Loving the Weather!

It was a drizzly grey late spring morning when I opened the door and poked my nose out. At this time of year the vegetable and flower gardens are always calling. It smelled amazing, awake, and alive and the decision to put boots on and go out made it self. Moments later, as I stood over one of the garden rockeries admiring my handiwork a shift in perspective came through. For years I have worked with these same perennials, shifting the Lily collection from one spot to another, the delphiniums, liatris, daffodils, and tulips, everybody in that rockery has more than once grown legs and transplanted themselves.

And then I knew. I felt how they had taught me, it wasn’t my doing, I had simply acted as their legs. It was the plants, the trees, the weeds and grasses, the dirt and air and water that has been teaching me since the first time I conceived of planting a garden. For forty years the plant kingdom has taken me under its wing and supported my fledgling attempts at working with them. They have taught me where to place each of them in relationship with the others, who is needy and who needs to be ravaged. My mind is rarely involved, though I have a library of gardening books. They teach me through my body, my senses, and mostly they teach through our mutual love affair.

Now with beginners’ eyes I view the scene, the same garden rockeries, the same trees, sky, air, rain, and nothing is the same. The shapes and colors, the smells, everything shone. My heart began beating that gratitude song until it poured out my mouth. Thank you to the nasturtiums and pansies, thank you gladiolas and dahlias, thank you to the peach tree. Thank you Life for the Grace called rain showering down upon me today.


In this part of the world the weather is the first thing we talk about when we get together. These days I hear a lot of complaining, it’s too cold, wet, hot, dry, flooding, windy. Behind those complaints I feel the fear and realize the weather is the recipient of that projected fear. If we subscribe to the idea of Oneness with All of Life we’ve forgotten that we are the weather. We want control but we don’t want responsibility. We’ll believe conspiracy theories about the bad guys using weather conditions as a weapon before we’ll accept responsibility for the weather we’re experiencing. We’ll believe that the Earth Herself wants to destroy us without spending a moment to consider the idea, the possibility that we have a part in creating the very weather we’re complaining about.

Swimming in the Ecstasy of Creation

"Earth is a smooth pond which is imprinted by and reflects the web of planetary influences, as soft putty carries the imprint of a gently-pressed finger. We humans are as water spiders on the surface of the pond, weaving into physical form the web that we see and feel reflected from above. There are reflections also from the sand on the bottom of the pond which are felt and woven on the surface, and in this way the stars hear not only their own echo from earth, but the music of Gaia's own sphere intermingled with their sweet symphony. Incarnate humans thus can be the creators of a heavenly web on the spherical surface of the earth, attuned simultaneously to the above and below, swimming in the ecstasy of creation. "
~Patrick MacManaway

A Spiritual Conspiracy

On the surface of the world right now there is
war and violence and things seem dark.
But calmly and quietly, at the same time,
something else is happening underground
An inner revolution is taking place
and certain individuals are being called to a higher light.
It is a silent revolution.
From the inside out. From the ground up.
This is a Global operation.
A Spiritual Conspiracy.
There are sleeper cells in every nation on the planet.
You won't see us on the T.V.
You won't read about us in the newspaper
You won't hear about us on the radio
We don't seek any glory
We don't wear any uniform
We come in all shapes and sizes, colors and styles
Most of us work anonymously
We are quietly working behind the scenes
in every country and culture of the world
Cities big and small, mountains and valleys,
in farms and villages, tribes and remote islands
You could pass by one of us on the street
and not even notice
We go undercover
We remain behind the scenes
It is of no concern to us who takes the final credit
But simply that the work gets done
Occasionally we spot each other in the street
We give a quiet nod and continue on our way
During the day many of us pretend we have normal jobs
But behind the false storefront at night
is where the real work takes a place
Some call us the Conscious Army
We are slowly creating a new world
with the power of our minds and hearts
We follow, with passion and joy
Our orders come from the Central Spiritual Intelligence
We are dropping soft, secret love bombs when no one is looking
Poems ~ Hugs ~ Music ~ Photography ~ Movies ~ Kind words ~
Smiles ~ Meditation and prayer ~ Dance ~ Social activism ~ Websites
Blogs ~ Random acts of kindness...
We each express ourselves in our own unique ways
with our own unique gifts and talents
Be the change you want to see in the world
That is the motto that fills our hearts
We know it is the only way real transformation takes place
We know that quietly and humbly we have the
power of all the oceans combined
Our work is slow and meticulous
Like the formation of mountains
It is not even visible at first glance
And yet with it entire tectonic plates
shall be moved in the centuries to come
Love is the new religion of the 21st century
You don't have to be a highly educated person
Or have any exceptional knowledge to understand it
It comes from the intelligence of the heart
Embedded in the timeless evolutionary pulse of all human beings
Be the change you want to see in the world
Nobody else can do it for you
We are now recruiting
Perhaps you will join us
Or already have.
All are welcome
The door is open ~
author unknown
.

"Alice" through the Solstice Window

This Week's Transmission . . .from Mary Nalini MacNab


'Alice' through the Solstice Window ~


Today's transmission comes from the alignment of the solstice window which we are now moving through, each in her own way.

