I wrote my first story when I was eight years old. It was about a flying dragon, it was seven pages long… no one else in my class had been so ambitious. It was in very big handwriting, simple thoughts, but what I received from the experience was a great sense of freedom and expansion.

Writing could take me anywhere I wanted to go on the inside.  The terrain was safe because I could do it by myself and did not need others to ‘come out and play’.

Writing meant I could be fully engaged in my own mystery world, safe and evolving away from the mainstream, which always seemed so ignorant and boisterous. You see, I am truly a hermit at heart!

I wrote my first book over a very long period, six years  and it’s still not really out there because it was very personal and biographical and there are parts of me that are not as resolved and forgiven as I would wish. Some part is dedicated to success and there are other parts  that are not, because they feel unworthy or wrong or weak and stupid.

Self forgiveness…there is no greater healing tool on earth.

I believe everyone is in a constant dialogue with themselves, trying to find their way through to happiness… fulfillment.

For a long time I felt I had no permission to write because everyone needed me more; the kids, the job, the company, the staff — everything and everyone came first because I had it hooked up that I had to help everyone else into their success before I could have time for my own!

In the end this leaves people resentful and I was on my way when I was stopped by these profound words…

“You are their role model, no matter how hard you try to help them be successful they will never know how to experience success until you show them what it looks like and you can’t do that from the back of the room.
You must walk to the front of the room and be seen for who you are!”

In that moment, I felt as if the scales had fallen from my eyes. Now I had permission to explore the way to my own success through writing; which is a very solitary pursuit. I would feel guilty for shutting everyone out in order to write.

These days I feel as if writing is one of the gifts of my life… that I have such a rich and fulfilling inner world that sustains me and allows me to share my wisdom and my joy with the greater world.

In the mean time, while I was busy putting my writing on hold so I could support my family into their success, they were just busy picking up on my deep resentment so no one was benefited by my martyrdom. Never do it, it’s such a waste of time;  the kids I love so much don’t really understand the details they just feel the energy and the energy was not balanced.

If you feel like writing… do it NOW!

As I write in my new book “Art as a Healing Force”,  I believe… and have a knowing born of experience, that Art, Music, Magic, Meditation and our Experience of God are all rolled into one great  field of energy.

Like a gemstone with many faces, each face represents a different access point to the same world of Divine Force — the energy that allows us to turn inward and fall in love with the God Force as it expresses through ourselves and each other.

From the outside, it may look like it is an access point to somewhere completely different… but once you have begun your exploration in earnest, you will discover as all the great artists always do… that they all lead to the same place — to a personal relationship with The God Force.

My work as an author and my work as a jewelry designer is one and the same. In both I am sharing my experience of Divine Force and in the process I am looking for ways to serve the community.

Ways to empower, educate and strengthen the individual;  to share beauty, creativity, strength. And through these qualities, open the heart chakra, releasing fear and doubt. making way for a new you, better informed, more connected to each other and to your Source.

Healthier and happier and of more genuine service to the world around you — that is what most of us truly desire. We are not really all greedy looking for lots of cash. What we want is the sense of security and worth that cash is supposed to provide us — the ‘safety net’, the ‘security blanket’.

Artists, writers… in fact anyone with true experience will tell you, those things are not actually available through the accumulation of money.  That is a lie perpetrated by those factions that want to keep us all in nice tidy boxes.

Thank God for the artists of the world, they just keep on keeping on.

I am proud to say I am one of these fringe dwellers, through my writing, my jewelry, my gardens, my drawings, my mosaics, my music and my meditation…

I want to help the world around me become more balanced and empowered, in love with the beauty of The God Force as it shines through us into the world and shines back to us from our actions in the world.

It’s never about what you ‘say’ you will do or can do.
It’s about what you are doing now… today!

My advice to everyone is find something you love to do and do it everyday… sing, dance, write, draw, design jewelry, become a blessing in your world and share your joy with others less fortunate.

