Little Voice Called Lani

Written by Deborah Jordaan

Good day, beautiful souls of this planet we call earth. Today I am writing about the little voice inside your head reminding you that you need to be somewhere else.

You always miss something but you do not know what it is. It is not a person or even a specific place …. it is your inner self and who you are that you are missing. This will lead you to where you need to be when you recognise that little voice and listen to it.

I have an amazing friend, and now I know why she is part of my life. She is living the life my inner voice has been calling me to. She is there to give me the awakening I need. She is my real-life version of Julia Robert`s character in Eat Pray Love. She has been my inspiration since I met her. My little voice has always nagged me but it became real when I met her.

My soul cries out to the big wide world and the adventure it represents. Since a child, I have always been responsible but my wandering soul never stopped yearning for something waiting for me.

Yes, we all say we want to find ourselves but we keep on with the mundane life we lead because we are afraid of what is waiting for us. Looking at the media I envy the free-spirited souls that are not afraid to live.

How often are we going to make excuses as to why we can not live our lives to the fullest? I am not afraid of the future, it is the present that has me worried about where will it end.

We adventurous souls have to dig deep into our inner core and decide what is keeping us from exploring our future. We are stuck in limbo and sometimes we are not happy to be there, we are just used to it. I am delighted for a short while in any circumstance but then it starts to become mundane and I feel the need to move on. I need to find my happy place and settle till my old years but right now my little voice is telling me not to give up on my dreams, but the dream comes with sacrifice.

I always made excuses that my children are not grown so I cannot do anything which is valid but as they became adults I used the fact that my grandchildren are young but have their parents.

At the end of the day, all we have is ourselves and only we will know what best is for us.

Being a responsible person comes with perks, but when can we let our hair down and breathe?

There are people out there with financial means that can live their dream but because of their shallow souls, they do not see how blessed they are.

There are a few philanthropists that live their life to the fullest and pay it forward and they still see the world. They get to live their dream just by being unafraid.

I once read a story of an executive in New York who was dissatisfied with his crazy life and he gave everything up. He bought a whole bunch of educational books, sold up everything and went to Africa. He is in Africa educating underprivileged children. To me that is beautiful, he is living his dream. He was not afraid, so what is stopping us?

My parting words to you are that listen to the little voice because you might never know where your path will lead.

So let yourself go and embrace a new beginning.

Be blessed and be loved.

I Fall but Will Rise

Poem by Neshni Naidoo

Uncertain of what pushed me
Into a downward spiral I fall
No way of stopping
No way out
I bury my head under the blanket
Warm dark cozy
A cocoon of safety
Searching for a handhold
I grab onto a thought
A positive affirmation
And pull myself up
I am beautiful
I am intelligent
I am courageous
I am brave
I am amazing
I am incredible
Each thought lifts me higher
Until I can lift my head
And get out of bed
Self-doubt still lingers
Emptiness loneliness
Here in my heart
Tomorrow I will descend
Into the well I escaped
Face the demons that pulled me down
Slay them so that they trouble me no more
And pull myself as I did before
Reminding myself to fill my cup
With positive thoughts
So that the demons can’t survive

We are Divinity

Poem by Neshni Naidoo

Tall and proud we stand
On the shoulders of our motherland
We remember those who have passed
And the legacy that they left us
They taught us to be strong
To stand up when there’s wrong
That when it’s dark outside
God will be our Guide

I will strive to love
And always serve
In my heart I will see
All as a part of me
Peace it’s clear to see
Is within you and me
If we fill our thoughts with love
And speak and act with love

Love like the brilliant sun
Residing in the heart of everyone
For we are Divinity
This truth sets us free
We are Divinity
This truth will set us free

Practical Magic – 102 Soup for the Soul

Written by Vanessa Anderson

The usual conjuring and imagery of Witches, witchcraft and spell work often centre around a cauldron bubbling on a hot fire – hubble and bubble – while a cackling crone stirs the pot, muttering softly to herself as she dollops and sprinkles her tinctures and herbs. Each component is selected for cause and effect, a concoction of sorts meant for suture and salve, whether corporeal, ethereal or spiritual. An act of intent, for which ailment affects.

