We’re nearing the end of the year, and for many this is a time for reflection: on where they are, on where they are going, on how far they’ve come.


If this is you, I would like to suggest trying something a bit different this year (read all the way to the bottom)...


This year, don’t ‘learn’ any lessons.


Don’t learn anything.


Only breathe.


If you learn anything, learn to be deeply meditative. Become the observer of your life.


‘Learning’ implies judgement, that a greater wisdom is now achieved. It will get you so far, learning lessons, but even this kind of wisdom is linear, a part of the illusion of existence, the ‘before and after’ story you tell of yourself.


You are still identified with the ‘you’, not the I AM. The I AM always knows, always knew, always loved unconditionally.


What happens if you stop looking for meaning, for the moral of the story, for signs? Many people have accepted that there is no such thing as a ‘mistake’ in their life, only a learning, but what lies behind even that ‘learning’?


Just be. Just observe. Just allow.


If you are learning from the past, you are bringing the past into the present which means you are not being totally present. This is not the most empowering stance, because it does not allow you to enter into the magic space of self love. Complete self love is to accept the perfect imperfection that manifests as your life. You can honour the past, without feeling the need to react to it.


If you can’t release yourself from the past, how can you release yourself in the now, release yourself from fear of making mistakes? How can you release yourself from fear of negative repercussions or ‘punishment’ for ‘bad’ choices? You are the best you can be right now.


Don’t learn any ‘lessons’, but do learn to feel. Without reference to the past, what do you feel like doing today? Feel with your whole being rather than thinking with your mind. Feel with your toes. What wants to happen through you right now? Where is your compassion pointing? Dig deep. What is the highest compassion you can access?


Don’t learn any lessons. Start unlearning everything if you want to experience freedom. It’s the only way into the now and the power that lies therein. You AM. We AM. From this still point of observation, of unconditionality, what can you co-create?


Instead of the ‘life lesson’ paradigm, allow yourself to experience fully, let each experience penetrate your knowing, feel the pleasure, the pain without pushing it away, without judgement, denial or analysis. Let it seep into your consciousness with compassion. Once you’ve done this, you can let your now moment do the talking. If you are in presence, your choices will become more enlightened without needing to judge or ‘learn’. You will sooner or later feel like doing something slightly different. This is the quickest way to evolve your consciousness - without causing blockages of guilt, regret, condemnation and fear.


Let your experiences go without judgement or drama. If ‘negative’, thank them for being a part of your existence. Acknowledge the feelings moving through you, and refrain from analysing your choices. Why is it good or ‘bad’ in the first place? This is the portal into dissolving your karma, to accept your desires, your humanity without drama or punishment. No lessons learned, only service, only life, only being in the moment and observing gratitude.


If you unite yourself with the ONE in divine union instead of your individual little ‘me’, become the I AM, what can become of that little me? What can you do ‘wrong’ if you are in a state of compassion with the Lover, the Divine?


Don’t learn anything. Be faithful to the divine spark in you. Breathe, and ask yourself what you want to do now.


......


I remember writing this poem down during the summer, one hot day standing in the queue for the outdoor swimming pool on Jesus Green with my daughters. This was before the current shift which I’m describing above, hence the word ‘learning’, but I don’t feel inclined to change it now. The softness of the meaning is still present. I hope you like it.
Happy New Year.


Karma is a quiet master
a gentle sweetheart
healing with grace
touching your voice
I AM both the lesson
and the learner
the teacher
who appeals to
higher dharma
Support each other
through your learning
What you forge
as family
You carry this
a love story
beyond the hurts
the grievances
Be loose, free
and marry
-Babaji

I’ve been working through a lot of issues of victimhood that I didn’t know I had. I started to realise that in the regime the guru guided me to, he wants the victim well and truly knocked out of me. It’s like bootcamp. I’ve never done everything on the list before, all at the SAME TIME. One by one I’ve come off all of my stimulants : coffee, then black tea, then green tea. I haven’t had a drink in several weeks. Sugar went by the wayside. I started a fitness regime. I started taking all my supplements religiously. I started cleaning my house top to bottom, sorting and deep cleaning.

Even though I’m not done yet, I’ve been able to make certain observations along the way.

