Loving Words: Postcards on Bark, and Bibliomancy

Hilary begins with the surprising story of a childhood postcard written on a piece of bark, tracing the lineage of our words back to the resilient history of the Beech tree. This episode is a deep dive into the "Phile"—the true love of learning and books—and the importance of reclaiming language to clear the path for a higher form of communication. By defining our terms with clarity, she opens a doorway to the "Living Oracle" that exists in the world all around us.

Through a personal reading from her book, The Power of Energy Medicine, Hilary revisits a 2001 "Help" meditation that transformed a basement box into a life-saving library, proving that the right word always finds the right heart at the right time. She concludes with an invitation to practice Bibliomancy and the ancient Egyptian Cledon, reminding listeners that the answers they seek aren't just found in the pages of a book, but in the way they choose to walk through the world. Whether seeking a bridge or a sanctuary, there is a fresh perspective waiting for those who simply open their eyes to see it.

Watch or listen to Hilary's TEDx talk now 

Transcript

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Think back to the earliest postcard you ever received or ever sent to anybody. And see if you can remember what it feels like to just get a few words sent to you across the miles. I'm thinking about a postcard, if you want to call it that, that I received from my little brother when he was at camp. I don't know how old he was. Um, but I'm thinking maybe less than 12 years old. Um It wasn't written on a uh standard piece of set stationary stationery, but it was sent to me and it was written on a piece of bark. And the message was raw and it it stripped right to the surface of what he wanted to say. It simply said, I'm homesick, please visit. Dear Hillary, I'm hopes homesick, please visit. Now how the US State Postal Service agreed to deliver this piece of bark across state lines, uh say nothing of the stamp, um, but on a wing and a prayer, I'll never know. But I am forever impressed because that bark made it to me. And there's the reason why this message has stayed with me for so long is that it wasn't just the words, it was the way he wrote the words and the way he sent them to me. And the funny thing is, is that um until my parents um sold their house, that piece of bark sat not on the fridge because it was curled up, it was a proper piece of bark. So you couldn't really put a magnet. There wasn't a magnet strong enough to hold it, but it sat perched right above um the door of the refrigerator and just greeted us every day. And it just sat there as like a little statue to um the impossible power of words, and also definitely an ode to the US Postal Service. So um here's a cool thing: the etymology of the word book um comes from the word Bach with B-O-C. Um, it's the etymology, the history of it means the tree, the B-O-C tree, Bach tree, the beach tree. And if you look at the word paper, that actually is derived from the papyrus uh leaves that were woven together to create the first surface of paper. So um the word book comes from the word beach, and I think it's pretty cool because thinking about it, I don't know which came first, whether I was thinking about books and talking about this to all of you and writing and the power of bibliomancy, an idea I'm gonna introduce in just a moment. Or if I was uh looking into the etymology of books and found out that book comes from the um origin of the word the bark from the beech tree. Come on, that's cool, that's cool, right? So uh when you hold a book, you aren't just holding data, you're holding um a descendant from the forest, um, like that postcard. And it you're also holding in all aspects, even in these uh mechanical, technological phones that we were holding, or the computer that you're looking at, you are holding a plea for connection, a plea to share, a plea for connection. What could be more human than that? And as we think back to the origins, the tree, the pulse, the life force of the tree, um think about how words are alive and language is alive, and connection is alive, and it gets carried right into the words that land on the paper or on the page. Um language is so fascinating. Um as an energy healer, I find language fascinating because it is the bridge that brings us from the ineffable to the languaging, and it's so powerful. It can sway understandings, it can skew opinions for good or for bad, just by repeating the same word or the same sound, even the same syllable until it sticks, and then an entire consciousness helps it make sense. So, like, take the word philosophy. Do you know what philosophy means? Uh philosophy is not this uh elaborate, confusing uh uh idea about how it's hard to understand things or where you have to go into deep, deep conversations. The word philosophy simply means a love of learning. Phile P-H-I-L-E means love, and Sophie means to learn. So, for instance, like sophomore is someone who's getting the