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Cyndi Dale: Discovering Your Subtle Body
Cyndi Dale is a renowned intuitive healer, bestselling author, and recognized expert on energy healing. With Sounds True, Cyndi has published the seminal The Subtle Body: An Encyclopedia of Your Energetic Anatomy and The Subtle Body Practice Manual: A Comprehensive Guide to Energy Healing. Sounds True will also be hosting Cyndi’s upcoming online course The Subtle Body Online Training Program. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon speaks with Cyndi about the many extraordinary experiences and important lessons that brought Cyndi to energy healing. They discuss the basic structures of the subtle anatomy and how physical ailments often have energetic causes. Cyndi explains her understanding of the chakras and details how people can maintain their personal energetic boundaries. Finally, Cyndi leads listeners in an exercise for recognizing their own subtle energetic field and talks to Tami about the “energy egg” that surrounds each of us. (70 minutes)
Bedtime Visualization: Rocketing to the Moon
Bedtime should be the calmest moment of the day with our kids, but often it is anything but. Whether we are dealing with last-minute pajama changes, tooth brushing negotiations, or we’re trying to corral our kids into their rooms, it can end up being an exasperating time for both kids and parents alike.
There are many reasons bedtime can be hard. The first is that we are tired, and of course they are too, so no one is exactly ‘at their best’ at the end of the day. Another challenge for children is that they are about to say ‘goodbye’ to us for the night and that can bring up anxiety about being on their own. Also, let’s face it, falling asleep can be difficult regardless of age. The shift from active to rest is not easy; especially when you add a mind full of racing thoughts—which is typical for children (and adults) when things get quiet at night.
What is needed is a way to help children settle mentally and physically at bedtime. When they feel safe and at ease, falling asleep gets a lot easier. Guided visualizations are tools to support children in using their own imaginations to let their bodies and minds relax at bedtime.
The visualizations in Sweet Dreams: Bedtime Visualizations for Kids ,by Mariam Gates and illustrated by Leigh Standley, engage children in mini journeys to underwater worlds, a horseback ride through a field, and even into space while helping them naturally shift into relaxation. The fun and gentle exercises move them into a calm state which is essential for a good night’s rest. Each visualization is also short enough that it can be easily added as a ‘final story.’
We invite you to try the “Rocketing to the Moon” visualization from Sweet Dreams and see if it helps make bedtime a little smoother for everyone.
Lie down on your back and bring your legs together, pressing your arms tight against your body. You are a rocket ship going to the moon.
Start bouncing your legs to ignite the engine.
10 . . . 9 . . . 8 . . . 7 . . . 6 . . .
Now shake, shake, shake your whole body.
5 . . . 4 . . . 3 . . . 2 . . . 1. BLAST OFF!!!
As you launch into space, point your toes and make yourself as long as you can.
Take a DEEP BREATH IN and a LONG BREATH OUT. Relax your whole body as you sail through space. You are heading toward the moon.
All around you are bright stars and clusters of asteroids. It’s peaceful and quiet.
The moon is getting bigger and bigger the closer you get.
Thud. YOU HAVE ARRIVED.
Step out of your rocket. Bend and extend your legs to make big steps onto the moon like you are walking in slow motion.
You can see Earth in the distance. It is blue and green, like a jewel hanging in the dark sky. Take some deep breaths in and out and think about Earth and how beautiful it is. Think about how lucky you are to live on such a wonderful planet.
It’s time to climb back into your rocket ship.
Take another DEEP BREATH IN and a LONG BREATH OUT.
YOU ARE HEADING HOME.
MARIAM GATES has a master’s degree in education from Harvard University and two decades of experience working with children. She is the author of the bestselling Good Night Yoga series. Mariam likes to spend most days writing, where she can explore underwater depths, fly through the sky, and walk on the moon—all in the same afternoon! She lives with her highly imaginative family in Northern California. Learn more at mariamgates.com.
LEIGH STANDLEY is the artist, writer, and owner of Curly Girl Design, Inc. She creates art for greeting cards, calendars, journals, wall art, and more, and her art is sold throughout the U.S. and around the world. Leigh resides in Boston with her husband and twin little people. She can’t live without yoga, her family, Snickers, and Lucy the Wonder Dog. Leigh believes in magic and is quite certain that given a cape and a nice tiara she could save the world. Learn more at curlygirldesign.com.
Available at your favorite bookseller
Cynthia Bourgeault: When Two Become One: Love Beyond D...
Cynthia Bourgeault is an Episcopal priest, author, and teacher of prayer in the contemplative Christian tradition. She is the principal teacher and advisor to the Contemplative Society and a passionate teacher of Centering Prayer. Cynthia is the author of Love Is Stronger than Death and The Meaning of Mary Magdalene, and with Sounds True she has created the audio learning course Encountering the Wisdom Jesus. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon speaks with Cynthia about new insights on the relationship between Jesus and Mary Magdalene, and the concept of the “abler soul”—when two souls come together to form something greater. Cynthia addresses some misconceptions of Jesus as a teacher and the path that brought her to Centering Prayer. Finally, Tami and Cynthia talk about servanthood and how we grow through service to others. (66 minutes)
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Meet the author of . . . P.S. I Love You More Than Tun...