I previously appealed to you, to remember your magic yet I was not quite sure yet which element of practical magic should follow my last instalment for I truly believe that everything we do, with intent, is magic. One practice, in particular, keeps circling my mind – cooking, brewing, concocting, creating with love and intent, spelling.

In my piece titled – When the world tries to break someone you love – I wrote about my nephew, he is sick, very sick. Amid the chaos of disrupted routine and emotional upheaval, one simple, wholesome act pulls together the red thread that binds us all – cooking. It is this element because it is so raw in our existence that I want to reflect on it in this piece.

The ill, like the stone thrown across a pond, cause a ripple and those within the concentric circles ebbing outward – hold the space of the one within. We take care of them, holding them together so that they can hold those within.

Through all the ages of man, in every culture across the spiritual realm, we have sustained each other, held these circles together and gathered others towards us, with food. When we celebrate, we gather and share food, when we mourn, we gather and share food, when others are ill, we do what comes naturally – we cook, we gather and we share food.

We do this to hold the line when others are raging against a battle and, if we are lucky, we may have others to hold the line should we find ourselves in a battle that threatens to consume us.

When we were little, and we felt sick, we rested and our mothers made us soup to eat. When family and friends are sick, we offer to make their food, and we sustain them when they do have not the strength to do so themselves. It is a practice (in magic) done naturally, with intent. We give of our time and our energy towards others, the ingredients may be wholesome and nourishing, but that is not all on offer.

We infuse love, a knowing and understanding of the space others are in. It is an act of kindness where energy, like magic flows naturally. It is not odd or strange that the foods we prepare are often, exactly what the body needs to support it. It is knowledge within, sometimes we forget, sometimes the universe reminds us.

Food, good food, is energy. When it is prepared with love and intent – whether twirling round a cauldron or a pot on the stove – it is magic.

All magic is, is practice with intent.

We give our thought to the idea that someone else is in need. We give thought to the knowing that they have other things on their mind. No matter whether they are the one who is ill, or the one taking care of the ill, or those holding the space between the lines and the circles – our thoughts, through simple practices, like making food, become the tincture that offers suture and salve to the wounds of the embattled.

Remember that you are magic.

Test the theory, remember the last meal you made now remember the way you approached preparing it, what you infused within, how you and others felt eating it? Was it merely sustenance for an empty stomach, or did it nourish and nurture more than just body?

Last thought: if you are what you eat, then should you not take back the power over how it is prepared?

See Me

Poem by Neshni Naidoo

meek
weak
too afraid to speak
emotional
irrational
too impractical
that is what you see
when you look at me

but when I look in the mirror
what do I see

I see
a creator
a nurturer
a source of wisdom
a fountain of love

I see a Mother
who has sacrificed
her body
her time
her energy
her dreams
her life
for you to survive
for you to thrive

I see an Amazon
who has scaled mountains
slain demons
and walked through fire
while carrying you

I see a cheerleader
who has stood beside you
championed you
celebrated your victories
and comforted you in defeat

Confident Intelligent Resilient
Passionate Compassionate Perceptive
Capable Resourceful Powerful
that is what you should see
when you look at me

Bad Energy Rubs Off

Written by Elsabe Smit

I like to believe that there is good in every person, and all we need to do is keep looking and keep loving.

I am also realistic because life has taught me that this approach only works up to a point. Some people are on this earth to spread poison and malice, and with the best will in the world you cannot change them, because their mission is not to change.
There have been times in my life when I was so bombarded with negative energy that I felt I was being dragged down into the same space as the people who projected their lack of self-love on me. I have had to make some very hard decisions about people that were supposed to be close to me, but who were clearly out to destroy me. I had to distance myself from those people and it was very painful but necessary for my own survival.

