We Can Trust the Word ‘Freedom’

This is not a political story but a story about Earth

Photo by Mae Mu on Unsplash

We think of freedom in terms of color. Red, white, and blue. Can we not think of freedom in terms of shape? In complexity? In form?

This head of lettuce, to me, represents freedom. It is a unit of measurement with multiple parts. It is a form. A shape. A representation of old and new. Big and small. Tender and tough.

Lettuce, you ask? How can a head of lettuce satisfy a serious-minded conversation about freedom at a time when the United States is reeling with insecurity and mistrust, and the very word ‘freedom’ is no longer a word we use as a united people?

I will tell you that we are a head of lettuce.

We, the citizens of the United States, are bound as one like the leaves to a common root. Place. There is no other word that will substitute. The United States is a place.

The United States has become a way of thinking, but before I go there let’s consider the root. It is. What? A root. A stand of multi-sensory components that nurture the head of lettuce.

What are we? We are the scattered leaves that have emotionally and spiritually dislodged ourselves from the root.

Did we dislodge ourselves or were we dislodged by some knife-wielding militant? I’ll let you answer that one for yourselves.

No matter the knife, the militant, or some grand unimaginable design in the scheming of our multi-verse, random or deliberate, we have been chopped.

Good: Away from expectations, the bound rules, and the societal box we were once put in, we are now free to explore new thinking.

Bad: Away from others, the rule of law, the institutions, and the church, we are now free but desperately alone.

Having imagined myself chopped free from the stupidity of this tit-for-tat world rule we must abide by, I feel uninvested in it all. And this is good. I am a leaf, free to drift away from the root, the confines of others, and their third-grade thinking. Freedom.

On the other hand, without the others, I will be alone.

My leaf, as well as all the leaves, belong. We may no longer be one, having become chopped from the root. This is good because we are all different leaves, but what will happen to us if we don’t honor the multiplicity of the whole? We come from a root. The root gives us sustenance and support.

My root is Earth. She is the core of my being and my strength. Without caring for Earth, I would be left rootless. Is that any way to live?

When we care for the root that nurtures and keeps us in form, we can begin to see all the other leaves around us that have been formed by Earth. We may not wish to be whole and held and will fight to get chopped from the root, but it is impossible not to think that we will always be whole and held.

We come from a place of whole and holding.

Freedom is a good thing and it is a bad thing. It is. It is whatever we want freedom to mean. For me, freedom is knowing I have the choice to be a lone leaf, having wriggled free from the crazy ‘leaves’ that dishonor my soul/self, free to be held when I wish to be held, and free to wander if I choose to wander.

For me, there is always the freedom to learn and grow and care about the world I live in. Thankfully, I get to do that in the United States and I get to shift my thinking as it suits.

Yes, I belong to one group think-tank over another, but first and foremost, I belong to Earth.

I will always maintain a respect for the past, as just that, the past — where we have maintained a certain degree of thinking. I will look toward the future by honoring what is good about the past and acknowledging what we must let go of. And I will sustain myself in the now by balancing this past self with the future self.

Earth, the root, is the boundary and the path.

Let the fractioning lettuce leaves do their thing. Many will wilt and die off without acknowledging the root.

Experiencing the Energetic Divide:

Photo by Bernardo Lorena Ponte on Unsplash

Can we find a way to embrace division and work creatively with it?

Imagine yourself in a corrugated box. Maybe it is the kind of box wine bottles are transported in—each bottle (you) in its own sleeve. The box is divided. You are divided from the whole.

There are twelve compartments. The box is one box but the sleeves separate the bottles from each other. Can you see yourself in this box? What part of the box are you residing in? Are you dead center? On an end? Perhaps you like one of the corners best?

There’s not a lot of room in this box. You are standing, feet planted squarely on the bottom, and you’re being transported this way with very little wiggle room. It’s stuffy. The box is hot. Claustrophobic.

Now imagine the box getting shipped across the country. Suddenly, you arrive in L.A. You step out of your sleeve thinking you will be fine in L.A., but L.A. is somewhat different than Topeka. It’s not that different, but it’s definitely not the same.

There are stores and restaurants. OK. This will bring some comfort. You might call an Uber to come pick you up and take you to a hotel. But once inside the hotel, you’re separated into a room. A door closes behind you. You are vaguely aware of yourself in proximity to other hotel rooms, but you’re separated from those rooms. You reside, for the time being, in another box.

This hotel is situated on a street. The street is marked on a map — an arbitrary drawing on the land. Someone long before you came to L. A. staked a claim to the land and put up markers to divide themselves from the rest of the territory. The land was fought for, purchased, or stolen. Divided.

Everywhere you look you notice division. It is in the atmosphere where the clouds filled with rain divide from the ones that are not.

On and on and over and over you find and recognize division.

You might think about the cancer cells in your body — how they are dividing. Maybe you think about the good cells that are replacing the bad. You think about all of this division as either good or bad.

Was it good that you came to L.A. in a cardboard box? I guess if you think about it — any vehicle that would have taken you there — represents some form of division. The train car is divided from the one in front of it. First class is divided from the third class. A car is divided from a truck. An airplane seat separates you from the other passengers. And on and on.

Your mind is like a corrugated wine box. It is like a train car. And it is like the map. It divides. Like the cells in your body, your mind splits into one of two camps. For or against. It will either think to build and repair or destroy.

The world, and all of its occupants, are part of a divisive universe.

We are under this impossible illusion that we can generate a unified existence, but this is an ideal.

One is one. But one is divided. One will always divide from the other.

Earth is an experiment in unification. Will the thoughts that separate you from your best friend destroy you or will you find a place in your soul for open honest conversation and exploration knowing you are divided from, well, everything?

The Stagecoach Driver: A poem in perpetual motion

Nuance, at best, is difficult to parse out. Difficult, as in not impossible, but challenging.

Challenge notwithstanding, the driver of this poem expresses herself in solitary flights. She is known to flee.

At her very best, or is that the worst — the undisciplined — she charges into an unknown with little respect for the difficulty of the terrain until she is forced, by some creek too high to forge, to retreat.

Fear has a way of driving the stagecoach driver to return.

