Reasons/Ways I am Blocked to Giving

I have been reading MJ Ryan's book The Giving Heart and was struck by the section on our blocks to certain forms of giving. I may be generous with my creativity and find it easy to give my art blessings away to the world, but I have blocks against other forms of generosity. Although I am very generous in the workplace and with my family in what I give them from the financial abundance provided by my work, I have huge blocks against intimate giving. I have latent intuitive and healing abilities that I don't use or even nurture for myself any longer. I don't follow through on impulses to reach out to friends in pain by phone or in person or even with a hug. I am much more comfortable giving materials gifts, whether created or purchased, than giving emotional gifts to those I'm closest to. I am a good listener as often as I can be, but I only give that gift when "requested." I don't know how to draw stories out of people I seek to witness (which really is everyone). It's easier for me to feel empathy and compassion for someone through various forms of media than in person.

I have always had generous tendencies in some form or another. But when I was a young adult my intuitive and healing gifts were often rejected or unappreciated by the recipients I wanted to give to most and I suffered for it. I closed up.

I need to open and expand again. I want to make my heart as big as the world and learn to be generous in every aspect of my life.

Questions for You

"Don’t worry about the world wants from you, worry about what makes you come more alive. Because what the world really needs are people who are more alive." -- Lawrence La Shan

Are you one of the many people in the world who have the desire to give, to be generous with your unique gifts, but have no idea where to start?

Consider these three questions and advice from MJ Ryan's book The Giving Heart:

1. What do you love to do?
2. To whom do you feel drawn to lend a hand?
3. Is there something that speaks to your heart?

Now take your answers and and try logging on to volunteermatch.org, plug in your responses, and find all kinds of choices right in your own backyard.

Eight Blessings

The next eight blessings requested will include Blessing Rings.

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"It is one of the most beautiful compensations of life that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

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"It is expressly at those times when we feel needy that we will benefit the most from giving." -- Ruth Ross

Fun Finds

Listen to the MUSTN'Ts, child,
Listen to the DON'Ts,
Listen to the SHOULDN'Ts,
the IMPOSSIBLEs, the WON'Ts
Listen to the NEVER HAVEs, then listen close to me...
ANYTHING can happen, child, ANYTHING can be.
--Shel Silverstein

I found these interesting creative generosity concepts today...

GlamourBombs (and here)

Postcardx

Finding Serenity

It's a wonder how I forget

that art making brings me peace,

even in the midst of my darkest storms.

I named this mandala Finding Serenity

before I started creating it,

and now I feel a soothing calm within.

Words of Wisdom

"We are all cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out."--Ray Bradbury

“Our deepest need is for the joy that comes with …knowing we are of genuine use to others.”--Eknath Easwaran

"I think a hero is an ordinary individual who finds strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles."--Christopher Reeves

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ps I am in a quiet place right now. I am still creating, but life has been hard this week and I need to rest.

On Generosity

"If you're really listening, if you're awake to the poignant beauty of the world, your heart breaks regularly. In fact, your heart is made to break; it's purpose is to burst open again and again so that it can hold evermore wonders." Andrew Harvey


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The Buddha named generosity as the first of the Ten Perfected Qualities of an enlightened mind.

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Author M. J. Ryan contends that generosity is "the mother of kindness." And it can be manifested in many forms — material, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual. "We can be generous when we give our knowledge, our awareness, our empathy, or our silence. Generosity is also about letting go of grudges, hurts, and concepts of ourselves and the world that stand in the way of our connection to others."

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Lama Surya Das: "Don't we all need some concrete form of retraining so that we may learn to be more generous and let go more gracefully? We all — each of us without exception — have so much to give if we only knew it."

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"It’s not the earthquake that controls the advent of a different life but storms of generosity." Boris Pasternak

Burning

"I am Burning. If anyone lacks tinder, let him set his rubbish ablaze with my fire." ~ Rumi

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I spent a couple hours last night joining a slew of blog directories in hopes of expanding my audience. Now I'm off to find other bloggers with quality content that might be interested in exchanging links. Eegads, this marketing things takes a lot of time and energy. But I've received some great responses from the packages I sent out this week so I'm feeling very encouraged.

Making Love to the World

I've just finished the chapter “The God-Mad” in Oriah Mountain Dreamer's book The Call (which I highly recommend). The premise of the book is that our primary purpose in life is to be present to what is in every moment and only act when the impetus to act or do comes from the still place within. If we flow from our inner being, then we'll naturally fulfill our individual purpose as well.

I am feeling some amazing serendipity magic right now.

