5 Minute ASCENSION TO JOY Exercises

Artist Jen Otey (Moon Bow Artworks)

O Great Spirit, whose voice we hear in the winds,

And whose breath gives life to all that is, hear us.

Winds of the East, Great Grandfather Fire, the spark of all life, we humbly seek the purification of your bold visions that we may once more experience the passionate joys.

Winds of the South, Great Grandmother Earth, the nurturer of all life, we humbly seek the grace of your embrace that we may once more experience the abundance of joyful love.

Winds of the West, Great Grandmother Ocean, the womb of all life, we humbly seek your power to dissolve and wash away all boundaries and limitations that we may once more experience the blissfulness of your joy.

Winds of the North, Great Grandfather Sky, your breath gives life, we humbly seek your clarity that it may soar us in your joyful visions.

O Great Spirit, whose voice we hear in the winds,

And whose breath gives life to all that is, hear our voices.

As we prepare for our Ascension to Joy Ceremony, I wanted to pause and look at what “joy” is and some short five minute exercises that you can do to bring joy into your life TODAY.

Often, we humans must learn to adapt to the cycles of flood and drought that are such significant aspects of our inner landscapes. In our inner worlds, flood and drought can be accompanied by desperation or despair, for few of us are comfortable with the absence of, or overabundance of, water, of emotion. We may fear death through desiccation or drowning. We want change, now! Yet, when we are able to wait, to have patience, the waters return, or recede, and our inner worlds bloom again.

As we age, we are called to accept and honor the power of our watery emotions, and to value our journeys through the desert. This is challenging work that teaches us to embrace and love the world and us, in all weathers. In doing so we are reminded we, like this Earth house in which we live, contain all that is. We are the Medicine Wheel, and we are, along with Pachamama, who births us, sacred.

In this journey we all have moments that are far removed from what we call joyful, whether it is sorrow or deep despair, but with the ascension into soul joy allowing a filter to shift perception, we can take those moments and say “I am not perceiving this situation as joyful, but I know it will bring me an opportunity of blessing.” That simple affirmation to self, acknowledging and allowing all emotion to be filtered through the joy filter will shift your perception.  It will shift your reactions and even as you state your affirmation of joy, it is being created for you. 

Ascension to joy allows for you to bring laughter and play into your life.  So many times life wears us down into a seriousness that does not allow for the laughter and smiles to flow.  The soul joy filter brings smiles, laughter and play into our daily life.  It opens more doorways to moments of joy simply by being able to enjoy whatever your journey brings to you. 

Dmitry Kichenko

5 minute spiritual practices to continue bringing the ascension to joy filter into play:

• State your affirmation whenever situations are bringing less than joyful experiences:  “I am not perceiving this situation as joyful, but I know it will bring me an opportunity of blessing.” 

• Make a picture collage of what brings you that soul joy and put it on your bathroom mirror to reflect on as you start each day.

• Write yourself a joy-note and mail it to yourself.

5 minute JOYful mediation:

            

• Close your eyes and imagine yourself in your childlike joyful state.  Feel it at the top of your head flowing down through your crown.  Allow that experience of joyful emotion to fill every cell of your being, floating all the way down into your fingers and toes. Every cell of your being is full of joy. 
• Inhale deeply this light, playful sensation. Overflowing in joyful experience it begins to expand out around you touching those closest to you.  Watch as the playful smiles cross their faces.  It gains in strength and intensity as each smile crosses the face and begins to spread out to the whole earth, further and further like a tsunami wave you see it spread into the stars as joy fills the whole of your universe.
• Inhale deeply this immense soul joy as it fills your universe to carry with you throughout your day.

Paul Sapiano

5 meditative exercises to connect with water's energy to prepare for the ceremony

• Inhale deeply while closing your eyes and hear the sound of water trickling in the back ground.  Listen to the gentle sounds and breathe the water deeply into your being as the water flows.  Experience the gentle water flowing deeper into your being.  