"'Each in Her own way', is the theme for this week's transmission. As the energies of the solstice loom the largest they have seemd in your experience, you may find yourself in and out of body, one minute supremely focused inward, the next drawn into something that feels otherworldly, then dropped back 'in' to the physical body in a way that confounds and confuses... what was I doing? What was I in the middle of? What did the person(s) I am speaking with just say? What planet is this? What world?

This is the beginning of multiplicity in a way you have not imagined yourself to exist. The veils are not just thinning now, they are diffused, seemingly 'broken' and yet not. The NOW is present, the NOW of eternal creation, pure dreaming, pure navigation from the heart.

It is imperative, so very important, that you move from the heart in each and every moment. Listen and allow it to direct your every motion. Your every direction. For the heart IS the direction you must follow at this time. When faced with the moment by moment multiplicity of choosing, listen. Breathe into centre and allow your heart, as it is in alignment with My Heart at its core, to choose for you. It is your core, your essence, the Truth of your Beingness that must now step forward and choose, in each moment, in integrity and from strength.

It is time to respond, moment by moment, from the power that runs through you and to remember the choice for Love, as it unfolds from within and around you ~ in the certain knowingness that you remember ~ even as you know not what you do.

You are held in this time, this window of creative flow called 'opportunity'. Allow yourself to be in this held space, to flow along with this great tide of changing, and watch as all morphs from within."

'Mother made me; I am She; Let go, and flow along with me!'

~ as given thru 'Mary', from the heart of the next wave 12/11/2010 ~ all rights reserved

May Every Blessing Find You!

With unending love,

Mary (Nalini)
www.delphicwave.com
delphicwave.blogspot.com

A Story from the Queens Kingdom

Once upon a time the queen found herself under siege and no longer able to travel her kingdom freely. In a dream the queen learned that this taking away of her rights and powers would serve the highest good of all of life. In the dream she was shown a place of beauty, love and light that would be born of her unconditional love for all of life. The queen agreed. She knew in her heart that her real power lay within her being and could not be controlled through siege or threat of death.

Eventually it became clear to the queen that she would need servants to help her steer clear of the dangers that daily visited her door, if she was lucky enough to have one. The first servant she wove from the fibers of her being hemmed with tears. This servant she named Power and Power was sent into hiding. The next servant was named Pretend and the next Forget. Slowly as circumstances arose she wove loyal and loving servants to help her keep herself safe.

Decades flew by and the servants were inherited by the daughters when they discovered they were queens. Often the daughters had to create new servants so difficult was it for them to refuse the moontime call of their queen selves. And so the armies of servants grew through thousands of years of siege.

When the day dawned that the siege began letting up the Queen was in a quandary. She could feel herself being called by the dream to stand up and take back her kingdom. Yet the queen had forgotten about her servants so accustomed to their service had she become. So every time she stood to take her place a servant would stand in front of her to keep her safe. This would send her emotional body careening off the walls in showers of anger, frustration, self loathing and an often unnamed shame of self betrayal.

The less the queen loved herself the more she loved outside of herself. It took a mirror the Sacred Witness and a few good girlfriends to remind the queen that she had an army of servants that would need new marching orders in order for her to be able to re-inhabit her kingdom. And so it came to pass. With the discovery of the servants came the discovery of their loyal, loving lifetimes of service to her safety. She was deeply, deeply touched by this love. She held ceremony to honor these servants their vigilance and faithful service in her name. And the queen began calling each of her servants to the head office to be decommissioned. The servants the queen had inherited wouldn’t be budged from their tasks until they were satisfied that the queen was really safe. Others were assigned new tasks until they were convinced, and others required no more assurances and were absorbed back into the heart of the queen in the blink of an eye. At the time of this writing the queen is in continuing peace talks with the remains of her one time army of servants. Her kingdom is hers to live happily ever after in, or not.
I send much love and gratitude to Beate Ronnenfeldt for sharing her vision that inspired this short story

A Certain Honesty

"This isn't a journey about becoming something. This is about unbecoming who we are not, about undeceiving ourselves. In the end, it's ironic. We don't end up anywhere other than where we have always been, except that we perceive where we have always been completely differently. We realize that the heaven everyone is seeking is where we have always been. Once again, what is required is a certain sense of honesty."
~ Adyashanti ~
.

I recently encountered one of the ways I have been deceiving myself, silly rabbit. I discovered that the walls I built around many of my gifts as a means of preventing criticism or judgment from reaching me had also prevented me from being present to the loving support that was also always available. Amen

Jigsaw Puzzling

I’ve discovered a metaphor that helps me bring the concept of Oneness with All Life to a manageable size:

I am a giant jig saw puzzle while I am also a single piece of the jigsaw puzzle.


