December 6, 2015

Samuel: Oh, goody. Greetings, dears.

Hi, Samuel.

S: [Sees a dog in the front row] “Don’t make me look that way.”

I won’t make you look any way. When have I ever made you do all right?

S: Congratulations.

Thank you. I can’t imagine how he ended up where he did, but we’re glad we got him.

S: Well, should you find that your lap starts getting tired, feel free to just set him right there.

He wants down.

S: Well that works too. [To dog] Well, have you met Quinn yet?

It was really exciting.

S: Well, greetings dears. You are in take-off mode. Does it feel like that?

Yes.

S: It should. It should feel like almost . . . almost levitating. Another couple of days and you’re going to find that things settle down a little bit, but it’s a very big month energetically speaking. Now it’s a very big month insofar as holidays, right? But energetically speaking, there’s a lot going on, and it’s going to touch you. And I’m going to talk a little bit about that before I get into another, more holiday-like—maybe; I’m not sure—message.

By the twenty-sixth of December you are going to know why you’re here. Now, I’d like to think that every one of you knows why you’re here, but just in case, the energy that is coming in is all about clarity.

It’s not likely to be chaotic except out in the world. So pay attention the next few days, the next couple of weeks, to what’s going on in your newspapers—if you still read a newspaper—to what your media accounts are about, what is happening in the world as a whole.

Clarity energy is also revolutionary energy. “I see it. I’ve got to do something about it.” Or, “I’m tired of seeing [it] and I’m going to do something about it.” Clarity is also, within your own life, that situation in which things that you’ve been putting aside and not dealing with become clear to you.

Negativity in your life. “Oh Samuel. We are so holy. We have no negativity in our lives.”

You didn’t read my OneHeart, did you?

S: Was that Bulldozer Bonnie?

No need to worry about you, I’m sure. Right? But the negativities are going to show up—hopefully only in the world and not in your life—which makes it that much more of a reason for you to be consciously positive in your thoughts, out of your heart. Consciously positive. And one of the big reasons for that is because this is a time of manifestation. So that’s a gift and a warning, because you’re going to manifest what’s in your mind and what’s in your heart.

So pay attention to what you are seeing over these next couple of weeks, because you will be seeing what you are manifesting. For some that’s going to be stress and difficulty; for some that’s going to be deeper relationships and greater happiness in their lives. But be assured, you’re going to see it.

And lastly, this is a time of—oh, I’ll use the word—karma becoming clear. Now, remember karma isn’t “Any bad thing I’ve done showing up.” It’s also all the good things you’ve done showing up. What does karma mean?

Balance

Cause and effect

Consequences.

S: Right. It’s not punishment: “Oh karma’s going to get you!” Karma’s going to get all of you. Action creates action. Right? So if you are ensuring that your thoughts are conscious and positive, then you’re going to learn when your past catches up with you rather than be knocked flat by it.

’Tis the season to be jolly, to manifest, to ensure that you are living the life that is being put in front of you. To know what you want and what you don’t want, but dwell on what you want that’s positive, and in thinking of what you don’t want, turn it instead into “what I want more of.” Not “I don’t want mean people in my life,” “I want more people filled with joy and goodness.” You see? So turn the negatives into positives while you are still knowing because it’s popping up right in front of your face “This is what I don’t want.” So look at yourself and your world over these next . . . until the twenty-sixth, more or less. Big, big changes. [Dog moans] That’s right.

The holiday season is upon you. Holidays come from the idea of holy days, and the earliest recognized the holiness in the light coming to the world. And so every ancient tradition and most of them that have survived to now ultimately those holy days are about light coming to the world. Light.

Now, there is the light that blinds you up in these sockets, and that’s a lovely light—good work—but there is also the light that is love, and the holidays that you celebrate are, ideally, based on love. So what is that love? What form of love is it referring to? Brotherly love? Sibling love? Parent-child love? Love-of-ice-cream love?

I think of it as the love that is Source.

S: Source love. Good. And I heard . . .

