Pink Coyote

Big Sur Bound: Matrilumina

I've written so many times about my deep love affair with Big Sur. I go there every year to breathe and decompress in the no-cell range canyon and cliffs that have been soothing my soul since my first solo retreat there in 2003. It's funny how you can fall in love with a place, learn it's curves and misty moments, it's hidden treasures and unbelievable secret vistas. The whole of it takes my breath away.

Last year, as I flew back from teaching in NC, I was hit with an expansive vision. It was alchemical in that it involved two other women and could only be created by all three of our energies. Having just dabbled in partnership and contracts with others, I knew it would call me out to trust in ways I never had to bring us all, three very different women with very strong personalities, together.

So we made a date in Big Sur early this year to discuss Matrilumina: an exquisite all-women gathering for Beacons in our communities: Luminaries-those who are carrying the torches for others, lighting the way with their radiance, discipline, and commitment to causes higher than themselves. We encountered at least a dozen creatures who seemed to say, "You can do it! Do it!" They said YES.

And so began our journey into the live experiences the three of us have been dreaming of. We began very quietly, knowing we would want to feel enveloped in our own sacred culture to try out what we wanted to share, and our eighteen spaces quickly filled. 

We'll all be gathering at beautiful Esalen on the cliffs of Big Sur Sunday-Friday to see what we can bring to the emerging Matrilumina community, to see what we can learn and carry forward, to touch our own torches together and see what kind of fire we can build *together*.

We've each posted entries over there for you to enjoy. We hope you'll consider joining us in the Wild West to share and expand your creative light, your vision and also receive from our hearts. 

Thank you, my sweet readership- for holding your dreams sacred, for building strong foundations, and leaving beauty in your wake. You are my inspiration.

Video: Spring SouLodge Demystified

For any of you on the fence about taking Spring Lodge, I want to tell you a little bit about the community and how supportive it is in the video below. It is a beautiful, sustainable women's community which provides us with a space to share our hearts and the gifts that have resided in our soulselves since before we were born. We're entering the powerful season of Eagle, which allows us to start fresh with Spring and begin all things anew.

This season of Lodge transitions softly from Winter's period of restoration and calls upon us to carry the aspects of self-care forward, as the Earth warms up and beckons us forth into the "doing" and "planting" seasons.

Do you have a dream you'd like to create some support around? Are you in a transition that requires new tools? Eagle implores us to step off of the ledge as empty vessels and soar.

Are your wings ready for take off?

Visit the SouLodge site for more information.  

Registration closes on March 26th or until filled.

The Juicy Details

Soujourning with women fills me up. Circling sacred is deep and personal to me, whether I'm the spaceholder or being held. Time in nature with incredible femmes lights my fire in all ways.

Such was the weekend at Teahouse and Point Reyes. If you've never taken a workshop at Teahouse, you must know how warm and inviting it is. The sun streams in the windows, falling across oversized mugs, piles of boxes of teas, little fists of stuffed grape leaves, open bars of spicy chocolate... The women who operate out of the space are well known in the arts community for prolific paintings and vintage-feel photos. They know their colorful, inspiring stuff.

Circle was held with fourteen of us, four journeys around the Medicine Wheel, prayer ties, a loungey lunch in the sunshine, and closing ceremony by Strawberry Creek. A few who came had not journeyed before, and all are exploring the various ways to see and think more symbolically and connected-to-nature about their lives.

 

As always, but not to homogenize how I feel about the power of women who gather, the caliber of dames was off the charts. And you know, my thoughts on this have nothing to do with what they do in the world, but with how deeply they are willing to go. Each time I sit in this distinct and never-ending shape, I am affirmed in my belief that every woman is a healer, every one a mother, a nurturer, a stewardess of the Earth in her own distinct way.

photo by Dominique Ridley

A magic moment during the third round occurred when each woman took a journey to obtain a message for the person lying next to her. A goddess with a goddess's name had received a blessing from Snake for her neighbor and we sat in disbelief when she was complete and the recipient stood up and unveiled a giant Snake tattoo that wrapped up her leg and up to her thigh. Magic happens, and it's very affirming and transformational. I think being seen by someone who doesn't know you and isn't attached, carries mystical medicine.

A magical meal was shared at Tacubaya, tortilla soup and chile relleno I won't soon forget.

More magic unfolded as we travelled out the next day to Point Reyes National Seashore, a no-longer-in-use turn of the century creamery with barns still standing at the edge of a Tule Elk preserve.

