Strength. Sue Patton Thoele

fear dims your divine spark and veils the sweet strands linking you to everything and everyone. On the other hand, paying attention to fear allows it to become an excellent guide to the places within that need healing. Places aching for your attention, love, and understanding. In the light of love, most wounds, worries, and doubts can be healed so that our souls are free to soar for our own enjoyment and the delight of others.

      As a caveat, if you don't feel safe exploring fears that present themselves, it's wise to pay attention to that message. Your inner wisdom, the ever-present divine spark, knows what is best for you. Please listen to your qualms and act accordingly. When you're examining fear, it's not unusual to want to be seen and heard during the process. If need be, trusted friends, family members, or professionals can provide a safety net of neutral ears and compassionate hearts as fear guides you toward healing and wholeness.

      During your day . . .

       Embrace the spark of Divinity within you. Set aside a quiet minute or two to bask in the presence of the Divine.

       Pay attention to your intuition. She has your back.

       Who you are is Divine expression, every facet of you.

       Be still and feel. That is all you need to do.

      —P'TAAH

      WRINGING OUT THE SPONGE

      Physics assures us everything is energy, and I've learned by experience that most of us are ultra-absorbent Energy Sponges. A driver flips you off and, wham!, you feel it in your solar plexus, or third chakra. Your teenager manages to be sullen, blaming, and sad in one sentence (if she is speaking at all), and you feel slimed. You are absolutely right; you have been slimed. Possibly on purpose from your hormone-laden teen, but we also routinely absorb energy that isn't meant for us, aimed at us, or ours to carry. Energy isn't bound by any delivery system, and negative energy is an equal-opportunity invader. We can look at the news for five minutes and be thoroughly saturated with sadness, disgust, rage, and a million other dense, downer energies. Often we absorb friends' energy or carry a lot more away from Facebook than is healthy for our psyches. Given the amount of energy and information inundating us daily, it's definitely enough to absorb only that which is meant for us.

      Sadly, our brains soak up negative energy more readily than they do positive. As Dr. Rick Hanson explains in his book Buddha's Brain, “Our brains are Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones.” Unfortunately, our brains react much as they did in primitive times and tend to compulsively obsess over negatives while sloughing off positive ideas and feelings easily. That fact is high on my list of topics to chat with God about when the time comes.

      Luckily, there are ways to protect yourself from unconsciously absorbing others' energy and cleanse yourself when you intuitively know it's needed. A few effective ways to be less spongy are to surround yourself with an impermeable bubble of protection, or imagine being enfolded in beautiful angel wings or, as I've recently been taught, place a protection rose or wall of roses around you to absorb energy that is not yours to manage. Roses are used because, wherever they appear throughout time, symbolize God at work.

      Even the best of precautions may not totally protect us sensitive sponges, but there are ways to metaphorically wring them out and flush unwanted energy from our bodies and auras. Years ago, my cherished spiritual mother and teacher, Annabelle, taught me the following discernment technique. If you feel “off” and can't pinpoint what is causing it, prayerfully asking the following questions may help:

       If this is my feeling or energy, I ask to understand what it is trying to tell me as soon and deeply as possible.

       If this is not my feeling or energy, I ask that it be gently, but completely, removed from me and returned to its perfect, right person or place.

       Thank you.

      Practices such as this one are often more successful when accompanied by mental pictures.

      During your day . . .

       Protect yourself from rampant slime in whatever ways feel right to you.

       Give yourself an energy bath if needed.

      Have fun wringing yourself free from unwanted excess energy.

      OVERESTIMATING STRENGTH

      Sometimes our greatest strengths are also our greatest weaknesses. For example, we may let ourselves be treated poorly because we understand the reasons and wounds creating another's behavior. Understanding is a valuable trait of feminine wisdom, but when it leads to accepting the unacceptable, it becomes self-sabotage. When a client, Maddie, tried to understand why her neighbor had stood by while her dog attacked Maddie's, the neighbor—let's call her Cruella—unleashed what professional mediators refer to as a character assassination. Maddie left the conversation reeling but tried to talk with her neighbor again a couple of days later. Cruella continued the assault, almost gleefully attacking everything she knew Maddie valued about herself and her life. Maddie came to me because she was distraught that someone whom she had considered a friend, and done a lot for, could think of her as such a terrible person.

      Although Maddie was heartsick, she understood Cruella's attitude was probably fueled by jealousy and kept attributing Cruella's behavior to wounds from a difficult childhood and abusive marriage. As we talked, it became obvious that Cruella was entrenched and not interested in working things out. While Maddie's understanding of Cruella's motivation was commendable, trying to make her feel differently was probably impossible and even a little grandiose. Because Maddie is a therapist noted for her communication skills, she wanted to believe there was something she could do.

      Maddie's strong need to be liked, exacerbated by the fact Cruella had bad-mouthed her in the neighborhood, blinded her to reality and led her to overestimate her power to change the situation. Maddie had the courage to recognize she had less clout than she wanted, and our work turned to helping her heal her wounds and manage her deep need to be seen and liked.

      As strong, compassionate, and understanding women, we are sometimes under the illusion we can make everything better. Not so. If you find yourself thinking along those lines, it's time to ask whether you are overestimating your influence and, if so, why?

      During your day . . .

       Accept yourself as is.

       Have the courage to admit—and be okay with—not having all the answers all the time.

       What you think of me is none of my business.

      —TERRY COLE-WHITTAKER

      AVOIDING OVERSTIMULATION

      Do you suffer from FOMO? Does FOMO keep you on the go even when exhaustion is tugging at your sleeve like a sleep-deprived two-year-old? Does FOMO have you tethered to social media sites or glued to twenty-four-hour news channels until you're drowning in a tsunami of misinformation? If you are scratching your head wondering what FOMO is, you and I may be from the same generation. At Bookless Club, I learned from a younger neighbor that FOMO stands for Fear Of Missing Out. Let's talk about a different FOMO, Fear Of Maxing Out.

      During crises, most of us are able to muster astonishing strength and stamina. Understandable causes such as illness, new babies, travel, deadlines, financial concerns, and natural disasters stretch us to the limit of our endurance but are a necessary part of life. And most are intermittent. In today's accelerated and densely