Tag: chakra

The closing down sale

SATURDAY 2ND SEPTEMBER 2017

9am- 12pm  AND  2pm- 5pm

CHAKRA REMEDIES

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Many years ago, I created a Chakra Meditation book, filled with chakra meditations and contemplation questions. There were 20 in all, with two meditations and contemplations for each colour. While I use the traditional 7-chakra rainbow system, I recognise extra colours for the base, heart and crown chakras. Here in this picture, for example, is one of the contemplation pages for BROWN, which I consider a second frequency associated with the base chakra, alongside the more traditional red colour used to represent this centre.

Some years after that, I began experimenting with drop-dose liquid herbal medicine, where small doses are used to tap into the energetic properties of plants. At first, I made a few mistakes and it took a bit of experimenting to get the dose right. If you go too low you can trigger symptoms that herb would normally treat. Nettles for example, might helps us release old resentments and stored anger from the solar plexus, but if the dose is too small, it might trigger a physical healing crisis with a hot red rash appearing on the solar plexus area.

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The Base Chakra Aura Spray, along with the ‘Stand your Ground’ and ‘Ground Yourself’ Chakra Tonics for the base chakra

Once I got the dose right,  I began to see and feel the frequency of each herb with greater accuracy. For many years I used the herbs during chakra/aura healing work, by rubbing them over my hands and allowing the spirit of the plants to guide me. All of this research has now culminated in the creation of 20 Chakra Tonics that align with the chakra meditations and contemplation exercises in the book I’d written years earlier. I hadn’t realised until recently that these two projects were going to merge as one!

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The Chakra Meditation book

For a few months now, I’ve been playing happily with the Chakra Tonics and am delighted with how effective they are. It might take me a bit longer to pull everything together as a full package, but you’re welcome to come have a dabble on the closing down day. Shuffle the Chakra Meditation card deck to find out which Chakra Tonic is right for you, or tell me a little about physical, emotional and psychological challenges you are facing and I can help you choose the right blend, or the right combination of Herbal Chakra Tonic with Aura Spray.

HERBAL STOCK TO CLEAR

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Herbal singles for the Base Chakra (brown): Earthy, restorative, strengthening remedies that help you ‘Stand your Ground’.

I’m about to begin travelling back and forth between Northern NSW and Darwin, which is another reason I’ve wanted to condense or down-size my product range. Being a chakra/aura therapist, I couldn’t resist grouping the ‘herbs for sale’ according to chakras. Each chakra section on the sale day will include liquid herbal ‘singles’ and ‘blends’. Singles are one herb on it’s own, blends are a combination of herbs working together.

In the Brown Base Chakra ‘single herb section for example, I have horsetail, which is rich in minerals, especially silica… a beautiful, earthy herb that builds strength on a musculoskeletal level. Astragalus builds deep strength into the immune system while also improving tone and resilience, being an incredible preventative for colds and flus and a brilliant remedy for prolapse of any kind. IMG_2596

In the blended section for this chakra/colour I have some energy restorative blends, full of herbs that restore depleted adrenal function and help rebuild us when we’ve become run down or are recovering from illness. There’s also a blend of herbs for restoring and strengthening the immune system.

In some chakra sections, there are herbal tablets for sale, and some dried herbs.

michelle bIf you need a herbalist/naturopath while I’m away, let me introduce you to the lovely Michelle Brown Some of you may remember meeting her when she was apprenticed to me years ago, while completing clinic time for her degree. Michelle is very intuitive and insightful, and shares my passion for holism, both in her whole-person approach to naturopathy and her grasp on the importance of whole-plant synergy and food as medicine.

WISH-PILLOWS

Over the past few weeks I’ve been testing out my new Wish-Pillows, which are soooo much fun! My inner child really loves them. I keep mine beside the bed and some night I snuggle up with it. I love breathing deep the scent of Schisandra, Shatavari and Rose Petals, while I make my wishes.

IMG_2496Schisandra has a ‘Synchronicity Pink’ frequency to it… for anyone who doesn’t have an Aura Card set, this means it’s a magical herb that helps us to have more faith in (and attunement with) divine timing. And in all the ancient textbooks, Shatavari (wild asparagus), comes with a warning: “Do not use if you don’t want flying dreams’. I mean, really, who wouldn’t want to have flying dreams? Perhaps if you were scared of heights….