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The coach is held in place by four wheels and a team of horses — often two or more. There is form, language, and punctuation. She uses them all.

She is not the kind of driver to brake suddenly.

Rather, she rides the brake until the brake is worn by repeated wear.

The horses cannot understand, now that they have crossed the divide. Will the stagecoach driver forge ahead or return to the empty parlor where the sherry decanter has been stolen, or at the very least, smashed?

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She is the driver of a heedless coach. She is the quill, the wheel, the horse, the buckboard, and the calloused hands without gloves.

She is the running board. Dammit. She has words to deliver.

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Running is for cowards.

Creeks go high. Roads get pocked. Wheels buckle under the strain just as discarded cooking pots, feather beds, and grandfather clocks clutter the trail. Ink stains.

Battles are lost. The sun blazes.

The buck cannot help her. He died when she shot him.

She took.

He gave.

Together, they grieve the instability of their path.

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Nuance, a difficulty, and death, an inevitability. Poetry is a lost language.

Or should that read: Poetry is a language yet to be found.

If she travels to uncharted territories where her mind is free to wander — can the driver call herself a pilgrim in search of a destination with unlimited choice? Or is she simply a nomad, unsettled, yet undeterred?

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Nuance is the ground she trods upon. Sage. Brush. Her hair is tangled, but free.

This, she knows. And the parlor keeps.

Time is a Loop: Let's balance our strict way of linear thinking with the circle

It’s been said countless times in various metaphysical circles that time is a loop so I’m not throwing out Earth-shattering news here. But I would like to share a broader way of looking at the circle as a marker for time.

I’m not a physicist. I’m trying to understand physics, but it’s kinda difficult. Ok. It’s a lot difficult. So what I’m going to say comes from my latest meditation. This is not a physicist’s perspective, nor is it a metaphysical perspective, although if you look closely you will find spokes on the wheel that belong to both camps.

I am a Reiki Master and energy teacher. I say energy when what I mean is meditation, but because my meditations are conducted in a way to help shift energy, sometimes I refer to myself as an energy teacher. I teach people how to look more closely at their own energetic (heartbeat) patterns and discern the self.

Meditation has a lot of merit. I wouldn’t have pursued my relationship with meditation if I didn’t find it helpful. But meditation has its drawbacks. It’s good if we can use it to find a broader meditative way of living and not so good if we compartmentalize it. Meditation is only as good as it is absorbed and assimilated. It’s not so good when you push it aside to access the logical mind. 

I would like to share how the logical mind and the meditative mind can work interchangeably.

THIS ASSIMILATION OF THE LOGICAL AND THE MEDITATIVE MIND WORKS IN TWO WAYS:

1) We accept the above statement that the logical mind and the meditative mind can work simultaneously or interchangeably. 

2) We honor the work of The Seeker.

When we accept that the mind compartmentalizes thinking we’re halfway to living a meditative existence. Accepting that we’re creatures of habit helps too. We don’t like change and we don’t like living easily. The struggle is the number one drawback to thinking. Because we think, we struggle. And because we struggle, we devise ways to improve our lives.

The logical mind pushes the meditative mind into a corner and says, “I need to toil (fill in the blank) to survive. I can’t deal with you right now. You’re not a priority.” And then when we’re fine, we pull out the meditative mind, rejoice, and appreciate the lack of struggle and the peacefulness the meditative mind brings. But then we push away the ease when more struggle arises, and the circle perpetuates itself. Time is a loop.

Throwing the meditative mind away at times of struggle perpetuates desire.

In times of struggle, I find it's best to meditate. This is when the heart helps clear the mind of fear and need and desire. The heart gives great answers, by the way. We just have to trust the heart. And we can. This is where The Seeker in each of us can help. The Seeker knows the beauty of the heart. And The Seeker delights in heart-centered answers to struggle.

Creating a timeline for ourselves perpetuates goals. Linear thinking is goal-oriented. It is logical. There is a time and place for this. We can’t live on this planet without some form of linear thinking so to ask you not to do this would be incompetent on my part. But as The Seeker begins to accept the loop, the meditative mind, and the timeline that says not all thinking is linear, The Seeker can begin to redefine struggle. 

It is The Seeker who meditates and can redirect themself into balancing time.

Still with me?

The meditative mind creates a loop. The logical mind creates a linear line. All lines (in our minds) belong, but as we assimilate the loop and the line, and balance the meditative and the logical mind, the motion, or the action of being alive in this world becomes less about the fraction and more about one.

We’re one. But we separate ourselves from ourselves and each other because of time. 

The line divides the lanes. The loop connects us as one.

Symmetry of Purpose: How to Make Something from Nothing

ALCHEMY IS THE ANCIENT PRACTICE OF SHIFTING PERSPECTIVE.

Long before Medieval forerunners adopted alchemy for personal exploration in their mystery schools, alchemy was once thought of as a philosophical branch of self-awareness, according to much of the guidance I receive in my personal meditations.

Alchemy is less to do with turning metal into gold, as we have come to think of this ancient art and more to do with the spiritual practice of shining light unto the soul-self. We are light bodies. We come from light and we live on light. Were it not for the sun we would not exist. And the ancients knew this. So to adopt a spiritual practice of blessing the light was in essence a way to bless the soul-self.

Light begets light. Metal begets metal. Turning metal into gold is symbolic of turning the body into light.

Turning the body into light is simply a way of returning the body back to its original essence or light form. A way of saying, “Use these light codes and you too will be transformed!”

Think of the body as light, as gold, as the ancients did and the body begins to realign with its soul-self. The key isn’t in the sun or in the gold but in the essence of what the light embodies. Source. We might turn to this light when we are in need. My Quaker family often says, “I will hold you in the light.” Meaning: I will hold you in love. I will hold you in prayer. We can turn to the light for inspiration and divine purpose.

I regard the light as love. But more than being a peaceful and calming embodiment of the divine, I love the idea of being held in light as both transformational and informative, as meditative energy often brings about interesting healing vibrations and a renewed sense of purpose.

I REFER TO THESE CODES OF TRANSFORMATION AS LIGHT LANGUAGE.

