Pink Coyote

Matrilumina: 2012 Initiation

I've just returned from our week at Esalen with Matrilumina, the inaugural gathering of Beacons and Luminaries: those who shine their lights so brightly and bravely into the dark corners, glowing for the world as they walk their walks. It was all at once restorative, deeply healing, connective, eye-opening, creative, a meeting with those who are completely unafraid to give name to what they're building, and FUN.  

I hope to share more details-most definitely about the exercise led by Maya Corinne, on Capacity Expansion and Filling Your Beacon Basket. Holy WOW. My beacon basket is overflowing. I find it amusing, in the most heavenly way, that we must fill up on exactly what we give out.

We GATHER.

Brave Girl and luminous leader, Melody Ross.

River nymphs.

 

Nourishment.

Cleansing to begin.

Sitting still.

Brave Intuitive Painter, Flora Bowley, restoring.

The illustrious and radiant Sunflower Woman, Herbmother.

Jen Gray, crossing bridges.

The womb which holds us.

Surrender.

To shine.

We hope to meet you on the cliffs of Big Sur to witness your light someday...♥ ♥

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.

 

First Moments at Squam

I'm home! And what an unbelievable time at SAW this year.

I'll be posting in great detail this week about what came up, what the workshops were like, what JUNE was like (!) because there are some differences between the Spring and Fall sessions. I have some announcements about other classes I'm teaching here on the west coast, and I'll share those really soon as well. Okay, here's a teaser. But I'll tell more. Soon. I just need to catch my breath and snuggle some babies up.

The feeling I came back with is one of such deep gratitude. Of course there'll be a list about that coming, too.

Enjoy this photo tease, in the interim. The snapshots are from my first blissful couple of hours there.

I pulled up to my cabin and fell immediately in love.

Then I walked inside and fell in love with our screened in porch.

Then I came home from setting up my classroom and fell in love with my roommate.

It's so good to be back!

*grateful

fine art print by the amazing rachel awes of all i did was listen.

 

the last two weeks have been on spin cycle for me, as i have pulled through the eye of a very unlikely and small needle in a matter of my life that has been very tough for about a year now. coming to the other side has left me feeling extremely quiet and vulnerable, capital V, and humbled. it is also as if a very bright light is shining all over the world and everywhere i turn there are unexpected colors and possibilities. it has felt like waking up...again. all i feel and can share is how grateful i am for this life, this deep process of unearthing and detangling, holding up this little light of mine and merging with aspects of spiritSelf that keep calling me forth. so...a list.

i'm bursting with gratitude for:

love

for women who know how to take care of themselves and in doing so, take care of the world

for the natural state of things

for the divine harmonies of mamuse and r.i.s.e

for campfires and the smell that stays in my hair and on my clothes

for trust that outlives the conflict

for friends living by example and risking it all for their dreams

for friends who tell it like it is

for wooden bowls and spoons to make "salad" from grass, dandelions and mud

for chiliquiles on mother's day

for wild ideas

for artists who believe in each other

for customers who tell me their stories

for the perfect ten dollar easel

for turquoise retro chairs on ebay

for long drives up highway one

for her boldness and his love of hugging her and kissing her toes

for them even when they don't say what i want them to

for kings, queens, cups and wands

for the first zucchini

the best reincarnated dog in the world

for cohousing and friends who stand at my worktable and proclaim that i live in an "oasis"

for impassioned creators who use their work for the good of humankind

for answering the call, following the smoke signals

for non-judgement when i fumble

for someone to lean into when i want so much to hold myself up the old way

for eagle feathers, storytellers, corn races, snowcones

for the writer who looks at my work and says, "I've been looking for you for a looooong time"

for eager students

for MOVEMENT, glorious movement all over this plane

for beet salad and goat cheese, arugula and course black pepper the size of seeds

for mockingbirds like nightowls, his bat drawings, and ospreys with messages

for creatures that come to greet my friend each time we speak on the phone

for tristan and iseult, psyche and eros, parisfal, and alice

for the friend who hugs me when i'm sick and doesn't fear for my germs

for Mother Ocean who breaks on the shore with no talkin' and all action

for amazing suppliers who love my business and go the extra mile

for wild ideas ideas ideas at naptime (the best kind)

for licorice mint tea and the fortunes they come with

for the hanged man

nanny mcphee, tim burton, and johnny depp

for druid circle cookies and borrowed popcorn

for laying down the sword and picking up the goblet

for romance and openheartedness

for adventure and passports

for coconut mojitos and first friday

for handholding and neck nibbles

for family bedtime stories and misbehaving

for stones that vibrate in my hand, rose quartz that reminds me to love myself unconditionally

for dreaming, scheming and allowing it to unfold

for letting go, always for letting go

for the cage and the will to break through it for something better

for salty salami and cheese on squishy rolls

for my body, this agreeable vessel which still leaps with friends for fun and gets me from place to place

and for you, inspirited readers, who come here day in and out to connect, to be inspired or be given permission, to forgive yourselves or just to have a trickster's laugh. i can no longer come here without profound gratitude for YOU.

photo by terri fischer

 

Turn to the Harp

There was a time when I was all about doing it right. When I had no other tools other than thinking it through, writing it down, hashing it out, forming opinions, making a decision and going for, or against it.

Again with this turning forty business- is it just me? Or is there a whole life that exists between the lines of logic?

photo by Terri Fischer.

Outside of helping my business test it's wings, paying the DMV their dues, and occasionally checking on my children's hygeine, I find myself hanging onto reason by a neglected thread. Books with decidedly un-western tales of where the divine feminine is hiding seek me out, and it is into these realms that I sail, diving deeper than ever into the place where there is no push, and even fewer answers.

When one side of human nature grows out of balance with the other, it becomes a tyranny on the soul. That is the tyrant Duke Morgan. It drives its complimentary opposite into the unconscious. That is Blanchefleur. But the unconscious will not tolerate this kind of imbalance; we have already learned that the greatest force in the psychic universe is the demand for completion, for wholeness, for balance. The feminine will return. Across the seas, Iseult is waiting. And when Iseult comes, the self-satisfied patriarchal world will never be the same.   --WE, Robert Johnson.

