December 2014

Dear One,

In this last half of this very profound year, I have been working on what would be the “teachings”, the book if you will, that should have been given to me at birth that would have made my life easier.

That being said, I have loved this human journey.  I have loved my experiences, my teachings and my teachers, and I finally know that everything is perfect just the way it is.  I have always wanted to make things simple.

 I have wanted to formulate the theories into simple steps to make it easy for the ones I love.  Indeed I have had a hunger. I have made a commitment to take my pain, my suffering, and my life challenges and turn them into the gifts that would create the arena that would help me to remember the light and love who I am. Through going through these “dark Areas” I have found my way back to Love and to G-d.  (G-d and Love are synonymous for me)

To know G-d has been to know myself and G-d is my life’s preoccupation.

In this search, I have some thoughts that are not original…not even the words are original.  They do have the same meaning to all Pilgrims on this journey. 

I am no longer a psychotherapist, a Helper, even a teacher.  I consider myself a “Verifier”.  I serve you by verifying your truth. I am a faithful mirror to reflect back to you the reality of who you really are. This means I must let go of my judgments, and see that you and I are one.

I mentioned my teachers:

My father:  He said to me that a wise man learns from another’s experience; a fool, from his own.   This was and still is so difficult for me.  My young child’s insistence that I needed to feel the “pain of the burning fire” that my Father wanted to protect me from, is actually what I am attempting to do with those I teach. Is it true?  Is this what I have come to learn and then to teach?

My Latin teacher in High School, Max Rosenblum, wrote to me when I had my first teaching position:  “Never chew the same piece of lettuce twice.”  I never have.  I am always teaching from my own newly experienced   “wisdom” of the teachings of Spirit.  I bring the present moment into my teachings

Emmanuel:  “Honor your wounding but do not build a monument to it.”

This is a crucial energetic teaching.

Thich Nhat Hanh:  “Repetitive exploring of your past wounding is just rehearsing the child’s anger and will not allow her to move to another place.”

A Course in Miracles and the 12 Step Program: This addictive, repetitive defensive behavior is insanity and will change nothing and no one.

How then do we walk through the Gate of Faith?

What I am offering is not Dogma.

It is a set of “thoughts that will if you commit to following them, point the way to you recognizing your own reality, who you are:  What I see is who I have come to VERIFY.  It is who you already are in your humanness,  an imperfectly perfect human person dealing with this adventure called LIFE.

 

The next step on this adventure called life is simple

1. Are you willing to accept yourself for who you are now? Not who you were as a defended and hurt child?

2. Are you willing to accept your emotional reaction as an addiction?

3. Since fear is the final addiction on this planet, are you willing to name yours and let it go?

4. Are you willing to let go of your blame, shame and victimhood and verify yourself instead of judging yourself and each other?

5. Are you willing to KNOW that the first step through the Gate of Faith must be to allow the hunger, and the longing, and to open your heart to yourself ?

6.  Are you willing to know you are safe?

7.  Are willing to know “ALL IS WELL”   --Julien of Norwich

 

I gave this assignment to my students. I am working with eleven women throughout the world and we call ourselves“Sacred Sisters Igniters of the Flame…”  We have sessions on Skype, and then these students write to each other of their insights.  I have not met six of them in person, and yet because of their willingness the work is transparent and blessed.  The following are three of their answers.  I know my work is changing, and so are my students.  We have to change if we are to bring peace to the world. We are the light bearers.

Mandy Grace wrote:

Barbara, what you are saying has reached my heart and brought me to stillness. I am not running or hiding in this moment. I am ready. In our last session we talked about this very thing. That I am still living my life in the fear of what has already happened. “A wise man learns from another's experience. A fool from his own”......

I insist on the pain. It is not necessary. It's time Mandy, let it go. Let it go. You said that I cannot protect myself from anything that will happen to me. The only "protection" I have is my willingness to be undefended, to be vulnerable". There will never be a place 'safe enough'. Can I be vulnerable with myself? "I am hurting, I need your help. I see you're hurting, how can I help" -- Thich Nhat Hanh. I am hurting because I was hurt. And though I may need a hug, I also want to move on. I can have both... acknowledgment of what has happened without "building monument to it".

So now what? I have begun to pray that despite my doubt, I have the courage and strength to enter those dark areas and touch them with compassion and grace. If I pray for courage, I also pray for the wisdom to realize that I will not be 'given' courage itself, but rather opportunities to be courageous, to practice my faith. I pray that I always find myself somewhere right in between where I was and where I'm going... and that is right here in the present moment of who I am. I am not perfect, and I know this. But I have put a lot of stock in my vanity and I have been building that belief for a long time. I am removing that monument stone by stone, encounter by encounter AND it's working.

I am doing the work and I feel good about that. Ilonka and Lana, thank you for sharing your process. I feel like a witness to the exquisite vulnerability and brilliant light of all my Sisters here. I am so blessed. I am so grateful. Thank you very much for being mirrors and individual opportunities to see myself, to know myself.

 

Mirjana wrote;

Dear Barbara,

Yesterday in our session I learned what truly means to be RECEIVED. Thank you for receiving me, connecting with me, embracing me and helping me with your beautiful heart drop resistances and stories and open up mine while going through pain. Through this pain and tears I felt connected with God again. I am hurting, I am vulnerable but I don’t want to go into resistance, and I’ve been asking God to be with me the whole day. Where there is  G-d, there is light. I could hold my pain and still be with people around me and smile and I felt their respect and love. As [my] resistance to pain dropped, the pain became soft, and there is something about it that glows. From this place people reflect back to me their softness.

Dear Sisters, I appreciate so much your sharing and your beautiful hearts. Not only that I don’t feel alone in what I am going through but I feel more connected to truth, with you and through you as reminders in spirit. I am grateful to you all. Love, M

 

Song: The Prayer by Josh Groban and Charlotte Church (with lyrics)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCzLU8gnWAQ

 

I wish you all the light of the Miracle of Chanukah and a Christ filled

Christmas.

May Peace and Joy fill You.

With gratitude to you all, and in celebration of who we are.

Barbara Azzara