Cyndi Dale’s Energetic Boundaries: How to Stay Protected and Connected in Work, Love and Life
A Review by Lisa Erickson
and a Book Giveaway!
Courtesy of the publisher, Sounds True, we are delighted to be able to give away a copy of Energetic Boundaries to one lucky commenter. Leave your thoughts below and you'll be entered into the Giveaway Drawing!
Do you often feel as if you take on other’s emotions? Does being around certain people drain you? Do you find yourself attracting the same kinds of people or situations over and over, although you have tried to change this? Do you frequently experience psychic phenomenon that you can’t explain and don’t know what to do with?
If any of these describe you, Cyndi Dale’s Energetic Boundaries: How to Stay Protected and Connected in Work, Love and Life may be of great help to you, especially if you are open to working on an energetic level. This book offers a comprehensive guide to working with your own energy body using many of the tools energy healers themselves use – color, gemstones, visualizations, and more. Cyndi is herself a renowned author and healer, one I have personally studied and worked with, and I have read most of her books. What I like about all of them – including this one – is that she includes concrete examples from her own life and that of clients (anonymously of course) to show exactly how energy healing works. She also empowers readers to work with themselves energetically, by providing exercises and information for doing so.
In Energetic Boundaries Cyndi begins by offering a little background on the energy principles upon which this book is based, including the three energy body components of the channels (meridians, for those familiar with this term), centers (chakras), and fields (including what’s often called the ‘aura’.) This book is mostly working with the fields, although these are intimately connected to the other two, particularly the chakras. However, you don’t need to be knowledgeable of these components in order to work with this book, although you do need to be open to the idea of them.
Cyndi then outlines 7 of the most common boundary issues, along with how they manifest in an individual’s life. Stuck in repetitive patterns? You may have ‘Paper Doll Syndrome’, in which your boundaries have become rigid, attracting the same people and situations over and over, despite inner work you may have done to shift them. Feel severely drained by certain people in your life? You may have ‘Vampire Syndrome’, in which you feed others energetically with your own energy, rather than insisting they function on their own. Always caring for others to your own detriment? You may be stuck in ‘Healer’s Syndrome’, in which you transmit caring energy out to others, but take in their problems and difficult emotions.
After outlining these 7 common issues, and how they relate to energy boundaries, Cyndi offers exercises for helping you to heal these issues. These include guidance on how to uncover old storylines in your life that might have helped create and perpetuate boundary issues, and steps for releasing old intentions and creating new ones. Visualizations working with color are included for helping you to focus in on strengthening particular chakras and their corresponding boundaries. Also included are suggestions for working with crystals, gemstones, metals, symbols and numbers that are associated with strengthening your various energy fields.
This information is presented within chapters focused on health, work, finances, and love, as our energy boundaries are our interface mode in every area of our daily lives. My favorite chapter was actually the final one on parenting, which outlines boundary issues that contemporary children tend to have (based on the different energy ‘types’ of children being born today) along with suggestions for working with each type of child to help them strengthen their boundaries.
Working with the material in this book does require being open to energy studies, and trusting in both your own intuition and your ability to self-heal. Nothing in this book is a meant to replace medical care or therapeutic counseling, but it may be a great complement to work you are doing in those areas, or the ‘missing piece’ for completing that work on yourself.
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You can learn about Cindi Dale's new book by visiting SoundsTrue.com. You can read an excerpt from the book here.
Learn more about Cindy Dale and her good work in the world by visiting her website:http://cyndidale.com/
Remember to leave a comment to be entered into the Giveaway Drawing for Energetic Boundaries!
Leave your comment below to be entered into the Giveway Drawing for this book.
I would like to share with you my thoughts on the book written primarily by Master Steven CO, along with Eric B. Robbins, MD and John Merryman. The book, The Power of Prana, Breathe Your Way to Health and Vitality, I found it to be a text book to be used by the medical community and those that have difficulty with their own health. I love how Master CO bridges Eastern Medicine to our Western Culture.
I was hooked by this beautiful book in the Introduction. The question asked was, "Why Do People Have Low Energy?" We are lacking in our life force. We are depleted of energy and feel mentally and physically ill. During the Introduction as well, Master CO talked about our medical health system and shared what his experience had been during his residency. He talked about what the procedures would be when a patient would come in complaining of fatigue or lack of energy. The doctor would run tests to rule out health issues and if nothing was found to be wrong, the diagnoses may be, "It is all in your head or you are way over stressed." Wow, did bells start ringing in my own mind. Master CO was speaking to me, that is how I felt. I am a woman who manages Lupus, Fibromyalgia and four other auto-immune disorders. I was finally (after eight different doctors) given my diagnoses and use many Eastern, turned more Western techniques to manage illness and build my life force (energy).
The definition of Prana Energy as I understand it is allowing yourself to be guided by the invisible energies within yourself, one of which is using your breath. Before you know it, you will feel the flow of Prana or Life Energy within you and understand what is good for you and what you need to heal and grow and achieve happiness and inner peace. I have found the breath as a life energy in this book, The Power of Prana, to be of great value for healing and another practice I can richly benefit from. Knowing nothing about the subject or the word Prana, I also found it enlightening, and the perfect theme for further investigation. I use meditation, yoga, breathing rituals already in my healing and for equanimity. My reading intentions became clear and were quite basic for myself, to learn the "Nine Energizing Breaths" to simply enhance a healthier lifestyle of healing.