I read a thread of opinions recently that brought into sharp focus how removed I'm becoming from...well, strong opinions! As odd as that may sound. I did not even know how to respond or chime in. I think I would have had plenty to say about a subject like this a few years ago, but I checked in with myself and came up with...yep, nothing.

I'm not trying to come up with nothing. I'm really not. I see myself as having been overidentified with my own inner masculine (animus) for so long, that though I'm not trying to reject this part of myself- but rather bring it into balance with my healthy feminine aspects- at this point in time I have very little use for it. Perhaps because I'm gestating a big project? Maybe. It's quite like being pregnant again and reminds me of how ambivalent I've felt, even at election times-which used to get a hot rise out of me before I had children.

When we moved to the Central Valley of California four years ago, I was full of fear. It was all my rednecked, oil-field laden, pesticided, anti-creative, dustbowl nightmares come true. But something strange has happened, as I've come to realize that where I live is more like the rest of the world than the hidden hippie mountain communities I wish I lived in. What I think I'm learning is that the world needs the kind of healing that isn't happening through politics or lobbying. What I'm learning is that I'm surrounded by people who WANT to heal and who ARE healing, despite appearances that have long left me feeling suspiciously otherwise. Perhaps this is why I don't have many opinions anymore. Basically, I've learned that I don't know shit. *Logically* know.

On another level completely, the deepest recesses of Self that we can touch inside of us, a marriage is trying to take place. The lost and knowing feminine is calling up, and she is dark, mysterious, silent, and ocean wave-like. She is transmuting poison, transforming shadows, applying the salves of the ancients, reminding us that to begin in our own injured hearts is to allow the medicine to trickle out effortlessly. It requires a kind of trust that has, in the past, made me very uncomfortable, because I am a big ole control freak. I've had trouble having faith that I'm protected from within. But I think I'm getting it now. The control freak seems to be a one dimensional warrior who misses his queen and is drenched in longing for her to rejoin him. She is Deep Trust, and she is Unwavering Faith, and she has been all but missing for the first half of my life.

No wonder I'm so eager to embrace her.

Each of us needs the sword power. There are times when we need to be logical and analytical. At times, we must be assertive and strong. But there are also times when neither logic nor force will avail; then we need to turn to the harp.  --WE, Robert Johnson.

 

photo by Stacy de la Rosa.

burning woman*

i'm too tired to capitalize, i'm sorry, friends. my beltane weekend away brought so so much teaching, movement and unexpected growth. best moments were cackling it up under the stars around a fire with some amazing women who traveled a long way to play with me and my local wild women. most surprising was coming home a day early to tend to my own homefire.

here is a photo journal of some of my favorite moments...

the day began with picking up my cohorts and going out for the absolute BEST veggie burgers and fries ever in the world at r&d, on montana ave. in santa monica. if you're in the neighborhood, do not pass them up. the food is magical. i wish i'd snapped the mascarpone and berries for you to drool over.

 

terri working her henna skillz on kirsten.

and again on julie...

 

beach shenanigans, which involved wine drinking and cheerleading jumps in the ocean.

terri, kirsten and julie.

photo by terri

altar building

talking stickin'

tarot card readin'

it was a weekend of laughter and merriment, but also one of deep emotional processing and exhaustion. it is said that beltane is all about fertility, may day, as it were. i would say we covered some pretty fertile territory, unearthed some deep roots, shifted our perspectives and learned a lot about what we have to let go. what i tried to bear in mind on this adventure was to know what i needed and ask for what i want. isn't that sometimes the hardest thing to do? to claim what's already yours-and to stand in the confidence of that decision?

i plan to go camping (or glamping as one husband had referred to it, as his wife journeyed toward) each beltane and for every natural holiday that i possibly can. i love that there is purpose in these days that mark mid-spring and solstices, that there is a history there to add to the toolkit for growing and learning. sometimes the lesson is to sit still and stop growing! and i embrace those teachings, too, as i tend to get easily obsessed with movement. however, this time movement swept me up and away without warning, and through the eye of a very small needle.

i hope that your holy day of fires on the mountain found you releasing the old and making way for the new, in one way or another, dramatically or softly.

Beltane Getaway and Interview with Stephanie Ladd

I'm off again to the central coastlands of my native California, this time as a magical group of eight to celebrate the season of Beltane, which begins May 1st and marks the mid-point between Spring and Summer. Light your own mighty fire for fertile prosperity and I'll tell you all about my adventure when I return.

The Goddess Maia, Queen of May.

I've interviewed someone precious to me to hold you over until I come skipping down the lane, flower garlands and maypole streamers clinging to my gown. I digress.

What I love most about Stevie Ladd, of Owl and Crow, is that she has fearlessly created something she'd always had in her. Her book, In the Lap of the Goddess: Connecting with the Divine Feminine, contains the meaty questions we've all been faced with-the ones that seem to come up again and again, but she takes you down into the deeper levels for new insights. I'm so proud to share her with you.

Enjoy!

 

What inspired you to create your SoulWork book, In the Lap of the Goddess: Connecting with the Divine Feminine?

Since I moved from California to North Carolina almost 3 years ago, I was determined to find a more creative way to do my work as a psychotherapist. I wanted to open up more as a writer and artist and find a way to bridge the two.

Both you and Leonie Allen have inspired me in the way you have built a strong following through your blogs and have created your art and other products that are so tied into who you are and your evolutionary process. It's so fun to watch and be a part of. I ordered Leonie's Creating My Goddess Year e-book and got inspired to write my own e-book about my favorite subject from an archetypal psychology point of view.

So I designed this book to be interactive, to help women plumb their own depths and find their way into the lap of the goddess by doing soul work.

Can you tell me more about what you mean by soul work?

I mean the deep questioning and exploration of our psyches, our purpose, life's meaning, our past, present and future. Ultimately, it is the work of connecting to our Self, with a capital S. And our higher Self is but a reflection of the divine feminine--the goddess of your choosing, or the goddess that chooses you.

I love the idea that a goddess figure would choose me to work with her. Which one called to you first as you went about beginning this book?