Gold, the manifestation of God’s light or sunlight, depending on what religious/spiritual preference you might have, was prophesied in every ancient culture as holding the spiritual equivalent of truth. Were it not for the ancients who worshipped their gold, we might not look at the artifacts they produced as anything but simple metal, but because gold was personified as something more important than Earth, gold became the standard bearer of truth.

BEHOLD THE GOLD!

In this morning's meditation, I was shown just how little we adhere to Earth. We dismiss Earth for the glory of what lies beyond us when what is in front of us, our soul-selves, exists to capture the energy of the spiritual soul. Earth is no longer used as a playground for spiritual exploration as many of our ancient cultures once esteemed her, but we can return to this idea of gold, an Earth treasure, and a language within the stars that will help steer us toward balance, equanimity, and a more heart-centered life.

Author Photo: Kiawah, SC

Use the energy of the light (the gold) in your meditation to recapture the essence you seek. We’re all seekers, and what we seek is either material or it is spiritual. Often it is both because we can’t live on this planet without seeking shelter or sustenance for our form, but should you desire a little less material and a little more spiritual, absorbing the golden light will help balance your body and help attain a synergy of purpose.

The body needs direction and we often listen and absorb various opinions from others about how to find what is best for ourselves. Going within and channeling the golden light will help raise the awareness of your soul-self, your truth, your star code, and your relationship to what you seek. It’s not hard to take care of ourselves, but we don’t like it. We want someone else to fix us. We want someone else to redeem us. We want someone else to pat us on the back for a job well done. But when we can begin to acquire self-love, self-awareness, and the glory of our unique selves, energies of need and want begin to dissipate.

We’re hungry for love and going to God helps. But if going to God doesn’t suit your vocabulary style, try adapting this idea of sitting in Pure Source Energy for ease of the mind/body/spirit.

Blessings,

Alicia

Creating Pathways to Love

I AM NOT AN EXPERT ON LOVE.

I am a student of love, and I will learn as much, on any given day, as the next person. Therefore, what I am about to chat about has nothing to do with experience. It has everything to do with my meditative discoveries.

I am a Reiki Master, teacher, and writer. I have taught myself through my meditative journey how to communicate, through writing, about healing with energy.

My journey is mine, it is not yours, but because most of us are aware that we are part of a Collective, perhaps it is safe to say that these journeys are universal. What I receive in meditation is not just for me. It is for us all.

Today’s meditation (actually it was a walking meditation in a gorgeous field) was to remind me about the subtle implications of how we give and receive love.

Blandy, Boyce, VA

NOT TO OVERSIMPLIFY THIS, BUT WE’RE TANGLED, BROKEN, AND STRUGGLING.

Love is an idea. An ideal. In our minds, love is never enough. We’re never enough. We expect, and we design love to be what we think love should be based on a guiding principle of give and take.

Love is less about the I’ll rub your back if you rub mine kind of mentality and more about just being.

But we expect our friends, partners, parents, children, and lovers to bend to our design of love. And they, in turn, expect us to bend to their design. Who designs these designs, by the way? I’ve always wanted to know that. Well, in my meditation today I received the answer. We do. We design love.

Love can not be designed, because no two designs are ever the same. Rather, Love is. Without definition. Without expectation. Without design.

Now, this is a head trip until we can begin to wrap our minds around the notion that Love is. The mind creates, right? But the mind tears things apart. We are tearing apart Divine Love because we’re no longer judging ourselves against a god who loves.

In the United States, this god separates us into us against them. (I’ll speak to the issue from the perspective of a US citizen, although this problem appears across the globe). This god is not universally divine, because...well…we create the version of the god we want.

And when we do this we divvy up our ideas about love across the landscape. One universal god could solve the problem, but well, that’s another kettle of fish. Maybe that’s for another story.

We have many versions of god. Many versions of love. And not one answer.

Blandy, Boyce, VA

I’D LIKE TO PROPOSE A TIME-OUT.

The adults in the room are fighting over which version of love is best. But isn’t Divine Love supposed to be the answer? And isn't Divine Love supposed to be universal? And isn’t it supposed to be from God?

Do you see the problem?

Divine Love has never been universal, thereby creating a multi-nuanced god of individuality. And these individuals create separation. The god is broken. The heart is broken. The individual weeps, “Where is my love?”

But in today’s meditation I heard the following words while walking:

Divine Love is simple. It is the love of the individual without expectation. It is love without fences. Without borders. Without need.

I am learning to love without needing this love to be returned to me in the way I think it should be returned. I am learning not to corral love or define it. I’m simply appreciating the nuance of love. It is about unburdening myself from need and opening myself up to exploration. I don’t reach far for my god. He/she/them is within. Me. I am honoring God because I love myself and when I love myself I simply love. Period.

It is difficult not to think of this idea of loving ourselves as selfish and narcissistic. We’re designed to give give give so that we feel the altruistic love of duty. But honestly, it's ok to give to ourselves. Feed the heart. Put the oxygen mask on first. Then we can give our best self to others without depending on love to be outside of ourselves. Tear up the script. Make discoveries. Love is. We are Divine.

Here’s What I Know About the Writer’s Journey

WE CREATE ROADBLOCKS IN OUR MINDS, AND UNLESS WE USE THE MIND TO DISASSEMBLE THESE BLOCKS WE WILL CONTINUE TO STRUGGLE.

Photo by Thom Milkovic on Unsplash

There is not one way to say this, and many writers will attempt to dissect and analyze The Writer’s Journey for us all. My approach, then, will be unique to me, because my experience is unique. Because of me. But I am not alone in saying this: “The Writer’s Journey is difficult.”

My first attempt at The Writer’s Journey led me straight into rejection. It was like I hurled my over-confident self right smack into a brick wall over and over in the hope that the brick wall would move and open up closed doors for me. It didn’t.

This desire to succeed and prove myself was so great that I couldn’t see what I was doing wrong. I thought the wall was wrong to be there. And it took a long time for me to see that I was going to have to take down the wall brick by stupid brick.