…but really, whether or not you have flying dreams isn’t really the point here. The flying dreams are a metaphor for freedom; for rising above what you might otherwise by mired within. Like an eagle looking down from a great height, Shatavari gives us the capacity to let go, step back and see the bigger picture. It’s this letting go, this detachment, that is such an important and often overlooked aspect of reality creating. Intending without releasing is like deciding what you want at a restaurant but forgetting to tell the waiter!Screen Shot 2016-08-09 at 5.19.27 PM

Another oft overlooked aspect of reality-creating, or making good wishes, is the ability to come from the heart. Rose-Petals centre us within the heart chakra and help us tap into the high-frequency positive emotions that help empower intent, like gratitude, forgiveness and unconditional love.

I’m madly packing for the big move at the moment, but hopefully once that’s done I’ll have time to write up the Spell-Scrolls that go with the Wish-Pillows. And me being me, I’ll naturally make sure there is a practical side to all of this, with a quality guided meditation that helps you focus not only on the more esoteric side of making wishes, but the grounded actions you can take to make your dreams a reality.

HOMEOPATHIC EMOTIONAL 1st AID KITS

IMG_2600This small kit of five remedies can be used for emotional emergencies. Gelsenium, for example, is brilliant for performance anxiety, where we freeze up while on stage, speaking publically, or being interviewed for a new job. It’s particularly good for anticipatory anxiety, where we are trembling and having trouble with our breathing because we’re getting ourselves worked up about something we are dreading.

Nat Mur helps us with grieving, where the grieving state has become stuck and unable to resolve itself. Nux Vom is the premier bear-with-sore-head remedy, perfect for terrible hangovers and the grumpiness that comes from burned-out, stressed workaholism. Silicea is for weak boundaries and empathic/emotional over-sensitivity, while Chamomilla is the famous teething remedy, great to use when we are acting like an impossible-to-please child who’s having a tantrum or whinging because we can’t get our own way or we’re in pain. I’ll soon be adding a wee scroll to the kits describing how and when to use each remedy.

BOOKS AND CARDS

IMG_2597The big aura book and most recent Aura Card deck are temporarily unavailable, pending a wee make-over sometime next year. In the meantime, I have a few guidebooks left and have rummaged up some old decks, for various prices depending on whether or not I’ve had to replace missing cards with hand-drawn ones. IMG_2599

There are a few Transformation books left, and plenty of the Flower Spirit card and book set. For more insight into the later, check out my flower spirit site. The flower site features the book and blogs about my wildflower spirit journeys, and the two people who fostered my deep love for wildflowers and wildflower photography, my grandmother Anne and grand uncle Peter, who have both passed away now.

GIVE-AWAY

IMG_2602I also have some books to give away on the day of the closing down sale, a mix of old and new, that need good homes. Topics range from the natural environment through to Aboriginal art, with the odd fiction book and magazine thrown in. There’s a laminator, a deck of cards, and so on.

Hope you can make it on the day!

Blessings!

Om

The Heart Chakra – Green

IMG_1496This weeks feature chakra in my clinic is the Heart Chakra. There are two colours frequently associated with the Heart Chakra: Green and Pink. This week, we will be exploring the Green ray or aura frequency. You can learn more about the aura and different aura colours here.

In my Aura Colour system, I have many different shades of green, ranging from pale greens to dark greens, from yellow-greens to blue-greens, from olive greens to eucalypt greens.

My spirit guides began teaching me how to read the aura in the mid 1990’s after attending a Reiki course. In 1998 I began providing clients with aura sketches and readings and my chalk box eventually expanded to include over 100 different aura colours.

Years later, I used these chalks to create the Aura Cards I now use as my primary healing and reading method in clinic.

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heart chakra dJoin my facebook business page Omanisa Ross ND to find out which Aura Colour is being featured as my Aura Card of the week in the clinic, with it’s unique message of wisdom and a healing mantra.

Keep your eyes open for this post, to discover how you can have your own personalised Aura e-Card sent out to you every week, starting with one of my many Green Aura Cards…

What shade of Green is your Heart Chakra radiating at this time? What shape is your heart chakra in?

Heart Chakra Blessings!

Love Om xx

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healing info greenExtra Resources:

BLOGS

Reflecting on Sketching the Aura

My Rainbow Journey

Reading colours under the arms

About the Aura Cards

Aura Spray – Crown Chakra (purple label)

The Chakra Collection features 7 blends designed to balance, nourish and strengthen the chakras. Each blend is made from Omanisa’s own hand-made remedies and includes 2 remedies each from Om’s Aura Colour series, her Central Australian flower essence range and her collection of gem elixirs. Om has over 30 years experience applying colour therapy in her own life and has been working as an Aura Colour practitioner since 1998. Please use the contact page to place orders. 