Well, when I got to North Carolina, I kept meeting Yemaya. Rob (my husband) had brought back a handmade Yemaya doll from New Orleans about 10 years ago and she had been packed away for a long time. I put her on my altar in my studio in North Carolina, surrounded by shells and other things I found at the ocean.

Yemaya is a mermaid and I kept being drawn to mermaids. At the same time, I was feeling this oceanic, watery energy calling me to create and flow. I made several dolls, SoulCollage® cards, and a shadow box, all with mermaids. I started looking into Yemaya's qualities and realized she was a Creator archetype and that's what was being activated in me. I started this book with her guiding me, acting as a muse. I feel I have gotten to know her quite well and have a relationship with her that helps me feel guided and protected.

What other goddesses make appearances in the book, and what drew you to them or them to you?

Kali was actually the first goddess I did a chapter on because I needed to clear out some old garbage before I could move forward with Yemaya and the book I had started. I had gotten stuck and needed help.

Remember how our teacher, Irene, used to say that when she created her retreats, whatever theme she chose she had to go through it herself, as she was preparing to teach it? That's what happened with me. I had to face some old creative blocks, so I worked with Kali, the Destroyer goddess, and she helped me burn up these fears and let go of some old ways of seeing myself and my work.

I've been exploring the Triple Goddess since I got here, too. I chose the Greek triple goddess represented by Persephone, the Maiden, Demeter, the Mother, and Hecate, the Crone because I love their story. The maiden and mother have been strong with me as I have watched Chloe (my daughter) transform from a 12-year-old girl when we first moved here, to a young woman of 15. There's been a little grieving involved with that, and I've revisited and healed some more of my own relationship with my mother in the process.

And then I've got one foot in the Mother and one foot in the Crone since I had Chloe late in my childbearing years. So Hecate has helped me own the wild woman and the wise woman. I love her magical, witchy, medial nature. She is truly the dragoman of the Soul.

What do you hope women will come away with by doing the exercises in your workbook?

I hope they will have an experience of how the goddess lives within them. I offer suggestions for rituals, totems, and altars so they can work with the goddess not only internally, but externally. It's important to create and surround yourself with likenesses of her when you work with goddess energy to make it a richer, deeper experience.

I've used a lot of pictures in the book because images are the language of the soul. Metaphor and archetypes allow us direct access to the soul as well. So I'm hoping women will have fun exploring some themes of feminine psychology through the goddesses presented in these pages. It's really a stepping stone, a way in. They can then take the relationships they develop as far as they want. I hope to expand on these goddesses more over time.

Who is likely to get the most out of your book? What does this reader look like? If I may be so bold to ask.

I think fearless women who like to journal and create will especially enjoy getting to know themselves better through these goddesses, and those who want to discover or explore their inner yearnings and their own divinity.

I'm starting to feel like Oprah here. How do we get the workbook? Because I want it now. It's Kali the Destroyer my inner wild woman needs to hang with. I've already been chosen! I know my wild self is tied to experiencing Kali as a creative-destructive-creative superhero, embodying the Life-Death-Life cycle I write about so much here.

It's available for download as a PDF on my blog, on the order page for In the Lap of the Goddess. You can buy single chapters, or the whole book to download and print.

I'll have copies ready to mail by May 20, and accepting preorders now, but if you order it before then, it's $22 instead of $24.

And there are 3 free audio versions of the guided journeys in the book that anyone can download and listen to available on my blog.

Ooh, I'm exploring your order page now-well done. Easy. I love it. I'm so excited about this book, and I'm loving that you're offering it as a PDF. All I need is more paper around here. Thank you for doing that-being as green as can be. I may want to print some of the goddesses images and hang them about, however. What else can you share with us?

I would love to know how women use the book, and what they get out of it, so feedback is welcome.

And thank you, my dear friend, for featuring me on Pink Coyote and sharing my book with your wonderful circle of wild, creative and fearless women.

Yip! Awroooooo!

Stephanie Anderson Ladd is a Marriage and Family Therapist, SoulCollage® Facilitator, and an amazing, awakened wild woman living her creative life in Chapel Hill, NC. I call her Stevie, as all of her sisters do. All I needed to know about trust, relationship and communication began with our longs talks and mountain walks, during what seems like a lifetime ago. Everyone needs a Stevie. I know I do. I hope you'll be as inspired by her work and stories as I am.

Springtime Goodness

There are still a few spots open in my Friday Muse as Mask class at Squam AND the Medicine Shawl class. Jump on board and return from the northeast forever inspired.

Loving this Cherry Blossom Essence offering from my friend MaryBeth and Three Sister's Alchemy. It's the perfect, Keep Me Present and Grateful in This Moment elixir. Thank you, Goddesses, for your magic and your positive energies.

Absolutely flipping over the relaxing power of chocolate. Yes, I did say relaxing. Lisa Reinhardt, of Wei of Chocolate, sent me a tube of passionflower and bird of paradise-infused organic RELAXED chocolate and the kids and I are HOOKED. I'm also over the moon about JOYFUL. Thank you, Lisa, for your generosity and for creating chocolate that heals, when I seriously thought chocolate couldn't get any better.

When women honor their ability to make magic, my heart soars. It seems Springtime is bursting open all around with mystical, intuitive healers popping up like fresh daisies.

 

Serendipity Retreats at the Outer Banks

I'm so pleased to be teaching in October at this retreat, in the amazing company of three women who I greatly admire. The Outer Banks of North Carolina is a place I've always wanted to visit- the magical lure of the folklore captivates me. Explore the website to meet the guides and see if it speaks to you...

Serendipity Retreats is the creation of wildchild Michelle Madden Smith, of Blissful Thinking. What I love about her vision is that the time spent there will leave plenty of room to explore your wild soul and ask the important questions which will lead you to unexpected and wondrous answers...

Join us!

 

Doorways

Wherever I roam, I find that I come home with photos of doors. The older and more weathered, the better. The attraction must have something to do with my willingness to walk into something new, risky. It takes trust, and I'm big on that right now.

This may be one reason why I love Lisa Field-Elliot's website...it reads and feels like an invitation to trust the process of this adventure-filled life.