Literally, and figuratively, The Writer’s Journey for me has been about disassembling expectations and stepping into a new alignment with the meaning of success. Because I had had a fair amount of success in school and was certainly a creative person, and I knew this, I had a fair amount of certainty that the wall would crumble. For me. I didn’t understand this kind of hard work. And it took me a long time to accept that writing is hard work.

All things being said, I wanted instant success. Right? Each of us has probably experienced this same story, repeatedly. It doesn’t work like this for the majority of us as many Writers’ Journeys are fraught with complications such as not feeling good enough to be here, or continually feeling upended by rejection. We must work to overcome these feelings before we can see that there is success right in front of our noses.

I took another route to work around the feeling of rejection that I want to share.

This became, not how I was going to tear down the wall by myself (remember the wall represents “that which stands in our way”), but how I was going to begin to understand my emotional self to understand how I had built that wall by myself. I was responsible for the wall. No one else created this wall. I created an obstacle because I saw rejection as a problem. It took me a long time to find rejection as only something in my mind. It only existed because I labeled it rejection.

Still with me?

It took years of rejection for me to accept the wall existed because I saw “that which stood in my way” as a construct. I saw rejection as a marker. I saw it as a plush pillow to lie my head upon and cry.

Let’s unearth the emotional journey, because we all have one, whether we’re writers, artists, or creators of any kind.

The emotional response to rejection becomes the wall. It is not the editors, the publishers, or the agents who say “no.”

This makes The Writer’s Journey about conquering emotion. It is not about fighting anyone else. It is not about laying blame. It is not about hurling insults at the world because the world isn’t bending to our latest whim. Therefore, becoming a master at emotional self-restraint is the key to creative success.

People will share their absolutes with you and these absolutes will be encouraging. I wanted to speak to this notion that the wall is our own construct, one we design in our mind that we build and that we when we’re ready can take it down with the help of a strong self.

I think self-esteem has to come from our truth and not from our desire to prove ourselves. We can’t playact our way to writer’s success. We have to be successful in our minds at every step of the way.

My idea of success is having one person drop me a line that says something to the effect of “you’re helping me.” I was desperate for the audience, but an audience of one is just as proven as an audience of one hundred. Or one thousand. I accept this now.

I write often about this need to succeed. To climb. To gain. We’re programmed to march onward and make inroads in our careers, but we tend to march forward without appreciating the steps. This journey is still difficult at times because I tend to still see it as difficult but to get to this place of acceptance that the journey is “a journey,” well, this is my goal.

The Writer's Journey still has its bumpy moments. But because I have a better emotional shock absorber and can appreciate and accept the nitty gritty work, and the fact that I create this idea of rejection as rejection in my mind, instead of seeing it as part of the maturation process, I can honestly say I’m having more fun. And more success!

The mind creates.

Traveling Light Years Ahead of Humanity Where Love is Profound

I am on an ocean liner. In my mind. Where I can look out over an azure blue Caribbean and see nothing but open water. There are no other ships in sight. It is only me and the unknown.

I lean over the polished brass railing and pause. No one else is on my ship. I am truly alone.

The ship turns ever so slightly as if on cue. I run to the starboard side and look about at all the emptiness, and I am frightened, yet the sea is expansive and I can’t help but marvel at how blue the water is. How gentle her waves.

I am only afraid because this is what I have been told to feel. Curiosity does not come to mind easily, but the fear of being alone does. I have no idea where this ocean liner is taking me. There is no itinerary.

Perhaps one day my ship will dock at a port and I will disembark all smiles and happiness, but for now, my ocean liner is taking me somewhere I have never been. I feel it. I am learning to embrace this unknown. It is all I have. But I am tentative and cautious.

You will say, “Oh, but you have friends and loved ones to travel alongside you.” And yes, I do. I know there are other ships on this beautiful sea. I have known this all my life. They are traveling where they need to go. As am I.

But for now, the sea is my sea. The ship is my ship. The direction is mine, as is the pace and my knowing. There is no one on this ship telling me how to be.

I will walk these beautiful old wooden decks, the ones that I have built, and polish the brass. My ship will be beautiful and stately. As am I.

This is the dance we all dance. The one where we feel we must turn repeatedly to another and ask, “Will you be my partner? Will you?” But there are no partners on my ship. I was once married but never felt my husband traveling beside me on the same boat, on the same ocean, or on the same course. But that is me. That may not be you.

To re-birth this evolving self takes a certain amount of courage and fortitude when one is alone, but it can be done. It has now become a choice, but you are not here to witness the difficulty of that ferocious stormy sea of decisions where I fought with myself and the stars for better navigational tools.

My seas are more tranquil now knowing that to re-create a new sense of place within I must stand alone. I have reached a place of knowing.

I want what is best. For me. For you. But my ship and your ship are two very different creations and we must always remember this. I can’t make you like polished brass and crystal chandeliers just as you can’t make me like your tipping, leaking catamaran.

But we will dance in the love of knowing that the sea is expansive and will bring us to where we’re asking to go. We may not know the journey's destination or pace, but just because I am on a certain kind of boat and you are on another, does not mean I will get there before you. Catamarans skim the surface of the sea and catch the wind without pause.

You have tried to sleep on cotton sheets and I on rumbled ticking.

We are two very different sailors, you and I. But knowing this is love. And the best is yet to be.

Please join me as we carefully unpack the soul’s desire to travel through Earth’s difficult expansion in Grace and Love.

Can We Unite in the Name of Freedom?

NO ONE TRULY WANTS TO BELIEVE THAT OUR PERSONAL FREEDOMS ARE AT STAKE.

I feel confident most of us believe that we have a right to freedom as a just cause, but are we recognizing the way our need for individuality is hindering this cause?

I write extensively about individuality. I write about the need for personal freedom. I write as though my life depends on me having the right to be me as well as you having the right to be you. That’s good. Isn’t it? But what happens when we end the dialogue at you and me? We fail to recognize that you and I make up the us.

The you and I are taking up space in this world as individuals with needs and wants. My needs and wants are not yours. Your needs and wants are not theirs. And the more we distinguish that there is a you and a me, the less focused we become on the Collective.