swing of learning. So if you're in a sophomore stage of your life or a sophomore year of your schooling, you're getting the swing of learning. So that's why it's sophomore, sophomore, get it. So um philosophy. Um and then we have this idea of a person who truly loves and deeply loves books. I really, really love books. And what I'm gonna talk about today is I don't ever always read a book from start to finish. Um, I love that when I do get to that, that's so special and it's excellent. But um, I also get huge value from just opening in a book on any on any page, and I've been doing that for years and years. Um when you do that and you're seeking like a oracle like answer. And by oracle, oracle means um something that you prey on to ask and receive. So it's the energy of asking and receiving. And if you say, gosh, is there something in this book I just need to know right now? Um, it's very similar to saying, What am I gonna make for lunch today? And say, Well, I'm gonna grab an old old-fashioned recipe book and open to whatever page I open to, you know, if it's soups, and I'll make that soup. It's really, really fun. We can do this with absolutely everything, but right down to the word in Biblio Macy, you can open a book, open the book, open any book and see what you see. I'll leave it at that. So um but speaking of words and speaking of philosophy, I want to take a little stop for a second because um I feel strongly about the mishandling of words, and I feel very strongly about when a word is hidden, embedded, or deceptive, especially if we just don't even know better. So um this is probably where for the first time in all of my episodes, I might have to hit the explicit button. Uh, not because I'm going to swear or anything like that, but I'm gonna talk about something that's just a a little less uh kid friendly than usual. Um and that is about a very dangerous way a word has been used. Um, in my opinion, the word um now keep in mind I was just talking about file, right? Philosophy, bibliophile. So the natural um connection to that is what else is file? And there's a very well uh known word called pedophile. And a pedophile is a dangerous word, and it's literally a linguistic theft of ideas. Because as you know, file means to love, and there is no love in the abuse of a child. So there should not be no pedta, pedo means of of children, and file means love. So there's nothing funny or sarcastic or interesting about using that word, and yet we've all collectively adopted it. Um the correct word um that we should be using, which I don't know has been um, but I'm letting you know what it is right now because I'm gonna break it down for you in etymology and create it, and it it um it would any etymologist or or or a dictionary would agree. The correct word would be um misopedious miso misopedioistic. Misopedioistic. Say that ten times fast. Misopedioistic, because the miso means hatred and pedio means child. So the misopedioistic uh would go into the same uh grouping as um the word that's used for the hatred of the female gender, uh, misogynistic. So misopedioistic would be the word. It's you're not a pediophile, you're a misopediaistic. And then we could actually find more uh words or syllables to describe abuse, right? So um I'm still recording and we're still going because if we're gonna talk about the healing power of finding words and seeking words and unpacking words, I also want to talk about the healing power of making sure what you say is impeccable. It's one of the four agreements, and there's a lot of different ways to interpret that for that agreement. I is it the second one, um, be impeccable with your words. Um, that means to do no harm with your words. That's all it means is to do no harm. That's not and I shouldn't say that's not all. That's one of the ways we do harm in this world is with our words. So um uh when we're trying to uh describe a problem, we may want to take a moment to see if the root of it is we're saying the wrong thing. So every single time we talk about pedophilia, pedophilia um as a problem, our tongue and our syllables are saying the love of children. That's it. There's no other, there's no other syllables in there that corrects that. It's it's two etymologies put together pedo of child of child, of and about children, and file, which is of and about love. So uh let me try that word again. It's a new one for me. I think I just made it up, but it's misopedioistic, misopedioistic, misogynistic, hatred of the female, and pedoistric, hatred of the child. That's what's the beginning of the problem that leads to abuse. Um, again, as a foster parent, I asked that you all um forgive me for uh going kind of that that route for a second, but I just couldn't get away from it because I want to talk about bibliophile and I didn't want there to be like a little like bibliophile. What does that sound like bibliophile? Right? Okay. Moving on, think about it. Um, we have these um ways where you know, fierce, um, we have to be fierce with our definitions because we have to call out