It’s 2012! It’s a whole new year.
I love new beginnings. Each new year, new week, new day and new moment is infused with potential. There is so much that is unknown and yet you can take steps to consciously create the tone that follows.
The practice of personal ceremony is a lovely way to consciously create. Personal ceremony can be as simple as making a wish while blowing on the seeds of a dandelion or as complex as performing a wedding ceremony. Ceremony is a way of honouring the transitions in your life and fueling your desires. The beauty of personal ceremony is that it’s all about YOU. It uses symbols and actions that are authentic to YOU to create moments that have great meaning for YOU.
Today on the first day of this new year, you might be tired from the excitement of the holidays. You might need some rest and some nourishment. A day like today is a perfect day for a practice I call ‘whispering’ a ceremony. Whispering a ceremony is very simple and yet it is a powerful way to make it known to yourself and to the universe that you are awake and aware and willing to consciously create your life. Whispering a personal ceremony takes just a few minutes and yet it can bring a remarkable shift to the quality of a moment and the quality of your life.
Are you curious? Are you ready to try it? Begin by standing up right now as you are reading this and say out loud “I stand up in my life in new and wonderful ways. I believe in myself”. Take a deep breath in and out. Feel the shift that enters your body. Then say it again. “I stand up in my life in new and wonderful ways. I believe in myself”. Take another breath in and out.
You’ve just ‘whispered’ a personal ceremony! It’s that easy!
You can create your own ‘whispers’ that have special meaning for you. I will offer you a few suggestions to get you started. Try one or two as you move through your day and use your imagination to create your own.
Open your front door and take in a deep breath. Then as you breath out say, “I am here, I am present, I am open to all that I have to give and all that life has to offer”.
As you go for a walk today at some point take notice of your steps and say, “ I am walking on my path. I know the way of my own truth”.
Look up at the sky and say, “I know that the possibilities for my life are limitless”.
Light a candle and say “ I light this candle to illuminate the infinite potential for myself in the coming year.”
When I ‘whisper’ a ceremony I don’t usually plan it. I like to see what comes to me in the moment. I light a candle and wait to see what words come to my mind and what feelings enter my heart. Sometimes a pause is necessary before anything arises. In this way, personal ceremony can be an invitation for your intuition to come to life. Your intuition is waiting just below the surface of your awareness. It is waiting for the invitation to come to your consciousness to support you in making choices in your life.
Personal ceremony is so easy when you ‘whisper’ it into life. It can be deeply moving and so much fun!
I’m wishing you a beautiful year of life ahead, one that you create through your intention and support with conscious action.
I’d love to hear of your experiences of ‘whispering’.
6 Comments
Jovanna,
Thanks for this beautiful idea! I tried a couple of your suggestions and could feel the energy moving through my body in a delicious way. They also made me smile. I love that they’re small and can be done on the spot, no matter what you’re doing in the day. Wishing you a fabulous 2012!
Lovely, Jennifer! I’m so happy you experienced deliciousness! Thank you for your New Year’s wish.
I also did the whispering ceremony. I was tired and drained but after doing it I left a shift in my energy toward power and optimism. Thanks for this.
You are welcome Jen…always.
Hmmmmm!! There are so many ceremonies in my life that your lovely piece brought to mind. “Whispering a ceremony” has me thinking of a simple way to slow myself down during a busy day and help me to discern over and over what might be helpful to the moms and dads, grandmothers and extended family, foster parents – and their babies/toddlers I work with every day. So many dyads every day, too much bureaucratic paperwork, so much past and present trauma, such varied struggles and joys. I witness, join, support strengths, spark hope and understanding. I’ll find a whispering way to bring me to the present moment before I start each session and move into relationship with curiosity and openness. It will be a way to create a breath, a pause, a place of center that each dyad so deserves. Thanks, Jovanna! Just the tool I’ve been searching for of late!! I am so lucky you are my sister!! First thoughts……”I greet this dyad from presence and strive for discernment in our work today.”
I’m glad my ‘whisper’ got you to thinking how to use ceremony as a tool in your work life. This is beautiful, Kate!