Become Your Vision Through Living the Cycles of Truth

Much of what we learn of the Truth of who we truly are comes through our relationships with others and our experiences in the world.  Some of what we take in as Truth is false evidence appearing real. Some of what we take as true is future events already ruined. This is the misunderstanding of the instinct of fear.   In the natural world, the instinct of fear is Creator's gift that tells all Creator's creatures to pay attention to what is coming.  That's it.  Just pay attention.  When we learn to pay attention to what is, then we can begin to discern with our all our physical senses; Truth from illusion as it is revealed in our relationships and our experiences. 

Self Reflection: As we sit in the darkness of the closing moon for the 13th Moon Cycle of Be Truth, we are preparing for January's moon cycle, and the gifts of Learn Truth.

Gratitude Replaces Resolutions

Carolyn Shares:  I try to be positive every time the end of December draws near, but I am most always crabby as I approach the final weeks of the year.  For me, there is a difference between the idea of starting over everyday and starting over in a 'new year' with a set of resolutions. So, here is my resolution solution:

The 13th Moon cycle, 'Be Truth', arrives during these weeks as well. For those of us who use the moon cycles as guides for growth and change the date of the ‘Real’ new year begins with the New Moon for January. One that day/night, we will take a deep breath in, and breathing out, start on the next leg of our journey.  

As we look for this new cycle to begin, do a review of the past year by asking for Guidance and Wisdom to see the Truth of your journey.  For the struggles there may have been that don’t yet make sense, set a place of gratitude for what is yet to be revealed.  For any successes, great and small, give yourself appreciation.  Sit in Praise for the journey that has been, and yourself for making the journey up to this point.  Rest in place.  Just rest and have gratitude for yourself, your fellow journeyers and the earth upon which we all travel.  Taking these remaining days of the waning moon phase to rest in thanksgiving without giving into new plans or resolutions will give more energy and clarity in the week to come as we prepare to step into the starting block for the 'real' beginning of a new year.

Self Reflection: This year instead of writing resolutions for the coming year instead, take time to reflect  with writing a gratitude list. Trust the time for new will come after this period of rest and reflection.

Who We have Been and Who We Are Becoming

By taking time to reflect on our gratitude, and on how the life we have lived so far interfaces with the vision WE have for our life,  we come out of from hiding ourselves from ourselves and the world. We come to know we are already whole. Perhaps we just need to take off the shell that covers our wholeness.  We have not allowed ourselves to see the Magnificent Wholeness of who we are. 

We are manifestations of Creator/Creation.  We all have experienced the magnificence of nature; we too embody that kind of magnificence in our own being. Now we sit in wonder of the magnificence of ourselves-whether we feel we are currently expressing our self in the world, or whether still in the becoming place. What a place of gratitude this is!

Self Reflection: Think about your most awe inspiring experience in nature. YOU are that magnificent, that awe-some as well. We all are.  We can and will embrace this as Truth, by our willingness to travel fully in our humanness. These days approaching the new year are times to allow the Vision of your being to visualize.  Express your gratitude, then YOU prepare to be manifest in the world.

How Truth Reveals Our Lives

 "...Does truth work in our lives?...Truth Heals the body, purifies the soul, reforms the sinner, solves difficulties, pacifies strife. There is no such thing as undemonstrated understanding. If you wish to know where you really stand spiritually, look about you at your environment, beginning with the body.  "There can be nothing in the soul that is not demonstrated sooner or later in the outer, and there is nothing in the outer that does not find some correspondence in the inner." (pg 201)       From Emmet Fox, July 20, (1886-1951), a pioneer of the New Thought movement, continues to inform many wisdom teachers and spiritual searchers.  Around the Year With Emmet Fox,

It seems all great spiritual teachers, mystics and holy ones were/are seekers of Truth. All of them! When we seek the vision for our life, Truth is likely to show up in one of the many forms we experience working with the moon cycles, which is just one path for searching and knowing Truth.  

