You Carry the Fire Now, And They’ll Be Healed Just by Touching What You’ve Touched | Acts 19
by Nikki Walton of CurlyNikki.com
“God did extraordinary miracles through Paul, so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched him were taken to the sick, and their illnesses were cured and the evil spirits left them.” – Acts 19:11-12
Those handkerchiefs and aprons were radiating Glory. Just as Paul did. Just as you do when you’ve touched Jesus’ Hem. When you’ve asked, and sought, and knocked until your hand bled and FIRE ANSWERED and now there’s only Holy Fire. So when someone comes to you, they receive what they’ve been asking, seeking, and knocking for. Whether they know it or not, they also receive Fire. They’re baptized with the Holy Spirit, with Fire, so that every breath is ecstatic Joy. Every breath. I breathe in Joy, I breathe out Joy. In joy… Out joy… Enjoy… Enjoy… renew in me a clean spirit, O Lord.
In my book, Wake Up to Love, an entire chapter was written about the Holy Spirit breathing through us. As us. Read it. Practice this today. Live Him today. And watch your whole life erupt with Joy. Everything becoming Holy, becoming Joy, even the parts of you and your situation that reported otherwise. I declare it all Joy, now.
Excerpt from Wake Up to Love- Remain Happy Twenty- Four Hours a Day
Even if the world is not smiling back at you yet,
you FEEL its smile,
you FEEL the changes beneath the surface,
you FEEL the GoOD behind the scene,
pervading the scene,
appearing AS the scene.
You know the Secret.
You’re in on the Secret,
You ARE the Secret,
and that’s why you smile.
Persisting in this Love,
swaying,
looking, and not letting the appearance of the world make you
forget to feel Love.
That’s the real change.
And only from here do you see the “outer” one.
THE QUOTES
“Whenever you are sitting and you have nothing to do, just relax
your lower jaw and open the mouth just slightly. Start breathing
from the mouth but not deeply. Just let the body breathe so it will
be shallow. . . . And when you feel that the breathing has become
very shallow and the mouth is open and your jaw is relaxed, your
whole body will feel very relaxed.
In that moment, start feeling a smile— not on the face but all over
your inner being. . . . It is not a smile that comes on the lips- it is an
existential smile that spreads just inside. . . .
No need to smile with the lips on the face but just as if you are
smiling from the belly; the belly is smiling. And it is a smile, not a
laughter, so it is very very soft, delicate, fragile- like a small rose
flower opening in the belly and the fragrance spreading all over the
body.
Once you have known what this smile is you can remain happy for
twenty- four hours. And whenever you feel that you are missing that
happiness, just close your eyes and catch hold of that smile again
and it will be there. . . . It is always there.” -OSHO, THE ORANGE BOOK
“Smiling is one of the highest forms of meditation.”
-ATTRIBUTED TO AMMA
THE PRACTICE
Just take a little moment,
eyes open,
and breathe into your heart.
Pretend your heart itself is breathing.
Just take little,
short,
shallow,
open- mouth breaths
in and out of your heart.
Try it right now.
Feel that energy?!
Let that smile grow from the inside.
Stay with the smile.
Live today, this week, as that smile.
And like you already know,
every time you notice that you’ve forgotten,
you can close your eyes for a couple of seconds
(like pressing a Reset button)
and come right back to It.
Take those breaths,
smile from the inside out,
and you’re back on the Throne!
BONUS PRACTICE
Watch yourself practicing the short, shallow, open- mouth breaths. Be
the Loving space for the breathing and the smiling to happen in, rather
than being the breather or the smiler. Be the formless, impersonal,
boundless, undivided, invisible Love instead of the “practitioner.”
I used to meditate every day for three hours. This went on between
2012 and 2015. It felt very necessary during that time. And when I did
not get the opportunity to meditate, I was not a very nice person.
That was the problem. I thought I was a person that needed meditation not
realizing meditation is something that is happening, that begins, right
where you appear to be. Now my life has become meditation. I’m meditating
right now. I’m always meditating, whether I’m writing, driving,
talking with someone, walking to the beach, loading the dishwasher. All
of it’s meditation now. But in the beginning, when this practice took hold of me,
when this journey launched itself, meditation felt like a part of my
life that was very separate from the rest of my life. Like if I was working,
I could not be meditating. Because for me, meditating was, at that time,
lying on my back in corpse pose, hands to my side, relaxed upward, and
I would just be there like that until I wasn’t there as Nikki, until there was
just this Love. No body, no mind, just a Silence, a very Aware Presence.
However, the moment I knew I was aware without thoughts, I was back,
baby! Spiritual ego on 100!
The purpose of meditation isn’t to still the mind but to encounter
God. The mind is then stilled in the presence of God’s Love.
It would take about 15–20 minutes. On a rough day, maybe 30 minutes,
for me to become aware of a quiet Peace. I’d begin seeing through the
thoughts, over their shoulders, and to the Bliss that was between, underneath,
and pervading them. But it felt like it would take at least 20–30
minutes of formal meditation, lying down, eyes closed, quiet, private
space, no noise, to arrive at this “state.”
I remember sitting on the couch one day in our loft in Washington,
DC, when I recognized that when I was aware of Love, by the time I
started noticing Love in my formal meditation sessions, my mouth was
open a little and my breathing was barely perceptible.
A very shallow chest breath that was barely happening. Breathing was barely happening
when I was in that deeper state of meditation. And I remember sitting
on that couch and trying that style of breath and being elated that
it seemed to connect me to, or turn me toward, the Love that before I’d
thought I could connect to only after allowing thoughts to “hush.”
And so I began practicing that. I began using it.
And I made a note in my phone titled “How to Shift Right Quick.” The instructions read,
“Short, quick breaths, breathe into your heart and smile.” But I never
shared this note with anyone because I thought it was very personal to
me and my experiences with meditating and connecting to this Love.
Fast- forward to 2016: I came across a tremendous work called The
Orange Book by Osho, which is full of practices, and this was one of
them. The practice that I had written in my phone years before, that I
thought was personal to me, that would make sense only to me, he had
arrived at, too. And all of his teachings and practices were inspired by
ancient sutras and the Vedas. So this is something that humans have
been practicing forever.
I remember being so excited when I read those words for the fi rst time.
“It’s not just me. This is a thing.” My mouth would be so dry after my meditations
because it would be open and those little short, shallow breaths were
happening. And so, re-creating that in my waking moments during the day,
I found that it works. It worked. I don’t have to do it anymore. And once you
start practicing it (I trust it worked for you now) regularly, you won’t have to
do it for too long before you’re able to just turn right to the Love.
So this week, wherever you fi nd that body, just take a little moment,
eyes open, and breathe into your heart. Short, shallow breaths. People
won’t even notice. Don’t even worry about them. Remember, it’s just
You anyway.
“Is it just me, or is it just me?” -UNKNOWN
So don’t worry about the seeming others, and just breathe into your
heart. Short, shallow, open- mouth breaths. Do it right now. Feel that
smile grow. Stay with the smile. Live every day as that smile. And as Osho
said, every time you notice you’ve forgotten, you can close your eyes for
a couple of seconds, like pressing a reset button, and come right back
to it. Take those breaths. You’re back. On your Throne.
I Love You.
Let It surface-
your Smile,
the Silence,
(t)His Love,
the Breakthrough.
They’re all Here.
They’re all One.
They’re all You.
Let It surface.
-As shared in Week 20 of my book, Wake Up to Love (HarperOne)
READ MORE: 111, 222, 333, 444, 777, 1010, 227, 1022
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