PERSPECTIVES: "Using the Overleaves to Create Happiness" and New York Channelings
Published: Thu, 04/23/15
I'll be in New York for two weeks, doing two "An Evening with Michael" channeled lectures. Suggested donation is $30 (any amount is fine):
Tuesday, April 28, 7 p.m., School for Young Artists, 31 Wittenberg Rd., Bearsville, NY 12409 (near Woodstock), (845) 679-9541, http://www.schoolforyoungartists.org/find-us
Monday, May 4, 7 p.m., TRS Professional Suite, 40 Exchange Pl. 3rd Fl (Broad/Williams) (also known as 27 William), New York, NY 10005, (212) 685-2848 http://www.trsincprofessionalsuite.com
PAT KENDALL
Pat is an old friend who introduced me to the Michael teachings in 1986. She is one of the most multi-gifted people I've ever known. I recently did a Journeywork session with her, and it was profoundly life changing. Journeywork helps you clear old trauma, unconscious beliefs, and decisions that no longer serve you. I highly recommend her work. You can learn more at lifepathconsulting.com, or contact her directly at 970-482-2974 or [email protected].
She recently created a marvelous series of CDs that teach leading edge techniques for working with our inner self. For more info: http://lifepathconsulting.com/cdseries.html.
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HAPPINESS AND THE MICHAEL TEACHINGS
By Shepherd Hoodwin
[Many thanks to Lauren Jensen for transcribing the lecture upon which this piece is based.]
PART III
USING THE OVERLEAVES
This is the final installment in my series about happiness. Here we're going to explore how to use knowledge of our Michael charts to be happier. If you haven't had your chart channeled and would like to, please see my brochure under "Michael Readings":
http://summerjoy.com/MichaelCH.html
HAPPINESS TIPS FOR EACH ROLE
The Michael teachings define seven roles, or soul types.
Servers thrive when they feel appreciated. We all thrive when we're appreciated but it's especially important for servers. It would be awkward to ask people to tell you that they appreciate you, but when someone does express appreciation, you can give positive reinforcement for that: "Wow, thank you! That makes me feel really good."
We tend to be self-deprecating about compliments. We all want to be loved, but then when love is expressed, we sometimes reject it. How much better to fully take it in. When we ask for things, we need to make space to receive them. By receiving appreciation and thanking the other person, you form a circuit. You make them feel good to know that they've made you feel good. As a result, they're probably going to express more appreciation for you in the future. That works a lot better than being a woebegone server who's always complaining "I slaved all day over a hot stove but nobody appreciates it!" That makes people want to leave.
Priests get depressed when they aren't inspired. All of us like to feel inspired, but for the other roles, it's not central. Different things inspire different people: being in nature, music, and meditating are examples. Meditation is great tool for happiness. It quiets us and allows spirit to take over for a while and relax, heal, and ground us. Priests who don't take time to recharge their inspiration languish. So stay inspired, priests!
Artisans thrive when they have a hobby, usually a craft. Artisan is the second most common role, accounting for twenty-two percent of the population. Obviously, twenty-two percent of people are not highly artistically gifted, but almost all artisans can get a lot of happiness out of doing something with their hands. It could be cooking or decorating — it doesn't have to be a handicraft.
Incidentally, almost anything you could say about an artisan is true of a sage to a lesser extent, and anything you can say about a sage is true of an artisan to a lesser extent. It works that way with the other axes, as well: warriors and kings, and servers and priests. The main difference between them is ordinality versus cardinality.
A big happiness tip for sages is laughter. I have a friend who is an old sage whose mother was mentally ill and severely abused her. When I first knew her, she never laughed. She smiled — she was as sweet as could be — but she didn't laugh. Her healing has been partly about regaining her ability to laugh. A sage who cannot laugh is in deep trouble.
You've probably heard this story of Norman Cousins who laughed himself to wellness by watching Marx Brothers movies and episodes of Candid Camera. He wrote, "I made the joyous discovery that ten minutes of genuine belly laughter had an anesthetic effect and would give me at least two hours of pain-free sleep," I channeled him as a priest with a discarnate sage essence twin, so sage was a secondary energy for him, but that sort of therapy would be especially good for sages.
Sages can also get a lot of happiness out of performing: playing in a band, acting in community theater, etc.
Warriors are the people who climb a mountain because it's there. (I look at pictures of a mountain while sitting on my Barcalounger because it's there. I don't need much challenge.) Warriors are not going to be happy if they don't have challenge and excitement: roller coasters, horror movies, athletics (both as participant and fan), etc. They also need worthwhile work.