Chris James is one of Shankari’s voice and sacred sound instructors for Esoteric sound and healing. Shankari wanted to share this article with you, her friends and family…this is the beginning of a new series, be on the look out for more guest writers, and please let us know what you think!

Chris James writes…

Dear Friends

I wrote this article recently about how the gentle voice builds a bridge for all of us. How it’s possible for us all to reconnect to this wonderful instrument.
This builds bridges for the the experienced student to recover their own evolving expression and for the absolute beginner to discover that there is a world of energy and how important it is to connect to it.

with Love

Chris

THE GENTLE VOICE
By Chris James

We ARE all born with beautiful and in–tune voices, and it is possible for us ALL to return to the full expression of this instrument that can express truth and beauty within us.

Remember that your body is your instrument. When a wooden musical instrument is first built, tuned, and played, the wood will align and reform within its structure to this ‘in-tune-ness’. Conversely, if the instrument is played out of tune, or not played at all there is no opportunity for harmonious alignment.

It is the same with our voices. If we are not expressing our truth, what is the vibration that is aligning our bodies? When people are expressing being nice or apologetic, contracted or frustrated, angry, jealous, or malicious, this is not their true voice. Our heart does not get to express truth, our throat doesn’t get to express truth, and our ears don’t get to hear truth. Connecting to our ‘IN-TUNE’ voice is important.

Over the many years I have been teaching the world has changed and so what I present has also changed. The awareness that has energetically developed for me is that what really helps everyone in their self-expression, creativity, singing, and in speaking their truth and being heard, is GENTLENESS.

The awareness and presence of true gentleness is very significant. I know, I practised and taught meditation for many years, but it NEVER took me into gentleness and my inner heart and thence to truly know my self. There was always an intermediary, a guru or a deep conditioning of transcendent awareness, which meant I was always looking outside of myself for something. Even though all the words were saying ‘look within’ the energetic message was, you can’t do it yourself. So now in my presentations on voice work I introduce an awareness of gentleness, and the very first place where this can be introduced is within our breath.  Breath carries our voice, and so the first place we express ourselves IS our out-breath, so we first learn how to allow our breath to be gentle.

Now this sounds simple and it is but I would like you to try something. Close your eyes and allow yourself to breathe gently through your nose, with no pushing or pulling of the breath…  A cool breath comes in from the tip of the nose, at the top of the nostrils, and leaves, warmer, on the bottom of the nostrils.  Allow it all to slow down so the rhythm becomes natural, and eventually allow yourself to rest at the bottom of your breath, and allow yourself to pause and rest there before the next in-breath… simple? What usually happens is that your mind will rebel at that point of pausing because it is no longer running the show. It is also at this point that we can start to make a choice about letting go of the NEED to CONTROL.

Note: to experience a deeper, clear process of The Gentle Breath meditation leave a comment with your email and we  will send you the mp3 file.

As you may know, most voice work is based on getting the voice OUT, projecting out, and breaking through the resistance. Yes this will get ‘a’ voice out of your body, but it cannot bring with it any of your true essence, and is definitely not healing or nurturing. This is not about being compliant or softly spoken.  You can come from gentleness and still have volume, clarity, and strength in your voice and yourself.

So once people have an understanding of gentle breath then they can start to feel what gentle toning is like. What this does is allow the body, in its own natural rhythm, to express in gentleness without imposing any IDEA or CONCEPT of what the voice ‘SHOULD’ sound like. It is at this point where we can start to HEAR the control in our lives, manifesting in a forced, controlled and false tone within our voice, and THEN we have the opportunity to work with and release this.

What is possible then is start to reconnect with our bodies, our stillness and our hearts. With this unfolding awareness we can build new relationships with our bodies, our voices, the rhythms that our bodies love to move to, and each other. This whole process of allowing the voice to emerge with no force and no expectation, enables us to reconnect to ourselves, recognizing, knowing and being all that we are.