An excerpt:“Today, wondering at my own resistance to writing this chapter, I sit and contemplate what it would look like for me to be God-mad, for me to follow the movement that springs from my experience of the sacred life force within me and around me, right now. And I see an image of myself handing out copies of poems, ecstatic poems about experiencing the Beloved, to all those who pass a busy street corner in Toronto's financial district. The image makes me laugh. To hand out copies of poems by Rumi and Hafiz and Mirabai, by Meister Eckhart and St. Francis and Teresa of Avila, to offer them to anyone who passes, not asking for advertising or anything but simply sharing the beauty of words written by those who experienced the freedom of knowing that to which they belong–what gloriously subversive mischief! It reminds me of something Daniel Landinsky, the translator of these and many other great poets, wrote me last week. During an e-mail discussion about doing a recording of these poems, Daniel said that he thought of sharing these poems as sending 'medics into the field.' And I think, 'Yes!'

Being God-mad is being willing to find your way of making love to the world today.”

The chapter also included a story of how she made a God-mad decision to take the speaking fees from her second book tour and give them away so that the tour would genuinely not be about making money but about truly sharing with others.

I am all a twitter with the serendipitous magic of reading this passage. What she describes with the poem giving vision is so close to some of what I am doing now with the Conspiracy (sharing ecstatic poems). The Conspiracy of Blessings is my way of making love to the world nearly every day. I become ecstatic and fully present to my creative endeavors when I am conspiring to bless others.

In the creating-my-bliss-work aspect of my life I have been stagnating and running in circles for a few years. Now I am experiencing a break-through and transformation that is so frickin' exciting. Generosity is the key that opened the lock to my visions of bliss, and it has a slew of positive side effect.

Oooh, here's a great story of how generosity first tapped on my shoulder and asked for my attention. Nearly a year ago I was a part of some creative focus groups by students at Artella's You-university. One of the perks of participating was receiving an intuitive portrait from artist Gretchen Little. When I received mine, Gretchen had this to say:

“I've been reading a book lately called “Fearless Living” by Rhonda Britten. I was very taken with an exercise in the book about identifying your essential self. I decided to use a pendulum to determine the essential spirit of the person I was drawing for before I started the drawing, which then in turn becomes a representation of that spirit. Your essential spirit is “Generous”.
I'd like to let the drawing talk to you directly, now, through my intuition.

'I am a bright and shining Being. I am eternal youth. I am springtime and Fire. Your name* befits you. I am the great green of the irish hills, and the green moss in the woodlands near your home. I'm looking down in the portrait because I am always just behind you, watching over you, enjoying your creations, hearing the songs of your soul. Look for me all around you - ‘generous' has become much smaller in meaning than it actually is. Paint your world with thoughts of generosity. I am with you always. Look for me.'

As I wrote those words I felt tremendous love and caring sweeping through my heart. I hope you can consciously connect with your essential spirit because she feels so wonderful!”

*My name means blooming or opening. I find my name highly appropriate for who I am, because I consider myself in a near constant state of blooming/unfolding as a human being.

Now I've found her, the spirit of generosity, in me! Isn't that amazing? This serendipitous gift is what first brought the idea of generosity's relationship to my bliss work.

I've tried doing some research online about generosity and I am sad to say there is hardly anything out there. It's weird. Usually you can put a general topic in a search engine and get all kinds of thoughts and opinions on it. But I can't find hardly anyone writing about generosity and its role in our lives. Am I truly on the evolutionary edge with a spiritual practice of generosity? Is it because it's the antithesis of our consumer culture? Or is it just that we don't talk about it? Maybe we don't talk about it because we've been conditioned to believe that we shouldn't draw attention to our generous endeavors. I'm constantly evaluating every contact I make with others about the project to be sure that I'm not coming across as holier-than-thou or miss goody goody. I am not seeking praise or attention. I just want to communicate about this process of transformation and make love to the world by blessing members of my human family.

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I've changed the color scheme on the blog because I've had a requests due to the black background being difficult for some people to read. I hope to create a more aesthetic design later but my web skills are minimal, so it will require some time to learn more.

In response to an email I sent to a couple of Yahoo groups I'm a member of, I sent out over 20 blessings this last week. Very cool.

This week I'm working on a set of gratitude blessing packages that I will leave on the doorstep of our local women's shelter for the staff and volunteers. Also, for Mother's Day I asked to get some Blessing Rings and more cards from NepalesePaper.com to use in future blessings.

Philanthropy

I learned today that I'm a philanthropist from the Everyday Giving site. I always thought that title was reserved for wealthy people who give lots of money to good causes.

Philanthropy(n.) Love to mankind; benevolence toward the whole human family; universal good will; desire and readiness to do good to all men.

Are you a philanthropist? Could you choose to be?

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I have more than ten packages going out this week. Woohoo! I took a leap of faith and posted a request to a couple lists I'm on that I thought would be open to aiding in the Conspiracy. I am glad it worked. I figure I need to reach a certain number of people before the concept will start spreading on its own from person to person without a lot of "marketing" effort on my part. I just wish I knew what that magic number was and how to reach it.