Kings like to have big projects to sink their teeth into, preferably leading others, or a difficult skill they can master.
Scholars are pretty easy to keep happy as long as they have something to assimilate: books, movies, the Internet, etc. For moving centered scholars, travel can bring much happiness.
GOALS
Goals are one of the overleaves, or personality traits we take on before each lifetime. Our goal is what motivates us, the kinds of experiences we seek.
Those in reevaluation enjoy quietude and nature. They consistently say things like "All I've ever wanted was a cottage by the shore or a cabin in the woods." Just not having too many demands on them is a happiness boost for them.
People in growth seek new things. They tend to be busy: they like to take new classes, read a new book, learn a new language, or eat a new cuisine. If they become overwhelmed, which they often do, they can benefit from sliding (temporarily moving to) to reevaluation. Sliding between growth and reevaluation is one of the most common sliding patterns among all of the overleaves — those in growth need to assimilate those new experiences, and those in reevaluation occasionally crave some stimulation, although not much.
Having high quality in our lives is especially important to those in discrimination, although it adds happiness for all of us. For example, if you want to watch TV, don't just watch what happens to be on. Give yourself a few minutes to research your options. Consider the DVDs you have, too, and pick something you'll really enjoy. When we keep watching something that's not very good due to inertia — we just don't feel like getting up and changing the channel — that degrades our happiness. It doesn't have to be Masterpiece Classic, just something that we really enjoy. Discrimination, like cynic, can be a difficult overleaf. In its negative pole, it can be excessively rejecting, such as driving other people away. But it need not manifest that way.
Those in acceptance especially appreciate agreeable circumstances and people; they avoid conflict, whereas some people are attracted to the excitement of it.
For those in submission, having something worthy of devotion, and having their devotion be respected, brings happiness.
Dominance is on the action axis, so it's about doing. Having an endeavor worth leading brings happiness for those in dominance.
Those in flow are happiest when they have a sense of freedom. They need to avoid getting stuck. Sliding to any of the other goals can help them overcome inertia and get moving again.
ATTITUDES
Our attitude is what stands out to us when we look at the world.
The attitudes are the most flexible in the overleaves in that it's easier to borrow from others if we need to, although our native attitude forms our personality. For example, we can all benefit from sometimes being skeptical when that's called for, or from adopting the spiritualist's vision of possibility, the idealist's optimism, the pragmatist's practicality, the stoic's equanimity, and the realist's respect for facts. Such flexibility can help us avoid extremes. Most commonly, we slide to our opposite overleaf for balance, but with attitudes, the others are fairly easily accessed as well.
Those with the attitudes of cynic and skeptic can be just as happy as anyone else — there is no overleaf that is intrinsically unhappy when it is in the positive pole — but the pitfalls of their negative poles are particularly problematic, especially cynic, whose negative pole is denigration. In fact, cynic may be the most difficult overleaf. Still, some cynics happily do their positive pole of contradiction. A lot of comedians are skeptics and cynics. They have less need for optimism than the other attitudes, and generally don't miss it. They appreciate when others are open to considering the issues they raise.
Any overleaf that is on the same side of the same axis as our role is more intense. For example, a sage idealist has a more pronounced experience of idealist than, say, a server, because sage and idealist are on the same side of the same axis. That's called a "natural overleaf." And if you're not an idealist but you're a sage, you still have a little bit of the idealist attitude built into who you are.
Cynic is a natural overleaf for warriors. I know a warrior cynic who can easily talk himself into a hopeless, black place, believing that everything is crap. That's an extreme expression of the negative pole.
We don't do harsher overleaves in many lifetimes but we do need to do them occasionally in order to have a balanced view of things. We need cynics — they test things for soundness. They challenge other people to prove that they're not pie in the sky. When spiritualists and idealists are full of inspiration and ideas about what could be, cynics come along and make sure that they hold water. They apply acid to metal to remove its tarnish, but in the negative pole there is so much acid that it eats through the metal and the thing is ruined. Few of us are in our positive poles all or even most of the time, so cynics will sometimes do denigration.
If we're on automatic pilot, we're likely to do our negative poles quite a bit. The more conscious we are, the better able we are to stay in our positive poles. As we do the work of bringing the light to bear on our shadows, the happier we can be. We are able to observe and understand our negative poles. We see that they are crude tools that don't work very well, that they are based in fear and make us unhappy. We increasingly choose to stay in our positive poles.
Stoics need peace to be happy.
Spiritualists need to share their vision of what could be, but they also need to make sure that it's grounded in reality — realists can help with that. Spiritualists are especially susceptible to taking on an inspiring vision that doesn't hold up, which can get them into trouble.