So NOW what is able to be brought up and revealed are some of the very old patterns of separation and self-doubt, fear and contraction. These patterns are always reflected in our voice and in what we say, and how we express in our lives.  When these old patterns are exposed and cleared, what is left is the start of true joy and a union with our true selves. This doesn’t have to be ‘big’ and ‘traumatic’, we learn to just observe and let go. What is great about working with our voice in this way is that we can have great insight into where we have been, have the opportunity to start to be honest, recognizing and releasing some old patterns, and then take a gentle breath or two and return to our hearts, singing together again.

Creating harmonious tones with our voices is really quite magical. It creates a joyful feeling of oneness, and brings with it profound healing. There is a sense of union, where we let go of feelings of separation and comparison, and also grow to nurture and cherish our individual path of return to our inner heart

© Chris James 2009

Chris James teaches internationally about the healing power of sound, song, voice and meditation.” Everyone is born with a beautiful voice”.  Through discovering our natural voice, we learn to trust our creativity and intuition, speak our truth…and be heard. Founder of The International School of Sacred Sound and Patron of The UK College of Sound Healing, Chris is renowned for his ability to unite audiences of thousands in song, facilitate intimate groups and corporate conferences. He has led singing at concerts, festivals and seminars for over 20 years. Teacher Training Programmes are conducted internationally.

I am writing “Doing it with the Divine…why be a beggar for love”, for everyone who loves freedom, great orgasms and self-sufficiency.

For the liberated men and women of today.

You’re my audience, the healthy, intelligent, informed man and woman who want to use what you’ve got to make a difference in your life, to your family and your world.

We have inherited a world that despite it’s faults is far more free and fluid than the one our parents and grandparents occupied.

It’s been a long time since Ed Sullivan was only allowed to have Elvis on his show on the condition the new ‘sex symbol’ was not filmed from the waist down… considering the satanic wave of promiscuity in women this was supposed to set off in society!

They never mentioned how Elvis might affect the men in the world audience who immediately wanted to emulate all of his qualities.
Why do you think you were never told all about this? Because it’s dangerous information.

It changes the picture socially and spiritually.

Many ancient religions teach that women cannot become enlightened. They must be in service to men so successfully that God allows them to come back in their next life as a man in order to get enlightened. Doesn’t that sound funky to you?

One of the missions Jesus had was to change that belief. He wanted to convince the world of two new ideas. Yes that’s right, only two new philosophical principles set Jesus apart from all his predecessors.

Two provocative new ideas… that were so seditious they got him killed and changed the future of the earth forever.

The first is Forgiveness. Very seditious idea when revenge was all they knew… a tooth for a tooth and an eye for an eye… Revenge was the accepted rule of law before Jesus!

The second is Equality. Yes, that’s the worst one!

The idea that before God all life is equal!

…No matter what color you are or sex you are or rank you hold in the world of man, all life is important and equal in the eyes of God.

This is what gave Jesus his edge… his seditious remarks regarding the equality of slaves and women and children in the eyes of god and that God is not fooled by a whole lot of pomp and circumstance… God does actually know what is going on behind the scenes.

Christianity is a religion that over time split into many different sects.  St Augustine, a terrible womanizer in his youth who could not control his sexual urges is responsible for the terrible attitude of the church toward women. As he became older Augustine regretted all his wildness and wrote prolifically and convincingly that women were put here to tempt men into sinful behavior.

The only way to protect yourself from sin as a man was to control the wanton ways of women by restricting their every movement, keeping them “barefoot and pregnant“ until their death from over-work!

It took the Christian world five hundred years to work through the accumulated effects of St Augustine’s guilt, sense of powerlessness and self loathing. Now we are socially expressing those profound words of Jesus …

“In the eyes of God you are all loved equally”…

This is not to say God wants everyone to be the same in order to please the Divine… we are not the same.

In fact we are all of us unique sparks from the Divine Fire.

We can be similar however each of us is on our own unique journey back to ‘the source of all life.’ We are expressions of the Divine Fire, each of us far more powerful and useful to the world when we are in touch with that essence within us that is closest to the Divine… Kundalini, the access point for communicating with the Divine that everyone in the world can find and use in service to the peace and prosperity of the earth and her people.

