Living in the Present

Inner Fire

“How do we keep our inner fire alive? Two things, at minimum, areneeded: an ability to appreciate the positives in our life – anda commitment to action. Every day, it’s important to ask andanswer these questions: ‘What’s good in my life?’ and ‘What needsto be done?’” -- Nathaniel Branden

I have found there’s a very different quality to my action when it springs from a sense of abundance as opposed to a feeling of being impoverished. When I sense I’m not good enough or that I don’t have enough, I feel driven to be better and to have more. Whatever I do takes effort – there’s an element of struggle involved. And this makessense because there’s no fuel – I’m working on an empty tank.

When I’m feeling abundant, I act out of my own inspiration. I’m rich and full and so the energy flows naturally. This action at times feels almost effortless.

Excerpt from "Higher Awareness" website

Links to Purchase My Book

I'm receiving great reviews for The Guardian's Wildchild. What I find interesting is that each reviewer is finding different aspects of the story that are appealing. There are some common threads. Everyone is happy with the development of the characters and the plot. And, they agree the story is fast paced. Check out my reviews on Goodreads and on my blog's "Review" page.

Here are the links to purchase a most amazing story.

Amazon.com (print, ebook): http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_0_15?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=the+guardian%27s+wildchild&sprefix=the+guardian%27s+%2Cstripbooks%2C203

Goodreads (ebook):
Feather Stone's books on Goodreads

The Guardian's Wildchild

reviews: 12
ratings: 309 (avg rating 4.06)

Barnes and Noble

(nook): http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/the-guardian-s-wildchild?store=ALLPRODUCTS&keyword=the+guardian%27s+wildchild

=the+guardian%27s+wildchild&store=nookstore

Omnific Publishing (print, ebook, pdf)
http://www.omnificpublishing.com/

What is the truth?

Have you pondered on what is the truth - about everything? Do you take everything you've been told about the world, religion, history, everything as being "gospel"? Or do you say, "What if we've been wrong, misled?"

I'm always questioning. Saying "What if ..." is a vital asset when creating a story. An author's creative mind will constantly seek out a kaleidoscope of scenes, plots and characters. As a reader you want to be moved into a world of "what if's". A well written story will trigger your "what if's" and may cause you to take a closer look at beliefs you've taken for granted. It stirs your imagination.

When The Guardian's Wildchild began to take shape, the world of the Guardians became clear in my mind. It was as if a long forgotten knowledge returned to me with clarity. I could see that at one time all humanity were Guardians, gifted, powerful and benevolent beings. Once becoming sidetracked into the physical world, they became slaves to powers of the ego. Their/our powers of space/time travel have been suppressed. Well, except for the Guardians who still live secretly on Hawk's Island.

Recently I have become interested in the latest astronomy programs which study the possibility that humanity was visited by aliens eons ago, perhaps as recently as the time of the Pharaohs in Egypt. Scientists have collected an enormous amount of evidence indicating many cultures around our planet were not only visited, but the space travelers may have integrated with humanity.

What if, yes, just a 'what if' the visitors were our ancestors. Perhaps our species began on another planet. What if .......


If you're curious, check out the website http://www.legendarytimes.com/index.php

Legendary Times

(The Quarterly Journal of the A.A.S. R.A. / legendarytimes.com - Archaeology, Astronautics and SETI Research Association.)

Members of the A.A.S. R.A. / legendarytimes.com receive this fascinating journal 4 times per year reporting the latest discoveries and theories in the Ancient Astronaut field, written by the fields most prominent researcher's such as Erich von Däniken (Chariots of the Gods), David Hatcher Childress, Peter Fiebag, Robert Bauval, Luc Bürgin and Giorgio A. Tsoukalos. Legendary Times features articles covering mysteries such as... of

UFOs in Ancient Times
Alien Visitation in the remote past
Alien Archaeology
Technology of the Gods
Alien references in Mythology & Ancient Scriptures
Ethnology (survived Alien traditions etc.)
Evolution / Genetics
Philosophy
Exobiology
Space Exploration


http://www.legendarytimes.com/giorgio/

Songs of your soul.

