New Age Grammar Lesson

I laughed at myself today as I was updating my website with the Daily Message. I think I spent about ten minutes deciding how to capitalize the word “love” in the message for November 30. It’s not that I’ve forgotten the basic rules of English grammar. It’s just that grammar gets a bit confusing in the New Age.

There are certain words – Love and Enlightenment, for instance – that have become ideographs in the New Age movement. They’ve taken on a gravity and persona all their own. We capitalize them in the same way that more conventional religious folks capitalize the word God. We strive to have the letters in the word help us hold reverence for what we’re writing. And I think this is great. Until I find myself writing something like this:

Daily Message -- November 30, 2011
The energy of Love is very strong today. Find a way to show Love for everyone around you. Spend time meditating on the people and places you Love most, and build a sense of Love in your heart that reaches beyond your body. Live in a field of Love today.

After I typed this out, I felt uncomfortable. It’s one thing to occasionally break the rules of classical grammar in order to add emphasis. It’s an entirely other thing to write the word Love with a capital L five times in only four sentences. The inner grammar critic inside my mind just started spinning and I couldn’t do it.

So I rewrote the whole thing with no capital-L Loves:

Daily Message -- November 30, 2011
The energy of love is very strong today. Find a way to show love for everyone around you. Spend time meditating on the people and places you love most, and build a sense of love in your heart that reaches beyond your body. Live in a field of love today.

That looks better to my inner critic, but it doesn’t fit at all with the emphasis on love that was coming through the Records when I channeled this message several weeks ago.

Finally, I decided to use a little grammar rule of my very own – one I’ve come up with over the course of typing out many channelings from the Akashic Records that use the word love in so very many ways. This rule dictates that I capitalize Love when it is used as a noun, and leave it small when it is used as a verb.

So here’s the variation that finally posted on my website today:

Daily Message -- November 30, 2011
The energy of Love is very strong today. Find a way to show love for everyone around you. Spend time meditating on the people and places you love most, and build a sense of Love in your heart that reaches beyond your body. Live in a field of Love today.

I feel fine with this for now, and I’m glad I’ve come up with my own little rule for New Age grammar. Sometimes I feel like I am overcapitalizing in the channelings when I post them online. Other times I wonder if I’m not doing it enough to emphasize the importance of certain concepts coming through the Records. Whenever I channel a message, it comes through as a set of ideas and concepts. It’s up to my and my brain to figure out how to put them into language.

I think all channelers and healers must face a similar conundrum. How do you put these huge, nonlinear concepts into words? When do words fail to convey, and when do words come through so powerfully that they have the ability to heal? I’d love to hear about your experiences.

Lightworker Scavenger Hunt

The Keepers have been talking a lot lately about Lightworkers.  Last month’s Live Channeling event (now a website download) was on the topic of “Leadership and Change: You Are the Ones You’ve Been Waiting For” which was all about how we are learning to lead by example, rather than leading by bossing each other around --  though the Keepers said it a bit more nicely than that!

I posted a channeling last week about Lightworkers that said:

“It is time to expand your definition of what it means to be a Lightworker.  It is time to expand your identity as a Lightworker to include everyone around you.  It is time then to start looking around and noticing that the most mundane situation can be filled with Light.  It is time to look around and start noticing that the most unassuming, quiet person in the room might be the one who is bringing the most Light.” 

Most of the channelings and most of what you’ll find online about Lightworkers tell us how be Lightworkers ourselves.  But what the Keepers have focused on lately is how much everyday life events are really expressions of Lightwork -- how we don't necessarily need to be involved in spiritual or energy work to be Lightworkers.

In that light, I’m going a Lightworker scavenger hunt and I’m inviting you to join me.  Every time I enter a new social situation, instead of asking myself how I can bring more Light, I’m going to start hunting for those magical souls who are bringing more light – each in their own way.  Then I'm going to help them, or celebrate them, or just sit back in awe and admiration as they work their mojo!

It’s easy to pick out the obvious ones -- the minister at the pulpit or the healer giving someone a hug over in the corner.   It’s not so easy to spot the stealthy ones --the kind soul who slows down while crossing the street in order to protect an elderly stranger, or the teenage boy making jokes in the hospital waiting room in order to ease the tension. 

I’ll give myself extra points for the ones I spot who have probably never even heard the word Lightworker -- the ones who show kindness in everyday moments because it’s in their nature, it’s just who they are.  Because “just who they are” is a Lightworker. 

It doesn’t matter what language you use or what social movement you are part of – if you sense the hearts of others and strive to make those around you just a little lighter, just a little more at ease – then you’re a Lightworker.

Hunting for hidden Lightworkers is fun.  It give me a sense of hope to realize that I am surrounded by them, and that whatever I’m striving to do to make the world a better place is supported by countless moments across the world in which others are doing the very same thing.

So let's make the Comments field for this blog post be a place where you can tell us about a hidden Lightworker you've spotted.  I can't wait to see what you discover in the months to come!