Elke May sounds a terrific lot like "alchemy"

I walked barefoot along the cool trail, where the Elk wander down, deeply breathing the air, drinking up the sun, and enjoying the company of some mighty fine women. Elk is a mother for me, sturdy and nourishing, comforting and serene. Communing with her energy ran my cup over.

Thank you SO much to the women who gathered and made beauty and medicine with me!

TeaLodge Chat with Stefanie Renee Lindeen

I'm getting really excited for the end of the month, when I'll be holding the first live Lodge circle of the year at Teahouse Studios. There are nine spots left, so if setting the tone for your year of *spiritual creativity* in person is high on your list, then jump on in. We'll be using shamanic journey technique (Yes, I'll be drumming) to go inward for the inner council of animal totems, guides, ancestral healers, and helpers who will see us through 2012.

In the audio below, Stefanie Renee, partner at Teahouse Studio and mamaphotographer extraordinaire and I share a casual call to talk about about what the space is like and what we can expect when we circle together in Berkeley on the 28th of January... and in which I am unusually giddy and celebratory :) (Or maybe not so unusually)

 

TeaLodge-Chat-with-Stefanie

This is a one-day workshop, which takes place on Saturday. A group of us from the workshop will be going out to Point Reyes for a picnic on Sunday in the hopes of spotting some Tule Elk, so send me an email if you'd like to know more about how to get in on that after our day together. I hope to see you there in the divinely feminine room of cozy eastern sunlight...

 

 

Desire-able Giveaway and Live Lodge Day

Did anyone see the Moon last night? I can't recall such a Cheshire smile in a long time, if ever. Mischievous, full of rhetorical questions, and philisophical pontifications, I felt her nudging me into the new year as I sat under her. Are you feeling the nudge to take any risks in the new year? Broadening your vision and deepening your connection?

Maybe one of them is coming to Berkeley on Saturday, January 28th for a live-Lodge journey circle with me :) Teahouse Studio has graciously offered to host us for the day: catering our lunch and providing a cozy space for us to journey and unearth the little pieces of gold that will carry us through each season of 2012. It will be a relaxing day of communing in circle in beautiful Northern California. Here is a list of local hotels and distances from the event, as well as directions, if you want to make an easy weekend of it. Email me if you have questions about anything at all.

I have two copies of Christine Mason Miller's DESIRE TO INSPIRE on my desk, just waiting to land in one of your hands. The first chapter being, A Force of Good: When We Care for Ourselves We Care for the World, and one of my very favorite chapters, number seven: Plenty of Room for Everyone: Understanding Our Unique Place and Purpose. I was very lucky when I started my very first real business in 2000, to have a mentor teach me that I need never be frightened of any person of company imprinting my ideas or creating similar vibes or products as me.

He told me (bless you Drew Bernstein, pioneer of clothing for Fashion Freaks) that all I needed to focus on was staying true to me-that if my vision was what I alreay do and who I already am, I wouldn't ever have to worry about what anyone else is doing, in fact, I could freely help them-which is what he did, and what I learned to do and still practice. For those of you who are considering taking a leap with your art, your written words, whatever it is that is pulling to you-get some fortification under you so that you can feel confident that your expression is truly yours and impervious to being duplicated. Our visions are as unique as our DNA.

Two copies are ready for sending out. Tell me what the Cheshire cat is smiling about, or that you will take a chance on yourself in this upcoming year which I'm certain will set the record for Creative Fire. As women, just about everything we do can be a creative act. Taking a chance doesn't have to be externally big, risking it might look as simple as loving the Truth more than anything else, Trusting deeper than the Ocean, Loving, no matter what scares you about Love.

I'll select winners on Monday evening here in the wild West.

I hope to sit with you in Berkeley and see what comes to you: what peace, what comfort, which allies, what beautiful surprises are within you...

Dashing in to Share

This is beginning to feel like dropping into a party that's being held at my own house-how silly does that feel?! Think of it like I'm passing through on a Grand Adventure to somewhere from which I will soon return...(that Grand Adventure being the opening week of SouLodge and homehunting in Ojai this week).

Find me at The World's Biggest Summit, sharing a tutorial on Prayer Ties. Grab a ticket if you haven't already! There are now 31 days of archives to peruse with gold at every turn.

Find me at Christine Mason Miller's blog, sharing Sixty Seconds on core values. Twenty artists, including myself are thrilled to announce the arrival of Christine's book, Desire to Inspire, which we all are honored to contribute to. If you're in the Los Angeles Area in December, please come to the official launch at the Ambrose Hotel in Santa Monica on December 15th. Email me for more details- I'd love to meet you there!

