Legos of Love

Written by Olivia Britz

This morning I woke with an ache in my heart and awareness of all that has been lost this year and I was not sure if I was sad to stay in bed or sad because I had to get out. I was simply sad and heavy…the dreaded feeling which sometimes overcomes me and I wondered what sad article I would write today.

Six hours later I sit and write and this is what I have decided to share. As my day progressed and as I saw what had been put in front of me, it became more and more clear that choosing to be down or sad has somewhat become a habitual pattern. Yet with the help of positivity around me right from doing my nails, to my eyebrows, to a kind voice note, to a well-written article shared by a friend on happiness and to a thoughtful article sent by another…I started to smile.

And I started to choose to be content with this day. I stopped worrying about money. And focused on my beautiful children and my good health. I started to see that I could make my life worth it and I could and would choose to be content with this day.

Thursday 16th December.
We are all going through different things and this year – 2021 – has been a hard year for our family. We have had tragic losses, not just one, but more and all these losses have been close to our hearts and changed our lives forever. The losses have included our beautiful 21-year-old nephew and cousin who took his life on 14th February 2021, a loss from which we will never recover nor heal. The loss of this beautiful boy will simply become part of who we are.

Yet I will smile because I can and I will be grateful because I must. We have this moment and our life is this moment here and now. I will take the lessons of 2021 and I will embrace those close to me and hold them dear each second we spend together. Less time on my phone. More time listening. More time in the presence of whoever I am spending time with at any given place. Less time worrying about money. More time letting go, praying and letting God. I cannot carry it all on my own.

I will savour my peace. I will embrace those times when I am genuinely happy and content and filled with JOY and I will collect these like pieces of lego to build a beautiful life full of positivity which I will share with each and everyone I come across.

As we end 2021, I hold onto my Legos of love and peace and let go of the aches.

Beltane Blessings

Written by Vanessa Anderson

The rhythm of life, our life, woven closely to the changing of the seasons. The warm glow of a summer harvest nurtures the body while stoic the preparations of a cold winter night feeds the soul with the promise of things to come. The Wheel of life, forever turning, reliable, predictable, a comfort in the ever-changing landscape across the journey of time. It is no wonder our ancestors placed great importance on the rising of the sun, the phases of the moon and the constant symphony of stars dancing their way across our night sky.

We are both One and a part of the universe, our performance, protagonist or heroine, but a fleeting twinkle in a grander saga.

In the comfort of the coming season we give thanks for what has past while embracing the fruits of our intention set to come. The thread of all connection is present in every culture and across all spiritual teachings. We are nothing without the Earth we walk on, the Air we breathe, the Water that holds us and the Fire that ignites.

Many are returning to this knowledge as the crescendo of dis ease around us reveals itself as more and more at odds with itself. That slow and steady rhythm of life invites us back to a time when we could feel the inhale and exhale of the Earth as it prepares itself for another season, another cycle. Where we released our own breathe and with it thanks for the passing of the old, and renewed our welcome for the coming months. Come take a walk with us down the garden path, and remember.

Borrowed tradition had the whole world celebrating Halloween at the end of October, but as the summer solstice* tiptoes closer here in the Southern Hemisphere, the earth’s calling does not align. Halloween, or Hallowed Eve is in fact an adaptation of the Pagan, Celtic or Wiccan celebration of Samhain (pronounced Saah-win or Saah-ween) and brings in the new year. It coincides with the end of harvest and the beginning of winter. As we are woke from our winter slumber down here in the South, you can understand the confusion. No, Samhain is celebrated, in the Southern Hemisphere as the ground cools and the promise of rain approaches, 1 May. So as the ghoul-faced spectres rapt at our doors for treats or tricks what lore prevails and was it pure?

The wheel of life represents the cycles or rhythms of nature, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, for every season, an equal and opposite season, a yin yang = balance. If Samhain is winter, the end to the harvest, the gathering inward, then Beltane is summer, the time to sow, to venture outward.

Whether you are Wiccan or no, you may recognise and resonate with some of the ways that welcome this season, that honour this phase in the wheel of life.

Like Samhain, Beltane, the celebration just past is fire festival. Fire creates, it gives life, it ignites passion and creativity. The word Beltane comes from the Celtic God Bel which means the Bright one, and the Gaelic word ‘teine” meaning fire and together they are Bright Fire.

Fire is an essence of life, the protagonist in our expanse across the globe, keeping a blazing coal to carry fire allowed man to conquer the cold and reach new land, it can provide warmth and destroy life. We hold fire in every tradition to light candles, to celebrate life and death. On Beltane Eve the change of season is marked by putting out all hearth fires and candles, to relight them in the morning from the flames of the communal bonfire.

