Earth medicine – Mindful Mama

A different type of blogpost

I’ve written from a place of shame; I’ve written from a place of compassion, and I’ve written from a place of love. I don’t know that I’ve ever written from a place of anger of the sort I feel now.

I am angry at our operating system.

I am angry at the patriarchy.

I am angry at the Judeo-Christian, off-planetary, white male, asexual god.

This myth has got to burn.

Operating from this place of hierarchy and feudalism is killing our planet, and this dominant world view divides. If we’re operating with parent images, we must replace the god metaphor of king on the throne with that of the Great Earth Mother— a strong, black, beautiful and naked woman who birthed (and wants to nurture) us all. We must replace in the name of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit with in the name of the North, the East, the South and the West. We must see and feel our connectedness. We must see that we can’t be for women and deny them the right to make decisions about their very own bodies. We must see that we can’t be pro-equal rights for some and not for others.

We cannot believe only some are the chosen people.

We must look to our historical figures with accuracy and cut the bullshit. We can walk in the way of Jesus, but we can’t distort his activism, love and self-sacrifice. And we certainly can’t use his name has a shield to protect us from the work we need to do.

We must know how powerful we are and the responsibility we have because of our power. Every word we choose and act we perform has consequences. We must act bravely and with discernment. It is absolutely okay to take breaks. It is not okay to stick our heads in the sand and pretend the lives of others are not our business, play that we are here on earth merely to consume and be entertained and distracted.

No.

We must wake up to our potential, to our power and to our duty to serve and to protect this earth and all her inhabitants. We must see that I am you and you are me. We must acknowledge both the slave and the slave master in each of us. Don’t try to tell me you don’t have slave master in you. How does the voice in your head speak? Is it kind? Compassionate? Soothing? Or does it tell you you are not good enough, that you must compete harder and perform and perfect better? Or else.

The work is inside work and it’s outside work. And it is all HARD FUCKING WORK. It will make you tired. It will make you mad and it will make you confused. I know. And I know I’m not alone. You can join me too.

Please stand up to nonsense. Please stand up for all humankind. Please don’t concern yourself with where people put their private parts, or with whom they put them. Please don’t value your property over human life. Please don’t tell me we can have differences of opinions about basic human rights like voting, healthcare and personal safety and still be friends.

No.

If you are not willing to stand up to your church or your church’s teachings, or your parents or neighbors or anyone whom you love in the name of keeping the peace, I ask you, what kind of peace do you want to keep?

Racism must become uncomfortable for all, not just for those whose skin is darker than ours. Misogyny must be uncomfortable for all, not just for those harassed. Discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation has to stop. Xenophobia must go. We are a global community whether we like it or not, which means we are all in this together.

All of us.

What is

My husband and babe #1 travelled to NYC for a basketball tournament that was graciously cancelled mid-game. Thank you NBA and NCAA for being the first leaders of our nation. For saying, we will stop the March madness and we will respond to what is. Thank you for setting a precedent for our president.

My people are back from this hot-zone, and now we are stuck at home together. We made this decision before the CDC advised it.

Some call it social distancing. Some call it physical distancing. I call it a dream come true.

How long has my soul begged for this kind of closeness with my family? The kind not required by a logistically complicated scheduled trip away from all of our duties and distractions, but rather a settling in, a sinking down, a surrender to our humanness. A call to close loops and finish discussions, to not escape to school or work mid-complicated sentence. To not try to fit in familial relationships among all the external obligations. And the world is asking us to do it.

I feel an ancient itch being scratched, an echoey yearning for tribe time, a longing for community collaboration and solidarity, as we relearn together how to work with the natural elements.

Yes, I feel fear. And panic has reached the surface of my body a time or two. But truthfully the undercurrent of fear has been here inside me for so many years. Fear for the earth, fear for the polar bears, fear for the people in poverty living near the sea. Fear for the glaciers and the grandkids, the forests and the furry ones. Fear for all the things we know and don’t address.

