Tuesday, December 29, 2015
Sex
"Sex, like money or meditation, is best used to realize and express your natural openness, rather than to build a false home of childish security." David Deida
Growth
“We do not grow absolutely, chronologically. We grow sometimes in
one dimension, and not in another, unevenly. We grow partially. We are
relative. We are mature in one realm, childish in another. The past,
present, and future mingle and pull us backward, forward, or fix us in
the present.” ~ Anais Nin
Wednesday, April 1, 2015
Courage
"Courage is the measure of our heartfelt participation
with life, with another, with a community, a work, a future. To be
courageous, is not necessarily to go anywhere or do anything except to
make conscious those things we already feel deeply and then to live
through the unending vulnerabilities of those consequences. To be
courageous is to seat our feelings deeply in the body and in the world:
to live up to and into the necessities of relationships that often
already exist, with things we find we already care deeply about: with a
person, a future, a possibility in society, or with an unknown that begs
us on and always has begged us on. Whether we stay or whether we go -
to be courageous is to stay close to the way we are made." David Whyte
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Trust and Keep Going
Lick the Fire
You don’t have to trust the process.
You just have to keep moving forward
through the fear.
If we had certainty,
if we could control the outcome
the risk wouldn’t be there
and without the risk
the growth does not run deep.
And believe me, it would
not be nearly as fun, or
transformative.
I try not to promise trust, or safety.
Art is not safe at all.
That is what you can trust,
it will take you into
dangerous territory, but,
you won’t be harmed.
Honor your instincts
instead of your controlling nature.
Stop trying to understand,
to grasp, to know, to get the
hang of it. Really, stop it.
The true work will often
feel like you are about
to start flying, lifting off.
Feels like bliss and
throwing up all at once,
enjoy the uncertainty of the ride.
Stop trying to predict or
create the outcome.
Stop convincing yourself
you have to trust and be fearless.
You don’t.
There is a new story,
the only storyline is this one:
KEEP DOING IT.
That’s it. That is how you
will get where you need to go.
Stop requiring so much
security during your process.
Let the freefall be your lover.
The feeling of no bottom be
welcome. Welcome the thought:
you might not get this one right.
Welcome the Uh-Oh! at the
beginning of almost
every stroke. Release the
need to dominate. Submit.
Let the process completely make
you come undone so
you drop your ribbons
to the floor and laugh
and cry and lay your
head upon your creation.
Keep the dialogue happening,
talk out loud if you need to.
Talk to the muse as if
she could really hear you. She can.
By allowing the fear to
be there without stopping
your work, the chatter
will not cease, but it will
change. You are the over-comer now.
You are an unstoppable creative.
You don’t have to trust the process.
Just don’t put your brush down.
Don’t put it down. Listen.
Allow yourself to get scared to life
instead of scared to death.
Don’t step back from the flame.
Lick the fire. Be burned if you have to.
And put the ashes into the creation.
All of it, every fear and wound,
becomes useful here.
Desire trumps the need to trust.
If you are not shaking in your boots
you haven’t yet, even arrived.
You don’t have to trust the process.
You just have to keep moving forward
through the fear.
If we had certainty,
if we could control the outcome
the risk wouldn’t be there
and without the risk
the growth does not run deep.
And believe me, it would
not be nearly as fun, or
transformative.
I try not to promise trust, or safety.
Art is not safe at all.
That is what you can trust,
it will take you into
dangerous territory, but,
you won’t be harmed.
Honor your instincts
instead of your controlling nature.
Stop trying to understand,
to grasp, to know, to get the
hang of it. Really, stop it.
The true work will often
feel like you are about
to start flying, lifting off.
Feels like bliss and
throwing up all at once,
enjoy the uncertainty of the ride.
Stop trying to predict or
create the outcome.
Stop convincing yourself
you have to trust and be fearless.
You don’t.
There is a new story,
the only storyline is this one:
KEEP DOING IT.
That’s it. That is how you
will get where you need to go.
Stop requiring so much
security during your process.
Let the freefall be your lover.
The feeling of no bottom be
welcome. Welcome the thought:
you might not get this one right.
Welcome the Uh-Oh! at the
beginning of almost
every stroke. Release the
need to dominate. Submit.
Let the process completely make
you come undone so
you drop your ribbons
to the floor and laugh
and cry and lay your
head upon your creation.
Keep the dialogue happening,
talk out loud if you need to.
Talk to the muse as if
she could really hear you. She can.
By allowing the fear to
be there without stopping
your work, the chatter
will not cease, but it will
change. You are the over-comer now.
You are an unstoppable creative.
You don’t have to trust the process.
Just don’t put your brush down.
Don’t put it down. Listen.
Allow yourself to get scared to life
instead of scared to death.
Don’t step back from the flame.
Lick the fire. Be burned if you have to.
And put the ashes into the creation.
All of it, every fear and wound,
becomes useful here.
Desire trumps the need to trust.
If you are not shaking in your boots
you haven’t yet, even arrived.
Friday, November 7, 2014
I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.
I circle around God, around the primordial tower.
I've been circling for thousands of years
and I still don't know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?
Book of Hours, I 2
Friday, October 10, 2014
Meaning
"
This quote by Sir Laurens van der Post‘s coincides with the angst that is central to individuals going through a quarterlife crisis:
“The Bushman storytellers talk about two kinds of hunger. They say there is physical huger, then what they call the Great Hunger. That is the hunger for meaning. There is only one thing that is truly insufferable, and that is a life without meaning. There is nothing wrong with the search for happiness. But there is something great—meaning–which transfigures all. When you have meaning you are content, you belong.”