When I went to a poetry evening with Maya Stein last year, she spoke frequently of, "the way in." As creators, we are searching for a way in. Access. Travel from the outside to the inner rooms, realms, secret closets, attics and pantries. Where the fertile soil lies hidden.

Not knowing what is on the other side, we've all found ourselves standing outside the proverbial doorway (to more information, if not the answer) wondering whether we want to know what lies beyond the click of the knob.

What I'm imagining, more now than before, is not to gain understanding or to comprehend my experiences, which are of the past as soon as they've happened. I've hopefully given up that fruitless pursuit. But to find a way to thrive amidst whatever lies behind the threshold I choose to walk through. I seek acceptance that can be discovered, received, without an intellectual bludgeoning needing to take place. To *move with fluidity* beckons through these days of young babes, new work, different levels of energy, than I had ten years ago. It feels particularly feminine to trust this and to let go the analytics.

I carry with me to my bed-nest tonight hope not to repeat the mistakes that initiated me into this complicated adulthood-and when I do, to softly thread myself back into the weft of thriving life without seamripping myself in the process.

Each road I travel, there is a doorway at every turn.

That's a bounty of metaphor for one post.

 

Spiral Slide

When I arrived at a recent destination, I relished the serendipity of what this point in my life feels like most often. I'd previously thought fifty was midlife, but now I realize that the center of the see-saw where I currently sit is the midpoint for me. It represents the apex of my lifetime of experiences thus far. While I hope to live far longer than eighty years old, there is something about the completion of fours that has me swirling into fives and landing smack in the center.

Five is the symbol of humans and of our sensory life. It often represents the opportunity to change direction. As a midpoint, it can denote mediation and adaptation. Fives can also signal a time of testing, and the presence of an inner struggle that will soon require a decision. They can encourage us to direct our sensory input and feelings into actual creative projects, or suggest that we regard our lives or activities from a more positive, satisfying perspective. Will we take advantage of the opportunity or continue to define reality in the same way as before? -Spiritual Tarot

Symbols of the crossroads are popping up all around me, to the point at which I just smile at each one. What else can I do but acknowledge that it feels as though I'm in the middle of a physics experiment?

I am most certainly feeling tested, in all areas of my life. I am absolutely struggling against tides that would pull me out of my ground and into the deep blue. I experience the full range of confounded to enlightened so many times in a day, that I often feel like I'm on a pre-menopausal ferris wheel at a carnival in the Bermuda Triangle.

I stopped at my favorite spot on the *central* coast on my way home to wander the shores, where at last visit, Ivy was soon to be born, as my belly was peaking at full moon.

The treasure that found me, like so many from the sea, spoke of the neverending cycle with no beginning and no end.  It showed me that the midpoint is really not a quantifiable place on a line, but a fleeting moment of joy on a spiral slide to be discovered over and over. It reminded me, in it's luminescense, of the color and light to be found all along the way from here to there and back again.

Hands in the air, I am determined to make the most of this ride.

Valentymes Giveaway Spectacular

Winners chosen for the giveaway using www.random.org.

Nicole Knavel-greeting cards

Maria Norcia-earrings

Stephanie Ladd-earrings

Darlene Kreutzer-head wrap

 

Congratulations to you all! Please email me with your mailing addresses so that your goodies can be shipped to you. Thank you for playing :)

**You should know that Julie Keefe is running a Valentine's Sale, through February 14th, while supplies last, on the little red earrings AND if you use coupon code PIXIE, you will receive another 10% off of your entire order.

Yip yip awrooooooooo!

 

 

I am feeling mucho amor from the comments, emails, facebookage, etc., about my recent vlog and entry about living the inspirited* life of a creative mama. Thank you all, I'm so grateful for this beloved community of readership.

And now, time to give something back. Leave a comment and if you win one of the four giveaway items, I'll contact you for your mailing address. Winners will be drawn Thursday afternoon. Good Luck!

From me, one winner will receive a set of two greeting cards, including the Lightseeker:

Another lucky winner will receive one of Julie Bartel's awesome hair wraps! I exclaim this because I happen to be a big believer in this hair accessory. Julie puts her blissy yoga mojo into them and this energy is precisely why I love sharing her artisanship with you.

 

Seen here on the delicious Terri Fischer:

 

And two lucky contestants will have the good Chinese New Year fortune to win a pair of Julie Keefe's* earrings! Again with the shouting because I was lucky enough to win a pair of Julie's earrings with the superior closures during her holiday giveaway. They are so comfortable and my hair doesn't snag the hooks up and out. No more lonely, lost earrings. The best thing, however, about Julie's work is that she is an energetic healer and knows her stone people very well. She, too, infuses her work with the best in her heart and positive vibrations. Read below to learn a little bit more about the woman behind Jakk's Magic Beans of Life.

 

 

Julie Keefe of Jakk’s Magic Beans Workshop may seem like a typical suburban wife and mom in Ohio, but rocks have been whispering their ancient stories to her since she was a little girl.  Now long grown, a Reiki teacher, Master Crystologist, and, like you, a traveler on life’s journey, she has a deep appreciation for the abundant blessings and tools that the mineral world and all of nature so generously offer to support our well-being.  Crystals and gemstones have taught her that this need not be such serious business … there’s plenty of room for playfulness, too, because you just never know what may serve as the catalyst to a positive shift.  Julie is honored to be of service to you through her arts, be they creative, healing, or both.  You can visit her Etsy shop at http://jakk.etsy.com and her blog, Jakk's Magic Beans Life, at http://magicbeansworkshop.blogspot.com.  She welcomes your e-mails at [email protected].

 

Pan de Cielo

Being with real people who warm us, who endorse and exalt our creativity, is essential to the flow of creative life. Otherwise, we freeze. Nurture is a chorus of voices both from within and without that notices the state of a woman's being, takes care to encourage it, and if necessary, gives comfort, as well. I'm not certain how many friends one needs, but definitely one or two who think your gift, whatever it may be, is pan de cielo, the bread of heaven. Every woman is entitled to an Allelujia Chorus.

-Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Women Who Run With the Wolves.