IMG_6505IMG_6497ABOUT THE CROWN CHAKRA BLEND

The Crown Chakra blend strengthens our connection with Spirit, your higher self, angels, ascended masters, spirit guides, deceased loved ones and God/Goddess/All That Is.

It also helps us have faith, to “let go and let God”, so to speak. It helps us surrender our ego to divine will and align ourselves with the heart of our higher self.

The Crown Chakra blend is excellent for improving the quality of our meditation and spiritual practise.

 

WHEN TO USE

*Before meditating or doing any spiritual practise (e.g. forgiveness work)

*When feeling anxious/fearful and lacking faith (in self, others, spirit, life etc)

*In general, to improve your spiritual connection.

*When you want to feel safe, connected and protected.

CONTENTS

AURA COLOURS

Screen Shot 2016-08-09 at 5.19.27 PMScreen Shot 2016-08-09 at 5.19.51 PMSynchronicity & Surrender 

While the crown chakra is usually depicted as white, violet or purple, these beautiful magenta-pink and purple-pink tones represent the heart of the crown chakra (or higher self).

Synchronicity helps restore magic and faith to our lives, helping us to believe that we’re always in the right place at the right time, having the perfect experience for us. Surrender helps us go with the flow, rather than trying to push or resist the river of life. The pragmatism of accepting what’s happening, and finding a positive way to look at your situation and work with what you’ve got (while believing that in spite of everything you are loved and supported by the universe), can be a very effective remedy for anxiety.

FLOWER ESSENCES

Screen Shot 2016-08-09 at 8.30.58 PMAncestral Flower and Convolvulus

The Ancestral Flower is one of Central Australia’s many native tomato bushes. This amazing flower essence helps us tap into the higher wisdom in our ancestral line. The higher wisdom in your ancestral line is the higher wisdom of your ancestors, which this remedy helps you access. For example, the first time I worked with Ancestral Flower, it helped me tap into my grandmother’s gift for being non-judgemental and unconditionally loving, just Screen Shot 2016-08-09 at 8.30.38 PMwhen I needed it the most!

The white Convolvulus flower is a spiritual initiation remedy. It open doors into spiritual journeys that help us grow, as well as connecting us with with our spirit guides and helpers. It’s also a spiritual rebirth remedy that helps us shed our old skin for renewal.

 

GEM ELIXIRS

Kunzite and Petalite*

These beautiful white crystals are two of my favourites for the crown chakra. Kunzite, like the Aura Colour remedies in this blend, is linked with the ‘heart of the higher self’. It’s an excellent meditation device, and provides some psychic protection to the aura by rising our frequency and super-charging our boundaries. It also treats anxiety, depression and loss of faith. Petalite is very similar but has the added benefit of being very calming by helping you to rise above turbulent energies and emotions and see things from a broader perspective.

 

(*google the net for images)

 

 

 

Red Colours in your Aura

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAPerceiving aura colours with psychic perception is a inner experience, like seeing an image in your mind, or feelings in your body. When I ‘see’ a red frequency like Strength Red I feel strong and powerful in my body, my base chakra tingles, my legs feel strong and I feel warm, energised, relaxed and confident. I might have visual images flash through my mind that accompany these feelings, but even if I don’t, I’m still going to know this is Strength Red, because I recognise the feeling. With empathy (clairsentience) as my primary psychic strength, I ‘see’ aura colours with my feelings and my body.

Strength Red is but one of many red colours I might see/feel while reading and healing the aura, and each different shade tells me a story about how a person feels, how they think, their habitual or current emotional state, their physical health and the things they might be experiencing in their lives. As a healer and spiritual counsellor, I’m teaching my clients how to recognise imbalances in their colours (chakras) and how to restore and maintain balance.

Even without psychic perception, it’s possible to recognise when a particular chakra or aura colour can become unbalanced. (note: I will occasionally refer to red energy as ‘fire energy’ or fire throughout this blog!)

TOO MUCH RED

When there is too much red in the aura, this can be because the base chakra is overdeveloped at the expense of other chakras and ‘hogging all the light’ so to speak. In a way, you could say the person is over-focused on base chakra issues, or base chakra issues are consuming their attention.For example, you might be overly fixated on winning and being competitive at that expensive of other values like friendship, or you might be so concerned about material wealth and image that you are neglecting or betraying other parts of yourself, such as your creativity or spirituality. Fixations of being right or having more and more power, sex, and independence are other examples of red in overdrive. Hyperactivity is another. Treatment can be a combination of learning how to be still and content with what you have (e.g. meditation, minimalism), nourishing and tending to other parts of you (e.g. heart, spirit) and learning how to focus and channel all that fire and passion into constructive projects that enhance your life and the lives of those around you in beautiful ways.