That's the beauty of this book. As Master CO points out, its applications are multifaceted. Everyone can enjoy the book for a variety of reasons--to help with low energy, as an alternative to medical treatment options, to satisfy curiosity or as a point of entry into more advanced esoteric study. I didn't expect a book chock-full of information, but it is. Rather than just heading to the exercise pages and skipping everything else (which you can readily do), I, instead, read the book cover to cover—actually twice. It is very organized, very explicit in directions, and goes above and beyond breathing basics. In fact, The Power of Prana touches base on a complete system of spiritual practices and meditations.
I am still practicing the Nine Energizing Breaths for my well-being. I have seen and felt change in the flow of my body. I am pleased to share with you that most anyone can learn this technique. Master CO explains each one and what it's purpose is and what the result can be. Another important learning for me was the step by step meditations he takes us through for body wellness. He teaches us what is happening to our being in the contemporary world we live in. I know many of us relate to the "never stopping syndrome." Master CO also teaches us in Part One of this book a spiritual and energetic framework for our contemporary world and how to heal. In Part Two, you will learn how to build your energetic foundation. In Part Three, the real fun begins as you learn the Nine Energizing Breaths and how they relate to your life. They are also joyous as a practice for keeping centered and healing. In Part Four, Master CO goes deeper and adds advanced practices for enhanced purification and sustained energy. This is where I learned meditations that went deeper into my being.
There is so much to this book, far more than you can see upon the surface except through the dedication of practice each day, for a few undemanding minutes, and then more and more as you come to peace, health, vitality, and awareness. These practices Master CO lends to us you will not find in a doctor's office, in a medication, or by reading a book. You must take responsibility to bring awareness to your heart and mind and this book will absolutely do just that. I started off by calling this a "text book" and that is exactly what it is. It is a book to be studied, practiced, to go back to again and again. I am thankful I have had the opportunity to read and now add the practice of Prana Power through the sacred breath given to me. I hope you, too, will take the opportunity to sit and experience many teachings and healings within your energy force.
Thank you to Master CO for your wisdom, love of Eastern medicine that applies to our current world, and for writing The Power of Prana, Breathe Your Way To Health And Vitality.
Namaste,
Cindy Hively
Don't forget to leave your comment below to be entered into the Giveway Drawing for this book. The winner will be drawn May 1.
Master Stephen Co is a personal student of Grandmaster Choa Kok Sui and one of only two Certified Master Pranic Healers in the world. He is a senior instructor at the World Pranic Healing Organization and has taught thousands of people throughout the world, including the United States, Asia, and Europe. He is the author of The Power of Prana (Sounds True, 2011) and Your Hands Can Heal You (Free Press, 2003).
The Intimate Life: Awakening to the Spiritual Essence in Yourself and Others ~ Judith Blackstone
A Book Review by Linda Lyzenga
A Book Giveaway Courtesy of Sounds True!
Leave a comment below to be entered into the Giveaway drawing to receive a copy of The Intimate Life!
The Intimate Life ~ A Book Review by Linda Lyzenga
“As we learn the spiritual lessons of compassion and non-grasping, as we trace our way backward through the labyrinth of our psychological defenses, as we attune inward to the subtlest essence of our being, we are transformed into lovers of life. “
Reading this concluding sentence in the book, The Intimate Life by Judith Blackstone, PhD, gave me a picture of the author holding up a mirror and inviting her readers to share in her accounts – professional, client experiences, and personal observations of fundamental consciousness and then take a look at themselves in the mirror. This, my experience with the book, sums up what the author has tried to do – answer the question: how can we deepen this capacity for contact, to become adept at love.
She broadens our typical definition of love to something more than just romantic love between two intimate partners to a more encompassing response of our heart to our own selves and to the world around us.
I have to say that this book found me. Its effect on me was a warm, dynamic response. – An invitation - overall, quite stunning. Am I recommending it? Dare you look in the mirror? Transparency, a major theme, is needed to relate to the personal accounts in the book and tenacity is required to read her sometimes clinical repetitious explanations. Her repetition, not really redundant, merely reminds, reinforces, and supports her recognition that this may be new stuff. Indeed, to much of what was covered I say, “I don’t understand – but I “get it.”
Each of the seven chapters concludes with experiential exercises which help bring into focus the awareness, emotion, and physical sensations that are fundamental consciousness. Most of them allow for sharing the exercise with a partner. Personally, I did not have that advantage, yet benefitted from them nonetheless. They did indeed awaken something inside of me. This is what I loved about the book - As a woman reading Dr. Blackstone’s book my heart resonated with the subtitle -AWAKENING TO THE SPIRTUAL ESSENCE IN YOURSELF AND OTHERS.
Interestingly I found that the author’s personal statement brings last month’s theme here at Buddha Chick Life, In Love with Life together with March’s theme, Celebrating the Feminine – as I awakened a bit more to the spiritual essence of my feminine self.
