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The best thing is to know you are loved.
To trust that your body is there for you and quietly doing all its work with grace and ease.

The best thing is to know that you mean something to someone.

To stand for something.

The best thing is to do something that makes a difference in the world.

To know that you have made a connection with another living being and left them feeling more than

The best thing is to know that the world is a benevolent place with possibility for change and growth all taking us to a better place if we can gather the courage to do what is required to take action.

The best thing is to feel the flow of the universe under your wings lifting you into the life of your dreams.

the best thing is to know you are loved.

humanity and horror

04/18/2013

All around the world we are being exposed to acts of horror.

Rape. Murder. Child abuse. Bombings. Suicide.

If you want to find something to feel bad about, just turn on the news.

The sorrow and the outrage we feel when we are faced with these acts are very real human responses to horror.

Appropriate.

But often i see the response of turning hate on the perpetrators.

Kill those bastards. Worse than animals.

Surely the people who commit these acts of horror do so because they are standing in a place of their own righteousness. Of course sometimes that righteousness is the result of being way out of balance.

I once worked with a woman who had been psychotic (undiagnosed and untreated) when she had killed her children. It was at the time and in the moment an act of love, protecting them from some evil. But now that she was treated she lived each day in abject dismay at what she had done, sorrow over the loss. But all the outside world knew about her was that she was a child murderer. And that gave many people the self appointed right to hate her.

I know that perpetrators often stand in the tyranny of their righteousness to commit the act. Being righteous about who deserves to live. What religion. What sex. What gang colour you wear. Even what kind of clothing you wear. ('Provocative = deserves it").

But doesn't that make those of us who are filled with hate and a blood lust for the perpetrators more like them than unlike them?

We who bay for the deaths of those who commit these acts are just standing in our own "tyranny of right"?

Those who for some reason turn to hate and violence are damaged. They are not filled with a sense of the beauty of the world. The possibility of humanity. The joy of everyday acts of grace.

Ironically it is being able to see the perpetrators as human, as people with a family, with pain and suffering, people who have birthdays and colds, people who laugh and cry, able to see them more like us than different from us that sets us apart. That stops the cycle of violence.

I am not saying that people don't need to atone for their crimes, get the treatment they need, learn new ways of seeing the world. Hell no. If that woman i knew all those years ago had not had that treatments she probably would have gone on to more acts that filled her and the world with sorrow.

Instead I am choosing to gather the perpetrators into the sadness i feel. Take a portion of my compassion and send it to them.

I don't know if i could reach this place quickly if something (God, Goddess, All that Is forbid) happened to my girls. But i hope i would eventually. For my sake.

Because the world needs us to find a way back to empathy and compassion.

wahine pounamu

03/28/2013

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i don't know if you remember but i found a peice of treasured pounamu or New Zealand jade on the beach a couple of years ago.

Pounamu is the magic heart stone of New Zealand. It kind of holds the essence of this country. It is sacred to Maori and owned by Ngai Tahu people. You may not take it from the rivers but if you find it on the beach it is yours. Pounamu must be either stolen in battle or given to you. It is traditionally blessed by a Kaumatua (male elder) or Tohunga (spiritual leader).

The piece i found was my touchstone, my companion and my solace up until the time she disappeared on my visit with Pixie, Nika and Claire... I had such sorrow at losing her. It was all mixed up with being with these powerful women in such a powerful place...

And i have been lonely for her.

I had been wearing a piece i had bought as a present and not yet found the owner for. I asked permission for that to be ok. I love that peice, as wild and face filled as it is.

But the day i walked into Tuatara, a local gallery which champions Maori arts and i began to speak with Kiri i felt something shift.

Kiri is Matakite (a seer). Her story is not mine to tell but she is triumphant and beautiful. Getting to know her has been a great pleasure and strengthener to me.

And she said "You have to see this" and took a piece of Pounamu from a case. It is in a Tohu shape (kind of like and adze head). It was a milky green, kind of like the sea on a shifting weather summer's day - jade and teal and deep green.