Excess red can also occur when we are having trouble processing, storing, expressing and /or discharging red energy, feelings, thoughts and experiences. For example, you might have trouble coping with anger within yourself and other people, tending to shy away from conflict and honest expression of feelings and opinions. You might have mixed feelings about sex, or perhaps you have trouble owning and expressing your personal power because you don’t feel to attract attention and come across as a threat to others. Just because the red energy isn’t being expressed doesn’t mean it isn’t there. When red energy isn’t expressed, discharged or stored in healthy ways, it can build up, creating tension, frustration and stress. In these instances, the red energy might leak out (e.g. passive anger), explode (sudden temper tantrums), or congeal like clotted blood (resentment). Learning how to be comfortable with fire energy by befriending it instead of making it bad/wrong can help. Martial arts is an example of a therapy that can teach you safe discharge and storage techniques (eh gathering chi and storing it in power centres), while assertiveness and/or conflict resolution classes can teach effective ways to process and express our fire in balanced ways.

NOT ENOUGH RED

If you repress your red energy for long enough, it can diminish. Like a fire that has been smothered, your inner flames die out and you are left with grey ashes. Grey is the main colour I often find in the aura when there is a lack of red. A lack of red energy can also be indicated when there is an excess of cool colours in the aura like greens and blues, but these usually represent a less extreme deadening of our inner fire. Grey in the aura gives us a classic insight into a lack of red energy, and the feeling of being oppressed, depressed, trapped, uninspired, bored, hopeless, powerless, and so on. With no red energy igniting our chakra system from below, like a flame of fuel snaking its way upwards from our base chakra, we lack drive, passion, direction and determination. To reignite our inner fire we may need to grieve our losses, acknowledging where, when and how we gave our power away, and work on reclaiming it. We might need to actively get more physical, heal our sexual selves, learn how to speak up or be real with ourselves about what we really want.

Some people have personalities that are naturally a little quieter and more reserved, and these people may have less fire and passion, less red energy, but this usually only becomes a problem if the imbalance becomes extreme. We all have unique aura’s and personalities after all! Some of us are naturally more red and simply need to find health ways to engage and channel this energy, while others can be perfectly content and balanced with the odd sparkle or flash of red passion and fire, here and there, from time to time. It helps to accept and honour who you are while also looking for opportunities to stretch yourself out of comfort zones and grow, and in the case of red energy, this might simply mean taking the odd risk here and there, being more physically active or asking yourself what you passions are and pursuing them more actively.

 

 

 

Lavender Fudge Cheesecake

2015-07-19 14.43.06Limitations. They can be fantastic when they are real and accepting them puts you in a better place. Accepting the reality of an injury and the time needed to heal, has been a nourishing limitation for me. And I’m generally better off when I accept my body’s regenerative need for sleep, in the spite of the fact that I’m feeling inspired and would like to stay up all night being creative.

But then there are those pesky pretend limitations that go around masquerading as real limitations, creating walls inside our mind that we project out into the world in the form of obstacles that simply don’t need to be there. I wonder how many hurdles spook us because they seem higher than they really are? Some perceived hurdles are just smoke and mirrors, all bluff and hot air, invented by fears and beliefs inside us that we are barely aware of.

I was asked to make a magic cake last night, by my spirit guides, whom I refer to collectively as ‘Spirit’. They love dancing around in the kitchen with me and tossing magic about; a pinch of this, a cup of that and a powerful sprinkle of higher healing intentions for good measure. For me, the kitchen is one of my creative playgrounds*, and I love inviting my magical inner child to play in this sacred space with me.

“What is this cake for?”, I asked them.

To clear limitations, they replied.

“Tell me more”, I asked them, like a child nestling in front of a warm fire, waiting for a particularly good story to spill forth from a loved ones lips. Except in this case, my nestling was actually more like rummaging, as I happily explored the deepest, darkest corners of my kitchen pantry in search of inspiring ingredients. It’s incredibly liberating, after a back injury, to be able to do this without help.

As far as ingredients went, Spirit had only given me two firm instructions: Lavender and Sesame Seeds. The rest of it I could make up as I went along. Sesame seeds just reek of wonder and magic don’t they? I mean, seeds on their own do, because they are these intense, tiny little packages of potential, packed tight with super-charged nutrients for the sudden beginning of new growth, new beginnings. Like a suitcase packed full of goodies, hidden under the bed, just waiting for the right moment for a new adventure to be unleashed.