Have a great week everyone!

 

Squam Snapshot

I'm home...ahhhhh. And determined to try my very dangdest to allow this one to be *gentle*.

There'll be PLENTY more to say about what was the most transformative SAW of all for me-as the week goes on, I'll spill over out of my cup some of what filled me up about this magical gathering. Plentiful art, heartful breakthroughs, new language, dancing on the frontiers of ideas...I'm full. Full up. Pardon my fragmented run-ons, as it all swirls.

If you attended Squam this Fall, and need to know how to access the SAW Animal Totem Workshop, email me! I'll get you all set up.

Here are a few gushy teasers I can't hold back, however, and must be paraded through town now. I'm going to shamelessly name drop, because Squam is so about a whole bunch of awesome people in one beautiful wood, and the interconnectedness of ALL of us.

Having happy birthday sung to me by over a hundred hot artists as I walked up to the Longhouse for group photo.

Speedboating out to Rattlesnake Island with Maya Hackett of urbanorganica, my comrade in shedding of old skins and massive *whoa mama* rebirth.

The staff are the very best and most helpful people in the world. I want to bring them all home with me because I fear I may never see some of them again.

Lying on the docks and jumping in the frigid lake with Flora Bowley. I had no idea I was going to fall so deeply in love with this woman. She altered my cellular makeup.

Learning so much about The Care and Keeping of Artists from my roommate extraordinaire, Jen Lee. I need to tattoo the entire content of the book up and down my arms.

Not cooking or cleaning. I never take that one for granted for a minute.

Laughing my ASS off with my second-time roommate, Maya Donenfeld. If I told you about our shenanigans, I'd have to kill you. She's wild under that burlap exterior, in the most honest and funny way. Plus, she's one of the most nurturing and caring women I've ever had the pleasure of being separated from at birth.

The fires. Something about the woodfires and the lake ice in the old iceboxes makes me feel like I'm at camp in the twenties. Everything my eye sees is picture-perfect and timeless.

Eating, dancing, conversing and simply being near Misty Mawn. It's like being in the company of an angel. She's an archetype all her own.

The Fox that ran through the wood right next to the building I taught in. It had a wee critter in it's mouth and was on a serious mission to dine. I wanted to grab my camera, but it was one of those moments that I would have missed had I tried to immortalize it. She was grey and beautiful and gave me much food* for thought for the remainder of the weekend. Partly because of this.

Generosity! I received so many unexpected surprises, some birthday related and some not.  I love the cycle of giving and receiving. It feels so good to send abundance around the circle, doesn't it?

I'm going to have to talk about my students later. Because they are a blessing that need their very own post. The women. The women!! I'm always blown completely away by what takes place in these workshops. Metamorphosis. Honoring. Rites of passage. Stepping out of fear and into power. I LIVE for this.

Elke said:  "I wanted to thank you again for the amazing experience of being in your presence, under your guidance and in your support.  You are such a grounded, wise, and inspiring woman.  And an excellent teacher to boot!!  You glide between inspiring us, to challenging us, to supporting us, to kicking us in the pants!  It was perfect".

So much to share. Such very big movement and gentle waves to ride it on. 

My Beloved Squam

This is where I'm headed tonight on a big ol' jet airliner: to meet so many friends, new students and faces, to jump in the freezing lake and continue this post-sweat lodge week of bathing in renewal and celebration. I'll be having my 40th birthday while I'm gone and lighting a fire to remember it by. This is my fourth time to the camp, and surely not my last. Fours, forty...the completion of something is afoot.

If you'll be there, please be sure to come up-don't be shy-so we can connect. If you're sitting this one out, know that next year is shaping up to be a creative humdinger and that if you're looking for a breakthrough, SAW is the hot ticket to growing past boundaries and joining an amazing community of souls who are a lot like you.

See you on the other side of my beloved Squam Lakes...

SouLodge: Do You Know Where You'll Be On Monday?

My lovely readers! SouLodge is upon us! If you were not able to gather for this class, fret not. I will soon be announcing the next run, which will begin in October. If you are registered, Yahooo!! Please be sure that you have received TWO emails from me. If you have not, please email me. I may not have your most used email account and pertininent information, and that is very important to make certain that you know how to prepare and show up next week.

