Note:  You may want to read the article Outflow, Inflow - A Prayer to the Universe for context.  (If you want to keep up with my discoveries during the June exploration process, check out my BLOG.)

I’m sharing my experience here because I’ve heard from a number of clients who are also going through a major re-assessment of their work in the world, with the intention and hope that sharing my journey might be of assistance to someone else.

I’m grateful and surprised at how un-traumatic the process has been for me – I have felt centered and calm in the midst of considering changes that are huge for me, and there has been a marked absence of worry or fear that has been filled with grace for me.

I say with gratitude that the Universe has spoken to me very clearly.

For those of you who are interested in exactly how I deciphered my message (in case you have a similar teeter-totter question for the Universe), this is what I did:

When I wrote out “Outflow/Inflow, A Prayer to the Universe” post (and then linked it in the May Newsletter), I made a clear request to the Universe about how I would know what it’s “answer” was.

I stated, in writing:

“If x amount of money arrives to us by Friday, 5/7 at noon – no matter where it comes from, whether from donations or winning the lottery, or from any other source, or if I receive so much positive feedback or some other very clear sign that we are to continue with what we’re doing as we are currently doing it, I will interpret this as a sign that we are to continue offering the same things we offer now, and will take on any new projects as well.”

If this amount of money, or no other clear sign appears by Friday, 5/7 at noon, I will interpret this as a sign that we are to completely re-configure what we are doing, and will pursue the new projects that I’ve received guidance on.”

I chose 72 hours from the time I sent the email and published my Prayer to the Universe, as I’ve found that three days tends to be a significant period in terms of synchronicities for me.

Then, I sent the email and settled in to watch for signs and synchronicities.

Here were the results from the period I invoked:

• Of the more than 350 emails we sent, less than a third of recipients opened the email at all (I can see this through our email system).
• Of the 27% who opened it, about a third of these clicked through to the article (and hopefully, read it).
• I received donations – what I think of as generous donations – from seven people (six of them in response to the email, one even before they received the email, but within the time period I’d specified).  These people were all what I think of as “regular supporters” – that is, people who have consistently sent donations or words of support.
• I got feedback or comments from five people (one of whom also made a donation).
• One person signed up for a class, and one payment came in that was expected from an existing class offering.
• I got $4.43 in a cash-back award for using my debit card.
• The total that came in as money was just under 35% of what I’d asked for – hmmmmm – seemed to be some magical energy around the 25-35% range –  27% read the email, 32% of those went to the article, 35% of those who read it responded in some way, and 35% of the amount I’d stated manifested.

Noon on Friday, 5/7 came and went, and I was well-satisfied that this was a clear answer for me – it was time to do something new and different.

What’s even more interesting, though, is what happened after noon on Friday, 5/7 – within the next two hours, I had two completely new clients call for readings – clients who were referred with no relationship to the article I’d written or the email I’d sent.

Then, that evening, at Open Circle, we initially had only one participant attending.  At the end of the check-in period, one more person arrived.

The energy of Circle was interesting – one participant was new to our events, and seemed to me to be just starting out on their spiritual quest, the other was someone who has studied in a lot of our courses and sat in many circles over the past 10 years.  Carruch answered their questions, but I had a sense that neither of them were precisely satisfied with the information they received, and I was aware that I had the sense that the questions asked were questions that had been asked many times before.

When I left Circle that night, I felt really grateful – this seemed to me like the clearest message of all:  This form of the work is complete for me.  The energy of it seemed repetitive, and I had the thought “I’ve done what I came to do with Open Circles”.

I don’t feel badly at all about any of it.  I don't feel that any of the work I did in this format over the past 12 years was wasted or useless.  It feels round and complete, and I am confident that I gave it my all.  I think these presentations were helpful to many, many people (more than 5000 people have attended Open Circle with me over the past 12 years).

I suspect that one of the reasons for waning attendance at Open Circles is that, as we evolve, people are turning to their self-guidance more readily, and I think that’s really great – it’s one of the primary goals of the work I've been doing; to help people learn to access their own guidance and to source for themselves.

Over the weekend that followed that Circle, though, I found myself, even in the face of these clear messages, “wavering” a bit – I entertained thoughts such as “Well, what if this answer isn’t really clear?” (Which I’m chuckling at now.)

That Sunday evening, a regular website visitor sent me an email saying “It looks like your site has been hacked” – when I went to the site, there was a spooky-looking page saying just that:  “You’ve Been Hacked!!!!”

I’d seen this type of hack before – it’s mostly mischief (kind of like the internet version of toilet-papering your house – inconvenient, and requiring clean-up, but no real damage done).  I cleaned up the files quickly and got the site back up and running.

The next morning, the site had been hacked again – I cleaned it up again and did some research to see how the hackers were managing it.

The third morning (three days, remember?), the site had been hacked again, and this time, as I was cleaning it up, I watched as the files one-by-one disappeared before my eyes.  The hackers had deleted my entire public html directory, presumably in preparation for an even worse exploit.

I shut the site down completely, cleaned it from end to end, and discovered the security flaw – my web-host had inadvertently replaced a critical security file on my site during a change they made.

Now, with the security back in order, I found myself looking at this sign.  No matter what I did at this point, I was going have to restore the site from scratch – I literally couldn’t "proceed as usual".

Throughout the process, I was amazed at how calm and good-humored I remained.  I found that I could genuinely take the actions of the hackers as simply a part of the Universe’s message:  Come to a Full Stop and Consider!  In the past, such an event would probably have sent me into some level of fear and paranoia, but this part of my journey showed me how much I had truly transformed.  Again, I felt deep, deep gratitude.

Initially, I took a week “off” of other activities, and sought counsel with myself while slowly re-building the site.  At the end of this time, though, while I was clear that it was time to stop doing, or radically change some of the things I had been doing, I wasn’t clear about what was actually next.

I am now choosing to take a month “off” (June 2010) from presenting the podcasts, Open Circles, and other donation-based events.  I have some ideas about how these events might be transformed in the future (after July 1st), but I'm not crystal clear on my intentions with these events yet, so I'm going to wait until I have that clarity before I continue.

There are projects and activities that I feel energized by -- I love nothing better than a big day of sessions where Carruch and I explore with others what is up for them, and I'm fully engaged with the Dozen Dozens Project.  In recent months, I’ve also been working on writing three books I’ve wanted to write, and have felt excited about the possibility of presenting a live show on Ustream which covers a wide variety of topics that expresses the full range of my interests.  I found myself “squeezing in” time for these projects that I felt enthusiastic about, working on them only between the time I was spending on maintaining the site and onsite events.  In fact, a good friend had observed that she thought I’d been spending too much time on maintenance and not enough time actually doing the work that I wanted to do.

During the month of June, I’m going to focus my energy on the projects that are bringing me energy – my writing, the Ustream show, Dozen Dozens, and private sessions.  I may be back with podcasts or some form of Open Circle-style teachings, but at present, I don’t know about that yet.

I think that what’s happening now with the work we have been offering is a sign of great success – a sign that something wonderful has been created and maintained for a long time, and has come to a close in a way that feels fun and interesting, rather than painful or traumatic  -- and I feel glad and warm and complete when I think about it.

As to what’s next – I honestly don’t know, and I’m genuinely thrilled about that.  I think that, for me, this is my “bursting forth” that Carruch talked about in the Year of the 10^th Talk.

I’m ready, and willing, and excited to be adventuring into what’s next.

Specifics about what services I will and will not be offering during June 2010 can be found HERE.

(If you want to keep up with my discoveries during the June exploration process, check out my BLOG.)