Going to Nature and the World of Spirit

"The healer, that is the technologist, is instrumental to the Spirit's power to heal, and to make changes in human lives. Thus, one can say to a healer, 'Teach me what you know'; but the better request to make of the healer is, 'Teach me about what teaches you.' Since the source, and home, of indigenous technology is nature and the world of Spirit, to that source you must go in order to learn and grow and evolve."

- A Quote from Malidoma Some

Embracing Your Path Retreat: November 4, 5 and 6, 2011

A retreat entitled "Embracing Your Path: A Retreat to Honor the Serenity, Courage and Wisdom Within You" will be conducted November 4, 5 and 6, 2011 at the Center of Consciousness in Bluemont, VA.   Come together with like souls to further your journey.   We will enjoy sound, nature, creativity, movement and more in an environment of sacred space.   An overview of the retreat is provided below.

Embracing Your Path: A Retreat to Honor the Serenity, Courage and Wisdom Within You

Whether you are on your path, envision your path and/or have lost your path, this retreat will honor the serenity, courage and wisdom within you.   Without aiming to impose a preference for one spiritual path or belief system over another, many of us are familiar with the following Serenity Prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.

SERENITY - Not doormat acceptance or stagnant complacency, but peaceful liberation.

COURAGE - Not tip-toeing by the shore, but steadfastly stepping into the water.

WISDOM - Not beating your head against the wall in hopes of seeing a shining light, but opening to embrace the light that is within you.

For details and further information, contact margaret@birthyourtruth.com .   I look forward to hearing from and working with you.argaret@birthyourtruth.com .

Birth Your Truth welcomes you.  

Namaste - The Divine In Me Greets The Divine In You.

Retreating to Nature

In her September 2011 issue of Transmutation News, Sandra Ingerman writes about the Healing the Heart Study conducted with the University of Michigan Medical School’s Program for Integrative Medicine. Participants in the study's Medicine for the Earth spiritual retreat showed immediate, 3 month and 6 month follow-up improvement confirmed through testing the measurement of depression and hopefulness.

While Sandra wrote about many of the techniques such as meditation, guided imagery, drumming, and journal writing that were utilized with the heart patients who participated in a Medicine for the Earth spiritual retreat, I am noting herein the link to nature as it can help with regaining one’s sense of well being.   She wrote “ … And the earth, air, water, and the sun give us life. We went outside to sit with a tree as a time to relax and feel our connection with the heartbeat of the earth. And then we took short walks in nature while appreciating all that the earth, water, air, and the sun give us so that we may thrive.”

Connecting with the Indigenous Path

In the 2011 written words of Malidoma Some from "What it Means to be Indigenous" he says, "So, indigenous is a kind of connection that makes us one with Nature, Fire, Water, Earth, Mineral and the Ancestors.   Inside such a connection is a being that shows deep respect and reverance to all that is."

Meaningfully explore as well as embrace your connection for health, well-being and the fresh breath of transformation.

Give birth to your truth!

Namaste.

Embracing Nature for Wellness and Healing

"Traditional healing restores balance between the person, community and the spirit of nature."   This is a quote from "Get Green When You're Blue. Nature's Remedy for Depression"., a September 1st healthy living blog from the Huffington Post.

In the blog post's section on ancient wisdom it is referenced that within the indigenous Nuu-Chah-Multh community "it is understood that cultural diversity and biodiversity cannot be separated: They coexist in the same continuum physically, emotionally and spiritually."

Nature both beckons and awaits you therein delivering opportunities for wellness and healing.

Namaste.  

Special Offerings for September 2011

Throughout the month of September 2011 many Energy Medicine Services identified in an earlier blog post entitled "Energy Medicine Services with Birth Your Truth" will be offered with a 25% cost reduction.   This includes the Personal Medicine Retreats.
  
In addition, up to three(3) Sound Circle as Medicine experiences will be conducted in the privacy of your home for up to six(6) people at no cost.   While there will not be a fee, donations will be accepted.

Contact margaret@birthyourtruth.com for specific information, and further visit this blog for general information.  

Energy Retreats with Birth Your Truth

Within the energy medicine services offered through Birth Your Truth are three(3) distinct energy retreat offerings.   Any specific dates, locations and/or additions will be communicated separately.

