Pema and Johnny Cash and the IRS whats a name anyway

Good Morning Relatives 

well I decided to do a little meditation last night before bed so I soaked in a hot bath of korean sea salt and epsom salt and rosemary and eucalyptis    nice   then I read a bit in Pema Chodrons book the places that scare you  only reading from a held back meditative place which by that point was quite easy 

it allowed me to observe and see something that I had not previously  which is always interesting isn't it   

Pema is big on meditation and on labeling her source of effort as bodhichitta  which is a nice effort  and all but there is way too much emphasis on levels and achievement  if we are then we are and why not 
I say go for it Pema and let yourself be an original and all encompassing source already  don't hold yourself back out of some sort of respect for those who have and those who can't or won't  its not worth it  so forget the bodhichitta or becoming a bodhisattva   be Pema  she is grand don't settle for  the prelim stage of enlightenment 

   anyhow that note aside I was enjoying the reading and not reading at the same time as the intense saltyness drew myself out of myself and allowed me to be me in a whole different way   that is when something that Pema said or rather she wrote on the page that I was reading caught my ah ha moment 

it is the idea that intensity let loose in side of me (usually in the dream time)  triggers such deep and intense breathtaking feeling that before I know it in an attempt to get away from myself   from that fire that is destroying me inside which I don't remember inviting in the door by the way  I end up leaping onto a story board and running down the road riding what is often a very dead horse till the emotion or the fuel burns out of me or burns me up and hopefully in the midst of all that conflagration if I can hold on and not harm myself  then I can phone a friend (though it seems no one gets up early any more do they at least not in my time zone) and if they answer and I havnt set myself or the house on fire I can ask them to help me please  help me while I burn to death in my own cauldron of fear that has somehow caught on fire in the night and is out of control inside my very own self   thank life for old childhood friends who do answer the phone and who know what a horrible and unremovable thing it was to have to live through my sister shooting herself and dying before I was done loving her or needing her to love me back   thank life for friends who can just say I understand and I am holding you even from thousands of miles away steadfast and long enough and strong enough that I can die and be reborn again into my own reality  thank life for the truly loving and selfless friend of mine

Pema said to let go of the story and have the intensity of the emotion and while having it sort of like the bath and the book and meditation all at once adding up to a fourth dimension  let it flow and yet don't be consumed by it but take a look at it while I am in it   that was an interesting thing that I as it so happens was doing while reading and soaking so the idea was already present (kind of like Pema being Pema without the boddi butting in)

so I thought about that  

then she said that when we hold ourselves to a story or a action or non action while we are having this eruption of fuel if we are fearful which is the point of the book to learn not to be fearful then we are simply using the fuel and the fire (the story we are telling our selves) to avoid the underlying fear and so in a way we are harming ourselves   which may not be overt but is definitely accumulative like steps on the treadmill or four or six too many m&m's or one more chip or one less hug eh?

so my project this week is to recognize when I am telling me a story and stop and take a face on look at the underlying fear    I may not change avoiding going to the gym on sunday because the guy who mans the desk not only watches in the cameras everything I am doing but comments to me about what he thinks of me when I come by the desk which I must  so what is the underlying fear?  a creepy dude watching me makes me feel awful and I don't want to feel powerless and exposed  so what is the story I tell me? that if I go to the gym I will be victimized   brrrr ugh yuck yuck yuck   since it is not socially acceptable to whack his head off  either I go and ask for his schedule so that I can go when he is not there  or I don't go at all  and or I tell his super visor what he did and does  and I recognized that I was avoiding going because I could feel myself holding myself back from going,  I could feel the part of me that wants to go work out and wants to not keep eating or reading or sitting for hours on end but I would ignore it. I would push it aside. I would push me aside and not listen to me.  thus the emotional cauldron fills with fire while I am looking away pretending that I am doing what I want to do when what I want to do is not what I am doing. Capisce?

all this from Pema  imagine that   anyhow  I don't feel less creeped out or less vulnerable knowing what is behind the story of why I am not going and allowing myself to add one more day of blobness to my already unwelcome days of blobness due to my injuries  but what I feel is that I am honest and clear and not carrying an extra layer of nasty crap just so that I don't have to think about facing the creepy dude at the gym because lets face it  what girl knows how to deal with her fear of creepy dudes?  I really don't understand how those girls who go about exposed do that knowing that there are creepy people out there oggling  them  not that I think I am ogable these days Im not but it makes it more creepy that someone would watch someone who is as out of shape as me urgh brrrr yuck  anyhow  I know as women we are supposed to take back the night and all of that but really it is exhausting having to deal with creepy people and in a small town there seems to be even more of them per capita than in the big city  creepy! ok enough of that

so I went to bed thinking about how to use Pema's looking glass today which is now and I was happy about it  a way to explore and reauthenticate my life  may not change what I do but really who wants to be a self induced zombie?  so i went to bed and thought about a friend of mine who is being reviewed by the IRS (by the way it seems despite the propaganda that they have cut back on staff and the audits are less than 1% that everyone is being audited except the rich and famous or the republicans or the Koch brothers) any how I was sending her a good night best of luck thought because I knew she was up late organizing old tax crap  and I woke up at one in the morning with this poem :

Lay down your burden as well as your hed
Let us sleep together the sleep of the ded

For the ded think not on things that are fled
Or let things go round and round in their hed

Like poems or loves that cannot be hed
For the ded be not afraid of ser dred

Nor do they toss and take to their bed
Memories of lives that have long since fled

Narrie do Thoughts of food, wine or bed
Cross their sleep nor worried their hed

Sleep ye now with neither harm nor dred
The sweet sweet sleep that comforts the ded


ta da!  nice eh  so I texted it to her in the early morning

then I finally fell asleep  and woke somewhere in Scotland with a bunch of old women who were trying to get their act together for a lament  but none of them were quite through the barrier that was holding them back  so I stood up and began to meditate out loud the song that Johnny Cash and Fiona Apple sang as a duet on one of his last albums  Bridge over Troubled Water   only they jumped right in on the first cue and took it off like a sunday school rhyme  which was all wrong  so I had to make them stop and begin again  and over and over they bungled it with their fast pony sunday school mantra carry me away down the river singing
I could feel that they weren't feeling the song  just singsonging it and that felt to me like so much less than what I could feel and wanted to bring to them  and to the ded

I kept telling them NO NO NO  it is a lament  a LAMENT you feel it and that is what makes the words come out that is what makes the song  only they weren't getting it  that it is FEELING that brings the song  and if we FEEL then the song shows up on our lips and we don't get lost down the river of denial

so Pema I feel ya

best mb

fortune cookie

Good Morning Relatives 

I've been working on the kung fu panda handbook  it is coming along   I also am trying to reconnect, to remake and perhaps rewire my brain as I go   when I fell back in 2012 I really smacked my brain and it had to take a break.  then, just when I thought I was breaking out of that healing cusp I fell again in feb last year and reinsured my shoulder and I am sure smacked my brain again though not quite as hard, and have had some setbacks due to that fall on the ice last year 

now every dark has its light if we can find the matches or where we put our glasses to find those matches and then locate the candle to find our way back into normal life   Im still working on finding my glasses for those of you who are interested  