And she said "This is special, have a look." and held it up to the light.

There in the cut stone was a wahine. A woman. In profile. Proud. Round hips. Full shoulders. Long hair. Looking out into what she sees.

I was over come. There was such a mix of awe and desire and acknowledgment of magic at work.

Kiri said she had undertaken with the stonesmith to make sure it went to the right person.

My first thought was 'i want to be that person", followed quickly by "Who are you to think you are enough to have that"

And then all the excuses about the protocol of not buying your own and not affording it right now and.... well they rushed in.

I tucked away my big feelings and i went home.

But the idea of the Wahine Pounamu would not leave me. Standing strong, in the stone, called to be at the breast of a woman doing the work in the world that answers the call.

The woman i want to be. The woman i am growing into.

I got some unexpected money (made a sale yay!!!) i checked in with myself, i made excuses about how it is my birthday coming up and how my family could go halves and....

I thought about how i deserve to have beauty.

I thought about how i need support to do my work in the world... How magic like that doesn't come your way everyday. How i am moving out of the archetype of martyr and into the archetype of wise woman. How the true beauty that feeds me is what i need to connect to in order to be clean enough to do my work.

How this felt like a task for me, this over coming of my self abnegation. Part of my work.

i went back to Tuatara. And i told Kiri i had come to see the Wahine Pounamu again. And she smiled and said i had to hold it to make sure. And when she touched my hands i heard the word "Sister".

and so i did something i have never done before. I put it on layby. I paid it off in dribs and drabs.

I didn't let my family pitch in. I bought it myself. $130.

I figured i did battle to get it.

Battle with myself. With my ancestral patterns. With my self loathing.

Kiri told me to take it to the Moana (ocean) to bless and cleanse her in the salt. So i did my own ceremony of blessing and cleansing with her. I joined up with her and Mama ocean and in our combination magic happened.

And now i have this ally, this sister and this reminder that i deserve beauty and support, around my neck and next to my heart and beating on my chest as i run into the world to remind me of where i live and what is my calling.

And i know i am blessed.

5 Comments

worthiness take two

03/12/2013

I am working with a group of Fabeku Fantumise's fans talking about money and other magic

today Fabeku posted this:

"Worthiness in very simple terms, means i have found a way to let the Energy reach me, the Energy that is natural reach me. Worthiness or unworthiness is something that is pronounced on you by you. You are the only one that can deem yourself worthy or unworthy. You are the only one who can love yourself into a state of allowing, or hate ourself into a state of disallowing." Abraham.

the truth of that really hit me in the gut

And i think that my circling around and around the vortex of worthiness is connected to my understanding of what constitutes worthiness.

Someone worthy, in my non logical inner truth, hidden in the darkness is:

ONLY THOSE WHO SACRIFICE ARE WORTHY

This lives deep inside me

When i think worthy i think of Mother Teresa, Madiba, Joan of Arc.

sheesh.

So that from this truth comes the belief that only those who sacrifice deserve abundance, love, joy, connection.....

this is in direct opposition to my deepest truth that we are all magnificent.

AND in our state of magnificence (waiting to be rediscovered often but still our core truth) we are inherently worthy of good things.

And this makes the whole idea of having to sacrifice ourselves to attain worthiness totally and utterly redundant. Being here - being who we are in all our flawed beauty makes us worthy.

The idea of having to sacrifice to be worthy needs to be sacrificed,

sacrificed to worthiness,

to being able to stand in and transmit from worthiness.

I am going to take some time, make some ceremony around releasing the idea of the necessity of sacrifice.

I want to be free to stand in worthiness as a natural state.

Wanna join me?

worthiness

03/10/2013

hello my old foe

i see you there
with your pursed lips and your hands clamped on your handbag.

i see you looking at me an harrrumphing
about the new blue in my hair

and the fact i am going for a massage tomorrow

and the way i am asking - yes asking, for money for people to spend time learning with me.

i know you think i would be better off if i was just grateful for what i have.

if i just shut up and got on with my life.

if i gave more, did more for others, worked harder.

if i shut up, put up, put out.