This quote by Sir Laurens van der Post‘s coincides with the angst that is central to individuals going through a quarterlife crisis:
“The Bushman storytellers talk about two kinds of hunger. They say there is physical huger, then what they call the Great Hunger. That is the hunger for meaning. There is only one thing that is truly insufferable, and that is a life without meaning. There is nothing wrong with the search for happiness. But there is something great—meaning–which transfigures all. When you have meaning you are content, you belong.”
Religion
"Then, it appears to me, one gradually formulates one's religion, be
it what it may. A person has no religion who has not slowly and
painfully gathered one together, adding to it, shaping it; and one's
religion is never complete and final, it seems, but must always be
undergoing modification."
-D.H. Lawrence
-D.H. Lawrence
Sunday, October 5, 2014
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Declaration of the Four Sacred Things
The Earth is a living, conscious being. In company with cultures of many different times and places, we name these things as sacred: air, fire, water, and earth.
Whether we see them as the breath, energy, blood, and body of the Mother, or as the blessed gifts of a Creator, or as symbols of interconnected systems that sustain life, we know that nothing can live without them.
To call these things sacred is to say that they have a value beyond their usefulness for human ends, that they themselves become the standard by which our acts, our economics, our laws, and our purposes must be judged. No one has the right to appropriate them or profit from them at the expense of others. Any government that fails to protect them forfeits its legitimacy.
All people, all living things, are part of the earth life, and so are sacred. No one of us stands higher or lower than any other. Only justice can assure balance; only ecological balance can sustain freedom. Only in freedom can that fifth sacred thing we call spirit flourish in its full diversity.
To honor the sacred is to create conditions in which nourishment, sustenance, habitat, knowledge, freedom, and beauty can thrive. To honor the sacred is to make love possible.
To this we dedicate our curiosity, our will, our courage, our silences, and our voices. To this we dedicate our lives.
--Starhawk
The Earth is a living, conscious being. In company with cultures of many different times and places, we name these things as sacred: air, fire, water, and earth.
Whether we see them as the breath, energy, blood, and body of the Mother, or as the blessed gifts of a Creator, or as symbols of interconnected systems that sustain life, we know that nothing can live without them.
To call these things sacred is to say that they have a value beyond their usefulness for human ends, that they themselves become the standard by which our acts, our economics, our laws, and our purposes must be judged. No one has the right to appropriate them or profit from them at the expense of others. Any government that fails to protect them forfeits its legitimacy.
All people, all living things, are part of the earth life, and so are sacred. No one of us stands higher or lower than any other. Only justice can assure balance; only ecological balance can sustain freedom. Only in freedom can that fifth sacred thing we call spirit flourish in its full diversity.
To honor the sacred is to create conditions in which nourishment, sustenance, habitat, knowledge, freedom, and beauty can thrive. To honor the sacred is to make love possible.
To this we dedicate our curiosity, our will, our courage, our silences, and our voices. To this we dedicate our lives.
--Starhawk
Friday, August 29, 2014
Loss and Grief
"The reality is that you will grieve forever. You will not get over the loss of a loved one. You will learn to live with it. You will heal and you will rebuild yourself around the loss you have suffered. You will be whole again but you will never be the same. Nor should you be the same. Nor would you want to. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross
Love and Fear
"The effect you have on others is the most valuable currency there is."
"Our eyes are not just viewers. They're also projectors that are running a second story over the picture that we see in front of us all the time. Fear is writing that script. Fear is going to be a player in your life. You get to decide how much. So many of us choose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. What we really want seems impossibly out of reach and ridiculous to expect so we never dare to ask the universe for it. I'm saying that you can ask the universe for it. Life doesn't happen to you, it happens for you. As far as I can tell it's just about letting the universe know what you want and working toward it while letting go of how it comes to pass. Why not take a chance on faith. Not religion but faith. Not hope but faith. I don't believe in hope. Hope is a beggar. Hope walks through the fire and faith leaps over it. You are ready and able to do beautiful things in this world. You'll only ever have two choices. Love and fear. Choose love and don't ever let fear turn you against your playful heart." Jim Carey
"Our eyes are not just viewers. They're also projectors that are running a second story over the picture that we see in front of us all the time. Fear is writing that script. Fear is going to be a player in your life. You get to decide how much. So many of us choose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. What we really want seems impossibly out of reach and ridiculous to expect so we never dare to ask the universe for it. I'm saying that you can ask the universe for it. Life doesn't happen to you, it happens for you. As far as I can tell it's just about letting the universe know what you want and working toward it while letting go of how it comes to pass. Why not take a chance on faith. Not religion but faith. Not hope but faith. I don't believe in hope. Hope is a beggar. Hope walks through the fire and faith leaps over it. You are ready and able to do beautiful things in this world. You'll only ever have two choices. Love and fear. Choose love and don't ever let fear turn you against your playful heart." Jim Carey
Life.....
“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone
won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You
have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth.
You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And
when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or
death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the
apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell
yourself you tasted as many as you could.”
~ Louise Erdrich
~ Louise Erdrich
Wednesday, August 20, 2014
Dark and Light
"What I know is this. When one hungers for light it is only because one's knowledge of the dark is so deep." Terry Tempest Williams
Sunday, August 17, 2014
Mystery
"Mystery is a way of seeing. A moment when the mask of habit that makes things familiar falls away and we can catch a glimpse of life itself. Mystery does not require us to do anything. Mystery may simply require us to see familiar things in new ways and remember the wonder. People who wonder rarely burn out. Maybe we all need to know a little less and wonder a little more." Rachel Naomi Remen
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