It is inevitable, as we seek to obtain rights and individuality, that we spend all of our effort on ourselves, our beliefs, or our pod, the group of individuals that think as we do. And the way we grab at this need is eroding the Collective, for the more we seek attention for our personal, or group cause, the less concerned we are about another. And the less concerned we are for another the less in-tune we become with the rights and needs of the Collective.

There are ways to organize ourselves to think about others, those who do not think and believe as we do, but we’re too caught up in the fight for personal freedom (a long time coming, by the way, considering our souls have been kept in check by individuals with more power than us) to stop long enough to acknowledge the Collective.

The Collective, to me, is the entirety of all who live and breathe (including plants and minerals) on this planet. We could go so far as to say the Collective extends beyond this earthly life to the soul. It is the multiplicity of All That Is. You and I are a fraction of All That Is, yet we have been historically lost to our individuality on a planet that has for so long dismissed the individual.

In our quest to know ourselves we are losing touch with them.

In our quest to demand our individual rights we are losing touch with them.

In our quest to contain and quantify what is right and what is wrong we are losing touch with them.

When is it going to stop? This need to be needed, to be heard, to be the individual? When we recognize our loss.

For so long the individual fractions of All That Is have been lost to the voice of power. Now it is on us to fight for this lost voice. And so we will. But as we fight for the lost voice, please recognize that your lost voice and his lost voice and her lost voice and their lost voices have equal pain.

WE ARE ALL IN SOME KIND OF PAIN, HAVING BEEN LOST FOR CENTURIES TO THE VOICE OF POWER.

Yes, step up and fight, but fight with one thing in mind…we are all troubled. No one is any more troubled than another because we all experience loss. We all grieve. Perhaps we can say that one grief is more powerful than another, or more damaging, or more wrong. Put them all into a bucket and label them “GRIEF.” Grief is.

Can we fight for personal freedoms for the Collective rather than continue to fight to deconstruct a union? Without a union, we won’t have enough resources for all of the individual groups demanding attention for their just cause. It’s going to take a bit of balancing for the individual, and the group, to come together to fight for the betterment of a union. Without it, we’re going to be in even more need as we all fight to be heard.

Let’s fight for the union. At the end of the day, we are stronger as a union than divided as the individual. But it is on us to balance this. It is on us to recognize the hole we’re creating for The United States. Keep digging in and we will lose it all.

By repairing your need to be heard your individual self will thrive to help repair a union coming apart at the seams. By healing your loss you can, in turn, help others. We can rebuild this collective desire for freedom, together, as we build a stronger platform for the healing of our past.

We all experience grief. We all experience loss. We all experience need. We all experience want. Together, we can all experience greater opportunities for ourselves when we know we’re not alone.

Straight Out Of Nowhere

NO ONE SAID THIS PUBLISHING JOURNEY WOULD BE EASY.

We can read just about everyone’s publishing story and find the common denominator: It takes a lot of work to become a published author.

My story is the same, yet different. Yes, it has taken years of pushing through some serious distractions to stay in the writer’s life. I was once a very hands-on mother to two daughters. As they grew, and I continued to work at home to become a writer, I worked alongside them at the kitchen table.

We studied together and formed a bond. As their mother, I felt it was vital that they see me working on my dream. I feel certain this has helped them find the passion for their own dreams. They do not share the same dreams I have but have dreams of their own. Grasping this was, and is, important to us all as I learned how to give them room to explore.

THE WRITER IN ME NEVER WANTED TO GIVE UP.

She was determined to find a way to “succeed” and prove to my loved ones that I was a serious writer with serious goals. For me to be taken seriously, first I had to begin to take myself seriously. This was hard to do. I kept waiting for others to perceive me as serious, but without me first instigating this seriousness, the seriousness, well, it fell on deaf ears. Maintaining seriousness became important. After all, I was out to prove myself.

Can you guess what happened after I began to take myself seriously? And find all the ways I could to prove it? I forgot to play. It was a terrible time. I was so hellbent on succeeding that I forgot to play. The push forward took me away from an important part of myself and I forgot to rummage around in my creative filing cabinet and try new things, explore, and learn. I succeeded in only exhausting myself in the push.

THIS IS WHERE I AM NOW.

On the open road to nowhere. To everywhere. To somewhere. Honestly, I don’t know. I managed to get some of my earlier work published. My first goal. Yay! I reached a mile marker I was determined to get to, but now that I am here I see the road in front of me, and boy, it is wide. It is long. It doesn’t end. Now, what is a writer to do?

Do I tick off the mile markers as I go along on this writer's journey one after the other, or do I ignore the mile markers and look out across the vast expansiveness and forget the road? Forget that I am tired? Forget the plans? The road map?

There are too many stops along the way that look promising. I may be at the beginning of my writer’s journey but I know, having achieved this first publishing marker, that it does not mean I should put my head down and keep driving.

I think I’ll get off the road, park the next writing project in the parking lot, sit back, and look around awhile. There might be a much different highway calling. It might not be the one I am on. I need time to rummage through the weeds a bit and see what lies hidden.

This is the kind of writer I am becoming.

Directionless Living

OUR MINDS CONTROL EXPECTATION.

It is the single most annoying thing about having a brain. The brain needs. It wants. It expects. I am not a scientist, an astrophysicist, a mathematician, or anything remotely brain-centered. I’m me. I’m a writer, a mother, a Reiki Master, yet I am fascinated with science, with physics, with potential. 

I could go back to school and study physics, but I won’t. I didn’t sign up in this lifetime for that kind of schooling. Instead, I must have signed up for the kind of hard-knock life experiences that have taken me toward metaphysics and meditation. My schooling comes from the stars. 

When it comes to writing, I often tell people that my stories, poetry, and meditation work come from something buried deep within me. I do not consult ancient texts, although what I teach is probably buried in the sands somewhere from some priest or priestess who once insisted that the stars hold knowledge.

We expect book knowledge. We expect rules. Lines. Graphs. Case studies. What happens when there are lines drawn in the sand that says: this is right and this is wrong? Do case studies even matter? 

I’m not a scientist to give you graphs. I am studying the stars and putting everything down into a language that can be accepted or dismissed. It is not absolute. It is a possibility. There are no rules here. When studying the stars one accepts a directionless life. At no point in the day am I wandering aimlessly, but rather wandering, exploring, manifesting, and accepting.