I'm nervous? Yep, like a virgin bride (a rare species indeed). I'm about to be the focus of lots of attention. As of February 20th, The Guardian's Wildchild will be front an center on several blogs. I hope you'll check out my book blog tour with A Tale of Many Reviews.

I'm playing some very romantic music, "Vincero, by Amaury Vassily," to deflect the butterflies. Oh, those passionate Italian singers.

Sidney Davenport, the heroin in The Guardian's Wildchild, would have loved this music. After all, she was also a beautiful singer - and passionate, particularly about Captain Sam Waterhouse. While writing her story, I listened to a lot of Enya and Loreena McKennitt, both inspirations of deep longings and whispers of the soul.



Music plays a huge role in our lives and in the movies. Who can forget the music in Titanic, "My Heart Will Go On". In another movie, The Last of the Mohicans, I loved the stiring music, particularly the piece at the end called "I Will Find You". Recently I saw the movie "War Horse" and was so moved by the story and accompanying music.

What would our world be like without music? Perhaps it would be as empty as a sky without birds, food with no flavor, people without soul. What is your song? The song that speaks to you, your life, your passion? We all have one. Maybe its changed as you've matured. Likely you have a few that speak to the multi dimensions of your personality, the dark, the sweet, the fierce, the spiritual. When I hear Dido's "White Flag" it touches the layers of who I am - strong, determined, soft, loving. "There will be no white flag above my door ...."

Tell me about your song. Forward a video of your favorite and share your thoughts about music and how its influenced your life.

The Magic Point for Empowerment

Excerpt from Higher Awareness website: http://www.higherawareness.com/index2012

"We are accountable only to ourselves for what happens to us in our lives."~ Mildred Newman Hancock ~

Has your life crossed the magic point? Looking back over our lives, Patrice and I can each mark a time when our self confidence and personal power sky-rocketed. It was a time of dramatic and lasting empowerment. We now call this time the 'magic point'.

What is it? Well, magic happens when we fully grasp that we are responsible for our lives... that we are accountable for all that happens to us. When we reach the magic point we tend to say things like: I create my own life. I attract all my experiences. I am responsible for my happiness. There are no accidents.

We stop blaming other people and situations. We no longer see ourselves as victims. We stay centered in our own experience rather than meddling in the business of others. We open to find meaning and purpose in everything that happens.

The magic point marks a time of true empowerment. The quality of our life changes dramatically -- we notice positive effects in all areas of our lives. We believe this is a time when the personality truly acknowledges the leadership of the soul or our higher self.

The magic point can be triggered by suffering or crisis that brings a new awareness and awakening. We can also move through the magic point more gently as our ego gradually matures.

We increasingly let go of faulty beliefs and blocks to allow our soul to genuinely express through us. On this path, we focus on inner work. We experience opening up, detachment, expansion, inclusion and evolution.

Of course, the magic point is not a single moment in time. Growth is more gradual than that! Rather, it marks the period when we choose to be accountable for what happens in our lives more often than we choose to play the victim.Cross the magic point, and thankfully, life will never be the same.

Changing Beliefs

My impulse urges have softened in my senior years. The negative consequences at this time in my life can be disastrous. However, several years ago I made an impulse decision, even against my husband's wishes, that had a powerful and beautiful impact for years.

A friend came to work with his Sheltie. Immediately I fell in love with Shep. I had to have a Sheltie just like Shep. Even though it took me nearly six months to find a Shetland Sheepdog breeder, and an other four months before I could pick up my little bundle of joy, I never wavered on my decision. It was all I could think about until hubby and I brought Scotty home, an eight week old puppy.

In the first two years of Scotty's life, he changed my world and my beliefs. Scotty's poor health required major surgery to correct severe hip dysplasia. He developed depression. Desperate to do anything to restore my dog's health, I searched for every kind of therapy that would go beyond conventional medicine. It was then I discovered Reiki which turned his problems around 100 percent. He was once again a bouncy happy dog. (photo: Scotty chasing Roo, our second Sheltie, at Yellowknife Lake, NWT)

My practice of Reiki led me to study other religions and beliefs, including Buddhism and Shaman practices. I studied meditation with Dr. Deepak Chopra. Amazing people began to flow into my life. My world opened to understand unlimited possibilities was at my command.