The energetic framework that we’ve lived within for thousands of years, a patriarchal framework has been dismantled and is no longer functional. While many of us are not consciously aware of this energetic shift, we sense through our bodies that the playing field has drastically changed. Men and women alike sense the shift. While women are feeling the shift as a call to new understandings about their feminine selves, men are being called into their hearts that they might support women as they shift back into the energetic driver seat that is our birthright. Women are being not only called, but commanded by Life to stand in their power as women.

Humanity has been preparing for this shift in the ages for centuries. Now that it is upon us we discover that we aren't clear about how to navigate within this new energetic soup that we’ve conjured up. The vessels that we “drive” no longer respond to the old maps that we’ve navigated by, the pathways we formally traversed have morphed into something other. The old picture that came on the outside of the puzzle box showing us what the puzzle could look like no longer applies. There is no box much less a picture. We are explorers in the finest Star Trek tradition of our inner worlds instead of the outer world.

How each of us expresses this shift is unique, we are totally individual puzzle pieces. Unless your puzzle piece is called seer or mystic most of us individual puzzle pieces have no clue what the “big picture” is. The puzzle pieces need to be gathered together before we can catch even an inkling of what the big puzzle looks like. To bring the metaphor into living terms I find that when I’m in a circle with other women, each there to share their unique puzzle piece I get a feeling for and knowings about the “big picture. I find when I listen to others describe their puzzle piece position my piece of the puzzle is fleshed out. The aha moments that come as I listen complete me and I feel like I’m finally home in a world of experiential Oneness, a giant loving jigsaw puzzle.

A Pile of You

I haven't posted anything here yet this year...and I feel this piece by Jennifer Louden articulates exquistely what's up for most of us.




A Pile of You
by Jennifer Louden


It is time.

You are ready. This time, you mean it. For real.

You are ready. You are shedding, dismantling, unbuckling, discarding: identities, accolades, glories, web stats, even your most treasured bio.

Impressive, glittery, sacred: past.

Scars, wounds, failures, shames, dents: they must go, too.


You unbuckle the past slowly, swearing to yourself, softly, repeatedly, “I am ready, I can do this” even as bits of you cling to your fingers.

Disrobe, unwind, unburden.

A pile of you forms on the shore of your future.

The water of the unknown laps at your feet, caresses your toes. So clean, so promising. You are almost naked, almost emptied, almost ready.

Then a thought: wouldn’t it be a good idea to hold on to just one wafer thin bit of you?

After all, like the Egyptian Pharaohs, you will need things on the other side. Maybe not 10,000 nubile slaves or a clay jar with your preserved heart in it but it shouldn’t hurt to take just one, or maybe five, of your degrees with you? Certainly the Oprah appearance would be useful. And being the youngest person in your organization to ever run a division, don’t leave that. And your divorce and bad investments and the semi-abusive relationship - you aren’t really ready to let go of those.

It would be silly to leave all of you. You might get cold. You take back more slivers of your identity from the pile. You worked so hard for them. Especially the stories that gouge and pinch and humiliate.

You put a few bits of you back on. Now you’re ready to dive in, the water looks so fine.

What’s this? You can’t swim. You can’t even float. You are sinking.

Your toes touch the soft, silted bottom. You panic, claw at the water but no matter. You don’t move, can’t move: sunk.

You know what you have to do. If you are honest, it is only because you will drown that you do so, but to your credit, you do it (many would rather drown). You cast away all of who you have been, these last most special and hurtful flecks, remembering, at the last moment to say thank you.

Thank you for it all.”

You find — you have no idea how — you can breathe underwater now. (Maybe it was the thank you?) You can’t see very far in front of you, only a few feet, so you move slowly, as if in a dream. Come to think of it, maybe this is a dream and, any moment, you will wake up. You will be who you are, or were, or always thought you should be. You fantasize about how good that will feel, the known!, and then, shit!

You are smack, stuck, back on the bottom, in the gloom. Unable to move, although thankfully, still, able to breathe.

You sigh and watch the bubbles streak upwards. It seems that holding on to anything here does not serve.

You concentrate on the feeling of the water passing over your skin, on the cerulean blue patch right in front of you, on the rise and fall of your chest.

You take a tentative breaststroke forward. And then another.

Ten Ways for Elementals to Work With Humans

1. Do not prejudge all humans as bad but examine each human to find the good in them.
2. Having found the spark of good, breathe your energy into it to enlarge it.
3. When a human pays attention to a plant, tree or stone, tell him or her what the plant or tree would like in order to be healthier. Even if humans don’t hear the message consciously, they will receive it subconsciously.
4. When you see a human who is trying to help nature, cluster around that human and give them all the help you can. Often humans don’t think to ask you directly, but our higher selves ask this.

5. Play with humans so that they can recover their childlike joy and wonder. Many humans are depressed and need the joy elementals bring.
6. Give humans proof of your existence. Humans are more inclined to believe in elementals if you do this.
7. Appreciate the human strengths of forgiveness, love, persistence, and focus. By associating with humans, elementals will learn these qualities.
8. To (human) body elementals: don’t give up. Keep moving your human hosts into situations to catalyze positive change.
9. Don’t judge humans by elemental standards. Presently humans eat beings that live, excrete waste and age. Through this path we learn to be creators of form and worlds.