I trust you will enjoy the journey as I guide you in discovering new worlds of pleasure and Divine Connection that is literally available at your finger-tips!

If you didn’t already download your free chapter on Sexual Breathing then you can get it here now…

Comment if you dare…

If you are bored and despondent, in need of motivation and fresh ideas, this day, the 1st of May, has the power to change your life for the better.

It is a time to ‘transplant’ your energy into a new ‘fertile field’ with ‘summer grasses’ filled with sensual pleasure and Divine Delight.

So what is Beltane all about?

Why use this ancient Celtic Ritual Day as the launch date for my new ebook, “Doing it with The Divine… why be a beggar for love?’ The month of May was named for the Celtic Fertility Goddess of the Earth, ‘Mai’ who was celebrated at the beginning of summer each year…

Why not use the Spring Equinox for such a celebration?

Yes, the Spring Equinox in late March represents rebirth …it’s a good time to rid yourself of bad habits… but Beltane (also known as Balefire) on the other hand is like the innocent younger sister of ‘The Great Mother’ who is present at the Spring Equinox, waiting for her moment of maturity and fertility…

On the first day of May, she was annually ripe for ‘the taking’, officially a woman…

Think of it… the nights were long and the days were warm at last! It was a time of fragrant grasses and birdsong after the long cold European winter. This new freedom was celebrated broadly.

“The Night of Fires”… The Eve of May Day (April 30th) was the eve of the Festival of Beltane or Balefire (Looking at this word ‘Balefire’ it is clear that the word ‘bale’ is still in our language and refers to the same thing… ‘hay’…) the people celebrated the change of season by the lighting of great bonfires fuelled by the old bedding and flooring of the previous year.

This vermin filled hay and sweet grass, was brought from all the homes of the villagers to the fires as a symbolic form of physical, spiritual and ritual purification… these community fires were strategically placed on mountains and hills of ritual, religious and political significance, to lend power to the most important festival of the culture… the annual celebration of purification and fertility for the year to come.

I don’t know about you, but I feel like I would like to activate that energy in my own life on the 1st of May this year… what do you think?

For the Celts, Beltane marked the beginning of the warm season when the herds of livestock were driven out to the summer pastures and mountain grazing lands. The spring lambs were big enough and every ram out in the fields was making love with the ewes… It was a time of warmth and fellowship. This was a culture not unlike Bali today… a community that relied on each other for survival…

Boughs of Juniper or other aromatic herbs were thrown on the fires to add an additional element of purification and blessing to the smoke. In some districts people and cattle would pass between two fires to purify themselves. This was echoed throughout history after Christianization, with lay people instead of Druid priests creating the need-fire on the eve of Beltane.
The festival persisted widely in country regions in Britain up until the 1950s, and in some places the celebration of Beltane continues even today…

Leaping through or over the flames of the ‘Balefire’ is a more recent custom developed from the original rituals and performed as an act of purification and to bring ‘good luck’ for the year ahead.

They are said to be jumping the Balefire in honor of the God Bel, Baal or Balder. (Note the linguistic connection to ‘Bali’… a place where the Goddess is still worshiped every day.

I find it fascinating that this is the same name given to the fertility God the people were reported to be worshiping in the Bible at the time of Moses… the Egyptian Pharaohs etc, when he went up to talk to the burning bush on Mount Sinai.

Is it possible that the Church of the middle ages used the local word (Bale.. (of hay) or a derivation of the word to describe earth worship? …when writing up The Holy Bible for the people of Europe? Or is the word so universally used that it transposed from the middle East in BC to the local villages in Britain in the late middle ages?)

The Catholic Church, try as they might, could not stamp out this ancient pagan tradition.

So who did stamp them out for the mainstream?

The dour (Sex fearing) Protestants, suppressed “May Eve” celebrations in England when they came to political power in the 16th century. They passed and enforced laws against public gatherings around Maypoles with their accompanying dances and fertility rites. Why was the Maypole Ritual considered an affront to the Protestant Christian God?

