I was married once, and I ended the marriage against much objection and prejudice after I had faced the wrong end of a fire-arm.  I had to struggle for years with the guilt, the sense of failure and the programmed prejudice that was targeted at me and making my life one great misery.

Did I gain from the marriage and the divorce?

Of course I did.  Even during my marriage I had to rely on my own resources, and that made me realise that I was emotionally much stronger than anybody gave me credit for.  I had to find solutions for problems that were not described in any textbook.

After my divorce I was a “sinner” and an outcast.  That forced me to reach out to people who otherwise would have been off-limits to me for ridiculous reasons such as a different religion, language or marital status.  I made great friends and learnt about unconditional Love.

When my 10-year-old son ran away from home in the night, I could not talk to anyone that I knew – not even my parents – to get help, because that would have provided proof of my failure as a single parent – which was predicted all round as part of the culture I grew up in.    It was part of the burden of being a divorced woman in a culture where the institution of marriage was (still is) worshipped.

I found my son within half an hour – and he was quite embarrassed and happy to be home again.  That brought us closer and I learned to listen more to what he was saying, and also to what he was not saying – a skill that has been invaluable throughout my life.

And the other day my boy spontaneously told me that he is very happy to have me as “the oracle on parenthood” now that he is becoming a father.  That was a humbling experience and it made more than 20 years of being a single parent worth every minute.  Without my “failed” marriage I would never have had that experience.  And I can write a book about the other wonderful discoveries I have made about myself and other people over the years since I got divorced.

The Celtic hand-fasting ceremony is far more realistic than any religious marriage vows that I have encountered.

I will quote selectively from the vows that go with the hand-fasting ceremony – if you want to know more, contact me and I will provide a link to the full wording.

“Will you cause him/her pain?
I May
Is that your intent?
No

Will you burden him/her?
I may
Is that your intent?
No

Will you cause him/her anger?
I may
Is that your intent?
No

Will you take the heat of anger and use it to temper the strength of this union?
We will.

The knots of this binding are not formed by these cords but instead by your vows. Either of you may drop the cords, for, as always, you hold in your own hands the making of breaking of this union.”

These vows do not create any unrealistic expectations.  They consider the fact that we are the masters of our own destinies, and that when things “go wrong”, there is not necessarily malicious intent.  Life is about positive and negative experiences, and all these experiences are meant to provide balance.

And above all, the vows are not based on the assumption that “failure” implies guilt.  There is no such thing as failure.  There is such a thing as being blind to the insights we are meant to gain from the relationship.

The lessons we learn and the wisdom we gain from ending a relationship are forever.  The legal and religious paperwork attached to a relationship are not forever.  The guilt and sense of failure may be forever, if you choose to hold on to that for the rest of your life.

Click here to ensure your seat on the seminar planned for 3rd June 2010.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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I recently wrote an article in which I explained that any relationship has a natural duration, after which it ends – unless the people in the relationship hold on to the relationship for dear life.

This raised a question about marriage vows.  Divorce statistics prove to us time and again that despite the religious and legal pressure on us, marriages do not last for ever – they do not even last for a lifetime.

And even where a marriage lasts for a lifetime, people often tell me that they have been desperately unhappy in their “long and happy” marriage because they were forced to stay in it for health or financial reasons or because of social pressure.  In these situations, even though the marriage certificate is there, the marriage did not last for a lifetime.  Who are we trying to fool?

Why do we have marriage vows?

The earliest marriage vows were not between two people.  The vows were between a person and the village that this person joined by means of a ceremony.  The person undertook to help watch over and protect the tribe and the village, in exchange for their protection.

During the Middle Ages marriage vows became a legal contract between families, and it was meant to protect the interests of the two families that were tied together by the union between a man and a woman.  There was not necessarily a religious aspect to this.

Later on the church got involved and insisted on having a public ceremony where a couple made promises to each other “until death do us part”.  Sadly there is so much religious pressure on many marriages that those words become the sentence people have to live with – mostly emotional death, sometimes physical death.  If you are still trapped in a marriage that has technically ended long ago, you will know what I am talking about.

Someone said to me the other day that even though he is divorced, he still believes that a marriage should last “for ever”.  He said that when you get married, you do not decide whether you take the 10-year or the 15-year deal.