abuse, and it's certainly not love. And uh when we when we confuse abuse for love, that's basically like a human set design for hell, you know, to use Don Miguel Louise's words a little bit more, like that's a set design for hell. Like, don't call abuse love. Um, we can do better, people, all of us, entire English language, do better. Uh okay, so today we are gonna uh strip away um that that misuse of the word love and and give it back to where it belongs, which is reclaiming the idea of file and philosophy and bibliophile, the love of words and things that actually nourish us. Um so I think uh I was teaching um, I was preparing to teach with um Victoria Jean Randall. Look her up. She is actually an Akashic Records practitioner out at Krapallu. And uh we teamed up um and presented together at Kropalu a couple weekends ago, and I talked to her about how I love the idea of being able to find answers hidden in plain sight, like um walking through the grounds, the beautiful campus of Krapallu among the trees and the water, and wherever you want to go, the streams, the even the parking lot for that matter. It doesn't really matter. It's wherever you go. Because actually, parking lots can be pretty cool. If you how many people get messages looking at license plates, right? Or bumper stickers? Kind of cool. I used to play that game um in the car um when we didn't um have like uh videos to watch on long drives back in my day, and we would play a game and the whole family would get involved and we'd find A, and then we'd find B, and then we'd find C and D, and we'd get all the way to Z, and we'd still have five and a half more hours to go, and we would just play it over again. So um, so these fun things happen. You would look at street signs and license plates and so forth. So um, I love that idea of things being hidden in plain sight. And Vic Victor Victoria Jean Randall said, uh, when you do it with a book, it's called bibliomancy. I'm like, what word before? Bibliomancy means biblio means of and about books, and mancy means of divine origin. So bibliomancy, it isn't just about reading, it's about receiving messages, and it's about finding like oracle-like messages just by opening a book and not to study it, not to read it, but you just see what jumps off the page and into your heart. So it's like almost flipping a card, you know? A lot of us out here in the holistic world, um, we love our card decks. The original card deck was just the the card deck, the, you know, the clubs and um spades and diamonds and hearts, um, and that there is meaning in a type of numerology. Um, but then we have these card decks that all have different meanings. There's, of course, the um tarot card, which I believe was created by Alistair Crowley. No relation to me as far as I know. But um here we have these um these different ways of buying like packs of decks, like that are a form of bibliomancy. When you could actually go right to your library um or somebody else's library or uh a shelf of books that you have, or any book that you love and just flip through it, like it's a deck of cards. Just let it flip, flip, flip, flip, flip and see what you land on, especially if you have a question on your heart. So the very first time I really knew uh that I was doing bibliomancy, but I didn't know the word for it, was um reported and I reported about it. It was right after um September 11th, and I wrote about it in my book. Um, my book is called The Power of Energy Medicine. And it is in a chapter called Help. It's early in the book. Um, and I was talking about the power of asking for help. And let me just read a little uh part of my uh book to you. Um, like, you know, let's take a little moment. It's like a cozy story time moment. Side note before I begin, I um was talking to a good friend of mine who's a librarian. And uh she said that one of her um most exciting things going on in her life right now is that she has for decades loved to read at the children's hour. That's one of her jobs, you know, uh one of her honors and her privileges as somebody who runs a library. And that's one of the favorite parts of her day. And she said that um it's getting really, really, really packed. Like in all of her years, in the decades she's been doing this, she's never seen more kids come out for story hour. And it's the and it's the kids and the caregivers, and everybody's completely engaged. And as she said, they're all clapping and laughing at the same time. They're fully engaged. And so there's this resurgence of libraries right now. So go support your local library. Here where I live, our library is under big renovation. It's about to reopen in about a month and a half, and that is gonna just up the level, the quality of life of every single citizen in our town, whether they step foot into the library or not. So um, you know, support your library that is doing these story times that are free and open to the public and they're available for children. And this is where people meet and they make friends and where kids meet, and their first joyful