Ignite the Flame...

As we prepare for Ignite the Flame II, we naturally return to last year when a small idea came from a huge heart, but one that wasn’t beating alone. When Ioana Popa, Volunteer instructor and coordinator for Halton-Niagara classes and events for Free Meditation (FreeMeditation.com) learned that the Flame has been reignited, she was ecstatic. She has marked her calendar for July 6-7, 2013, at Paris Fairgrounds in Paris, Ontario, the new home of Ignite the Flame.

I asked what stood out for her last year. “I felt it was such an important event and really good for the community. The entire event had such a subtle impact that, for me, was a great idea that came from a higher level, and I'm glad it continues.”

It was after the Group Meditation on Earth Day, Sunday April 22nd 2012, when I met Ioana Popa who was there with her friend Indu. In a crowded room, they gravitated to me and “plopped” me down in the middle of the dance floor to guide me into a personal meditation using the energy still rippling in the room. Even today, I find myself speechless in the retelling.

In the May 2012 issue of One Thousand Trees I share this experience. Ioana learned of Ignite the Flame from a general email I had dispatched to a few hundred people found via the internet. I am amazed at the power of today's technology.

“Interesting how you reference technology,” Ioana muses. For her, technology means something a little different in its distinction. “In a sense, we are using the ether element of this communication that happens without direct contact. Underneath this technology actually is this subtle element of ether that has to do with the Sacral Chakra. I always connect everything from the subtle point of view.” She explains the Sacral Chakra is all about communication and connectivity with community and relationships. She finds relevance in the fact that it was via an email communiqué that we indirectly met and now, with her on speaker phone from an older blackberry, she is being recorded on an android.

“Internet communication, people that reach out to strangers across the planet and share from the heart, is when technology can unite, making us feel the world is really small as we are all sharing. These experiences are what truly make us a global personality, a global human being.”

I am very amused and impressed with Ioana’s distinctions between technology and spiritually driven communications. At first, I think it is her Romanian heritage as English not being her first language as I learn she has travelled, lived and worked in Germany as well as Africa; But her experience comes from both ether styles of communications, as by day, Ioana is an Incident Manager /Technology project Coordinator with a Canadian bank; and by night and weekends, she is a volunteer and coordinator for classes and event in the Niagara/Halton areas for Free Meditation.

To make a connection, you don’t need to communicate, but you are communicating because you are using a different transmitter. What energy source makes this connection?

“It is the subtlest of the subtler of the subtle,” exudes an excited Ioana as though what is said is the summation and definition of the force. “When we are connected, there is the ultimate type of communication that goes beyond the message. For me, connectivity is togetherness in oneness, and that’s it!”

So energy is the ultimate communicator?

Ioana believes society is overusing the word energy. For her, energy is what we truly are, a common fluidity, the thread of life. It is an awareness that has a bigger purpose. “We are all bound together in it like a primordial type of creation. We all have to connect to that energy. Ultimately that is the one that does the real communicating. Take a real flower and a man-made plastic one…” begins Ioana’s energy lesson, as she explains that in nature, a real flower opens and it closes; it reaches for the sun and sways with the wind. It touches and moves with its surroundings as it is connected. A plastic flower doesn’t.

Is this magic? People will say it's mumbo jumbo, coincidence.

“From what we both felt, it was magic,” as Ioana references our impromptu encounter at last year's Ignite the Flame. “For the person who says it is mumbo jumbo, then rationally tell me how you can think to explain how one can just take up meditation and relaxation and be there, in the moment; that people were totally there and connected. How can you explain that logically? If you talk about the facts, the place, it was crazy, we were all excited and tired, we did not know each other, we had nothing in common, logically it would have been an impossibility to reach those results. But in reality, what we shared demonstrates the opposite; it did happen and in that lays the definition of magic.”

But society will continue to believe in mumbo jumbo than the pure moment. Is this influenced by the media or is it modern civilization?

“We have lost our roots. Modern civilization is so far from nature, and what makes life real. The mind, heart and attention must be integrated, not for just personal advancement but also connected for mankind’s global evolution. Human being is a family that has a common destiny. Nowadays everyone is focused on the extremely superficial. Money, fame and materialism, these are the perpetrators getting in the way of true communication.”

It’s a concrete jungle out there, far from nature, full of negative vibration and radiation. Everything we touch in materialism has an energy that is equal or greater than meditation. It’s a David and Goliath battle of energy as no matter how much meditation or clean eating and living we add to our toxic lives the concrete jungle is the Goliath.

