Sometimes I get a tired of the newsletters and Facebook posts promising "transformation" and a new shiny life free of old patterns. Ah, Gawd, I just realized I'm talking about my own newsletters and posts. I'm the one who is boring me.
Here's the thing: yes, of course we are transforming, and yes, even with so much evidence lacking, I actually believe humans are in a paradigm shift that is raising our vibration-consciousness-maturity-soul age-flamy flame. And yes, I believe we can absolutely choose whether we ride this wave or get swallowed by it, and that’s the key to the spiritual path. But I want to tell you a little story and the title might be, "But SHEESH - I could just use a little beauty!"
I've been working this shamanic training thing very hard for many years, and even harder for the last six, because my life shattered open when my marriage ended and among the crows picking through the carnage, the daisies and white birches and new pine trees began emerging. Did Spirit crash my life so as to open it so I could finally devote myself full time to building these skills that would permanently marginalize me from my culture but make me a better servant to my people and Spirit? Yeah, I guess.
So I've been going to Peru every six months, studying hard with a family of shamans, and to New Mexico two or three times a year, studying hard with a family of shamans. And recently, I added another teacher in the mountains and I suppose I'll be studying hard with him. The study is like a constant roller coaster ride with fear, thrill, doubt, more thrill and, inevitably, vomit. The work is loaded with mystery and, yes, power, and I've seen my healing and teaching work get stronger and my life get deeper and more interesting.
So, every time I get into the room with my teachers, I'm thinking really hard: "I'm here to transform. To get better. To get… better." And so a few weeks ago, sitting in the declining evening light as the shamans were whispering prayers into their tobacco, preparing for the hours-long ceremony, and the cacophony of daytime jungle birds was giving way to cacophony of nighttime jungle birds, I'm whispering my prayers: "Oh Spirit, make me better, oh Spirit make me deeper, oh Spirit make be a better teacher, healer, servant…and my mind and heart are absolutely loaded down with Grand Intention for Transformation, and Grand Intention for becoming more skilled, and Grand Desire to Know Spirit more and become a Brighter, more goldy-shiny, hotter burning flamey-flame human, and advance and progress and evolve and open and BLAH BLAH Freakin' BLAH.
And I put my hand on my heart and wept. And these words spilled out: "But Spirit, really, I could just use a little dose of beauty right now. A little…dose…of beauty." And it came.
Because Spirit really does give me what I am asking for. And most of the time what I'm actually asking for is just a new form of old trouble, I guess because trouble is inside my comfort zone, and I think fighting a giant lizard with a sword in my living room is different from hacking a giant boulder to bits with a hammer in my living room, but the thing is, both are happening inside my living room.
And so I made a prayer to step outside and ask the stars to just send a cooling song down into my head, and. God be praised, they did. And so that’s what I want to offer this summer - just a little dose of beauty. The links tell you more: Three Moons Summer Ceremony / Pilgrimage to the Boundary Waters / July Healing Special
(With apologies to the poet Rilke, translator Robert Bly and Spirit channeler Paul Selig):
Sometimes a person puts down the hammer
And leaves the great boulder in the living room unsmashed.
She walks outdoors and sings, and keeps singing,
Because there is a church in the stars whose doors are flung open only by song.
Sometimes she returns to the house and cooks a meal.
And sometimes she wanders off, singing, never to be heard from again
And her children say blessings on her as though she is dead.
And another person remains inside her house,
And dies there, among the shards of rock.
And her children sell the house
And move out among the swirling songs of the night world
Looking for a new church.
And maybe they learn to sing.
Here's the thing: yes, of course we are transforming, and yes, even with so much evidence lacking, I actually believe humans are in a paradigm shift that is raising our vibration-consciousness-maturity-soul age-flamy flame. And yes, I believe we can absolutely choose whether we ride this wave or get swallowed by it, and that’s the key to the spiritual path. But I want to tell you a little story and the title might be, "But SHEESH - I could just use a little beauty!"
I've been working this shamanic training thing very hard for many years, and even harder for the last six, because my life shattered open when my marriage ended and among the crows picking through the carnage, the daisies and white birches and new pine trees began emerging. Did Spirit crash my life so as to open it so I could finally devote myself full time to building these skills that would permanently marginalize me from my culture but make me a better servant to my people and Spirit? Yeah, I guess.
So I've been going to Peru every six months, studying hard with a family of shamans, and to New Mexico two or three times a year, studying hard with a family of shamans. And recently, I added another teacher in the mountains and I suppose I'll be studying hard with him. The study is like a constant roller coaster ride with fear, thrill, doubt, more thrill and, inevitably, vomit. The work is loaded with mystery and, yes, power, and I've seen my healing and teaching work get stronger and my life get deeper and more interesting.
So, every time I get into the room with my teachers, I'm thinking really hard: "I'm here to transform. To get better. To get… better." And so a few weeks ago, sitting in the declining evening light as the shamans were whispering prayers into their tobacco, preparing for the hours-long ceremony, and the cacophony of daytime jungle birds was giving way to cacophony of nighttime jungle birds, I'm whispering my prayers: "Oh Spirit, make me better, oh Spirit make me deeper, oh Spirit make be a better teacher, healer, servant…and my mind and heart are absolutely loaded down with Grand Intention for Transformation, and Grand Intention for becoming more skilled, and Grand Desire to Know Spirit more and become a Brighter, more goldy-shiny, hotter burning flamey-flame human, and advance and progress and evolve and open and BLAH BLAH Freakin' BLAH.
And I put my hand on my heart and wept. And these words spilled out: "But Spirit, really, I could just use a little dose of beauty right now. A little…dose…of beauty." And it came.
Because Spirit really does give me what I am asking for. And most of the time what I'm actually asking for is just a new form of old trouble, I guess because trouble is inside my comfort zone, and I think fighting a giant lizard with a sword in my living room is different from hacking a giant boulder to bits with a hammer in my living room, but the thing is, both are happening inside my living room.
And so I made a prayer to step outside and ask the stars to just send a cooling song down into my head, and. God be praised, they did. And so that’s what I want to offer this summer - just a little dose of beauty. The links tell you more: Three Moons Summer Ceremony / Pilgrimage to the Boundary Waters / July Healing Special
(With apologies to the poet Rilke, translator Robert Bly and Spirit channeler Paul Selig):
Sometimes a person puts down the hammer
And leaves the great boulder in the living room unsmashed.
She walks outdoors and sings, and keeps singing,
Because there is a church in the stars whose doors are flung open only by song.
Sometimes she returns to the house and cooks a meal.
And sometimes she wanders off, singing, never to be heard from again
And her children say blessings on her as though she is dead.
And another person remains inside her house,
And dies there, among the shards of rock.
And her children sell the house
And move out among the swirling songs of the night world
Looking for a new church.
And maybe they learn to sing.
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