I have chronic pain in my left brachial plexus  by chronic I mean it is ever-present in varying stages of attention controlling awareness  which is exhausting actually  who would have thought my days would become exhausting?  the brachial plexus which you can look up if you are curious and my shoulder were something that I really took for granted most of my life, as to what that plexus affects  the effect it has on me is that I get tired, I have very little ability to function for very long at all during the day and if I work on writing it can be the end of me for the remainder of the day  because of the nerve and muscle pain it triggers or exacerbates in my left neck, shoulder, arm, hand 

to top that all off I have been working on my brain  trying to restore and recapture what I think of as myself in that capacity  I cannot tell you how horrible it was to find that parts of it were inaccessible to me after the traumas I had   not good bad in fact   so I have been trying to fix that and it causes me to have headaches  odd dry pain that is not quite finger point able but present  very not good   but I trust the process actually and understand that with nerve injuries going back through the pain to find the way back to no pain but functional is the way it works or is supposed to work  

I am someone who gains comfort and peace and extreme well being from snow  from the silence and the cold and the beauty of its perfection and its smell and texture  on and on  everything about snow makes me happy  so my brain decided to interpret my wanting to have my brain back as me going skiing in new snow in an amazing place with amazing drops and twists and turns  what is funny is that there was the old me skiing with me and the new me following  that is until I got to the place where the old way led into a deep well worn actually scorched (imagine scorched snow) very deep track that looked way over skied so I made the decision to hop up on my skis and take myself down a different track  leaving my old self to find its way in its past on its own 

thus the headaches eh?  so new snow new tracks new schussing  kind of scary eh?  no not for me  who knows what I will find the the vast reservoirs of my giant snow brain as I make my way across its landscape  at least I am home at last 

anyhow  I got stuck while working on the panda and had to wait a bit while the pieces found their way to the top and I could put them together.  I realize that not all of what is put together for me is immediately recognizable for you  but that is the nice thing about having your own blog  it is yours as is mine so it makes sense to me which if you read it and you are welcome to it it may or may not make sense to you  se-la-ve 

anyhow I was thinking about how like my shoulder before it made itself so ever presently present to me through loss, I was thinking about how Po's skill as a kung fu master is over looked. Not recognized until he becomes recognizable by learning the standardized forms    what is it that Master OOgway sees when he sees Po? what is it that Po is before he is trained? what is it that makes him Him?  Him of course  like my shoulder. it is the unseen the behind the camera that makes the film  it is the life that is brought to the action that makes the action valuable  not the action itself  so I thought I would share a little of what I wrote this morning  

good luck star troopers,  have fun with your life 

How do we teach that kung fu is everything, everywhere, all the time? That we are its’ essence. We are kung fu always even as we are always language, emotion, give and take, curiosity, and that which must attempt. We are always all of these things. Even if we have not mastered our Effort so that like a horse charging under fire we are able to hold our purpose, our intent and our motion channelled through a form that is particular in its path. WE are that. 

Why do I understand this? Because it is everywhere, every moment that I am. Because I am it, and if I am here it is here. If I am moving it is moving. I am the ball of clay it makes itself from. Therefore in me is all that it is or can be. As I make my way through my life, through the things that I choose to use to shape me or that my own push pull with life molds me into or out of, it still remains that all that is possible, came from me.  How cool is that. 

How do we teach ourselves to return to the understanding that we are masters?  That we are born fully capable of all that we want to be. It is an simple matter of believing we already are extraordinary rather than thinking that we have to achieve something or the other in order to be extraordinary. The only permission we need is our own. 

We are all already all that we can be.  Without me there is no kung fu, I am kung fu, I just may not be disciplined yet, or fully trained. But I am what creates kung fu. Without me kung fu is nothing. I am the everything that kung fu needs so that it can exist. Kung fu comes to my table to eat not, the other way around.  It is very important that we take this tiger by the right tale so that it doesn't eat us alive. 

How do we reverse the mirror in which our lives are viewed so that the vast hidden reservoir of our ability is not misfiled in our psyche and shelved as insignificant the moment we walk out of the door of our yoga class, our tai-chi practice, our church study group, or our compassion as a second language study group?

When we push who we are to the back of our minds and forget that we are who we are all the time we become as dry and dusty as a discarded book lost on a forgotten library shelf. When I look back at my life, or at the system of lives around me I see that we are and have been living our lives as if we need some sort of special permission, degree or certificate of competency in order to own them. In order to simply enjoy them. I see so much loss through the loss of all our magnificence because we have come to believe that without what is without whatever that is or may be we are nothing. Worse than nothing, most of us believe we are less than.  Brrrr-ugh, yuck yuck yuck.

When Mr Ping teaches Po that in order to make something special you just have to believe that it is special, he is also saying the opposite. That in order to make something insignificant you just have to believe that it is not special. Our lives, our system of enslavement which is bowing down the heads of our society almost to the breaking point was not created by picking the right or wrong system with which to align ourselves. It was created by thinking that we needed a system at all in order for us to have value, to have purpose, to blossom or make the most of ourselves, or to come to the conclusion that life after going to so much trouble and particular magnificence in creating us would discard us as if we did not matter after all. 

Life is not impersonal. It is not meaningless. It is amazingly, extraordinarily, extravagantly magnificent. And each of us. Each living thing has it wholly in our own hands from the moment we are born until the moment we lay down our little clay suits and move on to the next glorious adventure. We have forgotten that without the magnificent gerbil, the wheel is irrelevant.  When we become salves to the wheel that cannot because of its very nature encompass all of the extraordinary ordinariness of our own simple selves we have lost sight of the original gift of the wheel. 

How do we teach ourselves and thus each other that we already own and in fact embody a tremendous vast incalculable opportunity and competency that is so singularly amazing that there is only one of each of us ever created? How is it that the tools that were created to sharpen our wit, dulled our sense of awareness? Why is it that when I was sent to school and driven to church that the very essence of my own value, my own extraordinary capability was denied, discounted, eliminated from the equation of a successful me as if it was never a divine gift of life fully delivered the moment I was born?

Rather than receive me as the overflowing well that I am, I was taught, brainwashed into thinking that without the permission of that which is without I was less than the meanest thing, even to the point of non existence. I am not the only one who was taught and has used the mirror to destroy myself before it ever occurred to me to see in that mirror looking back at me the infinite capacity that I AM. When education, or persuasion of any kind depends on the premise that without its’ approval, without its’ mastery I am less it is a false teacher. 

Any skill, any discipline, any idea pursued to its infinite application is in fact itself dependent on the presence of the student. Without the student there is no discipline. The student brings to the practice the infinite possibility of learning, adaptation, assimilation, incredulity, curiosity, resilience, application, repetition, opposition, and eventually the ability to discard and move beyond the static realm of the classroom.  Between the small number of practical and personal extraordinary gifts that each student brings to any class, practice, or study of any form of applied learning are the infinite nuances that each student carries within him or herself. Each of us has the seed of infinite possibility bursting open deep inside of us, and reaching and growing towards the light of our own experience in a way that no master will ever experience or have the pleasure of its extraordinary essence of life. 

How do I teach myself? How do I teach all of us to turn the mirror around and instead of seeing what is lacking through some small thimble of controlled negative dialogue, teach myself and others to see what it is, who it is that I bring to the equation just be being present. Just by showing up. Hmm? How do we accomplish this extraordinary reversal of fortune and restore ourselves to our own lives?