Whether you handed out candy to neighbourhood children donning menacing disguises or whether you are searching for a connection back to the patterns of life, there are many other ways to celebrate Beltane.

A SAGE SMUDGE:
When winter sheds its gloomy coat we often feel the need to dust off our spaces, open the windows, let in the fresh air, we call it spring-cleaning. We forget that we are also tinged by old energies and negative patterns. Honour your sacred space and person with a sacred cleansing with a sage smudge or incense.

FLOWERS:
1 September in the Southern Hemisphere is celebrated as Spring day, synonymous with flowers. Honour the season, gift back to nature by planting flowers for the bees who help to pollenate your other edible plants, remember, the cycle of life, wear a flower in your hair for beauty compliments beauty.

MEDITATE:
Let the slow rhythmic pulse of the earth guide you back to yourself, with a slow breath in activating your heart chakra (green) towards compassion, understanding and balance. A balanced heart chakra can more easily gift joy and kindness to others.

SPEND TIME IN NATURE:
The wheel of life has eight days of honour closely tied to ebbing seasons of the year. Walk on the earth, within its forests or on its shores, hear its sounds, breathe its smells, feel its pulse. Collect the gifts it offers along your walk, these can be feathers, flowers, stones, bark. Give thanks and remember to return a gift, water the ground, plant a seed, speak to the earth. Connect with each season by spending time in nature.

HANDFASTING:
Blood is not the only tie that binds. Love, friendship and soul connections, our soul tribe come and go, we honour a forever connection with hand fasting, a tradition that is often observed in Gaelic weddings where a couples hands are bound together with a braid as they recite vows. Be you blood, friend, tribe or love that binds, fasted hands are vowed to last.

Each season invokes its own memories and feelings, sounds and smells and Beltane or the calling summer was a treat for a palette, earthen browns and fleshy greens, romantic pinks and lunar whites warmed by the gentle solar yellows. Be you Wicca or no, if you have enjoyed this walk down the garden path we challenge you to celebrate with us. We will be sharing information on the Wheel of life as the months proceed. Come find us next at Litha, ( 21 December 2021 in the Southern Hemisphere) the Summer Soltice to learn more about Wiccan celebrating life, love and happiness.

So mote it be

The Magic Toolbox

Children Story Written by Grazia Martienssen

Hello children, Big Bear here, gather round as I tell you about…

Busy Elves:
One day shortly before Christmas, Santa and his elves were so busy making toys in the workshop in the North Pole, that the elves wished the toys themselves would help. As they finished making a toolbox, the box suddenly opened by itself, and all the tools jumped out and started helping.

Different Talent:
The saw started sawing, the hammer started hammering, and each tool started doing what tools are meant to do. I don’t remember how many tools there were, but they worked hard together, and each used their talent to help the elves. Santa and the elves were very pleased and were able to take a nice break thanks to the help of the tools. They made wooden toys, plastic tools, along with both wire and fluffy toys. They made all kinds of toys and games. I was one of the first toys made and I wanted to help. I asked Santa what I could do to help and he told me to arrange smaller toys on their shelf, so that’s just what I did. At the end of the day the tools went back in the tool box and I retired to my shelf.

What kind of toys do you think they made?

Would you have helped if you were there?

Have you ever seen Santa’s workshop and his elves?

After a while I heard all the tools talking to one another. Some were even bragging about what they had done. ‘I hammered everything so nicely,’ said the hammer. ‘I tightened all the screws,’ said the screwdriver. The saw sighed, ‘I wish I was as talented as you hammer, or as clever as you screwdriver.’ Some of the other tools also wished they had different talents. Finally, the toolbox itself spoke. ‘You are all a family of tools, and you all have different talents and are all equally important,’ it said. ‘If you were all hammers how would the sawing get done? Or if you were all saws, which one of you would hammer?’ the toolbox insisted. ‘Aww I understand,’ said the saw, ‘So my job is also important.’ ‘Was my job also important?’ the pliers asked. ‘Yes,’ said a very smiley toolbox. Even Big Bear did a wonderful job of arranging the smaller toys on the shelf. I felt so proud to hear that.

What are your talents?

What are you good at?

What are your friends, brothers and sisters good at doing?

Christmas Eve:
A few days later it was Christmas Eve and Santa and the elves put us all in a big sack and flew around the world with the reindeer, to deliver gifts to all the children. I fell asleep before the magic toolbox was delivered, so I don’t know who received it.

