KAJAMA.COM NEWSLETTER

by Skipper Kim, founder of iskip.com

Imagine that you are walking on the sidewalk on a Friday night with a couple of friends. You’ve just had a nice dinner and one of the people you are with says, “Come on, let’s skip!” and leaps into the air and goes bounding down the street in front of you.

That’s exactly what happened to me shortly after I moved to San Francisco from Indiana. Without giving it a second thought, there I was bouncing down the street with pure abandon. I couldn’t’ believe how exhilarating it was! I hadn’t skipped since I was a kid! My friends and I were smiling and laughing as we reached our destination and I suddenly couldn’t stop thinking about skipping. When was the last time I had skipped? Why did I stop? Why don’t adults skip? I thought about how a new fitness crazes pop up all the time…why not skipping?

Two years later, at the height of the dot come gold rush, I decided to walk my talk/skip my skip and take my skipping public. That’s when iskip.com, my website that is dedicated to making the world a happier place one skip at a time was born. Unlike the majority of sites that were going up at the time, I didn’t even pretend to try to find a revenue model. My only goal was to share positive playful energy with the world and to encourage as many people as possible to rediscover skipping.

I started organizing group skips, mostly with friends in San Francisco, and before long the SF Chronicle caught wind of what I was up to and published a fabulous article called “She’d Like to Teach the World to Skip”. That kickstarted what is nothing short of a national media phenomenon with Time, Newsweek, CNN, USA Today and People Magazine all doing stories about the skipping movement. I even skipped my way onto the Donny & Marie Show and skipped and held hands with Donny Osmond! Talk about a childhood dream come true.

As it turned out, there were hundreds of people out there who had already been skipping for years…and so I found myself in the unlikely position of providing a portal where all of the skippers of the world could unite. Many called themselves “closet skippers” and thanked me for giving them permission to take their skipping pubic.

I recruited head skippers to organize group skipping events in their hometowns and there were as many as 70-cities…from Lima, Ohio to Manchester, England… where there was a head skipper helping to spread the skipping message.

As for me, I was a woman completely possessed. I even went as far as to quit my corporate job to follow my skipping dream. Unfortunately, that didn’t go nearly as well as I’d hoped at the time, but somehow through it all, I’m still skipping nearly ten years later.

These days, I’m working as a book publicist for New World Library, the publisher of The Power of Now…and am writing my own book about my skipping experience and all that goes with following your heart and living a dream. I also maintain a regular skipping blog through iskip.com.

My own skipping has become more of a personal spiritual practice than the evangelical mission it once was…but through it all, if anything, my resolve about skipping being one of the most powerful and underutilized tools we have at our disposal to make our own lives and the world us happier has gotten stronger as time has gone by.

Now, you might be wondering, “What exactly is so great about skipping?” Here are four of the MANY reasons why skipping might be good for you:

It’s great physical exercise. It burns twice as many calories as walking, has less impact on your joints than running does, and is a lot more fun! Some people skip for long distances, and others simply incorporate 10 or so skips at a time into their walking routine to raise their heart rate. It’s REALLY fun on the treadmill too. There’s nothing better than happily skipping to your heart’s content with two serious runners pounding away on either side of you!

It makes you feel like a kid again. Skipping automatically connects us with spontaneous, creative, free spirited childlike energy. It energizes our dreams and our imagination! It’s a super fun way to experience the many benefits of PLAY!

It makes the world a happier place. Skipping infuses your entire being and the word around you with positive energy! It makes people who see you happy too. An adult skipping down the street seems to be just unusual enough to snap most people out of their daily grind to take a moment to smile and feel good. It’s also a wonderful thing for parents to do with their kids. It shows them that adult life can actually be fun.

It connects you with the voice in your heart. Skipping gets your inner critic out of the way so your joyful, exuberant spirit is free to shine. To this day, after over ten years of skipping, my logical self still says things like, “You don’t want to skip here. You will annoy people with your joy…or people will think you are crazy.” And the voice in my heart says, “Yay! I love to skip, let’s go!” Every time we choose to follow that voice in our heart, it grows stronger and when we are connected to that voice, anything is possible!

Of course, skipping is something that is much better experienced than talked about. So I’d like to encourage you to contribute some positive energy to your immediate environment by skipping at least ten steps today! Go ahead. Get your skip on! What have you got to lose?

Kim Corbin is the world’s most vocal advocate for the body, mind, spirit benefits of adult skipping. She has been featured in USA Today, Time, People, and Newsweek Magazines. Visit her online at iskip.com.

Over the past few months, I have stopped dreaming (or stopped remembering my dreams), but at the same time, my psychic abilities have really taken off. My perceptions seem to be much stronger and far more accurate. I have been doing a lot of reading on spiritual subjects like chakras, astral projection, etc. I'm wondering if there is a connection between my lack of dreams and my abundance of psychic experiences. What do you think? My birth date is 12-14-66. Thanks! - Wandering Mystic

Dreamchaser:

What is happening to you is quite exciting in my opinion: You are growing spiritually by leaps and bounds.

If you've ever been on a diet, you know that you will lose pounds quickly and then slow down and perhaps plateau for a while. It seems to be that way with our spiritual growth too. Sometimes we hit a plateau where nothing seems to happen, and then suddenly we start to evolve again. Youíve emerged from a plateau, and are evolving spiritually at a good pace again.