I am going up a mountain to do some clearing of my own in my sacred circle of women that I've been so blessed to sit under many moons with, to gain some attunements for what's to come. It seems fitting, considering that what I am offering is so closely related heartwise to what I've experienced in the woods with these women. The sitting, the creating, sharing and feasting will soon begin! And not long after, we'll begin our virtual version, as well.

So much love and gratitude to you, for how deeply you live, for how courageously you connect, for how wildly you howl.

Awroooo!

 

Open It

A doorway is a gift. We never know what we'll find on the other side of it. A threshold is a journey into the East, into a new beginning, the energy of Eagle. I'm finding these years that less and less does fear-of-what-might-come presents an issue. When fear subsides, trust flows in. When the river is undammed of obstacles, abundance flows in.

What is your deepest human intent? Does it require that you show up fearlessly? Open a door of sorts, come what may? What help do you need?

(Explore these questions and more in the SouLodge)

(More on taking risks, and walking through Doorways here)

(Thank you Susannah for Owl City's Introvert mythbuster)

(So no one can pull the but-I'm-an-introvert card)

(((supportive hug)))

(Don't forget to howl up this beautiful, pregnant Capricorn moon-the biggest moon of the year)

 

Naked In the Rain

It's a far cry from raining here in the desert-like belt of the Central Valley, but my spirit feels like it's dancing in the rain. The SouLodge is growing into a robust community of truly kindred individuals and we're weeks from beginning. Creating something that comes from a place so ready and fertile is the best feeling in the world.

I received some Rabbit medicine on the porch last night, (Bunny Killer just left me a fluff of cottontail) about thirty minutes before I read this blog post on Possibility. Stacy wrote about stepping into possibility rather than stepping out of one's comfort zone. Think of Rabbit and how much risk she takes- she is the ultimate vulnerable creature. Yet, she is so prolific: creativity is the key to her survival. She steps out into possibility, because hanging out in her protective warren would never allow her to create the way that she needs to in order to thrive.

When I read Stacy's post, I immediately thought of all that I've created, and of how easy it is to step into possibility, rather than out of a comfort zone, and I felt the truth of that vibrate in my bones.

Everything I need to know, I learn from the creatures and the Earth. And good friends, too.

Where's Alice? By Donna McKenzie

Get naked. Dance in the rain with fertile Rabbit and she will teach you magical things, indeed. Come sit in the Lodge and share the wisdom that comes from those wild, healing, ancient, transformational experiences.

The Nature of YES

There has been such a tremendous response to the SouLodge course announcement, that I don't know what to do with myself. Except to be grateful and do a major happy dance! Also, I have a hard time calling it a course, because it's not a course at all. It's not academic. Not of the left-brain at all. There will not be much *thinking* involved. As I've watched your names pop up in the registration pool, sparkling like clear water in a protected turquoise bay, I realize that I know you. 

Transformation is already taking place. Just by nature of saying, "YES. I want that."

SouLodge Virtual Retreat is Live!

I'm so excited to announce the details of this online class! I'm over the moon to deepen my work with myself, with my community, and to midwife you through your explorations of the parts of yourself that want to come forward with courage and wildness.

is up HERE.

I want to invite you to step into the forest, into a safe lodge where you can experience a rite of passage, an honoring of the feminine process, a place where the Four-Leggeds and Winged Ones, the Plant People, and Stone People, are waiting to greet you and help you walk through to the next level of intuitive self-care.

Thank you to all who have encouraged me to do this, for asking for the teachings, and for opening your hearts to the deeper work. I am in pure gratitude for all of you.

 

VLOG Sacred Tools: Working with Crystals

At long last, and thank you for your patience! Now that I have the kinks worked out, we can start talking e-course. Yipppeeeee! Awrooooooooooooooooooo!

 

 

The crystals featured in the video are a selenite wand, a chunk of raw rose quartz, and an amethyst formation from inside of a geode.

The Owl wing is from a Barn Owl, which I use in intuitive work because of Owl's ability to cross easily from one realm to the other, and because she brings magic and femininity to all that she touches.

I read from Sandra Ingerman's book, Medicine From the Earth.

 

Thank you all again for your love, patience, and curiosity for the Earth and her magical ways. Bless...

 

Journey With Me

Thank you all so very much for your comments and enthusiasm about circling together virtually. I've given it much thought over the weekend and I think I have a plan. The few bits that were confounding me seem to have resolved themselves. So stay tuned for the launch of something very special, and please keep the feedback coming about what it is you need and want to experience. It goes without saying that video and audio will be a big part of what I have to offer, and I'm testing some other media to see what will work best to create ways to connect. I'm still doing a little bit of troubleshooting, but I'm very excited about doing what I do in a more expanded way and with many of you that I would like to witness more closely.

