Many new people have been added to the list this month to receive this newsletter. They include clients, friends, and those that have attended Reiki Shares. As always, this list is made of people that have some relationship with Caring Palms, and is not intended to be spam. At any time, you may remove your name from this mailing list by selecting the Safe Unsubscribe at the bottom if you wish to do so.

Also, there are some entries on this list that are just an email address with no name. This is something that the sign-up process allowed initially, but does not anymore. At the beginning of next month, all of these entries will be removed unless you email me and tell me that you want to stay on and give me a name to be put with the address. If you get removed and want to go back on the list, simply go to the website and select "Join Our Mailing List" on the lower right hand side.

Thank you.

• March 9 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm  Confirmed
• April 13 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm
• April 17 (Wednesday) 10am - 5pm
• May 11 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm
• June 8 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm
• June 19 (Wednesday) 10am - 5pm
• July 13 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm
• August 10 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm
• August 14 (Wednesday) 10am - 5pm
• September 14 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm
• September 18 (Wednesday) 10am - 5pm
• October 12 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm
• October 16 (Wednesday) 10am - 5pm
• November 9 (Saturday) 10am - 5pm  

The following is a list of currently scheduled classes.  This class is a two-day class worth 12 CE hours for Florida massage therapists.  Each class (unless otherwise marked) currently has a status of 'Scheduled'.  This means that a date has been set, but no one has signed up for it yet.  Once a deposit has been received for a class, the status will be 'Confirmed'.  The current schedule is as follows:

• March 16 - March 17  (Saturday 9:00am - 5:00pm and Sunday 10:00am - 4:00pm)    Confirmed
• June 4 - June 5  (Tuesday 9:00am - 5:00pm and Wednesday 10:00am - 4:00pm)
• June 22 - June 23  (Saturday 9:00am - 5:00pm and Sunday 10:00am - 4:00pm)
• August 3 - August 4  (Saturday 9:00am - 5:00pm and Sunday 10:00am - 4:00pm)
• August 20 - August 21  (Tuesday 9:00am - 5:00pm and Wednesday 10:00am - 4:00pm) 

All classes are scheduled to be held at the Hampton Inn at Jacksonville Beach, FL.  Should the location change, that change will be on the website and students notified. 

Note: Check with the hotel for special room rates.  

Maximize your results with less effort. Utilize the science of martial arts and apply it to massage. Body Mechanics and Advanced Techniques for Massage Therapists is designed to reconnect the massage therapist with proper body mechanics and techniques showing how to work without hurting oneself and how to apply deep pressure with little effort.  The class being part lecture, part hands-on practice uses theory, stances, centering, and the proper use of body strength from martial arts and applies them to the art of massage therapy.  Students will learn how to focus their energies and use their body to do deep work with less effort and not get hurt.  This class will help anyone to work deeply with less effort no matter if one is 90 pounds or 250 pounds.  This class is for both the seasoned therapist and the new therapist.  It will show moves everyone is familiar with, but in a new light as well as moves many people may not have seen before (which have been taken from Lomi Lomi, Esalen, and other styles).  The idea is not to dictate how to practice, but to show better body mechanics which the therapist can adapt to what they do.  This is true whether they adapt all of it or just part of it.

We've heard many times that we are a product of our environment, and that is true. We are a culmination of everything that has happened in our lives, every experience, every pain, every heartache, every joy, every wonder. Everything that has happened has been to mold us and shape us into the being that we are today. That girl that turned you down for the big dance. That kid in the back in third grade that kept shooting spitballs at you. That first kiss. That new car. That pretty sunset sending colors all through the sky. Everything has helped form who we truly are. But why do we carry it all around with us?

It is good to know what happened in our lives, and have memories, but we tend to carry these with us as we go. And the load gets heavier the further we go along our various paths. This has been termed unwanted baggage, and leaving it behind is a difficult thing to do.

It is all right to remember things that happened, they bring us joy, or reminders to be careful. But to still be attached to the point that we are still angry or sad, well, that pulls us back into the past and does not let us move into our future. This baggage we carry bogs us down and makes us not able to step forward. As it has been said that we need to leave the past behind us so we can move forward. We need to not carry our baggage from the past into the future. But it is not as easy as it sounds. (Is anything really as easy as it sounds?)

Part of the trouble releasing the past is that we identify with it too much. We take it in and define ourselves by it. Let's take an example... John is a person that suffers from epilepsy. When John introduces himself, does he say, "Hi. I'm John. I have epilepsy."? Probably not. More likely he will say, "Hi. I'm John. I'm an epileptic." Do you see the difference? In the first one, John says that he is a person and that he has an illness. In the second, he includes that illness as part of himself. He defines himself by his illness.

When we define ourselves by the problems we have, it makes harder to release these problems. To someone that is angry a lot, they tend to define themselves with that anger. When they go to release that anger, they feel like they are letting go of a part of themselves. That makes them panic, which makes them bring that part back to them to hold onto. The same thing has been said of people with unwanted spirits in their house. They get someone in to convince the spirit to move on. Then when the spirit is gone, the people will miss all the goings-on no matter how annoying they were, and bring the spirit back in.