“No, no… the problem is human beings think about quantity, not quality. The vibrational energy that is mitigated by this concrete jungle may seem happy moments, but they are still bad vibrations; that is all they are. They affect our chakras, the energy within us, but each of us has an amazing force within that can easily conquer the heavy negative vibrations of the concrete jungle. When Kundalini is rising, it sees and connects every single one of us. Even if there is not one piece of nature around us, it can connect within each of us,” and that is what happened at Ignite the Flame last year.

Though everyone was in a dark, closed off banquet room in a concrete building, they were connected and transmitting on the same frequency. I was an innocent bystander watching over and was amazed how tangible the energy generated was emitting, and I am not a devote follower or practice meditation.

What I have learned, meditation is more and more about awareness, many of them mindful, while some focus thinking to empty the mind. The solution for the modern time is actually obtaining a connection, and I think this is why at most shows such as Ignite the Flame, the Free Meditation booth is a popular attraction.

“The popularity of our booth is very subjective,” Ioana is always amazed and grateful when there are continuously people in line waiting their turn. “Our Free Meditation booth is run completely by volunteers. What attracts more than anything is the energy it exudes. The volunteers love to give without feeling like they are giving anything. It is intended pure love, an oneness, and once you feel it, once you are in it, it pushes itself forward to be shared, and by default sharable as you cannot hold it for yourself. It’s a desire, without any purpose, without any ego related purpose, as we don’t expect anything. We are in the moment, and we love it, the magic moment when you feel the energy sprouting out of from another person as its tangible. You can feel that nervous energy when someone approaches the booth initially with doubt. Their nervousness and doubt is always present, and then, you see the magic as they are transformed in minutes. They open their eyes and you see a milder personality, you see the child in the seeker’s eyes. It truly is magic. It is not a skill that is learned in a course, it is something we carry within us.”

“It is quite common for this energy to be a healing one,” Ioana shares the experience of a recent seeker Sonya and found in detail on the Free Meditation website. It is very, very similar to what I felt when Ioana plopped me down at last year’s Ignite the Flame and now as she guides me through another meditation over speaker phone.

As I desperately try to understand, she instructs me not to. “Words have energy. Intelligent energy that finds its way to everyone and gives what you need when you need it. Kundalini knows when you need healing the most. It gives you relief on that physical level. The purpose is to show beyond all that is as you are transported to a very elevated state. People that are happy, cry tears of joy. Nowadays people don’t display their emotions; they are very guarded; genuine expressions are void in their lives as most have become very disconnected from within themselves.

I am looking forward to reconnecting with Ioana and Free Meditation at Ignite the Flame II in July. To learn more, visit them at www.FreeMeditation.com

I am 'inspired'!

I have found this great passion for helping to heal the world through using our own energies and inner light!

It is my greatest desire that I inspire as many people as possible, to come out of their shells and say want they want to, and feel what they want to, without feeling critisized or judged....as so many of us are feeling that we have to have approval from those around us.

It took me great courage to speak up about what my beliefs are, as these beliefs are deemed 'outside of the box', and that's where most would like to keep them!

However, it is my understanding that this world is truly 'waking up'! And that's what Ignite the Flame, is all about!

This global meditation is to help the world through this 'shift' by providing her as much love as possible, with the understanding that we are all ONE!

I KNOW that this change possible, in fact, I see it happening before my eyes, and you will too if you just take a look and pay attention.

I love you all! I truly mean that....

Much love and appreciation...

Sara

 

    The concept of the Maharishi Effect is ancient.  Vedic texts from India stated thousands of years ago: "In the vicinity of Yoga, hostile tendencies are reduced and harmony is created." 

  Studies have shown that when practicing Transcendental Meditation, only 1% of the population needs to be participating for the entire area to experience changes!  To go further, individuals participating in a technique that is the next step beyond TM, called TM-Sidhi, the number of people required to affect change is dramatically reduced, more like the square root of 1% of the population!

  Many well known personalities have recognized the power of the square root of 1% practicing Transcendental Meditation.  We've heard Dr. Bruce Lipton, Dr. Wayne Dyer and Doreen Virtue mention this phenomenon, just to name a few!

  So, if we hope to affect change for the entire planet, the best way is to have as many people practicing TM-Sidhi as possible.  The square root of 1% of the earth's population is ony 8,372 people! 