I can feel Mother Earth sighing in relief for the little break we’re giving her, and now I don’t feel quite so alone in my fear.

Now maybe we all look at the invisible elephant in the room. Now maybe we talk about the necessity of universal healthcare, of community gardens and converting our tidy blue-grass yards into life-giving earth. Maybe we address how every action we take as individuals ripples through the community, affecting all.

Maybe we embrace our interconnectedness as demonstrated by the constantly-updating live outbreak maps. Maybe we acknowledge as a culture the inevitable end we all face. Maybe with this acknowledgment we choose to live in more life-conscious ways.

I pray and I choose to believe that this virus can raise our consciousness and our health as a vibrant community. All of us have unique ways of contributing and growing, all of us have work to do at home— both inner work and work with our closest people. For all those who continue to do important and life-saving work out in the community: providing food and medicine, caring for the sick and assisting the compromised and the elderly, —thank you. From the bottom of my heart.

We are each other’s destiny

I was lucky enough to lead yoga at a wilderness retreat yesterday. There, a friend read these words of poet Mary Oliver:

I would say that there exist a thousand unbreakable links between each of us and everything else, and that our dignity and our chances are one. The farthest star and the mud at our feet are a family, and there is no decency or sense honoring one thing, or a few things, and then closing the lest. The pine tree, the leopard, the Platte River, and ourselves – we are at risk together, or we are on our way to a sustainable world together. We are each other’s destiny.

As we find ourselves in week three (and one) of the primary races, and are perhaps enjoying some extra leisure time this president’s day, it seems a perfect time

-to pause

-to contemplate our connectedness

-to familiarize or deepen our knowledge of the politics surrounding us

-to wise-mind our way into choosing a candidate that best represents our values

-to envision a new way of operating, one that celebrates both our connection and our sovereignty

Happy third Monday of the month, and first day of Mercury appearing to move backwards.

May the force be with you!

October play

The end of October is almost here, and I haven’t written a thing to share. Not because nothing is noteworthy, but rather because what I’ve been wanting to write seems a tad too intimate and vulnerable and a tad too woo-woo. But the truth is, this is my favorite October on record. Anxiety still rears its head, and the threat of depression looms like it often does in this tenth month of the year, but this particular October the leaves are extra vibrant and the light more sparkly than I remember. Part of the October magic is due to the perfect climate conditions for color, but part I credit to the playful work I’ve been doing. Three times this week I saw some iteration of

what you did yesterday created today;
what you do today creates tomorrow.

I’d like to think that my actions and self-care rituals over the last few months are playing out now, one of which is setting intentions with the moon.

Super witchy, no?

With the new moon I set intentions for habits I want to cultivate and parts of my personality I want to grow as the moon grows big and fat into fullness.

With the full moon I set intentions for habits I want to drop and thinking patterns and grudges I want to release as the moon shrinks to invisible.

Each day I return to these intentions, and standing in front of the altar I build each fortnight, I light a candle and some incense and read the intentions aloud. Every. Single. Day.

How’s that for some magic?

Being so in tune with my intentions, I can’t help but be more aware of my behaviors and how I create my own reality with the words I choose, the company I keep and the actions I take. Decisions become easier and relationships cleaner.

Being so in tune to the moon, I can’t help but be more aware of my cycle and how my moods and energy levels change with the changing shape of this celestial tracker. Checking in with her on the pre-dawn and pitch black drive to middle school, I feel connection to (and participation with) Mother Nature like I never have before.

Being so in tune with Mother Nature, I can’t help but feel supported as the seasons change. The days are shortening furiously fast, and this year, instead of feeling the dread of winter so solidly, I am finding twinges of excitement in the cracks. I am grateful for the way the sun shifts and the light shimmers through the quivering leaves onto different spots in the house and yard like twinkle lights.