Scotty taught me about unconditional love and brought to life an awareness of the power that lies within. Without Scotty I would not have written The Guardian's Wildchild. The book is dedicated to this awesome boy, who loved without limits for thirteen years.

See my blog post "Dedication to Scotty" in January

romance, Romance, ROMANCE

Men and Romance
Do our male brethren enjoy romance? I mean do they really enjoy the soft music, candle light, crystal glass filled with champagne, picturesque surroundings as much as the gentler sex? Or do the boys see this as a means to an end, the strategy of the conquest, an necessary inconvenient passage to the fulfilment of his pleasure.
I can honestly say that I've seldom experienced a romantic event with my spouse - not that I haven't tried. One afternoon, a long time ago, I prepared a delicious evening meal and planned for a sensual evening with hubby when he got home from work. When he arrived home and saw the dining room table lit with candles, smelled the delicious meal, and glanced at my nearly naked body, he asked, "Can't we eat in the kitchen?"
I suppose my timing could have been off. It was probably a rough day at the office. However, I was so deflated that I never again attempted to woo him - at least, not that way. After several chats with my girlfriends, I hear similar stories. We agree that our men are clueless about how much they would gain in the area of intimate pleasures if he would consider a moment of romance now and then. An effort to surprise us with a special night out, or a small inexpensive but thoughtful gift would reap bountiful dividends of affection beyond the capability of viagra.
Mind you, I'm not complaining. Hubby is not a drinker, no drugs, doesn't sleep with other woman (though I have observed the occasional flirting), dedicated in his profession, and is good to wee animals. He is just totally practical. Gifts he receives must be practical or he will complain. And, yet there is a place in my heart that yearns for the occasional magical moment in the moonlight.
Okay, gals, do you really get enough romance in your relationship? Or do you read romance novels to fill the gap?

Happy Valentines Day everyone!

Feather bad. Bad, bad, Feather!

Oh, I'm such a tramp. Every time I saw Julio Iglesias singing, all I could thinks was, "Take me, beat me, hurt me, make me feel cheap! Just please take me!"

http://nickielson.blogspot.com/p/tumble-4-ya-blogfest.html

Higher Awareness Growth Tools

“You would not exist if you did not have something to bring to the table of life.” ~ Herbie Hancock ~

People who are drawn to personal and spiritual growth are often convinced that they have to find their unique purpose in life. They may also believe that until they do, they are somehow missing the boat. From my own experience, I know it's easy to become obsessed with the need to identify life purpose, to the point where it becomes upsetting. For more years than I care to count, I lived with a low level of anxiety because I hadn't grasped my true calling and therefore assumed that I wasn't living it.

As our thinking creates our reality, if we are convinced that we don't know our life purpose, then without doubt, we won't figure it out! Fortunately, I now understand that the essence of who we are is much more powerful than our ego's need to know. No matter how clueless we may consider ourselves to be about this, we are always actively living our life purpose because it is so intrinsically who we are.

The more we relax and trust this, the more fully we will express what we've come to this lifetime to be and do.We tend to seek a meaningful or grandiose purpose when our purpose can be as simple as learning a basic life lesson or integrating a value or bringing another soul into the world. So really, there is no need to be searching for a label for why we are here. At the same time, it can be fun, informative and rewarding to explore our nature in this way.

http://www.higherawareness.com/index2012.html

The Horse - Lessons About Love

DreamWorks Pictures' War Horse, director Steven Spielberg's epic adventure, is a tale of loyalty, hope and tenacity set against a sweeping canvas of rural England and Europe during the First World War.