Personally for me it is all right here in the Kung Fu Panda. Thank you very much DreamWorks Animation. I just have to believe that I already have the eyes to see it, that I already have the ability to be whatever it is that I see or understand. Then I simply have to get up and get on with it. With me.  No need to be God, or have a degree, or be able to write a masterpiece, do 183 asanas perfectly, or even go on a successful blind date. I just have to get up and be me. Every moment of every day trusting that I am already capable of finding my Way, enjoying what I choose to take on as a discipline or discard as not my cup of tea; as long as I do not leave me behind as I make my way through my own day, my own present presence I will be more than ok. I will be more than enough. I will be, I am my own dragon warrior. 

I'd rather eat bean buns

Good morning Relatives

its super cold today   yet the sky is so present in the crispness  I was able to see the evening and the morning star both in the past twelve hours   so clear and present
I'm working on the writing of the Kung Fu panda interpretation? the teachings that I see in it  and in doing so of course I am getting a great education

its funny how once we clean our glasses the world does have a different focus doesn't it? and it is also funny how what we are working on in ourselves is so immediately relevant to what is next
I received an email from a good acquaintance and it had a link in it to a pod cast by two well respected folks that was titled "The Inner Life of Rebellion"

you know how it is that in the first five minutes that you spend with someone you find out not only how they treat themselves but how as a result of how violent or not they are willing to be to themselves reflexively how violent they are willing to be with you   or you can replace violence with any other adjective or verb as you like  but the first five minutes like a title to a talk are very telling

out of respect for the elder that sent me the link I am looking at this talk

so before I even listened to the pod cast  I reflected on the title
which may seem abrupt to some but the title of something is in fact a big summary of the core of the media

so  I hope you enjoy

First reflection     I am not rebelling    I am restoring myself to my inner focus while staying fully engaged and present in my life 

the wheel that turns me is not outside but within and it turns on this planet and through me and the water that passes through me with each breath and each word and each thought   there is no violence in me nor will I allow the movement of violence to go through me as if I am here to be its filter 

rather I begin and end with neither the idea of a closed system or the thought that it has to have a ruling party 

when we step into the arena of either- or, we have already lost and become prey to the illusion of control

the use of the word rebelling is to assume an antagonistic stance or demeanor   a power play   it assumes that I must either attack or defend something that at best can hold my attention only long enough for me to be destroyed by it 

remember the panda does not chew on the fist of his foe    

remember the only foe the panda faces is the one inside of himself   himself 

rebelling means that there is acquiescence to the idea, the concept that there is a power source outside of me that has right to lay claim to me  

which is false 

chewing on that fist will only distract and deplete me and put my foe in charge of my Effort 

if I take the idea that I must be or am rebellion into my mouth and chew on it, then I have already conceded that I am not available to me. This is chewing on the fist of the illusion of control and giving my center over to that which is not real

I would rather eat bean buns

thank you for the conversation 

best 

mary 

Winter wonder land

Good morning Relatives

Its windy here in Pipestone   the wind is literally howling down the chimney  its quite something to stand out on the snow while the dogs have their morning constitutional and have the wind clean off every wisp of the past  

of course its quite cold out  but somehow it feels really refreshing first thing in the morning    I always think of Ben Franklin and his daily air baths   today the moon is still up  not full any longer already waning as the world comes between herself and her light  so where does that light shine when it is not shining on us ?

I'm waiting on the tea to brew   to take the dogs back out in the morning just for a bit   they are really good dogs  especially this time of year when we have runs of days when it is too cold to be out more than one or two minutes   and inside they spend only a small portion of the day off and on playing then its in their crates to meditate while I am either at the doctor, the library or resting   they are learning to be still when they are not in their crates  which is nice

there are some things that go on in my life that I never write about in the winter  there are some things that go on in my life that I never write about at all.

one thing that my injuries brought into my life is the experience of being connected in a way that I was not previously   previously I think my heart and my mind and my body and my effort were all disconnected  like worker bees that belonged to the same colony  then my Dantian woke up and took over which is amazing and wonderful but very different   it means that the parts of me that worked so diligently separately now tax one another leaving me as a whole rather depleted  I am only just learning not to deplete my self  nor to channel or flush all that I have into one effort as if the balance in my life did not matter or was infinitely recoverable  perhaps it is but when one thing drains me to the point of circling the drain there is something I am not paying attention to about why I am allowing that or seeking it? perhaps

I do know that I have no more tolerance for trauma  and what is funny is that i have discovered that I actually have no responsibility to tolerate trauma   another thing from my primary education discarded   yea  maybe I can take that vacation now and actually go and enjoy the beach

winter sounds are different than summer sounds  especially winter sounds in town  

here the snow plows begin their work at 4am  so if there are going to be owls visiting and I have any chance of hearing them in the night it has to be before the plows begin

I prefer the sounds of the woods  of the water running of the leaves on the trees or the mammals moving about   or the wind  like today   the wind is flexing its muscles against any and all that stand in its way

the other night I went out to get wood from the lean-to and discovered that the pheasant that I had watched walk around the yard while I was writing that day had decided to roost in the rafters of the shed  the explosion of pheasant and dog that was my companion in that tiny space in the dark was so amazing  so much surprise and fear and force coming from the pheasant   so much alert protectiveness from the dog  and me standing still listening holding the wood simply making sure I didn't do anything that would cause me to fall

thats it isn't it  what the winter can be about  learning to stand still and not fall  learning not to leap out in fear, or protectiveness, or service, or what ever    learning to not take hold of the fist of the illusion of control  learning to stop seeking for some kind of input that will entertain me or distract me but rather to find the part in me like when the wind meets my skin in the morning that part of me that perceives it as excellent to be able to find that part in me no matter what is happening with the wind or the moon or the body I wear

I have reached the end of something inside of me this year     the end of debating how to or why or what or which

my writing will change because of it    but the thing is that I think Ive had enough of those kinds of conversations  I would like to go forward to just playing I think   to enjoying what I have learned and fought hard with myself and others to become  I think its enough struggling for me

I've never been much of one for drivel  or talking about stuff that is simply the repeat of someone else trauma or disappointment  or listening to someone trash their family their boss or their whoever  it is just a waste of now to dredge up and vomit all over me and then I have to go and clean off  and start over  

what good is it to think or perpetrate that that kind of standing around and letting oneself be assaulted by someone else's displeasure at their own life or their frustration built on a high emotion rather than a frustration at actually really trying to work something out and not yet making the corner so they keep slamming into the wall of their own blind spot  

we all have blind spots   and we ram into them or use them to run someone else over

until the day comes where we think oh  you know Im tired of that   and we stop   and we stand still until we understand what to do next which sometimes takes a very long winter to find

now i think its time for me to learn how to have the moment as it self  without dragging conversation about the past into it  or allowing someone to fill my moment with their waste products   I think its time to actually learn what is worth having a conversation about  and may be if there is nothing to chat about to be perfectly ok with no sound  no harmony no music blaring all the time  no tv no story running  no plans about the future or assessment of whatever

maybe the sound between myself and others can be discovered and enjoyed without what I used to fill it with  I don't know Ill have to find someone who can understand that without me teaching it to them and then they will have to choose it like I did. they will have to choose it because of them and what comes from it not because of me

have a good day relatives tomorrow it won't exist
mb

Don't Go Wasting Your Emoticons; Save All Your Love for Wee

Good Morning Relatives

there is an ABBA song from Mamma Mia running through my head

what an exciting year this has been   it is full of Wee moments that open and blossom like a sea of Lotus


yesterday I was finding my way through the idea of violence  and how it is that I am so very amazingly discovering who I AM by finding in me the ME that I don't want to be  and then remembering the me that is not her and being that me   its like imprinting   it is like weaving back and forth through a mirror  without looking back