But it’s not just the seed part that makes sesame seeds glow in the eyes of my magical inner child: it’s the ‘Open Sesame’ story-connotations from the tale of Aladdin’s magic lamp. My inner child sees sesame seeds as keys to unlock surprises, gifts, treasure…. all of which is hidden within me. A way to unlock the wall of my own perceived limitations so I can reach past them and unleash the sleeping light in my shadows.

This cake will help you see through mountains, because these mountains are actually molehills in disguise. The lavender will clear your third eye so you can see clearly again. Your mind has become lost in a maze of tangled thoughts, creating complexity that blinds you to the underlying simplicity. We seek to liberate this creative simplicity from within you so that you may be free to express your deepest truths in beautiful, pure, joyful ways. Blessed Be.

Ohhhh, that sounds like fun! Sure enough, I had a startlingly lucid, simple idea last night after making this cake and I hadn’t even eaten it yet! I hesitate to say “brilliant” idea because you might laugh at me and call me arrogant, but if I let that fear hold me back, I won’t have as much fun in life, so I think I’ll let the fear go. Besides, the idea was brilliant: that doesn’t mean I am! haha!

By the way, I had three crystal spirits hovering around in the kitchen while making this cake, helping to weave the magic: Blue Agate, Pink Agate and the Picasso Stone. I’ll write about these soon

RECIPE (delectably scrumptious and magi-licious)

BASE

1 cup macedamia nuts

1/4 cup toasted buckwheat groats

1 tablespoon of unhulled tahini

8 pitted medjool dates

Put all of these ingredients in your food processor and crush/blend until the mix looks like cooked cake crumble or fresh bread crumbs. To check whether you need more dates, pinch some of the mix between your fingers to see if it squeezes together and holds together if you roll it into a ball in your hand. A taste test at this stage helps too! Is it sweet enough for you? If your base chakra is balanced, you will balance excessive sweetness and sweet-indulgence with healthy limits, self-discipline and an ability to nourish yourself from within. 

“Why do they have to be medjool dates?” my husband asks.

“Because they are THE dates. The manna from heaven!”, I replied. They aren’t just sweet, they make everything stick together. It’s got to be sticky enough to firm a fairly firm base in the bottom of your dessert dish, without being too sweet. Add coconut oil or prunes for extra moisture if your food processor isn’t powerful enough to pull this off. Not water- that makes the cakes icy instead of creamy. These are freezer cakes, so keep in mind that they won’t shrink and pop neatly out of a cake tin when you turn it upside down, so be clever about the dish you choose to put your mix into. 

MIDDLE

(This is so much fun! Are your fingers twitching yet!?)

1/2 – 1 *banana

1 cup of walnuts

1 cup of cashews

12 pitted medjool dates

Vanilla essence or seeds (a splash or 1-2 seedpods)

*Bananas are surprisingly strong in aroma and taste, so their use needs to be careful, if you don’t want it to over-power other flavours, but they do give you more bulk without needing extra nuts. If you don’t like the taste of banana in this cake, replace the banana with another cup of nuts

Blend everything in the food processor. Keep going until it clumps together and becomes fairly smooth. I actually prefer texture in most of my meals/dishes, so I don’t make it completely smooth. More moisture does help with smoothness so if you prefer your cakes this way, add coconut oil or use cashew butter instead of cashews. 

Remove 1/4 of the mix and put it aside (in the freezer) to use as the base for the ‘icing’ (the top layer). It’s important to have some icing on your cake sometimes because it makes you feel special and pampered. 

Now add 1 tablespoon of cocoa or cacao powder to the remaining mix and blend again. (Use even more if you really love chocolate and your food processor is tough!) Yum! Spread this mix over the base layer and put your dish into the freezer. 

TOP

1 tablespoon of melted cacao butter

1 tablespoon or more of lavender flowers

You can adjust the lavender quantity and add more, but lavender is powerful, so a little bit goes a long way. Stir these ingredients into the 1/4 mix you had set aside in the freezer. If you want some more vibrant colour in this layer, mash/stir/blend in some blueberries.

Spread this mix over the middle layer of your cake and your cake is finished! Put your cake in the freezer over-night and serve the next day. These cakes can last months in the freezer, but do keep them covered. 

My daughter (the tea-tasting expert) suggests having a cup of lavender or cocoa husk tea with this cake. We love cake with tea! The flavour balancing is so much fun!

Enjoy

Love Om (and Spirit)

*I sometimes wonder if my love for sacred play and the way I weave my interests in psychology, neuroscience and neurotheology throughout this play, is a family trait. How lovely to discover one of my father’s sisters has been cut from the same divine cloth! My auntie Kay has a beautiful healing approach based on a blend of healing, psychology, philosophy, mindfulness, performance improvisation and the playful wonder of possibilities….