By releasing our anger, fear, or pain, or whatever we have, we actually miss that because we used it to define ourselves. We let go part of ourselves which in turn redefines us, and what we truly are. We miss that piece. And it is frightening feeling like we are missing an important piece of ourselves. And the bigger that piece is, the more we used it to define who we are, the harder this transition is. But this is the type of thing we need to do to move on, to release the past and move into the future.

Now, how do we release this baggage? There are many good ways. Meditation is one. You go into your meditative state and look at experiences in your life one at a time. You can let them come up randomly, or ask that the ones having the most hold on you come first (and these can be painful experiences, or happy ones). With each experience you view, strip away the emotion. Without the emotion, it is just fact, something that happened. Without the emotions tied to them, there is nothing to grab you and pull you back into the past.

Hypnosis is another method. In this case, someone would lead you through something similar to what is done in the meditation.

There are also tools that health counselors use that have the same effect. They let you release the stuff you don't need so you can move forward with the stuff you do.

Or you could simply pay attention to yourself. How am I reacting to this situation? Why am I reacting the way I am? You just might remember something similar that happened that is still pulling on you. Once you have this, just say, "I release you. You have no pull on me anymore." Yes, it can be that simple as long as you mean it. And you have to mean it with all your being.

So, find the tools that work best for you. Leave the past behind you, and step into your bold new future.

by Brian Dean

What is involved with moving forward? Well, I think a good part of it has to do with letting go. Now, what is involved with letting go?

Let's imagine for a moment that you are in one of those disaster movies. You've come to a chasm that needs to be crossed, and the only thing there which would allow you to cross it with is a long steel beam. It is too far to jump, say maybe 20 feet to the other side. As you step onto the beam, you grab a branch that is there. You use it to balance yourself before moving across. You need to move across because there is molten lava approaching the side you are on. You need to move forward. What is the first thing you need to do to move forward? Well, you need to let go of that branch you're holding onto.

If you continue to hold the branch, you will not move, and surely nasty things will happen if you stay there. Holding onto that branch keeps you in one place. It makes you inactive. It keeps you from moving away, from moving to safety. It keeps you from moving forward.

And so it is in real life. We hold onto things that keep us from moving forward. We hold onto the past. We hold onto perceptions of the way things are, or should be. We keep ourselves stagnant. We keep ourselves from moving forward.

All too often, we cling to the past. We hold onto things, remembering how they were, wishing things could be like that again. I do the same thing. When I started sight scanning, I did it a specific way. At one point, things changed, and now I do it another way, yet there have been times when I went back to the original method. I was holding onto the past. I needed to let go of that original method as it was keeping me from moving forward. By holding on to it, I was not letting myself go to the next method. I was not allowing myself to be open enough for that next method to come to me. Therefore, I was stagnating, and not moving forward.

Everyone has problems like this, and I'll bet not just one. Ok, so the first step is to let go of the past. The next step is to let go of wants and desires that keep you penned to a small area.

We all have things we want or desire. We want to be rich. We want to weigh less. We want to look different. We want to be successful. We want to command starships... uhh... well, some of us do. The point is that by tying ourselves to what we want, we limit ourselves from what we can do.

If we take the situation where someone works for a company, and don't like the way things happen, maybe their desire is to some day run the company. Although that sounds like a good path, it is limiting. That person has limited themselves with staying with that company, putting up with all the garbage necessary to get through it to the top, and then getting there. The first problem I can see is that by the time they jump through all the hoops, they will have changed so much that they will forget what they are actually there for. I think the same is true all too often for politicians. A person gets into politics to make positive changes, but as they go through the system to advance far enough to make the changes they see necessary, they have changed so much that what they initially wanted to change is no longer important to them. There was a saying that stated... "If a person has the means and ability to get themselves elected president, then they should by no means be allowed to hold the office."

By keeping this desire to become head of the company, this person does not allow other, positive things to happen. Maybe something would come along that would take them out of that company into a better, more positive situation that they would enjoy. But to see that, this person would need to let go of that one desire, and allow new things to happen.

The same thing is true for all of us. We have desires that we hold very dear to our hearts. We are always consciously aware of what they are. But maybe this desire is not the best solution. Maybe we need to let it go to open ourselves up to other possibilities.

Once we open ourselves up, we need to allow other things to happen. Then to truly make it work once these other things present themselves, we need to accept them. We need to accept them as a positive change, and move forward with them.

Several years ago, I was laid off from my day job. I could have clung to the past, and done everything I could have to keep it, or find something else just like it. Instead, I embraced the change. I let go of that job and that company. I opened myself to other things, like working for myself doing healing. This brought opportunities which I then had to accept to move forward.

Now, a job is not the only thing we cling to. It is a good example, but we cling to many things. We cling to habits, and reactions that cause certain emotional states. We cling to people, and to thought processes.

Now, I'm not saying don't dream. Please, dream. You can want something that is reachable, and on your path, like my desire to be a good healer and to keep growing as one. You can want it, and work toward it, and let it manifest at the same time. In that respect, you are letting it happen. You are not making an all-consuming effort to be there. You are working within the energies of the universe, and allowing them to help create your dream.

But first, we need to let go. So, the small piece of wisdom I leave you with today is...

Accept it.

At Caring Palms, we pledge to do the best work we can at every session.  We not only do this to continue to earn your business, but because we believe that you deserve the best care possible every time you are here.  This is true whether it is massage, or energy work, or classes. This is our promise.  This is what we will continue to do.