A Love Letter

Happy Valentine's Day!

I believe that each of us wants to be deeply loved, and that without that love, we will never find the happiness we crave. No matter how much money you make, how beautiful your body or how many accolades you acquire, at the core of who you are, you desire to be deeply loved.

And yet, how many of us would be willing to stand up and admit to the world this deepest of deep desires? Would you? Of course you might express that you would really like a loving relationship, that your family is important to you, or even that you'd like to take better care of yourself.

But would you peel back the curtain that protects your delicate soul to reveal that inside is the most innocent and pure heart, one who craves to be seen by another so deeply that you could almost feel that person witnessing your soul? Would you show us the holes of loneliness that sometimes surface on that same heart when your soul feels unseen, unheard, un-understood?

I'll show you mine if you show me yours.

The loneliest times of my life have been in relationship - be it with a parent, a friend or a romantic partner - in which I called out to be seen, when I reached out for unconditional love, and neither was returned.

After 30 years of trying to find that deep love from the people around me whom I loved, I was gifted with a profound realization, one that I have since come to understand is the secret to everything in life. When we live by it, the happiness and love we seek is ever present. When we don't, we will find ourselves forever seeking out happiness and love, in vain.

The secret is this:
The deep love you seek starts and ends with the love you have for you.

Every person on this planet, including you, desires to be deeply loved. At the core of your soul, your spirit requires that in this lifetime you seek out and find unconditional and pure love. The reason most of us spend our lives searching without ever really finding it, is not because this precious love doesn't exist, or even that it is rare. You've been taught to look in the wrong places - outside of you - when the truth is that the love you seek starts and ends with the love you have for you.

It is your right to fall so deeply in love with yourself that you only invite that same kind of unconditional love into your life. It is your quest in this lifetime to get to know who you truly are in your soul, beyond all the surface and societal muck that covers up your beautiful spirit. It is your gift to learn to accept the person you are today, right now in this moment and love him or her, all of you. And it is your duty to free yourself to fully express every piece of you without apology, so brightly that it lights every heart it touches like a firefly, including yours.

That is self-love. Being. Loving. Living. You.

When you can do this, you not only receive the extraordinary ability to feel the greatest of love, but you also gain the ability to give that same deep love back, giving others the gift of witnessing and loving their beautiful souls.

My wish for you is that today, you start and/or deepen your journey of falling madly in love with the powerful, beautiful and free being you are, just because you are you!


With great heart and in service of self-love,




Christine Arylo
Author of Choosing ME Before WE
Founder of Madly in Love with ME
Co-Founder of Inner Mean Girl Reform School

Almie Rose

By: Michelle Lawrence

It was at least two months before Christmas when
nine-year-old Almie Rose told her father and me
that she wanted a new bicycle. As Christmas drew
nearer, her desire for a bicycle seemed to fade, or
so we thought. We purchased the latest rage, Baby-Sitter's
Club dolls, and a doll house. Then, much to our surprise,
on December 23rd, she said that she "really wanted a bike
more than anything else."

It was just too late, what with all the details of
preparing Christmas dinner and buying last-minute gifts, to
take the time to select the "right bike" for our little
girl. So, here we were - Christmas Eve around 9:00p.m.,
with Almie Rose and her six-year-old brother, Dylan,
nestled snug in their beds. We could now think only of the
bicycle, the guilt, and being parents who would disappoint
their child.

"What if I make a little bicycle out of clay and write a
note that she could trade the clay model in for a real
bike?" her dad asked. The theory being that since this is a
high-ticket item and she is "such a big girl," it would be
much better for her to pick it out. So he spent the next
four hours painstakingly working with clay to create a
miniature bike.

On Christmas morning, we were excited for Almie Rose to
open the little heart-shaped package with the beautiful red
and white clay bike and the note. Finally, she opened it
and read the note aloud.

"Does this mean that I trade in this bike that Daddy made
me for a real one?" Beaming, I said, "Yes."

Almie Rose had tears in her eyes when she replied, "I could
never trade in this beautiful bicycle that Daddy made me.
I'd rather keep this than get a real bike."

At that moment, we would have moved heaven and earth to buy
her every bicycle on the planet!

I have been sio busy with the setting up of my new practise and the Mannaz Project that I have been neglecting my blog.  But this news I just HAD to share!  Still too starstruck to comment :-)

How to cure a witch: Catholic Church issues guide in Britain to turn the tables on Harry Potter

By Simon Caldwell

A guide on how to convert witches to Christianity has been published by the Roman Catholic Church in Britain. 

The move comes in response to fears that growing numbers of teenagers are being lured into Wicca, occult practices and paganism by the heroic depiction of witches in entertainment including the Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice films, and TV.

The booklet, called Wicca and Witchcraft: Understanding the Dangers, offers parents advice on what to do if one of their children takes an interest in witchcraft. 

Bad influence? Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter, Rupert Grint as Ron Weasley and Emma Watson as Hermione Granger in 2010's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

It also instructs on ‘how to evangelise a witch’ should readers come across such a person in their circle of friends or at the local pub.  

The guide, published yesterday by the Catholic Truth Society, the UK publishers to the Holy See, was written by Elizabeth Dodd, a former Oxford Wiccan who converted to the Catholic faith.

She said nearly 70 per cent of Wicca practitioners are young women seeking some kind of spirituality.

Behind the glamour there were ‘grave dangers’ because of its link to the occult and the sinister movement championed by satanist Aleister Crowley, she said.

She added: ‘Recognition that Wiccans are on a genuine spiritual quest can provide the starting point for dialogue that may lead to their conversion.’

Some 7,000 of 31,000 neo-pagans identified themselves as Wiccans in the 2001 census but the figure is believed to be far higher.