Raising the Maypole represented the “Divine Erection” and was a ritual sexual act performed by the men of the village. The pole represented the penis of the Male God Force, and the hole it entered within the earth, which was dug and prepared by the women, represented the yoni or vagina of the Earth Goddess.

Bright ribbons fall from the top of the pole, and are woven around it as dancers raise the energy through joy, symbolically fertilizing the Earth’s body so that She would be fruitful during the growing season and provide a bountiful harvest. (When finished their weaving these ribbons look remarkably like the interwoven strands of our DNA.)

From ancient times, up until the 16th century after the dance was completed, couples disappeared into the freshly ploughed fields to take advantage of the energy roused by the fertility rituals… A community service to ensure fertility for their crops.

The children born of these sacred sexual unions were considered ‘gifted’ and often trained to become the next generation of Druid Priest or Priestess… no wonder the Protestants were against it!

There are Modern Mystics across the world who are resurrecting these old traditions in honor of the earth and The Great Mother of All Creation in dynamic relationship with ‘Great Spirit’… the Masculine aspect of the God Force.

Leaping through or over the flames of the Balefire is a more recent custom performed as an act of purification and to bring good luck. Choosing a stranger of the opposite sex is an invitation to the fields later on…chuckle….chuckle

Beltane is a time to be dancing naked under the moonlight, twirling ribbons around the pole, laughing and flirting with one another. This is the true Valentine’s Day of the Solar calendar.

Alternative Beltane Rituals:

Ranging from the simplest to the most outrageous…

1. Transplant a seedling tree you love into the ground where it can grow big and strong, with its roots penetrating deep within the earth… symbolizing the interwoven nature of life in all forms… with prayers for fertility and abundance.
2. Offer someone you love a massage and spend an hour worshiping The Goddess through service to the body of another….
3. Some people like to blindfold themselves in their own private room or area and light incense and let their senses and their imagination carry them away with the green man of the forest…
4. Beltane usually brings good weather, sweet winds, and a new start. Spend some time with candles burning and incense, and pray to the gods and goddesses, your guides and angels. Tell them of your troubles and then walk outside and kiss the ground. I’m not asking you to suck the dirt… you can kiss the grass… or if you are really paranoid, why not a flower? ..Don’t go smooching topsoil, try to find a grassy area and be with nature and her bounty… Spend as much time as you can outside, (remember to stay warm).
5. Also, this is a good time to call upon the Sidhe or fairy realm.. and the nymphs. They come out from the ground, trees and rocks where they have been hiding to stay warm all winter long. If you see anything flash silver like a single piece of glitter floating in the air, that is a sign the Fairy Realm are close. Nymphs can be seen as a blur… as they prance, dance and fly around you, if you are quiet and creative you can hear their laughter on the breeze. If you ask them politely to play a sensual game with you, they will!
6. Or then again you could always take yourself into your full erotic imagination and dance with the Divine Consort on the night of Beltane….our world is overpopulated… I am sure the Goddess of fertility would be happy if you were dancing for the success of your creative projects and the protection of your home and family…

The celebration of Kundalini in action is a true parallel to Beltane and the reason why I have chosen this date to be the date I release this very special book… I trust that this book “DOING IT WITH THE DIVINE… Why be a beggar for love?” and the information and stories shared within will open your heart and mind, heal your body and spirit, awakening you to a new destiny upon the earth.

I believe with this information you can access new vitality and celebration in each moment of the rest of your life, no matter your age today…. Since we already know, nothing dies, God is simply not that wasteful… everything is in a constant state of change, through our genuine desire for evolution, we keep moving on…. To the Light…

The Great Mother of All Creation is kind and loving, forgiving and caring, she is quick to heal your aching soul. Her consort, Great Spirit is the Holy Father to her Divine Mother… full of love and protection, strength and power… may they become your intimate friends in many forms…