  Now, we will be leading a guided meditation, which is different than practicing TM, but the message to us is very clear!  If we want to make change, all it takes are a few devoted and loving people to come together for the betterment of all!

  It will be interesting to analyze the world data for Earth Day 2012 when all is said and done to find out just how big our impact will be!  If we can inspire even the sqare root of 1% of the earths population to participate in our healing event, we will feel much success will have been achieved! 

  Join us this Earth Day 2012, and practice whatever method of meditation works best for you in order to bring about loving and healing light to our beautiful earth, and all creatures upon it!

Learn more about Transcendental Meditation at:

  Holistic Healing Reasearch

  Maharishi University of Management

  The Transcendental Mediation Program

  It is time for change!!

 Around the world things are happening...we can't explain it, but the world is shifting before our eyes. 

  We are reaching a time in history, where the truth is coming out!  And so, I would like to open my own heart and speak to you my truths...

  I no longer have to hide...I am not what I am judged on...and I am ready to be the person I came here to be!  Society may have us feel that we are our success, we are what we own, we are inferior human beings, but now it is our turn to peacefully protest and say no, that's wrong...I am much more than that!  And I am willing...

  And so I feel that my 'purpose' is to add to the collective consciousness by bringing people together as one, to do some powerful healing work on this planet.

  Regardless of race, gender or whatever society has judged you on...prayer, meditation, call it what you will...

  It's about embracing the earth, and just being grateful. Always being grateful...!

  For many of you reading, you may already be aware of the positive effects of collective positive thoughts, but for those of you that are just waking up, well, let me tell you, when this Earth Day Mediation takes place, the earth will never be the same again! I mean that quite literally...perhaps I will save this conversation for another blog...in the meantime, I ask that you just open up your mind to the possibility of such things and just let go....

  The internet is such a powerful tool!  If used wisely, word can spread very rapidly!

  My dream for this event is that this message will travel around the globe...there is only a short period of time, so I would appreciate everyone doing the best they can to spread the word to your communities...and I will do my part in contacting the 'larger' groups around the world to help raise awareness...timelines will be provided to those wanting to arrange their own Earth Day Event in their own communities!

  I am so excited to be on this journey!  Everyday, I feel like I could burst at the prospect of this event! I look forward to experiencing the heightened energy of such a group.  I imagine it will be beautiful and joyful!

  I am encouraging everyone, everywhere to open your heart, and ignite your own flame of love.  To join us on this amazing journey to raise our hearts and heal old wounds.  The flame analogy is an excellent tool for understanding just what we hope to acheive for our beautiful planet. 

  Most of us can now see that for a very long time, human life has been dictated by darkness.  That darkness can be called many things (fear, ego, greed/power, negativity, etc.) but it is all relative.  The flame is the positive light of forgiveness and love.  For no wounds can ever be healed with the instrument that inflicted it in the first place. 

  Now is the time for humanity to wake up and realize that in order to move forward to a place of peace and togetherness, we will have to make some drastic changes to the way we interact with each other, and all living things.  It is time to see that darkness CANNOT survive in the light, and it is our goal to flood the world with as much loving light as humanly possible!  We will tip the scales in our favour!  Humanity will prevail, and darkness will be banished finally. 

  The goal of our healing Earth Day meditation involves healing all wounds that have been inflicted on our earth as well as humanity.  We aim to raise so much healing and forgiving energy, that holding grudges and hate will become a distant memory of the past!  For, we cannot move forward until we learn this lesson.

  No matter what atrocities have been committed in the past, and no matter who perpetrated them, they are all lessons for us as a civilization to learn from.  Thus far, we have failed. 

  What we have failed to collectively realize is that by holding onto the pain and fear, hate and negativity, we are creating a prison for ourselves.  We are putting our minds in perpetual bondage by not being aware that by engaging in such behaviours, we are destroying our spiritual connection to each other, and to any higher form that may exist to us. 

  By joining us this Earth Day 2012 for our healing meditation, you will be consciously raising the collective energy of every person on earth.  This raising of vibrational energy is what will help us to realize that we are all indeed connected.  There are many of us who do realize that once this occurs, we are well on our way to a better world for all.  Forgiveness and love is the key to our healing and moving forward. 

  Join us and let go of all your fears and negativity, and trade it for a more positive outlook for the earth and humanity!  Ignite your flame and let it burn brightly!

  Here is a great meditation to give you some idea on how this group meditation will be demonstrated.

  I hope too, that you will share your truths with the world!