In relationship  in communion and intimacy with another  I am finding that my first relationship  is with The Beloved   who at first was presented as someone outside of me  i.e. they were supposed to be my Beloved, and me their Beloved as someone outside of them

 but  I think that is not so   not at first    I think that at first I must find the Beloved in me   My Beloved   The One who will not be moved away from me by the reality of me no matter who that me is

and lets face it  not all of us want to live where it can be -30 with a strong North wind  and some of us no matter how good we get along with each other just have a path that takes us along a different route

but today we are in the same coffee shop  reflecting on this wee moment and sharing our journey thus far

so Back to the wee moment of realizing who in fact My Beloved is

I have never left me,  I have avoided me like the plague at times, and hated me, and despised me, and fooled me, and pretended like I didn't exist, or that I wasn't actually out with me when cooler folks showed up, and I have done all kinds of unimaginable and imaginable good and bad things to me, but I have never left me relatives.  that mirror of me looking at me is as close as it always was the moment I came into this reality...   My Beloved, is that not ME/THEE with Thy/Myself ?   Is not my first relationship with myself truly?

and when I have fear in relationship and act to avoid what ever that fear conjures up like a djinni out of the bottle of imaginary hurts and losses, am I not being, by my act of changing me to suit the djinni, violent with me?  And if I am willing to be violent with me relatives  then am I not willing to be violent with you?  So you see, in the wee moment, I must turn to me and see me, and make the choice not to be violent, but to be The Beloved, to see myself as The Beloved that I AM.

I am discovering relatives despite all the self help books that I have not read so far and a few that I have, that I have been violent with me about you.  why because I am discovering that I have been violent with me.   who would have thought .
  
 In the wee moments of freindship, of encounter with another human being; there is a difference in the conscious act of holding back that which is not said, that which is private but true and stays true and private;  and in the decision and action of holding back that which is true so that I can present that which is not true or that which is false, and thus, in doing so "try" for a more favorable outcome in the encounter for me.   that is me manipulating me and thinking less of you    that is self violence and probably a thousand other things that Froid or Young or Madame Cure you and me would be able to identify.

that means that in that moment I have chained me up somewhere inside of me and presented to you and the world around me a me that is not me,  and when I make me show up as not me out under the threat of whatever it is, when i agree to do that,  it is me being violent with me.  and if i am willing to be violent with me relatives, you can be sure that I am willing to be violent with you.  

 a simpler way to say that is to say that some things are private  and some things are timely and somethings are deceptions  and we /I always know the difference . don't we?  and when we step out thinking that we will not be transparent only until we feel safe we have already shown up as someone who is not ourselves and in her presence  we will never be safe because she is not based on trust, on love, on confidence, on acceptance, on steady feet filled with the strength of our own true Beloved self.

 Are we not first and foremost violent with ourselves long before we are to another who is outside of me/us?  yes I think we are    because I think that some of us are raging inside and rather than come face to face with whatever it is or was that we wanted that we did not get and let that go, we want to make the world around us pay for that loss and we are willing to do anything to make that happen even change, crush, destroy ourselves to get that bottomless cup filled.

that is one of the millions of scars, of wounds,  that lie behind that faux face we choose to put on. That scar never fades, that wound,never heals, as long as we continue to hold it dear and chain ourselves up to its memory and force the world around us to dance to its toon

Thus in looking at this we find one of the keys to inner peace,  to becoming, and deciding to consciously live, with The Beloved. We find the willingness to look into our own eyes and see what pains us without letting it rule us, without letting it hurt us, without letting it change our world into something that is inauthentic and begun on the premise of the self violent act of not accepting ourself as we are  and of being afraid to ask our world to accept us as we are, afraid enough to take our own life and diminish or eradicate it rather than risk exposing our fear for the djinni smoke that it is.

In relationship the fear of sharing  of communing of being transparent is it not rooted in something that I am myself afraid of losing or encountering if I am honest first with me and then outloud with you?

when we experience the threat of loss and try to deflect it by withholding or withdrawing, we are using the manipulation of our own authenticity to present a faux face of cooperation so that we may increase our chances of favorable participation in a relationship with someone or something, it is a primal act of violence towards ourselves.  we have threatened our own self with our own fear, or greed, or illusion whatever it may be.  and that threat no matter how subtle ends our transparency and our opportunity for success and freedom

a threat is a threat is a threat  and violence always begins with stepping into a supposition and then escalating it into reality

so when I am afraid of expressing me to me  or to anyone outside of me   at the root of that avoidance, is my own violence my own threat of loss my own threat of causing pain or experiencing pain as a result of........  at my own hand

and so I train myself or did to avoid what is true or transparent about me   thinking that if I avoid that threatened thing then I am avoiding / saving myself from something I have imagined and decided about you or the world around me

so the first step is to acknowledge that the only way that I would know that I am lying to you by not being me is that I already know that I know me already  and I can't bear the thought of sharing me with you.

I cannot escape my Beloved,  I can turn my back on her,  I can ignore her but I cannot eradicate her.
She is Me  
Because of her  I cannot but be transparent with me  My Beloved
I can pretend that I am NOT ME,
but the only way that I can avoid being me with you is if I already know who I am and I have decided to act on that fear of letting you know the real me    therefore: it is impossible to not be transparent with me.  so you see the hard part is over before we begin.

it is to see that I exist even when I don't want to and to also see that that part of me that is ineradicable is the part of me that loves me evermore  that part of me is my Beloved

the next step is to admit that the only way to be safe in the inner or outer world is to exist as my transparent authentic Beloved Self, as me in the presence of my Beloved ,I am never alone or unloved in any world,  and if those whom I am around are truly NOT safe for me then pretending anything other than that the smart thing to do is to get away from them is also me being violent with me   staying with violence out of fear of violence is self violence.

which means that if I am not brave enough to be my transparent self transparently with you, then either I am trying to manipulate you, or my environment (which tells you something about me), or I am operating on the assumption, the judgement, that you will judge me, or perhaps the already knowledge (which is different than judgement) that you are indeed dangerous to me [( which simply may mean that you prefer that I not show up as me) that is the second most dangerous relationship, the first being if I am that way to me].  It means that I am behaving in your and my relating as if you have an agenda towards me and that that agenda is what fuels our interaction and without that agenda being met or satisfied then the relating between us would end, change, cease and desist, or something

and that would be perceived as a loss, or pain full for me  

why

why a loss if the parties I am partying with require me / if I am to be part of their party/ to be something other than what I am ?   if that is so, then they do not want me there in the first place. If that is so, and what they want is what they want and they are seeing if I am ready willing and able to fit the bill, then what am I doing?

Lucky for me I was never a Bill  I was always a Mary

so when I look at you and see in me the need, the desire, the want, the impetus from me to harm me so that I can or might be in your good graces, or conversely out from under what I already know to be your evil eye, I am being violent with me   and in doing so I am giving you and the rest of the world permission to also be violent with me  because I have already begun any interaction with me at the core of me with the violent act of threatening myself that the world will be less; my world will be less, my world will be painful or awful or unbearable if I am in it.

