Of Stars Falling Out Of Sippy Cups

"Olaf and the Falling Stars" Photo by Elana Kilkenny.

One rainy summer afternoon after finding out some challenging news, I found myself in search of clarity. My energy was scattered, my heart was worried and my head felt messy. So I did what I knew to do, I couldn't unfold the big things in my life, I could only unfold that which was in front of me. So I went into our home office that had been cluttered for way too long and started clearing it out. My prayer in doing so was for my mind to be cleared out with it. 

Through that process, I found in a Disney Store bag these two sippy cups. They had been given to me a while ago as a gift from my father to my children. They were of Olaf the unflaggingly optimistic, magical snowman from the movie "Frozen". I somehow resisted these cups for months, but today inexplicably I decided to wash them out and get them ready for my kids to enjoy.

In doing so, in one I found quite expectedly a piece of paper with washing and care instructions. But when I attempted to open the other sippy cup, the top was stuck. Olaf's head wouldn't budge. As I was still knee-deep in emotional muck, I found myself spewing expletives under my breath followed by a deep urge to chuck Olaf into the garbage. I was angry, why did everything feel so hard right now? Even a stupid sippy cup wouldn't open easily. I persevered and attempted to get the snowman's head off once more. Finally, his head popped off and quite unexpectedly, out flew a slew of paper stars.

They were these perfectly-shaped, delicate little stars. So small that I couldn't even imagine an origami master making them. So, I knew. They were angel made. The universe knew that I did not need one more instruction manual that day, I needed grace. And so, grace was provided. As, come to think of it, it usually is.  

For sometimes grace comes in the form of stars falling out of sippy cups...

Gazing upon these fallen stars I burst into tears. I cried because I knew. Because I knew this was a message. I knew this was an answer to a prayer. I knew that I had opened up this silly cup at the perfect moment to know that I was not alone, that indeed my life and my family's life was still and would always be imbued with magic. I needed the reminder, because even those of us who speak to angels lose our way sometimes.  

While the challenges that were obscuring my faith didn't go away over night and I still very humanly at times find myself dipping in and out of faith; I continue to go back to that shooting star moment. As it was one of enigmatic synchronicity. I mean really, how the hell did those stars get into that cup? Even if as part of some "Frozen" marketing magic, a few stars were slipped into some Olafs randomly, well, even the analytic side of my brain couldn't argue with the fact that the timing of these falling stars were indeed serendipitous and deeply meaningful to me.   

For in that moment I knew instantly that I should indeed, still believe. Believe what I know to be true, but sometimes lose touch with feeling. Believe that help is always available. Believe that support is always there...seen and unseen. Believe that indeed peace would not only be restored but is already here if I could just trust into it.  

Believe that even on a stormy day in summer, that a snowman could warm a girl's heart.

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SOME "STARS FALLING" MESSAGES FOR YOU:

*Sometimes you need to ask the universe, god, spirit (whatever feels right for you) to show you some signs.

*Be awake and present enough in your day to receive the message, sometimes they will hit you over the head even when you are sleepwalking through your day, but it helps to be available to receive the message.

*Follow that intuitive whisper that tells you to do something, go somewhere, speak to someone, etc. Messages from the universe are often subtle. 

*Don't judge yourself when you are feeling bad, scared, angry. Judging how you feel only further entrenches it. Allow the feelings to move through you, but also allow some space for support to come in to shift how you feel. Ask for support and help when you feel you need it and/or when you are spiraling in your stuckness.

*When a sign comes to you, don't take it for granted. Pause, breathe in the gift of it. Allow the synchronicity, sign, moment of serendipity to shift your energy. Your present mood and resistance to feeling better might tell you to do otherwise, but choose to let grace fill-up your heart and soul. You'll be grateful that you did...

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INSPIRATIONAL BONUS CONTENT:

Spotify Playlist to Follow:

*A "Stars Falling" Music Playlist That I Made for You

LOVE TO HEAR FROM YOU:

I would love to hear about a time in your life when you experienced a synchronicity or received a sign that was particularly meaningful to you. I have found that when we share our stories we not only empower ourselves, we also help to inspire those who hear them.

Leave a comment below to share the love, as you never know who might just need to hear your story and you might just need to tell it! 

I look forward to hearing from you!

Blessings and love,

Elana

Beauty Within The Frost...

"Beauty Within the Frost" Photo by Elana Kilkenny.

It was a late autumn day all the trees lay barren, a reflection of their current wintry state, alone amidst the fallen landscape stood a tree aglow in vibrant fiery lushness. Radiant, bejeweled with orange leaves and a perfect undercoat of yellow. Harried New Yorkers stopped dead in their tracks spellbound by their rare beauty. Strangers unfolded stream of consciousness utterings to one another..."Wow", "Well isn't that just magical" and "Miraculous." The New York City perpetual ticking clock stopped for a moment and we all paused spellbound to drink in the beauty.