When I gave something up, I felt like a victim.
The guru banned me from fasting for a time, saying he wanted me to nourish myself. I felt as if I was force feeding, and cue feeling like a victim.
I was told to fast again. I found myself feeling like a victim.
The guru told me to join a choir. I joined two.
They are great. Uplifting, balancing, bonding, but part of me felt like a victim as I am now so busy I don’t know where to look.
The guru said that’s how he wanted me: busy, so that I didn’t have time to think.
I still had time to feel like a victim.

This is not about poor me. I am having a great time, and my sense of assurance is increasing with each week that passes, but this is about the bits in between. Someone doesn’t acknowledge me, I feel like a victim. I learn to love my daughters more deeply and instead of enjoying it, I start worrying more about their wellbeing = victim.
Someone else is down or having a hard time...I’m an empath so part of me feels like a victim.
If you don’t like my social post, I’ll feel like a victim. If too many of you do I’ll also make myself a victim.

When I studied Health Kinesiology a few years back, I came across an energy correction called ‘being / not being’. These corrections deal with the phenomenon of people not being able to find a state which is safe for them. For example ‘being angry’ is stressful, and ‘not being angry’ is also stressful. ‘Being healthy’ is stressful and ‘not being healthy’ is also stressful. It’s very common. If you are stressed, on some level you are being a victim. There is more than one way to tackle just about anything, but it makes you think, doesn’t it? You are overweight and take action to reduce it, then suddenly everyone around you without fail is concerned you will ‘overdo it’. Where can you find your balance if you are not ‘safe’ anywhere?

When I empower, none of this happens. It is like flicking a switch. Nothing has changed in my life, but ‘too busy’ becomes ‘abundant’. ‘Demanding’ people become people I can serve and empower. ‘Annoying’ people become people with whom I can guide, teach or share wisdom. ‘Threatening’ people become people with whom I can co-create. I find my quiet in my centre.

The ‘victim’ is getting really boring. I don’t like false deadlines, yet I have given myself until the end of the year to finish off all the half-finished jobs I’ve started, even if I have to stay up half the night. The uplift will be worth it. Osho defines karma as incompleted action, and when I first read that some years ago, I wasn’t entirely sure I could relate. But now, yes.

I still need to be at ONE with my humanity and limitations. Nothing is ever done. There will always be something undone, so it’s a balance between taking control, and surrendering to the moment and how things are, in itself a form of completion.

How to find this balance?
​
For me it’s about listening to the moment, feeling it in the body, feet on the ground and energising. Not trying to be in the future where the job is ‘done’, but enjoying the DOING as an act of BEING. This is completion. This is grace and peace and gratitude and all the good things. In this state I float effortlessly from one task to the next knowing that I’ll be empowered to deal effectively with it.

I like this place. I hope the 'victim' is listening.
​

Let me tell you a secret. I am a mess. I am not ‘together’ at all. I look together on the outside. My life is looking pretty good at the moment. But I am not together. I am falling apart, one piece at a time, or sometimes a whole load of them just start to cleave off in one go. That’s when it gets crunchy. The other day I sort of found myself deciding whether to have a breakdown or not. It could have gone either way. But just like the other times I’ve been in that position, there was too much of me conscious to really go there wholeheartedly. And it's a bit too much drama for my taste. Better to just voluntarily give up and let go. That feels better. Crisis over. I’m a mess, I’m a failure. Generous, loving, but still an asshole at times.

I heal people as I go around without having much control over it anymore and sometimes, as an empath, it makes me trigger and I am still learning how to manage the level of perception I feel. I feel awful for no apparent reason other than that I’m letting go, rather than holding it in. I’m not trying to be cool, but from the outside I’m 'performing' better than ever before without even thinking about it. I feel anxious because when I look around there’s very little else holding me back any more. I read somewhere recently that if the path in front of you is trodden, it’s probably not yours. SO TRUE. I do and experience things ever day that make me weep, make me sublime, make me dissolve, and none of it makes sense. I keep getting married. It doesn’t make any sense. But it’s too compelling to give up now.