Of course you don’t, and even if you could, it would not make sense to choose any duration for the marriage in terms of time.  The marriage – that is the relationship, regardless of its legal status – will endure for as long as the couple teach each other what they undertook in their soul contracts which they entered before they were born.

The religious view on marriage vows has caused a lot of heart-ache, violence and emotional damage.  People are expected to buy into the fantasy that a relationship will last “for ever”.  When reality destroys the fantasy, the church and society heaps guilt onto the “guilty” parties for failing to live up to the fantasy.  When the relationship eventually ends – legally – too often the partners walk away with a sense of failure, rather than with a sense of achievement.  This sense of failure in fact keeps them in the relationship well past its sell-by date.

Do we achieve anything from a broken relationship?  Of course we do.  We just do not acknowledge our achievements.

To be continued

Click here to ensure your seat on the seminar planned for 3rd June 2010.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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Did you have fun discovering the energy field around your body?

I promised to tell you why you needed to rub your hands together.

Ever heard of chakras?

Chakra is the word for wheel in an ancient language called Sanskrit.

There are concentrations of energy at various places in our bodies, including our hand palms.

This concentration of energy, if you are ever sensitive enough to observe it, looks like a two-sided funnel.

Imagine a funnel coming out of your hand palm, with the narrow side embedded in your palm.

Now imagine another funnel coming out of the top of your hand, with the narrow side still embedded in your palm.

When you rub your hands together, you ”encourage” this funnel to spin faster, and this makes your hand palms more sensitive.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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Who is wrong?  The person who is “wrong” is not the one who cheated.  The person who is “wrong” is the one who does not at the end of a relationship step back and do some introspection.

What did you learn from this partner?  In what way did you grow from the relationship?  What was the most valuable thing you gained from the relationship?  How did the relationship make you wiser and stronger?  In what way was your partner the best teacher you could ever have had to learn that specific lesson?

Life is about balance.  For every light side there is a dark side.  And this is the blatantly obvious bit that we like to overlook:  for every dark side there is also a light side.

The closer we get to the natural completion of a relationship, the more we focus on the dark side and the hurt from the relationship.  This hurt gets so intense that we completely forget to look for the light side – the gain from the relationship.

Often a relationship ends on the surface, but that does not mean we get closer to the natural completion.  Think about divorces where the hurt and pain drags on throughout the divorce negotiations – and often for years afterwards, long after the divorce was finalised.

As long as we get stuck on the part of the equation that focuses on “me, myself and I” and “the things they did to me”, the relationship drags on.

Dealing with the paperwork or dividing possessions does not end a relationship.  Getting into another, more fulfilling, loving relationship does not end a relationship.

The only way to end a relationship is to acknowledge how that relationship changed you for the better, and then to thank your partner for being a valuable part of the experience.  Then let go of the relationship and hold on to the learning experience.

Yes, it is possible to thank any partner for their contribution to your growth, even if the partner raped or abused you, or was an addict.  You had that experience not so that it would destroy you, but so that it would help you heal a division inside of yourself.

The secret of gaining from ending a relationship is to acknowledge the nature of that division, and to move from division to wholeness, gratitude and Love.

As long as you hold on to the division and look for someone to blame for your hurt, you will remain divided, hurt and in a dark place.  Understanding yourself comes in small portions.  Accept the small portions and grow from them.

Click here to ensure your seat on the seminar planned for 3rd June 2010.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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Why is it that we hold on to relationships long past their natural end?

Think of a friendship that no longer exists.  Do you still remember how your friend insulted or deserted you?  You gained new friends, but you still feel that hurt.

Remember that supervisor who made your life such hell that you left to get a new job?  You smile every time you think what a sad sod that supervisor is, and how much better off you are now.  Or you still resent the opportunity that you missed as a result of that person, even though you gained much more from the new job than from the old one.

Then of course there is your marriage.  You have known for a long time that there is nothing left of that relationship, but you still hold on.  You cannot get a divorce – or so you have convinced yourself.  You are dying a slow death every day because your partner refuses to change.

Probably the most destructive relationship to hold on to is a marriage, because of all the social and cultural restrictions against divorce.  Somehow we share a belief that a marriage must last for ever, even if statistics confirm that most marriages do not last for ever.

If you end a marriage, does that mean your relationship has failed?  That depends on what you take away from the marriage.