Bring the Flood

Weeping Woman, 1937.

Need I even note his holy name? He's my favorite, you know.

I've been feeling dried up like a forgotten old raisin under a carseat cushion. Needing hydration, rain, emotions. Somewhere between the summer madness and the committing to of next year's plans, I've forgotten to stay connected to some vital aspects of my own feelings. And here I thought I'd been so good about loving them up and down. The reality is that I hold a lot of space for others to have feelings, read: little ones, clung to my leg like static, who erupt into tears about fifty times each in a day. And friends who trust me enough to shed tears in my ear. I envy all of you.

I get to and need to cry, too. How could I forget this?

Tonight I melted down but good, and sadly, it came at the cost of yelling at Miles while he putzed endlessly, picking at his dinner. A meal that the rest of us unsurprisingly weren't having. I gave him a consequence I had to shortly thereafter recant on, and once cleaned up between he and I, I retired to check in with myself about how shitty it all felt and how awful I made him feel.

It wasn't easy to connect. I knew there was a well of emotions ready to come up out of hiding, but I had to conjure, dig, lie down for, and cajole. I just store it up so that it forgets what it's like to come out as tears. As frustration, no problem, I'm topped up on hair trigger frustration these days.

Once they began to flow, I marched out into the living room, blankie around shoulders and cried right in front of the children and B, instead of hiding my feelings away and trying to appear like the one who has it together- the one they can trust and lean into when they feel sad. Very sensitive Miles has said to me since he was very little that he doesn't like to see or hear me cry. When I do, he bursts into tears. Tonight, he was fine and gave me a little kiss at one point. To think of how long I've been adjusting for him, so I wouldn't have to investigate that or deal with what it meant. It reenacts the policy of not crying in my childhood, lest I be given "something to cry about." Wouldn't want that.

Tonight's tears felt very cleansing and like a mini spa for my soul.

Twice this week, I've heard feedback from two women close to me that I give, but I don't allow myself to receive. I'm turning it over, at first a bit reluctantly, because there's a whole family story there that I can't deny. It's out of balance, to say the least. And holding space for my own emotions is something even I reject the notion of. To allow myself the gift of tears is to acknowledge that there is space available in the cosmos for them. They're not in anybody's way. I'm not in anybody's way.

I do not have to be The Strong One. The Big Sister. The Oldest Child. The Old Soul. And all of those things disguised as lacking in human vulnerabilities.

So this monthly moon week, I'm bringing on the tears! I'm going to cry about everything that makes me sad until I no longer feel like crying. I'm going out to buy Kleenex tomorrow and I intend on using it.

 

Protection

photo by denise andrade

It is an act of love to stride out into the weather naked.

What is protection anyway but paper-thin skins piled on top of each other upon us, placed there by injury and fear?

To peel off the crackled drying things is to expose the beauty underneath, to allow the truth to see blessed daylight; to come into contact with, perhaps, a lie, that became an imposter and hung on for too long: summer's last zucchini gathering a white coat in the crisper.

To cast off is to *brighten*, and I could well use a bit more brightening. Could you?

I've been surprised by the most recent shedding layer, which feels injurous, and intermingled with gashes from my own sword, as well as those unintentional, unconscious lacerations from someone close to me. How I'm working through it is by declaring freedom from it, and holding onto hope-the notion that it will be possible to repair that which was sacrificed and make something new out of almost nothing.

If I start with my own soul, though, it isn't nothing, it's a little ball of light I can hold gently and birth into fresh butterfly-being. I'm coming to believe that it was Protection which caused me to sustain the injury, by putting me into a long sleep so I couldn't feel what was being done.

To feel awake is to feel warmth returning to the stone figures, as when Aslan breathes his magical exhalation.

Protection isn't needed when it's not raining.

And as I've learned from my friends in Portland, it's not needed even when it is.

Surrender

I get asked a lot about what this tattoo is a symbol of. Love? Harmony? Trust?

It's sort of all of those things, but I never find it simple to explain.

In 1998 I walked into the local Vermont Ave. tattoo joint with a copy of the Tao Te Ching in my hand and pointed to the symbol. I sat for about forty-five minutes while the artist inked and scratched the moving shapes into my left deltoid. This was a bold move for me, a tattoo on my arm; I'd hid the others below the waistline: the wolf's paw print in 1990 and the Warrior's spear in 1994. Earlier messages to my then self from my further-along self that I am still learning about. Funny how we reach back and teach ourselves from the future, isn't it?

The direct translation of Tao means, literally, the way.

Like so many things I've done, I have no real clue why I'm doing them until it manifests years later. I only know in the moment that it will be significant, though I can't say precisely why or how. Releasing and surrender have been big for me for a very long time, but I'd say that this year has been the token year of letting go. Letting it all go...

This piece, from the essay Surrender Into Mothering, by Chris Pritchard, says much of it for me:

What I know now about parenting is to "surrender." I've learned how childbirth brings with it self-discovery, self-healing, and adaptation to the new selves we become every single day of our lives. No one ever told me that, as an adult, I would keep on changing. I would have to move and flow with changes in myself, as well as all around me, for the rest of my life. No one ever explained that this process never ends, that it is infinite. Learning to surrender means learning to go with change. And change requires surrender.

From the first days of pregnancy, when the beautiful creature inside your body begins to puff out your belly and your breasts, makes you nauseated and tired, makes you have emotional depths and heights, radically affects your relationship with everyone around you, you are asked by this tiny new life to adapt to all these changes, If you resist you will suffer. You must give in. You do let go. You shed your old self. Perhaps pregnancy, more than any other period in a woman's life, enables her to understand the complexity of this requirement in life--to change and to adapt.

Pregnancy enables us to open a multitude of doorways--into ourselves, into our ancestral past, and into our future. Sometimes walking through these doorways can give us insights that can shift old patterns on this planet. The gift of childbirth challenges us to take nothing for granted, and to flow and to move like a great ocean, around any rocky obstacle.

