What is Prayer?

I was raised Roman Catholic and for many years prayed the rosary and went to Church every Sunday and raised my children Catholic.  My questioning began when my children were small and would refuse to go to Church. What really caught my attention was when my son ~ Michael did not want to make his confirmation.    This is when I started IMG_0132-300x200questioning God and prayer.

Today I realize that prayer is just as simple as saying “I love you,” “Thank You,” and more importantly loving whatever arises within me.  Loving whatever arises within me has not been easy due to the fact I have been conditioned with the labels of “right and wrong.”  It has been a longstanding pattern and when I fall into my labels I begin questioning  “Is this true?”  This helps disrupt the pattern.   A wise person once told me “everything is God.”  That was an eyeopener and very freeing!  This lifted a great burden off of me and gave me permission to accept the greater version of myself.  Freeing in the sense that every thought and emotion that arose within me was okay and that this happens with everyone.  We are human after all!  Being with my emotions altogether is a different animal!  One thing I know for sure is I am more willing to allow my emotions to surface.  Emoting has freed up space within me.  I feel less depressed, compressed and stagnated.  I feel more alive!  It is as if weight has fallen right off of me.  I am so happy to have discovered this within me and my hope is we all can do this for ourselves.

Posted on January 21, 2016 by Anne Lamantia

How To Keep The Heart Open!

Why Do We Close our Hearts?

I can only speak from direct experience.  First I would say that we are not brought up with the tools to keep an open heart.  It is not something my parents taught me or I was taught in school.  I’ve heard many times just open your heart ~ Well what the heck does that mean?   At that point I became curious and I began noticing what I noticed.   I noticed I would nIMG_0155-300x200ot feel my emotions ~ for example my anger, sadness or grief, and I felt ill-equipped.  I began to notice there was this heaviness I accumulated in my body and I believe it was because I did not process my own pain.  As time went on I began to get in touch with my anger, sadness, hurt and fear.  As I began to get in touch with these aspects I began to feel lighter and to my amazement less depressed.   Oh here is another big one for me!  I also noticed when I interacted with others I was too involved with their stories.  Over the last 5 years I have been willing to acknowledge my feelings and as I do I unravel.

How to open your heart!

1.  It has taken a lot of courage and trust to do this.   A willingness to open to life and feel.     It takes time and patience and a willingness to meet life from a brand new platform.  It takes baby steps to put something new into motion.  We all have our patterns so be gentle with the self.

2.  If you have heard of that saying it takes a village to bring up a child I believe there is a lot of truth to that.  Find support, people who are honest and who will empower you.  Don’t take No for an answer.   We are more alike than different.  As mother Theresa says “do good anyways.”

3.  I believe authenticity is vital to our well=being.  It is so easy to get caught in societal roles and responsibility. when we are missing the point of just being ourselves.

4.  Find something in your life to be grateful for.  Make a list everyday.  It takes time to change patterns.

5.  Love on your pets!

6.  Do good for someone in need!

7.  Prioritze yourself.  Spend an hour every day to nuture your spirit.

8.  Walk away from people who drag you down.

9.  If it does not feel good do not do it.  The same goes for food choices.

10.  Get out in nature.

11.  Never go to bed angry.

12.  Do more listening than talking.

13.  Listen to your intuition.

14.  Say I am sorry and as Mother Theresa has said, “forgive them anyway!”

Posted on November 1, 2015 by Anne Lamantia

Simple Steps to Practicing Presence!

1.  Stop, slow down and breathe.

pathocean-300x1992.  Witness your thoughts.

3.  Notice where you are feeling discomfort in the body.  Perhaps it is in the stomach, chest and throat.  If emotion arises, accept and embrace the emotion.  If it is anger feel the anger no matter how outrageous it may feel.  The only way out is through.

4.  If you judge it’s okay.  Notice the judgement without making it wrong.

5.  Pat yourself on the back for allowing yourself the space to be in presence!

https://annelamantia.wordpress.com

Posted on June 24, 2015 by Anne Lamantia

Measures to bring people into Balance.

