Inspirations: Polarities

Mother’s Day Re-Defined

Yoshiko Matamoro wrote, “Each moment of this precious life is a treasured vessel, ready to be filled with every grace and many blessings.” Nietzsche wrote, “You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.”  Does not every mother give birth to a ‘dancing star,’ a shining soul worth everything she has to offer…. her Grace AND her chaos, her light and her dark?  Do you perceive yourself as a ‘treasured vessel’ filled with blessings?  Or, do you feel that you are more ‘a messenger of chaos,’ perhaps dark with drama and danger…a fallen star,  not a ‘dancing star?’  Depending upon mother’s perspectives, as well as our own, derived in part from ‘MOM’, we formulate ideas of what life is about, how we might lead it, and who we might become. Emerging from the embryo, re-defined in a new cellular structure, mysterious, in fathomless layers of re-formed DNA, we are born.  Birth is such a chaotic, creative, physical-meta-physical, spiritual, magical event.  From each cocooning womb emerges a life, the majesty of what the feminine offers the Universe.  There has to be chaos for new life to emerge.  There must be destruction, fabric torn, and emotional dissolution to create anew. If we could reconcile ourselves to our own chaos, we might re-align ourselves more readily to another’s, namely- mother’s.  She is after all but one of our own conduits for magic and crazy, Grace and abandonment, terror and forgiveness. Whenever we honor the dark gods within it allows others opportunity to meet theirs.  Mothers so wish their off spring to be perfect, to be happy, to be safe.  Our chaos is terrifying to them, as theirs was/is to us. Mother’s Day is but one day out of all others to honor her years of struggle, with herself-and with… Read more »

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“BETWEEN THE TWO MY LIFE FLOWS”

“Wisdom tells me I am nothing.  Love tells me I am everything.  Between the two my life flows.” Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj The constant swing from human to divine is the ebb and flow of ocean tides washing flotsam and jetsam.  Only essential Self remains when we have been pushed and pulled back and forth between endless demands of relationship polarities. Learning to respond rather than react to polar swings hones edges, awakens sensitivities, and grinds grain from the chaff.  In the dark of a New Moon birth, we prepare for Full Moon revelation. In summer’s richness waits winter’s barren bones. In the storm’s center, lies its stillness.  As we dance between contrasts, growing consciousness from un-consciousness, we deepen the response between fate and free-will. This emerging free-will creates new mind/body/spirit pathways.  It is a magical endeavor where we are able to heal psychic splits and divided selves. In the willingness to struggle with and against polarities, to risk wild swings, and manipulate multiple relationships lies the opportunity to enter new realities.  This can be a space where what was invisible- becomes visible, and what was previously impossible – manifests. It doesn’t always work that wonderfully, but at bare-bones bottom, that flotsam-jetsam bald and bold place, we might become the best and brightest of who we are.  Having swung back and forth not only between wisdom and love, but more likely, fear and anger, selfishness and generosity, even Revelation and Armageddon long enough, wisdom teams with love to open the listening heart. Ain’t nothing better than that, eh? POSE WITH SEASONAL ENERGIES Asana: Eka Pada Galavasana-Crossbow Balance: A great pose of strong polarity where we are tethered to earth, yet lift off and ‘fly high’ through the power of holding the center. You can come at this from Utkatasana, (or tripod… Read more »