 

I begin my fortieth year wiring in Coyote's way- to enjoy having without possessing, to revel in loving without boundaries, to delight in surrendering my defenses, to laugh when I might reflexively admonish myself, to freely release all that I create, to dance around the fire which burns up the old, to drink in breath without fear, to trust it all and take nothing for granted. To do less, to want less, to need less. To practice it over and over again.

To yield.

Whatever is soft and yielding

is a disciple of life.

The hard and stiff will be broken.

The soft and supple will prevail.

-Tao Te Ching

Looking For a Way In

"I never know what I think about something until I've read what I've written on it."

--William Faulkner

On Thursday I went to an amazing night of poetry writing in Santa Monica that I'm dying to tell you about. It was facilitated by Maya Stein, whom you may know as Papaya Maya from the old days. Can I just tell you how freaking awesome! it was to sit in a room full of fearless goddesses, sharing their post-it note vulnerabilities round after round, searching eagerly all the while for what Maya calls, "a way in".

This idea of "finding a way into" the work resonated so deeply with me. Of course when one takes a shamanic journey, you use a portal that is generally the same each time, but sometimes a prompt or any other influence can grab you and carry you off trancelike into the otherworlds, too. So I felt that her instruction to use, for example, a piece of food that you feel a connection to or opposition to, was a very useful prompt for writing because there are *feelings* there that help to serve as a diving off point-a portal to enter the unconscious realms.

Here are some of the mundane notes I made (from detailed bits of my day) to uncog the wheels and see where I could be led:

*Home Savings Bank. Since 1889.

*The black hillside on fire, being sprayed by firemen in hot suits, as cars stacked up routinely on the highway.

*His scratchy five o'clock shadow- forgetting to make his way over the king sized covers for a goodnight kiss, as he also neglected to turn off the bedside lamp.

*The moon upside down on it's flat edge.

*Muesli with hot water poured over it because I'd run out of their favorite packet oatmeal.

*The tube of moisturizer crammed and rolled up still sits on the countertop-why can't I throw it away?

*The mockingbirds eat all of the cat kibble and leave crumbs of it all over the porch, which I step on resentfully.

*Dead hawk? Owl? And me without my rubber gloves. Shit.

*Shiny Happy People, and each time it comes on, they dance and make giggling laps around the kitchen island.

At one point, I held the potato I'd brought, and wrote on and on about how I felt about it and what it represented to me. As it turned out, an unseemly potato was my ticket into some deeper issues that wanted to be written about rather desperately. It told me a story about my family and my relationship, and about my feelings around that which is bland and unexciting. The writing revealed that I struggle with some aspects of the ordinary. That there is something in me that seeks out the different, the colorful, the passionate, the risk-takers. All of these things which, for me, Potato is not a poster-child for. Not brand new revelations, but from the pov of a potato, there was a freshness about it that I enjoyed mucking around in.

The evening was LOADS of fun: Maya is grace, stunning words, and a very effective teacher. I felt absolutely plumbed by the end of the evening. I highly recommend, even if you don't consider yourself a writer, that you find where she is and go to her.

Catch Maya on her Tour De Word this Fall, and see if a vegetable can uncover your hidden depths...

Do You See Her?

Nothing to fear

nothing to hide

Is what she said

when she found herself

standing in a downpour in warrior pose,

over and over again

I am the dream

and the growth

Release me

along with any ideas about her

the symbol

Care not for thoughts

Mine and always mine for the truth

Especially that one which you yourself

are afraid to hear

Layers and layers of protection,

fear, burn off

Born captive and freed by two hands

two hips and a head

What she's found out to be

a relief

cold washes over her

What she finds to love

unexpected

arms extended up

Home is closer

than you think

in gratitude.

I've been on a fiery rampage for weeks now as I've been clearing the last of the clinging, asthmatic virus out of my system. This weekend's jaunt to Yosemite Nat'l Park with treasured girlfriends was watery and cooling to my inflamed disposition.

The falls are so magnificent; if you haven't seen them, you are missing out. The giant Sequoias, Redwoods, Lodgepole pines, Oaks, and the blankets of flora on the valley were so soothing. The air was incredible.

We stayed on a lovely 180 acre horse ranch and soaked up the landscape, each other's love, our passion for growth, and bits that needed healing.

Give and Run

(Taken with my Palm Pixi)

Lately I've been giving away far too much of my emotional energy, to causes that are not nourishing me enough to continue on with. I'm always surprised at how willing I am to give myself away in tiny bits until there is nothing left for me. It's like carving off little hunks of flesh and handing them out to every hungry stranger on the streetcorner.

When it became painfully apparent that I was doing this, I decided something drastic needed to be done. It's been six official days since Ivy hasn't nursed. My hormones are wandering aimlessly and my mind is unconsciously seeking out ways to fill that space...the space of my baby not needing me in that way anymore. It's created a host of triggers, all terribly unexpected.

A voice inside has been urging me to "RUN"...and after a bit of thought, I decided to take it literally. I bought a new pair of running shoes and hit the trail at sunrise twice this weekend. It seems the negative energy was piling up on me, and it almost feels like it's chasing me at times (along with a mad case of PMS).

I can't explain how lovely it was to be up that early, all on my own, to hit the ground running and meet a physical goal. Other than giving birth, I have had no real fitness aspirations in over five years! I can't do gyms because I feel like a hamster. And there is not abundant nature here. But there is a bike path that runs through town, past a lake and through some trees and a park, where bootcampers run obstacle courses at 5 am and cyclists buzz past on my left.

I was pleasantly surprised to see a Great Blue Heron, a Red-Tailed Hawk, a lizard, a jackrabbit, a family of ducks and ducklings and a whole barrage of ground squirrels chilling on the quarry-like busted up cement rocks that lie on the side of the trail. At that hour, birds were  everywhere and it was not unlike a Zen meditation to walk and run along at the pace I felt comfortable at with nothing to very little circling around in my bean.

Rather than run away from the feelings that were surfacing, I felt like I was running straight into them, sweating them out of my skin and transmuting them into positive energy. When I left the path today, I began to evaluate how I deal with my reserves. It seemed clear that there are a few areas which need major improvement.