I have recently joined a rock choir. For those of you not in the UK, this is a bit like a Glee. It is satisfying and soothing in so many ways, not only for the singing of Footloose and Can't Stop the Feeling in four-part harmony with choreography, but also for the fact it meets in the local church, and we’re all standing there singing to the crucifix at the end. I'm not Catholic, but but y'know, crucifixes have been growing on me lately... Anyhow, I was there last week, just enjoying the experience, and I looked up and thought - He doesn’t look as if he has it all together.... But appearances can be deceptive. The key theme I have running through me at the moment is power, influence and authority. Do you need to look cool, together and badass to have this, or do you allow yourself to come undone? I found myself coming a little undone in the choir rehearsal. And then that night it continued. I read some post on Facebook that made me feel off-centre so instead of trying to resist and figure it out, I just opted back out into that gnosis state. I spent the night going deeper. My guides took me back to the church where I became one with the church itself, the walls, the chairs, the crucifix on the wall. Just feeling into the waves and ripples that made all these solid items. The bliss of dissolving into nothing. The point they made was, who has more power and influence? The one who is together, who looks in control, or the one who knows they can penetrate all things with their influence? The authority comes with letting go.

I’m like the person on the assault course who’s crawling through the mud, and then there’s a big wall ahead, and I just stop. Why is it better at the top of the wall, on the other side of the wall? What is wrong with just lying here quietly in the mud? Feeling into the mud, my body in it, looking up and seeing the sky, becoming one with even the wall. There is no need to go anywhere as I can feel it all in this state of compassion. And what happens to the wall? It just disappears, and it’s like, you can go through now. And I’m like, actually I’m ok here, I’m not sure why I thought I needed to go through but if you say so...

This is a bit like my life now.

My mind is checking out. So ciao, see ya! I hope you weren’t attached to me with my mind.

I go into my mind and I can’t string a sentence together. To be honest I never could. I switch off my mind and just turn up and open my mouth and something coherent comes out. I know where I’ve been going wrong all this time....

Luckily, losing your mind is a good thing in spiritual terms.
​
I go into my mind with an issue and it shouts random words at me like a perverse word association game. They say when you are drowning your life flashes before your eyes - this has been going on for a while... I look at someone and my mind delivers a name that is not theirs - Jessica becomes Sarah, Emily becomes Jenny, Nicki becomes Natasha, I become Wendy, and so on.
But, there’s nothing wrong with me. I don’t want a diagnosis because in your diagnosis is always an implied judgement. I don’t want to be fixed. I want to be loved the way you love a rose. I want to be held and told it will all be ok. There’s nothing wrong with me. Finito.

Go deeper, I tell myself.
Giggle.
Melt.
Transfigure.

More and more, the message I am getting is to FAIL. Allow it. When I fail, give up, everything shifts. Sometimes from minute to minute, sometimes overnight. How else are you going to dissolve your ego? Too many people are holding on to a half life instead of living. How can you define a successful life? I am hot out of seeing Bohemian Rhapsody at the cinema - Freddie Mercury died at the age of 45. Successful life or unsuccessful? To me, successful is surrendering to your poem, your part in the tapestry of humanity that you came here to weave. If you try to be together, chances are you will probably hover on the edges of success but never actually benefit from that full swell of feeling the wind behind you when you seize your moment.

Fail better, Fail harder. Fail nobler. And let the universe fill in the gaps. It's MUCH bigger than you are.

Girl, you are doing great.
​
It is not easy being female with no rule book, no guidebook. There is no template for an enlightened female except the mother figure who sits calmly and blesses those around her. How will you integrate your shadow, and become a whole being instead of the half you have been for millennia? 
How will you know which bits to choose, and which to let go?
It’s all been repressed, and now it comes out. 
Don’t be hard on yourself.

What does it look like when the woman who has come by the path of Wicca reaches divinity? What when the temple priestess dissolves identity and becomes oneness? The dakini? The warrior woman?
Who is going to tell us what it looks like? 
We think we have achieved some freedom as women but look how few these years are in human history. Our karma is still screaming at us telling us that we won’t live to tell the tale. Think of it all - the stoning, the ducking, the burning, the consignment to mental asylums. Joan of Arc was condemned for the crime of cross-dressing in the end. She was just wearing trousers....
It’s all still there just lurking under the surface as soon as you begin to deviate from the narrow norm. 
Just a generation ago you were meant to suck it up and take Prozac. Sometimes Prozac still seems like the best option for the pain you’re not even supposed to feel, but you do. Because you are not recognised or valued for your feminine brilliance, you are dissuaded from exploring your essence. 

