Everyday Energies - When Did Madonna-Bashing Become a Sport?

I have a Facebook page which I keep just for close friends and family, where last week I asked a question about Madonna. What I had been observing in reactions to her (much publicized) fall at The Brit Awards really baffled and struck me.

The public reactions revealed far more about our own judgmental natures, than anything to do with a woman who fell in public but immediately got back up again, and continued with her purpose. 

I wrote this post because I wanted to see what the people I knew truly felt about the whole thing, and their answers were diverse and fascinating. 

So I'm now opening the exact same post out to all of you, so we can discuss and explore it together. You could see my post as purely focused on Madonna. Or, you can see it is an energy discussion about how we react to women, age, sexuality and those who fall.

When did Madonna-Bashing become a sport? 

I saw the vid of her falling at the Brits and it looked painful. My first instinct was concern for her. She fell quite a long way backwards, down several steps, and said to the interviewer Jonathan Ross she had whiplash following the fall.

Yet laughing at it seems to be the norm among a lot of people. 

The thing is, I was 8 years old when I first was a fan, and now 30 years later (especially when other 80's superstars Michael Jackson and Whitney we lost to drugs) I am just full of admiration for the balls and stamina it takes to show up and do what she does.

I have several friends who either 'hate her' or think 'she needs to dress her age' or 'she's not a talented singer or songwriter' or 'she's had it and should just shuffle off to a dark corner'. And the level of vitriol she provokes baffles me. 

While I respect that we don't all need to like her, her music or her choices, I find it sad that everyone wants to bash on her. I know for a fact that if she was a man, she wouldn't get even 20% of the stick she gets now. A lot of this smacks of sexism and ageism to me, both of which I am against, for each of them are divisive and unhealthy for our society.

For me, there's something mighty reassuring about a multi-millionaire (who certainly doesn't need the money), still wanting to do the job she has done for over 30 years. Especially when she knows that while yes, she has fans, she will also get the public judgement she gets. And quite honestly, if the woman wanted to dress up in a fluorescent hippo outfit at the age of 70, I would still find her journey and choices interesting to observe. 

Because I remember she has been part of our lives and our culture for a long time, and there is a value in that for me. Those who live in tribes value their elders and I don't think we do in modern western society. And we are ALL going to be older. It's a universal destination.

When she is dead, people will look back and realise there was no-one like her. And many of those who criticised her will change their tune, because she will no longer be here provoking reactions in others that makes them feel they should judge her for their internal reactions. I hope we as a society in the future evolve beyond the judgement protocol we are so willing to run with now. 

Let's talk about this people, in the comments below, as it is a bizarre thing.

And no, I don't need anyone to like her. I'm just a bit alarmed by how many people vent their spleen using her as a symbol…. and I'd really love to hear your comments on it.

Big love
Lee
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March 2015 Energy Forecast - Faster Times and Feelings in the Shadows and the Light

Click on the language for translation: Polish Japanese Spanish French

(Transcribed and edited from Lee's live video message.)

Hello and welcome to the Energy Forecast for March 2015.

We are in San Francisco this month, and by ‘we’ I mean you and I, because unusually for me this month I'm here alone and filming this alone. I never feel alone because I feel all of you guys are listening to this.
And I have to say, (I've started this video or attempted to start this video about five times), which is not my norm, but the level of energy in this city and a higher level of distraction is definitely present; but that can always be a good practice. I feel like when you have a lot of distraction around you, then focusing and honing in on energetics is part of your daily work - the same work that we do every single day. So, this beautiful vibrant city is quite the place and I hope that you feel something of it through the lens.

To speak now about the energies of March and what you’re going to notice coming up this month. 

There are two keywords or titles that I would like to throw on the table for you; one is the word faster, and the other is background noise. I promise you that background noise is no pun intended (Laughter). I had that term come to me this morning when I was tuning in on the energy of March, and of course lo and behold I'm very aware of the level of background noise compared to usually the quietness of our hill.