Unconditional love.

S: Unconditional love, aye.

Love that’s in action.

S: Love in action. Active love. Love of toys. Love of glittery decorations. Love of getting together with the extended family to fight over the meal. Love of crowded stores and obligatory gifts, which, unfortunately, is more of a statement of how far from the light the holiday has come.

Imagine yourself on an ancient hill, and all you see is the dark sky with the peeping of some beautiful light in the sky. The sun has been less and less and less, and you know that it is the time in which winter is upon you. Now, of course, that only works in this hemisphere. And your wise ones have it all worked out that this is the time of the great change from days becoming shorter, because of less light onto the world, to them starting to get longer again with more light in the world.

Well, if you can imagine yourself back there, then you can also imagine what a celebration that would be. Now, there’s a lot of stories that like to say that there were terrors, that the fear that with the sun getting shorter . . . giving shorter and shorter days, that must mean that everybody was terrified that it would never return, and therefore celebrated when it started. That’s ridiculous. But the celebration recognizing that warmth will soon be back, that the skies will soon be clear, that we would harvest and have luxury again.

Every ancient civilization recognized the sun as a powerful function in the world. Some worshipped the sun itself, some recognized that it was a giver of life on the planet, but they all recognized that without that light there would be nothing.

You show that with your holiday lights, recognizing the ancient connection of light to light to light. The holidays are at the end of your year, a time in which things are winding down. And as a result, it’s also a time of starting new. Part of the energy that’s going on right now is about new starts and showing you where you need a new start.

In March, at the summer solstice, in July, in August, and in September, you had massive change energy coming your way. “Samuel are you saying it stopped?” No. Massive change energy that causes you to say, “What do I want in my life? Do I want this? Do I want to continue in this job, continue in this relationship, continue going in the direction I’m going right now?” because the energy was about fulfillment.

Have you felt fulfilled? And in those areas that you’ve not felt fulfilled, you felt it. You knew “I’ve got to put something in this empty space. This isn’t working.” And as a result, in your life you’ve had an opportunity to have a lot of choices in front of you. The choices you make right now are affecting the rest of your life because you are in a new dawning.

This is a new year unlike your past new years. This is a holiday season unlike your past holiday seasons. And that’s where I want to go tonight, to give you two ways to make the best use of the holiday spirit, and it has nothing to do with spiked punch or elves.

I’ve always loved your holiday time because you are so willing to be playful and joyful, and to enjoy the whole majesty of it all. And in this day, there is a little of something for anybody, including you old pagans. It’s all about opportunity.

It’s very, very easy for the holidays to become […], but that only happens because of expectation. Opportunity and expectation are the reason why you’d need the gifts this holiday can offer you, but I want you to take a few moments to think about expectation during the holidays. Particularly expectations that wear you down. Give me some for-instances here.

Finding the right gift.

S: Finding the right gift, and let’s add to that, for all of these people.

Making sure you see the right people during the holidays.

S: Making sure that you’ve made the rounds, and done the greetings, and you’ve seen who it is you’re supposed to see, because at the holidays there are “supposed to bes” abounding aren’t there?

That we will finally have that extended family—blissful experience—that will heal all of the ones before it that weren’t. Finally.

S: Finally. Finally. Aye. Because you have the control of other people’s decisions, and you are able to turn that key that says, “Bliss; healing; goodness; joy.” Yes, expectations.

The expectations that you will prepare all this hard labor of food for others while they don’t do it.

S: How many of you have experienced that one? “Yes, I’ll do it all. Don’t bring anything. That’s all right.” Now, you see, that’s an opportunity to say no.

And, in fact, all of these are opportunities to make a change. The expectations that stress you out are a multitude during this time. “I’ve got to travel.” “I’ve got to eat.” “I’ve got to give.” “I’ve got to . . . I’ve got to . . . I’ve got to . . . .” And it puts before you opportunities to release those expectations. Now, I would like to remind many of you that I have said this multiple times, and yet the holidays still tend to be fraught with expectations.