I will speak from experience.  Balance addresses the male and female part of us.  One can be female and be very controlling and non-sensitive and this holds true for the Male as well.  Being female this is what I know ~ I can be very controlling and critical.  When I am in this space I do not like it but what I have discovered I am in this space less and less than I have ever been in my life.  I am allowing to express and feel my feelings with ease.  I am giving myself permission to not hold back.  I grew up in a household where it was not okay to speak my truth.  I was born in 1962 and women at that time for the most part were not working outside of the house.  My grandmother did not have a license to drive.  I believe the female and male aspects parts of ourselves have been out of balance for some time, probably for eons.  So, here we are in 2015 and most women I know drive, have a right to vote and work outside the home.  We have taken back our power and this is balancing out our male energy.  From my observation males are participating in child-rearing.  The table has turned.  Not only is this individual but globally.  In order to be balanced we must seek harmony within our own lives.  With the demands that present themselves it is important to slow down, breathe and feel the underlying emotion into completion.  This goes for both genders -Male and Female.

Posted on by Anne Lamantia

What I know about Heart Disease

I am going to start this conversation with a testimony.  It begins with Eugene Carns who is my father.  He is 79 years old and was diagnosed with heart disease when he was in his early 30’s.  He had a heart attack.  He was very thin and smoked cigarettes and drank Genesee beer.  He sought the advice of his Dr. and was given a diet to adhere to.  It included skim milk, magarine and lean meat.  Yep, I remember drinking skim milk due to the fact it tasted like water.  Oh yeah I forgot to mention my grandmother had artheriosclerosis.  I don’t know alot about her circumstances.  As a child I never understood why he would have heart disease at such a young age and being as thin as he was.   Moving forward ~ 10 years later (age 40) he had another one.  He had awoken in the middle of the night with indigestion that would not go away.  The end result ~ Open Heart Surgery.  When he arrived home he looked 20 years older and Mom began balling her eyes out.  I knew he was going to be fine but I was afraid.  My Aunt Mary Pat who was taking care of me and my 4 siblings was afraid too.   Again, he needed to adhere to diet and exercise.  He slept on the second floor and was told not to climb stairs.  I remember he would never lift anything heavy (Dr’s orders).  I had  to haul wood from outside and up a flight of stairs into the second floor!  Luckily there was 5 of us for this hard labor.  He healed rapidly and was back to his old self.  What went through my mind was: ” I don’t understand why he has this disease he is so skinny.”  I did understand one thing ~ he had a blockage in his vessels which impeded his blood flow.  I never understood how diet was related due to the fact he was a very thin man.  When I look back at all of this I can see how afraid he was of dying.  He always spoke about it and seemed cautious with life to venture out and try new things.  Ten years later he had open-heart-surgery once again.  Same protocol as far as diet and exercise.  He was always mindful of what he was suppose to eat or not eat.  He did cheat with bacon.  He drank alot but did not smoke cigarettes since he was 30.  Fast Forward;  since than he has had another heart attack and stents put in and struggles with his body temperature and shortness of breath.  In the past he has been on a beta blocker and has gone off of it due to the fact he was barely alive while taking it.  Side effects are atrocious!

My observation;

I have always questioned what has caused his narrowing of his vessels and blockages.  We all know it does not help to be type A personality.  On a scale of 1-10 I would rate my Dad a 7 maybe a 8.   What I do know about my Dad is I rarely saw him cry and he seemed angry and sad alot.  He also was very controlling.  It makes sense to me when we do not allow are feelings to flow we constrict and become tight and are vessels do the same.  According to Panache Desai emotions are energy in motion and when they do not flow they get stuck in the body and this creates density.  I read a study once and it said when we are stressed are DNA tightens up and when we are calm it relaxes.

Helpful hints:  Breathe and relax.  Let go of the outcome of situations and let go of control.  Let go and let God.  Feel your fear, anger and sadness.  In the past it was easy for me to step aside from my feelings labeling them bad or wrong.  A dear “old” friend reminded me that these feeling were the doorway to my humanity.  Thanks to this “dear” friend of mine I feel free, alive and learning everyday in every way to love who I am.

Posted on by Anne Lamantia