Are You an Empath? Part 2-Tools

It’s actually an asset to have such a finely-tuned vehicle (your body-mind-energy system). In order for it to work FOR you, it is important to listen to it, care for it, have good boundaries and learn how to use your intuitive, empathic gifts. Wondering how to do that? Here are some tools we like:

• Energy Medicine: gather yourself and strengthen your boundaries. Check out Kathryn Brewer’s blog to see her favorites from the Energy Medicine Kit by Donna Eden.
• Salt Water: Make a salt water spritzer using Himalayan Sea Salt. Use it several times a day, especially anytime you start to feel overwhelmed.
• Water: get in it! We are both big fans of baths, jacuzzi’s, creeks, walks along the beach, showers; even sitting and looking at water.
• Listen: When you take the time to pay attention, your skills improve. Nurture your abilities through meditation and relaxation.
• Learn about your gifts by reading or attending classes. For beginners, Elaina suggests the books of Sanaya Roman.
• Awareness: observe what environments seem to be “too much” and avoid them, go there at a better time, or come home and clear yourself after.
• Balance and clear your chakras and energy field. Elaina has three favorite cd’s for this: Vocal Toning the Chakras (Jonathan Goldman), The Bliss of Transformation (QuietStar Band) and Journey through the Chakras (Colette Baron-Reid). Available in our store and online store.
  
• Come to our "Empaths, Sensitives & Intuitives Workshops: Due to popular demand, Robin and I have created a series of workshops for Empaths, Sensitives and Intuitives. We promise to make them fun, relaxing, and share lots of tools with you! We are very excited; we’ve been waiting to co-create a workshop together, and here it is. See Flyer for more info. Register now
  

Thank you for taking the time to nurture your spiritual gifts. With everything going on in the world today, you are needed! Blessings on your path.

Love and Light, Elaina

“Are you an Empath?” Take this test...

“Are you an Empath?” (created by Elaina Geltner and Robin Klickstein)

1. Does it seem like you feel everyone else’s “stuff”?
2. Do world events (especially tragedies) send you into a tailspin?
3. Do you often wonder where “your” feelings are coming from?
4. Not sure about: “What’s mine, what isn’t mine.”
5. Do your feelings make no sense sometimes? (Am I crazy or am I an Empath?)
6. Do you feel more than other people?
7. Do family gatherings leave you feeling overwhelmed and discombobulated?
8. Do you find yourself spaced-out after being in a crowded store or big event?
9. Do people tell you that you are too sensitive?
10. Do you sometimes have food cravings or impulses to behave strangely that don’t seem connected to what you are experiencing?

The Scoring: If you answered yes to more that 5, you can be pretty sure you are an empath! Now what? Stay tuned for the next blog for some tips and suggestions....or look in QuietStar's Summer Newsletter. Join our mailing list

Summer Solstice: June 21, 10:16am PDT

Summer Solstice: June 21, 10:16am PDT. Do your own Ceremony to honor the longest day of the year, and get celestial help for your projects and manifestations! You can make this as simple or as complex as you like. The most auspicious time is high noon today. You could simply go out into the sun and express gratitude for all the life-force energy and soak it up! You could create a bonfire to honor the fire of summer, and connect with all the summer fires that have been created since the beginning of time. Attached are some samples of Medicine Bundles that you could throw in the fire! Make your own or come by the QuietStar store to get one made from our garden.

Using Sound to Ground and Center

I love to have things to listen to that help me ground and center. I am very sensitive to sound and vibration, and love to find things that shift me quickly. Listening to and creating Sound have become tools that I am very grateful to have discovered!

Recently, I added the "Getting into the Vortex" meditation CD by Abraham-Hicks to our store, and I love it. The first night I listened to the meditation, I had this amazing dream about QuietStar's (future) retreat center. I woke up inspired and passionate (and had been feeling overwhelmed before listening). Now I listen to it every night before I go to sleep. In fact, it helps me go to sleep, which is sometimes a challenge.

Tom Kenyon's voice really resonates with me: Lightship, Songs of Magdalen and the Golden Orb all shift my energy to a vibration of love and expansion.

Other favorite sound healers: Jonathan Goldman, Sophia, Dean Evenson

Simply humming balances the "emotional body" (a layer of the auric field), and there is so much research out there about the power of toning and sound. My favorite part is that it bypasses the conscious mind and goes directly to the more primitive/unconscious parts of the brain to create balance and relaxation.