Rainbow Chakra Meditation

Listen for free, then contact us to enquire about purchasing your own copy.

cropped-centred-balanced-chakra.jpg Learn the positions and colours of the traditional rainbow chakra system in this guided self-care meditation.

This meditation guides you through the process of balancing your chakras with colour-breathing and creative visualisation. You don’t have to see clear pictures in your mind for this to be effective. Creative visualisation is actually a multi-sensory experience, a combination of imagery, feeling, sound, thought and so on. In much the same way that we experience the sensory richness of story while reading a fictional book, your task is simply to stay focused on the story being told by engaging your imagination. This meditation will come to life with practise, and you will start to notice that some colours are easier to imagine than others. These are the chakras that are healthy! If a colour is more difficult to imagine, or you find yourself becoming easily distracted and unable to focus on that colour, it may be because this chakra is blocked. Continued colour-breathing practise will gradually unblock these chakras.

Berry Bliss Cake

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI made this cake to align my heart chakra, third eye and base chakras.

I am calling forth deep passion stirring in my heart, awaiting rebirth, like a flower bulb hidden under layers of snow in the winter, waiting for spring to come. I feel this passion grow legs, beautiful anchoring lines that guide my path forwards.

I see with the eyes of my heart, a single thread of passion cast forth like a beam of light from my third eye into the unknown, seeking what will nourish the growth in my heart.

I feel a deep strength rising up from my base, like a foal who suddenly finds her legs and unfolds upwards to stand tall, gazing at me unflinchingly.

I call forth horse energy to guide and nourish me. I see myself walking down an ancient pathway into a place of gathering. There are many others. We sing as we walk. Bowls are balanced on our heads, filled with water and flowers for blessing. We wash each other’s faces clean from the dust of travel. We cleanse our third eyes and the backs of our necks and we offer this old energy to the stars, that it might be made new again.

Now we stand in a circle and pray to the heavens. A child is born amongst us, at the centre of the circle in a flash of star-light. She is horse energy and she is me. We run alongside each other, we pace, we step, we nudge, we glide…..

I feel a deep patience and knowing welling inside me. I feel stillness that runs deep; stillness full of potency and grace.

We are One.

If you would like the recipe for this cake, visit my vegan site.

Crown Chakra Cake

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI made this cake to test whether I could create a purple colour, using blueberries, and a purple taste, by adding specific herbs from my naturopathic dispensary. I created two layers. The first layer I made was the yellow looking layer you can see poking out of the middle of the cake. Prior to freezing, this layer was actually looking like a grey, overcast purple sky, or wet concrete with purple sky reflected on it. It was murky and rubbery looking, with a strange, pasty consistency. But it tasted good! I had fun making this layer, even though it didn’t look right, and I have no idea how it turned yellow during the freezing process. I totally love the alchemy of ‘not’ cooking. Haha!

This first, rubbery ‘grey’ layer contained pecans, macadamia nuts, cashews, coconut oil, blueberries, dates, and two herbal tinctures: hawthorn berry and buchu leaf. These herbs, especially hawthorn, have a ‘purple’ scent and flavour to them: floral, light, mystical, wispy… with red berry undertones. Hawthorn Berry is a heart chakra herb, primarily, but as with most herbs, it has various layers or facets; many different sides to its nature and many applications for use. Hawthorn is a herb I use to tone and nourish people’s hearts and cardiovascular systems. It contains incredible plant chemicals that give the herb cardiotonic and blood pressure lowering properties. Like many berries, it contains bucket loads of vitamin C and bioflavonoids- these tone up all the elastic blood carrying pipes in the body, as well as oxygenating and nourishing the micro-capillaries that perfuse our tissues. Vit C is a marvellous food for the adrenal system, helping us respond to stress with vibrancy and bounce (bouncing back from set-backs!)

Hawthorn is used in chinese medicine as a digestive tonic, for food stagnation issues…. in other words, it helps us break down and digest our food, encouraging the digestive system to get up and go do its thing, rather than lolling about languidly under the weight of stodgy food, or food that we can’t digest easily simply because it doesn’t agree with us. So many of us are eating things that don’t agree. Part of the problem is the idea that only some people have food sensitivities- sure, some are more sensitive than others but the reality is, no-one can digest all food with equal ease across the board- we ALL have foods we would be better off leaving alone….and there are common culprits when it comes to foods that befuddle the digestive system- like refined sugar, wheat, dairy and animal proteins in general, just to name a few.