Self Reflections: When I intentionally follow the path of my unfolding vision, I am living my life purpose as best as I currently know it, with the Truth I currently know. I can trust teachings on Truth to pop up synchronicitically in my life. This synchronicity is confirmation of my connection to Creation

Flipping the Coin of Forgiveness and Gratitude

In practicing gratitude for our experiences in life, we come upon times where we experience hurt, anger, frustration, dissolution, pain.  Can we even think about being grateful during these times?  The gift in this cycle is 'Thank Truth' .  We look for the Truth, open ourselves to what is Truth, (with an uppercase 'T') when we are confronted with the challenges of living life. 


Self Reflection: Forgiveness and gratitude are two sides of the same coin.
If this coin comes into my possession, I have received a gift more priceless than gold. It is a gift which brings me a freedom greater than I have ever known!

The Amazing Gift of Gratitude for 'What Is"

The gift of  'Thank Truth' is a gift supporting us to start each day anew with the willingness to begin again, and again, and again. Gratitude allows us to miraculously be present to life in an amazing, powerful way.  It truly is a gift to be able to see beauty in the everyday and the mundane.  It truly is a gift to know hope and possibility in the midst of chaos.  It truly is a gift to be able experience change as it is happening in our feelings and actions.  Gratitude = a path of living in the present/in Presence.

Self-Reflection: Today I begin again. Today I will live in the present of each moment. Beginning again and in the present I experience Presence. I live Gratitude

A Practice of Gratitude Changes Consciousness

As we move through these weeks of the waning moon our focus of gratitude turns outward as we explore our perception of others and the world around us. It is easy to express gratitude toward others when we are getting what we think we want, or when things are going our way.  This is only a tiny part of the gift of Thanking Truth.  We receive the gift of greater consciousness when we can be grateful for the whole of the Truth, which may be very different from our original perceptions and beliefs--as was noted in yesterday's post,

What DOES it mean to look for the Truth in every situation and experience, especially those that are challenging in some way? We can start with a question teacher and writer Byron Katie  asks, "Is it really true?"  Through deeper exploration we often find the Truth is different than our personal perception and experience.  We come to understand how important our life experiences have been/are for the growth and healing of our being.  This space of expanded understanding of what is reality is the place where we truly and deeply feel gratitude for the Truth.

Self Reflection: Check out Byron Katie's guided questions here in her process called: The Work. Choose one current belief which is challenging you and explore "Is it really true?"

December Moon Gift of Thank Truth Reveals Our Deep Truth

When Jamie Sams writes of 'Gives Praise' as the Clan Mother for December, her story reminds us that we have levels of being and depths of character which are revealed as we journey through life as a human beings.  Many cultures give a 'spiritual name' to children-when they are born or enter into adolescence.  In Jamie Sam's writng in The 13 Original Clan Mothers, a number of stories tell of different ways a spiritual name may be made known.  In our 'modern' culture, such namings are not usual, but that does not mean we don't have a 'name', different from the one by which we are publically known, that represents the deep spiritual qualities of our being.  Is it not  ironic that knowing this identity helps us to live more as the being we really are.

Self-Reflection: What is the name I call myself?  Is it a name which honors or shames my being? 

Keep Me in Truth

If I spoke only Truth
If I saw only what is Truth
How different would my life be?
Truth with the capital 'T' is so different from
          the little truths,
               half-truths,
                    non-truths,
                         wanna-be truths
I embrace as the 'real thing'.
These are 'mis-beliefs', not truths at all.
It takes time to come to know the difference between my mis-beliefs, which have come to feel so much like truth to me, and the kind of Truth which stands up to the scrutiny of time and life.

The cycle of Thank Truth gives me the practice of gratitude. Learning how to be grateful takes practice.  It is a challenge to see the Truth in my own being.  To be willing to see Truth in others is an even bigger challenge.  This waxing moon cycle invites me to take up the challenge.