Being so in tune with the light, I can’t help but be drawn closer to the sun-based celebrations. We began celebrating the Winter Solstice at home years ago, as a call for more meaning and connection with the Earth, but this year Samhain (Sa-wen) is on my radar too, the half-way mark between the Fall Equinox and Winter Solstice. Like its cousins Halloween, All Saints’ Day and Day of the Dead, Samhain is marked by thinning veils between the land of the living and of those passed, between this reality and those unseen. It’s the season of imagination, divination and magic, the season of celebrating light and dark and the season of co-creating the reality in which we live.

All of this in-tune-ment, intentional attention and Mother Earth support is providing a sense peace that I didn’t know could co-exist with a racing heart, sweaty palms or a deep longing to spend the day in bed. I think the play with the moon and my intentions is helping me to understand the cyclical nature of all things a bit more tangibly. The light grows bright, it goes dim. Feelings arise, (and if I don’t mess with them too much) there they go. And if I focus my intention on my desires often enough, I just may create the playful world I want to inhabit.

Happy magic-making to you.

Boo!

A visit to my mother, from the Great Mother

Dear sweet child,

You won’t remember this vision when you wake. You’ll only feel the echo of my message, but please trust this echo, and revisit it often as you grow.

I want you to know that you are god. Holiness lives and breathes through you. There is nothing you can do to stop god from being you. You can only dim or brighten her light. You’ll know the vibrancy of this light by the signs your body gives you, so it is of upmost importance that you learn all you can about this body— about the parts you can see and the parts you can’t.

Let the body be your compass.

Make friends with the breath, the heartbeat and the pulses that respond to your surroundings. Discover the ways your body prefers to move. Know your belly and what it desires as fuel for your play.

Play with your body.

Give great care to each and every one of the body’s portals to the outside world. Pay close attention to where your body gives and receives energy; observe how it excites and how it recoils. Learn what depletes the body too. Know which environments, situations and conversations stoke the body’s fires and which dim the light.

Take exquisite care.

Know also, sweet child, that God is nature. Be in nature. Observe carefully, learn from the patterns of her plants and animals. Listen to the water and to the stones. Know in your bones that you too are nature. Study your seasons and cycles well. See your patterns. Feel your feelings.

Feel your nature.

Finally, sweet baby of mine, know that just as you are god, all other creatures on the planet are too, in various shades of dimness and brightness. Pay most attention to your light, protecting it and caring for it while letting others tend to theirs. Do not confuse your light with the light of others. Do not give permission to others to control your light.

You are the keeper of your light.
You are the keeper of your light.
You are the keeper of your light.

Sweetest dreams to you, my love. I am here.

Always.

Art credit — Priyanka Rawat Sharma

Autumn equinox

My bare feet are quite happy on the cold stone of the shady back patio. Birds and crickets are chirping, and I’ve a warm drink to sip. The sunshine is casting intricate shadows across the yard, rorschach shapes formed by the leaves, which are toying with changing color as the summer toys with becoming fall.

Light and dark.

For many, the autumnal equinox is not as big a deal as the sudden and drastic time change that comes here in a few weeks. For others this gradual shift from more daylight to less has been on our radars for weeks, and these days surrounding the Autumnal Equinox, equal light and dark, are quite powerful. The days of balance are a gentle beckoning to examine what’s to come.

Light and more dark.

We still hear the laughter of children playing outdoors and appreciate the the goldenrod’s blooms, while also aware of the shrinking cicada symphony and the extra effort required to navigate the pitch-black of early morning.

We still feel the warm sunlight on our face, while also aware that the serotonin boost provided by the fire-in-the-sky won’t be this available for much longer.

We still rest gratefully in the hammock, while also aware that backyard comfort and recharge will be challenged in the near future.

Less light and more dark.

We realize we’re soon to be asked to hibernate. To slow, to feel and to reflect in a way that’s different than that of the active and fiery summer. As we move into Autumn, we are invited to witness nature’s transformation around us. Asked to contemplate the leaves changing and releasing to the ground as nutrients for the earth. We are invited to ponder our own aging and compostability.

Dark and light.

In the Fall we celebrate our harvest and good fortune, while at the same time preparing for the call to still.

We feel, allow, surrender, release.