People often come into East West and comment on the smell, the dreamcatcher, or just the peaceful ambiance. As an employee, however, it becomes easy to take the beauty of our store for granted. The other week, however, I had the opportunity to visit California for a spiritual pilgrimage with some friends. California is where the great Indian swami Paramahansa Yogananda first made a headquarters for his new church. We went to Encinitas, where I visited the gift shop at Yogananda’s Hermitage. The effect of entering into a space such as that was tremendous. The lighting, the architecture (the building is a cluster of circular rooms) the statues of gods and incense, and the wood furniture – it all combined to create a place that is distinct from the outside. I finally had an understanding of the immediate effect a place as mundane as a store can have on a visitor.
What is Reiki and how can it help? Reiki is an ancient healing art which has been said to date back far beyond the documented beginnings with Dr. Mikao Usui in the early 1900’s. REIKI comes from the Japanese word meaning Universal-Life-Force-Energy. It was used predominantly in the Eastern Hemisphere and even by doctors as well having healed tumors without surgery. Today, Reiki and other energy work is recognized and used worldwide as a safe alternative for ailments.
We, as with everything in existence are made of energy, with humans having 4 energy bodies comprised of emotional, mental, physical and spiritual. When one or more of these bodies is out of balance, it can create many forms of discomfort or dis-ease.
Have you ever walked into a room and felt old or negative energy suddenly pull your mood down? Or perhaps after a long day of work you come home feeling like you took home with you a pile of stress, your co-workers problems and other energetic burdens. Even when moving into a new apartment or home, or taking home something second-hand, you might sense old energy lingering. Luckily in our modern world we have easy access to tools and supplies to help clear out old or negative energy in ourselves, our possessions and our space. This is a quick in-a-nutshell guide to clearing your space. White Sage: The burning of white sage is also known as Smudging.
Here we are, friends. Another significant retrograde -- this time with our friend Venus.
Venus retrograde periods tend to be quite personal in their effects.
This article, however, is intended to help us understand what this retrograde period has to say at the collective level, because it is incredibly poignant and powerful.
From an evolutionary perspective, this Venus Retrograde ushers us through another gateway. It gives us an opportunity to work through patterns of surrender and sacrifice -- particularly those that stem from violence and repression of all things feminine -- female bodies, the body of the earth, feminine essence and feminine expression. Within it, we can learn something about the antidote to self sacrifice: groundedness in personal power and awareness of our worth, needs and desires.
As I write this, the sun has come out and a swarm of ladybugs has landed outside my window. Ladybugs are a sign of good luck and kindness, including kindness to oneself.
The perfect symbol. After all, my blog topic today is kindness to self. And in that pursuit, it’s been my great fortune this week to interview Corinne Cayce, the great granddaughter of the late Edgar Cayce who was known as “America’s greatest psychic.”
Corinne Cayce is coming to East West Bookshop on Saturday, October 20 for an all-day workshop. This is one not to miss. As a working mother, Corinne is the first contemporary Cayce woman to carry on the family teachings. Her approach is kind, esoteric and practical -- in line with the Cayce legacy.
On Monday, October 8 at 8:47pm we have a New Moon right smack dab in the middle of Libra. Libra is the sign that is normally about balance, harmony and beauty. Perhaps this New Moon will offer a chance for some respite, or a coming back to center. The astrological, political and social context, however, speaks to the emergence of something deeper.
This lunation is ruled by Venus, now in the initial stages of her retrograde through Scorpio. Any retrograde invites us to go inside to reexamine our truths, but this one is quite forceful, demanding an honest look at our motivations, manipulations, needs and desires at a soul-level. The New Moon is also squared by Pluto -- the planet with a natural affinity for Scorpio, underscoring and echoing the transformative qualities of the lunation and the moment we are in.
This is part three of a multi-part series summarizing “Education for Life”, the philosophy behind our curriculum. Reading these articles will familiarize you with the principles and ideas that make the Living Wisdom School a unique educational experience. Please check our site regularly as we post synopses of additional chapters from this original and pioneering text.
Reason Must Be Balanced By Feeling
In chapter three of Education For Life, the author digs into one of the most important topics concerning not only education, but the human experience: questioning the current paradigm of reductionist, materialist culture. Kriyananda calls for an observance of human nature (and human consciousness) in the realm of education, scientific rigor and understanding of the world overall.
No other stone is quite like nuummite, one of the recently discovered stones of the “New Consciousness.” Nuummite shows distinctive qualities, as the oldest mineral on Earth!
Although rare, nuummite sits inconspicuously near the entrance of East West Bookshop, available for less than a Venti coffee ($4). Like most people, I might easily have bypassed it without thinking.
Fortunately, nuummite let its presence be known.
As one of East West’s in-house psychics, I often help customers choose an appropriate crystal. I love doing this! So when a customer walked in, requesting a stone for protection, I gladly volunteered my services. I didn’t have to search far. I felt an immediate strong pull from one of the plain black rocks. I bent a few shelves down, to get a closer look at the rock that had “broadcast” itself so loudly.
The Bhagavad Gita, the sixth book of the Hindu epic The Mahabharata, has been translated into over 75 languages, and in English alone has 300 published translations. This book, often considered the Hindu equivalent to the Christian bible, has been cherished by not only prominent spiritual figures, but also authors such as Aldous Huxley, Henry David Thoreau and Herman Hesse; political figures such as Gandhi and Steve Bannon; and scientists such as J. Robert Oppenheimer, who famously quoted after the first nuclear test "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." Have I convinced you that it is a big deal? It would be easy to say that the work on this book has been done. It would also be easy to feel that tackling this work should be left to the experts. But then again, the book itself would unravel those statements, emphasizing that our “dharma” should be done, no matter how difficult the task at hand. Amit Majmudar, a radiologist and writer from Ohio felt that it was his dharma to give this ancient text new life in a translation he calls Godsong.
Paradiso and Rasamayi will be visiting East West Bookshop on Saturday, October 6 and Sunday, October 7. Here is a written transcript of a recent interview with the sound healing duo.
Paradiso & Rasamayi, could you share a bit about your paths as sound healers? What drew you to this work?
We share a deep devotion to the spiritual path and to safe, gentle and powerful healing modalities. We have both had profound peak spiritual experiences in Sacred Sound. In addition to spiritual growth, our work connecting with sound frequencies also has brought us complete and rapidly accelerated healing of emotional and physical dis-ease (including cancer, depression, parasites, Lyme's co-infections and more). We have been offering this work for a combined 35 years, and 10 years working together full time! We continue to dedicate our lives to it because of the many attendees who have enjoyed and reported similar benefits.
My friend reached out to me a few years ago. She wanted a Tarot deck for her precocious daughter’s eleventh birthday. She was having a difficult time finding a deck that didn’t feature, in her words, skinny European looking fairy people. “That’s easy”, I told her immediately, “she’ll love the Wild Unknown deck. I’ve been looking at it for ages. There are no people, its hand drawn, the color is sparse and painted with water colors. There are animals, and the impact is visceral.” On my birthday which followed a couple of weeks after her daughter’s, my friend surprised me with my own Wild Unknown deck. I was beyond thrilled to receive the deck that I had been coveting and touched to be a part of the long-standing tradition of being gifted with a deck.