I also love to "do" sound. It connects me directly to Spirit! When I play the crystal bowls, the native flute or use my voice for toning, it brings me fully into the present as all my awareness goes into creating the sound. I started out years ago just humming to Enya, then "humming out loud" and my sound channeling developed from there. All I have to do is remember that I have this amazing tool, and USE IT when I am feeling scrambled. Now I get to "do" sound in my sessions, in classes and at our Sunday Vortex. It is truly amazing!

Tonight, I am excited that we have Jay Schwed doing a crystal bowl concert at QuietStar. I am looking forward to experiencing his great wisdom and learning so much from him! That's his picture above!

3 Weddings and a Fair!

I realized that I have not posted a blog for so long....and I know why! I have been to 3 weddings and did the Transformational Arts Fair. All big rites of passage; events which create powerful transformation for everyone!

The Fair this year (our 3rd annual) was magnificent. Our Fair Committee astounded ourselves with how much fun we had, how much work it was(!), and how much we all grew in our ability to step up and share the wonderful world we live in. After the fair, we have a little celebration and invite the volunteers, exhibitors and musicians. Many people commented on how much LOVE there was...and I am delighted. About a week before the fair, as I was a bit swept away by the details, I went into meditation and asked for help shifting my own energy. And what I got was "It's all about the love!" As soon as that came through, all the stress I was feeling totally evaporated, and I was excited again. So, now that's my new mantra!

There have been lots of requests to do the Fair more than once a year. But that could, perhaps, create a mutiny, so we are cooking up some mini-fairs for you! Stay tuned.....November will bring more opportunities to hang out at QuietStar and enjoy all the love.

A big thanks to everyone who made this Fair happen, including all the volunteers, musicians, exhibitors and all of you who came to soak it up. It was SO worth it for us! (The next blog will be about the weddings...promise!)

Photo Credit: Thanks to Ed Joseph for the great picture of our Love (Closing) Circle at the Fair!
Love and Light, Elaina

The Week of Transformation!

The Week of Transformation! I had the privilege recently to be a student 6 times in a week! (in additional to all that I facilitated). I attended Donna Eden’s Introduction to Energy Medicine, An Evening with Darius (and Linda Mora), Authentic Movement with Raquel Mitchell, 2 Satsang sessions with Lisa Schumacher, who visited with us from Ashland, Oregon, and Reiki 1 with Wendy and Dale. Whew! I guess I inadvertently did my own intensive, while staying right here in SLO! All of them, except Donna Eden, were even at QuietStar.

It was so powerful; I am still integrating! There are so many opportunities for transformation. Each one of those classes or workshops uses a really different approach; yet the goal is basically the same...moving closer to being who we really are and doing what we are here to do in our lives. (Oh, yeah, that would be Soul Path Alignment!) I feel so blessed to have all these opportunities. I am grateful to all the teachers who share so generously of themselves as we receive the blessings and light. And grateful to be living in such interesting times!

I am really finding that being in groups of like-minded people helps me to stay focused on what I want to create and manifest, with grace and love.

How are you supporting your own transformation? Let me hear from you! Love and Light, Elaina

RECEIVE the Transformation

Are we letting ourselves receive the transformation? We are working hard to change, to become more of who we really are. We visualize, do affirmations, use the law of attraction. We are doing our best to be more loving. We are recycling, taking our re-usable bags to the store, shopping at the farmer's market, supporting local business. We are volunteering to give back. But do we take the time to pause, to "receive", to let it all in? My favorite yoga video includes a reminder to "receive your practice". This receiving allows our whole system to take in the change and re-calibrate. Integrating the shifts and transformations requires conscious awareness, too!

Take a moment to breathe in deeply. Review all that you have been shifting. With each inbreath, accept the change. "I accept the changes that are in my highest good. I allow myself to receive the changes that I have created".

I have had the privilege to be at several events since Sunday Circle that brought more of the pieces together. Monday, I attended a Donna Eden (Energy Medicine) presentation, and remembered that I do not need to "live with" things that don't feel right to me. I can consciously change them, even in my own body. Yesterday at QuietStar, I got to be the "student" two more times: in "Authentic Movement" with Raquel Mitchell, I went deeper into my own body to listen and feel what's really true for me. And I felt my body receive more of the transformation I have been experiencing. Then, thanks to Darius and Linda Mora who reminded me last night of this last piece...to accept the change!

I look forward to this weekend, when I get to experience Satsung with Lisa. She is traveling from Ashland, Oregon, following her guidance to share her work with us in San Luis Obispo. I know that I will have the opportunity to receive more of the transformation I have been working for.

Love and Light, Elaina