I give a lot of energy to the children, as all moms and women seem to give to their homes, families, and pets. This is the kind of giving that gives back, but not necessarily in energy. I also give a lot of emotional energy to friendship; and in most cases, this feeds me, too. And then there are some things that take without giving back. And after a while, the drain becomes more than I have noticed. It slips through the cracks of my awareness and I am realizing, with some urgency, that I have to bring that into balance. It is simply too easy to give myself away without replenishing the well.

This little lesson comes up again and again for me, surprising me with its varied masks and causes. When I do as I was taught, when stress is starting to siphon my tank, I come back to tending my own garden by giving my attention to what is in front of me, and to...my breath.

It is my simple confirmation of existence that needs no prompting, and it came to me that it is the only thing I truly have that belongs to me.

Doors

“If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is - infinite”. --William Blake

I've been photographing doors like crazy these summer weeks. Each time I see an old, weathered door, a big red door, a yellow art deco door, I must stop to take its picture. There is something about the draw to open and go through them that I am taken with at the moment. Perhaps it speaks of risk-taking, which for me comes back to faith. Faith that if I walk through, I will accept what comes with my choice and be glad that I chose to try something rather than play it safe. Going through most portals into unfamiliar territory has always taken me on fine adventures.

I think that becoming a mom has caused me to try to be far more careful about which doors I choose to go through, for fear of what the repercussions might be that would affect the children. And with the weaning of Ivy, which is now complete, the call to enter more adventuresome realms is just a bit louder.

The quest to seek, play, discover and uncover is strong for me. I keep trying to find a way to integrate my need for these things with my need to be an undistracted mother.

I'd love to hear how you do it, that is, balance your idea of what kind of mother, partner, friend you'd like to be with the things that call out so persistently. This is classic feed-the-wild-woman-archetype territory, so please throw your ingredients into the pot and let's swirl them all together and see what magic may come.

Maezen's Plunge

 

 

All photos are from the lush, hundred-year-old backyard garden of Karen's home.

Plunging with Karen Maezen Miller on Saturday was great fun and full of tools to implement at home when I returned. Most of all, it was a time to rest among women who also needed a rest, and recharge on the simplicity that is Karen's way.

What came up for me again and again is that I run through my days: run through my tasks, run from here to there, run from my children. Attention. Breath. Peace. With yoga and sitting, it was so easy to return to these simple little actions that need no prompting. They are right within us happening reflexively. It takes effort to stop them, not experience them.

Something she said has stuck with me from the moment she said it, her wise words always followed by her infectious, elvish laughter: Peace lives in this moment, and peace never leaves us.

Today, I am peace. Peace is me.

In Honor Of

Births

We will never remember dying.

We were so patient

about being,

noting down

the numbers, the days,

the years and the months,

the hair, the mouths we kissed,

but that moment of dying:

we surrender it without a note,

we give it to others as remembrance

or we give it simply to water,

to water, to air, to time.

Nor do we keep

the memory of our birth,

though being born was important and fresh:

and now you don't even remember one detail,

you haven't kept even a branch

of the first light.

It's well known that we are born.

It's well known that in the room

or in the woods

or in the hut in the fisherman's district

or in the crackling canefields

there is a very unusual silence,

a moment solemn as wood,

and a woman gets ready to give birth.

It's well known that we were born.

But of the profound jolt

from not being to existing, to having hands,

to seeing, to having eyes,

to eating and crying and overflowing

and loving and loving and suffering and suffering,

of that transition or shudder

of the electric essence that takes on

one more body like a living cup,

and of that disinhabited woman,

the mother who is left there with her blood

and her torn fullness

and her end and beginning, and the disorder

that troubles the pulse, the floor, the blankets,

until everything gathers and adds

one more knot to the thread of life:

nothing, there is nothing left in your memory

of the fierce sea that lifted like a wave

and knocked down a dark apple from the tree.

The only thing you remember is your life.

--Pablo Neruda

As my baby's final weaning days weave in and out in slow motion, nearing the crossing over point, I find myself thinking about my childrens' births. So very many new babies have come in this year, into the glorious tribe. And so many elders have passed along their memories and ways to us to hand down, across and down further still. I feel ceremonious and close to the bone about...everything.

As friends plan new babies for next year and adopted babes dash into the lives of others, I am reminded of how sacred the mere act is. Dear Pablo is so right. We don't remember a lick of it. The rush of it. The story of the day.The brightness of the room, or the slick darkness of it. The peace or the chaos. I want to believe that our bodies remember even when our minds fail to. That we carry the minute and the moment with us, as our badge of honor to exist fruitfully and completely.

grateful + postcards

new postcard listing...

AND, it's that time again...

i am gathering gratitude like blueberries in a basket destined for a grand pie

gratitude for

inspiring friends

hot with new ideas that move, shake and stir

for my own inspired lamplight

which seems to burn all on it's own at the moment

for dark purple plums hanging by skinny wooden teeth and threatening to drop

from their own juicy weight

for mysterious and wild books that arrive by the magical mail system

for solstice candles burning all night

and for cool waters sprinkling on happy ankles

for perfect quiche

for breezy, warm days that surprisingly don't sear yet

for kind helpers from far away

for little plucks on tiny violins

for outside of the box thinking

for partners who scoff tradition and live their freedom to create

for healthcare providers who make a huge difference with her tiny needles and funny intimate conversation

for possibility of what i haven't yet dared to imagine

for responsibility and peace

for new color and shape

for raw feelings and guts

for good fitting sunglasses and pre-pregnancy skirts

for an old dog with humid breath and long, thick, loving fur and a goofy smile

for days that last longer than i do

for satisfying memories 

for commonality among people

and for you, gentle reader, persistent traveler, friend

i count you today as my blessing among them all.

Know The Place

"Explorer" (scanned greeting card) by Anahata Joy Katkin

What do you think T.S. Eliot meant when he said this?

It makes me think mostly of this mysterious year of two thousand and ten. A year which I began full of so much hope for movement of my Chariot. A year which I would deeply explore self-care, so that my well-being would equal the priority of my various duties. For once.

I suffer from distress at learning lessons the hard way...again and again until eventually, the experiences begin to rewire my thinking and my living. But the process can be so gradual with some things that I hardly feel the shift. And so disappointment comes and goes easily, clacking the screen door of my emotions behind him every time.