Let’s assume that you decided to end the marriage because you discovered your partner is cheating on you.  Of course the cheating partner is wrong and should carry all the blame.  Or maybe not?

Let us take a step back and look at the situation from a different angle.

You had particular expectations of the relationship.  You made those expectations clear to your partner, who obliged and live up to your expectations.  Everyone was happy and all was well.  You were very pleased with yourself.

Then you discovered that your partner was seeing someone else.  This of course was devastating.  When you confronted your partner they had nothing to say, or they said “it did not really mean anything”, or they said “you won’t understand”.

Did you listen to that?  Did you hear what your cheating partner was saying to you?

It is not pleasant to realise that the relationship was all about you and your expectations.  It takes much effort and sometimes a large leap of courage to look at the face in the mirror and see who carries 50% of the “blame” for a relationship where one person cheated.

Cheating is only the symptom of the lack of communication in the relationship.  Did you ever listen to your partner?  Did you ever ask and discover what your partner really values?

Of course it is quite disappointing to discover that a person does not live up to your expectations.  But in any relationship there are two people and they both have expectations.  One person may have the vocabulary to express their expectations and values, while another person uses their behaviour to express their expectations and values.

More to follow.

Meanwhile, click here to ensure your seat on the seminar planned for 3rd June 2010.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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How do we respond to these changing times?

Therein lies the key.  Times are changing.  How do you normally respond to change?  Do you resist?  Do you cry or try to find the guilty party?  Do you shut up shop and withdraw until things get back to “normal”?  Do you show your worst side?

Or do you find your inner resources and deal with the situation?  Do you feel a greater awareness of yourself and your environment?  Are you aware of the physical changes in your body?

Have you noticed how your senses pick up more information?  Many people have noticed that they have a stronger intuition.  People are asking more questions and getting answers that require them to think in new ways and find new solutions to the daily challenges that confront them.

Where are you looking for leadership?  Are you discovering your own leadership abilities?  Or are you searching for a new religion or political figure or celebrity to imitate?

The question is not how we can get back to how things were in the “good old days”.  The question is how we respond to today, right now.

For example, let’s assume you live in the UK.  You hear about an earthquake in Australia and you say “Gosh, another big one.  What’s for lunch?”

Or you hear about an earthquake in South Africa and you say “Oh dear!  I hope Elsabe’s people are OK.  Maybe I should call her.”

What if the earthquake is in Egypt?  Will you decide to give a donation to a charity and buy some salvation?

And if the earthquake is in London?  Will you find a politician to blame for a slow response?  Will you wait for someone to save you?  Will you burst into tears or get hysterical?  Or will you do what you need to do for your own survival and help others?

This is where my travel experience as a result of the volcanic ash cloud has been an invaluable confirmation of what I have suspected about myself and human nature for a long time.

On this journey I have met fascinating people who served as archetypes of the way we respond in crisis.  I want to thank them for providing me with the experience that I will relate in the next few chapters.

This is the final extract from the book Volcanoes and Other Eruptions. If you want to read the entire book right now, click here to purchase the ebook.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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Are we experiencing more earthquakes?  Or are we just more aware of the earthquakes that are happening because of mass media and the era of electronic communication?

Check out http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsww/ and return to the website over a period of a week.  You will discover that Mother Earth is shaking her shoulders as we speak.

If you know how many earthquakes happen every DAY, you will want to ensure that you sleep somewhere safe every night.

Also have a look at http://www.wordinfo.info/words/index/info/view_unit/4096 for some fascinating information about earthquakes.

And of course there are also now volcanoes erupting and having devastating effects on the lives of some people, as we have experienced recently.

Anyway, it is not as if the planets have stopped for a while and are now waiting to pounce on the morning of 21^st December 2012.  The planets have been orbiting around the sun non-stop and will continue to do so, regardless of who win elections or who sets the next fashion trend.

So what has all these planetary and earthly movements got to do with us?  I have been told that all the above is just some more New Age stuff that has nothing to do with us, apart from being interesting.  Right?  Wrong!  You can run, but you cannot hide.  And you cannot escape the consequences of all these planetary orbits and stuff.