Personal Medicine Retreats

This one-on-one personal retreat is customized to focus on the "medicine" that lies within you as well as the "medicine" that can be brought to you.   With the goal of energy alignment, whether a half day or a full day this is a purposeful "stepping stone" to further your journey.   Contact margaret@birthyourtruth.com to explore the customization process that will best work on the intent to ... Birth Your Truth.


Embracing Your Path: A Retreat to Honor the Serenity, Courage and Wisdom Within You

Whether you are on your path, envision your path and/or have lost your path, this retreat will honor the serenity, courage and wisdom within you.   Without aiming to impose a preference for one spiritual path or belief system over another, many of us are familiar with the following Serenity Prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.

SERENITY - Not doormat acceptance or stagnant complacency, but peaceful liberation.

COURAGE - Not tip-toeing by the shore, but steadfastly stepping into the water.

WISDOM - Not beating your head against the wall in hopes of seeing a shining light, but opening to embrace the light that is within you.

Birth Your Truth welcomes you.   Namaste.   For further information, contact margaret@birthyourtruth.com .


Womb Wisdom Gathering: A Retreat to Free the Divine Feminine Within You

The Womb Wisdom Gathering Retreat with Follow-Up Days represents a sacred opportunity and a specialized self commitment to say, "Enough.   I can not, and I will not live like this anymore."   It is designed for the woman for whom life after ... abortion, adoption, hysterectomony, miscarriage, stillbirth and/or rape has been quietly or loudly governed by the wounds which have been left behind.   Understanding that everyone's experience is their own, if this speaks to the core of your being ... participating in a womb wisdom gathering designed to free the divine feminine within you ... is meant for you to "give voice", for you "to be heard" and for you "to release yourself" within the blessing of sacred space.      

Again, Birth Your Truth welcomes you.   Namaste.   For further information, contact margaret@birthyourtruth.com .

Cross-Cultural Yearning ... to Be Well

The following is reprinted from the blog Well Part Coaching - LLC - Be Well and Margaret's posting therein dated October 26, 2010.   Since that posting, restated below, I have continued my purposeful visits and seen the broadening of cultures as represented through their people yearning to be well.

Valuing self-care and originally following the referral of a colleague, I have become a regular patron of Spa World in Centreville, VA. Spa World is identified as a 24/7 Asian-style spa promoting health, beauty, leisure and life. All word of mouth communication that I have received references a Korean-inspired spa with a clear focus on preventive health.

While there is definitely a beautiful grounding in and relationship with Korean culture, recently shared conversation in the "Ice Poultice Room" was amongst those with heritage from the United States, the Ukraine, the Sudan and Afghanistan. It spoke to the cross-cultural significance of well-being. Wherever we are from ... whatever our ancestral roots ... we all yearn ... to be well.

To learn more, visit www.spaworldusa.com . In the interest of advance disclosure, please know that along with the unisex, fully clothed/uniformed services such as in the wonderful poultice rooms, relaxation great room, foot massage room, fitness center, restaurant and juice bar, the single gender water massage therapy and body scrub/massage services within the bade pool area require each recipient to be fully unclothed.  

A Story Told - The Birth Your Truth Logo

Over a year ago I had the pleasure of meeting Natasha Smoke Santiago at the National Museum of the American Indian.   Upon looking at her work, inquiring about the depictions of pregnant women and talking with her directly, I knew immediately that she was "the one" to commission for the artwork needed to represent the story of "Birth Your Truth".   I was honored when Natasha accepted the request for logo design and belly fulfillment.   When I consulted with her regarding the possibilities, it was an affirming experience to receive "confirmation" that she was the right choice.   Her artistry touched my soul.   For further information about the artwork of Natasha, visit http://www.storytellershouse.com/ .

With African, Bajan/Barbadian and Native American ancestry within her, Margaret is a woman of color who may be deemed as having an affinity to provide a tailored service within that niche.   Further, although women tend to become more engaged in these processes, it is important to note that the work of Birth Your Truth is inclusive of men as well as women and is multicultural.  The embracing of diversity within gender, culture and perspective is central to the work   While Native American practices have always been and will no doubt always be a driving force, a workable balance of the integrity and/or integration of cultural perspectives is vital.   As depicted in the logo, the focus is on birthing the truth of people from all nations - red, black,yellow and white - while accessing the heart and freeing the spirit.