Most of us don’t actually listen to our bodies, and many of us have no idea that there is a connection between food and health… which astonishes me because it certainly isn’t rocket science! Take a good rocket, put crap fuel in it and watch it go no-where. It isn’t that hard to put two and two together. But having said that, being able to identify food sensitivities isn’t always so simple. Reactions can be delayed and we can become so used to chronic symptoms that we just ignore them, put up with them, accept them and even think they are ‘normal’… or normal for us, at least. Given the same unhappy toxic food over and over again, the body becomes exhausted and while drowning in a sea of miserable symptoms it can’t shout loud and clear to let you know it’s grumpy about the things you are eating… it just puts up and shuts up and tries its best to adapt. So we put up with sub-standard health for a large swathe of our lives, ‘managing’ the symptoms by suppressing them with medications, and then we crumble into more serious chronic illness as we age and wonder why. Mind you, you are allowed to get sick and you are allowed to age… nothing wrong with that! I’m just talking about being kind to your body, listening to it and giving it a break from continuous onslaught so it doesn’t wear out quite so fast.

As I was saying, food sensitivities can be tricky to pick, for many reasons. Eliminations diets can help, checking family history can help and then there’s always the delightful Dorte with her bioresonance machine: I love referring people to her for food testing. It seems pretty accurate! Wherever you are, you can get help from a local naturopath or herbalist who specialises in this area and then start experimenting to leaving particular foods out of your diet and noticing how you feel. As with most cleansing processes, we can feel a bit yucky at first. Sensitivity foods can also be addiction foods- they break down strange, creating funny chemicals that our body can become hooked on… or to put it another way: your body has spent a long time trying to work our how to co-exist with a crappy food and when it sudden’t gets taken away it can be confusing for it at first! (a bit like giving up cigarettes)

Hawthorn is a feminine plant, toning the Yin in the body and belonging to the rose family. As herbalist Peter Holmes puts it “Herbal medicine since the Renaissance days has seen the rise of more Yang, active remedies….A subtle gentle, yet highly effective remedy like Hawthorn berry simply found no part in the trend to quick, radical, heroic fixes.” What does he mean by ‘heroic’? He’s talking about a specific tradition or attitude in medicine, especially naturopathy… one that is very different from the Wise Woman tradition. The heroic tradition is obsessed with toxins, detoxing and cleansing, often in very forceful ways. Heroist healers love stimulants, enemas and purging. I’ve never liked these approaches. I’m much more of a wise woman herbalist. The wise woman approach is more spiritual, holistic, gentle, nourishing and loving.

Buchu is a herb used for healing and supporting the urinary system. It’s warm, drying herb that tones bladder and kidney Qi. It’s always been one of my favourite herbs because I love its smell! Buchu strengthens and relaxes the bladder, and is anti-bacterial. It relieves incontinence, urinary and vaginal infections, and prostate troubles, amongst other things. Like Hawthorn, it promotes digestion, but it can also resolve mild digestive infections. This herb is indigenous to South Africa, specifically the Hottentot tribe.

After I made my sticky grey-purple layer, i put that aside and had another go. This time I started again with blueberries, added cashews and coconut oil and kept it simply. I got a lovely red-purple layer. I used this as the base for my cake. I few hilarious messy moment later, I realised that if I mixed the two layers together, it somehow gave me an incredible purple colour: the colour I was looking for!

My husband totally loves this cake. The ‘rubbery’ layer, once frozen, is really beautiful- the texture is indescribable… perhaps I could say ‘very creamy and silky’.

Here is a channelled message from this cake:

“I am here to centre you. Many things will go wrong in life but pay them not too much heed. It’s in the muddling through, the unwieldy grappling with our errors and unwanted outcomes that we turn new corners and arrive in unexpected, but wholly happy places. You cannot find these happy places if you give up too easily. Life is always changing. Never feel as though you have arrived in a corner and there is no where to go. I will take your hand and show you the secret passageway that leads to Somewhere Else. There are hidden oasis’s of peace, calm and contentedness hiding behind the rubbish piles and broken china in life. Give me to people who are desperate for change and yet frightened of it at the same time. I will set them free.”

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Blessed Be

Working with energy lines

When I’m working on the energy fields of my clients, I’m often working with energy lines. Most of these lines run vertically throughout the energy field. I think of them as ‘the long lines’, or ‘major energy channels’, or even ‘superhighways of the energy body’.