10. Surprise us.

Ten Ways for Humans to Work with Elementals

I found these guidelines in a book by Tanis Helliwell called Summer with the Leprechauns. I couldn't resist copying them to share.



1. Believe in elementals. Human belief strengthens elementals and gives them energy.
2. Be happy and enthusiastic. Elementals are not attracted to depressed, sad humans.
3. Go to healthy places in nature as often as possible. Walk in forests, along the seashore, lie in a meadow, listen to birds, sit by a brook. Enter into the right vibration of the Earth and listen to what it wants. Humans will purify their vibrations if they do these things.
4. Appreciate the beauty in nature. When humans do this, elementals will be attracted to you.

5. Cooperate and create with nature by planting trees, growing flowers, feeding the birds.
6. Send energy to elementals, who look after trees, flowers, water and mountains, to keep them healthy. Do this with joy and gratitude.
7. Teach other humans to appreciate nature. Do it with love and joy, and these humans will begin to understand the Earth and her needs.
8. Do things spontaneously; free yourself from overplanning and organizing.
9. Take time everyday to do nothing. Create a space in both your house and head so magic can occur.


10. In order to contact an elemental who wants to work with you on an ongoing basis, sit in a quiet natural place, close your eyes and call this elemental to you. Notice what kind of elemental has come. Ask it what it’s gift is and its name. Listen to this elemental on an ongoing basis; act on its suggestions, and your relationship will become stronger.

Imagining Peace

For years, when given an opportunity for a wish over birthday candles or Beltane fires, I wished for peace on Earth. I admittedly didn’t start out wishing for peace because I believed in wishes. I wished for peace because I didn’t in the least believe in wishes. So if I was going to wish I had decided to wish for something else I didn’t believe in.

Considering that everyone of us starts out as a child believing in wishes coming true, and considering that we’re all eventually directed to give wishes and wishing up for reality, I could have continued throwing my wishes away on peace and not thought further about this. Instead, I began to reclaim the childhood wisdom that knows that real wishes do come true, though a real wish can be hard to sort from other kinds of wishes. When an opportunity to wish a wish showed up I wished for peace again. I didn’t believe in peace, though I couldn’t have admitted it at the time.

It was after joining a group of women calling themselves the Vessels of Peace that I began to examine my beliefs about peace. It was the name itself that had sounded inviting, sounded at that particularly difficult time in my life like a concept I could well afford to embrace. I began imagining that I was a Vessel of Peace. I discovered that peace is a hard sell, not many people interested, except maybe Christmas Day. I discovered that while I did believe in peace, I had difficulty imaging what that peace would look like. I found that it was easy to imagine disaster scenarios, but that I couldn’t imagine peaceful scenarios with nearly the same gusto. I wondered when I would be a Vessel of Peace.

This December 7, 2009 as winter solstice approaches I find myself able to sketch an answer to my search around imaging what peace looks like. I needed to bring myself to my imaginings of peace and then I find circles of people gathered in sacred space emote peace. I find when I channel the Mother, conveying Her messages, I feel peace. When I pray aloud I am at peace. I am at peace when I nurture. I am at peace when I listen to the news. I am peace in my sleep. I am at peace with the anger, at peace with grief. Peace enlightens my fear. Peace crept up on me, caught me unaware that I had fallen so thoroughly into Her arms that I am embodying Peace. Yes, I can be at peace with war!

When I open to peace it isn’t a boring, nondescript space. It is a daring vital energy with a rejuvenating quality that sings through this vessel at the speed of light. It is a well of hope from which youth can spring eternal. Peace is the softest flowing gossamer fabric, peace is durable and sturdy; it is eternal whether I am present to that peace or not.

Peace and love are interchangeable words. Peace and love aren’t far away nebulous places. Peace is and always has been available within. I invite you to join me to open your inbuilt circuits and lets plug into peace and glory in it's glow together.

Sounding Out the Love

Aaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Module Two of the Kundalini Trance Dance facilitator training was a magnificent experience and I'd like to share some joy.

Let me start with the fact that this work is helping bring about what I consider to be an extraordinary transformation in my life. For now, the best way I have to put this statement into other descriptive words is to say that I have gone from knowing with my mind and heart the truth that I am/we are light beings, to being able to feel into that subtle light body to activate, cleanse and nourish it.

My journey home takes me through the Little River ferry terminal to catch a boat to Powell River. It is always the first place that I have time to catch my breath after leaving the Haven and my thoughts turn to the daily breathing exercises that are recommended we use to keep us vibrationally sweet. Like other trips home I knew that these would be opportune moments for the practice. It was blowing a gale outside so there was no going to the beach this time. I put Goddess Alchemy Project on low, closed my eyes and starting grounding down to connect.