How crazy is that ?   somewhere inside of me in the past and on less and less occasion in the present, I threaten me with pain, dismemberment, horrible difficulties; it's like a nightmare house of horrors that are self inflicted  if I don't behave according to what I think is outside of me   according to what my fears are deciding for me

[All the while my Beloved Self is jumping up and down singing, "Take a Chance on Me! Take a Chance, Take a Chance, Take a Chance, Chance, Chance!"]

so what is worse    actually losing a relationship that is not interested in me/you to begin with?  I know I know  everyone wants to be wanted  me also and many of us have invested years, decades really in this faux connection [don't you think we have lived in the djinni bottle long enough?]  and at heart we are so used to letting our own fear chase us through and out of our own house  

but I assure you     I guarantee that if you stand for you   and don't sell yourself for less  if you find you and not be all inner child huggie and loveydovey  but rather say  Hey I know you   and I like you and you are me and hey after all this time you are still here.  Huh whats that? You promise to bear whatever pain comes through the illusion of consequence and dispel it with a wave of the wand of The Beloved  well  who could not go for that   and what as a consequence those who are also of the Beloved of Themselves will also be brave and transparent with me and we will actually have created and live in a world that is made of authenticity and trust

its a simple thing really  to find ourselves  we simply have to look  don't be afraid  there is no one there who doesn't already love you totally and know you totally in all your old style fit the Bill-ness there is no judgement and no dues to pay and no going back

just the gentle standing with you/me as wee are and saying ok  yeah I can see why you might think that but lets try our life without that  lets try our life as us  as something that is not fearful or bent on revenge or holding on to whatever or needing recompense or blah blah blah

lets just everytime we feel that threat of needing to be non transparent, call a spade a spade and dig into our own supposition and get to the root of it, not in a messy past life way, but simply,

   I am afraid I am going to lose our friendship if I show up as me  and in saying that simple thing I admit that I think less of you and I am sorry for that   and I was for a wee moment willing, thinking about, considering not showing up as the real me

so

think wee can do that relatives     I think so     no need to be whoo-hooey  or rash or bold  just take a wee moment and look that emoticon in the face  and see its heart and  Take a Chance
accept that you/I am a being that needs a Beloved    and then  ta-da  be The Beloved you always wanted

love ya
mean it
mb

Comfort and Joy

Good Morning Relatives

it's a weird thing isn't it  needing to actually discover and learn and then practice new skills if we are going to actually have, allow, and enjoy a world that is different than the one we have walked away from

but there is no other choice is there?   I suppose that there is the choice of not doing it    but then what would become of all that newborn creativity if we use it to simply recreate what killed us in the first place?

I had a crazy horrible dream about the bank failing   and by that I mean THE BANK  you know what we all believe in  well  in my dream it failed   kaput bankrupt  insolvent

so for me that meant panic    not sure about what it would do to you  but to me  panic  then mad really mad sort of in a horrible told you so way     awful feeling  horrible

and then completely unnerved     I was caught in a night mare   caught in the past by looking back, my feet no longer flowing in my present which was caught by my eyes and senses and the essence of me that I let turn back.   I felt like Lot's wife slowly turning to salt by looking back and admiring the horror of what was foretold actually blossoming and coming true right before my eyes and the backs of those who were fleeing and NOT looking back   I didn't want to be salt  to be consumed by tears  which is how I felt  that I was dissolving into tears  it was comforting in a horrid crazy death calling way comforting but not who I wanted to be or where I wanted to be

what happens when we leave the present for the past ?   what happens when we use the past to define our present?   a past that we have put to death, that we have sent on its way to it's inevitable demise.  we who are used to being steady in now that we believed in to be true and viable.  what happens what happens when we try to be in the present when all we can FEEL is the pain of the past ?  how do we unfreeze ourselves ?

so  what do we use to save kung fu from what defeats kung fu?  

we use kung fu

I know that is a little bit mysterious and kungfuy  but its way more concise than what is to follow

being caught in the fear and pain and rawness and tears of the past/present I got out of bed

I wanted to be held to be comforted but something in me finally realized that one of the reason I have not been in the position of actually having comfort; hugs, thoughtful hands, chests to hug that are solid and warm and gentle, laughter that gently put you/me back on your/my feet, then teases that help you/me regain your/my steadiness  and then trust and love that allows you/me to go on and forward and leave behind what ever it was that was back there

the reason I had not been allowed or to have that was that I did not yet have the skills to make it something that was not the past  that was not diseased or insolvent.  Life knows that I am not interested in what destroys  and I am aware that the subtle start of a downhill path often looks so exactly like the stairs that lead up to heaven,  I should have known that opportunity when proffered me was opportunity to change the world, my world, because changing my world, my path, my skill, my actions and application of theory will change my world  and changing my world, changing me  will most directly and solidly change all of you    THAT is kung fu   that is NOW a NEW NOW
and up until then when I reached for comfort I didn't really know how to have it in a non dependent creepy biohazard biofeedback horrible way.   but what do we know when we look in a mirror  we know that the opposite of where we find ourselves exists   and because we know that it exists  i.e. the opposite of a lie is truth,  the opposite of not now is now  the opposite of me who is not educated, skilled, confident and joyful, is me that is   the me who can receive comfort and give it without myself or the other person being trapped in it or covered in sticky nasty crap meant I had to be different  I had to discover and become new skills, but I also had to be engaged with a person or persons who are different as well

no wonder its been a bit bollocksed till now   I wasn't at the root of the weed yet  hmm one more root rooted out

 that revelation did not scare me rather it helped me to see finally the light of the door that I didn't know I needed to open

so now

the whole thing is about learning to have NOW  to be now
its back to the exercise of inner peace   in kung fu panda 2   letting the past go even if I have just woken up from it s night mare

but not in a oh you didn't happen way    Nope that's not it  living on the river DeNile is not a good idea either

present in the present with the past as the past but not denied  learn new skills  

the only thing that would bring me back to NOW was NOW

the only way to have a now that is not the past is to leave the past out of it

the only thing that can save kung fu from what defeats kung fu is kung fu

so getting dressed,  letting the dogs out, the cat in, scooping the poop, making coffee, slicing bread for french toast, feeding the dogs, eye meds for stinky, pouring coffee,  make the fire   all at the same time breathing and feeling my Dantian rather than cutting off my gut and walling off what I came out of  (and trust me it was the scariest tunnel of love that Ive ever been in) whew

and now NOW I am I find I am ok   wow   interesting   cool
and exhausting   all this doing is so traumatizing  I suppose it is better than starting over isn't it?

I can do this  I can discover you in the moment without knowing all about your past  and you can discover me in the moment without knowing all about my past  

we may not have a big moment  or know at first go how to have all that it is  but I have an idea that will grow and change   as our skill develops   but first we have to decide to have that skill

first we have to believe

thanx for that

love
mary

The Heart Was Made For Other Things: A Reflection on the practice of Heart Coherence

good Morning Relatives

 I want to offer a different perspective to the heart coherence idea.  There was no time at the gathering to discuss this idea fully either in private or public. Given that it was so beautifully outlined and emphasized in the fall issue of the Grandmothers Circle News, I thought that it would be timely to offer the mirror perspective to that practice.  I believe this might be valuable as well as informative to our sisters. I appreciate the balance and willingness of the Grandmothers Circle News in cultivating diverse community and perspective and I have mailed a copy of this blog in the form of an email to them and requested that it be published in the Winter issue.