Because we haven’t met your expectations.

S: So what do you choose to change this year to make it so that you are more free of the expectations you put on yourself, or others put on you which you have accepted?

And I don’t want you to answer this one out aloud, but I’d like for you, within your own heart, to think of two things, just two things—I started out thinking that I’d ask you to do five, and then I realized that that wasn’t going to happen—two things that you can let go of. Two should-haves, two expectations upon you, two things you can change to free yourself up a bit.

And what might they be? Maybe it’s something to do with time. Maybe it’s something to do with material goods. Maybe it’s something to do with space. If it has to do with time, it might be allowing others to take a greater part so that you’re not doing it all and you have more time because of that. Material goods could show up as the gifting you do, or don’t. Space could be either giving yourself time alone to regroup, regenerate, renew. Maybe that happens by not going to this event and that event and that event and that event and that event, and then next week doing it all over again. Maybe it means you buy the cookies rather than make them all, because they’re gone within moments anyway.

It seems to me that from what I heard on people’s expectations that they’re strung out. The ones that were causing more difficulty or frustration were the ones that you had no control over. It wasn’t about you, it was about other people or other things.

S: All expectations are about control—they all are—and you’re the only one that has control over yourself. On the other hand, your ability to say “No, I’m not making the dinner this year” puts it on you, because other people and their expectations only conquer you because you’ve allowed it.

It always tickles me when I say something like that, and across the room the therapists say, “Right.” You know it. You know it.

But so much of this particular holiday is embodied in all of those things, because what this holiday is about is giving—giving light to the world, putting love into the world.

So think for a moment about your holiday stories. Now, your culture doesn’t have a whole lot about Saturnalia or even the winter solstice; they’re not such big deals. But theoretically in this country it is about the giving of light in the form of Jesus, who was the Christ at that birth, or about presents, and Santa Claus who gives to you—only if you’ve been good, of course. Or about Rudolph—I had to think about that one—who gave of himself to save Christmas. It’s all about giving.

So what I want you to be very, very aware of this holiday season is your giving, that you remember yourself and to give to yourself, be it time, or space, or even material peace of one kind or another.

You have the ability to say no, and you have the ability to say yes. Practice it appropriately and often. You will function better and happier this year if you pay attention to what you are giving.

One of the stories talks about three very intelligent people coming to visit a prophesized new beginning. With me? Three wise men following a star, all of that. And they brought with them gifts. Now, the gifts for that time were very costly and very important for that culture. Instead of gold, frankincense and myrrh, I guess you would have unlimited credit, and . . .

Amazon.

S: Dot com. Unlimited credit at Amazon, there you go, a new set of clothing and formaldehyde. Something like that.

Or a cremation plan.

S: Or a cremation plan, yes. “I’ve bought your cremation for you. Here.” Isn’t that a must at every baby shower?

They gave what was important. So what’s important? It’s a real tidy thing to say, but it doesn’t change the truth of it, the most important thing in your life is all about love, be that in the relationships that you have, the way you take care of yourself, love for others—two legs, four legs, doesn’t matter, no legs—love is what fills and fulfills you. It fills you when you are receiving it, it fulfills you when you are giving it.

How can you bring more love into your life over the next few weeks? Look at that, because this season is all about love, but it’s also about generously giving.

Now, believe it or not, this isn’t a request for fundraising—sorry, David, who’s head of Fundraising—it’s about giving as a whole. How often in your life do you give because it’s expected of you?

When you are thinking about what you are giving, you receive fulfillment when the giving is out of your desire. You receive frustration when it’s the result of another’s expectation. What are the expectations regarding your giving? Because here is the problem: when you are giving out of expectation, you are seeking recognition. And when you don’t receive that recognition, it creates a patch of suffering on your heart, and that suffering causes you to move away from the one you have been generous with but who did not recognize what they were receiving.

How many of you have gone out and done special shopping, giving of your time, giving of your money, to find just the right present, and you give it and they say, “I don’t have a need of this,” or “It’s not the right size. Can I take it back?” or . . . Have you ever experienced that?

