I just wanted to set aside a few minutes to say Thank You to my mother, to the mother of my children, to my sisters, my friends, and to all mothers and women everywhere.

It is a time for me to give thanks not just to mothering itself, but to the female energy that is in and around all of us.

This is a difficult weekend for me… as it is the first Mother’s Day since my mother passed away. It is also the first Mother’s Day I am spending without my wife since having children of my own.

I am looking forward to Sunday as a time of reflection and prayer. It is a day for me to re-connect to source, and re-commit to my own life’s journey.

These aren’t just words that I am throwing at ambiguous feelings. These past few weeks feel to me like a huge time of transition.

It has been just over a year now since my father passed. I am accepting the end of my marriage in my heart, not just my head, and I have moved through the Winter season, the season in which my mother passed, and fully into Spring growth.

Indeed, I have moved from surviving to thriving. That is a transition I could not have even contemplated a few short months ago.

Winter to Spring. Death to life. Sleep to reawakening. Easter. Rebirth. New life.

My father was quite a character. He had a great light in his spirit that not enough people got to see, in my humble opinion.

He was the type that had a bunch of sayings, and used them often. He was a smart guy… and even though the sayings were a bit cliche - he knew exactly what they meant, and used them with a lot of personality and heart.

As a kid, I just started to tune them out. It is funny to me now though - that I have so many of his sayings replaying in my mind.

One of the things he used to say to me quite passionately was “come down off your high horse”.

Only in my recent self-development and spiritual work have I realized what was embedded in these sometimes heated moments. I would guess my awareness may evolve over time, but my “today snapshot” is this:

1. He cared about me. He cared enough to tell me to do something important.
2. He sensed me judging him and others. He saw a child who thought he had all the answers to life’s problems and complexities.
3. My father was telling me to dismount my self-righteous place in my mind so as to better be able to connect with him and others.

Well dad, I am sorry I didn’t quite make the short journey in your lifetime, but I am here to tell you now - I am off!

I made it!

Of course, that high horse seems to be right behind me — and I have to work at not climbing back up, after all, the view from up there *seems* better at times… you know, looking down on the world and all. But this is where I belong. This feels right… and by right I mean good inside - in my gut. By “right”, I do not mean righteous / justified / valid / good.

You see, for some odd reason, I have spent most of my four decades on this planet feeling like I have to come up with “the answers” to life’s problems. Yeah, I know. Funny… but the world’s problems were my problems. The fate of the world rested squarely on my shoulders.

Starting with my family, extending to my job, and all the way outward - how would anything work and get better if I didn’t work tirelessly and selflessly to come up with solutions… if I didn’t busy my mind with the task of breaking down all the pointless complexity around me. I knew there were others out there like me - but we were of course to busy to find and thus help one another.

I was a text book cynic. I didn’t trust anyone or anything. If it didn’t come from my ego - it just didn’t make sense.

That was the me sitting up on my high horse. That was the me that my dad was trying to help. He reached his hand out to help me endlessly. It haunts me, in a way… just how much he always seemed to know and understand.

How did I get down?

I don’t know, really. Maybe I was knocked off :)

Whatever the case, I believe it is a natural progression and evolution on my path. These past 6 months - I have had a few extreme moments of enlightenment, a few deeply spiritual and personal experiences… but these did not change me in isolation. More so, I feel I have been moving towards this time in my life all along. I was ready for these experiences. My soul was ready to grow.

I will not claim to understand all the forces at work - in fact, that itself is a direct result of the change: I no longer feel the need to know or understand everything.

Because of this, something magical is happening - I am suddenly open to so much more of what life has to offer. All possibilities become available - because I am no longer only seeing what my mind understands. I am Allowing into my life ALL POSSIBILITIES without fear. Now I understand the only real power I have in life is the power to choose how and where I focus my energy. This is also absolute liberation.

As I let in all possibilities, I am also seeing the amazing order and way of things. You can call it whatever you like - God, the Tao, or just call it Love.