Well unworthiness, it is like this.

I am done with you.

I never liked you anyway. You left my skin tight and my heart tighter. You made my teeth squeek and my gut clench.

And the thing is i realise that is no way to live.

So i want you to know that you are no longer welcome here.

You can't live in my tender heart anymore.

No, sorry, not even if you pay more rent. A walk on the beach once a month you say? No, You see you don't get to dole the good things out. I get to choose the good things now.

I get to invite them in. Call out to them, watch them tumble in the door, wrestle with them, make them tea, talk to them while i take a L-O-N-G hot bath. When i want.

No, this is not immaturity.

This is a mature woman saying ENOUGH.

That she is worthy of good things, ...good people, good treasure, good luxurious abundance and not putting it off until, some time when i become, after all my sacrifice and self abnegation, worthy.

Starting right now.

I am
Worthy.

and so my friend are you. Are you going to join me.

are you going to tell unworthiness and her grannypanties to piss off?

self compassion

03/05/2013

one of the biggest acts of self compassion i have ever been through - Chris Zydel's painting from the Wild Heart workshop

reach out your hand and place it on your heart

yes, now!

hold your hand there for a few moments.

feel the warmth and the connection

feel the surface between your hand and your heart

your heart and your hand

take that warmth and let it soften

let the softening spread

now see that warmth as compassion

see that compassion for the tiny things, the forgotten appointment, the mislaid keys spread through your heart.

now see that warmth as compassion for the big things

the anguish, the shame, the failures and the worries

let that compassion wash through your heart and clear away the negative scratchy surface of self meanness

and turn back to love

because love is always there... and if you loose the thread you can come here-

love live

te one you were waiting for

02/26/2013

she. coldwax on board

what does it take for us to honour our magnificence

what does it take for us to be aware that we are worthy of great things.

Great beauty.

Great love.

Great abundance.

Great kindness.

Great tenderness.

Does it take someone else telling you that you are entitled. Do you have to reach a certain milestone? Diploma? Degree? Doctorate?

Or do you have to look at your darkness and your light and decide that all of it, the mess and the confusion and the stumblings and the ecstatic beautiful life filling heart opening gloriousness... ALL OF YOU is enough.

And that you were the one you were waiting f

returning returns

02/12/2013

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so i am returning to talk about returning
again

ii am spending a lot of time awake in the most dark of hours 3-5 am.

that time when the most dark of thoughts arise..

the time when i am assailed by self meaness and imaginings of all the ways i have failed and dismayed other people

and the idea of returning as an antidote to this came to me....

returning to my body...

leaving that swirling morass of dark and venomous thoughts

and returning to my body.

Faithful body.

Always here, transporting, regenerating, supporting.

i return to the space inside my bones, my guts, my deep mysterious organs and i listen to what i find.

an ache here.

a tingle there.

a stillness.

and soon the whirling dismay is quieted by the truth of being in this body

returning to the remarkable gift i have of being a human

being here

being alive and awake and sentient

that return to my mortal reality is a healing for me....

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sacred time and shoulds

02/03/2013

i often berate myself for not making more time to be in the sacred moment
prayer, meditation, yoga...

all of it is so nourishing to me i know... so heart filling
they are all on my list of tools, of things that make me feel more alive to myself and this magical world

but they are often hovering there like shoulds
like things i haven't done and are therefore a burden
a weight in my life

which is the opposite of what i am seeking when i go to them for solace
and i realised this morning when i snuggled back down into bed for 5 minutes and opened my book with that hungry-joy that a good story stirs up in me,

that those ordinary things can be a sacred moment.

the hungry-joy is a sacred gift.

the comfort of the covers and the soft sheets and my skin in the humid wet February air are all sacred.

Turning from the shoulds and finding the sacred in the ordinary ... not just earmarking it as something accessible only through those pathways to God that are tried and true

that is my nourishment