The consequence was that by detaching myself from the person and the situation, I discovered what those people had to teach me. I was then able to appreciate the wisdom I gained from them and think of them with unconditional love – or so I thought. The love was there, but on the condition that despite my gratitude towards them, I had to stay away from them if I wanted to be my true self.

I discovered that as people we are not capable of unconditional love, but we are capable of forgiveness – in the sense that forgiveness means understanding what those people have had to teach us, and feeling gratitude for the wisdom we gained from our experience.

Social media is no different from life – in fact, social media contacts are probably even more intense and instructive than having personal contact with people.

When we have personal contact with people, we can lie and pretend, and get away with it for a while. With social media, every word and sentence you type carries its own energy, and people pick that energy up, even if they deny that such energy exists.

I have blocked contact with a handful of people of the type of “hi mem I want to merry nice amerikin girl mem do you life alone mem“. I have blocked contact with one other person who was incredibly destructive and who on more than one occasion had a field day while intoxicated, only to brag about the situation afterwards.

I do believe in freedom of speech, and I also believe that bad energy rubs off. There are times when you have to decide to either love and leave contact or be dragged down to the level where that contact feels comfortable. This is no different from life away from the internet, just more intense and therefore happening much faster.

If you ever decide to block a social media contact, I trust that you will do it with love and understanding rather than with anger and resentment.

Practical magic – 101

WILLOW, Warwick Davis, Billy Barty, 1988, (c) MGM/courtesy Everett Collection

Written by Vanessa Anderson

In a world that teeters closer and closer towards obsession over technological marvel, until one day you look back and realise that EVERYTHING has over time been replaced – become artificial, from the conversations we have to the food we eat.

I have written often about returning to self, remembering, and collecting ourselves back towards ourselves. Sometimes we all need a little practical magic to help us get there.

I am going to start with an anecdote from one of my favourite movies, Willow. If you participated in the Holistic Fayre’s birthday competitions you may have read this snippet from me already.

In the movie, the protagonist Willow Ufgood, a Nelwyn with magical talents presents himself as a would-be apprentice to the town Magician, Aldwin – at the Planing festival. He and two others are asked to identify which finger holds the power to control the world. Willow wanted to point to his own finger, but he didn’t trust his intuition.

Anyone who has watched the movie will know, for those who have not yet, spoiler alert – his own finger was the correct response, he held the power.

We hold the power!
You have the power!

The world we live in will have us forget that, because people who believe in themselves are harder to hoodwink with sparkling baubles, bright lights and fakery. True magic does not deceive, that is performance for it implies a performer and an audience.

True magic is within us all, no performance, no act – we have simply forgotten. In the rushed existence of our lives, filled with work, money, entertainment, fulfilment, expectations, judgements, distractions and challenges – there is little time.

It is time, it is now when we must recall. We speak of technology as an advancement, but those before us had knowledge, knowledge we have unknowingly let go, little bit by little bit. Its loss felt only now – when we have started to realise what we have given up in an attempt to get our time back.

Artificial intelligence is sold as the opportunity to free up our time, work smarter, not harder – but in a world of information we have become less, truth and knowledge diluted – we spend our free time being entertained by…. Artificial intelligence. We have given our power for a freedom in bondage.

Higher petrol prices, failing energy grids, job losses, global pandemics. The world is in desperate need of a little magic. In fact, it needs a lot – and it starts with each of us.

I am not going to claim that these are all steps in a programme to reclaim that magic. I am going to help you remember that magic is in the details, it is in the little things we do, every day and that every day, in every way that you are mindful in your intent you practice your magic.

It begins with you: Hair is magic – every cell in its make-up is you, when you cut your hair, you release energy. Like the rings in a tree trunk, those cells tell a story of what we have experienced. The sudden desire to cut ones hair is often a reflection of the need to change. We feel different when we give attention to certain parts of ourselves.

Our hair, connected to our crown chakra is an important link to who we are. In many cultures, the way that hair is worn – or treated is an embodiment of spiritual nature of that culture. Women braiding each other’s hair is not only a grooming practice, but a kinship ritual and possibly why we feel so oddly free to share things with our hairdresser we would normally keep to ourselves.

