, or the 6, the number of communication.

Tapping on Patterns. Energycize by Donna Eden
Should your subconscious come up with the answer you might do well changing some of your patterns;
then Donna Eden, hands you this easy and simple exercise
If you can’t tap yourself, ask someone else to do the tapping for you, while you create your own affirmations.

With all best wishes

Ingrid Schippers

The post Mindful Christmas Holidays appeared first on EN Energycounseling.nl.

The cards summon up and support,
what you already know deep down inside.

Even though the cards of the Nan Yar – Who Am I method are read by the brain, they stand in direct communication with the subconscious. This is how things work with everything in daily life.
Should we only be guided by what is perceived by the brain; we would be computers without any form of empathy.

It can even be stated our subconscious plays the major part in the way we ultimately perceive and experience life.  This can be compared to an iceberg, of which 2/9 is above surface while the remaining 7/9 is out of our immediate view and perception, even though it can confront you big time, which in turn is what determines the way you ultimately feel.

Needless to say we, in the West, live in our heads a lot; in other words spend a relatively big amount of time living in only 2/9 above water.
The discomfort of that, is that our feelings of well being, happiness, curiosity or drive, do not reside in this ‘ 2/9 direct recipient of information’ , but…as the word indicates…in our feelings, the ‘invisible’, ‘non-proven’ 7/9 of who we are.

Without this subconscious, we would be robots without feelings. This is exactly the reason why government institutions and  courts of law, often  feel totally cold, harsh and unjust, as they totally only work with 2/9 of the perceivable humane truth, while the other 7/9 of the truth resides in the unknown.

We may not always be aware,  but the biggest part of our life is shaped after and initiated by that which we cannot directly perceive.  The Nan Yar – Who Am I cards, serve as a mirror to accelerate what otherwise would be kept hidden a while longer.

Everything within our perception, the top of the iceberg, has the function to summon up what lies underneath the water, in the subconscious. We associate that which we see,hear, touch, (sensory perception) with something that also lives within our inner world, and where the brain at some point knows limitations, the possibilities in the subconscious may well be as infinite as the Universe; with the experiences we thus gather in the subconscious reflecting back to the sensory system in the ‘top’ conscious.

Basically, everything operates in cycles. Just as insects and fruits serve as food for birds, who in turn serve to spread seeds, who in turn sprout and serve as food, literally everything that takes place in life stands connected, one way or the other, with all the other occurrences in life.

Everything in the world exists for a reason.
Everything has its own life cycle and as such is connected to everything else in life.
This connectivity in all its diversity of the 3 layers, the physical, psychological and spiritual realities, (see also module 3: the 3 Realities and their Gatekeepers) is mirrored in the last card XXI  The World as depicted at the top of this module

The World has good reason to be the last all-encompassing card.
Similar to how everything in life is connected , all 78 cards of the Nan Yar-Who Am I method are also inter-connected.
The presence of one card in the pack creates the prerequisites for all other cards to exist, in numerous different combinations, interpretable in an infinite number of ways.
As such, the Nan Yar – Who Am I cards, mirror as many situations as are present in the real world and are connected to all other sources of  wisdom at the disposal of humanity.
Tools such as the Tarot, on which the Nan Yar Who Am I method is based, are also part of life for a reason and also part of a life cycle. It are media that end up in the world to serve as steppin’ stones to a next phase in the development of the human collective, starting with a few people, to gradually be adopted into a culture.

In the past 5000 years, from about 3000 BC to the end of the 19th century,- the so called Kaliyuga era-, much as changed in the fields of human thought, feelings and spiritual awareness.
Money was introduced, originally as a means to a goal, but soon became the goal. Humanity materialized placing a priority on appearances rather than a connection to the natural world, an image more real today than ever before.
And where before Kaliyuga there was an individual connection with spirituality from within;
this was now taken over by external institutions, churches, ruling their followers ‘from above’ .

Because of this, the capacity to source from ones own inner knowing, was overruled by cultural rules and regulations generated by the outside world (not to be confused with card XXI The World , which consists of an outer ánd an inner world.) thus moving esoteric knowledge to secret societies that only few were privileged to know about.

On the one hand this turned the individual person more into a member of the community, while on the other hand it in fact isolated the ‘ordinary’ individual from The World with the natural connection to the inner world and the insights that belong to it being severed and out of reach of that community.

These changes however are certainly not just negative; they are also part of a development. Learning curves for (wo)mankind, inspiring  awareness, enabling people to learn and distinguish night from day, darkness from enlightenment. (as depicted in the Nan Yar – Who Am I card 2 of Challenges: Dilemma.)