Energetics are one of the ways that we as human beings communicate and listen, to our selves, and to each other. Energetics are a way of transferring intent to our environment and to each other. By Learning to feel, or gauge Energetics, we are able to determine the positivity, or negativity, of the intent of those with whom we interact on a daily basis as well as during times of ceremony.

I hate to be the one to say it, well actually I don’t hate to be the one, I am willing to be the one to say that not all who come to any gathering are of the same positive intent that I/we may be showing up with.  I don’t thing there is need to walk around like "I’m under attack," all the time, but suffice it to say that at every ceremony or gathering I have been at, there have been those who come to feed off of those who are there or may even have had a more destructive intention than just filling themselves up on someone else’s energetic giveaway.  It is a given that when a light shines things are attracted to that light.  There are predators in our world and for me pretending they are not there is just silly and a waste of time.

I have long been of the opinion that rather than pretend that this does not exist it is the responsibility of the leadership (i.e. those with more experience or training, or who are "in charge") to protect and guide those who attend, as they may be less aware of these entities and less than prepared to deflect, avoid, or negate them.

Even in a positive exchange, the movement or transfer of energetics can leave or create a feeling of euphoria, exhaustion, or fear depending on the circumstance.  These feelings, if created in a group or mass effect of human beings can be quite powerful.  They can also be quite misleading if not downright dangerous. One only has to bring to mind the people who died in Sedona a few years back to find a real-life example of the danger that is possible.  In Sedona there were charismatic leaders with a willingness to mislead others for energetic gain combined with individuals who as a group were willing to be misled for the chance to experience a spiritual phenomena.

The transfer of energetics whether willingly, naively, innocently or without awareness is something that can be mistaken as a sacred act. It is not that hard to manipulate a group of willing participants who have come to an event; to get away from their daily lives, or who have come seeking spiritual elevation, or who have come to find something that they still think is outside of themselves.  Elevating the energetics of willing participants can be done with group chant, song, recitation, meditation or voice over direction.

Even if it is a “Fake it till you make it” situation, that doesn’t mean that energetics are not being given and received.  On the contrary, if we elevate our openness and willingness and give away our energy,  even if we don't know what we are doing, someone or something is most likely going to take it.  Unfortunately for those of us who are faking it till we make it, the leaders of ceremonies like this will continue to drain us without ever teaching us to be ourselves truly until we have nothing left to give or we become succubus’s ourselves because we have an ah-ha moment where we learn we can snack on those who are all standing there pouring out their energy trying to connect by feeding the universe like it is not capable of feeding itself.  Trust me the Universe does not need you to sustain it, it is the other way around. 

Elevated energetics can be perceived and or described as coinciding with detailed phenomena which may in fact occur. People have visions, interact with Spirits, medicine comes in the dreamtime, in the practice of tai-chi or qigong after years finally, it clicks and then flows like magic.   But, I always remember what Dr Clarissa Pinkola Estes says, “ Interesting if true, but so what.”  Meaning so you saw some firecrackers or your past life, what are you going to do about you in this life? How are you going to use that insight in your daily life?

One of the ways that I was taught to recognize those who I could trust to go to ceremony with was in observing whether or not the phenomena was the end point to them, or, whether or not the work that was being done was to actually educate, heal, or strengthen the participant.  Sadly to say the education part, the application of practical magic, or tai-chi, or simple prayer, so to speak, to our daily lives was and continues to be sorely lacking at many of these events.  

The phenomena is not the point of any energetic exchange. Whether that exchange be between a person and the Spirits, or a person and another person.  The point is to come face to face with the you, you have created so far, and decide if you are going to continue with her or not. If not, then the ceremonial leader should be able to follow up the event with perspective that helps YOU find YOUR PATH.  Any ceremonial leader should be available for you to ask questions of the day after or perhaps after you have gone home and thought about yourself.  We are accessible.  It's one of the rules.  However we / I am not available for you to follow around and worship. If you need something ask, but ask because you are working on working you out, not because you perceive them, or me, as the mouth of god dripping with honey. Yuck.  See what I mean? double yuck. 

For example: I am happy to help bring ceremony and real time connection for the grandmothers to the gathering.  I am aware that the Spirits show up, and that there is an exchange between the grandmothers individually and the Spirits and I am glad to be able to help that happen.  But, it does not make me more than or better than anyone else. I am just someone whose path lay in that work.  so, If you come back to grandmothers because you think I will be there and you can have another spiritual bang, I will probably be at the beach or in New York catching a show.  If you come back because you used the giveaway to grow and to blossom and you want to share the new beauty way that is you, well, I’ll be all ears and the first to honor you for your love of you and the medicine that was given by the Spirits and all the hard work you put it to in your life.  That is the phenomena for me. Awesomeness!

so, on to the fantasy of energy and coherence.

Any one among us who has “fallen in love” only to find out that our hormones, our passions, our libido, or simply what we ate for breakfast has given us a rush of fantasy or projection about ourselves or another person and our relationship to them as being exactly what we have been looking for all our lives; (gasp, take a breath and sigh)  only to find when we try to recreate that phenomena in our daily lives, that neither of us are who or where we thought we were or are; can understand the enormity of how wrong we can be about phenomena, energetic exchanges, and about how powerful it can be and that we are not in love at all but caught in something else. Something that can be quite dangerous.

Remember in Harry Potter the most dangerous potion in potions class was the love potion.  

 In the practice of the traditional medicine way, in which I have trained and continue to practice, it is strictly forbidden to step into the role of doing the work of the Spirits.  Each person who is in ceremony may be there in a circle, but each person has an individual interaction with the Spirits that is their business, not mine and not anyone else’s in the ceremony.  The “rim”:the pipes, the patterns, the directions, the medicine herbs, the songs or rituals of the ceremony, the people and animals who are gathered, the fire, the prayer tyes; are a dance of invitation and agreements between the intercessor and the Spirits so that there are rules and also consequences of stepping outside those rules if either the intercessor or the Spirits decide to use the willingness of the ceremonial participants to their own advantage.  This agreement on both sides is imperative for the safety of the participants.

During these times of energetic exchange between the individuals gathered and the Spirits, I may be present, I may be the intercessor,  but I am not a part of or connected to that exchange between each person and the Spirits.  I'm helping, I'm holding but I am not grasping or owning.  It’s complicated and takes years to understand and years to learn how not to be harmed let alone not harm anyone else and to let the Spirits do their work as they can.

Believe it or not Relatives, we can and do prevent them from giving all that they can. Thankfully the Spirits know exactly what my intention is and while I have been spanked soundly for being ignorant, not paying attention, or not being mindful, they know clearly that I have never ever ever wanted to use or have any personal gain from standing in that space.  

whe-ew  it is scary even thinking about that. As Grandmother Margaret says, our way is not an easy way.  

True Spiritual medicine or work does not happen because we have purposefully tried to cohere our hearts into one energetic mass effect.  Believe me the Spirits are fully capable of bringing all the needed energy to any event. We on the other hand, are already in alignment because we showed up and are standing together.  That is all it takes.  The medicine is not that complicated and it does not need for us to compromise ourselves or merge with another in order for it to work;i.e. have an effect on us or the world around us.  The Spirits are not one being, but they and we are all, One Being.  It is complicated to put into words but not to see.