Something very special is shifting, and I find the evidence every place I turn, including the conversations I'm having with women in my face-to-face and phone tribes. There is a freedom and a soft-focusing occurring, a lifting and a deeper level of trust coming. There is a fortifying of ego strengths, a surrendering to the feminine process, and a great power radiating from that place. I can't wait to gather you and discuss with you how to connect more deeply with yourselves, how to retrieve the information you are seeking, how to build your inventory of tools, your wise furry/feathered/scaled inner council, and of course, how to trust your intuitive guidance.

Thank you for the opportunity to serve-it's my blessing to do this work with each and every one of you!

Awrooooooooo!

 

 

 

Council

Desktop helpers.

Summer finds me less at my computer, outside more. Less at the stove, more at the fruit stand. Less in my mind, more in my heart, my feet. This is the first week since coming home from Squam that I feel grounded. Teaching brings me such a high that I found myself floating and unable to let go of my experiences there and come seamlessly back to work here.

I asked myself before I came to writing a) what it is that I am processing, and b) who is helping me. If I know what I need, then I can ask for what I want, right?

It has been a very long time that I have felt like I do my inner work alone, probably ever since I took my first journey and aligned with my first totem animal, who would lead me into the Under World to sift among the messages my unconscious landscape had to show me. My first totem was Spider, black widow, to be exact. And she spun her silky thread around my wrist and took me through a portal that I recognized as a place I played at as a child, a grassy hill full of squirrel holes and treasures such as the first owl pellet I would pick apart and find tiny mouse bones and bits of fluff in.

The creatures have always been here for me, teaching me, guiding me, sharing their secrets of the natural world, blessing me with a quick glance at them as they cross the road in front of me, calling me inward to lead me to the places I needed to go to find peace. So, perhaps they've been helping me since long before that first journey in.

One thing that we are all connected by is that we live on Earth, here with her creatures-communing and sharing space in a way that we can all relate, regardless of where we come from, or what our spiritual beliefs are. Some animals ground us on the planet, while others take us up into the Upper World to seek messages from the heavens and energies outside of us. They have so much to show and teach us, simply by how they have adapted, survived and thrive here.

What I want to share of myself most is this process I have come to love, trust, and also hardwire within me. I have yet to suss out all of the details of an effective way to do this in my virtual community, but I'm working steadily on it. The effect of sitting in a circle in person is difficult to re-create online. I want to connect with my circle's processes, in the way that I have when I've worked on custom medicine bundles and artwork, to bring the healing and the words in a way that shares tools, points you toward your own unique tools and totems, to assign creative projects in which you use your intuition to guide you (as I do in my workshops), and give you the support you need to discover the insights you seek, to share rituals, ceremony, and ways to care for your tools.

I want to get an idea about the interest in this, as I go about discovering the best way to create the circle. Will you share with me if you'd like to do something such as this? To answer my first questions, this is what I'm processing, and it is your help I need to get to where I'm going.

August Workshop at Teahouse Studio

Image by Teahouse Studio

I don't know if you've caught the classes I'm teaching over in the right sidebar >>> but this is where you can find me and come play!

The amazing and colorful Stefanie Renee Lindeen asked me up to Teahouse Studio in Berkeley, and there was no way I could turn her down. The space that she, Mati Rose and Tiffany have is expansive and bright and I can't wait to create within those beautiful, sunlit walls.

Image by Teahouse Studio

The idea behind this course is to explore ourselves from the perspective of anima and animus, Jung's terms for inner feminine and inner masculine, but also deriving from soul and spirit, respectively. Using the shamanic "journey" to delve into our deeper landscapes, we'll retrieve information and guides who will assist us as we set out to bring more of ourselves into the work.

Sometimes our inner masculine speaks to the good warrior within, and the feminine tends to align with the abundant, creative energies within. What I want to adventure into is balancing these two elements and seeing, through the art we create, a story or a personal myth about how these aspects are working in us. Because we have two full days to dig in, my hope is that we'll come away with an enhanced idea about what really wants to come authentically forth and be expressed in the art we make. You make!

Join me August 20th-21st in the Bay Area for:

Wild Inner Foraging: Exploring Masculine and Femine Archetypes with Mixed Media ~ Pixie Campbell

I hope to meet you there!

Image by Teahouse Studio