You see, I used to be afraid to believe in anything because I didn’t Know. My old self had to Know for sure - because after all, the world was depending on me to get it all right. I HAD TO BE RIGHT. Because I had to be right, I had to know for sure. Because I had to know for sure, I blocked it all out! I had too many mental filters to let it all in.

Now, I don’t care if I am right or wrong. What I care about is doing the best I can. That’s it. I want to feel the best I can. Be as healthy as I can. Do the best I can do for everyone I care about. And it all starts at the center of me.

Now it is easy to believe in my intuition and gut feelings about the world around me because I don’t have to be right to the world. I just have to be right to me… to the me that I am today.

I don’t have to convince anyone else of what I know and experience and feel. Because of this, I am free to know and experience and feel so much more than ever before in my life.

It is like a Chinese finger puzzle. The harder to pull the more stuck you get. When you let go, you are free. When you let go, and when you are free - you see how it really works - you see the truth.

Another way to say this is that you cannot see the truth when you are trying to see the truth. But for me, it came flowing in the moment I truly let go.

Another wonderful shift in my life is that I am surrounded by loving-teaching-learning people in all directions. I see more than ever that every single person is on their own journey in this life.

I feel deeply grateful for all of my interactions on a daily basis. I see how every single person is a teacher and a student. We are all drawn to one another in the right order at the right time.

Although they are no longer here physically, I am learning from my mother and father even now. Here there is a richness and abundance of love and wisdom available to me — if I am ready and open — *if I am grounded* - if I am not sitting up on my high horse!

This is my “coming down off my high horse” story. I know my dad is smiling. And with this, I am sending out a very heartfelt song of appreciation for this amazingly transformative time in my life.

Do you feel stuck, trapped, weighed down, uninspired?

If so, chances are you are ready to move on to the next stage of your life.

What you’ll find here is a common sense approach to moving towards the next phase of your life. Like so many things in life, these are things we all know, but seem to forget, or lose track of in the busy-ness of life.

This is my working framework for embracing change in my life. This approach is simple by design. You can apply it in a day, a month, or a year. The same approach can be applied to any dimension of your life.

Here is one way to think about the different dimensions of your life:

• the body
• physical space
• the mind
• social environment
• spiritual dimension

The hard thing for some of us to accept is that there is no one silver bullet to kill all of life’s problems. Although many in the self help industry get rich off of this mind set, it is up to each of us to recognize the cycles of life, and to not only accept, but embrace them!

To meet this ever evolving need, this approach is iterative. The good news is that it gets easier each time you do it.

I’ll introduce the approach here, and continue to explore these themes in the coming days with some concrete scenarios and examples.

5 Stepping Stones to the Next Phase

1. Choose - only you can change you… the first and most important step is the decision to embrace change and to grow your life.
2. Make room for the new - clean house, let go, give away, embrace emptiness, detox your system.
3. Be & Allow - pray, be with it, meditate, walk.
4. Accept & Receive - be in the flow of life, pay attention, watch as doors open and opportunities present themselves.
5. Express gratitude - say thank you… morning, noon and night!

Here’s a visual representation of these steps:

This is my current integration of everything I am learning. It is not a one size fits all kind of model. But if it helps or works for you - wonderful!

If this framework resonates with you, check back over the coming weeks. I will be exploring these five stepping stones in more depth across the different dimensions.

To find more articles like this, or share your favorites… please visit the main high Vibe it website!

I live in the Chicago area… and today is a day we all have to deal with water in its many various forms - especially the forms of ice, snow, and rain!

But it has brought to my mind some very interesting themes I keep stumbling across.

First, I have lived my whole life feeling physically oriented around water one way or another. In my youngest years, I remember feeling very drawn to and safe with a place we simply called “the reservoir”. It was a set of three connected small man made lakes in my home town - but to the eyes of a small child, they seemed wild and vast.

Soon after that, I became oriented to the closest of the great lakes - Lake Erie. I spent most of my early life near this lake, and visited it frequently.

My family has also always been oriented towards this lake… so much so that my mother, who passed away recently, has requested that we return her remains to that lake.