It is more important that we be who we are individually, together, than to create an energetic connection that involves our hearts. That medicine of connectivity is happening all the time. It is not through our hearts that we connect to it.  Our gathering is to share our diversity, our nuance, our beauty, not to be gently trained to give our energy through repetition and practice to someone else's agenda or control.  The circle is not about being one or being the same. The circle is about individuals holding principles and agreements so that they through a predefined practice are able to be fully themselves as individuals.  That is the circle.

It is our singularity shining forth, yet held in closeness by standing with each other, that makes the great light of our gathering illuminating.  Linking our hearts, trying to put us all on the same wavelength, in fact for me makes coming together a vulnerable and dangerous activity.  Years ago when i was exposed to this group heart cohering, it felt wrong to me. I felt like I was being herded or trained to be something that was headed for a cliff.  There is a way to connect without this herding business. I will explain more about this in a moment.  Bear with me this is an important concept and is complex.

Spiritual medicine happens because the Spirits choose to show up. They are in charge. Not someone with a vision leading us through an energetic exercise that is designed to wow or shock and awe.  Every ceremony that I have led came from the culmination in the immediate moment of understanding, requests, lessons taught and visions discussed with elders after the ceremony was requested.  It comes from those who requested it and are gathered to receive it and deliver it. It is built as the medicine gathers itself specifically for that time place and all the participants.  For me there is very little "ritual" or pattern but there is always principle and listening and following with careful strict boundaries what the Spirits involved request.  Afterwards it is fully discussable and I am very willing to do so with any who were at the ceremony.  Confidentiality is one of the parts of ceremony.  Remember that the medicine of one event is connected to all the events of that gathering.  Ceremony works because those who are present are willing, not to be what we are not, but because we show up as who we are. The energy that is brought to a ceremony is brought by the Spirits and bound by the agreements made by the process  it is not generated by those who gather there.

Hooking up a bunch of old lady batteries to a spiritual display and creating an ah-ha moment that dazzles and distracts and fails to educate or teach something for daily life is not what the energy of your or my heart is made for.  We become what we practice and what may start out as a feel good ritual that is apparently innocent may be training us to participate in something that is much more serious and not necessarily in our best interest. the best example of that was the koolaid drinkers in Jonestown. Those spiritual seekers did not all of the sudden one day do the things they did.  They were led there by those who trained them in their innocence long before they moved to Guyana.  I'm not saying that the grandmothers are planning on serving koolaid but the point is that messing with the heart and what you or I or we connect to it can harm us and it begins with something that is small and not questioned.  it is lemmings headed for a cliff, or not?  my point in all of this is unless those who are asking you to do something are also giving you the chance the strength the opportunity and supporting your right to question and understand what they are asking you to do, then why are you doing it?  HMMMMMMM?

Frankly I wouldn’t want anyone to stand in circle with me and be expected to entertain or hold or bear what I might be ready to and I definitely don’t want to go through your stuff either. No offense but its just not a good idea. Why does all this matter to say?  Because, words matter, intention matters, because they are medicine and we don’t swallow medicine that we do not know fully or as close to fully what it will do to us and or what it will take from us. Words  matter.  It also matters because playing with fire will get you or me or some of us who are the most innocent burned.  We don't play with fire. 

  Not everyone, in fact very few of us have the same vibration or energetics at any given time.  One of the beauty ways of the circle practice is that even when we think we are all in agreement and have the same intention, we see that we are very diverse in our perspective and application of that intention.

The energies of our intention are align-able its true.  It can be done.   The mechanical, mental, or emotional alignment of group energies is one way that some people use to achieve what is felt or illuminated as a higher plane, a higher consciousness, or an esoteric happening.

Some people use the energies of others to create phenomena to try and gain something for themselves, or to create a group experience that is powerful.  But the creation of a group experience is not necessarily the same thing as a safe environment or helpful experience for those who are in attendance.

Giving your energy so that someone else becomes something from it is not your responsibility and will not bring positivity into your life even if it makes you feel different or whoo hooey for a little while. We are not responsible for each others spiritual successes, but we can be a participant in misleading them or ourselves if we proceed in ignorance or with negative intention.

 It has been my experience that those who manipulate the energies of others for their own purpose (even if they think it is for world peace) either do not really know what they are doing, or they are only interested in how it makes them feel afterwards and don't really care what it might do to you in the process. As long as there have been exchanges between our temporal bodies and our celestial selves there have been those who think differently about how and when and why that exchange is valuable or useful.

Trust me I have gone up to the "spiritual leader" the morning after one of these group ceremonial coherence grandmother events and asked her point blank about what she was doing. I asked her if she could see the dimensionality of the patterns and what they were really for.  I asked if she actually saw it or understood it, and how she intended to teach the grandmothers that were exposed to it how it might affect them later.  I asked her what life teaching came from what she used them to create or reveal.

The reply I got was that it was not her problem how it affected the participants. She didn't understand what it meant and she said it was not her responsibility to understand. She stated that she felt no responsibility to educate them or teach them, she didn't care if she didn't understand the depth and use of the pattern she only cared that she was successful in using the grandmothers to open it; and wait for it.... (this is the big holy crap eye awakener for me)  she was now (thanx to all the energy she just helped herself to and manipulated that was freely and I believe ignorantly given by the grandmothers who participated) some sort of spiritual creation chief of rainbow energies and she had better things to do than think about the daily lives of grandmothers or how what she wanted to do would affect them.

yeah  I kid you not that is what she told me    not a great followup to ceremony huh grandmothers ?

I guarantee you that none of the Spirits of Creation or otherwise are uninterested in our individual health, well being, and understanding.  At least not the ones I hang out with.  Whew, After that gathering I felt like I had been witness to a great spiritual tragedy.  the next year when it came time to send in an application I sent mine with a list of questions for the leaders with concerns about ceremonial impact and followup. It was the third year that I had asked them if they would consider putting together a spiritual council of women from different faiths and tribes who were spiritual leaders to be part of the planning and care for the grandmothers.  It seemed to me, after attending for three years that they were determined to make ceremony and spiritual encounter and energy exchange a big part of their agenda and I thought it would be a good idea to have some elders help over see that and be available to the grandmothers. Kind of a balance and oversight committee.  I received no reply to my questions or suggestions.  I waited and then sent another questioning email to see what was going on, it voiced my concerns and the wall of fear that I encountered in the ether every time I sat down to write out my check to attend.  What I received in the mail was a letter from the planning committee of that gathering formally disinviting both myself and Grandmother Margaret from ever attending.  It was written by the leaders of that gathering, they clearly expressed that they preferred I never come back to that gathering.  Something to do with asking too many questions. 

One of the Traditional Spiritual Teachers that I have has said that any ceremonial leader should be able to sit down and quietly and thoroughly answer questions from another ceremonial leader about what they are doing.
In other words if you cannot sit in front of the most innocent and speak clearly about who you are and what you are about and have clear and repeatable answers for those who ask then are you someone who is safe?