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Serene As A Fish

Being vacuous is the new luxury. Vacuous defined as, ‘empty, void, vacant.’  The modern inference is, lacking intelligence.  But the truly vacuous state may be the most intelligent after all.  When we are empty – are we not available for filling? When was the last time there was space to not do-YOU? When was it you were not multi-tasking, not be planning your next move in the middle of the present one?  Can you pull up one vacuous-memory? When did you feel a new, unexpected possibility present itself because you had a wide space of nothingness?  Can you feel the gift of silence as it hushed your landscape?  More please. I used to swim, lost in oceans Seeking other wild, gentle things, With large eyes on either side That lived within. They were from other worlds Filling me with delight. Now, I am never lost And no one visits. Pose & Seasonal Energies Asana: Matsyasana-Fish Pose  If you have a dicey neck, the full pose is not for you,  begin with Fish prep.   Lie on your back, either with knees bent- feet on the floor, or legs strongly extended. Inhale, lifting hips off  floor,  sliding  palms under buttocks. With buttocks on back of the hands, pull forearms and elbows up close to ribs. Inhale, pressing forearms and elbows against floor, lift torso and head up.  With a dicey neck, keep head off floor.  Open the chest to the sky and breath. For the full pose, crown or back of head is on floor, hands come into Namaste mudra on chest, or can be extended overhead.  Keep legs strong and chest lifted to minimize weight on head.  Lengthen neck, don’t crunch it. If the back is strong, lift legs at 45 degree angle. Health Notes: This is a wonderful chest… Read more »

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Straddling

Straddling is not easy. When we are of two minds it’s difficult to make clear decisions.  Emotionally, when we are un-committed, neither fish nor fowl, we stew. Straddling is more difficult with big changes such as divorce, losing a job, a child arriving, or a parent dying. This requires we figure out new energetic pathways while sustaining the known, that we learn to straddle an old life with a new.  It can be exciting.  It can also be tough.  When we don’t know the territory, straddling, despite the wide stance, feels tippy and risky. Shifting into a new year asks we make an upgrade in consciousness, that we re-boot hard drives. These past months, the world has struggled and straddled many difficult, and extraordinary issues, and because we are interconnected through an energetic grid, we influence one another all the time.  My transformation, or lack of, accelerates your cellular structure. Your triumphs and failures influence mine.  Planetary waves of distress from major disasters, affecting large numbers of people, profoundly affect the planet, plant, and animal kingdoms. We have straddled giant leaps of faith, we have tried to keep the faith, but have we taken time to heal the wounds holding us back, and/or the horribly wounded? Sadly, there has been little to no straddling from those running the world.  We have failed miserably to come together despite random act of conciliation and kindness.  What can I do?  If my action influences yours, and together we are a more formidable resonance, rather than curse the dark, let’s stand in the night to sing the Beatles, “Come Together.” We move into 2012 at the speed of light.  But before we blast off, we are straddling this worn out year, struggling with what was lost, and those forsaken. We look to the future… Read more »

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Karmic Connections

This fall calls for us to be clear about who we are, to be as authentic as we know how, and to unhook from what, and who no longer represents us. Life always demands this, but if we don’t, or can’t now, we shall be lost in the tsunamis of change.  Few of us are where we’d like to be, there is not enough high ground. But hopefully we find solace in who we are, and who we love.  Perhaps in the world’s instability, our treasure becomes one another, but we cannot truly be with one another if we are not authentically ourselves.  We can facebook, but we cannot jump into the same lifeboat as the water sucks out to sea, unless we are committed.  Committed to what?  Committed to the alignment of self with self, self with other, self with the earth.  Our karmic companions, those Wily Coyotes of heart and mind, are here to change our lives. We must be in cahoots, AND we must be wily, or fail miserably. Every time we toss around the word, ‘karmic’ we are in deep waters, for karmic infers past and future relationship, as well as present. It infers profound entanglement.  How to un-tangle lead from gold? How to be in cahoots as cohorts, not desperados? How to bow to the other while holding personal integrity?  We cannot escape.  We are in the territory of Libra’s gracious requirement of partnering, plus Saturn is slowly wending its way through Libra, demanding that the structures of every relationship are ship shape. We are about to have a Full Moon face off in Aires/Libra (self in polarity to other).  I write to you with the energies of the Universe behind my pen. But even if I didn’t, this is a pivotal hour in the… Read more »