Skeptics need interesting things to explore. They can get bogged down in suspicion, their negative pole. The trick is to stay curious and open without bias either for or against.
Idealists are full of optimistic ideas for a better world. Similar to spiritualists, they need to ground their vision into the practical — pragmatists can help with that. Successfully instituting some of their ideas makes them happy.
Pragmatists are happy when they find practical solutions, such as ways to reduce waste or to organize things better. They can become plodding and rigid, and benefit from the soaring ideas of idealists.
Realists like to know what the facts are in a situation but they can become earthbound. They can benefit from the inspirational input of spiritualists, just as spiritualists can be grounded by realists.
MODES
Modes are about how we run our energy. The cardinal modes are expanded — they increase quantity; the ordinal modes are contracted — they increase quality. Occasionally sliding to the opposite overleaf, from ordinal to cardinal or vice versa, can help us find balance, and therefore happiness.
Passion mode is cardinal on the inspiration axis — it opens the floodgates to a greater quantity of inspirational energy. Its archetype is the big puppy. An example of it being out of balance (in the negative pole) is a person who throws herself into every love affair with so much abandon that she loses herself, until it inevitably breaks up. Happiness requires passion with healthy boundaries, which are the specialty of its opposite, reserve.
Being ordinal, reserve mode is the inner refinement of inspirational energy. Its archetype is the ballet dancer. When it is frozen in contraction, it is uptight. Happiness requires control with freedom, found in its opposite, passion.
Power mode is cardinal on the expression axis – it increases the weight of one's expressiveness. People in power mode may feel that they're just being themselves when others see them as being overbearing. Power is a natural overleaf for sages. A sage in power mode might seem like a larger-than-life diva, too loud and big in the negative pole. Happiness requires being aware of one's impact on others, careful about what one expresses, which is the specialty of its opposite, caution.
Caution mode can be too careful when in its negative pole, phobia. Happiness requires being in one's power, found in the positive pole of its opposite, authority.
Aggression mode is cardinal on the action axis — people in aggression do a lot. Since they naturally have dynamic energy, it's important for their happiness that they know when to rest. The negative pole is belligerence; particularly if they get too stressed or tired, they fly off the handle, losing their temper. Aggression is a natural overleaf for the king role, and it can look like king tyranny.
Aggression mode is balanced by perseverance, where one contracts on one task until it's completed. If it becomes stuck, unable to let go when it's time, it can find balance by borrowing from the dynamism of aggression mode to get one's energy moving again.
The neutral mode is observation, with a negative pole of surveillance. It can be balanced by sliding to any of the other modes, but especially helpful is minding one's own business. When we focus on making the choices that are ours to make, and leave others to make the choices that are theirs to make, it frees up a great deal of energy. The urge to gossip comes from instinctive center hardwiring designed to keep other members of our clan in line by judging them. Much of our evolution comes from photographing when we're acting blindly from hardwiring and replacing that with more conscious and skillful approaches.
CENTERS
We each have seven centers: emotional/higher emotional, intellectual/higher intellectual, physical/moving, and instinctive. One of the first concepts in the original Michael channelings was the need to balance our centers in order to be happy. That implies that we have cultivated all our centers enough so that when we react to a situation, we can use the correct tool for that situation. For instance, if somebody needs a hug, we react emotionally and hug them rather than intellectually, explaining how they should try to fix their circumstances. Someone lacking emotional development has a harder time doing that.
Our primary center (either intellectual, emotional, physical, or moving) is like a switchboard that can direct our next reaction to the most appropriate part of center. Even though we use one part of center habitually, our switchboard can direct us to a different part of our primary center when that's called for. The more balanced our centers are, the easier that will be.
We each have a weak link. I'm in the emotional part of intellectual center, so my weak link is my body. I have to be more deliberate about using it, such as exercising. I also have a passive body type, so getting my body in gear can be a challenge, but being disciplined about that balances me, so it's a boon to my happiness.
We use our higher centers both in everyday ways and for intense, peak experiences. We use our higher intellectual center to conceptualize, but also for transcendent aha's when we see eternal truths. We use our higher emotional center when we're feeling transpersonal emotions such as altruism, and also the highs that result when we feel one with the whole. We use our moving center to move, but when we're in the zone, such as during ecstatic dancing, we can feel bliss. Those peak higher-center experiences come from opening to our essence (our eternal nature), and to the essence of others. They are the epitome of happiness.
