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“Many seasons are the season of giving, depending upon your beliefs and traditions. When is a gift truly a gift? Many presents are given with expectation. One can expect delight, thankfulness, joy. What happens when the gift that is given is because it does not truly come from the heart? Is a gift something given because the other person needs it or wants it? Whose gift is it? Yours because of your expectations or theirs because it’s something they desire? Never mistake an unwanted gift as a gift. If you’re giving something that is needed, but not wanted, don’t wrap it up in pretty paper and expect joy in return. Give it if it is needed, and let the real gift be the one that comes from the heart because you can see what the receiver has yet to discover.”

Wow! I’ve always sat with when is a gift a gift if the other person wants one thing and you want to give something else. This puts things into perspective rather plainly.

“Together we are great, divided we fall into a chaos that doesn’t need to be so hard, so drastic. Chaos is needed for change in our world, without it we would simply exist. Existence is life without evolution. We need chaos for change, but what we do not need is the chaos created by self-serving passions for material wealth, personal power, or laziness. If your passion and drive does not serve All life, you are not evolving. In fact, you are helping humanity to spiral down into de-evolution.”

I’m not sure it’s possible to catch the magnitude of what The Great Tree is saying. We have entered a time in our spiritual evolution where we are either moving forward or backward, into the evolution of our soul and spiritual self or away. There just isn’t an in-between anymore. If you choose to de-evolve then you add to your own personal chaos which adds to everyone else’s out there building momentum to create awful stuff in our world. Your other choice, which brings a chaos that pushes you to grow and evolve, is to step up and do good In this world. Does that mean you have to run for Congress? Maybe…probably not though. It may mean being the very best parent you can be, or learning patience or compassion to better work with people. It definitely means building something that you aren’t comfortable with in your life. Who would like a check-out person who goes the extra mile on a day your harried, or with an elderly person. Who wants medicine to bring back a healthy balance of compassion at all levels? Where do you stand in your evolution, and how do you impact the chaos in our world? Is it the growing pains of change? I hope so.

“Make peace with yourself. Find ways to discover likeable things about you. Remember that as a child of The One, it’s already decreed that you are loved and loveable. That all that has passed in your life has brought you to the precipice of change. A change that you always get to chose, whether you wish to realize that truth of that or not. Chaos may happen, must happen, but you get to chose how you interact with it. Are you going to allow it to bowl you over. If you must that okay. Then your choice is to pick yourself up and make positives strides forward. Don’t fight the stream, learn to navigate its waters. Holding back the stream is impossible, every crack and crevice will leak until damn bursts wide open. Life is not against you, although at times it must feel that way. When you realize that it is the choices you make that impact your life most, you will discover that you have power that you never thought you had – but you do and you always did.”

That was quite a flow of words, from inner peace to making choices that sustain and support the unfolding or evolution of your life. They do go hand-in-hand though. When you are at peace with who you are, it’s much easier to take the so called blows that Life seems to doll out to all of us. When chaos hits us, it’s hard to remain centered and grounded. Yet this is the beginning of returning to peace. A daily meditative practice is extremely useful or a perhaps a yoga regime, or running or any activity that brings you back to center.
If you are able to literally feel chaos, try focusing on stepping aside and standing in the path that goes with the flow. If running is your way to feel a peaceful flow, then try to reach for that flow without running. If it’s meditation or yoga then reach for that energy. How, close your eyes and feel yourself in the experience of meditation, yoga, running or whatever it is that brings you back to center, calmness, and stillness.

“Can you comprehend how you thoughts, words and deeds really do impact those around you? Every judgment you make impacts lives.  Let someone else handle it, it’s not my problem. Life is not and never has meant for you to make yourself beyond the reach of others. You can sit in your personal dwelling looking out and making judgments about your government, your bosses, you co-workers, people in other countries being starved, scarred and mutilated, denied basic rights and what do you think? Poor people, what can I do? Yes. What CAN you do? Did you even think about it or did you turn to another station, another channel, another self-righteous attitude?
Are we asking you to fix the entire world? Absolutely not! But take a stand make a stand. Mean something to someone who is less fortunate than you. Rise to the occasion, even when you’re afraid. Sometimes the most powerful gift you can give a stranger is a smile. Add to the Human Consciousness, don’t take away from it, or even worse – don’t empower it with pettiness, false pride, or a feeling of I’m better than they are. The moment you add to this, is the moment you literally add to the chaos of those war torn countries you turned the channel off  on.”

We have all contributed to this, myself included. Judged another for their cleanliness – but what if they were homeless? Judged another for their weight – but what if they were covering scars and wounds most of us couldn’t comprehend. I once knew a morbidly obese woman who was raped in her early teens. Do we ever talk to an elder to learn about life? The stories you can discover! Or do we complain when we hear the same thing over and over again. Perhaps you should be grateful that you hear them at all. Remember your blessings, but don’t use them as an excuse to make yourself better than another. Be grateful that you have ears that hear, a mind that can listen and if they are a loved one, that they are even here able to connect with you. It is all these small blessings that truly make up the foundations that support us in life.