We can build a directionless life once we accept that there are only directions, (read: limitations) within the mind. When we open the mind to the limitlessness of space, of place, of potential, the mind responds. Meditation helps open the mind to potential. It helps us evolve, as a species, I’m convinced. Meditation is like listening to the stars reveal their light language. 

And only you are in a position to know their words.

To live in correlation with the stars is to live in correlation with the energetic component of all that is possible. There is no other way to explain it. Living without expectation (direction) is opening oneself up to nothing, to everything. Not to what is right or wrong, but to what IS.

DIRECTIONLESS LIVING IS ABOUT BEING IN THE NOW.

It is not about projecting oneself into the future or staying trapped in the past. This form of self-healing opens the mind and the body to ageless living and the potential to transform (think alchemy) into higher consciousness.

I feel that I am a teacher to help expand consciousness, and it’s a difficult job because language is limiting. There are only so many words I can use. I repeat myself, often, in each of my blog posts. I know this. It is my intention. I use language as a tool to help transform energy away from what is right to what is possible. Language conveys intention, and it is my intention to take you along on a journey to a more grounded, spiritually mindful way of being. Just being.

Soul Journeys

NOT ALL SOUL JOURNEYS PROVE SAFE.

Some feel uncomfortable, disruptive, and complex. Are we adequately prepared for turmoil? And if not, why? Some journeys are tempting us into greater awareness, and others, well, not so much. They are little more than just headaches.

I think of soul journeys as patterns we make, or take, depending on how you want to look at it, into unknowns. These unknowns show up for me as difficult relationships with others. I didn’t know that difficulty or struggle was a modus operand for many souls. I never equated struggle with my personal objective: freedom. You see, I prefer not to struggle. I prefer to tiptoe through a garden of good intentions and come out the other side joyful and fulfilled. But when the Universe sends us difficult people to travel alongside, it is time to sit up and listen.

Not all of my experiences are difficult ones, and I have lovely friends and a loving family, but there are just those people we meet who take us, metaphorically speaking, onto their overburdened boat and expect us to paddle alongside them in some chaotic race to succeed. And what exactly do I mean by this? I mean just that. We get in other people’s little dinghies (god knows why) thinking that the journey will be easy when it is anything but! We travel alongside difficult people to help us find balance. Without knowing difficulty how could we ever know ease?

I won’t say I have the answers to the great cosmic question: why are we here and for what purpose? But in my little world of Reiki healing, this is what I have seen. Difficulties exist to help transport us through some universal emotion, and how we respond to this difficulty is how we respond.

EARTH IS A COMPLEX EQUATION OF MISSTEPS AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS, AND WE ARE THE RECIPIENTS OF THIS ENERGY PATTERN.

We contribute to misunderstanding by further employing misunderstanding. We use it as a tool. We deem it respectable. We fight. And then we use this fight to find Right. God forbid, I tell you there is no Right! Well, maybe there is Best, and I could say that there is much that is Better or Best, but Right is impossible to define since someone's Right will always be someone else’s wrong.

For this reason, alone, balance helps us see that one person’s way of travel (think capsizing boat) is not wrong. It is simply a way. As I travel alongside others who find themselves and their soul’s growth paramount to struggle, I have to stop and look more closely at my own journey. Am I putting a wrong on their Right? Am I defining them? And for what purpose? Telling them that struggle is a ridiculous way to learn, that there are more clever ways to travel will disrupt. How, if I am asking them not to disrupt my way of being must I disrupt theirs?

Philosophically speaking, this journey we take with others teaches us to be more balanced individuals. Let’s hope the unsteady waters we float upon prove capable of holding some leaking boats! Not all of us travel in elegant ocean liners.

Can Meditation Help Build A More Creative Life?

What are you trying to build in your life? More resilience to disappointment? A better relationship with your mother? An opportunity for advancement in your career? No matter what you’re trying to build this will take momentum, stamina, and above all else Truth.

Building for the sake of building becomes exhausting when we’re not motivated to build, or worse, uninspired by the lack of creativity in ourselves to build something honest and unique. We are creative people, designed to perpetuate the creative spirit of a planet continually creating. God didn’t halt creativity the day He departed this world and left us to our own devices. No. He gave us His vision of possibility. And this vision is unique to every single one of us. Could this be the purpose of our journey here? To make discoveries about our creative spirit? I’d like to think so.

Being creative honors the relationship with the creator in each of us. I didn’t wake up one day and discover that I was a Seeker, one of those meditative types, but I have since discovered ways that meditation can help find creative Truth. And now I teach self-healing through meditation and encourage it to enhance creativity.

I'm the daughter of an aspiring physicist and an eighth-generation Virginia Quaker. My family supports both intellectual and creative pursuits, and I have found that I approach meditation this way. It can become both a spiritual and a pragmatic experience. We live on a planet teeming with change. Every day the planet recreates itself by experiencing death and rebirth. And every day, should we be so inclined, we can tap into the Earth experience, these energies of rebirth and reawakening. Through both a grounding and an uplifting approach to meditation, we can enhance our relationship to creativity.

Meditating on a planet that continually shifts gives us a unique perspective on how to accept challenges in life and accept the potential for growth.

Earth is a biosphere, and we are a part of this controlled atmosphere. There is only so far we can go before we will circle around again to the same place we started in life. From death to life. From life to death. The circle is important and gives us a unique perspective on our evolution. By meditating and acknowledging that the planet has as much to give us as does our relationship to God, or Source, or All That Is (pick a vocabulary word), we gain unilateral knowledge of balance. Balance is key to achieving the glue we need to make who we are, and what we pursue, stick.

Earth provides the building blocks if we tap into those building blocks to redesign our relationship with her. We’re struggling because we don’t accept Earth as a spiritual entity. She’s Earth. We want to believe that our spiritual realm is out there. But if Earth is a part of the solar system, the Universe, can she not be a part of the Heavens? Who says Earth is here and Heaven is there? Isn’t it all one plane of existence? Can the mind help us build a better future for ourselves by taking ourselves into new territories of thinking and awareness? I’d like to think so. Think of meditation as an anchor rather than a lifeline.