The author, Judith Blackstone, is a licensed clinical psychotherapist in New York, author of numerous books and an innovative teacher in contemporary spirituality. If you’re at all familiar with Sounds True, the publisher of this book on spirituality and relationships, you’ll recognize Dr. Blackstone as one of their contributing authors and teachers.
Can I recommend it?
Familiarity with body awareness through breath and body work &/or the practice of yoga, this could be a helpful resource for your healing journey.
The Hindu Chakra System is foundational to Dr. Blackstone’s teachings here. Her generous explanations of this, which I had only limited understanding of, were very helpful.
If you’re daring to awaken to your spiritual essence and have been looking for greater intimacy in the truest sense of the word, this could be the book you’ve been looking for. Or, is this the book that has found you?
Untie the Strong Woman: Blessed Mother's Immaculate Love for the Wild Soul
By Clarissa Pinkola Estes, PhD
Many of us have been eagerly waiting for, Untie the Strong Woman, Dr. Estes newest book. It's been a 10 year wait, but one that was oh, so worth it.
If you are a fan of the work of Jungian analyist, cantadora ("keeper of the old stories") and author of the landmark book, Women Who Run with the Wolves), Clarissa Pinkola Estes, PhD., you will delight in this insight-filled, soul-revealing exploration of Mary. She is not the meek and mild Mary that many of us in the West were raised with through Bible stories. This is a bold and passionate Mary, a Mary for all times, for everyone, as Dr. E. describes her:
"She wears a thousand names, a thousand skin tones, thousands of costumes to represent her being patroness of deserts, mountains, streams, and oceans. If there are more than six billion people on the earth, then thereby she comes to us in literally billions of images."
She is the Great Mother, according to Dr. E, and there is "no greater exemplar, teacher, mentor than she who is called many other true names ..." and "nowhere is there a feminine force of more compassion and understanding ..."
As a young girl, Dr. Estes was ceremonially dedicated to the "Blessed Mother," (as Dr. E reverently calls her) and she, in turn, dedicated her life to the sacred task of introducing people to her. She does this very well in this collection of reflections, prayers, blessings and handcrafted (full color) artwork which makes up Untie the Strong Woman. Her zeal sings throughout this beautifully crafted book and sometimes the strength of it takes you by surprise. This "fierce" passion, as it could be described, I sense, is to stir us, even shake us, so that we will open our hearts and look more deeply at Our Lady ("La Nuestra Senora"), to take her seriously, to be warmly embraced by her, and to ultimately embody what she herself represents—compassion.
And that is, perhaps, the most important message woven throughout the book: Mary's unbridled, limitless, compassion for us as human beings—and her consistent presence—ever here to lend support when called upon. This, no matter who we are or what spiritual tradition we come from; this Mary is the "Great Woman," The Mother Who Gave Birth to Love," known by countless names and portrayed in countless forms. Yet, one thing rings true: she is available and present to all people. In fact, she waits for us to invite her into our hearts and lives.
Dr. Estes writes: "In Blessed Mother's view, all are lovable, all souls are accepted, all carry a sweetness of heart, are beautiful to the eyes; worthy of consciousness, of being inspired, being helped, being comforted and protected—even if other mere humans believe foolishly or blindly to the contrary."
And now, today, when we find ourselves at a pivotal point in history where La que sabe ("The One Who Knows") is greatly needed, when so many individuals are suffering, struggling through life, Dr. E invites us to call upon this Great Mother, and she assures us she will come to our aid. Indeed, she has for the author again and again which is poignantly shared in personal vignettes throughout the book.
The timing of the release of Untie the Strong Woman seems perfect and, in honor of that holy synchronicity, Dr. E is offering a free one hour, audio event, "The Incandescent Heart" on Sunday, Dec. 11, 9:00 p.m. EST—to honor the feast day of the Guadalupe. I'll certainly be there at the fireside.
Untie the Strong Woman is a book that is heroic, personal and impassioned; sometimes raw and tearful, wildly celebratory, a feast for one's senses and one that will undoubtedly serve as a balm to many weary hearts. I have thoroughly enjoyed it and know I will return to it again and again for sustenance. I celebrate Dr. E's courage in crafting this book. In a world that doubts and often condemns the presence of Holy Ones to directly interact (if not intervene) in our lives, this book is a comforting and courageous gift to us all.
Perhaps, more than any other passage from the book, this one will remain in my heart: " ... for she is the quintessential Mother who does not, will not, leave her children behind."It reminds me of how much each of us wants and needs to be held, loved and protected by our mothers, by one another, indeed, the Great Mother in and of us all. Forever.
With pure delight, we are Giving Away one copy of Untie the Strong Woman, courtesy of the publisher, Sounds True. Leave a comment here, share your thoughts and heart, or offer a message to Dr. E, and you'll be entered into the drawing. The winner will be chosen January 1.
Learn more about Untie the Strong Woman and Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes at SoundTrue. com
Respectfully submitted, Jan Lundy, Editor, and a "Mary" girl for many years now ...
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