Do you know who received the magic toolbox?

Did you or one of your friends or siblings perhaps get it?

Moving from Darkness into Light

Written by Elsabe Smit

Currently, there is a lot of talk everywhere you turn of humanity moving from darkness into light. It is easy to attach some esoteric meaning to this, where “they” are in the darkness, and “we” are in the light. Of course whenever this is said, a large dollop of judgment is added, because of course “we” are right, and “they” are wrong.

But what does this mean for me and you? How do you and I move from darkness into light?

I did a reading for a client where I started off by describing an image of him sitting on the floor in the corner of a very dark room, covering his hands in self-defence. Then the picture changed, where he slowly got up and made his way to a shred of light showing from under the closed door, while taking care not to bump into any of the obstacles that he could feel but not see in the dark room.

I am always fascinated when Spirit gives me words like these, and they immediately make sense to the client because the words describe what they feel and perceive.

It turned out that this client lost both his parents under traumatic circumstances, a few years apart and for different reasons. It is now nearly two decades later, and only now is he slowly approaching the Light. He acknowledged that at the time, he lost faith in a God that left him rudderless after two cruel life incidents that robbed him of his parents and their support.

It is only over the past few years that he discovered the love of his wife, and that has led him to re-assess his view of God. In this process he discovered his own spiritual self, and he is still getting used to the knowing that he is a spiritual being in a human body. He las learned to appreciate small miracles and is slowly learning to love himself.

This is one example of striving towards the light, only to discover that the Light has been there inside of you all the time, guiding you through the dark and helping you to find the external source of light so that you can appreciate the internal source of Light.

Many people have all their lives thought that they have a strong faith and that living a God-fearing life is all they need to do. They have over the past year discovered that they had a misconception of God being either a God to be feared, or a God that would salvage them from any situation if someone intervenes and prays for them or on their behalf.

These people are like this man, finding their way through a dark room. They will find the source of Light, and they will discover that Light is the opposite of fear, rather than the opposite of darkness.

I read this little gem in the Srimad Bagavatham canto 1, ch 8, text 6: “The sun rays are equally distributed, but still there are some places which are dark always. This is not due to the sun but to the receptive power.”

The world is in crisis, and we all know that saying about crisis being the flipside of opportunity. We are now discovering what it truly means to love your neighbour – starting with your physical body and extending this Love to everyone we encounter. The sun is there. That is not disputed. The question is whether we are willing to soak in the rays of the sun. We are each on our individual journey, and each one of us will find the place in the sun that is meant for us.

meditation

Poem by Nishni Naidoo

Swirling, twirling
Twisting, turning
Spinning, shifting
Ever-changing

STOP!
SILENCE

S….I….L….E….N….C….E

Light
A Presence
A Feeling
A Knowing
God in me
And around me

PEACE….LOVE…. BLISS

Where Are Our Children

Written by Deborah Jordaan

Hello to all our loyal readers. Without you, we could not reach out and help someone that might read our article and find it helpful. I’m writing about parents that need their children in their time of need and they are absent. This next passage I’m going to write is about a parent who has given me permission to write his thoughts.

Coming back from the hospital where my left foot was amputated I was trying to get in the house up the stairs I had to go up from behind and on my bottom. Once I got inside it was a battle trying to get into a chair as I wasn’t equipped with paraplegic aides. I took the walker and moved slowly toward the bedroom but on the turn going toward the bedroom I lost footing and fell. My carer was trying to help as much as she could but it was the first day home so we were still trying to find a way to do things. As I lay there tears filled my eyes as I realised that I was alone – where are my sons? Why cant they be there to pick me up as I picked them up when they were in pain? I finally found myself in the bed, sleep evaded me. I was wondering -who will pick me up when I fall tomorrow again?

I myself feel lonely sometimes. I have two daughters but they have lives of their own and also have challenges. I try to be there for them but I myself fall emotionally and wish they are there to pick me up when I go to a dark place. When our children are grown they seem to think they are no longer a part of us as they have their extended families also to spend time with. Many children do so much for their parents and others disappear. Where do our children go? As parents grow older they need to feel loved and like they matter and not that they are only an ATM to their children and a place to stay when times get tough. Acknowledge us as parents. Make parents feel like they are a part of your life and make sacrifices for them as they gave up many things the day you were born.