As I opened and began breathing Shakti Ma up I could feel my perineum sipping the electro-magnetic energy, could feel the light thrilling up feet and legs to pool in my pelvis empowering the cleansing sounds of light being pulled through the four layers of my auric body. Again I found something special about doing this practice alone for the first time in a week. With the accompanying sounds of rain lashing and winds shaking the little vehicle, I took the deepest most aware dive into light body, like the last time, only more. I could feel every ray of light that encapsulates this physical body, could distinctly feel the subtle movement of light streaming through central pranic tube, ida and pingala pathways and through each chakra and tube torus. Combined with the sense of connection to Shakti below and Shiva above, it was breathtaking, an ecstatic state in seconds, much less time than it takes to read or write this. I hung out at heart in the light, feeling akin to a child at play in a summer rain, splashing light and sounding out the love.

For years I've sensed that humanity needed spiritual food. Now I know that we literally need to feed our spirit bodies with light. It feels exquisite and perfect this Divine plan that gave us physical bodies designed to "plug into" our energetic environment, like a plug into a power outlet. Perhaps a billboard campaign selling humanity to itself by describing how these wondrous vessels come factory equipped with a bank of batteries and complete circuitry to run not only Solar power but Earth energy through our systems as well.

I need to share about another joyous aspect of these Awakenings and training periods that also really came home this time. Through each of your eyes I experienced myself held, respected, accepted and undeniably unconditionally loved. The feeling of sisterhood and sense of belonging that was seeded and nurtured has grown into a full blown garden in which I refresh myself regularly. A lifetime, many lifetimes of yearning for I knew not what is now known. I am blessed beyond my wildest dreams. You have all held space for me to flower as the purring slobbering love muffin I really am and I thank you and love you from one end of my sweaty self to the other.

Sounding Out the Love Part 2

The wonder of this work really shows up when I’m in a sweat, whether literal or metaphor. Instead of falling back into old coping mechanisms when I am triggered by a circumstance or person I now have the tools to step out of the story and finally put an end to the behaviors that before kept me looping and stuck in the stories.

I received counsel during the interview with Leyolah and Luna Astraea at the end of this training that I knew immediately was a gift of Divine proportions. It was really simple as most truths tend to be. I was counseled that it was past time to mature away from the old need/loop to be liked. I laughed. I was delighted at how easy it was to hear this perfect and true counsel. We three laughed and agreed that this counsel applies to most of us some of the time.
First thing the morning after the interview an examination of the need to be liked was triggered and I had fodder to either process or loop in. Thanks to the fact that I was fresh and clear from the weeks work I knew immediately which childhood story had come up. Now instead of wallowing in the story what happened can be described as a surrendering to it. Instead of becoming the story I witnessed it. Rather than feeling put upon and out of sorts because I had been triggered I sensed joy at the journey of discovery that was opening up for me. I asked a question. “What’s with this need to be liked and where was it born?”

I witnessed that my choices in childhood around what I liked and disliked had been compromised at best, denied completely at worst. I witnessed my opinion not mattering and the resulting loss of trust in self. I witnessed taking up the spear of judgment and criticism that was used against me. It was when I witnessed myself hating that I felt I had uncovered the heart of the answer to the question. Intuitively I sensed that loving self or another completely and unconditionally isn’t possible when there is a hidden kernel of un-owned hatred anywhere in our being. A part of me was out of integrity with who I am as love and until I owned the lack of integrity neediness would show up as a symptom.
Standing into, by witnessing the hate that I had generated wouldn’t have been possible until now. Sharing this process without the back story hasn’t been possible until now.

I have enjoyed this dance with the shadows and light. I am delighted to find that the light and dark are merging, not into hazy grey but an illuminated silver.

A Spring Dance Retreat

These next weeks I'll am fulfilling dreams so long ago dreamt they were for a time forgotten. As I look over the preparations for this retreat and facilitator training I am grateful and feel blessed beyond my wildest imaginings. The privilege of stepping out of time, as it were, into days and weeks of dance and prayer, of life revolving around the tribe and temple is an exquisite life transforming blessing. Yes there is work involved, yes I'll have to dig deep within, yes I am ready to be completely me!

Namaste

A Day in the Garden with the Birds

I prepared the potato and onion beds for planting these last days. It was a great gift to find a couple of meals worth of potatoes that had over wintered in the ground perfectly. Today I found the last leeks in a tangle at the far corner of the onion bed. The sweet smell of soil, the hard crunch of rocks under the shovel and then bend to pull a few weeds and breathe out gratitude about this wonderful chore, I love these piles of dirt collected on bed rock. I’m as twitterpated as the birds I hear singing their hearts out about the wonder and joy, the glory of life around us.

Grateful I am for the sound of the male hummingbird announcing himself to the world as a suitor ready and able after he’s climbed straight into the air a hundred feet and more. I have to stop and watch as he goes straight up to arc and swoop down making his distinctive ta-da before doing it all again. What a show, I’m swooning and I wish him well with his own kind. A male red winged blackbird is sounding his arrival song at the bird feeder with his female close behind. A red bellied sap sucker is drumming his availability on the light stand above the garage; every female for miles around can hear him. The deep blue Stellars Jays are trying to chase the red winged blackbirds from the bird feeder with raucous caws that sound like crows. Something, probably the cats have disturbed the chipmunks in their mating escapades and they’re scolding can be heard in the distance. Grateful I am for this gentle natural soundscape.