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I have a request for a blessing box, which I'm working on. I've got two others I'm decorating at the same time, so if you want one, let me know. (Blessing boxes are decorated wooden boxes filled with 50 inspirational quotes.)

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I've been attempting to be as transparent as possible about this project and its effect on my life. In the spirit of transparency, I have something to share. I am overweight and I have an issue with food as a substitute for boredom. I don't mean regular boredom where I just have nothing to do. I mean a deeper sort of boredom when I'm not acting from my authentic creative self. I can watch a good movie and still eat from boredom. Since getting active with this project in February, I am finding that my boredom binges are much rarer. If I fill my spirit with creating, I don't feel the emptiness I try to fill with food. It's pretty amazing and thrills me. Figuring out how to take control of my eating habits has been a struggle because dieting won't matter if I don't address the underlying issues. I've already addressed past issues with putting on weight to protect myself and emotional eating. I stopped gaining, but can't seem to lose it. I think figuring out this boredom issue is just the breakthrough I needed.

May your day be filled with blessings.

How To Participate In the Conspiracy & FAQ

Here are the ways you can participate in The Conspiracy:

~request a snail mail or digital blessing for yourself

~request snail mail or digital blessings for others

~request one to five blessing packages that you want to distribute in your community (I limit it to five so that I don't become overwhelmed with commitments)

~tell your friends about the project

~request and distribute blessing postcards in your community

~link to The Conspiracy from your site or blog

~contribute something to be gifted to others

You can contact me at blessingconspiracy@hotmail.com.


FAQ

1. Are you really giving away these blessing gifts for free?

Yes. Everything I offer to give is free of cost. This is a gifting project and an experiment in interactive creative generosity. This is my opportunity to share my abundance and creativity with the world. My only request is that you pay the blessing forward in some way, unless I've sent you a package as a gift of gratitude for something amazing you are already doing in the world.

2. What do you do with people's snail mail and email addresses?

I delete them as soon as I've sent their package out, unless there is a kind comment, and then I copy and paste that to a journal I'm keeping. I do not maintain a mailing list of any sort. You will not hear from me again unless you initiate contact.

This is not a marketing ploy for any other service or product!

3. What is an art or creative blessing?

There are three kinds of blessings at this time:

A) Digital blessings: a mandala or other image with an inspiring quote emailed to the recipient. I sometimes create specialized ones when requested. I hope to have an e-card set-up in the near future.

B) Blessing packages: these are sent by regular mail and include a variety of creative blessings that incorporate inspirational images, quotes, poems and stories. They are enclosed in a hand-folded and decorated envelope. Sometimes they include a blessing ring from blessingrings.com or other special hand-made gift.

C) Blessing boxes: decorated wooden boxes with a set of 50 or more inspirational quotes on floral business cards.

4. Are you affiliated with a religion or faith?

No, I am not. I have a sort of abstract spirituality but do not belong to any religious community. The only school of thought I am associated with is the concept of Pronoia as presented in Rob Brezny's book: Pronoia is the Antidote for Paranoia, which is a manifesto on how the whole world is conspiring to shower you with blessings.

See this post about the meaning of the word blessing.

Appreciation

I received two emails today, thanking me for packages received and requesting blessings for others. Yay! I made someone cry joyfully! And I had hoped recipients would be inspired to participate in the Conspiracy and pass on the blessings.

I've been working on some postcards that I could leave in coffee shops and other shops that allow such things. I'm using some of the mandalas I've made on the front with just the phrase, "There is a Conspiracy...." On the back I've included the Stellar Generosity quote in the post before this one and then the phrases, "The Universe is conspiring to shower you with blessings. What will it take for you to accept them?" and the website address for this blog.

I'm brainstorming other ways of "marketing" both locally and to the online community. I'd like to have enough invitation-to-participate marketing out there to bring a steady flow of requests without getting totally overwhelmed by more requests than I can handle fiscally and/or energetically. I'm realizing that what I'm marketing is totally unique in that people don't generally advertise to give a service and/or product for free unless they are trying to inspire/manipulate others to spend money later. But what I'm giving is not a sample. The service and product themselves are free. I'm not sure where to focus my exposure efforts. To artists? To spiritual communities? What kinds of websites would link to me? How do I market without allowing my ego to take over and spout about how wonderful I am? Seriously. I can see ways that this could turn into an ego trip, and I don't want that. Do I sit back and hope that the project spreads by word of mouth as more blessings find their way into the world? I don't know, so I guess I'll just keep following my little intuitions and see what happens.

Thank you for listening. May you remember that you are a blessing in the lives of those you love.