introduction to this idea of the love of books. All right. So my book starts off uh uh I'm writing about a moment uh right after September 11th, 2001. Here we go. It was a late October afternoon when I closed my eyes and gave up. It was 2001. I was inundated with anxiety. All escape patches were blocked by messages of fear on the radio, television, phone calls, and evil, even a peaceful attempt to walk in nature was interrupted by the roaring sound of military planes preparing for war. This was 2001. I remember the idea of meditation. I had no idea where to start, so I closed my eyes and I asked help. In about five long seconds, I felt a calming presence around me. Read this book was the impression upon my heart. Still in meditation, I felt a surge of energy which felt like the opposite of the discomfort that plagued me. This bright thought guided me to go to the basement and grab the book. I stood up from the couch, walked down to the basement, found a stack of books, lifted one book, and then reached my hand into the next one to grab the exact book, The Beauty of the Thor Thorn, which was the book that was pointed out to me in my meditation, The Beauty of a Thorn. Read this book. And there it was, suddenly in my hands. The synchronies, the synchronicities were lining up. I read and read and was enriched by all the books waiting for me, aligned in perfect order from this moment. And before I knew it, it was December. So I needed to go someplace where I wouldn't have to be externally escaping to. I couldn't externally escape to a conversation with another person. I couldn't externally escape to a television show, or in this case, in this day and age, scrolling. Like I couldn't externally escape. All I could escape to was the words. And it's duly noted that no, no, not only did I find that book and escape to reading those words, and I also read books by Steinbeck and a nonfiction book called Hands of Light by Barbara Ann Brennan, which was beautifully written. She's a beautiful writer. Um, I found my way to also writing, which without being said was the result of that particular chapter, because I decided to go within and use the writing. It's called automatic writing, or I like to call it um scribing, fluid scribing, where you just maybe you can't find the words in a book through bibliomancy. So pick up a pen and just start writing and see what shows up for you. You will be surprised how much your hands or your heart has to say once you start sharing without the filter of um all of the exercises and techniques that are built into our brains and into our tongue and into our um systems of filter. So you write unfiltered. So I wanted to share that piece because I am I love that idea of surrendering into the sanctuary of believing that everything around us is available. Messages, um, answers to prayers, um, comforting messages, um, inspiring messages, things that reconnect us, that energize us, um, your meditation itself, the closing of your eyes and going into the meta, the the quietness of your of your mind, and scanning it as if it's a library and see what beautiful message with the intention of show me what I need to know for my highest good right now and see what thought appears. That's also a big energy healing technique. Um, and it isn't just for books, it isn't just for meditation. It does work if you go outward, if you want to go outward, but it's called the kledon. It's based on an Egyptian tradition, C-L E-D-O-N, I believe, the kledon, where you um ask a question and then you walk out into your day, your marketplace of your time, of your village, of whatever your version of walking out into your day looks like, talking to all of you who have remote jobs. What does it mean to walk out into your day? Does it mean to take a walk around the block? Does it mean that, oh, as I go through my day on all my Zoom calls, I'm just gonna see if some random fun thing shows up and pops up in front of me that answers this question or this this desire that I'm praying for. Um here's the thing, though. You go out and you put a prayer on your heart or a question on your heart, and then you walk with two things confidence and curiosity. Put those two things together and you'll do very well in life. Confidence and curiosity. But what are you confident about? You're confident that you're going to find out the answer. Not if you will find the answer. You're gonna simply go confidently and curiously say, I wonder how the answer will appear today. I wonder what I'm gonna get today. I wonder how the answer is gonna appear today. So um so I want to offer this exercise to you right now. I want you to think about what it means to walk into a room that has books. Any room that has books could be three books, could be books scattered on the ground, it could be a whole library, it could be your library. Okay. And float your hands and see where you land and let yourself be surprised that it's a book that you're, you know, you might not have been pulled towards. Um, where it's a book that looks like Captain Obvious. Of course, this