In our rushed world, we hasten through this grooming ritual, without the ritual. Intend to honour yourself more. Intent is magic. It is the energy we invest in everything we do. Ironically metered to ourselves and yet given so freely to other matters. Reclaim that magic, in small ways, every day, start with hair, brush it, braid it, love it.

I make a joke of the fact that most of what I knit or crochet ends up having a strand of hair woven into it, unintentionally of course, but unknowingly, everything I make has a part of me, part of my magic, woven in.

Practically, magic is everywhere, we just have to allow it in and if you will allow me, I would like to author some more practical magic tips in the coming months.

Remember, you are magic.

Harmony…

Poem written by Ada Den Hollander

The orchid just makes flowers
The Cycad just grows tall
The spider just builds a nest
The rabbit just nibbles on a carrot
A dog just nudges a toddler,
invitation to play
The lioness just hides in the bush,
watching her next meal to survive.
No second thougths, no egos, just knowing.
Nature our big teacher, always, all the time.
Focussed, content and wise.
The third part of nature, us humans,
shows a different picture.
We know better, we go to war,
we disagree, we manipulate, we lie,
I am right and you are wrong,
we say, always, all the time.
Not focussed, not content, not wise.
Where did we go wrong?
As soon as we became ego driven?
When did we forget that only
love is real?
When did we stop living from our hearts?
Where is our compassion?
Especially NOW we need to go back,
back to who we really are, aware and living life
as it should be: Love In Full Expression.
As loving teachers to others, accepting differences,
in harmony, stillness and with peace in our hearts.

When the World Tries to Break Someone You Love

Written by Vanessa Anderson

I promised someone a while ago that I would pen this article. It’s telling delayed because I truly did not know where to start. For I, could not possibly give you, the reader – an accurate account of the experience being that I was not an active participant in the story.

Then it occurred to me that reason and accuracy have no part in its telling. For reason you see is neither fair nor factual – not in this account, and accuracy, well, being accurate is neither here nor there when it comes to watching someone you love suffer.

And you, you may be a combatant observer of suffering in your own world, unsure of when, where or how to shine your light so that those who suffer can find a way back to themselves. It may well be that this is for you, as much as for me, is a tale worth knowing.

When you can neither see, touch nor hear the cause of someone’s distress – but rather you sense it like an oozing web that threatens to engulf, cover, hold them down and smother them. You see it hiding in the shadows, fearful of the light, you sense it is sneaky and deceitful, it changes moods and appetites, it changes personality and sleep is a constant arms-length away. Yet you cant name it, you cant calm it and it feels so unfair, so unjust and misplaced.

When a diagnosis is a prying, meddling, scab-picking torment, like a gnawing woodworm carving holes into their being and after all of that it offers little relief or lasting solution. When all you want to do is rage against it, cast it back and banish it from their world and all you can do is wish for them a quiet calm so they can come back to themselves, even for a moment.

Around 7 months ago, you turned 21 years old – I was there the day you were born and named as the ‘first born son’ derived from the Siouan (Sioux) language, Chaska – brave and strong. Names are words, words spelled – spelling is a casting of spells – the name is certainly fitting.

You have shown us a world we may never have known had you not been born brave enough to bare the seizures that take you from us at times.

The malfeasance of time and practice aside, you question ‘why you’?

No answer came, it likely never will.

You turned 21 years old last October and for the longest of days and the endless nights to follow – you got lost in darkness, cloaked in chaos and anger, locked behind a shroud most could not see past, let alone unveil in the hope to set you free.

You became opaque and we became obtuse. We could only flutter around like moths to a flame, trying to catch the light as it tried to escape from within you, like flour through a sieve, inane, useless.

You ask, ‘why you’ – I can’t fathom a reason or rhyme, I couldn’t come close.