Energy lines come with complex pathologies. One of the easiest ways to understand some of what can go wrong with these energy lines is to think of the body as a guitar. These long lines are like guitar strings. In some instances, energy lines can become too taut or tight. People with over-tight energy lines can be tight and stiff in mind, body and emotions. They seem tense and can lack flexibility. Tight lines can reflect tension in the muscles, an inability to relax, wariness, a hyper-alert state, and/or pain in the mindbody.

Some people with tight lines get ‘all wound up’, or reactive, and this winds up their energy lines. Wound up energy lines are twisted, yet still stretched tight. This can create a flow that is rough and bumpy. If you could hear the sound of energy running through a channel like this, you might describe it as a high-pitched, reverberating, thrum that sets your nerves on edge and makes your muscles tight. This of course, is exactly what it happening in the body of a person whose energy lines are ‘all wound up’.

Often, when we get wound up, we get defensive and/or aggressive. In either scenario, if we can’t shift this state, or we stay in it too long or too often, we are going to end up with chronically tight and knotty energy lines. In some people, excessive over-tightening will cause the fibres of the aura will start to bunch more closely together, almost like a defensive wall we can hide behind. Some people even grow extra fibres to build the wall. Over time, some fibres decay but instead of falling away, they get tangled in the rest of the fibres. The worst walls are those that are matted together like dread-locked hair. In healing, I often find myself running my fingers through fibre-walls, almost as though it is hair. I’m trying to get the knots out and create some clear space around each fibre so the therapeutic light of spirit and healing can enter the aura.

People who get aggressive first recoil into tightness and then over-expand, often very quickly, like a bullfrog puffing his chest up. Some of these energy lines have muscle and bulk. Many are hot and prone to inflammation because they are working so hard. The energy that runs through them moves very quickly and can tend to be red in hue. It helps to remember that aggressive responses occur when someone doesn’t feel safe. Dig deep enough under all that heat and activity, and you will find a deeper layer of recoiled fibres shielding fear, sensitivity and vulnerability. These people are just very good at hiding and defending their sensitivities. They may consciously be out of touch with their own vulnerable inner child, but an aggressive response is almost always a guarantee that the inner child has felt threatened by a person or situation. Something or someone has acted as a trigger, reminding the basic self (subconscious, body, memories, emotions and inner child) of a past threat, and an offensive defence is quickly mounted.

These wound -up defensive/aggressive responses can be very subtle. The easiest way to recognise them in action is that someone is trying to over-control a situation, a person (even themselves), and/or their environment. Over control can take many forms, such as:

*Refusing to step out of your comfort zones because you are afraid of the unknown.

*Hoarding and not being able to let go of the past.

*Insisting on rigid rules and regulations

*Trying to force other people around to your point of view

*Trying to control the behaviour and feelings of others

*Never opening up and being vulnerable with others

*Being self-denying, perfectionist and mean to yourself

People who adapt readily to experiences that wind them up, by bouncing back gently with new found wisdom, have energy lines that can readily return to a relaxed, yet toned state. The initial stretch in response to stress doesn’t cause them long term damage because it isn’t sustained. In a way, it’s like they are smoothly flexing a muscle to make it stronger and more resilient.

But getting wound up too much and too often can lead to a different kind of stretching in the energy lines; the kind of stretching you don’t bounce back from. Instead, the energy line looses it’s tone and becomes unresponsive. We might liken this to depression, stagnancy or apathy in the person as a whole. On a muscular level the muscles become flabby. On a mental level, the thinking is slower. Throughout the mind-body in general, slack energy lines can result in (and of course reflect) weakness, fatigue, loss of sparkle and loss of function.

The slackness caused by over-stretch has to go somewhere, with energy lines often bulging and looping. This causes energy flow to meander and bulge into areas it wouldn’t normally be travelling through. This can be confusing for the energy field, the mind and the emotions. On a physical level it can create (or reflect) disturbed body function. Slack energy lines are prone to tangling. Tangling can causes energy to get stuck in one part of the field, almost as though the energy were lost in a maze with no way out. When energy doesn’t flow to and from its origin and destination, parts of our mind-body become starved, cut off from other parts, and congested.

Slack lines caused by over-stretching are often best removed rather than restrung, but some lines that seem lack are slack for other reasons. It’s always a good idea to search for both ends of the line. Lines can become slack when there is a break in the line (like a line being cut), or the end of the energy line can pulled free from its port. Some lines can be repaired and reattached, so long as there isn’t too much fraying or decay in the line.

Lines can also seem loose when they aren’t integrating in and through a chakra appropriately. For example, an energy line on one layer or level of the aura might seem slack, but that’s because it has been pulled too tight on another level of the aura (the slack created by an over tight section of energy line gets pushed or stretched into another part of the field.)

Blessings and Love

Om