is the right book for me. And then you want to open that book and flip through that book with closed eyes and then land on a page. And you can either slide your hand with your eyes still closed and like land on a word, or you can let your eyes flutter open, as they say, and just see what part of the page your eyes go to. Do not edit, don't try to reset. Just trust where your eyes go. And you might have an oh wow moment, or you might have a, hmm, this doesn't make sense. Stay curious, stay curious, and keep reading a little bit until you get that big yes on your heart that says, oh, this is the message that I needed that I wanted. It's a really beautiful way to build this interconnection with all of life, like to really um understand that it's not a matter of I'm alone, I'm with others. I'm alone, I'm with others. It's it's um it's a way to do it in such a way that you can absolutely uh um get filled up, um, realizing that all the resources you ever needed were around you all the time. Does anyone recognize that who listens to listens to this um podcast regularly? All the resources that you ever needed were around you all the time. Think Wizard of Oz, but you can also think Joseph Campbell. Um, think Heroes Journey. Uh, what we're what we're seeking has been with us all along. But we definitely needed to get the adventure in the journey to help us unfold and get to these levels of awareness that you cannot do if you just sit like a lump on a log. Um, you have to um no disrespect to a lump on a log because that's right there next to bark. And we just decided bark is the root of the word book, right? Uh beach bark. So maybe that's not even a good expression either. Also, the thing about a lump on a log, I'm just breaking this down, people. A lump on a log sometimes um is the strongest part of the log because that's where the tree healed. So um maybe it's not so bad to sit around like a lump on a log. Maybe that's what meditation is, being a lump on a log, the strongest part of yourself, because that's the part that healed. I was once at a um gift shop at Stony Point Retreat Center, amazing retreat center on the Hudson River Valley, in the Hudson River Valley on the river. Absolutely gorgeous place. It's it's all about peace and um bringing together uh diversity of thoughts and uh growing consciousness, humanity, community, all that good stuff. And in their gift shop, they sold bowls that were made out of the um the knots from the trees. So I guess those are the the and the reason one of the makers of the bowls um came over to me while I was admiring one and said, This this is very, very strong wood because this is built from the wood that healed after the tree lost a limb. Cool, right? So this energy of trees is really, really not far from bridging uh this energy to human consciousness, to the power of what would happen if the trees sacrificed a bit of themselves in order to let humans share ideas and reach out and connect. This is the way we connect, is through books and through writing and through words. Pretty beautiful stuff. So, yeah, I guess um rather than sitting like a lump on a log, uh, I don't even know where I was with that point, but I love that I corrected it. But what you can do is grab a book. So I want to um walk with me here, folks. I know this is just a recording, but walk with me. I want to go over to my uh sets of books and see what I see. I was um thinking about a book earlier today, and it is a kind of book that gets you hmm looking and looking and looking. Okay. Well, here's another thing that's happening. This book is not jumping out, it's sort of hiding from me right now. So whether I subconsciously or consciously hid it from myself, I don't know. Maybe I brought it upstairs to read it by the bedside, but I'm gonna go for another book then. And I might do a whole nother episode about that other book when I do find it. Um let me grab a book. Um I'm gonna take, I'm gonna grab two books. And feel free to do this with me if you're if you're at home or you're someplace near a book. And I've grabbed two books, and I'm not sure which book I want to grab from, but I will let you know that one is called Anamkara by John O'Donohue, a book of Celtic Wisdom. And one is called The Web That Has No Weaver, Understanding Chinese Medicine by Ted Kapchuk, OMD. Okay. So um I have these two books and I have them in front of me. And even though I'm speaking to you and I'm never on video here, this is an audio only podcast. I'm going to um with my left hand, I'm gonna open the book from a web that has no weaver. I'll turn it around a little bit so maybe I'll forget which is the right side up and right side down. Okay, good. And then I'm going to flip that one open, and then I'm gonna flip this one open. Stay with me, everybody. Here we go. Is this gonna work? Well, first of all, what is upside down? And I'm gonna just check this. All right. Um I went to the part about um the pulse. The pulse, and this is in the energy about the energy of energy medicine. That you would have a slippery pulse means