• Go to the beach and sit quietly closing your eyes and hearing the waves ebb and flow.  Allow the experience of the water sounds to fill your entire being starting with your toes and with each wave allowing it to rise higher and higher in your being.

• Take a shower and allow the water to gently flow over your being.  Visualize the water entering your crown and washing your spirit so that all the soul is rendered clean to leave you feeling light and energized.

• Simply take a sip of water and swish it around your mouth before swallowing it.  Experience the water as it flows down your throat.  Consciously drink the water with each sip.

Ascension To Joy through Empowered Breath

As we evolve to co-create ceremony, it is also important to understand that the intention of any ceremony is to create a bridge between the world of Spirit both within us and surrounding us. The intention of this ceremony is to balance the water and fire elements with the new beginnings of the new moon. To co-create a prayer stick with a despacho. To use the power of water to carry the fire of passionate joy.

We will be weaving different traditions through the waters of both the Atlantic and Pacific in this ceremony. Carla Goddard was gifted a prayer stick during a tropical storm as the rains, winds, and the fire of lightning fused in one moment. During the next week she will take your prayer requests while adding your name to the prayer stick through a daily ceremony. At any time you may blow your intention into the prayer stick picture. As she travels to the West Coast, she will carry this sacred object and release the prayer stick into the Pacific Ocean to be carried by the waters in another ceremony.  (Excerpt to read how the ceremony became, read What happens When Two Medicine Women Get Together For Lunch).

So the evolution and creation of this ceremony was to balance the water and the fire elements with the new beginnings of the new moon.  To co create a prayer stick with a Despacho.  To use the power of water to carry the fire of passionate joy.

The power of water is immense from the trickling streams to the tsunami waves, it has the ability to carry our prayers in its waves and purify our own bodies.  The power of water strengthens us, allows us to remain fluid and not “ice” up with emotions.  It brings conscious flow.  In the human life we have learned to “evolve” our own life cycles surrounding water.  From the physical world aspects of rain and drought to the inner world of the drought of desperation or the flood of emotion, we are like the ocean as it ebbs and flows with the cycles of the moon.  

Many have been walking through the journey in a desert – lack of joy.  Joy of a simple drink of water.

Declare your intention to ascend to joy!!!  

The ascension to joy is a blending of notes from within that reverberate like the waves to touch every one and everything you come into contact with.  It allows you to open yourself to a new song of joy, soulful joy.  What is the soulful joy song?

Understand that your soul within does not know the emotions your heart sometimes feels.  It only experiences love, joy, bliss.  The emotional nature of our physical being is not who we are, it is only what we experience.  So when we ascend into the soulful joy within, you begin to bring that joy into your daily life.  It allows for you to trust that the whole Universe is supporting you.  It grows and spreads into your thoughts and actions.  Remember that your attitude determines your perception. Your perceptions are what determine how you react to life.  When you ascend to a state of soul joy, your attitude, perceptions, and even your emotions are filtered through the joy.  Your attitude and thoughts are full of magnetic energy, so when you filter everything through soul joy, it generates and attracts even more moments of soul joy. 

Joy lives in the moment. Joy abides within us, it is apart of us. When we awaken and invite joy, we invite healing. It is a delightful,overflowing, and cascading nectar of life that transforms even our sorrows to take on new perspectives so that we may see and experience the soul joy once more.

What brings soul joy to YOU right in this moment?  What is one thing that fills you with that childlike joy?  Do you even know?  So pause just for a moment, reflect what is it that truly brings YOU joy. Do you want more of that experience right now?  If you said yes, that is the first step in the ascension to joy.  You have to recognize joy, know what brings you joy, and be open to receive the joy. 

To make a powerful statement right now to your soul that you are open to receive more, state your intention here.  Declare it! Own it! Be Open to it!  We will carry it in this new beginning to the ocean and allow the waves to cascade more and more joy into your life. 