Yes.

S: Does it make you love to keep giving to them? Probably not.

It makes you want to buy gift cards.

Unless your masochism runs deep. Unless it runs anchored into you, you move to gift cards or you stop giving.

S: So, here is what I want you to think about right now: If you only gave two gifts this year—all right?—if you think, I’m only giving two, what would happen in your world? Would you get inundated with complaints? Would you feel like you’d done something wrong? Would the world stop?

Financially it might.

S: This is the season the make the banks happy, fa-la-la-la-la.

With your giving, how much of it is the expectation of others, and how much is the expectations upon yourself, and do you know the difference?

Giving out of a full heart with love is a year-round opportunity, it’s not a seasonal thing. And most of the time, gifts that are to represent love, gifts that represent your time and your goodness, those gifts become obligations, and you’ve got to outdo yourself more and more every year to make it better than last, and that’s when it stops being fun.

Too often you put yourself into an endless cycle thinking that the giving means something material rather than the love that fills hearts and fulfills yourself.

How can you give love? How do you give love? Well, sometimes it’s cooking a meal, sometimes it’s giving a gift. Sometimes it’s supporting a cause you believe in, but everything you give needs to come out of your great love, or it will only lead to frustration, anger and separation.

Don’t follow old habits to bad places. It’s a journey not worthy of what you are. Don’t follow old habits to bad places when you can make a change. So think about it. What can you change?

Gwendolyn, who likes breaking hands and arms—got to stop that—has always been an “I can do it all” person. Now, when a sculptor cannot sculpt, it requires making a change.

Martin—aye, I’m just laying them all out. You’d better watch out on this front row—did some pretty nasty damage to his leg, and for one who is a construction, builder, that sort of throws things off. You can’t get out there and get up the ladder and do what you’ve got to do—so he learned to allow. Gwendolyn learned to allow.

I’m about to say something that’s going to be very painful for some of you. Consider giving the gift of allowing another to take part, of allowing yourself to see the whole world won’t come to a stop if you say no, of allowing your love to be the gift.

Your card this year can say, “In the tradition of the first Christmas I’m giving you nothing but love.”

Ho-ho-ho.

S: Or Ha-ha-ha. Release expectations and accept change.

Gifting is not about what you have, it’s about wanting to show love. Gifting love in a simple way is by far more meaningful to you, as you know, by far more meaningful to you to receive something small filled with love than something large because you have to. Once again I’m going to say, give someone else the opportunity to learn that powerful lesson. Give the opportunity to have no strings. Give the opportunity to experience the love of being together and not buying each other off.

Change those old habits that lead you up bad roads. Gifting your time, gifting your space, or even gifting something that has been meaningful to you but isn’t brand new and off the shelves are ways you can do that. But however you gift, allow it to be generously from your heart.

If you’re not giving generously, and if that giving is not coming from your heart, you’re buying a thing to add to that wall around your heart. You are seeking a way to keep yourself from pain; you’re not giving something of love. Do you see how that is? Can you change that in your life? Are you willing to change that in your life? Because right up here on the front row are a whole line of people who can tell you that change can be a good thing.

All right, did you get the two things? Hmm, you’re all just staring at me.

Expectations. Not having them.

S: Releasing, yes. Expectations, old habits, the need to do that does not come out of love. Releasing behaviors that stress you out, hold you back, put you into a negative frame of mind instead of a happy one. And what else?

Opportunity to love.

S: Take the opportunity to love, or I’m going to switch that a little to give generously from the heart, remembering that only love fills and fulfills. Letting go and giving out in a positive, powerful way during this powerful time.

Now there are a lot of things you can say at the holidays. How often have I given you holiday stories? Let’s tell it you from the animals’ point of view. Let’s look at all the candles of Hanukkah. Let’s remember the Light. There’s so many different ways, but the fact of it is, this year, at this time of power, I want you to realize that this has been a whole year of change and it should not stop because the holidays are here. “All of a sudden, I’m going to fall right back into old patterns, get controlling or controlled, and lose my connection.