But first let's deal with the word ‘faster’:

Faster times, faster energies

Faster is going to be part of the pattern of your life this month and so for some of you it could cause you to question, “Am I a little bit overwhelmed? Is too much happening at once?”

The truth is going to be that you’re actually re-patterning yourself to be able to handle a faster life. And by faster life I don't necessarily mean you feeling overloaded with work or overloaded with demands on you - more that a very visceral experience is now beginning to happen for all of us on the planet. We are noticing that everything is speeding up. And that is because on an energetic level, everything is opening up.

So as you yourself open to an opening world there is an experience of multiplication that takes place. 

It's not just because of your level of personal opening or development that you'll be feeling this. It’s directly because of how this whole planet and its people are beginning to rise and change together.

This can be tricky. It can turn up the heat emotionally and in action. 

Dark rising to attempt to dominate light

We see this on the global stage. We see heated areas and heated arguments kicking off; some of them which seem as if they are from the Stone Age. So for example, the control that we’re seeing that’s trying to be executed over women's rights in America; the sudden rise of homophobia and racism in closeted areas around the world. Ways of being that you would hope and feel that we moved through a long time ago. 

But the reason that these things start to come to the surface is, at such a time of opening, the dark or the contracted energies will also rise. They will rise towards that which is opening and try and take it on, or take it down.

So try not to get too emotionally disheartened when you see that. Be an advocate or an activist in the areas that you feel most passionately about, to both make your stand and stand by your beliefs in areas that you feel you have something to contribute to. 

But try to remember within all of this that it's really important to come back to yourself every now and then when it feels overwhelming and acknowledge, “Oof! Everything is faster and more intense, including my own personal process.”

So some of you will notice that your life is moving fast; be that synchronicities, be that the ability that you have it to multitask in a way that you didn't have before.

But where I would like to really focus this word ‘faster’ for you is emotions.

You will notice that emotionally, March is going to be a faster month than ever for you. Whether this is a sudden rise in emotion that just appears in you with no apparent warning or catalyst, partly because you're allowing a higher level of feeling in, and partly because the world is feeling a lot more. Or you respond in a very big way to a trigger or a catalyst for you, if you stay aware, you’ll notice emotions bursting through and out of you in a faster way.

The joy of connected feeling

Now depending on where you are in your own development around how you manage and experience your emotions, that's going to look like anything from extreme emotional outbursts, right down to you just noticing a more subtle but present level of your heart in your everyday life. And not always in a way that makes you feel vulnerable or exposed and causes discomfort, but often in a way that you recognize you’re now housing a higher level of feeling inside your body everywhere you go and with everyone you meet.

So for those of you who develop and consciously work with this new feeling ability, this will mostly feel lovely. The experience of it will give you an incredible feeling of deeper connection to everything that is sensory and energetic in life. And that in itself will be a homecoming for you, because connection is what we are all ultimately here to experience. Connection really is the gold on this planet  - our experience of connecting to something we’re passionate about or someone we're experiencing great love with. And that love is on every level; partnership, marriage or lover intimacy, right through to the love that you can experience with a stranger that you walk past and you two just smile at each other and feel that connection.

The shadow of connected feeling

The other side of this, or what some of you would label the 'shadow side' perhaps, is that this higher level of connection can raise the extreme emotions which are weighted in the negative. Feelings that don't feel so good. 

I know that for many of you, you’re sick of 'the purge'. You know, this 3, 4, 5 year process where you feel like you’re purging emotionally, purging emotionally, purging emotionally. 

I’ve said this before, but if you do find that’s your story, you definitely want to look at some work on energetic boundaries. 

You definitely want to look at;

• How are you supporting your nervous system - is your nervous system overstimulated? 
• Do you need to just help your nervous system calm down in a more focused and concentrated way? 
• Is there a person or a method that can help you focus this?

Those of you who feel regularly chaotic; that's a real call for you to learn how to stand still. 