CHIEF OBSTACLES
Our chief obstacle is our greatest blind spot, what we most fear. It's an unconscious illusion we deeply believe on a gut level, that we will defend unto death until we become conscious of it. The seven are self-deprecation and arrogance, self-destruction and greed, martyrdom and impatience, and stubbornness. Overcoming our chief obstacle is the biggest thing we can do for our happiness. It is a huge subject, but I'll make a few comments here.
It's not useful to demonize the obstacles. It's not useful to demonize anything, because demonization originates from a false belief that something is not God or part of the whole — what is. If we see everything as a lesson or gift, we don't beat ourselves up about our obstacle. Getting in the habit of observing it with compassion and learning from it can contribute a great deal to our happiness. Michael refers to that as photographing it: recognizing it when it is operating in our lives, and knowing that it's an illusion even if we are not yet able to release it. We all have a bit of each of the obstacles in us, although one is dominant so we can better work on it.
A good way to break the back of arrogance is to remember, when we feel critical of someone else, when we have done something similar and forgive ourselves for it.
With impatience, if we're running late once again, rather than frantically speeding up, we can do the opposite and come into the present moment in a relaxed way in the awareness that all is well, even if we'll be late. Calmly considering our choices and letting go of doing things that can wait help us work smarter.
Those in greed feel a hole inside them that nothing can fill. Gradually, by counting our blessings and validating what is already abundant in our life, we can break its hold.
Stubbornness is the most common obstacle, and because it's on the neutral (assimilation) axis, it tends to be especially invisible to those who hold it. "What me? I'm not stubborn! I'm just standing up for myself. Nobody is going to tell me what to do!" Noticing the feeling of digging in our heels helps a lot. Gradually opening up and discovering that it's safe to let others make some decisions that affect us, and that it's safe to change our point of view — that change can be for the better — softens stubbornness.
Those in self-deprecation fear that they're inadequate. Knowing that that's an illusion, that we're all perfect as we are, and recognizing our strengths, can help. Putting oneself down is often seen as virtuous (especially compared to arrogance), but knowing one's strengths as well as one's weaknesses is not arrogance — it's just realism. If we don't believe in ourselves, we will sabotage all our efforts, which will only serve to seem to prove our inadequacy.
Those in self-destruction fear a loss of self-control. They look for structure that they may have lacked as children, but as adults, we need to find our centering within. Becoming more conscious of our choices and developing inner balance is the long-term solution. Ultimately, stability only comes from grounding in the eternal.
Those in martyrdom fear that they aren't worthy and need to suffer in order to earn brownie points. Everyone is worthy and deserves the blessings of life. It is only our ability to know that and receive them that is at issue. Letting go of martyred role models is important here. Self-sacrifice is sometimes called for, but win-win is a higher paradigm.
For more on the obstacles, read José Stevens' book "Transforming Your Dragons."
BODY TYPES
Body types are the influences of the celestial bodies on our physical bodies. There are seven main ones. Four (saturnian, venusian, jovial, and solar) are positive charged, meaning that their focus is external. They tend to be better at letting things slide of their back because they don't take things in as much. Three of the body types (lunar, mercurial and martial) are negative charged. They take in things more and are more easily hurt. They need to learn how to manage their higher sensitivity. Negative types can have as much happiness as positive, but they have to be more careful about protecting themselves, which they instinctively do.
Here we are addressing our body's hardwiring. One could have a positive body type but have high mental/emotional sensitivity. Also, artisans and sages are the most sensitive of the roles because of their multiple inputs, or psychic receivers.
We generally have a combination of two or three body-type influences working together. A person's body could be half positive and half negative, in which case she's in the middle. But someone with, say, ninety percent negative influences is likely to be hypersensitive and feel everything, especially with a high amount of lunar influence, which is also passive and feminine, so it doesn't have built-in defenses. Therefore, lunars need to be alone a lot, and especially benefit from learning not to take in other people's energies. However, becoming skillful in handling energy requires all of us to discern and let go of what is not ours and maintain the sanctity of our aura. Karmic humanity is a mess of tangled energies that make it hard to know who we are and create happiness.
Having a positive body type gives you an initial leg up with happiness, but where positive types get into trouble is by being oblivious. Saturnian/venusian combinations, for example, tend to be easygoing. If they let trouble signs slide off their back, failing to engage with them, they can slam into a wall.
Body types are also differentiated by being either active or passive, and either masculine or feminine. Active types are more often drawn to exercise, which adds to happiness by generating endorphins. However, they are less comfortable than passive types when required to sit still. Whatever our configuration, we need to learn how to manage it in a way that's in balance.
The Michael teachings are one tool that can help us be more self-aware. By comparing our present experience to the yardstick of happiness — a free and refined expression of self — we can gradually become happier.