Option. Control. Command.

Option. Control. Command. We instinctively know where these three words appear on the keyboard and we use them repeatedly without pausing to discern. We know what purpose they serve and the ways they will help, yet we look unwillingly at what greater meaning these words bring.

As a writer, I look for inspiration outside myself just as I look for it within. I look to landscape because it inspires me to think about myself in relationship to Earth. Landscape is me. It is me in relationship to my surroundings within this vast biosphere, a deep molecular/spiritual/energetic kinship to something larger than myself. I am but a small thread, nothing without others. Perhaps I should say, “landscape is we,” as the whole of landscape encompasses more than myself.

WE ARE BIO-MOLECULAR INHABITANTS GROPING ABOUT UNEASILY IN SOME SEARCH OF IT ALL.

Rather than stop searching, because there is this inner pull within me to explore alchemy, transformation, and old stories desperately in need of re-writing, all in the name of living, I continue to explore what life means. I don’t do this uneasily, but playfully, lightly, and with a sense of childish wonder. Who are we really? Are we just some random species, having formed from a rudimentary molecular structure to become one of the fortunate ones now able to sustain and continue life? I’d like to think there is an advanced understanding we have with this planet that needs exploring.

Are we in balance with this Earth that supports our magnificent molecular journey? No. We’re gorging ourselves on her bounty. And we know this. Anyone reading this right now knows this. You might have been drawn to the title, the tags, or the photograph, but this is because you and I are probably like-minded individuals, and something about me resonates with you. So what I have to say isn’t new to you. You’re writing/teaching/communicating the same thing hoping people will listen.

LIKE-MINDED SOULS HAVE ONE ANOTHER.

But then how do we reach beyond those who are listening to the planet’s woes to those who are not responding? And what is it we want to say to those not understanding/respecting our symbiotic relationship to the planet?

I want to say this: It isn’t an option not to listen to Earth if we want to continue sustaining human life. Earth will be here longer than we will and it’s on us to respect this. We’re bio-molecular beings, a string of biomes, plasma, bones, and blood systematically strung out because we can’t control Earth or her evolution. Get over trying to control. We can’t. We can inhabit and respect, but we can’t control. We have options. We can respect the way we’re in a relationship with Earth or we can ignore this. I suggest we treat our planet in the same way we take care of ourself.

Can you see where I’m going with this? Unless we take care of ourself we won’t have the mindset to take care of the planet. So what’s a girl to do? Start helping by getting down into the muck to teach self-care, self-awareness, and self-love. Help heal old wounds. Love. Support process, transformation, exploration, and sustainability. I can’t feed the homeless. There are others who do that. I want to help those opening their eyes to the problem and give them a little understanding of alchemy. There are ways to transform ourself by taking better care of our molecular/spiritual/energetic relationship to the planet. By doing so we’ll grow deeper roots and respect who we are and where we belong. We’re alchemists if we choose to be. Let’s transform.

What is Truth?

YOUR TRUTH IS NOT MINE

My Truth is not yours. We’re living at a time when this is becoming more and more apparent. Individualism is pulling us into ourselves at such a sharp clip. It’s frightening how we’re pulling ourselves deeper into only our own people, only our own ideas, only our own needs without addressing the vast Collective. We’re becoming our own limitation.

I’d like to offer you this: as we explore individualism, unpack our self Truth, and make discoveries about ourselves, let us remember that we can be doing this for the betterment of not only ourselves, but others.

We need clarity and a strong alignment with our Truth because when we are clear we can help others discern. Individualism is a fraction of All That Is. We are a fraction of All. Our fractions make up the whole. Without the whole there would be little use for the fraction. Let’s stop tearing apart our threads of humanity just because we can. Individualism might light a fire in us as we get to know ourselves more clearly, but remember this: individualism disrupts the Collective.

There is nuance here, yet this is very hard to unpack. Nuance is difficult to understand, but in The Intrepid Meditator I hope to convey this idea that as much as we are learning about our soul/self (should you be so inclined), we are also learning how this soul/self falls into alignment with All That Is. To destroy for the sake of destroying something such as an institution, a concept, a philosophy, a law will ultimately destroy the Collective. And when the Collective, that which binds us together, falls, we will fall. Without the fraction there will be nothing left of the whole. Without the whole our individual threads become meaningless.

Facebook Is In The News

ONCE AGAIN, FACEBOOK IS IN THE NEWS

I speak often, whether it is in personal conversations, in this blog, or in my book, THE INTREPID MEDITATOR, about how difficult Social Media is for me. I’m in a quandary, emotionally and socially, about it. I was the last hold-out, I’m sure, signing up perhaps a decade after all of my friends signed up. I dislike online communication, online dating, online this, and online that. However, look where I am! Online. As much as I dislike the platforms, I am here. There are fewer and fewer alternatives, at this time, to direct communication. It is all online!

INSTEAD OF FIGHTING WITH MYSELF OVER FACEBOOK…

…and the ridiculousness of it, the increasing distrust I have for it, and the anger I feel knowing that young women are being taken down emotionally and psychologically by it, I’ve decided that instead of continuing to stay angry about it, and stepping away from the platform, I am going to go in and become a voice for learning to live with Social Media. It’s on me to find balance in a world increasingly living with Social Media and becoming disillusioned with it.

I WANT TO HELP YOUR DAUGHTERS.

I very much want to help them help themselves drill their way out of the underwater mine they have landed in. We’re all in this together. We created these platforms by using them and engaging with them. We’re responsible. We are creatives, creating. We can create a hole for ourselves as much as we can create a solution. I want to become part of the solution. Not the problem.

I AM OFFERING MEDITATIVE INSIGHT IN THE INTREPID MEDITATOR THAT GIVES PERSPECTIVE ON THE SOCIAL MEDIA PHENOMENON.

Facebook acts as a disruptor. It is a seemingly innocuous machine spitting out content from which we react, and it is the reaction that causes the harm. But believe it or not, through meditation I have been shown that Facebook is a teaching tool. Are you capable as seeing it as such? Facebook has become a threat. It is no longer harmless. It is a threat to our sense of self. Can we learn to appreciate a teaching tool that looks and acts in such a backwards way?