Energy Coaching Circles with Birth Your Truth

Within the energy medicine services offered through Birth Your Truth are three(3) distinct energy coaching circles.   Designed to meet the needs of the client populations for which they are expressly designed, each has seven sessions in honor of the 7 sacred directions as well as 2 individual coaching sessions which provide a further opportunity to embrace the birthing of your truth.   With a series starting in October 2011 and then another starting in April 2012, more information will be introduced by mid-August.   In the interim, know that there will be circles for the Emerging Healer, Evolving Seeker and Heal Thyself Practitioner.   The significance of each of us having our own journey to be traveled with a healthy balance of integrity, personal responsibility, healed healing and self-care will be discussed.   For basic information regarding this perspective, visit an earlier post entitled, "Healed Healing" - Integrity in Energy Work"    It was dated July 10, 2011.   Namaste.

Energy Medicine Services with Birth Your Truth

As "the divine in me greets the divine in you", the following energy medicine services allow for a match with your own special and unique journey.   For any consultation or inquiry, contact margaret@birthyourtruth.com or call me directly at 571-527-9606.   I look forward to connecting with you.

Bach Flower Remedy Formulas

Shamanic Reiki Energy Sessions

Shamanic Energy Work and Coaching Packages

Soul Retrieval Ceremonies

Energy Coaching Circles

Home Cleansing and Blessings

The Sound Circle as Medicine

Personal Medicine Retreats

Embracing Your Path Retreats

Womb Wisdom Gathering Retreats

"Healed Healing" - Integrity in Energy Work

The following is reprinted from the blog Well Part Coaching - LLC - Be Well and Margaret's posting therein dated October 10, 2010.

In the midst of steadfastly engaging in personal work, those similarly on a path of healthy transformation have the powerful potential to intentionally and/or naturally contribute to our journey. Alongside individual responsibility for one's own work and one's own well-being, is an interconnection wherein a shift in one can energetically impact another despite the distance between them. In the case of Birth Your Truth's (BYT's) distance energy work, there is a mutually understood holding of intention.

From my vantage point the importance of my forging ahead with personal work serves a purpose for me and those with whom I am connected, however, there is a larger goal related to the advancement of integrity in healing facilitation.

In conversation with a shaman and sound healer, a perspective on the concept of the "wounded healer" as having outlived the "punch that it once had" was discussed. This was not to dishonor the authenticity, perspective and value that the challenges of life deliver, but to emphasize that what is really needed are "healed healers", healers who themselves are willing to do their work and practice on-going self-care so as to enhance their capacity to work with others who themselves are committed to their own healing journeys.

In thinking of my emerging energy work, I think of it in the following ways.

1. Personal Work.
2. Portrayal of Commitment to "Healed Healing".
3. Exemplification of Mindfulness and Integrity in Energy Work
4. Demonstration of Healing Practices that When Embraced Both Advance Personal Work and Provide Lessons Learned Regarding the Facilitation of Healing in Others.

I am blessed to have an ever-growing circle of like-minded and evolutionary people with whom I interact either casually or formally, circles holding sacred places and honoring sacred purposes.

Embracing the words of a great movie line, "You have to surf beyond your comfort zone to catch the next great wave of your life.

Birth Your Truth's First Blog Post: The Poem - Intuition's Legacy

This is the first blog post for Birth Your Truth.   It serves as a meaningful reflection upon breathing life into the vision which gave birth to this mind, body and spirit entrepreneurial endeavor, an energy spa.

The following poem comes from the book, Earth Medicine: Ancestors’ Ways of Harmony for Many Moons by Jamie Sams.

Intuition’s Legacy

There is a place inside us

Where we feel what we know.

If we act on that intuition,

Doors open, urging us to grow.

The legacy of inner knowing

Comes from Great Mystery’s grace;

Learning to trust these feelings

Is a talent we develop and embrace,

Ultimate trust of the Self,

And inspiration’s guiding light,

Allows humankind to develop

The rare gifts of second sight.

When we embrace growth potential,

Feeling -- with all that we are --

Then the legacy of intuition

Allows us to reach for the stars.

Nothing outreaches our senses,

Nothing is too hard to attain,

We serve the truth through healing

The limitations our minds contain.

Intuition is born from reflecting all the senses that we can feel,

Then implicitly trusting that knowing

Gives the guidance that allows us to heal.

Have a beautiful day … with many more to come!

Namaste: The divine in me greets the divine in you.

Margaret