I also have this vivid memory of going on an all night fishing trip with my father to one of the piers near Huron, Ohio - and watching with absolute amazement and a good deal of fear as the lake began to churn with an approaching storm, and swept up over the pier, forcing us to leave before morning.

I have many powerful memories associated with that lake.

Back in 2000, I moved from that area to an area that to me seemed like a whole new world - the Chicago area. But I was instantly oriented towards another of the great lakes… this time, Lake Michigan.

I drew power and strength from this lake through some very hard times in my life.

More recently, I have moved a little farther away from the lake, but find myself almost equally drawn to the Fox River. I love this river with all of its various moods and twists and turns. Watching it flow through the seasons this past year has been a joyous journey for me. It is always ready to match me in the moment - bring back to my mind the ineffable qualities I cherish in life - resiliency, flow, and the power of nature.

Zooming into the moment, I was wonderfully amused when listening yesterday to a speaker who was delivering a message about how to better tune into one’s own awareness… about how to develop one’s deeper and broader senses, and one of the very first things this person recommended was to drink more water!

And in a fast moving discussion last night with a fascinating group of people, a friend brought up the whole concept of The Hidden Messages in Water, based on the work of Masaru Emoto.

So today, I am drinking more water, having fun with this last little blast of winter, and simply feeling much appreciation for the role water has always played in my life.

Have you ever simply asked for what you really want in life? I mean, a real genuine heartfelt honest asking?

When I first met a group of people who were really into The Law of Attraction, this was the first thing that really struck me… these people really seem to know what they want! I felt like I was in the right place at the right time - I mean, things were really clicking for me, but I felt a little fuzzy on the topic of deliberate intention.

The Abraham-Hicks teachings offer up specific practices to assist with this challenge. And one of the ideas that I appreciated the most on this learning journey was the notion that you do not have to know what you want in order to benefit from these principles, and that it is good enough to simply want to find out!

In fact, even if you think you know, life is an ongoing dynamic process where you are always learning, and your desires will always be in the process of evolving and changing.

There are days when I feel like a toddler in regards to the material I am encountering.

Today was one of those days.

To begin with, it got off to a rough start. First thing this morning, I was terribly thrown off balance by a recurring pattern of disruptive energy in my life.

What absolutely blew me away was this - on my train ride home this evening, I was listening to material that I download last night, and that material specifically and concretely addressed the issue that I hit head on this morning!

Let me restate that a different way.

Last night, I was drawn to some interesting and new material. I mean - really drawn to it… like I wasn’t sure what the heck I was doing, and when I found it, I said “oh - that was it!” - I downloaded it, and went to bed :)

This morning - I hit a wall. A familiar yet terribly unpleasant pattern of energy in my life. It kind of stuck with me and had the wheels turning much of the day - with no real progress or answers bubbling up… and then, on the train ride home, I remembered the material I downloaded last night, and listened to it for a while.

Wouldn’t you know… the exact, specific pesky pattern I am struggling with was addressed head on in this material. It was like a bell going off… and the answer was delivered right to me so directly and with such clarity that it was unmistakable.

Well, I am not saying too much more at this time. I am in the process of reaching out to the author of this material, and can’t yet imagine the possibilities of what is unfolding in my life. It is my intention to remain open to these possibilities.

What will be better is when I am actively and deliberately creating the life I want. For now, I am toddling along, and having a lot of fun along the way!

First things first.

If a garden is what I want, I am first preparing the earth in which it will grow. In fact, that is precisely what my next step is all about - my connection to the earth… my ability to be grounded and to know, versus getting swept away by feelings and emotions.

It is an all important step for me right here and right now. I know this now… in my gut.

I may have gotten to this point sooner had I known what to ask for. My skill in this area is not yet refined. But days like today sharpen my vision, to be sure.

The event at the start of my day was unpleasant - but was what I needed precisely because of how it made me feel… it pointed me in the direction I needed to go — and made me that much more receptive to a lesson I myself sought out the night before!

I am left tonight with nothing but gratitude, and a welcome anticipation for what tomorrow will bring.

My prayers tonight are likewise full of gratitude… and I am asking for nothing but for what I have learned today to sink in a little deeper and for these seeds to take root.