The earth has a magnetic field.  We learnt that in school when we were taught about the north and south poles.  Animals respond to this magnetic field all the time.  For example, birds migrate seasonally.  Baby sea turtles navigate the ocean just after they are born (and they do not receive any training in the bleeding obvious, so they will never qualify to become British or part of the European Union).

And here is an astonishing fact that scientists have discovered recently:  when cows and deer stand in the field and masticate, they face the magnetic north.  Whoopee! My grandfather, who was a farmer, taught me that when I was a little girl.  Farmers the world over have known it for millennia, and it has now become a “scientific fact” thanks to some beardless wonder somewhere in an office who noticed picture on Google and came to this earth-shattering conclusion.

Bats also navigate according to the earth’s magnetic field – a real blessing to them, since they cannot see a thing and have to rely on their “radar”.

How do these animals manage to detect the magnetic directions?  They have tiny magnetic particles inside the linings of their cells.

So do you think you can function without being affected by the earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis?  I am afraid not.  Your body also consists of cells, and you have the same magnetic particles inside the linings of your cells.

When the planets orbit around the earth, the movements impact on us.  We may not be consciously aware of this, but it happens.  For example, research has shown that suicides tend to increase in areas where there are geomagnetic peaks as a result of planetary movements.

Also, police and social workers know to expect higher crime figures and more domestic violence during the full moon.  The full moon appears every 28 days, but we do not have “crime cycles” of 28 days.  Crime happens all the time, and it tends to increase around the time of the full moon.  Why would that be?

Here is my simple understanding: the moon orbits around the earth every 24 hours.  During this time the distance between the earth and the moon fluctuates.  The fluctuation causes low and high tide, because the water in the oceans react to the magnetic pull and push of the moon.

Our bodies consist of 70% water.  To me it would be logical that we react to the same magnetic pull and push of the moon because we are 70% water.  Plants react in the same way – which is why farmers use the moon cycles for planting and reaping harvests.

If we react to the moon cycle in measurable ways, can you get an idea of how we react to magnetic fluctuations based on the movements of the planets?

Of course, we have not really noticed or explored these reactions, because we have been conditioned to ignore ancient knowledge.  Organised religion has a lot to answer for in terms of fear-mongering and teaching people to be oblivious of their true being.

The planetary movements have other effects that we either have learned to live with, or that catches us unaware because we are becoming aware of a part of our reality that we have ignored or even denied.

Have you noticed the change in the weather patterns?  In many countries complaining about the weather is the main national sport.  How many people actually take a step back to ask why the weather is so different?

The tsunami a few years ago was a “natural disaster”.  What if it was a natural occurrence that we turned into a disaster because of our ignorance?

We have become aware of some major earthquakes over the past few years.  Earthquakes happen all the time – we just do not really notice them until they disrupt our lives.

And the most recent “surprise” was the volcanic eruption in Iceland.

Is there more to come?  I do not think we need to be rocket scientists to realise that if the planets continue to orbit towards the predicted positions, there will be more natural disturbances that will affect every single one of us.

And of course none of these events are new.  We have had earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanic eruptions for many years – they are just becoming more frequent and more intense at the moment, and we are physically feeling their effect on a more conscious level.

Next time I will explain what all this means to us in our day-to-day lives.

If you want to read the entire book right now, click here to purchase the ebook Volcanoes and Other Eruptions.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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Geoff Stray wrote a fascinating book (not exactly bed-side reading) called Beyond 2012 – Catastrophe or Awakening? In this book he explains how the Incas, Hopis, Cherokees (all from the United Stated) and the Zulus (from Africa) all have a prophecy that sounds remarkable similar to the Mayan Long Count calendar.

He also provides facts that indicate the similarity with Vedic time cycles, the Chinese, Tamil and Tibetan calendars, and some Hindu prophecy.

Have I got your attention?  There are also correlations with information in the Christian Bible and in Judaic and Islamic scripture.

The bottom-line is:  something big is happening as we speak.

And this will not be the first occurrence.  The previous time this alignment of Jupiter and Saturn happened (about 5 125 years ago), old Noah got suspicious and built an ark – and that is why we are here today.

The time before that (this is about 10 000 years ago), the dinosaurs woke up one morning and . . .  actually, they did not wake up.  They froze to death in the middle of a meal or fight or whatever they were doing.

I suspect that the world was not exactly created on 13^th August 3114 BC – it might have rather been the beginning of the current 5 125-year cycle that we are completing now.