There is no template, no precedent, or very few. This is why we are all in love with Frieda Kahlo, why we are creating a scrapbook of others like her, to learn from.
You are a pioneer. Sometimes it hurts, sometimes you will get labelled. You have to deal with the dual ‘blame’ of not being ok all the time AND breaking the mould. Why do you think you can go your own way when your mental or emotional state is not always well? 

Come back into the rigid constraints we have created for you. 
We care about you. 
We know what is best for you. 
What you feel is nonsense. 

And you silently scream...

Girl, you are doing brilliantly. 
You are still alive. You are still breathing. Are you going to beat yourself up for your self management - your coffee, your wine, your other helpers? You know you’ll let them go when you get a better option. You know the yoga class is good for you, walking barefoot on the grass, the dancing, the talking with a soul healing friend. Open yourself more. Allow yourself to be vulnerable, an open wound. 
This is your work. 
Feeling something is wrong is important work. 
Think of yourself as a barometer of how well humanity is doing. Feel into what feels light. Be the change. 
No prophet is accepted in his own village, is what they say. Maybe ‘prophet’ feels a little heavy for you, but if you are guiding from your space of feminine wisdom - your feeling, give me a better word.

We need to forgive ourselves for not being ok, for hurting, for being sick. Just because we feel it, and the other half denies it, suppresses feelings, does not mean we, they, are well. 
How do we make this less of a burden? If you had a broken leg, how would you treat yourself? If you had the flu? If we are happy to admit on a personal level that we are sick, and that this is not failure, we will open the way to allowing the masculine energy to let go. 
It’s not weak. 
It’s not failure. 
Take his hand. He can let go of some of that control. We can show him how to trust. We can show him the magic with confidence. 
Forgive, forgive, forgive. 
Angry people need forgiveness. For the limitations of form, of time, of ability, for being in dis-ease, for feeling cut off from what is sacred, for not being in love.

Girl, you are doing great. It’s ok to have a bad day. We have to allow ourselves to flow with our emotions - around people, around family, around workmates. Find a way to express them, not pretend that we are not really happening. This is the role of the healer, the shakti. We have to be at peace with the feelings of pain and unease, and also find ways of not being overwhelmed by them. We don’t need to identify. 
Forgive yourself for being sick. You are carrying the burden of many.
​Know when to feel, and when to dive into no-mind and non-judgement. 

And allow yourself to heal. 

I wrote this letter to myself the other day. It was a challenging day - travelling, a 2.30 am start, many hours more than usual in an airport, many miles covered. This is difficult for a sensitive empath.
I am experimenting with more raw posting. If it doesn't feel right, I may not keep it, so if you find this personally useful or encouraging, please leave a comment :)

I have recently really tapped into the power of Reiki. It is just over three years now since I was first attuned. And not the first energy therapy I have ever practised. But it is the one I’m using now.
​
They say that the more you use Reiki, the better a channel you become. I believe this is true, but significantly the shifts I have noticed recently are based upon understanding, letting the Rei Ki teach me how best to use it, and how to really step into its power. Not just using techhniques because I’ve been told they are useful, but being guided to pick exactly the right technique and know simultaneously that it will work. It’s not that nothing was happening before - I would not be without my Reiki for nourishing, balancing, relaxing, and healing of many issues has taken place over time, it’s just that it often felt as if I was nursing issues along, taking the edge off but not really getting to the bottom of the issue. I wasn’t even sure if Reiki was the right tool for this.

Lately I have started using it slightly less, but more consciously, and increasingly only when I know it is targeted where I need it. I have been listening to my body, going deep within myself, and realising I can manifest what I need from there in terms of healing.