By doing this for YOURSELF, by making the declaration to the Universe “I am open, I am ready” you are affirming that YOU are the creator of your own life. Every time that you begin to feel sorry for yourself, the victim story, or you hold a negative emotion, PAUSE. Pause and remember that image of what brings you joy, bring the soul joy filter into play.  It will begin to shift your perception, your thoughts, and your emotions so that joy moments are overflowing.

"A shaman prays with intention, empowered by the breath." (Karen Chrappa) Make your declaration out loud and by pausing and taking a moment to blow your intention into the prayer stick.  As we meet in ceremony, we will pray using breath and intention in both the prayer stick and the Despacho.  As your intentional breath is blown into the prayer stick, the intention will be carried by the waters of Mother Earth.  Each intention, each name, will be written on the prayer stick in ceremony.  It will be wrapped and carried with me to the Pacific Ocean and released to the ebb and flow of the waves during a ceremony.

Declare your intention to ascend to joy!!!  

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN TWO MEDICINE WOMEN MEET FOR LUNCH?

Ceremonies that were taught by our grandparents are not the same ceremonies we hold today. With each experience, each reflection, ceremonies transform to become the sacred offerings of the present day. As boundaries and preconceived notions are left behind ceremonies evolve. It is a time for birthing new ceremonies. And so it is how this ceremony came into being. A meeting of two medicine women with the heartfelt desire to share the joy of sacred ritual and ceremony from their own lives with the world around them.

Through evolution we must walk in honor and deep respect of the traditions that have come before us. When any evolution happens, we are cautious to reflect to ensure our approach is deeply respectful and in integrity with each step. A teacher once explained, very long ago, whenever we cling absolutely to something, whether it be tradition, ritual, ceremony, or emotion, we are stepping into the ego. Ego is only one way – my way.

When we evolve and create from the old, we are breathing our own life force into the ceremony. There is no greater honoring than to give life. It is about walking in balance with integrity and honor in all things – including creation.

As we evolve to co-create ceremony, it is also important to understand that the intention of any ceremony is to create a bridge between the world of Spirit both within us and surrounding us. The intention of this ceremony is to balance the water and fire elements with the new beginnings of the new moon. To co-create a prayer stick with a despacho. To use the power of water to carry the fire of passionate joy.

We will be weaving different tradtitons through the waters of both the Atlantic and Pacific in this ceremony. Carla Goddard was gifted a prayer stick during a tropical storm as the rains, winds, and the fire of lightning fused in one moment. During the next week she will take your prayer requests while adding your name to the prayer stick through a daily ceremony. At any time you may blow your intention into the prayer stick picture. As she travels to the West Coast, she will carry this sacred object and release the prayer stick into the Pacific Ocean to be carried by the waters in another ceremony.

Photographer Clark Little

At the same time, Karen Chrappa will be in Bimini where she will create a despacho on the shores of the Atlantic. A despacho is a prayer bundle from the shamans of Peru that traditionally is made by blowing prayers into cocoa leaves, placing them with offerings in wrapping paper to tie up like a gift before burning in a fire. For this ceremony, prayers will be held in a natural finger sponge into which your prayers and intentions will be blown in with your breath through a short ceremony on video. The sponge will be carried to Bimini and become part of a mandala of natural elements created in sand. Our despacho in sand will return to the waters through the tides of the Atlantic.

Through this unique, bi-coastal ceremony, we call to the waters to cleanse us of all that blocks that flow of JOY in our lives. We call to Pachamama and all her elements to balance our beings to the vibration of JOY. We call to Inti Ti Ti, Father Sun, Mama Killa, Grandmother Moon and all celestial beings above to shine the light of JOY in our hearts. We call to the medicine of dolphins to teach us the ways of unwavering JOY.

Ascension to JOY allows laughter and play into our life. So many times life seems to wear us down into a seriousness that does not allow joy to flow. Ascending to the joy inherent in our Soul brings smiles, laughter and play into our daily life. Doorways open so our moments of joy grow simply by being able to enjoy whatever your journey brings to you.

May you join us in JOY!

AHO!

To find the event on facebook click here.