So what can we expect this time around?  More about that later – but it is happening already.

There is another significant event that will happen around 21^st December 2012.

The December solstice sun will cross the Milky Way in precisely the location of the dark-rift in the Milky Way, also known as “the road to the underworld”. The sun will be at the exact centre of the Galaxy.

Imagine that the Milky Way is flat, like a table top.  Now imagine that our solar system is also flat, like a pizza.  Imagine that the pizza has been floating somewhere below the table top for the past 26 000 years (or 25 800 years – who cares), and that it has slowly been floating upwards.

Around 2012 the pizza will be level with the table top, and then it will continue to float upwards until it hovers above the table top.  26 000 years from now, the picture will probably be the other way round, and the pizza will be floating down to below the table top again – correct me if we are here again and I am wrong.

According to the Maya the centre of the Galaxy is the cosmic womb, the place of dead, transformation, regeneration and rebirth. This moment shows the end of the current Mayan Long Count Calendar.

The Aztec Calendar Stone indicates five different eras or Suns. The First Sun began in the year 15 213 BC and ended with the last Ice Age (was this when the dinosaurs got their surprise?  I am not sure). The Second Sun began in the year 11 205 BC and ended with the demise of Atlantis.

The Third Sun began in the year 8000 BC and ended with the Mesopotamian floods (this is where old Noah showed his genius – but why did he allow those mosquitoes to enter the ark?). The Fourth Sun began in the year 3114 BC (the start of the Maya Long Count Calendar) and is predicted to end on 21st December 2012.

According to the Maya, the Fifth Sun will then start, and the ancient Aztec records say: “There will be a movement of the earth and from this we shall all perish.”  To me this sounds like earthquakes.

Read next time about the earthquakes and how they affect you personally.

If you want to read the entire book right now, click here to purchase the ebook Volcanoes and Other Eruptions.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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Now for some basic astronomy.  Do you remember how we were taught in school that the planets orbit around the sun, and the moon orbits around the earth?  The impression was created that although the orbits of the planets have different radiuses and velocities, they each orbit in a perfect circle around the sun.  That is not quite true.

The orbits of the planets resemble the wanderings of a drunken fly – around the sun, but not in a perfect circle.  The fly would follow a circular path, and then maybe retrace its steps before resuming the circular path, or maybe go outwards and then return again to the circular path.

Various beautiful crop circles have been found to resemble these fascinating orbital patterns.

We are aware of the major planets that orbit around the sun – and even that knowledge is changing all the time.  For example, we were taught that there were nine planets evolving around the sun, including the earth and Pluto.  However, in 2006 astronomers voted to downgrade Pluto to the category of “dwarf planet”, along with more than 40 other planets in our solar system.

This gives us an indication of our level of ignorance about what is happening in the world around the earth.

What the Mayans discovered thousands of years ago, was that even these uneven orbits can be predicted.  They made their predictions to cover literally thousands of years accurately, based on their observations of the night skies.

If the Mayan Long Count Calendar is correlated with the Gregorian calendar, then it can be calculated that the world was created on 13^th August 3114 BC. – or was that just the beginning of an era?  The Mayan Long Count Calendar ends on 21^st December 2012.  This day is “the end of time” – that is the end of the Mayan Long Count calendar as translated to the Gregorian calendar.

The Mayans knew that around December 2012 there will be a specific alignment of Jupiter and Saturn on either side of the sun.  This alignment only occurs every 5 125 years.

Is this an exact date?  I don’t think so – not because I claim to know better than the Mayans.   We know that we operate on a 24-hour day and that this day starts at Greenwich Mean Time.  Greenwich is in England, and Australia is on the other side of the earth.  The same day starts in Australia once the earth has completed an orbit around the sun, which is 24 hours later.  So which 21^st December 2012 are we talking about – the English one or the Australian one?  Time is relative, and we are talking about a time frame rather than a specific date and time.

I can hear some people say yes, but why would we attach so much value to the opinion of one ancient tribe?  What if their calculations were wrong or not relevant?

Wait for the next instalment.

If you want to read the entire book right now, click here to purchase the ebook Volcanoes and Other Eruptions.

Love and Light

Elsabe

PS: I am a professional transition coach. I help individuals and businesses to achieve their personal and commercial objectives.

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