Recently for one slightly daft example, I asked my body what it needs right now, and a packet of chia seeds came to view. I had just left for 3 weeks hols to Turkey where to my knowledge, chia had not yet taken off. So instead of worrying about it, I laughed and said well if you need chia seeds you’ll have to manifest some in your direction, because I’m not going to think about it. Shortly after, I remembered that I had brought some coconut snacks with me in the suitcase, and indeed, they had chia seeds added. Is that enough chia I asked? The next day at breakfast I reached for the gluten-free wraps that I’d brought along. Without realising, I had bought the seeded version which also includes chia. A day later we visit the supermarket and I find there are two brands of chia seeds to choose from in huge packets. More chia than I know what to do with. I should just be quiet...

So this is not really about chia seeds, but about me teaching myself not to stress over things that I think I need. If a voice out there, no matter who this is, however much you respect them, tells you to do something, or that this or that is the best, or if you are in your rational mind which has taken any of this in, you will not be in your power unless this resonates deeply with your inner knowing. If you go deep within, the requirement, the ‘what we are working on next’, the ‘do this now to achieve ....’, is effortless. If you get your mind out of the way, it happens. The need and the having are the same thing #askanditshallbegiven.
Your body knows how to do tantra. It doesn’t need any lessons. It knows exactly what to do for your current healing. Even if it’s one simple thing. It’s the one simple thing you need to do until you get another impulse bubbling up. Your body knows how to do yoga. I have experienced my body making postural adjustments from a deep meditative state of body consciousness. Your body knows how to heal itself and release trauma. Your body consciousness will not ask you to do any more at any given time than you can manage. Your task is to access this inner awareness, but in the knowledge that it is there.

And that is not all. I have been identifying and targeting some deep-seated issues. You know - the ones you have to tackle or you just can’t move forwards. And it’s as if the universe was just waiting for me to identify these underlying causes instead of picking off symptoms. The healing has been so profound and rapid that I’m sure that I'll be sharing this with others in due course. You can only really share what you have healed in yourself, and this healing goes very deep.

So what am I saying? Go within. Let your soul, your body consciousness teach you. Feel into the areas of tension and resistance and really listen, but not with your mind. Equally, listen to what feels peaceful, and good. Practise tantra with yourself - sit quietly in a state of acceptance and compassion. Feel loved. And then see what bubbles up. If you are in tension with your mind, or a belief adopted by your mind, you will know which part to let go of, and which to keep. Your power is within you. Your soul knows its way home. Can you trust it to take you through?


Find out about Body Wisdom Training here
​

I am mama
and child
I call for baba
while called
your beloved
but daughter?
It's fine
that I don't
get this
and I'm calmly
losing
my mind
Your mother
when you suffer
sister-friend
to take you down 
brother
with the others
defender to
the end
You always 
have an answer
and it's
different
every time
Who am I?
Who are you?
Who are we
not?
The ‘I’ is
confused
but I AM
loved
and that
is all the 
explanation 
available 
at this time



My reality. Just me.

If I AM ok, but you are not, what difference does it make who is who?

Divine confusion.

Which part of the whole of humanity did you pick up when they were giving out slices of karma? Your concept of 'self' is a part of that karma too.

Hmm, this looks interesting,
I'll explore what happens when.....
Oops. 

Did the game you were playing collide with someone else's?
Can you hear the cosmic laughter?

WE are looking pretty funny. And we are looking pretty awesome. And cute. 

We are the sweetheart - mischievous angels.
How many lovers can we hustle?

What happens if we melt all the parts of ourselves together, take little leaps of faith towards each other? How many 'serious' players can we wrestle to the ground in a heap of giggles?

We might have to get closer. It might feel more intimate than we're used to. 
It might start to look a little like ecstasy.


I am the breeze that plays about your lips
You kiss me back
Softly your essence gives itself up to me:
tender, treacly pleasure
Butterflies lightly meeting in the air
circling apart, then touching
Undisclosed, beaming joy
provoking bubbles of inner laughter
feeling each other this intimately
a startling, delicate delight

​Two and a half weeks into what I'm calling my personal retreat. Fasting, simplifying, streamlining, grounding, forgiving.

The healing is intense.

We are letting go of violence and drama at a core level, embodying ahimsa. We are acknowledging the 'we' that we have remembered we are. We are finding peace and presence at a much deeper level, surrendering to what is. We are finding that we are ok.

New and interesting questions are surfacing...