We are now in the heart of winter, I pass by this tree every day as I bring my daughter to school. Its branches are now bare like their companions. But burned into my memory is an overlay of its autumnal incandescent glow. On certain days I could swear I see the halo of burnt sienna leaves adorning its limbs. And I am reminded that there is always beauty within the frost.

As we rush, as we bundle up, as we dream of spring wildflowers in bloom and a whisper of a spring jacket...we are beckoned to remember that change is inevitable and yet so much remains innate. The beauty that resides in you, in each of us, is immutable. It may radiate more in certain seasons of our lives, it may deepen with the bloom of requited desire and fluid moments of grace but even in the days of our winter's darkness the aura of our heart's luminosity is always present.

So today as you roll out of bed, engage in the world, dance with your muse...breathe in beyond your resistance, beyond your slushy winter boots, beyond your old stories that fool you into believing that your finest days are behind you and touch that which the frost protects...that which is your radiant self.

For more of my February Newsletter dedicated to the subject of love click here to read more...

Watch My New Video On: "Intuition, Signs & Expectations" for Happiness Series

"It was sign." "I thought I followed the signs but why did I end up where I did?" "What do these signs in my life actually mean?" These are snapshots of conversations I have had over the years with my Intuitive Counseling clients and have overheard a myriad of times in passing.

As it is often more powerful to illuminate a broad topic with a specific example and then go broader, Tania Van Pelt and I made for you a video for her illuminating website Happiness Series where we discuss "Intuition, Signs & Expectations" using some specific examples. One of the clearest takeaways from this discussion was that expectations and signs don't "mix well" at all.  In fact, expectations often get in the way of the natural momentum and direction that the signs of our life are trying to take us in.

Whether you are a believer in synchronicities, signs and its ilk or not, you will garner wisdom from this video as we speak about a type of experience that is common to all of us in one way or another. We often go in a direction in our lives feeling that we are somehow being led on a path only to find out that the process and the outcome is very different than we anticipated...and then what?

Watch the video below and enjoy! Share the wisdom and love, please share this video with all those you feel would benefit! I would love to hear from you about your own experiences with intuition, signs and expectations so please leave a comment below on the blog or underneath the video on YouTube!

"If we miss the moment, we miss the clues. In the present, when we allow ourselves to fully live there, we are restored, made wiser, made deeper and happier." Marianne Williamson (via: www.oprah.com)

Synchronicities, Letting Go and Nora Ephron

"Rainbows Over Manhattan" Photo by Elana Kilkenny.

I feel somehow that Nora Ephron is woven inexorably into the tapestry of my living in this city that I love so profoundly. When I was a college senior I moved into a tiny, slightly decrepit one bedroom apartment in the boondocks section of the Upper East Side. There was scarcely a thing about that particular neighborhood or apartment that felt like me, but on my second night there I went to see "Sleepless in Seattle" in a local movie theater and it hit me...I was living my childhood dream of calling New York City my home. So my apartment was still just an apartment, but I was now at home in New York City.

Years later when I was in my mid-twenties, I found myself blessed enough to buy a one bedroom apartment in my beloved city. And although I had barely spent a minute in all my years in Manhattan on the Upper West Side, somehow my vision of living in New York City was shaped by my adoration of Woody Allen movies and my hundredth viewing of "When Harry Met Sally". My home for fourteen years was in the West 70's and close to Riverside Park. I spent countless strolls passing by the storied Apthorp building. And when I did, I would always look into the courtyard from the street and daydream of all the magical people I imagined lived there. Never realizing at the time that Ms. Ephron was one of those very people.

Years later, I found through a series of synchronicities Nora Ephron's famous love letter in The New Yorker to her apartment in the Apthorp. Somewhere in this timeline, my dear friend Alex D. invited me to the New York premier of "You've Got Mail" and I found myself living out another childhood dream torn from the pages of "The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler" of being inside The Natural History Museum after hour. Underneath the iconic blue whale stood both Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks who I adore, but it was Ms. Ephron that I was longing to speak to but too shy to approach. No small violins are playing here though, as in that inevitable way that life presents us all with our own full-circle story arcs, I had my opportunity years later to speak with her under much more meaningful circumstances.

So at this point in my own story, here is my love letter to Ms. Ephron that I posted in the wake of her recent passing:

"I will always remember Nora Ephron, not just because I loved her humor and her movies, but because she obsessively loved her Upper West Side apartment in the Apthorp and her article in The New Yorker about letting it go helped me to let go of my own apartment on the UPW that I was obsessively attached to. I loved her because when I was pregnant with my second child, and my aforementioned beloved home was in contract to be sold, I found myself sitting behind her in a movie theater and mustered up the courage to thank her for her Apthorp article. I told her of my heartache in moving and she turned around to me and put her hand on my arm and looked me squarely in the eyes as she said, 'You will feel so stupid that you ever worried about leaving...'

And it being Nora Ephron, it was said with the perfect mix of tenderness, tough love, perspective and emphasis. And of course, as I sit here looking out my window of my new home where I am greeted by rainbows, fireworks, and all the phases of the moon...I know she was right."

With deep abiding gratitude and love,
Elana