I hear my inner talk going from desperate questions to patient encouragement all day long, and on a long day of painting, as it was today, I caught myself mumbling my fears and questions out loud. My looming fear of the day is:

What if I take these medications for several more weeks or longer and my symptoms don't change or worsen? (The main symptom is a persistent, usually non-productive, cough, worse at night, with inflamed, narrowed airways that spasm dramatically during coughing fits...the meds are Fluticasone nasal mist and Qvar, an inhaled steroid).

I should share with you that I agreed to take the medications because it's now been six weeks of coughing, and the children are also suffering this. Presumably, this kind of cough-variant asthma can follow a bad bout with sinusitis/bronchitis, which plagued us from January through March. My idea is that I will be able to find out if prescription asthma medications are the best remedy by being the guinea pig, while treating the children homeopathically, with herbs, massage, and lots of fluids and rest. If it truly is asthma, it may only respond to the meds, but if it is a virus mimicking the symptoms of asthma, well, then, it will work it's way out of our systems eventually anyway.

In the meantime, I'm feeling uncharacteristically vulnerable and wide open to hearing all of your favorite immunity-building tips and products, as well as about your experiences with asthma and any other encouragement you may be able to scatter lovingly.

I'm hoping to know this place once and for all.

Thank you all for your support so far...it really does mean so much.

Pull Up a Chair

And enjoy my homage to art and mamas at Mindy's amazing little creative corner, the wishstudio...

Regularly Scheduled Program

Studio companion, carved of malachite (a gift from my teacher).

Painting is officially underway for the June show and I'm feeling good about the direction I'm going so far. Each time I begin a new series it's like having a baby on the fast track! Work with a vision, mix up some color, glue down some paper, and let go...

Here're some of tonite's layers (note Corn Maiden over on the right! Tee hee, didn't realize she wanted to make it into the photo so badly):

 

This is an especially fun series for several reasons. One of them is that it opens just a hundred miles from here so I'll be able to attend! I won't be in the third trimester phase of my brain-in-a-cave for another week or two, as I face the home stretch. I so enjoy this stage. I would liken it to being about 5-6 months pregnant, before the back aches and sleeplessness set in! The sparkly, glowing, everyone-thinks-you're-so-cute part.

I also wanted to clue you in about a prayer flag giveaway that Lauren of Visionwise is having at her blog. And share a pic of the necklace I received in the mail from her today! It is energized with many healing stones which my slowly recovering bones are in desperate need of. I love the originality of her work. It's unconventional in palette and form in some ways and that reflects a lot of who Lauren is. Please BEG her to make her music available to you while you are commenting to win the flags. Her beautiful, honest voice, soothing, uplifting poetry and organic ramble of her acoustic guitar will knock off your stockings.

 

Fed By My Feet

I've always wondered why I love to go so much. My parents tease me about loving to "go, go, go", as if I am a freakish gypsy or hobo that must move to feel sustained. I do believe that wanderlust is out of the ordinary around here, out of fashion since the dust bowl days and deluxe coupes.

I crave adventure. I want to live in other places. I want to live out of the country with my family, to speak another language poorly. I want to eat learn to love the food that other cultures eat. I want to do things that frighten me a bit. I like to push the edge of my comfort level because I thrive on learning new perspectives and all about the world's people. And creatures!

And also, because I am wild. Not so buried inside of us many, there is a brujita living in a hut which runs around on chicken legs. I don't know where she came from. Up from the generational pipeline, I suppose, having gone dormant in some women before me, and for plenty of fine reasoning. I'm glad she's with me, and that I can hear her.

I read recently that, "The wolf is kept fed by his feet". To wit, a wild woman's soul is kept fed by answering the call when one feels restless.

Up, now.

Out the cage door we must go.

In the Den

I am working on two pieces for an upcoming group show and tonite was really my first official night back in the studio to work on..."work" since January. It is unbelievable how much time can pass between creations when destiny has many other ideas for what life is really about around here.

I must say, though, that I am really excited about these two pieces. They involve a topic that I am very intimate with and so wrapped up in my heartstrings. This is unusual for me-painting a statement. The messages that come from my subjects when I paint are fun to receive, and tonite more than ever, I am feeling the hairs bristle up on my neck and my wild bits sniffing the wind while I work on bringing them to life. These dogs have been a long time comin'.

I have been dreaming more than usual about these creatures since we lost Blue, (who is so generous to visit me in the dreamtime) and I was gifted an extra serving of inspiration from Anna Marie last week, which is helping me knit up my vision with even more gusto. It also helped that I reached into a random bag of collage papers, not even knowing if collage was what I wanted to do... and pulled out a very old map that fit perfectly into the scenes. I love it when the Muse is guiding my hand!

In minutes, I'll be piled up with my pack: a gangly, long-legged loner and a feisty, yet snuggly yearling pup. In my dreams, I hope to hear the yippings of these paintings telling me where we're headed next on this adventure...

Creative Spirit

Sweet, spirited, Lauren of VisionWise is giving away this necklace this week, called Creative Spirit. I have two of Lauren's necklaces and also commissioned her to make a very special hemp and stone bracelet for a new Daddy in the clan recently, and I have been so happily thrilled with her work. She is a very special fire mama who puts amazing energy into her *works*. Stop in and enter!

I spent the entire evening clearing out my art studio and adding more to the donation pile-this time many, many skeins of unloved yarn. I've freed up my bins and organized them, which makes my little, obsessive-compulsive brain do a very happy dance.

My desktop could still use a bit of help, but it didn't stop me from working on a postcard for a student pen pal project I volunteered for. So nice to create for kids.

And when creativity is flowing, it seems to be flowing everywhere in this house. I love Miles obsession with globes. He has long loved drawing the planets, but lately he's been putting them all on stands! Dig the volcanic explosion happening down south.

Additionally, I'm intrigued this week by The Artistic Mother, by Shona Cole and Found City, by Keri Smith. Must make a found city with Miles!

Shona's recent article at Wishstudio, titled Art Makes Us Better Moms deserves a read.