You know, my loves, you are a gift. You chose to come here now, and from your childhood you knew that you had something special to do. You’ve always been a giver. You recognize love. You choose wisdom’s path [dog groans]—even Quinn. You came here because this world was going to need you, and you are all about giving. You are a great gift to this world unless you are so frazzled and so worn out that you have nothing to give. And it’s important this holiday season that you remember, give to you what you are so willing to give to others. Give generously and from your heart to your heart.

There were a group of chickens that lived together. Cluck, cluck, cluck. Do you do chicken noises?

Cluck. Cluck. Cluck.

S: Those were pretty good ones. I’m impressed!

A flock. Do chickens flock?

Yes.

S: A flock of chickens lived together, and one morning a hen that had been particularly deeply sleeping over her nest of eggs woke up and said, “Something’s not quite feeling right here,” and stood up and looked, and there was a really large egg, larger than her own eggs, that had somehow been placed under her during the night.

Well, the hen had a couple of choices. One was to get really indignant that somebody would dare ask more of her because she’s got her own brood to take care of. “And look at this! This is not mine. This is an expectation put upon me. I can’t do this. It’s too much. I won’t have enough for that which is mine.” Or, she could have said “All right. I’ll deal with what’s been put under me here and spread out just a little more and cover it.”

Well, that happens to be the choice that this hen made. She actually was a happy hen. She was pleased to be able to do this service. When the time came—and you know eggs don’t hatch all at once. That’s some strange myth that people who don’t know animals come up with—one by one they would hatch out.

Finally, the large egg hatches out. Well, you know the ugly duckling story. This looked nothing like her babies. This was something weird. The color was wrong. The size was wrong. It wasn’t even her thing, but she’d given so much time to it already and it was alive, so she took to mothering it like the rest of them.

Well, this chick grew up to be far beyond the size of the chickens. And its colors were far different than the chickens. Chickens come in a lot of colors. And this poor little creature seemed to have so many needs while it was growing. It needed more food. It needed more water. But the little, happy hen gave out of her heart—all right, out of her instinctual heart.

Now, if you do know animals you know that they don’t like different. They like routine. You change things and it worries them. How many of you have known a cat and you just move the food bowl over, and the cat says, “All right, enough of this. I’m going to poop in your bathtub. I’ll teach you.”

They don’t like change, which means that this happy hen who loved this whatever-it-was paid for that love by being ostracized from the other creatures that did not want to be with her and that whatever-it-was. But she kept at it. She loved and she gave and all of her babies grew up.

And one day a fox started prowling around the hen house. They could hear it, and they were afraid to go out, but the whatever-it-was had also grown up and had grown up with a really special skill. That whatever-it-was learned that it had a gift unique within the flock, and it actually ran toward the fox, shook out its tail, and scared it away, saving them all. Yes, it was a peacock.

You are that peacock. Aye, you thought you were going to be the happy hen, didn’t you? “I was all ready to be the happy, loving, maternal ,giving hen. No matter what comes my way, I will love it.”

No, you’re the peacock. You’re different, unique and you have special gifts, and those gifts come about in a natural flow when circumstances need them.

You’ve been living through a year in which you have been experiencing all kinds of circumstances, and you’ve been learning to shake your tail, you’ve been learning to show your stuff, and in doing so you have had some success scaring the fox away.

Beloved ones, you don’t have to live like a chicken when you are a peacock, but you have to be willing to own your tail feathers if being a peacock is going to do you any good. Peacocks are warrior birds, they always have been. You get attracted to them because of their showy beauty, but it is a fighting mechanism and a mating mechanism. Scare you off and impress you.

The holiday is a time to stand out from the flock. If the world doesn’t stop spinning, you know you did it right. So try. Release those expectations that take you down those bad roads, and give generously of the love you are to bring fulfillment for a change.

Glochanumora.