that you have excess dampness. Okay. And so therefore, um when you have a slippery pulse, it has aspects of heat and is a yang pulse. Oh, so a slippery pulse is often seen along with coughs and indigestion from stagnant food, damp heat pouring into the bladder, and damp heat in the intestines. A slippery pulse may also accompany pregnancy and can be a sign of a strong constitution. So don't make assumptions. But he's talking about the power in the appendix I opened to um about the power of measuring, um measuring the pulses. Um, that's something that it's a special way that acupuncturists work, and deciding uh what a pulse looks like. That gets me curious about what are the other kinds of pulses? So if you ever get acupuncture, which I'm sure none of you do, that you can say, Hey, Doc, did I have a floating pulse? Did I have a rapid pulse? Did I have a thin pulse? Did I have a big pulse? Did I have an empty pulse? Did I have a full pulse? Did I have a slippery pulse? Did I have a choppy pulse? Did I have a wiry pulse? Did I have a tight pulse? Did I have a knotted pulse? I'm getting this right from the book. Did I have a hurried pulse? Did I have a short pulse? Did I have a long pulse? Did I have a moderate pulse? Did I have a flooding pulse? Did I have a soggy pulse? Soggy different than slippery. Did I have a minute pulse? Did I have a frail pulse? Did I have a hidden pulse? A hidden pulse? That's exciting. Oh, I'm gonna be reading all about this. Did I have a confined pulse? Did I have a moving pulse? Did I have a scattered pulse? Did I have a hollow pulse? And those are all the different kinds of pulses you can have. All right, that alone is just very cool. And because I wasn't really that conscious about the um, about the questions, uh, the question that I was asking, I am confident that there's somebody out there that is gonna be um listening that's like, what's going on, Hill? Why are you suddenly talking about um acupuncture and pulses? I've been thinking about that all week. Or I'm an acupuncturist myself. I need to go back and look at this book, The Web That Has No Weaver, and remember what all the different pulses are. Okay. Oh boy, here we are. Now I've switched over to the Celtic with my right hand. Um my word. Oh my goodness. Okay. I'm actually on the word pulse over here, too. You cannot make this up, except the word is impulse. Deep within us, there is a terrible impulse. It's a drive towards perfection. We want everything flattened into one shape. We do not like unexpected shapes. One of the essential aspects of beginning to reimagine the workplace is to awaken the ability to welcome that which is difficult and awkward. Frequently, the actual work itself is fine. Rather, it is our image of it that makes it appear difficult and awkward. Um so um I'll leave it at that because impulse was the word that my finger was on. So I had pulse on on my left hand and impulse, my finger was on. Deep within us, there's a terrible impulse, and it's a drive toward perfection. Wow. All right, well, awkward me doing this live bibliomancy for all of you to listen to, uh, giving you all permission to take time to um stop trying to find answers that are you already know. Uh, start trying to find answers that are um have been hidden and you don't know, you haven't seen, they haven't been revealed to you yet. Um so often we like patterns. Um, well, patterns are basically uh knowledge repeating itself. And if we're lucky, um it makes it shifts ever so slightly like a spiral and evolves, right? So it's like a circle, but then it shifts a little so it starts to evolve. Like be awkward and allow yourself to do things a little bit differently. Hear that inner critic, hear that outer critic. Um I was watching a show recently, it had to do with a critic. Oh, you know what it was? It was um, I kind of recommend this. It was a uh documentary on the 100-year anniversary of the New Yorker magazine. And then inside of that, they had like a mini little documentary about the guy who is the movie critic. And his job every single day is to go see a movie. He said he's seen a movie every single day of his life in New York City, a different movie every single day of his life for 40 years. And the magazine's only been around for a hundred years. So he's like almost like 50% of like all movie critics, you know, criticisms that have ever happened. And so they they leaned in and of course asked him, you know, the question, like, why be a movie critic? Why do we need movie critics? Is that helpful to have moot movie critics? And um, I just said, you know, let's not give too much credence to the critics inside of our head. And I don't even love the energy of criticizing things. I don't think it's helpful, certainly from an intuition point of view. I definitely don't think it's helpful unless you, as Brene Brown says, unless you're in the ring, why are you sitting on the outside, like telling people how to do things differently? But this guy had an answer for that, as as the New Yorker film critic. He said he just loves to strive