Don’t apologize for who you are

Be yourself no matter what they say. –Gordon Sumner, aka Sting

There’s no one alive who is Youer than You. –Theodore Seuss Geisel, aka Dr. Seuss

Our first assignment at the SoulCollage retreat I attended earlier this month was to make a card using only two images. I’d brought a small stash with me in my carry-on, and I asked myself which image was strong enough to carry a card all by itself.

This one, which I’d chosen at my very first SoulCollage workshop and saved ever since, came immediately to mind. The background image I’d found only the night before. I think they’re perfect together, and I love the strong, unapologetic energy of this card.

Toward the end of the retreat, we were assigned to write down a question, draw three cards blind (face down), and ask the cards’ advice about the question.

My question was about how to make nice in a situation where I’d been thrown together with someone who probably wouldn’t have chosen to spend any time with me, and vice versa. This card was the first I drew, and her advice was simple:

Don’t apologize for who you are.

What good advice this is.

Just because someone may be judging, disapproving, reacting, doesn’t mean you’ve done anything wrong. Sometimes that’s just what people do.

Each of our personalities is, in my view, integral to the sacred missions we’ve each come here to carry out. To learn and grow, to love, to face and overcome challenges, to resolve karmic debts, to move closer to the realization that we are all one.

So be yourself, your best self, no matter what they say.

This post is illustrated with my new SoulCollage® card Queen of the Night.

SoulCollage cards are for personal use, and are not for sale, barter, or trade.

 

Advertisement

A bit of natural magic

I’ve just returned from several days at a SoulCollage retreat, and I’m feeling relaxed and mellow. There’s no telling what kind of outrageous thing you could say to me right now, and still get a very mild response.

We each had our own cabins, and mine was a little extra hike away on an adjacent property. The first night I walked back at dusk, about 9 pm, and was surrounded by flashing fireflies–a bit of natural magic, and something I never see at home.

There were lots of beautiful wildflowers, fresh air, a bit of rain, grasshoppers that rose up on black wings as I walked down the path to the road, invisible as rolled leaves when they settled again.

It’s good to get away.

This post is illustrated by one of the SoulCollage® cards I made this past week, Retreat.

SoulCollage cards are for personal use, and are not for sale, barter, or trade.

Faith as substance

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. –Hebrews 11:1, KJV

I’ve been thinking this weekend about faith, and this passage in particular, one I’ve heard all my life. In doing so I’m finding new meaning in it that I never saw before.

This verse seems to me to be saying that faith is actually what the things we hope for are made of. That we in fact manifest what we hope for by having faith in it. And that how we know it’s coming is by looking at our faith. If the faith is there, it will produce results. This will happen.

This post is illustrated with the SoulCollage® card I made today, Faith.

SoulCollage cards are for personal use, and are not for sale, barter, or trade.