I'm a horse lover since childhood. I had my own horse, an Arabian named Dusty. She was black, or would have looked black if not for the dust. Dusty taught me lessons about perseverance, mindfulness, and bonds of love. She and I were the same age, 13, when she came to live on my dad's cattle ranch. She was in foal, and delivered a spunky male colt the following spring. We named him Windy. Sadly, Windy died mysteriously before his first birthday. Dusty and I reluctantly carried on following Windy's death. Both she and I cried out our heartache for months. In the next seventeen years, Dusty and I trotted through the country side from sunrise to sunset.

Dusty's lessons were tough. It started with me trying to catch her in the pasture. After about 30-40 minutes, I was allowed to get close enough to grab her mane. I had to make sure I had a good handful because she would take off in a gallop. As a farm girl, I had strong hands from doing chores so I was able to hang on, her dragging me along until she gave up. So lesson number one was all about perseverance.

Lesson number two was about mindfulness. Now, Dusty was not a young horse, but the people who saw me riding her often told me they were concerned for my safety. Dusty had the presence of a thoroughbred and pranced and danced like she was performing in a show. It became apparent that she was also very intelligent and sensitive to my demeanor sitting on her back. If I let my guard down for a few seconds, wham - I'd find myself flying through the air and sliding along the dirt road. Being the well-bred animal, she would then casually walk over to me and sniff my head as if to determine if I was still in one piece. So I learned to pay close attention to her, especially her ears. If at any time her ears twitched toward an invisible rodent along the road, I prepared myself for a flying leap to the opposite of the road. Unfortunately, my brothers never learned the lesson and they gave up trying to ride my high spirited Dusty.

Lesson number three was about love. It wasn't so much a lesson as an experience of love. The depth of my love for Dusty is as eternal as my soul. The days and evenings spent with her created a bond I have seldom experienced with the human animal. Dusty never deserted me, not even when I was careless and fell off her back. She waited for me to dust myself off, limp back to her, and hoist myself back over her shoulders. After a day of riding, usually bareback, I would walk beside her, letting the reins rest over her neck. I walked barefoot in the warm dusty country roads, listening to her footsteps keeping pace with mine, listening to her snort and swish away the mosquito's with her tail. It was bliss.

I went to see the movie, War Horse, with a little trepidation. There was the risk of seeing horses in pain and treated badly. I did see horses being overworked and put in deadly situations, and some died. I was able to muster through those scenes. I was so captivated by the plot and the boy's determination to find his horse, that I had to watch to the end. Barely! I was watching through tears. And I know I wasn't the only one in the theatre that had a hanky dabbing at eyes. I highly recommend this movie.

When I come to the end of my life's journey, the first face I want to see when I pass through the veil is my Dusty.

Manifesting Your Dreams: Imagine

Imagine your ideal future
"Your imagination is your preview to life’s coming attractions."
-- Albert Einstein

If you were to create an ideal future for yourself, what would it be like?
All things that now exist in form were once simply ideas in consciousness. We each hold the power to manifest different circumstances for our lives. If we wish to manifest a new reality for ourselves, we need to consistently focus our imagination on the ideals we seek to realize.
Remember to explore your ideal in terms of qualities, not people or things. What qualities do you most want in life? Freedom? Respect? Playfulness? Abundance? Whatever qualities you seek, imagine experiencing them now and be open to new ways to discover those qualities appearing in your life.

"Change is created by those whose imaginations are bigger than their circumstances"
-- Unknown source

Romance In All the Wrong Places

Definition: Romance is the pleasurable feeling of excitement and mystery associated with love.
In the context of romantic love relationships, romance usually implies an expression of one's love, or one's deep emotional desires to connect with another person.

In the Guardian's Wildchild story, Sidney and Sam had little chance to discover romance among steel, weapons, naval protocol, and deadly enemies. And yet, slowly, painfully slow, romance began to take root.

A look, a touch, the scent, or simply a knowing transformed a captain's office to a space of intimacy shared and secrets revealed. Sidney had no intention of putting Captain Waterhouse under her spell. But the hours they spent together during interrogation revealed more than her activity of sabotage on Admiral Garland's naval base.