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Unholy Alliance

William Blake said in “Eternity.” “He who binds to himself a joy Does the winged life destroy: But he who kisses the joy as it flies Lives in eternity’s sun rise.” As spring’s haunting hour of splendor turns toward summer, ‘kissing the joy as it flies’ is a full time job. The only dance left is to hold on while letting go,  The difficulty is not simply offering sweet kisses in honor of the season’s bloom, but the speed required to blow those kisses.  How to pucker up and savor while breaking the sound barrier… This is our un-holy alliance.  It is easier to not bind, or cling to splendid moments when we are savvy enough to be present. Or is it? As we grow awareness of the grains of numinous sand running through the hourglass, do we respect and treasure each grain? Do we then create a life that is entirely vivid, more potent? Do we not want to hang on, knowing what we now know, aware of each fleeting gift?  Or is it possible to free-fall, skydiving high cliffs, un-tethered to any yearning?  Rumi wrote:  “The soul’s extravagance is endless.  Spring after spring after spring…We are your gardens dying, blossoming.”  When we remember that in this lavish sea of perfection, and longing, bliss and death, redemption and horror, we then honor our wings and our kisses, our sunrise and sunset. Pose with Seasonal Energies Asana: Dwi Pada Viparita Dandasana.  This looks like a graceful bridge or arc, as though the feet lowered out and away to the floor from Salamba Sirsasana/headstand.  Begin flat on back, placing palms under shoulders, fingers pointing to feet. Bring feet near hips, knees parallel.  Exhale, straighten legs, and bear weight on the hands, neck and head.  Place L hand behind head, forearms on… Read more »

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Training Wheels

Remember the training wheels on your first bike?  Or perhaps you were one of those without? You had the scabby knees to prove yourself a flyer. Starting out in anything, especially life, it’s a gift to have the support of training wheels, all kinds of wheels; those, who are the ‘wind beneath your wings.’ These wheels give a leg up to learn faster, push doors open, and therefore rise higher.  I suspect these fabulous lives are well earned by greatness in another life. Most children are given poor or no training wheels.  More still have no bike, never mind a childhood.  But here, I’m questioning differences in those who rolled along with training wheels, and those who got on and fell off a lot, There are different gifts that come from the school of hard knocks.  For one, you tend to be hard headed. Perhaps you don’t consider that a good thing? 2. You are used to flying without a net. Nice if you like heights. 3. You are either more timid, or braver than average. Cultivating balance is difficult. 4. Doors are rarely opened so you stand outside hoping they notice, or you bang the door down.  Early Grace is not a strong suit. The interesting questions are:  What do we do with what we were given?  What do we expect from what we have? How have training wheels, or lack thereof, turned red lights– green, or not?  Have you become who you set out to be?  Hard to know this.  But if your starting gate were today, what sort of training wheels are in place for the coming leap? When you prepare to fly into tomorrow’s unknown, I hope it’s more than hot air that lifts your wings, and pushes your magic bike forward.  I wish for you… Read more »

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Dynamic Balance

 December 6, 2010    First of three December Breaths on connection When the wind blows, will we scatter?  When the hammer descends, will we flatten? When someone says , “You’re more disappointing than the bottom half of a mermaid.”  Do we feel unworthy?  Or laugh, and know ourselves beautiful, tail et all? What holds a dynamic center?  Those made of ‘sterner stuff’ may find that these days the core has become too stern and rigid, fighting fear and risk.  Perhaps the demand is not to be made of the sterner stuff but to move loosely and connect unexpected dots from a flexible POV? We are all under some hammer, waiting for the next blow, scattering in fierce, chaotic winds, or swimming like mad for new shores.  If the last is the case, be pleased with a mermaid’s (merman’s) tail. Therein lies a secret.  Making a space to grow strange appendages to dive deep seas of emotional change can be what saves us. When the known home does not hold in the same comforting way. We cannot return again on the same mindless paths.  We cannot find balance in stale, accustomed habits, for the true center is dynamic, in a constant state of give and take.  Each new cycle requires we move from and toward home ground in willing to risk not knowing how. How to ask the heart for courage?  How to remain vulnerable when  fear-filled?  If anything sends us packing back to a rigid Self, it’s fear.  The terror of not being enough, or not being accepted are blueprints for rigor mortis. *Five possible ways and means to grow a courageous heart… and a georgous tail. Make space to breathe deeply, and consciously.  Feel powerful. When cold winds rage, stick your head out the door, (in a fabulous hat of course) but make sure your feet are glued to a warm… Read more »

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