Mauri - Life Force:

Everything has a Mauri. A life force.

When we are ill, our life force has been compromised. There are simple techniques we can do, to rejuvenate ourselves, allowing our life force time to recalibrate and re-invigorate itself.

They are:

- Acceptance. There is a saying that a form of madness is to do the same thing (behavior) over and over again, expecting a different result. Acceptance is an energetic power, a gift of self-tolerance, and ability to stay within the self, and love that person (yes yourself) warts and all. If we had the ability to absorb the ego early in life, by the time we reach a good age (teens) it would be done from a place of service and integrated values. For us as Maori that is a form of Koha. Koha has been devalued in modern times and for some, it's a way to receive more for less. Koha at its highest energy is to give without constraint and to your highest ability, whether it be money, your time, your knowledge, a sack of kumara, a dress, a cake. Once given that energetic 'rush' you feel of goodness and happiness brings forth a simple joy within yourself and you are likely to repeat this deed again and again.

In the movie Chocolat, a character says, "I think we can't go around measuring our goodness by what we don't do, by what we deny ourselves, what we resist and who we exclude. I think we've got to measure goodness by what we embrace, what we create, and who we include." That to me is Acceptance.

- Awareness. Awareness can be a freak in our natures that were it taught at an early age, without conditioning through fear or not enough, our inner self indeed our inner passion would shine a lot earlier in our lives. I continue to meet people in their 40's, 50's, 60's, onwards, who don't know what it's like to have a passion or even a passionate life let alone a dream. Their awareness of their ability is lacking, it hasn't been developed. An easy way to feel awareness growing in the body is to do something for someone else, unbidden, without thought or reward. Awareness supports one's freedom to choose. And raises your empathy and adventure.

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote "it is one of the most beautiful compensations of this life that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself.....Serve and thou shall be served."

- Action. In order to have, to be, to do, to create, action must be part of the picture. Dream the biggest dreams you can, then create the steps to getting there through action.

Action for me is the maturity of my soul in my body and my life, that has grown with me. Over my years I have done some really dumb things, and then I have done some really great things. When reflecting on my life, the negative has popped up first and strongly. I have worked at balancing this out now and in fact, every time I have a negative thought, my process is to end it with a positive thought.

I have learned that instead of saying, 'How can I help?', the real question is 'What do you need?'. In asking that, people stop and give it thought, then come back with truth that either highlight they really wanted and needed 'it' or it's not important anymore.