spiritual connection

Feb

2021

Must Have Crystals in Your Home

Reading Time: 4 minutes

If you’re just starting out with using crystals, here are some must have crystals that you should consider for your home.

Crystals have been used since ancient times for different purposes. More and more people are adding crystals in their spaces and in their homes. Others even use them as jewelry but they do so for specific purposes. Since crystals are all minerals, their energies connect us with Earth and nature. Even people who don’t believe in their special properties appreciate them for their beauty alone.

SELENITE

Selenite is a good crystal to place in your home’s main entrance or near doorways, a corner of the room, on an altar or window sill. This crystal helps to keep the area free from harmful or negative energy and can raise the vibration of the place so it feels more light and airy. You can use this crystal to cleanse your other crystals especially those that you often use as jewelry. Just place them near Selenite over night and they are ready to use the next day.

HIMALAYAN SALT (HALITE)

Himalayan salt is a natural pink salt that is known for its cleansing properties. It produces ions when warmed which helps cleanse the space and protect it from negative energies. This crystal can be placed near entrances and doorways; in the corner of a room or bedroom and in your home office to ward off EMFs (electromagnetic fields).

BLACK TOURMALINE

Black Tourmaline has powerful protection energies. It helps protect your space from negative influences and negative energy in the environment. This crystal is also very grounding which is helpful for releasing stress. Similar to Selenite, you can place this crystal near doorways and window sills and in the corner of a room.

ROSE QUARTZ

Traditionally associated with enhancing love, Rose Quartz can help bring a calming and soothing atmosphere to the space. It helps in attracting and encourages loving relationships, bringing about family harmony in your home. This crystal is also helpful in developing self love as well as attracting new romantic relationships. Place this crystal in areas of the home where family members usually gather such as in the living room and dining table or in your bedroom.

CITRINE

Citrine is a crystal that is good to place in your home office as it helps to attract abundance, success and prosperity. Just like its color, it also helps to warm up the area with the energy of sunshine and encourages positive thinking. It is also good to place it on the dining table and the altar as well as in places where you usually store your money or valuables.

AMETHYST

Amethyst is a crystal with very high spiritual vibration. It works to transmute negative energies and offers psychic protection. For people who are deeply sensitive or intuitive; this crystal supports spiritual growth and psychic development. This is a good crystal to work with during meditation. Place this crystal on your altar, library, yoga or meditation space. Don’t place it near windows or direct sunlight to avoid fading.

CLEAR QUARTZ

Clear quartz is a crystal that enhances the energy of other crystals. This crystal can be programmed for any intention. Clear quartz has healing properties that helps to cleanse a space, enhance mental focus and mental clarity. This crystal can be placed in most parts of the home.

REMINDERS

For the home, bigger crystals in solid shapes or in their raw form are recommended. They also look great for decorative purposes.

Create a sacred space for where you put your crystals. Experiment by placing crystals in different areas and see where they feel and look most suited to be placed.

Just like you regularly clean your home, crystals should also be cleansed regularly. They are sensitive tools that pick-up different energies from people and places. Cleaning them regularly will keep their energies pure and effective. If your home has experienced challenging situations, your crystals will also need to be cleansed. This will help you and the whole family start anew or move on from the situation.

Feature Image: Original Photo by Sarah Brown on Unsplash.

Apr

2020

Gratitude in Tough Times: Bringing Light in the Dark

Reading Time: 4 minutes

It is easy to be grateful if everything is doing well. However, the challenge lies during difficult times. It is hard but it is something that we need to learn. To practice gratitude during tough times is the only way to bring light in the dark.

Darkness deserves gratitude. It is the alleluia point at which we learn to understand that all growth does not take place in the sunlight.
– Joan Chittister

Pessimistic. Negative thinker. Sensitive. Prone to depression.

That’s who I was.

There were moments that I will just find myself crying. I would wake up in the middle of the night and just feel the sadness, pain, and rejection and all over me. I’d feel deep sorrow permeating inside me. I would cry and cry until I fall asleep again.

And when I am down. Gee! I was really down. And it would be difficult for me to stand up again and live my life. For weeks, my emotions would control and pull me down.

I am the type of person with a melancholic temperament. For a personality like mine, seeing the positive and being grateful is back-breaking.

I had this tough experience but to this day I am thankful. I had this super difficult boss. No matter how much effort I put into everything I do, it will not be appreciated. If I do well in my work there is no need for appreciation because I was just doing my job as expected of me. Those were his words to me. But when I make any mistake no matter how tiny and insignificant, it is easily noticed. I will be reprimanded immediately even in front of many people.

It was an arduous journey. Pessimistic as I am, if I have collected the tears I shed it would have been an ocean. Even my self-esteem went down.

But later on, I learned a very important lesson.

For you to improve the quality of your life, you must see the blessings. Then you will attract more of the things that you can be grateful for.

I am dealing with this difficult boss but I love my job.

My boss is grumpy at times but I am grateful that I can still smile and influence him to smile.

Although my boss is unappreciative but I am grateful for the people around me who support and love me.

Yes, my boss will easily reprimand me for my mistakes but I am grateful for the many opportunities for me to grow and improve.