Self-Reflection: What new Truth about myself has been revealed during the waxing moon phase?  Am I feeling gratitude for this discovery?  Am I full-in with Truth?

Feeling Alone and Forgetting Truth

Carolyn shares: I wake up very early. The cloud cover has shut out every bit of light from the moon and the stars. All the holiday lights are off in the neighborhood. I'm in the midst of that in-between everything time when I feel totally alone, disconnected from everything and everyone; even from the source of creation. It is a terrible anxiety, moments of total desperation, loss, panic, confusion. I recognize how often these feeling pass through me.--I wonder if I have tapped into an ancient feeling in the core of human beings in those moments, hours, days, maybe even weeks, when they felt alone. How often I forget I am connected to ALL.  I can't ever really escape this connection, but I am always forgetting it. THAT is probably the main reason I stay connected to the mooncyclecircle--so I  forget less and know my connection more. Then, I am able to be a place for others to know and remember their connection as well.  

When I forget, I close myself up in seeming self-protection, and these feelings can not pass through.  Instead, they must take up residence in  my body ('my own personal, 'oh shit, here I go again' response), my mind (which brings up all the bad stories from my memory), my emotions (I feel them in the racing of my heart) and my spirit (which I think feels desperate in my disconnection). They are trapped there until I open up again, which happens ONLY through my willingness to remember I am always connected, even when I forget I am.

Self-Reflection:  Am I willing to open up enough to let the difficult, scary panic,anxiety and fear pass through?  

Gratitude for Truth: The Crack Where the Light Comes In

Taking time to sink into thankfulness for the truth of what is opens the space for us to be the human we are born to be. This is, to paraphrase the late Leonard Cohen, 'the crack where the light comes in'.

Cracks occur in a number of ways:
A house settles and a crack appears in the ceiling.
The root of a tree grows pressing against the sidewalk.  The sidewalk cracks against the pressure of this tender, tenacious root.
Humpty Dumpty falls of the wall.  He cracks his shell.
The earth quakes, she cracks open.
We lose a Love. Our heart breaks. Our heart has a crack.

It may take some time to hold gratitude for that which cracks us open so the Light can enter into our hearts and our life.

Self Reflection:  Am I willing to allow time to see the truth in the cracks in my life?

Thankful for Honsety

In all of our relationships we ask:
Am I in truth?
Or am I in non-truth, falsehood, wishful thinking, manipulation, delusion, addiction?
To walk a path of gratitude for truth
is to walk a path of committing to honesty.

Self reflection: Am I committed to honesty in my thoughts, words and deeds?
Where might I struggle most in using this gift in my life?

The One Reason We Thank Truth

To say Thank You and really mean it requires we fully accept what is offered.  Otherwise, our thanking is shallow.
To express gratitude while not truthfully receiving what is given, denies a gift we may need for our well being.
It may be that we are given the gift of gratitude for the primary purpose of practicing gratitude so we may eventually learn to thank and have gratitude toward ourselves.
We must experience gratitude toward Self in order to truthfully express gratitude toward others.
To thank the truth within our Self, in our gifts, imperfections, and miss-takes opens us to the gift of being human.
It is a gift to be human...a rare gift.
When we live this gift in the practice of being human, we are Truth,
we know the meaning of Thank Truth.

Self Reflection: Am I willing to express only authentic gratitude?

How Do I Thank Truth?

How to Thank Truth.

What does it mean to Thank Truth?  

Live in gratitude

Gratitude for my path

Just as it is unfolding.  

Cut myself some slack

Pat myself on the back

Lighten up

Maybe even embrace a little humor, even if it is dark humor

Don't take myself too serious

Self Reflections: Creator, Spirit of All That Is, help me remember that the path of my life takes me toward truth.  No matter how crooked my path, no matter if I stray far off the path laid out for me, eventually I WILL embrace my Truth.  And I will thank her for my journey.