I still have something to say that I haven’t said yet. I think I have been avoiding the issue. I think I really do need to find words. There is a lot that comes out in raw emotion through tone and all of the dynamics of sound, but the fact is, my throat chakra continues to be blocked on the left side. I have been working at this now for years. The blockage comes down from the back of my left ear down into my jaw and my neck and shoulder. I think it is something I have to say as a female.

I feel the need to apologize for being so plain in expressing that which may seem strange. This has been the case for me since I can remember. But I am who I am. I think I need to begin to accept that and be who I am without apology. Maybe that is part of what has kept me from speaking. Or writing lyrics. I don’t want to make anyone uncomfortable. I want people to accept me. But I need to be honest about who I am.

I finally sat down and began to use a method that my dear friend suggested to help me find words in a non-linear, non-reductionist??? way. An expansive way. A way that plops me right down into the ocean and lets the waves throw the words to me. We’ll see. I’ll let you all know.

Technorati Tags: chakras, Lyrics, sound

I spoke in an earlier post about singing through different parts of my body. I said that I discovered that the quality of the sound and the emotional content change as I explore different areas.

Since I started being more aware of my own inner processes in the past couple of years, I have learned about chakras and a little about what the meanings are in the different regions along the spine in the front and the back. The concept really isn’t that far out. It’s not unusual to hear people talk about a “gut feeling” or a “guttural sound” or “speaking from the heart”.

I think that to a large degree, people have come to judge the lower chakras, those that are more connected to the earth, as lowly and less deserving of attention. These areas are connected with basic survival instincts, security, money, home, appetites for food and sex.

These needs and instincts have been used as weaknesses; as tendencies to manipulate. We manage these needs of our own and each other with a focus other than love. We exploit ourselves and each other just as we exploit the earth itself. I want  to focus love and attention on these lower chakras especially. Maybe it is OK to be so very human. Maybe we need to accept each other’s humanness. Maybe it is OK to love and accept the very materiality of the earth. Maybe it is OK to be here, really here. Maybe here can actually be heaven.

My music is responding by coming from a gut level. It is often gravelly and very connected to my body. I can’t help but move as I play and sing. And I don’t want to intellectualize it. It is, I believe, what often is considered primitive; a wisdom that I believe is important now to offset a world which is so out of balance. The outward world seems to be based so very much on control, manipulation and exploitation. And perhaps also the inner world which has its counterpart in the control that we feel we need to exert over our bodies, seeing our bodies, and perhaps our very souls as simply objects to manage.

We need to remember that those “objects”, those bodies and souls are our very being. We really are alive. We really do exist. It is easy to lose track of our present reality when so much of our life is connected to computers, TV’s and cell phones. Maybe I can’t speak for anyone other than myself. I must open my eyes. I must do everything I can to save this thing while there is still time.

I am still so preoccupied, I spend most of my time in my brain. But I am finding my music to be an avenue which brings me back to a fuller perspective which includes my heart, my emotions and my great desire to survive.

I have a hard time putting all of this into words. I am used to using words in a narrow way. The best poetry can convey amazing depth of feeling and more. Perhaps this blog can be my practice in bringing words to that which I want to convey. What I want to convey feels so big and undefined to me, that I find it difficult to begin. My focus is general. It is both upward and downward. It reaches up to God, (and I am not even sure what I mean by that), and downward through my own body and self with all of my foibles and roots itself into the earth. I want to draw nourishment from both directions just like a plant. I feel like I have been focusing so hard lately on the sun that I have forgotten that I also need water and nutrients. The earth feels so arid right now. We need to take care of the earth.

Technorati Tags: appetites, chakras, earth, home, money, primitive, qiging, security, survival, wisdom

Sometimes the world seems like it has gone crazy. And it is reflected in my own life directly around me and within me. I reached a point a couple of years ago where I felt like I was being sucked down into a well and I didn’t know how to pull myself up to see my own horizon any more.

But then someone gave me a sense of hope which I followed. And gradually I began to remember that I exist. You see, at that point I couldn’t even feel my own existence any more. I was awake and I had a body and I had thoughts, but somehow I was gone. It took someone looking into my eyes and seeing my despair for me to realize some time later my own despair.

Life can be really tough. And I guess it is particularly tough right now. It is scary to watch the world as we know it fall apart. Outside and inside. But since I grabbed the thread of light from my friend, I have been climbing out of my well and I have remembered that I am really still here and now I even have a sense that the world around me exists. Hey people! Hello! How are you!

I began a yoga class a couple of years ago. It taught a very relaxed deep form of yoga called Svaroopa. It allowed me to ease into parts of my body that were holding tension and not allowing energy in. I began a process of release. Thank you, my wonderful teacher and friend Midi.

I have been exploring the disallowed parts of my own inner space through yoga and qigong since then, and have found that breath and energy work can be blended with singing. I have found that singing can in itself be energy work. After all, certain notes are associated with certain chakras. And I do find that if I draw attention to different parts of my body as I sing and allow the singing to flow through those parts of my body, the quality of the singing changes, a feeling emerges and blockages can be cleared.

I am finding through my qigong that energy work can heal others as well as the self. I am hoping that I can use my singing in the same way. And my talking and communicating generally, although I am reluctant often to commit myself to strict rules of thought which sometimes makes understanding me difficult. I think I still have a bit of anger to work though. I will gradually come back down to earth through my healing process though. I really want to get to know you all! And I want to begin to learn from you too!

Technorati Tags: , chakras, energy work, qigong, Spirit, Svaroopa, Yoga