When Greek philosophers appear on the world stage, a new growing awareness is introduced in the way people think, with the individual becoming aware of having  an I-consciousness; initiating a quest to (re) discover the relationship between humanity and The World , the inner world and the outer world. This as opposed to earlier peoples who were guided by their Faraos and other leaders and regarded their leader as their god.

It is in the narratives of Homer that the first individual life stories, biographies and character descriptions are being displayed and it is a Greek diary in which someone refers to himself as ‘I’ for the first time in written history.

This historic phase in human development can be compared on the individual scale of a life time with a child around the age of 3, when it refers to itself  as ‘I’ for the first time and recognizes its own individuality.  It is basically then, it starts to create its own life story and becomes its own Storyteller

The esoteric sources from which the Marseille Tarot originates and from which Wisdom is handed down to humanity so it can further develop itself, were still kept hidden in Greek-Roman times. They were only accessible for initiates, priests and mystics.
At the sacrifice of ones life, it was forbidden to divulge any secret knowledge, as the awakening I-consciousness of ordinary people was still at the age of a toddler.

In the Middle Ages, the church ruled, – and moreover controlled- , the I-consciousness. While the Church was very much aware of this inner knowledge available to humanity it tried everything to keep these sources away from their flocks. The last thing religious institutions especially in those days wanted, was to have an independent parishioner with a mind of its own. (also see module 1: Earth,Breath, Presence)
To have ones personal spiritual connection was strictly forbidden. In the 7 prerequisites to live on earth (also see module 3: The 3 Realities and their Gatekeepers) inner spiritual life is therefore shown in disguise as V: The Pope, number 5, the number of the human being and the quintessence of life, the core.  (also see: module 5: People and Numbers)

Only as predecessor of the period of Enlightenment that would follow the Middle Ages did the Tarot appear in the world. As with other esoteric knowledge it took some time to be recognized as a Tool to explore ones inner world with.  To begin with it was used as a regular card game. Only later was it used to predict the future with, mostly with a (clairvoyant) third person interpreting the cards, rather than in dialogue with oneself.

Until this very day, the Tarot is used in a wide variety of interpretations, mostly by third parties interpreting the dialogue created through the cards.
The structure and composition of the Tarot however, with her archetypes, suits and number characteristics (also see module 4: The 4 colors: Challenges,Insights, Gifts & Tools)  define the cards as a perfect medium to distill your own insights in dialogue with yourself, while staying close to who you really are, with the Nil-card, The Storyteller from the Nan Yar – Who Am I method, serving as your personal guide.

In daily life you can apply the Nan Yar Who Am I personal Development method to draw a card every now and again and  interpret it with your own associative thinking, a natural gift rendered to every developing human being, safe-guarded in your subconscious); combined with what you know about the meaning of Numbers,Colors en Archetypes as discussed in the 7 modules of this course.

More extensive card readings, such as the drawing of 3 cards:  recent past- present-near future, or the so called ‘Celtic Cross’ displaying 10 cards enconpassing the present situation and its possible outcomes (for you to interpret!), are further explained in the Nan Yar Who Am I group training and individual sessions and in the Life Make Over Journey Book.

Since ‘walking’ and ‘thinking’ draw from the same source of lifeforce”,  the group training, individual sessions and Life Make Over Journey Book, also offers breath- and bodywork exercises from ‘The Body language of Energy’ to support the energies of personal development.

The ‘Nan Yar all cards’ page is one of the pages on the energy counseling website which offers the opportunity to draw your cards on line and source information on the meaning and background of all 78 cards.
Scrolling down on the same page you’ll find a small shop to buy the Nan Yar – Who Am I personal development cards with an explanatory booklet, or one of these products separately,  or the download of the booklet that comes with the cards.

You are invited to respond to this 7 module course  with questions and comments through the comment form at the bottom of the blog page. Your reaction will be read and shared underneath the blog you responded to.

Should you prefer a one-to-one exchange, send me an e-mail through  the contactform or mail me at: info@energycounseling.nl

I regularly give lectures discussing the content of the 7 modules, either on locations chosen by me or at invitation of  companies and events.

30-08-2015,

Ingrid Schippers

The post ‘Who Am I’ in daily life. appeared first on EN Energycounseling.nl.

There are those moments where suddenly the light bulb goes on.
Things I’ve seen happening right under my very eyes for very long, yet as I’m so used to seeing them happen the way they do, I hardly ever question their validity.

Recently I came to notice certain patterns about myself, that I had never even recognized as such and by that I mean I had not even recognized them as a patterns, but simply as something I was used to doing a certain way. Something I was used to doing the way I was brought up to believe was the right way to do.