So, instead of sulking in negativity and self-pity, I changed my perspective and saw it as a challenge. Instead of the negative, I chose to see the blessings and learned to be grateful with the blessings that I have. I chose to work smarter. By reading a lot of books and attending seminars, I began to grow. I learned from my mistake and improved the quality of my work and my disposition.

And when I decided to change myself and the quality of my thoughts, without me knowing, my boss saw my improvement. He even commended me personally and even in front of others about how I have changed and improved through the years.

Because of that experience, I became a better person. A grateful one at that.

Today, you might not have a difficult boss that you are dealing with but instead you are in a difficult situation. You might be experiencing a grueling trial in life or you might be dealing with a loved one or an officemate who is challenging to deal with. You might have problems with your family, your finances, and your health.

I do not know where you are right now. But remember unless we experience failures and hardships in life we will not truly grow. It is essential for our success so that we may bear fruit.

I assure you: Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains by itself. But if it dies, it produces a large crop.
– John 12:24

GOD suffered and died for us. He was crucified and was buried in a dark tomb. After three days, He resurrected.

There might be times in our life where we feel it was dark, hopeless, and it seems that the suffering that you are experiencing will not end. You feel buried in the darkness of hardships, trials and difficulties. However, let us remind ourselves that problems in life are temporary because victory is on the way. Easter is coming.

Let us be persons who will see the good in difficult people. Let us be the kind of persons who will see the opportunity in a challenging situation, and the kind who will appreciate what we have, even in the face of darkness.

It is easy to become grateful when life is easy but being grateful when things are difficult is hard. Let us choose to embrace gratitude to be able to get through the hardships. And in the end, we will come out victorious!

Think of one difficult moment or any problem or any challenge you are experiencing in your life right now. Write down 10 blessings that comes with that problem.

Hazel Atencio is author of the book The Gratitude Habit: How to Change Your Life by Saying Thank You Everyday.

She is a graduate of Bachelor of Science in Electronics and Communications Engineering. When she was still in college, she dreamed of entering the convent to dedicate herself serving to God as a nun. She finds her calling serving God in Bo Sanchez ministries.

Hazel’s personal life mission is to influence and add value to others by bringing out their uniqueness and greatness.

To learn more about Hazel, connect with her via her Facebook page or email her at hazel.atencio@gmail.com.

First published in Pinoy Smart Living in 11.14.2018
Feature Image by Sasin Tipchai from Pixabay Images

Mar

2020

The Practice of Mindfulness and Its Benefits

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Emotional health is not always easy to measure as people generally go through a range of different emotions from moment to moment. No one can maintain being cheerful all day or being sad all day. There will always be a break in the cycle. However, we can describe our general mood for the day. But is there a way to keep tabs on our thoughts and emotions and process them without stressing ourselves out? There is a way to do this through the practice of mindfulness and its benefits.

What is Mindfulness?

Mindfulness is an innate human ability to be fully present and aware in the moment and not be overwhelmed or be too reactive by the things happening around us. Mindfulness is a state where you can focus on what is going on in your thoughts, your physical sensations, etc. without judging what you observe. In this way, mindfulness is a meditation method and sadly, we don’t do much of it in our daily lives.

Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementaly. And then I sometimes add, in the service of self-understanding and wisdom.
— Jon Kabat-Zinn

Mindfulness is a quality that each of us possess. Thus, we should learn how to make use of it in our daily lives so we can experience the benefits. There are benefits in our mental, emotional, and physical states and even in our relationships and finances.

Benefits of Mindfulness

Mindfulness meditation provides us a time to suspend judgement. Instead, it gives us time to analyze how we think and feel, why we think in a particular way and why we feel the way we do. Mindfulness allows us to observe our experiences without judging them and instead look at them with kindness and understanding. This approach to understanding ourselves and our daily experiences has many health benefits.

Reduce Stress

Not judging yourself and extending understanding and kindness towards the self greatly reduces mental and physical stress. Too often, we punish ourselves for the things that we think we did wrong or did not accomplish. We rarely sit back and try to see why we acted in a certain way.

Encourage Acceptance

When we observe ourselves without judgement, we learn to accept and appreciate our flaws and weaknesses as part of who we are and we can more easily decide on how to change them to better improve ourselves. This also means, that we will be able to easily accept and even forgive not just ourselves but also the people around us.

Enhances Deeper Understanding

Being mindful and learning about our own inner workings helps us to better understand other people and through regular practise, we also learn to let things be instead of judging them in the moment. This means that we are still able to interact with negative people or still behave normally even in a toxic environment without being overwhelmed or being overly reactive.

Increase Awareness

Practicing mindfulness also enhances our awareness and insight not just of ourselves but of other people’s mental and emotional states as well so we can help them better in the way that they need most.

Enhance Performance

When we have a better understanding of how we think and act, we are also able to easily adjust our own patterns of thinking and our actions to align with our goals in the different areas of our life.

Practice mindfulness in your daily activities and experience the benefits in all areas of your life.

Mindfulness meditation is a practice that you can easily start doing. Find a quiet place to be alone with your thoughts and focus on them without judging them. You can also do the same type of observation in daily situations like during eating. Instead of just gulping down food, by being mindful of how you eat, you are able to appreciate the whole eating experience and appreciate its benefits. Try practicing being mindful of your daily habits today.

Edited version. First published in Pinoy Smart Living 08.07.2019.
Feature Image: Original Photo by Erriko Boccia on Unsplash.