So if you feel like you're chaotically being bombarded from everywhere, or inside yourself  do something very simple. Go into a room by yourself. Go into a bedroom in your house for 10 minutes and just shut the door, have no outer distractions, have no noise or sound or phone, and just go in there and be with yourself for 10 minutes.

For some of you, doing this will burst open your underlying emotion. 

But it will be a good thing, rather than having this chaos running your life and making you feel jittery all day.
Sometimes walking into the bedroom, shutting the door and having silence around you energetically (and in noise terms) just allows you to burst into tears. And when you burst into tears, out comes the emotion which was underlying.

The Inner Fire of Suppressed Anger

The other side of this, for some of you, is going to be anger and in some cases, rage.

Rage and anger. It’s funny when I say those words, as I can feel the nervousness among us as a collective when you even name those words. I’ve said the same thing about fear and it's true. Just the word fear makes us nervous.

Anger and rage make us nervous because we think of safety. We think about personal safety if someone is angry or raging us. We also think of our responsibility towards others' safety, and so we judge the idea of having rage or anger, in case we throw it at someone or are destructive.

The anger and the rage for a lot of you is going to be an experience of inner-fire. Think of it as the base chakra igniting and fire running through your body.

I read an interview with the actress Kathleen Turner the other day, and she said that she's had anger all her life and it's what has helped to fuel her activism in areas that people need help. This is clever use of an emotion. Our emotions are in us for reasons and if you are someone who does feel a bit angry, and you notice it rising in you this month, ask yourself 'What can I do with this?' How can I constructively take this energy that is firing in me and alchemise it into form so that it can be useful and balanced for me, or beneficial to the world?

Where anger will also show up is that many of you will be feeling really sick to your stomach and at the end of your rope in some of your relationship issues.

There is this very interesting feeling I get as I'm talking about this that some of you have just had enough and the word is ‘abuse’. A feeling that you have that your boundaries have been abused, or that someone has been abusing you. And I think those feelings are going to come up very viscerally for some of you this month. 

The thing I would remind you of if you're going through that process is to try not to get psychologically righteous about what's going on.

We can all have our moments where we may feel like we're a victim of someone else, and in that moment we’re processing a wound of feeling like we were a victim in the past, and now playing it out with this person. 

But ultimately, the truth is when you go beyond the wounds because you have got in touch with the underlying feelings, you get out of that psychological labeling of; “I was their victim, they were my perpetrator”. Because when you get stuck into those frameworks, it can leave you very off-balance.

Be patient with your feelings before you act

So to the best of your ability, if you do get emotional or you do feel anger or rage this month, try and just allow yourself to feel the feeling without acting.

For example, if you want to send someone an outraged email, or you want to phone someone and tell them what their problem is, try and first take a breath and catch yourself before you do it. Because I promise you, it will be the kind of feeling that within one day or sooner you will not have the same sense of purpose around the feeling.

It's just going to be a very feeling month. And know also that this is the time that we are in now; everyone is feeling more, but anger and rage are going to be up on a personal level because collectively, we’re seeing some very destructive examples of anger and rage going on in the world.

Our evolution in this brave new world

If you look at some of the things that are going on around control of women's rights in America or the attempt to take away women's reproductive rights; if you look at some of the rise in homophobia in certain parts of the world, and also racism, this is real Dark Age stuff, it's really old energy - old and dark.

Whenever any group or person wants to try and kill or limit another group or person or take away their freedom, we’re dealing with dark, dense energy that has been on this planet for a very long time, and due to a lot of the light and opening now happening on the planet we’re also seeing this darkness rise.

It's difficult to see. I know, as a human being like you, when I see or hear about those things, it doesn't make me feel good. 

But there is a place that all of us have to come to in this brave new world; because it does take courage to be alive at the moment, if you're in any way connected to your feelings or your senses. It is a time where a lot of us are having to, in a way, find strength that we didn't know we had, and that's the purpose of our evolution.