Obviously everyone needs certain convictions to go by, a springboard from which to start and base decisions on, but convictions can be very binding and blinding and close off doors to new opportunity if we don not question them every now and again.

While some convictions can be there to protect us from doing things rashly, they also have the ability to ground someone in the negative sense of the word, preventing that person from evolving.

A recognizable pattern, familiar with many is arachnophobia: Fear of Spiders.
Regardless of where, when or how it developed, many shy away from spiders and are unable to touch them. Spiders instill a certain fear.
Yet even though these fears consume precious moments and situations, only few people will actually do something about it. Instead ‘they learn to live with it’, as such creating a reality that includes a pattern that accepts fear of spiders as a fact of life.

This while it is relatively easy to get rid of fears. Hypnosis, Tapping, Behavioral therapy, self-reflection, a wide range of methods live out there next to spiders; some only taking little time and effort. Even simply holding a spider just for once can be effective and make way for other things in life, provided of course the fear is unfounded and you’re not squeezing a black widow or other poisonous spider between thumb and index finger.

‘But why should I get rid of my fear of spiders?’ one may wonder. ‘As long as I avoid them I’m perfectly all right.’

But see here’s the point. Avoiding things, avoiding confrontation, takes time and space and consumes a certain percentage of an every day allotment of energy. Just imagine you would have an certain quota of energy of 100% that equals 10 hours of a day and even as little as 2% goes to looking out for spiders on a daily basis, meaning 12 minutes per 10 hour day. On a yearly basis that is 12 minutes times 365 is 4380 minutes is 73 hours, is more than 3 full days and 7.3 10 hour energy days that are spent on looking out for spiders. Just think how you could spend that time differently and what you could spend it on.

Next to being liberating and therewith rewarding, getting rid of a fear opens windows of opportunity, that we do not sense or foresee as long as we stay in the old pattern of fear. Energy invested into one fear, cannot be used for something else, so my point is that even though I fool myself at times by saying I’m perfectly fine with the way things are; getting over my fears and changing these things can give me space I could not even have dreamed of. That is the reward for initiating change.

In their book ‘Energy Medicine’, Donna Eden and David Feinstein present a surprisingly easy exercise called the temporal tap, involving tapping the left and right temple area above the ears while using an affirmation.
I’ve found a little video for you to watch where Donna explains the principle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6yH0gdyu8Q

The post Fear of Spiders and Other Obstacles appeared first on EN Energycounseling.nl.

It may sound too simple to be taken seriously,
or so basic that it is taken for granted and overlooked.
It may also go against what would you would want to be true;
because you want things to be different.
You might want to be able to eat ‘all you can eat’ without gaining weight or minding the fact that many mass-produced foods deprive you from important nutrients.
You might want to be able to drink alcohol without it affecting your health.
You might want to be able to smoke for the same reason.

Yet as the saying goes:

A healthy mind needs a healthy body

and that goes the other way around as well:

a healthy body needs a healthy mind.

The two go hand in hand like water goes with thirst, food goes with appetite and laughter goes with happiness. They are inseparable.

What triggered all this is a very meaningful interview I recently listened to by Donna Eden and David Feinstein, with John Grey, author of the book: Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.

It woke me up again to the fact how a healthy lifestyle and a healthy spirit are interdependent.
How the way we eat, influences the way we function physically and how the way we function physically, influences the way we feel energetically,
(and how that is different for men and women.)

Now of course, as an another saying goes: There’s no sinner without a future, or a saint without a past. We’re all human, most of us drink a glass at times, as do most of us occasionally eat a piece of triple chocolate cake. (I know women do)

In a society where we get our nutrients in supermarkets that are filled with sweets; and even worse where the majority of products holds sugar;
In a society where ‘all you can eat’ restaurants are the place to go,
where environmental pollution is rife and where stress is the number one emotion in men, women children alike; it is virtually impossible to live a hundred percent healthy lifestyle.

What we can do though, is refuse to toss the towel into the ring and think: what the heck; they do it so why shouldn’t I?.
Instead take responsibility over your own habits, patterns and actions;
in effect influencing your own physical and mental health.

At birth we were all given tailor-made natural resources to nourish, educate and take care of ourselves, and each of us was given a mind of our own to set it all in motion.
To avoid making it rigid or ‘religious’, give yourself some slack every now and again, say 20% of the time, doing it right for 80.
Try it; and find it beats having bad habits 7 days a week.

The post No Sinner without a Future, no Saint without a Past appeared first on EN Energycounseling.nl.