 We are not gods even though we are God. We do not use each other to create or destroy.  We are on this physical plane, we are removed from some of what we as eternal beings are capable of when we are stars, so that we may understand compassion and thoughtfulness, mindfulness and love each of us in our own moment as one beauty way perfect as we are. That is a great power and a great thing that is made to be the great IAM as the infinitesimal nuance that is everything all together all at once in one moment as itself. There is no need to blend or link to create our work or see or feel who we are in each others presence.  In fact if we become one here and now we negate the here and now of who we are. 

we are not the same and we are not meant to be the same  or to use who we are  or use each other to make something else in this time and space that is not our job this go round  that job belongs to the creation spirits   it is quite enough to learn while we are here to be all that we individually are  and to come together and make the space for each other to be as we are separate but gathered is quite a miracle in itself

so back to the circle and the intentions that are gathered there and why we don't connect to that circle with our hearts

It is easy to see that very few of us no matter how long we know each other or how cohesive our discussions are have or carry the same intention in any given situation especially in a circle. We all come from different experiences, memories, skill levels, and have different agendas and communicate well but often not very well with those who we are meeting for the first time or even those with whom we are trying to learn a new way to connect. One of the reasons we use the circle practice is that it allows us as individuals, as ourselves fully, to interact in a personal and sometimes very powerful way through our connection to the middle; to the fire.  Our connection through the rim of agreements, principles and practices assures us that we may show up as we are without any worry that we will fit or not fit, be the same or not, be huggy and lovely, or something altogether original. The one thing that the circle practice prohibits as does the universal or cosmic laws, is that of using opportunity for self promotion, gain or manipulation of others.  Its a no-no.

We are unified in our circle practice and the energetics go in the middle, in the Dantian, the fire in the belly of the circle. For some of us this is the first time we get to experience freely not fitting in, not being the same, not bending ourselves as women or changing who we are into a cohesive unit that pleases or serves something beyond ourselves.  For some of us, the circle practice at the gathering is the first time we get to exist as ourselves and listen to our own heart speaking to us.  What makes the circle valuable is that it is diverse.  What makes us so valuable is that we are diverse.  We are the beautiful nuance of eternity captured in a moment of time and space.  You are absolutely different than me and I love that about you!

The heart is powerful.  It is also personal.  It is private and in more than one human being who is walking around the heart is often physically compromised or weak.  It is no secret or illusion that great energy can change, move, harm or heal the physical, emotional, and cognitive capacity of a physical being.

This is why in the study ofTai-chi, qigong, and in ceremony it is a core teaching and responsibility of the master to teach the student that the energy of the practice, the medicine, flows not from the heart but from the belly, the Dantian of the fire. The heart has other tasks and medicines to attend to.  Energetics that flow between us especially during elevated times of interaction should not originate from, reside in or move into the heart.  To do so is to risk killing or severely damaging the heart of the person you are sending that energy to, or to yourself as the conduit of that energy. There is more than one account of Masters who damaged their hearts, had heart attacks and died or nearly died, because when they were first beginning to learn their practice, they did not learn to move from the Dantian rather than the heart.

basically its like plugging your christmas lights into the wrong socket.  It may work for a bit when you are learning and trying on your practice, but when what is really inside of you and what is really outside of you (which is still you) connects in your heart, rather than the Dantian which is designed for that connection; it fries the heart.  just like too many plugs at christmas

Please do not ask me to align my heart with yours energetically. Please, recognize rather, from my individuality and my active attentiveness that I am present and I want you also to be present.  I do not want to be you or for you to be me, I want us to BE together we already are, One, and it is here as singularities that I get to see myself in you as the beauty that in this time and space I cannot be or see when we are not here.  My heart is mine, yours belongs to you.  Our Dantian however is something else altogether. 

and if you are still with me after all the preamble  which is important  then now we will get down to the Dantian (not the heart, ha caught ya!) of the matter.

In tai-chi, and in qigong, in ceremony, the flow and exchange of energy is one of the core principles of the movement and power or strength of the practice.  In tai-chi, ceremony, and qigong, energy may pass through our entire being including our heart, but we do not hold it there or move from the heart in our practice.  We do not use our heart as the focus or receptacle of energy flow, chi, around or through or from us.  To do so is dangerous.

To teach people to connect through their heart for energy exchange is, for someone of my training and background, a thought that is abhorrent in the highest degree.   I understand that not all have my background or training, or experience.  I remember that we are all diverse and that we all have differing paths and nuances to share.  I respect those who want to pursue this way of heart coherence that is being taught and shared as the beauty way.  However, I feel it is my responsibility to speak up for a different way.  

We use the Dantian for energy exchange precisely because it is not emotional or controlled by our thoughts. We use it so that we do not overwhelm another with our own thoughts or emotions or allow another to overwhelm us. Moving from the Dantian, connecting to the energetics that flow between us through the Dantian is connecting through the higher states of awareness rather than the physical and emotional and mental mechanism of the heart.  Believe it or not the heart is real. It is a muscle that can be damaged, overwhelmed, and sometimes destroyed actually very easily by energy.  The Dantian however, is a place that exists inside us without existing in one of our physical organs. It therefore capable of being used as an energy exhange center, without risk of a heart attack and is quite useful as a defense against a body or energy attack.  The Dantian is capable of being everything all together all at once (Takucnascnan) without harming us physically or depending on someone else to manage or control it.  it is not controllable by another in us which is quite cool and yet it is very capable of connecting to all that is.   Awesomeness!!!  and it is built in , yep  its free you already have one just like I do and its been waiting for you to find it all these years   cooooooool 

I understand the desire to feel the heart bond or elevation of energy especially when our hearts are tired or our Dantian is cut off from the energetics of our universe and spiritual self because we have a block in ourselves that keeps us from its balance. If you are unable to connect to your Dantian I suggest working on it rather than using or practicing connection by using the heart.  The heart is wonderful and amazing, but it is not the place to connect, it is the place that tends to us as individuals.

Many of us have forgotten that we have a private garden in our heart and we also have a universal spiritual hub so to speak  in our Dantian.  They are two different places in our bodies.  My heart is the place in me that gets to remain gentle and soft, protected by skill, experience, and the sacred space that is my one and true place in this physical world that is part of the great circle of life.  My heart is my place.  It belongs to me and it is where I sit in council with myself.

My Dantian is my place of exchange.  Because the Dantian is intimately and inexplicably connected always to Takucnascnan (everything alltogether all at once) the eternal and the temporal and all that is and all that was and all that will be  ALL of IT, it has much more skill and ability than my brain, or my heart muscle, or my slow to remember untrained ignorant self thus far.  So I trust it to take care of me and I am learning to move from it and to receive through it and to let it take care of me and to not override it (my gut) with my head or my emotion or someone else’s story or agenda.  It has enough coherence for me with all of you for lifetimes of connection. 

when we gather, I trust that my presence is a coherence.  I trust that my practice is a coherence.  I keep my heart for me. my Dantian is constantly in motion in balance with the Dantian that you also bring.  So think about your heart and think about your beautifulness and take good care of it.  We are quite amazing spiritual warrioresses ladies.  We just need to make sure that we know what we are doing and choosing.  Educate yourselves, ask questions, follow but don't be led.  Walk with me not behind me.  we are in circle are we not?

So with all respect to the other side of the mirror and its practices and practitioners, Rather than using my heart to give, receive, or send energy and coherence to any other, I choose to use my Dantian, my core of chi, my gut.  It is the place where my sense of restraint and deflection and thoughtfulness and understanding is not controlled by my head or by my emotion or colored by my fantasy or past. It is the place that is impervious to harm, which is quite nice frankly.  It is the place where I know that no harm will come to you from me or to me from you.

and so with this letter/blog I stand in my place in the circle and add a voice of perspective and perhaps balance to our gathering 

thanx for letting me be present and I hope you enjoy the present of this

love ya, mean it 

Hehaka Win Wicakpi Zi