Dr. Howell’s Daily Reflections
Everyday, Dr. Howell writes a reflection, a spiritual practice, an inquiry prompt, and a prayer.
To receive Dr. Howell’s reflections everyday in your inbox, please sign up for our mailing list using the form at the bottom of the page, and begin your journey into who God has made you to be.
Make peace with your ego and discover your true path today. The path to wholeness starts now!
Abundance
November 14, 2023
Many people’s Thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations are abundant with food, family, friends, merry-making and gifts. For many families, there is also an abundance of love. Why? Because when we are with the people we love, our hearts overflow with fullness, affirmation and happiness.
Abundance
November 13, 2023
Instead of instructing us to achieve financial prosperity, Rabbi Jesus tells us how to fill ourselves with the life force. When we receive overflowing love, energy, contentment, enthusiasm and peacefulness, we receive the life force. Of course, we are conduits of this force in our ego state, but once we’re aware of the life force Jesus asked us to seek, to knock for and to thirst for, we have a more abundant life force than the ego alone could ever create.
Abundance
November 12, 2023
Abundance is generally associated with financial prosperity. For example, a family always has more than enough, or a person receives a windfall just when she loses her job. Then there’s the person who always lands on his feet after a financial setback. Abundance seems to flow to them.
Abundance
November 10, 2023
A mindset of scarcity blocks us from abundance. We choose something we value, and we think it is our life’s blood. In scarcity, we focus on accumulating and protecting our most valued things because we fear losing them. Therefore, we stockpile these things to prevent our life’s blood from “hemorrhaging.” Some may call this approach self-reliance, and others may call it isolationist or the silo phenomenon. In any case, the mindset of scarcity thinks that abundance is created only by our own efforts.
Abundance
November 9, 2023
People of conscious faith approach abundance quite differently from people who are primarily ego-driven. Ego-driven folks either work for a constant flow of abundance or complain about a lack of abundance. Neither strategy works. But those striving for conscious faith are aligned with the natural rhythm of the universe. They understand abundance is like the ebb and flow of the ocean's tides.
Abundance
November 8, 2023
So many of us fear scarcity which is, of course, the opposite of abundance. At times, there is real scarcity. For example, in the American Great Depression of the 1930s, jobs, food, clothing and everything money could buy were scarce. Money itself was scarce. The entire world was in a global financial crisis.
Resilience
November 5, 2023
In a trauma requiring resilience, we nurture ourselves unfailingly. We do not distract ourselves from our needs by focusing on the needs of others. In self-compassion, we attend to our needs, and then compassionately extend ourselves to others. In this way, we open ourselves to the love of others and we are affirmed, even in the midst of turmoil.
Resilience
November 3, 2023
We receive and give Divine energy, resources, presence and wisdom. We absorb these gifts and freely let them flow through us to others. We do not withhold ourselves or our soul from others.
Resilience
November 1, 2023
By becoming conscious of the Divine, we manifest our higher self. Through our higher self’s qualities, we adapt to adverse circumstances that our egos alone could never do. So, instead of disintegrating into blaming others, crumpling under the Inner Critic, panicking, losing hope or going into despair, we pull from a treasure chest of spiritual capacities.
Resilience
October 30, 2023
At Point Three, another essential aspect of resilience is called Reality-Based Action. This means that we take action when we are traumatized, but we first embrace the realities of the situation, regardless of the pain involved.
Resilience
October 27, 2023
We are fortunate to have a blueprint of how to build resilience: the Enneagram’s inner flow against the arrows shows us all nine energy points. Each point represents an essential spiritual energy that is a building block of resilience. By going to each point, we build resilience.
Sleep
October 25, 2023
Love and sleep are related in many ways. I recall the many evenings I tucked my kids into their beds. After a busy day and evening, I lay beside my children, reading a story and then saying a prayer. By the time I finished the prayer, my child was asleep, and I was so relaxed that I often drifted into sleep as well.
Sleep
October 23, 2023
Yes, we have a much better chance of sleeping when we shut down our overactive ego. One of the most influential and non-chemical ways is through systematic relaxation followed by prayer. This is not a light matter because prayer is the reconnection of our mind, body and heart to the One True Source of All Being.
Sleep
October 20, 2023
As a child, I fought my parents about going to bed. I wanted to stay up for more TV or more play and could not understand why I was made to go to sleep. I was mad at my parents because sleep was like dying for me. During sleep, I had no life and no excitement. I didn't even remember what happened in those eight to ten hours.
Pushing the Reset Button
October 18, 2023
When in tune with our essence, we can better know if a challenge is relevant to our destiny or if it is an unhealthy egoic desire. The essence senses when a challenge is essential and connects us with the ideas and qualities we need to work through it. It does not mind if we have to push the reset button because our failures are not viewed as shameful but for learning.
Pushing the Reset Button
October 16, 2023
I wept at my desk one evening while doing homework. I did not understand Algebra, no matter how hard I tried. I felt ashamed because I'd never had trouble with my subjects before this year in Junior High, and I prided myself on making good grades.