towards better, the betterment of the craft. He's like, I'm, I like to think I'm like the watch, I'm I'm now completely paraphrasing. So take this with a grain of salt. I I did not uh take notes on this, but the essence of what I remembered it to be is that he was like the watchdog for the integrity of the entire art form, right? He loved the art form and he wants to be the one pushing the art form and looking at the art form in a way that's critically thinking rather than critical, just for the sake of being critical, critical thinking of how to do better, how we can do better, and also to call attention to these art forms that wouldn't otherwise get attention unless they were reviewed. All right, so there you go. So let that New Yorker uh critic, he's a famous person, half of you probably know his name, but he's not recalling to me right now. Um, let uh that type of critic have a little bit of real estate in your head, but mostly see what happens when you do things a little bit differently. A little bit different often feels like um a genuine apology. Um, rather than working a story through um like with my kids, I I like to polish over sometimes. I was like, that was a good time, right, guys? And they're like, no, mom, that wasn't that wasn't like a great memory because this, that, and the other happened. And I'll be like, oh, let me really reflect on that. And um, and then I will, without prompting, I'll come back and say, you know, I really want to apologize. I know that there's tons of healing in that as a parent. Um, and then the opposite will happen. We'll be like, I am so sorry. I really messed that up the way I freaked out in the airport, you know, five minutes before we're supposed to get on the plane. And they'll be like, yeah, we don't remember that, mom. Like, you don't need to apologize for that. So we have all sorts of ways, both ways it's awkward. Allow yourself to be awkward, to own your own narrative, to own the your own book of your life, the story of your life. Because I don't know if you're getting the metaphor here, but to be in love with your life, to really love your own life, means that you are that tree. You are the tree, the trunk, the growth, the roots, and the bark. And your story gets written. Um, your story is still unwritten, as that beautiful song goes, but your story is always being written. And um don't plagiarize. Don't write somebody else's story. Write something new, be poetic, um, be daring, be brief, be long, be all those things that we talked about as the different pulses, be have variations. Um, nothing is all right or all wrong in this world. Um be true to yourself and allow the books to guide you and help you and throw these wild coincidences at you where you saw me in real time grab two random books, close my eyes, and uh trust that I closed my eyes. I try, trust me that I closed my eyes because I did, because it wasn't easy. It was really awkward. I opened up on a thing about pulses, and then I wasn't even looking at the right hand, and then in the right hand, I had my finger on the word impulse, the impulse towards perfectionism, let it go. And then instead allow for the diversity of all, according to Chinese medicine, all the different ways we show up when the acupuncturist touches us, all the different ways we have a pulse on any given time in our life and of our health. Did I even say I'm Hilary Crowley and welcome to the Good Energy Healing Show? I'm saying it now, and I'm also saying goodbye. Um, I'm Hilary Crowley and thank you for tuning in to The Good Energy Healing Show. I've loved every moment of sharing this awkward, fun, uh, really powerful uh moment with you uh about taking back your life as a library. And one more thing, speaking about Akashic Records. The Akashic Records uh is the loving record of the soul, of your soul. That's another definition of the Akashic Records. That sure sounds like a library to me. So think of your soul as a library, and every single moment, every single material thing, breath you take, person you bump into, a moment of grace, uh, moment of learning, moment of challenges, moment of dark night of the soul, moment of guidance, moment of uh finding your boon, all of those adventures that you're on. Let that all fill the library, the big, beautiful library, the size of a cathedral of your life. I'm Hilary Crowley. Thank you for tuning in. Um, go ahead and you can uh order my book if you want. It just celebrated its fifth year anniversary. Um, it won um the finalist in the International Book Award in the Mind Body uh category, I think in 2023. And in 2022, it was a civil art nautilus uh award-winning book in the mind body category as well. So um I wrote that book with a lot of love, and uh I continue to want to share it for the rest of my life. Um, and it really served me today. It was fun reading to you from uh The Power of Energy Medicine. And uh go ahead if you have a chance to share this podcast with others, hit the five stars. Um, go take awesome care of yourself, and I truly hope you have the most beautiful day.