Photo by Lyn It is early morning. I am enjoying the cool crisp air and the quiet just before my daughters get up. I've been getting up early these days, and going to bed late too. There is a new fuel that appears to be running the engine much more efficiently, so less sleep has been okay. All I can think is that I have cleaned up a lot of the power leaks. One of my biggest power leaks that I am in the process of repairing centers around my creating. It is no secret that I've struggled with my mind towering over me when it comes to my creating, and often my mind has won. But I am finding pockets of light that begin to show the way. A meeting with a sweet friend the other night, helped to show me just how far I have come, and how many forces have amassed already to help this integral part of my being to feel more flow. I've realized that my struggle with creating comes when I try to sector it off into a suffocated little place

Photo Credit Scenic Reflections I am here writing without giving myself a chance to think about it. A slogan that has been working for my good friend Julia has been showing up constantly in my mind like a flashy neon sign:  Don't think about it, just do it. How is it that Nike knows? How is it that Just do it is printed everywhere, and has had as little effect on me as the Got Milk slogan. It doesn't make me buy milk. Why have I always had to take the long route--I could argue that it has been the scenic route, but c'mon, poet or not, I need to function on this planet. Oh, how many endless minutes have I spent in that place just before moving, feeling stuck--overwhelmed by a sensitive nature that jams the engine, an eternal winter icing the gears--overload of information pouring in, needing to be parsed and dissected from every angle, all possible scenarios to be scoured, all possible thoughts of anyone and everyone to be considered, filtered through guilt-c

Photo by J. G. I don't quite know how to write about what is happening in my life. I have such a sense that the being that is hopping out of bed, doing daily tasks, completing projects, feeling enthusiastic about my kids, isn't me--or at least familiar to the me of the last 36 years. I don't know how I am doing it all, and mostly I can't understand how engaged and joyful I feel in everything--how close my heart feels to the surface--but how balanced it feels. Not extreme blissed-out highs, but not god-awful lows either. Somewhere in the middle. I notice that this place on the continuum is where I  want to return, and more and more I do. I seem to be hoovering around a mid-point. It feels quiet and stable and clear. It asks nothing and wants nothing, but does not impede doing, intuiting or feeling immense joy and appreciation--perhaps the best way to describe it is that it isn't so fleeting or so much like a roller coaster. Something very heavy I've been carrying

I don't know if I like rats or not. They've invaded my house in the past few months. Funny the fear of sharing this here, that you will picture my humble abode as kind of an evil lair, dirty and ill-kept--the kind of place where rats would assemble---become armies for some infamous villain. You'd never know how the furniture I came away with from my divorce fit perfectly in each space of my little house, as if it had been destined for this place all along. You'd never picture little girls rooms frosty with pastels. You wouldn't directly guess that I have a taste for swirls and the belle epoque. Yes, and I can't help but ignore a conflict within, that the rats feel like mere rats, and I can't elevate them to a higher status. Is it any different from the aristocracy and the hungry peasants? I trapped one unknowingly in my daughter's room. I thought the towel under her door was keeping them out. But when I went to wake her up, I saw the signs of a rat in re

When I began this blog, I was just stumbling on the heart of a new way of being. It was all very new, ground breaking for me in my life, and leaning toward an intellectual understanding and synthesis of matters over mind--in other words, there was the idea that I just needed to become proficient at tackling the mind. Tonight, I was reminded by my friend Nige , at what has been behind all the words on this blog all along--the stories, the proclamations, the testimony--even if at times, I got caught up in my own war stories. This all began as heeding the call to wake up . I realize that this new way of being is becoming less intellectual, and often living and breathing in the moment-- deconstructing stories, finding relief, and Love, sometimes in an instant. I am humbled by how easy it is becoming to choose love, and how easily it is being reciprocated. Seems that when an authentic love is extended, there is nothing left to fight. This morning I had some Jehovah's Witnesses come to m

Sometimes the heaviness is gone, as if something has truly taken root, grown up big and strong toward the light, and begun to blossom. It began with baby steps. Giving myself what I need. This was so hard at first. Practically impossible. Everything I wanted or needed was in direct conflict with all the shoulding driving my life. Stood still when I was supposed to run. Shut the door when I was supposed to keep it open. Spoke when I was supposed to be quiet. Ate when I was supposed to lose weight. Stoked the fire when I was supposed to put it out. All along, I could measure changes in my inner landscape, but my outer landscape remained mostly the same. But the outside changes have begun to manifest--small, but big enough to be honored here. Tonight, an impromptu trip with my girls to watch the sunset. Sitting with them huddled in a big green blanket, watching the sun sink below the hills, singing about amber waves of grain waving around us, and purple mountains majesty rising above us

Or making all of my writing part of the family . One of the biggest conflicts about ending Wild Road and beginning Soul Carving, was that, in essence, I cut off a limb. I had no idea how much I needed that limb to get around. I do  now.  If you want to join me walking around again, visit Backdoor to the Moon (formerly Wild Road). If you want to join my imagination running wild, stay and play. At least, that's the plan for now. As I said in my first post on Backdoor to the Moon ,  I see how gathering back parts of myself is part of the journey, and how letting it happen, is my freedom...   if it looks like I am flailing, it is because I am. M y soul, embracing what it needs, and realizing that the only thing constant is change, and the only thing I can do about that, is be me.

Okay, I get it. I need this blog, like I need to breathe. I need to be able to write here, to work through process and to share preciousness. I need to have one place to weave through the fabric of it all, and another place to let my imagination run wild. Last night I had a dream about an old woman. She was in a wheelchair and was being wheeled into a dangerous surgery that was to likely kill her. As the doctors stood around her , cutting, poking, prodding, and sucking, to remove dangerous blood clots, she flat-lined over and over. I watched as parts of her body gave out, including a leg, that was amputated. Everything happens for a reason. That I get. Even down to the smallest most insignificant events. They all add up, somehow. I see how leaving and coming back here, takes courage. I also see how writing here was such a precious part of my experience, how it helped the life-force to flow. I see how gathering back parts of myself is part of the journey, and how letting it happen, is