Now,
With your eyes still closed,
I want you to visualize the full moon.
And imagine the light of the full moon coming down and shining upon you,
Sending that rays of healing energy down through your body,
Starting from the crown.
As it enters,
Fills and surrounds your crown chakra,
Visualize violet light.
As it goes down into the body through the core channel to the region of the third eye,
And as light turns into a deep indigo,
Going down further into the throat,
Visualize a blue light surrounding and filling this throat area.
And further as it goes down into the chest to the heart region,
The anahata chakra,
Visualize a green glow in this area.
Further down as it enters into the manipura chakra,
The solar plexus,
A golden yellow light just like sunlight,
And allowing that to go down further into the sacral towards your belly button,
And in that area,
This light is orange.
And then allowing that light to sweep all the way down to the base of your spine,
To the Kundalini.
That takes the form of red light.
Allowing this moonlight to wash all through your body,
Removing any energies that you want to release,
Any stagnation,
Any feeling of stuckness,
Things that you've been having a hard time shake off.
Use this time of the full moon and bathe under that light to wash yourself.
Now,
We want to look at our fear,
And it's the most commonly associated with the work of the shadow.
As young children,
We might have feared the dark,
Imagining frightening forces and beings lurking in it.
They're coming close and they're closing in on us.
So we,
More often than not,
Learn to fear the dark,
The shadows,
To fear what they might bring,
What they might stir up.
At the same time,
The presence and the play of shadows fascinated us,
Giving us a fledgling sense of dual nature of things,
Which is the dark and the light,
Obscured and the clear,
Hidden and that which is in plain sight.
Shadows often inspire fearfulness,
However slight that might be.
What's in the shadow,
We might wonder,
As we walk along vaguely ominous,
Poorly lit nighttime streets,
Our stride getting a little quicker.
And when the light gets low,
We often get more alert,
Like our prehistoric ancestors making their way back in the dark,
Stepping more carefully with the senses amped up.
This way of moving through the dark was highly adaptive,
Increasing the odds of survival way back in the day.
Who knew what might be hidden in the shadows?
But today I'm going to help you move towards your shadow and knowing that moving towards the shadow naturally brings some fear,
Both personal and ancestral.
And if this fear isn't overpowering,
It can fuel our steps.
And it's not just the way we may have to deal with the fear that's in our shadow.
But what we may come across there can be greatly relieving.
All of our projections,
Our anxieties,
And those pain that's tucked away outside of our comfort zone.
We'll shine some light into that and try to heal that.
Shadowland,
It's a vast shadowland,
But however forbidding.
We are love skillful exploration and it's dragons aren't actually blocking our path,
But they are essential part of our path.
Our encounters with them ready us slowly,
But not too slowly to make us wise.
Make us wise in using our treasures that those dragons are guarding.
So how do you bring your fear out of the shadow?
I'm going to share with you a few strategies.
First get to know your fear,
Approach it,
Become curious,
Turn on the lights,
And get to know it even better.
Get an inside look at it,
Paying close attention to all of its qualities.
The more familiar you are with your fear,
The less the chances are of you getting controlled by it.
Second,
Get to know its roots.
The expression of your fear might be outside your shadow,
But its origins,
Its foundational roots may be in your shadow.
You may,
For example,
Begin with an obvious case of worrying and then drop below that to an anxiety that has been with you since you were young.
And underlying that may be a survival-based panic that comes,
That's anchored,
And an even earlier time.
Spelunk that,
Get to know your depths.
Third,
Stop shaming yourself for being afraid,
Because everyone has fear.
Whether you admit it or not,
Everyone has fear.
The Dalai Lama had said he sometimes feels anxious,
And the more we shame ourselves and are shamed for being afraid,
The more our fear will be driven into our shadow.
Fear is natural,
But what we do with it may not be so natural,
Such as when we pathologize it.
The fourth is to open your heart to the frightened child in you.
Have as much compassion as possible for the fearful you.
This compassion comes from you,
Who is not in fear.
Don't tell that child not to be afraid or that there's nothing to be afraid of.
Instead,
Be caring and protective enough to hold such fearfulness the same way you would a trembling infant.
Remember that as a child you needed not just love but also protection.
Giving a good parent to your inner child will decentralize your fear so that instead of it holding you,
You are holding it.
Five,
Instead of giving your fear higher walls,
Give it bigger pastures.
Doing so expands you,
Making more room for your fear to shed some of its constrictedness and transition into excitement,
Allowing you more access to contexts other than that of fearfulness.
Fear contracts our breathing,
Squeezing and gripping us as if we are stuck in too small of an enclosure,
Unpleasantly walled in.