There are a few movies wherein two people, against all odds, fall in love late in the story. Last of the Mohicans comes to mind. What about Gone With the Wind? Poor Scarlet didn't know she was in love with Rhett until it was too late. You probably know a few. I'd love to see your list.

Guardian's Secrets: Who were the Guardians?

The big question on everyone's mind is, "Who were the Guardians? What made them so different?"

Their history is not written or remembered - except by the Guardian Elders. Captain Waterhouse, a naval officer, was baffled by his strange female prisoner. Here is an excerpt from The Guardian's Wildchild. Believe it - you must believe it.

Scene: Captain Waterhouse meets an old man in Acapulco and reveals his problem with his mysterious prisoner.
Paulo: “She sounds like those who follow a path of the higher good in all they do and think, guided by spiritual forces. They become closer to the source of all things. They have great power, Sam.” Paulo held his hand to his chest. His head bent in reverence to the words he spoke. “There are many legends about these people. Thousands of centuries ago, our ancestors knew them as the Guardians. It was said the people in power began to see the Guardians as a threat to the stability of their economy and the government. Those in power planned to destroy the entire Guardian community. Guided by their wisdom and their connection with higher dimensions, the Guardians fled, leaving no trace of their escape or destination.”

Captain Waterhouse: “Why were they feared? Did they try to take power?”

Paulo: “No, Sam. The Guardians had been respected and honored for their gifts of healing, for their wisdom, and for their reverence of all life. Those in power saw the Guardians as a hindrance to acquiring total obedience from the masses. Political leaders wanted to be the gods, to be the ultimate power.”

Captain Waterhouse: Paulo’s story was the most outrageous fantasy Sam had ever heard. “You’re not saying these Guardians truly exist?”

“You’ll have to decide that for yourself, Sam.”

“Okay, suppose your story is true. Have you personally ever met a Guardian?”

Paulo winked. “I’ve met one or two. If one becomes your friend, it will change your life. I promise you. Chances are you’ve walked right by one and never knew it. They live in total secrecy. They must. If governments knew of their whereabouts, well, who knows what would happen?”

Sam shook his head. He didn’t know if his friend was delusional or if his story was based on fact. If it were fact, it would explain a lot about Sidney. But it was just too incredible to accept. “Who else knows about these Guardians?” he asked.

“The Guardians have revealed themselves to only a trusted few who are returning to their Guardian path. You see, we were all Guardians once.”

“Now you’ve really tipped the boat over, Paulo. How can I believe that?”

“The truth lies within you, Sam. You’re right to question what I’ve said. It shows your intelligence. What you need to do is to search for the truth within yourself. You’ll find it right here.” Paulo placed his hand over Sam’s heart. “You may even discover your Guardian heritage is closer than you realize.”

Sam felt a vibration travel from Paulo’s hand into this chest. It took him by surprise. Paulo lowered his hand and reached for his cane. As he stood, he fumbled in his pants pocket and pulled out what appeared to be similar to a quartz crystal. It easily fit in Paulo’s hand and was shaped like a main sail with hundreds of facets. As it caught the rays of the sun, it flashed shards of light back with such brilliance that Sam had to shield his eyes. Paulo thrust the crystal into Sam’s hand.

“A gift for you, my friend.”

Sam studied the gift. The crystal formations were rough but clear. In the center was a small, bright blue and green iridescent crystal — a crystal within a crystal.

“Paulo, this is too much.”

“No, it’s yours. The crystal has found its way to you. Forgot it was in my pocket until now. I’d been wondering what to do with it. Got a few of my own. Now I know why it was in my pocket. It belongs to you. Crystals do that, you know.”

Before Sam could respond, Paulo thanked him for a wonderful evening and said goodbye. He reached for his cane and slowly headed to the café’s exit. Sam gathered his belongings and tucked the crystal into his coat pocket.

When he looked again to wave to Paulo and say goodbye, the old man had disappeared.

Links to Purchase The Guardian's Wildchild

Omnific Publishing: http://www.omnificpublishing.com/

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Guardians-Wildchild-Feather-Stone/dp/B005PJ04RK/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1328119471&sr=1-1

Barnes and Noble for Nook