Dont go knocking on your parents door when you hear they are ill. Are you already counting the money you will inherit when they die or are you really concerned? Remember your parent has worked really hard in life to get where they are in life and of course it will all go to you but dontcount your chickens before they hatch. Your parents didnt count pennies when you were born they did what they had to do to get you grown-up, educated and tried to teach you respect toward mankind. No matter what your mother had to do – she did what she had to do to feed and clothe you so dont throw her away when she is in need. Your father gave up hes aspirations and had you in mind as he was sweating at work everyday to earn a living, so its time you wipe the sweat from hes brow if hes ill.

Don`t let society consume your humanity and make you part of the rat race. Keep your humanity and empathy. Be the child your parents dreamt you would be one. Make them proud. Whether you are a cleaner or pilot, just love and respect your parents and everyone else.

May the universe bless you with abundance and bring love and light to you and your loved ones in the month ahead.

Authority…

Written by Ada den Hollander

Authority comes in many forms. In general, we can say that authority is a body or person with authority. For example, we can think of politicians, the police, the municipality, a professor, your GP or any other person to whom we attribute expertise that we do not have ourselves. When we were young, our parents, educators, and teachers played that role, shaping our beliefs and values ​​later in life —getting ready for the big world, society. Obedience was seen as essential because the authority has the upper hand; who knows what they are talking about. As we grow older, we often question what these people taught us as the truth, valuable, right and wrong, and so we form our views, which often differ from what our influencers told us as children. We like to associate our opinions with being good and conscientious person who does not intentionally harm another.

On the contrary, we want to help and adhere to the rules as much as possible. Unless, of course, those rules go against your feelings in your opinion, you disobey and obstinate. That is personal, so not the same for everyone. One person is simply more docile than the other. In general, we can say that our conscience is the most important factor driving our behaviour. Some people have absolutely no conscience; those are the sociopaths in our midst, who make up no less than 4% of humanity. A shocking percentage, I would say. These people are not all criminals, serial killers or child molesters. Through extreme manipulation and the constant telling of blatant lies, they often manage to reach high positions. The following experiment shows that we can easily set our conscience aside when an authority prompts us to do so.

In 1961 and 1962, Professor Stanley Milgram conducted a psychological study with astounding results. Two men who do not know each other arrive at a laboratory under the guise that it is about memory and learning. Milgram tells the participants that the experiment is about the effects of punishment on learning. One of the two is the learner, the other the teacher. The learner is placed on a chair, and his arms are tied to the armrests. An electrode is then attached to his wrist. He is told to learn word pairs. For example, the colour blue belongs to the word bird. If he makes a mistake, he gets an electric shock.

The more mistakes, the stronger the shock. After the teacher sees that the learner is chained to his chair, the professor explains that he, the teacher, must inflict the shocks. He takes him to another room with a machine with buttons he can press to deliver the shocks, ranging from 15 volts to 450 volts to the learner. It should be clear that 450 volts through your body put your life in grave danger. Soon the learner has a hard time and screams that the shocks must stop, that he wants to be freed from his chair. However, in the same room as the teacher, the professor gently encourages him to continue. The teacher doesn’t know that the learner is the professor’s colleague and doesn’t get any shocks at all. He is only pretending in the context of the experiment. The experiment is performed 40 times, with people of different levels of education, all with the same result. You can already feel the mood. 34 out of 40 Participants continue to shock the learner, that’s 62.5%, even up to 450 volts. They sweat, complain and hold their heads in despair, but they carry on because the authoritative professor says they must. The only difference between the male and female participants was that the obedient females reported more stress than the males.

Then Milgram experimented with an ‘ordinary’ man giving the instructions, i.e. no authority, with the result that the percentage of those who obeyed fell from 62.5% to 20%.

The participants’ consciences were turned off by coûte que coûte obeying the authority, with the result that they didn’t care that they inflicted ‘the other’ enormous damage. The fact that the ‘ordinary’ man still scored 20% is perhaps since we want to do something well? Don’t want to disappoint the researcher? Those are my interpretations, by the way.

You can also extend the results of this experiment to the soldier. Their authoritative superior tells them that an enemy is an evil person, does not deserve the light in their eyes, in short, should be killed for the great good of the country for which they are fighting. With that mindset, the soldier leaves for the battlefield. Thoroughly indoctrinated and unable to think for themselves and with their conscience gone. When they come home, there is a damaged person, often with PTSD.

What about the conscience of the authority itself? Or your conscience? Is it sometimes gone for a while or on the back burner? Because you obey an authority which, in your opinion, knows better than you? Because your self-esteem is not optimal? Because you don’t take the effort to find the truth yourself but are lazy?

Do I need to go into the moral, or is this clear enough? I think so…

Source: The sociopath next door, Dr Martha Stout.