I chose to focus today on the mantra I love and approve of myself. After a while of such it felt right to move into I love and approve of the whole world. After another while a note of doubt sounded…did I really love and approve of the whole world? That note did not feel right and I remember that most negative thinking stems from ego and I knew that ego was attempting to circumvent a loss of control. I returned to feeling into loving and approving of the whole world and felt how vital it is to hold to this mantra; this viewpoint of the world can and will recreate anything that doesn’t serve the good of the whole without violence, without fear.

Sometimes, in order to remain present and at peace with what is, I have to ask these two questions; am I coming from love around this or am I coming from fear. The easiest choice can be the one that feels good and works as well for the good of the whole.

Blessed be!

Approaching the Winter Solstice 2008

A gentle snow began falling early yesterday evening and it hasn’t stopped. How appropriate for the season of darkness that the ground is carpeted in light. I love to leave first fresh footprints in snow, hence a walk into the village today. There were only locals about, on foot too, enjoying the still and quiet that the four inch blanket of snow lends. The white light that comes up from the ground instead of down from above makes the deep grey still snowing sky less ominous. Snow will continue falling until tomorrow morning and isn’t expected to warm and melt before the New Year.

A phone conversation between Canadians, will usually start with how’s the weather where you are, even if they’re only a few miles apart. A day like today is the reason that this conversation goes on year round. The answer to the question how’s the weather can give more information about another than hours of conversation can convey. If you’re also from a Northern climate, when I tell you it’s snowing you know a lot about my circumstances. You know that if I don’t have to drive, I don’t! You know that there can be a lot of work involved. You know that any other plans that were made for this day could change, maybe fast.

One of the ways I say my prayers, to send love and offer gratitude for this life at this wonderful time in our herstory, is to feel back to how the First People’s and our ancestors lived on this landscape in this weather hundreds of years ago. Talk about a reality check, hot and cold running water often top the gratitude list, with feather quilts and wood burning furnaces. And the food preserves…aahhhhh…blessings indeed. None of those blessings would be rich and juicy without the people and cats that fill out the landscape of my everyday life. Thank you, thank you!

Tonight as I listen in to the approach of the darkest night of the year I hear clearly that we need to slow down and take stock now, not when it is convenient. As nature is rejuvenating Herself the message She sends is clear; ease off on whatever you are using to stress yourself. Turn to the Light within when the Darkness without reigns.

A Root Chakra Journey: Getting Real About Oneness

Looking back I see that the first months of dancing and feeling into my base or root chakra I barely felt the connection to the Earth energy that we were being invited to experience. I could see the facilitators’ intent reaching down to the to Earth, I could see/feel her pulling that Divine Feminine life force into her own body; when I imitated her movements I knew I was experiencing only a small part of what I witnessed. My body desperately craved more. I knew that if I kept moving and calling and breathing I would connect deeper until the experience was authentically mine, not the mime.

With hindsight I see too much head and not enough groundedness: so much denial of self, a refusal to witness and accept my own need to feel/be part of a tribe. I can hear myself saying over the years that I needed to be a contributing member of humanity. What I remained clueless to was that my humanity was a nebulous over there, anywhere but here where I am humanity. This masked the pain of feeling ostracized by tribe and was felt/expressed as an unrelenting desire to be seen, to be heard, to be special. That need couldn’t be met. I couldn’t hear or see me for me either.

The first time I witnessed my resistance to tribe or community was October 2008 when our facilitator expressed her joy at having the dance tribe gathered again after a hiatus. I could feel her genuine joy against which I found I felt not a drop. That got my attention as it coincided with a discovery that I had been disrespecting and disenfranchising myself from the political sectors of society.

The memory that came up dancing root chakra first day of the retreat was the story Mom told of how when the nurse brought me to her in the hospital she denied that I was her newborn baby because I was too beautiful. Whether I felt the abandonment as a newborn or not, every time I heard the story during my childhood I felt abandoned by the story, not loved and special as Mom intended I feel. Mine are all the classic reasons for avoiding the tribe, fear, distrust, anger/rage, betrayal, this lifetime, other life times. Too, I see now that I lived many classic symptoms of an under active/over active root chakra, with poverty consciousness at the top of the list.

I did not sleep well the first time I participated in a Kundalini Trancen Dance. After three nights of not sleeping well at the retreat, I knew I needed to ask Leyolah for help. I also shared about the newly awakened pain in my left hip (feminine side), a pain that had also come up the first time I danced, a pain I thought I had danced through.

As she laid her hand on my hip she suggested that I needed to focus on grounding myself well and thoroughly before going to bed. As she spoke the words I felt their truth. She instructed me to find the ecstasy in my legs. As she said that I realized that it was true that the goose bumps that for me often signal the ecstatic state never covered my legs, only my torso, arms, neck and head. As I retrieve this memory by writing these words I remember the need to focus on bringing the ecstasy down into my legs these next weeks and months. (I felt goose bumps down my legs at the height of our dance last night. (Dec.8, 2008) Yes, yes, yes!)