What does the woman in me want?
What do the women in me desire?
Standing by the side of the lake
looking out: 
I am complete
I am enough
I am compassion
I am peaceful 
I am exploring myself
as woman
I am not looking at you
though you are pretty
- you will not distract me
There is too much violent 
activity
in you
You are too worldly
I am in love 
with me

​It's not me, it's you.

Let's call this delegation.

This is counter to most streams of thought which tell you that anything you perceive in anyone else is a reflection of something in yourself. So you do your own work and see what shifts. But then you get to a point where this is your own work. Because if you can feel it, you need to call it. Maybe not out loud, but firmly and silently. Because the bigger you become, the more you can feel other people and their stuff. Or they'll unconsciously try to project it onto you. And if you feel bad about seeing negativity in others you'll end up sucking it up. You need to call it. You need to give it a name. Pretending it's not there is not loving. And when you do, don't allow yourself to feel bad or guilty. Demons go for the jugular every time so you need to be tough. They will say: 'you don't understand me or what I've been through', 'I'm being nice', 'I'm just worried about you', 'you are not so perfect yourself' etc. etc. All these things sound reasonable, play to your compassion, and are designed to get you to back off so that you'll leave them alone to be small. It takes practice, but if you do this your relationship with the real person you care about will improve and more love will flow between you. It's actually an act of trust in the other person - you don't need to rescue them from seeing what needs to be seen and correcting it.

It's not me, it's you. Because it puts you back in touch with who you are, standing firm in your inner light. 

This is work in progress. I'm an empathic healer which makes this really tricky so I have been finding rage useful. Allowing rage helps to integrate the shadow body and it's not the same as anger at all. Anger is more superficial, reactive and based in the ego and its attendant emotions. Rage is a much purer cleansing power which bubbles up from your belly in the same way laughter does. Rage is loving, and should leave you feeling light and joyful. It can even be funny. 

Here is a selection of four poems around this theme. Rage-y, muscle-the-demon-to-the-ground-y alchemy: this is me, and it's not ok to be aggressive, passive aggressive, cynical, victimised, reductionist, self-righteous, pious, complacent, patronising or accusatory around me. We are all heart-broken, maimed, limbless athletes in the Paralympics. But we can still GO. ​

 

I am not here to make friends 
to seek reassurances
from you
I am not here to blend in
I am here 
to BE
to express 
something new




Suddenly it’s not ok
for you to deny me
to pretend that I’m not real
to make me doubt my soul
and what I feel
It’s not ok
for you to humour me
to redefine this cynically
I hear your demons
they are carping at me
They want to make me small
so that you don’t have to let go
But it’s not ok anymore 
when I look at the work
that I’ve done
the passion that I’ve shown
the truth that I’ve grown
to feel your indifference 




If you try to give me bullshit
if you are nice 
if you try to be understanding 
show me sympathy
or worry
but we are feeding your pretense 
I will grab you by the throat and shake you
If you take the moral high ground 
I will slap you
and pull it out from under you
It is kinder than the violence 
this does to my soul
If you play the victim I will keep away from you
lest you make me your next aggressor 
I am on my knees 
at the beauty of this
but you are unmoved
Where is your fire?
You are busy, you are tired...
Let me tell you how God is busy
Did you not see
what happened there in that
microscopic moment?
how the universe realigned itself
to my pretty?
Can you do that?
Who will give you permission 
to call the clouds to attention 
the moon and stars to heel?
I want to see the rage in you
that burns your self to ashes
I am not gossiping 
with other inmates
I am standing at the door 
and turning the key
Will you be free?


​

How much love 
do you allow yourself to give?
This is 
the only question 
If you think it is other
your arguments are
clever
But our soul
is a simple
thing
​
​

These are the people I see around me:
the light beings
the hidden masters
the real masters.
We know life
we know love
we know how to cooperate
to get things done
We don't need to look elsewhere
We need to look within
and laugh
and be soft
and allow ourselves
to melt.
​

​I've been wanting to say a little about consecration for a while. This is an enormous topic but if you're serious about your wellbeing and development, a very important one.

You can consecrate just about anything - your food, your projects, yourself, but what I am going to talk about now is consecration of your space. This one thing can make a huge difference to your sense of peace, wellbeing and clarity of mind. 