You have not stopped dreaming, per se - you have changed what you are doing while you are sleeping. Lately you are going off and being instructed spiritually. You're rehashing what you learned that day and being given information about what to expect next.

Your soul is growing and learning at a fast pace right now, so you are being helped to deal with all these changes while you are asleep. When we evolve that quickly, we often have to deal with physical changes as well. Sometimes, for example, we will not be able to sleep or stay awake, eat or stop eating. It will often go strangely quiet in our heads.

What has happened is your main guide has stepped back, and you are in the process of getting to know your new teaching guides ñ those that come with this new level of spiritual growth. Your body itself has to get used to the new vibrations at this level. Sometimes you will almost feel like you want to rip your skin off because it is so different. You will adjust. Give yourself time.

As a result of being on this new level, you are realizing that you are becoming more aware. Your thirst for knowledge is healthy. You should continue to research and learn about every subject you feel drawn to learn about.

This period of spiritual growth is all about education. You are educating your mind by studying all these subjects. You are educating your soul by learning how to trust this new level of ìknowing.î You are also being educated in how difficult it can be to be keenly ìaware.î

The key word on this spiritual level (or ANY spiritual level, for that matter) is TRUST. Your soul will not guide you in the wrong direction. Just follow what you "know." This not only goes for what you know about yourself, but also what you "know" about others and the outside world.

So to answer your question, yes - there is a connection between you not remembering your dreams anymore, and your psychic abilities taking off.

I wish you continued evolution.

*****

Astrea:

You're on to something when you say you're dreaming but not able to REMEMBER your dreams right now. Sag folks go through periods like this as other parts of the psyche are awakened.

While not remembering your dreams might be connected to the blossoming of your psychic abilities, it seems more likely to me that you've come to an age where you can tap into your own personal resources, which have always been there.

As we grow older and mature and get our lives in better shape, our psychic side begins to emerge much more forcefully. Practical, mundane issues become less important as we become happier, more settled, and more successful.

Then we begin to explore all the things we didn't have enough time to experience and enjoy while we were struggling through boyfriends, weddings, babies, college and wrong jobs and career choices.

Also, for a Sagittarius life begins to take on new meaning at the age of 40. Really, I see that all the time with folks like us; it's almost as if by magic we begin to come into our own on a psychic level. That whole world seems to open up for us as we get to be that age.

I have VIVID memories of those kinds of things beginning to happen differently at forty than they ever had before. That's when our minds begin to perceive the psychic side of life in different and more useful ways.

Certainly during that transition time, it's possible for us to stop remembering our sleeping dreams. Our minds and bodies are overloaded with new inner stimuli, and we can't hold everything in our conscious awareness at the same time. Memories of your dreams will return as soon as you get a better hold on what you're going to do with the abilities you've been given.

If you feel lonely because you can't remember your dreams, try this ritual. Take paper and a pen with green ink, and write down the subjects of the last three dreams that you can remember. It doesn't matter if they're in or out of order - just pick the three you remember as being the most recent.

Light a white candle on the left and a pink candle on the right and say: "Dreamweavers, Angels and Heavenly Spirits, cause the mist to lift from my mind so that my dreams return to me with clarity and beauty."

Pray in your own way for your dreams to return, blow out the candles and fold the paper. Place the paper under a piece of silverware at the right side of the foot of your bed, and your dreams should return to you within a few nights.

Astrea:

Many times in life we hear, "You will always have what you NEED, but not necessarily what you WANT." Your spirit must have needed to experience the feeling of leaving your human body, and the suggestion in the next chapter of Sylvia Brown's book was all it took to get you there.

Even though you hadn't read it yet, your SOUL recognized the title of that chapter as something it had been seeking, and your soul, knowing that you had that reference to read after your experience, got with it and out you went!

While I don't usually recommend her books, Sylvia Brown has a wide reaching and powerful effect on lots of people. A Gemini like you would be able to relate easily to her writing and put it to good use. Synchronicity - you gotta love it!

I like your description of "getting caught." That's exactly what it feels like, isn't it? One minute you're free and hovering above the room, and the next minute, ZAP! back down into your corporeal form you go!

As a little kid, I loved that "feeling of return." With practice, most of the time we can control that event, but sometimes, when our physical ears hear a distracting noise or something else occurs to knock us back into reality, back we go. With practice you will be able to control your return better.

I find it interesting that you were visiting your mother-in-law and not someone in your own genetic family. Evidently, you and your husband got married for reasons that are even deeper than love. His family's interest in "psychic stuff" will nurture your children in such matters and help them to grow into their own abilities.

You'll never have to be concerned that when your daughter visits them, she'll be discouraged from exploring her own psychic life and power. My parents encouraged me to develop my psychic senses in a time when it wasn't nice to even discuss such things in public. Heck, it's STILL not considered a great topic at the dinner table in some families!

Your kids will get to talk about it ALL and ask questions and read and study. This is going to give them such an edge in life! Talk with your husband about how you want to present this to your kiddos, so that you are united in your approach and ready to tell them their experiences are all natural and okay.

A word or two of warning: Geminis often have difficulty staying grounded in REAL LIFE. Don't get so strung out on your ASTRAL life that you neglect what you're doing here on Earth.

You are at the beginning of a long journey to learn where your power really lies. Try to be patient with this process and take your time.