Giving our fear more room,
More space,
Doesn't make it worse but rather spreads out its energies,
Diluting its intensity and reducing the pressure.
Six,
Think of your fear as excitement in disguise.
Where there's fear,
There's excitement close by.
Make a hard fist tightly balled up and imagine this is your fear.
And relax your hand,
Letting your fingers spread wide.
This is your excitement,
Open and available.
It's the same energy,
The same adrenaline,
But the context has shifted dramatically.
You weren't trying to get excited,
Simply relaxing your fist freed up your energy.
The fear initially is tightly held in the shadows,
Making conscious contact with it allows it to begin uncurling and allows some light in.
Seven,
Keep your anger on tap.
Take advantage of the fact that fear and anger are very closely related,
Being basically the same biochemically.
Where fear contracts us,
Anger expands us for better or worse.
In fear,
We neither tend to flee or freeze,
We often tend to be paralyzed.
But in anger,
We thrust forward,
Leaning into what angers us.
Our energies mobilize for taking strong stands.
Some anger is a mask for fear,
But plenty of anger is fearless fire.
Flaming through the relational deadwood and obstacles to wellbeing,
Providing a torch that can illuminate even the darkest corners of our shadow.
Eight,
Separate the content of your fear from its energy.
When fear gets into your mind,
You spin out storylines that keep you in dark places eternally,
Thought cages packed with fearful ideas and expectations.
When this happens,
Don't think about your fear.
Instead,
Bring your awareness as fully as possible to your body.
Notice where in your body the energy of fear is the strongest.
Taking note of the sensations there and their detailing.
Stay with this body awareness,
Sensing instead of thinking until you feel more stability.
Sense more than think.
Soften your belly and chest.
Feeling how your breathing moves your entire torso.
Building some awareness on the arrival and the departure of each breath.
Number nine,
Practice courage.
Courage doesn't mean we are fearless,
But that we are going ahead regardless of whatever fear we are feeling.
Start with small acts of courage,
Doing things that are a bit scary,
A bit daunting.
This could mean having a cold shower when you are feeling overly sluggish,
Or saying no to a lunch date with a friend who you know you'll find draining to be around today.
Honor your everyday courage.
Sometimes getting out of bed asks more from us than parachuting from a plane.
And as you practice courage more and more,
Your fearlessness will shift into resolve and action.
If you are looking for genuine transformation,
You need look no further than your fear.
For in it there exists not only an abundance of trapped energy,
But also the very testing and challenge that we need in order to live a deeper and more authentic life.
The dragon's cave awaits us.
However shadowed it may be,
You know where it is,
And you can see it more clearly as you move toward it,
Step by conscious step,
Bringing the fearful you into your heart with your adrenaline,
Not so much fueling your fear as your courage.
Courage and excitement.
And this fear is not just individual,
It is also collective.
It is a collective shadow that we all are affected by.
The American psyche is riddled with fear.
This shows up not just as heightened everyday anxiety,
But also as normalized paranoia.
A widespread affinity for conspiracy theories and unquestioned pull to the security of fundamentalism,
An excessive attachment to weaponry,
And an over-exaggerated aversion to outsiders.
Not just foreigners,
But also non-Caucasian immigrants,
Black socialists,
Non-Christians,
And ironically,
Even the natives.
Building bigger walls won't help cut through such fearlessness,
Their fearfulness,
Nor will finding better tranquilizers,
Nor will being armed to the teeth.
Until a significant number of us face this fear,
Both personally and collectively,
And get to the root of it.
The home of the brave will continue to be a fear-driven land.
I want you to bring your palms together in prayer position at your heart center.
Ask for yourself,
How do you feel right now?
I want you to rub your palms briskly,
Igniting the chi,
Activating the prana,
The life force.
The palms are an energy vortex.
I want you to go ahead and once you feel a nice warm ball of energy ignited between your palms,
I want you to go ahead and cup both your eyes,
One with each palm.
And bless yourself.
My heart is filled with love.
My mind is filled with clarity.
And health reigns in my entire body.
Then bring your palms in front of you,
Facing outwards.
And imagine you are a mirror that reflects the rays of this full moon,
This divine energy coming down upon you.
Towards the world,
Towards some dark corner with someone,
Some people,
Some place could use this strength,
Courage,
Hope.
And I love this light to come upon you and be reflected into that person,
People,
Or people,
Giving them just the lift they need to find their step,
To find their voice,
To find that stride.
Bring your hands back together in prayer position at your heart center.
If you could summarize how you feel right now in one word,
What would that be?