You might wonder why this is such a big deal, but if an area is under-consecrated, your energy will be lower, the quality of your thoughts will be more negative, and it may be difficult for your family to feel in harmony there. This may not make sense to the rational mind, but everyone knows how much better they feel in harmonious surroundings, such as in nature, or the difference between when you've tidied up before you went to bed, and when you haven't. 

Think of your living area as being a reflection of your energy (and that of any other people you live with). The macrocosmic mirrors the microcosmic, so if your home is disharmonious, it is likely that your mind lacks harmony. Often people think, 'I will wait until I have more time/energy/things are less chaotic and then I will do it', but the opposite is often true. It may be that the most compassionate thing you can do for yourself is to give your space some love, and this will bring about the desired changes in your world. It means that the space will work for you in your life, providing an area of light for you to grow in. An unconsecrated space can magnify your karma and keep you stuck. If the people you live with are going through problems you may not be able to change them directly, but you can provide a safe space for them which will give them the best chances of working through their issues. If your work is challenging you, you need a sanctuary to return to at the end of the day.

If you are going to meditate or take part in other spiritual practice, it is extremely important to clear and consecrate the room in which you do this. It will make your practice progress much more easily and help you to feel more connected as you do. 

Ideally all spaces in your living area should be consecrated, but in order of priority, look at your communal and sleeping areas, and then if you work, your desk or other areas. 

So, how to do this?

As a first step (and if you only do one thing), de-clutter and tidy. Then de-clutter and tidy some more. Clean (this is a note to self here too over the bank holiday weekend). Feel into the space. What would make it more harmonious? Do you need to move things around? Is anything unsightly? As an aside, it's good practice to keep electronics out of your sleeping area. The most important ingredient in consecration is love. Love the space, enjoy keeping it in a pleasant state. If it helps, think of your efforts as karma yoga, a form of prayer, or devotion. 

There are many, many practices and objects you can use to consecrate a space, however I am only going to recommend here those which I have found most effective versus their simplicity, practicality and price.

1. Fire - if you have a stove or fire, put it on regularly. If not, or if it's summer, get yourself some candles. There is nothing as purifying as a flame, and it creates an atmosphere which is harmonious on all levels. Most people resonate with candlelight so you are not going to freak out your family, partner or less sensitive housemates. 

2. Sacred symbols - for the sake of ease and simplicity - choose a sacred symbol which appeals to you for each room you are consecrating. Easy to find, print and put on a wall. Try to feel into what the space requires rather than imposing something on it. For example, I love the Sri Yantra for it's power and ability to bring on/enhance samadhi, but recently when I was re-consecrating my bedroom, Sri Yantra was not right - despite the fact that I meditate here. The 'right' symbol for this space turned out to be the Om Shanti symbol. If you're not sure or new to this, try one or more out until your room feels attuned. Be prepared to re-evalutate this over time as your needs change.

3. Crystals - by no means a must, but a very simple, easy way to help clear your space and keep the energy attuned to your highest good. As with symbols, experiment with what you are drawn to for a particular room. The bigger the crystal, the more powerful its range. Amethyst is a good all-round choice for purifying energy, and is useful for 'in-between' places - perhaps halls and smaller rooms that you' haven't given the full treatment. Crystals are also good for a child's room as they are tactile and your child can help choose which one they want. Remember to cleanse the crystals when you first receive them in salt water and refresh at intervals thereafter.

4. Anything else you've learned: Reiki, tibetan singing bowls, music, scents, holy water, flowers, plants, clever geopathic healing etc. etc.

5. Any of the above will lose their impact if you fail to keep the space uncluttered, fresh and tidy. Your space needs to feel loved, not neglected. Keep your eyes on the ball and continually see this as a work in progress. There are some times when your space will feel more challenged than others and may need extra attention to keep it in alignment. 

Don't underestimate the importance of consecration. In your list of spiritual practices, this may not be at the top, but you may want to move it higher. It's something I didn't consider so important when I first began my journey, but now I can feel the difference when I move from room to room or if something is out of place. I spend a lot of time in spaces which could be made to work better. 

Over time, consecration will simply become a way of being, a way of going through life that allows you to slice effortlessly through karma. It's both an art and a science that you'll develop with practice. 

Start with your home.