The purpose of our evolution is that we can get stronger and bigger as who we are and not only contribute to our society, but also experience our contribution in a very felt way.

The Background becomes the Foreground

So the other theme for March is the term ‘background noise’.

Elements and areas of your life that have been background noise are now going to come forward. So if a relationship dynamic with a person has been niggling you for many months, it's going to come up to the surface in March. If you have this underlying feeling you need to make a change and you can't make it, March is a really good month to let it rise, and to tie up loose ends.

Think of it as a time to really clear out anything that has been niggling you for a long time. And if you feel like your pattern has been to avoid it, just say to yourself this month I’m going to do it. "I’m ready to let go of this avoidance -  I'm just going to do it."

The worst that can happen is you will attempt to do it, and then will stop yourself. But try and harness what is a very potent energy of fast transformation right now. 

Transformational availability

The speed of everything - the level of feeling, and the rising to the surface of that which has been suppressed. All of these things actually contribute toward powerful and really transformational openings.

So if you need to go into the bedroom and close the door every now and then go, (huge in-breath) “Oh my God! A lot is happening and I don't know if I can keep up!” Just do it!

I promise you, we can keep up, but we can't keep up if we don't learn how to maintain ourselves within the speed of it all.

So, all along all of these Energy Forecasts for the last three or four years, I really feel like I have one job only. And it's to keep reminding us that we can find what it is that we need internally, in order to be strong and bold in this world. Especially for the sensitives among you. I know it can be a challenging area and we've all had our experiences where we haven't felt so able to be in that place.

Support each other

So the final thing I will say this month is be aware of supporting each other. If this month you practice one thing, practice the principle of "Who needs my support?"

I'm sure many of you are very programmed to be that way anyway, but this month why don't you just bring it into focus, that this will be one of your default checks, every now and then. Every now and then, you’re going to ask yourself, “Who needs my support? Who is it that I could phone right now?” 

And many of you will do this intuitively. You might think of that sentence and a friend will immediately come into your mind's eye. Give them a call, write them an email, think of them, send them some love from inside you if you don't feel like directly communicating.

Let's support each other and develop our authentic ability to do that. Because as we are in a time where certain groups and factions would like us to disconnect from each other and become afraid, the strength that all of us will find in times like these, both individually and as a group is coming together and connecting and looking after each other.

Connection and Love

You can't look after everybody as an individual human being. You can't save everyone you see. But you can give yourself and your love and your care and your attention in whatever way that shows up for you and to whomever feels right in each moment. For some of you that will mean talking to someone, for some that will mean making them a soup or buying them a meal. Supporting others will always have a different form depending on you or who you're with, but it's all the same ultimately - loving and caring action toward each other. And that's what we really need.

So this month think who needs my support and where can I offer it?

It will not only make you feel good, it will light up these other people and that in itself will make you so much more connected to the purpose of being here, which is connection and love.

So guys, thank you for tuning in this month.

We get several emails whenever I wear certain T-shirts. It's kind of funny but we’ll occasionally get emails of people saying 'Where did Lee get that T-shirt from?'. 

So today I very consciously chose one that I can actually tell you where you can go and get it if you like it. This was a gift from my friend Dana Weekley, who also is the mandala illustrator for my Energy Speaks books. She sent me this mandala on a T-shirt and I love it. I wear it regularly and people always comment on it. So if you want to order one of these for yourself, you can click this box here and go to Dana's website, NineTomatoes.com, and she will have those T-shirts there.

And I want to say a big thank you to those of you who send in financial donations. That makes a big difference to the investment that we make in the forecasts here, so thank you so much to those of you who already do that and you can click here if you want to do the same.

And for those of you send in love donations or kind messages, you know it’s awesome to hear from you and to receive messages and support and thanks for that. We're a wheel and we’re connected, and I show up and do this very directly because you ask me and my team to.

We also have a few places left if you would like to join us for the Colorado Energy Mastery Retreat in April, click here for more information.

See you next time and love to all of you and I hope you have an awesome month.