Soul’s Code

Will soul evolving strength and beauty emerge from the rubble of Haiti?

GUEST COLUMN BY CHELSEA LANGAN — It’s been a tough couple of days for Haitians, their families, and sympathetic souls around the world. The devastation that has unfolded in such an already grief stricken island seems catastrophic.

But on a positive note, I believe they’ve acquired a rare opportunity to rebuild their nation from the ground up with a new, uncanny, unprecedented strength and perception that has the potential to spread miracles to the rest of the world.

One might consider the damage from the earthquake a free demo, a courtesy, rather, from God himself.

Although many of the Haitian structures deemed sacred have been leveled, or re-leveled in some cases, I don’t question God’s testaments to the ephemeral.

Recession pushed a real-life couple into therapy.  What they found when they got there: money was synonymous with love and security.

DAVID RICKEY — In early 1988 I began work with a couple, (we’ll call them George and Martha), whose relationship seemed to be a victim of the ’87 recession. Martha worked as an interior designer; George worked at a Wall Street investment firm.

The recession was the cause of his being laid off and it also saw a decline in her business. Before this upheaval they had lived a very comfortable lifestyle on the Upper Westside of Manhattan.

They came to me because they found that most of the time that they were together now, they were fighting or just irritable, and there was a big decline in intimacy. They thought all this had to do with the decline in their income and therefore the lowering of their “lifestyle”.

An animal communicator talks about the complexities surrounding the decision to let your friend pass on

GUEST COLUMN: KAREN ANDERSON — One of the most difficult decisions we will ever make is when to say goodbye to our beloved animal companions.

Those of you who have struggled with this painful decision know the ups and downs of your emotions, the guilt, the uncertainty and the sadness of it all.

You are not alone in your pain. I receive many calls from distraught humans in the same situation who just want to be sure the time is right.  Although their situations are each different and unique, the ultimate result is the same.

They have made the decision to end their animal’s life. . .

Superstar clans that have lived with trauma and scandal look to bury the past in very different ways.

BY PAUL KAIHLA — Grief is a very private affair. But this week, it’s going very public for the loved ones of Michael Jackson and Ted Kennedy. May they rest in peace —  and for the rest of us, may we share the Dalai Lama’s brand of guidance and comfort.

The loss of a loved one is a shock to your system. It’s useful to remind yourself that you’re in trauma. A being who took up a Grand Canyon worth of space in your psyche is gone. The vacuum their loss has left leaves you confused – and reeling. So do drugs, alcohol, addictions, affairs and other escapes. You don’t need any more momentum in that direction.

You’ll keep asking yourself, “What do I do now?” Don’t even try to answer that question. You can’t.

I wasn’t yet 10 years old and — in a flash — my childhood was over

BY SUEANN JACKSON-LAND — March 26, 1975 started out like any other day. It was a school day and I was in the 4th grade in Ms. Royer’s class. Ms. Royer looked like a great grandma. She was thin and gray, and secretly, I thought she was a professor instead of a 4th grade teacher.

The school bus pulled up to Oxford Drive and my neighbor Joel and I got off the bus. We were walking together, the same way we did every day. I stopped. Just stopped right in my tracks and I remember saying to Joel that something was wrong. I had a strange sensation like dizziness, but not dizziness; something else, instead. We continued up the road to my house and I unlocked the door and let myself inside.

Love is the answer for transforming all pain into unconditional love

SMADAR DE LANGE — I meditate on this day on the worth of life. 9/11 is an exhibit of the way some in the body of humanity do not believe in the worth of individual human life.

It’s easy to call people like this “terrorists.” But let’s drill deeper into the thing in their value system that devalues. They believe that human lives do not have a meaning in their individuality, but only as a collective.

Belonging to a certain ethnicity, religion, nationality, geographical location is all that a human presence is to this group-think mentality.

In these times, it seems that we are on a pendulum between being a spark of dust to being it all  . . .

Does the continuing recession feed your anxiety? Is your grasp on hope loosening? A former business executive-turned-mystic, speaks

SPECIAL TO SOUL’S CODE: RONDA LARUE — What does one dedicated to a soulful life do in the days following a layoff or the termination of a job?

What does one do with the shock, the feelings of betrayal, and the confusion — and the paralyzing waves of fear?

How does one survive, find hope, stand strong, and create new opportunity? How can one dare to meet life in a new way — to stay open and not cave in?

“Just because CNN is selling economic fear across the board doesn’t mean you have to buy it.”

GUEST COLUMN: VAISHALI — From the Eastern perspective there will never be one single pill, diet, exercise or lifestyle that will cure what ails all people.

Each of our lives fulls of thoughts and episodes and sensations reflect an intensely-experienced microcosm. Each being has a unique fingerprint —  let it be said, soul’s code — and wants to be understood, examined and healed uniquely, not through the lens of mass judgment.

What is experientially, emotionally and perceptually toxic to one person could be liberating to another. There is not one accepted standard that will equally measure every nuance of every person’s life. The “average person” does not exist in Eastern philosophy.

A priest and psychotherapist shares how he and his friends have dealt with recession, job loss and financial poverty

BY DAVID RICKEY — The loss of a job — the proverbial “Pink Slip” — can be a major challenge on several levels. Material survival, physical well-being, emotional balance, and, ultimately, sense of meaning are all threatened by this single event.

Here’s a “prescription” for dealing with this threat.

First, breathe . . .

Then, as you keep breathing deeply, let the fears and emotions gently come forth. With each fear, as it arises, ask yourself: “Is that really true?”

“Headscarf martyr” mourned in Egypt

An Egyptian woman stabbed to death in a German courtroom was mourned by a throng of people in Alexandria, Egypt, July 7, 2009. Marwa al-Sherbini, 32 years old and pregnant, was allegedly attacked in court during a case in which a neighbor accused her of being a “terrorist” for wearing traditional Muslim garb. This is what’s in the air over there: President Nicolas Sarkozy has made waves over the past few weeks by advocating a ban of wearing burkas in public.