Yet through it all, what resonates sounds something like ‘Thank God’ – whatever that means for you. You are because we are – your family, by soul or by blood.

You are recognised, you are loved, you are a light the dark tried to blow out – it didn’t know how many WE were, that fluttered and floundered around your flame, catching your light and sending it back to you. It didn’t know that we, in soul and blood – would hold the space for your family to work their magic around you.

It didn’t know how strong your Mother was or how fiercely she would fight.

It didn’t know the army of light she had seeded or the determination of their intent. You are because we are – here for you.

The world tried to break you, now show it what you have become.

The world tried to break you, now we know what we are capable of.

We are all here because others were here for us. Others before us, others after us, others because of us.

Breaking Down Boundaries

Written by Elsabe Smit

My name is Elsabe. My grandmother was named Elizabeth, but I was the first grandchild and my parents wanted to be original. The result? I have one unique name, there was hell to pay in the family because of the audacity of my parents, and my siblings ended up with strings of family names that they do not use because they are all known by their nicknames.

I think that was an early sign of me breaking down boundaries and surging ahead into unknown territory. Is it a matter of a fool rushing in where angels fear to tread? I did not think so, but then I am biased.

I once had one of those experiences that would not be more bizarre if you make them up. I have a British passport, but also still carry my South African passport. I traveled from the UK to South Africa for a short break.

Legislation required me to use my South African passport when I am in South Africa. I also need to have my British passport available, because part of the job of airport officials is to ensure people have the correct travel documents for their destinations (like a South African passport with a valid visa or a British passport if you travel from South Africa to the UK). If they slip up, people are deported back to their place of origin at the expense of the airline.

When arriving in South Africa, I went to an international foreign exchange agency to exchange £60 for South African currency. This was not a large amount of money and should not have aroused suspicion.

When asked for my passport, I was not sure which one to use (I normally do the exchange in the UK or use a credit card) and made the mistake of providing both passports.

The clerk looked at my British passport and then asked for proof of residence. I provided my British driver’s license which is acceptable throughout the European Union, and in many other countries including South Africa. But not for this company.

They then looked at my South African passport and demanded a visa that would justify my visit to my country of birth – in addition to two legal passports and a return ticket. I soon realized that I was getting nowhere and left without the money.

I went to the next company, provided only my British passport, and got the money within minutes.

These people, as well as my parents, were obliged to enforce boundaries. It does not matter that the boundaries are artificial and impractical. The boundaries are there, and in their minds overstepping those boundaries would have dire consequences.

No matter how well educated we are, we grow up in systems and cultures that tell us to obey the rules and face the consequences. As a result, we understand from a very young age that we must do as we are told, and that the control is outside of us – with other people that have authority over us.

End of creativity. End of audacity. Beginning of lifelong pandering.

Of course, people break out. They use the opportunities that are given to them, and they use their God-given brains and various talents to make the world a better place for themselves and for others.

They become entrepreneurs, artists, inspired achievers in the fields that they are passionate about. They also often become lonely because people start to revere them.

The result is a class system, where one class looks up to another and protest about the class differences. The “upper” class does not necessarily look down on the “lower” class. However, they know what happens when you accept boundaries without question, and they shy away from anything that would put a damper on their creativity.

Once you have tasted the freedom of breaking rules and expanding your personal territory, amazing opportunities open for you. Each opportunity is a test of your ability to conquer fear and each success brings you closer to the self that you were born to be in this world.

And I am not saying you should do as you please in all circumstances. We are social beings, and we need to be aware of how our behavior impacts on others. There is no need for anyone to deliberately hurt other, but there is also no need to blindly obey rules based on the fears of other.

I wonder what those foreign exchange clerks would say when they hear about the three occasions when I was illegally in other countries? Each time a border policeman helped me on my journey (one accompanied me to safe territory at his own risk, one was bribed to let me in, and one pretended not to see me) and I had a wonderful time because I refused to see the obstacles and went for the opportunities. But that is a story for another day.

Go and find your boundaries and start breaking them down.