The Author
Sarah Chauncey is the coauthor of P.S. I Love You More Than Tuna along with illustrator, Francis Tremblay, coming October, 2020. She has written and edited for nearly every medium over the past three decades, from print to television to digital. Her writing has been featured on EckhartTolle.com and Modern Loss, as well as in Lion’s Roar and Canadian Living. She lives on Vancouver Island in British Columbia, where she divides her time between writing, editing nonfiction, and walking in nature. Learn more at sarahchauncey.com.
The Book
Our cats occupy a unique space in our hearts. When they’re gone, the loss can be devastating, the grief profound.
P.S. I Love You More Than Tuna gives us an opportunity to give friends, loved ones, or ourselves tangible comfort during the grieving period, when so many of us feel isolated and misunderstood after a beloved pet dies.
Send us a photo of your sacred space.
First Nation, Saysutshun Newcastle Island is an ancient forest and marine provincial park. Saysutshun, I’m told, means “training or preparation ground,” and indeed, for millennia before colonization, the Snuneymuxw brought healers to this small island to train “mentally, physically, and spiritually.” I knew none of this history when I first began walking long stretches of the uninhabited island’s 13.6 miles of trails. I only knew that the island seemed to lift away anything that wasn’t essential, easing my mind and making way for creative ideas to flow. I’d walk a bit, then sit and meditate, write for a while, then walk some more. This bench, under a circle of seven trees, became my favorite writing and meditation spot. The moss-covered trees became my friends, teaching me to stay rooted when things around me change. As I wrote in a 2016 essay about the island, “I have become a literal tree-hugger, and even—when nobody is looking—a tree-kisser.”
What was your favorite book as a child?
I was a total bookworm as a child. Instead of playing games at recess, I preferred to curl up under my desk and read. Of all the books I read—from every Encyclopedia Brown to Freaky Friday to The Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway (I was a precocious kid), the book with the most enduring impact was also the simplest: Harold and the Purple Crayon. I was enchanted by Harold’s adventures, amazed by his ability to draw his way out of every obstacle and ultimately find his way home. Long before I began seeing this as a metaphor for creativity (and life!), this story appealed to me. Fifty years later, I continue to find new layers of meaning in this little book. It’s a simple yet profound testament to the power of imagination and creativity.
What is one unexpected thing or habit that inspires your writing practice?
Walking in nature is my creative “secret sauce” and the central practice to my writing. Several years ago, I realized that although my role in this world is as a writer, my job is to bring myself back into presence, over and over, to get into a place where words can flow through me. I walk to get out of my mind and into my body. I come into fierce presence by noticing the rain on my face, salal berries ripening into deep blue, or the texture of earth beneath my feet. When my body is occupied by walking, ideas bubble up from my subconscious. Whether I’m looking for ways to trim an over-long essay or searching for words to evoke a hard-to-articulate experience, as soon as my legs find their rhythm, ideas begin to flow.
Learn More
Sounds True | Amazon | Barnes&Noble | Bookshop | Indiebound
Winter Solstice: Rebirth of Light
At winter solstice, the darkest point of the year, light begins its journey of reemergence. This great cosmological rhythm sets our internal clocks, our biorhythms, to the subtle glow of slowly increasing light. In our spiritual and creative process, we begin our own gradual awakening and reemergence from the dark, fertile soil of winter.
This biological and spiritual attunement to light is what has made the many cosmological temples with their ritual periods of connection to the sun, so powerful through the ages.
Can you imagine the impact of the winter solstice less than a hundred years ago when we lived life primarily in natural light? At the nadir of the year, we were sustained by the living fire of candlelight and by bonfires when, in some places in the world such as Scandinavia, a day might consist of as much as twenty-three hours of darkness. And we were sustained by celebration—the twelve-day festival of yule and other rituals of its kind—in which we came together and made merry and honored the promise of the lengthening days ahead.
We have marked the all-important sadhya of winter solstice, the rebirth of the sun, with the literal birth of a son. Myths about the return of the sun king at this time of year have been recorded as far back as ancient Sumeria and Egypt. The birth of Christ and of the Lord of the Dance of the seasons re-erect an extraordinary diversity of winter solstice holidays that celebrate the rebirth of the light through the mirror of human birth. In fact, there are more cross-cultural celebrations at this point in the wheel of the year than at any other time—from Scotland to China, from Tibet to Antarctica—as we turn to one another for comfort, solace, and the shared joy that comes from bonding together to celebrate the return of the light.
Looking for more great reads?
Excerpted from Tending the Heart Fire by Shiva Rea.
Shiva Rea, MA, is a pioneer in the evolution of vinyasa flow yoga. She founded Samudra Global School for Living Yoga based upon her worldwide travels and her studies in UCLA’s World Arts and Cultures program, as well as the roots of yoga in Tantra, Ayurveda, and dance. From transformative home practice videos to large-scale festivals, Shiva offers yoga as a universal pathway for self-realization and awakening positive change for all. For more visit shivarea.com.
Do One Thing More Consciously, with Caroline Myss
Does transformation have to be a complete life makeover? Do you have to radically alter everything you do in the search for authentic spirituality? Caroline Myss says that the opposite is true.
In this short teaching, Caroline offers a way that you can take just one minute to make a profound change in your life—and deepen your connection to an essential part of who you are.