During the sixth day of the retreat, when my room mate was pulling out early, the old feelings of not being worthy and being abandoned and betrayed came up full tilt boogie. In the context of the retreat I was able to witness yet experience the grief and anger without getting enmeshed in the old story. I am not a five year old girl, I choose to be the grown woman experiencing another grown woman making a choice that went against the grain of the group. I was able to confirm my initial congratulations to her about her courage to face and make her difficult decision. I did not in the least loop back into my old story of abandonment and was grateful for the validation of my good health as it were, by the whole experience.

I found my little girl, rather she showed up one day this week as I was distilling my experiences with root chakra. In feeling into her, around five years of age, I remembered the anguish and loneliness of not feeling supported, nurtured, loved. I remembered the feeling of not belonging where I was, of being called a bad girl when I knew I was a good girl. I remembered pining for my real family to show up. I remembered meeting my first girl friend the first day of school. I felt I had found a family member. At six years of age, we walked to school together, holding hands, promising we’d marry twin brothers so we could stay close. We named our children. I remembered her death three months later. I remembered being beaten and told to forget about her when I expressed my grief. I had to stop being a good girl to forget her, which I did. I began cracking into pieces.



No matter how clear in my head I was or am about my Oneness with all of Life, as long as the sludge of unresolved “scar tissue” resided at my energetic root chakra I was unable to fold all of humanity into my heart or to use Leyolahs’ words “ecstatically embody the fullness of our Oneness”. Without owning tribe I remained always outside Oneness, separated as it were by divisions within self and unable to truly ground myself. As I explored root I found I had really let parts of myself take up space outside me, forming a mini tribe of parts and components of myself to take up the space left void and empty without an authentic love connection to tribe. No wonder no joy.

Separation beliefs begin in our core/root chakra. For years I didn’t make the connection between using politics, politicians, doctors, lawyers, teachers and such, all part of our/my larger community/tribe as scapegoats in the blame game and the separation ideology I knew needed undoing. My attitudes and beliefs toward sections of my culture have come up to be peeled away steadily this year. It began with committing to meeting with women in sacred ways regularly, which led to the Kundalini dance circle. The dance cycles have insured that the layers of the onion in my being called social conditioning keep coming up to be seen for what is real and released if need be.

My original attraction to the dance came with an unparalleled conviction that I needed the grounding that this work offered as a counter weight for the heady, third eye meditation service with the Vessels of Peace. For me, after years of building an energetic sludge to the dynamic life giving Divine Feminine energies by disrespecting my physical ancestors feminine legacy, it feels perfect to dedicate myself to clearing those blocks/bricks through the cleansing connecting breathes between Mama Gaia and my root chakra. I am made whole and complete in this practice.



If we as subtle activists are to fulfill our creative potential as activists, a journey through our subtle or chakric body can serve to build parameters within which to better utilize the potential of that subtle activity.

The Keys to Our Kingdoms : A Doorway

Blessing of Peace, Love and Laughter are winging your way this sacred day!

Reflections from THE AWAKENING RETREAT Nov. 2008

I thought I was going to dance when I left home ten days ago to attend Leyolah Antara's "Awakening Retreat". Now I can say that I returned last night from a journey to answers to my question of how I can bring Heaven down to Earth.




I've long dreamed of peace of Earth. Most wishes I've sent to the universe have had peace at their core. I've cultivated peace in my own life that it may ripple outward. I felt that I needed to dig deeper still into myself to find a way to bring this wishful dream of peace more down to the Earth. I know now that when I was strongly called to attend the retreat, it was the answer to how to deepen my peace. What appeared on the surface of things to be a my free will decision to go dance for eight days was as much or more my answering a call that sounds from Leyolahs' Heart to serve humanity at this time in our awakening. Twenty two women and two men were there answering the call that rings out from Leyolah's heart to be in a "timeless" service to all of Life, from the horrific or mundane to the ecstatic Self of humanity.





Leyolah lives her teachings. She embodies the Divine Feminine of a Thousand Names. She is a model of how we can, through our very bodies, raise the vibration rate of a humanity in dire need of these tools. Through dance movement, breathing, our voices and meditations we were slowly, gently, but ever so inexorably inspired to experience our ecstatic potent selves. She and her facilitators loved us and loved and loved us...until we loved ourselves.

My eternal thanks to Davina for enticing me to dance through her beautiful embodiment of this work and for introducing me to her teacher. More eternal gratitude to Leyolah for being who she is, for diving into her visions of humanity and having the amazing courage to live her dreams and share them with us.


Here is one last picture of the tribe...can you see the outline of a heart that the bodies formed?

I will share more when the words have sorted themselves out. In the meantime for more info about Leyolah and her work:

http://www.kundalini-dance.com/


P.S.
Happy Birthday Dad! I burnt the onions this sacred day in your honour. Thank you, I love you.

