2022 Year Review and Looking Forward to 2023 - Heartful Art by Raphaella Vaisseau

In Numerology, 2023 is a 7 Universal Year in the 9-year cycle. According to "The Secrets of Numbers" by Vera Scott Johnson and Thomas Wommack, this means it is a "time for assimilation, analysis, and introspection, a time for perfecting the results of past efforts, and not a time for expansion and change." They suggest 2023 will be good for savings, banking, and insurance, which is great for me since I'm all about feeding my bank accounts at the moment. What is bringing me joy may also be right on target.

Last year, in 2022, my intentions were to deepen my relationship with my daughter, find new friends I resonate with, simplify my home while visualizing something even better in the future, continue establishing my legacy in art, and to enjoy nature in this beautiful place where I live. Below is a picture of my 2022 vision board. The adorable painting of a fox in the center of my collage is by local pet portraiture artist, April Johnson. I'll be creating a new vision board for 2023 in the coming weeks as the new year comes into focus.

Opportunity was my keyword for 2022, although I hadn't remembered that until I read last year's review. Nevertheless, with my mindful focus on listening to my Inner Guidance, I took inspired action enough times to feel I was vibrationally tuned into opportunity whether or not I consciously remembered to claim it. I met or surpassed most of my goals and, overall, I'm pleased with my progress over the twelve months of this past year.

I'm super excited about the coming year. I'm not sure I've ever felt so realistically hopeful. It's a great feeling. 

I haven't defined my intentions and goals yet for 2023 so I'll say this: As I move forward into the coming years, and look back over my entire life, I'll be pleased that I sought to continually take the next step, time and time again, toward being in greater and truer alignment with my highest purpose and with living a joyful life.

I wish you all the very best holiday season as 2022 comes to an end, and the most prosperous, joyful year in 2023. Blessings of Light and Love to you.

-Raphaella Vaisseau

Meditation is Life - Heartful Art by Raphaella Vaisseau

I was asked today to share how I built my meditation practice.
Here's my answer:
     Currently, my life is a meditation. I meditate off and on throughout every day, while walking in nature, waiting in a checkout line etc. It started in 1975 with a 6-week enlightenment experience I had while traveling from Minneapolis to Niagara Falls, across upstate New York in the most glorious autumn ever, to Boston, and back to Minneapolis. The intention I declared to the Universe was, among other things (like a closer relationship with my daughter and making new friends) to have greater spiritual inner awareness. A longer story than this, but the final message from the Universe to me at the end of the six weeks was, “Contact Anja. Her teacher will be the one to get you off of the planet.” (Exact words.) I knew Anja was a patient of mine at the dental office I worked at so I went to work, found her file, called her on the phone and asked, “What are you into. I have to know.” She invited me to an MSIA seminar she was hosting that night. I didn’t have a car at that time but I took 3 buses and walked several blocks to get there. I was cautious about the seminar but it seemed straightforward to me so at the end of the evening I asked, “What’s next?” Someone suggested a little poetry book called, The Spiritual Promise, which I bought. I journeyed home and when I got there, not wanting to disturb the people whose home I was staying at, I sat on the floor under a tiny lamp to read. While I read the book my heart opened. So magical. I knew I was home. As Spirit would have it, MSIA is an acronym for Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness (note the almost exact words I declared to the Universe). My conscious journey in multi-dimensional consciousness began that night, on November 15, 1975. Three months later I moved into an ashram in Minneapolis with 17 other MSIA students, including Anja who has been my best friend since then. She and I traveled the country singing our original spiritual folk music, thinking we were the very ones to bring in the New Age.
     I take my studies seriously, as you may know. The meditation I learned how to do was active, not trying to empty the mind but rather to chant tones and/or focus on breathing. The tones I started with were HU (God) or Ani-Hu (empathy with all creation). Two years later I received my 1st initiation, was given my own tone, and from that point through this day, I used/use my personal tones from that and future initiations. Living in a spiritual ashram made it easy to be consistent with meditation because we were all committed to spiritual enlightenment and were meditating at odd hours all the time. It was glorious. There was a period a few years later when I no longer lived in an ashram, and instead was married (to another MSIA student) when, after I claimed the meaning of devotion as “living out my vows” in the world, I made a commitment to meditate for 2 hours a day, which I did for 3 years.
     At a time when, a few years later still, after having moved to LA and deciding to leave my marriage, I found a lump in my breast that was cancer. The doctor gave me 10 years. I thought, wait! I don’t want to leave yet. In meditation I had strived to be one with God. Instead, I course corrected, changed everything about my life, continued my spiritual studies but in a more balanced way, and I started living my life for me, expressing who I am (rather than taking care of everyone else). My entire company was created after that point. I have been supporting myself with my art for over 25 years. Meditation now is like breathing. I pause and consciously sit to breathe my tones, but I also feel them always around me as I drift to sleep, wake up, be in nature, share with others, even while I’m working at the gallery. Meditation is life.

- Raphaella Vaisseau

2021 Year Review and Embracing 2022 - Heartful Art by Raphaella Vaisseau

In Numerology, 2022 is a 6 Universal Year in the 9-year cycle. According to “The Secrets of Numbers” by Vera Scott Johnson and Thomas Wommack, this means an emphasis on security and reliability. “It is a time for adjustment, for seeking a balance,” they write. “It is a time for reparations on the home front” and “There will be interest in educational and health programs, in food and diet, in ecology, in civic improvement.”

Last year, 2021, my intentions were to focus on Freedom, Accomplishment, Balance, and Expansion. It went well, in spite of the continued presence of pandemic challenges and national and global changes. I traveled a bit, reached a weight loss goal, bought a new car, and enjoyed success at Heartful Art Gallery. I took a few Adobe art classes and learned some things about repeat pattern design and photoshop. And, of course, I continued my studies of Law of Attraction with Abraham-Hicks and Good Vibe University. All and all, when I did my year-end review in December, I was pleased.

I then set about to visualize my focus for 2022. Opportunity is the word that came to mind. Contemplating the word over the last two weeks of December, I ascertained it would allow me to be alert to inspirations of any given moment, and encourage me to shift from an action I am in the process of taking to momentarily explore the possibilities of taking another action. It will be good for me to loosen up a bit in my day to day plans of action.

Thus, in 2022, in alignment with the Universal 6 year and my chosen word, I plan to continue my focus on health and wellness, deepen relationships with family and friends, expand my tribe, simplify my home, continue establishing my legacy in art, and be in nature as often as I can. As much as I love my home with a view of a farm and the Blue Ridge Mountains, I'm awake to the possibility of finding a different home surrounded by nature, with vista and conveniences that provide me with even greater enjoyment of life.

I put all of this in the Light for the Highest Good, and hope, as the year unfolds for all of us, we experience a year of security, health, and well being. Peace be still.

-Raphaella Vaisseau