In order to find balance within we must begin to balance our relationship with Social Media. I invite you to join the conversation. How will you see yourselves and the daughters in your life, the young women who might look up to you, as contributors to the balance? Where do we begin?

Find The Intrepid Meditator in your local bookstore. Go to my Free Meditation Series.

The Intrepid Meditator

I DIDN’T THINK I WOULD WRITE A BOOK ABOUT MEDITATION.

Aren’t there enough of them out there already? Who am I to say what meditation is or how we should interpret it?

I don’t think meditation should be spoken about or interpreted in language, nor should I attempt an explanation. Meditation just is. It is multi-sensory and individualistic. Maybe it is dualistic if you choose group meditation, but it is of the self. Of you. This puts me in a bit of a mess and I apologize profusely for putting thoughts on meditation into words, but how else to talk about it if not in language? Meditation can’t be explained as much as I feel it is time to offer an explanation.

We’re at a crossroads in our relationship to ourselves, and unless we begin to know ourselves, truly know the self, we’re going to destroy the planet and ourselves along with it. I feel this. Deeply. No matter your religion or economic status, your ethnicity or tribe, the peril we are all in is real. This isn’t some apocalyptic truth. Nor do I want to scare you. We’re an evolving race of people, all of us, of one planet, yet we don’t know who we are. We’re desperately clinging onto something, but what? It is as if the rug is being pulled out from under us on a daily basis, but we don’t know what it means. The fight-or-flight response is all we have left because we’re exhausted beyond measure. No one said this was going to be easy, this life, but never did we think we should be in this much distortion.

THIS IS AN EXCERPT FROM MY FORTHCOMING BOOK ENTITLED, The Intrepid Meditator.

As a companion book to the free mediation series, The Intrepid Meditator is designed to help guide you through the series. By introducing you to the personal backstory behind the healing modality, I hope to travel alongside you on your journey to greater creative freedom. Please join me in the mediations, as they are FREE, and provide ample space for you to take yourself to your inner creativity. Your inner Truth.

I HAVE BEEN A WRITER FOR ALL MY LIFE.

I only began to take myself seriously when, in 2000, I was introduced to a very unique healing meditation modality. I have been using this straight-forward, no fuss meditation modality on myself for over twenty years. It has changed my perspective about myself and my relationship to the planet, and as a result I have discovered my authentic writer’s voice.

We’re in a relationship to Earth, and consequently to one another, but we’re not connected to the planet in ways that sustain us. We take. And we take from others.

This healing meditation series is designed to open your body, mind, and spirit to greater creative energy and help you find ways to sustain it. Time is of the essence to understand our own self. By learning to balance the creative self, the humble self, the provider self, the mothering self, the fathering self, as examples, we can grow to respect that it is on us to discover our personal happiness, and consequently our personal freedoms without expecting a partner, a parent, a school, a church, or a government official to provide us with this Truth.

How To Create A Relationship With Meditation

Read Time : 3 Minutes

Meditation guides your journey to a higher self

I’ve been circling this wagon for years trying to find myself, whole. I won’t say meditation is the end-all-be-all of that quest, but it has been a very important part of my journey.

To be able to find me, my creative expression, my truth, I have relied on meditation.

The two are interdependent as they are dependent actions. Meditation is an activity. It is a way. It is a road long traveled, but one where you might not get from where you are to where you wish to be. Meditation takes you places, and yet you find yourself never arriving.

And why is that?

We’re so focused on the points along the road, the dials, the measurements, the markers we forget about the way. If we are asking for a way that will help take us to where we metaphysically, spiritually, or psychologically need to be, and if meditation is perhaps one of those ways, how then can we create a more meaningful relationship with it? And why bother if we never arrive?

Where is it that we so desperately feel we need to be?

Honestly, I don’t mind wandering. I love the nomad soul searching journey that takes me to new places, new towns, new relationships, new houses, and new companions. No, I’m not an unsettled soul. I’m simply a wanderer.

This, I will tell you, took me many years to understand and many new roads to travel down before I began to appreciate the nomad in myself. I am a piece of sagebrush, and more times than not I let the wind take me.

The Never-Ending Journey

I don’t mind the journey. Sure, I would be lying to myself and to you if I told you milestones and markers weren’t important. I travel to those markers, the days and years of my life, but in this quest to understand myself, and by using meditation, I don’t rely on those markers as true markers. They are simply placeholders in time. I may go from point A to point B, and I may be able to mark this part of my journey complete, but as soon as I arrive at point B I usually realize there is a C, a D, and an E to find.

If you could, Would you travel beyond the boundaries of time?

I travel, metaphorically speaking, to unearth myself by traveling across time and not through time. I travel beyond the boundaries of time. Traveling beyond the boundaries of time allows you the freedom to never arrive and to never stop yourself from trying.

You just keep going.

Learning. Growing. Acknowledging. Trusting. Trying.

I’d like to offer you an experience, that should you be so inclined, you may want to try.

If you’ve ever found yourself thwarted by meditation ask yourself- why?

Was it too boring? Too underwhelming? Too complex? Too rigid? Too New Age?

I’ll let you fill in the blank. And if you haven’t tried it in awhile, or ever, I’d like to offer you that opportunity. I’m here to help.

I won’t promise you that you’ll have a change of heart, but I’d like to be there to help you find your inner self, your creative expression, your creative voice through mindfulness. If there is one thing available to all of us it is this. Creative Expression.

Your journey will be uniquely yours, and I honor that, as mine will be uniquely mine.

But should you find yourself curious, or you’re a seasoned meditator and you’d like to boost the confidence in yourself, I’m here. It’s been years of study, years of exploration, and years of a few hard knocks that has put me here to offer this help.

Please join me in my Guided Meditation Series : Winter Into Spring.

This series is structured for the beginner as well as for the most experienced meditator because through these guided meditations, which I have written, you will be free to go where you wish to go. I offer this guided meditation series as a free resource to you.

I am only here to offer a helping hand as you find your own way, your own creative expression.