PRAYER SHAWL WEAVING for Sunday, Nov. 9, 2008

Peace, Om Shanti, Salam, Shalom

Welcome to #34 in our Prayer Shawl Weaving series. It is nigh on a full moon and we are exactly half way through this turn of the seasonal wheel called Autumn.

In honour of the Fall we are traversing, let us again start in the West to welcome and introduce ourselves…I am Anne from B.C. and I will be our facilitator this evening. Let us weave our ancestors into our circle by also naming our parents and grandparents. I invite Tina and Richard my parents, I invite Antoinette and Rene and Josephina and Ryzard to this sacred circle with us this evening. (Each of the callers introduces themselves and their circle of ancestors)

This year our Service to the Divine Feminine as Vessels of Peace gifted us Grandmother Spider as guardian of our journey. This week She asks us to weave, with light or thread or prayers, whatever works for you, a connection next with each other in this circle…. then moving on to include other Vessels of Peace who can not join us in form, and further still to those beings who resonate with Peace wherever they may be or who they are, in the world. Breathe deeply and feel, see, hear us linking up…to weave together.

I was born on North American soil, a first generation Dutch/Polish becoming Canadian immigrant. Until I was twenty five years old I was unaware of the native presence of the First People that had walked the land of this North American continent before us. Within moments of stepping off the plane in Vancouver in 1978 visions of the people who had walked these trails before me flitted at the periphery of my consciousness. I knew I had been here as an aboriginal person by the sense of return, home coming and welcome that filled me. (This before I had any framework for or belief in reincarnation.) One of the consequences of reconnecting with the First People’s perspective was anger and rage at what had happened to them/us, most of which, though certainly not all, was directed at my/our ancestors.

Now I’ve learned I am responsible for it all, there is no one to blame. Though you and I are generations removed from the wave of people who over ran this continent we can now make the choice to assume responsibility for the actions of my/our ancestors. In that choice is the wisdom and healing of learning and adopting where possible the ways of praying and gathering in the Name of God or Great Spirit that were sacred to the First People of this continent.

Breathe deeply in and out releasing any tension or resistance. Envision your toes growing, weaving roots that delve deep into the Earth... Let those roots find the sap of life, the Divine Feminine milk/energy of the Mother, and bring that sap or light back up into the trunk of your being to your open heart….and fill your heart with the milk of Mother Love and kindness…. Now traveling from your heart up your body/ tree trunk, out your roots or branches to the sky to connect with Father Sky…and then bring down that Divine Masculine energy to your heart….and marry those energies together…enlarging yet balancing your heart. Revel in your expanded and centered heart for a moment…

We entered this sacred circle of service through the Eastern doorway of Springtime to plant the seeds of our intention to weave a prayer shawl of connection with Gaia, each other, ourselves, all of life. As we fulfill and are filled in by our intention to serve life we move through, or better yet, become various embodiments of Divine Feminine energy, sometimes barely nameable, other embodiments known by a thousand names. In the West, deep in the heart of the introspective Autumn season one of the forms of Divine Feminine energy that has been invoked since time began is Shaman Woman.

Before we listen to Her (Shaman Woman’s) message, the bowl will sound…after we have listened to this message from outside yourself, the bowl will sound to signal our entrance into the silence…where we will go to listen to the voice of our inner Shaman Women…

SHAMAN WOMAN

Shaman Woman older than old, wisewoman whose deerskin cloak touches the ground. Her feet are brown, wide with her strides across the earth. Walking, she leaves tracks of puma and bear, skeleton tracks in the dust between the worlds. The Aurora Borealis, her shawl on cold winter nights, glimmers like fireflies, green, lavender, indigo.

Shaman Woman, long silver hair, stars wreath her head, a map of the universe in the wrinkles around her eyes. She sees beyond the veil of skin, down to our soul gifts, beholds the river of our destiny, the unfolding ribbon of our fate fluttering in the wind. Her laughter lifts spirits, bears peace to closed hearts. Shaman Woman, drumming since the beginning of time, she carries the heartbeat of life. Her drumming keep the galaxies turning, the plants growing, animals birthing and babies swimming down the birth canals. She is Guardian of the Gates of Life and Death. She sings into our births, holds us in her veil of moth wings at our deaths.

Shaman Woman has been called many things over the vastness of time: Lady-Unique-Inclination-of-the- Night, the Moirae, Grandmother. She holds the Medicine Bundle of Life. From it the stars tumble out, the moon waxes and wanes, the sun rises: the elixirs and healing formulas, mending medicines flow in a neverending stream. As we sleep, her drum beats softly like the heartbeat of the mother, steady, sweet.

The threads of life all begin and end in her Bundle, streamers of red, silver, gold. They flutter down to earth, join us at our birth, guiding the journeys that lie before us.
by Beth Beurkens 2006

(Sound the bowl) Gently, slowly coming back to our bodies…we offer thanks to our parents and grandparents, to our ancestors. We thank Grandmother Spider for her always timely nudges and guidance. We offer thanks to Shaman Woman for the mirror image She holds up for us to see ourselves within and send thanks to the creator of the poem Shaman Woman.

Peace, Om Shanti, Salam, Shalom