Kom me naar buiten allemaal
Dan zoeken wij de wielewaal
En vinden wij die muziekant
Dan is zomer weer in’t land!

Dudeldjo klinkt zijn lied
Dudeldjo klinkt zijn lied
Dudeldjo en anders neit.

Oh, it feels like Springtime inside and outside. . . the birds are singing, my heart is expanding out so far I feel like bursting!

Technorati Tags: Bursting, Emergence, fluidity, hope, love, Music, renewal, Spirit

So what do I do? Stay present – be present – exist. Live. Allow. Allow. Allow. It’s OK, I must reassure myself. I must be gentle and compassionate with myself. Allow myself to blossom. Allow that intellect that does exist within me if I just allow it.

I remember the flow from so long ago. The confidence. It’s funny – I feel the block as I begin to focus – it feels like a physical/energetic block that stretches between my left temple and my intestine or maybe my pancreas on my left side. Some of my intellectual recovery will involve physical recovery. I know the direction I need to go to allow more flow. . . more and more. A trickle, then a stream, then a torrent. In some areas of my being I believe I have allowed the flow. I feel healthy. In other areas I have barely begun to allow. But it is OK. It can’t be about self denigration, about blame. It must be gentleness, compassion, love. Suzie, it is OK. Be faulted. Be exactly who you are. And then feel the warmth and support around you as you are. Allow that warmth and support. Allow it. Let it cradle you. Let yourself melt into your own tears. Release. Let it go. Let it go. Grieve. Grieve. You know it is OK. Give yourself the time you need to grieve. You don’t need a reason. You don’t need to explain. Let the world hold you now. Take the time you need. Have faith in Life. Allow. Allow. Allow.

You see how it is coming. You see it. You are allowing it. It is not perfect. You are not perfect – yet maybe it and you are perfect because it is. Is. Allow. Allow. Allow. Help me to let go. Let go . Let go. Let go. Let go. Allow. Allow. Allow. Allow. Allow. Allow – my thoughts quiet a little. Allow – calmer and calmer. Allow – I can hear the fan of the pellet stove and the sound pattern of the flame. Allow – I hear my own breath. Allow – I see the light outside – a morning light muted by the clouds and the snow coming down. It’s coming down. It is morning. It is snowing. I am inside writing and listening to the pellet stove which is trying to warm the room. I look up and see the pictures of my kids and my friends on the wall. I am so lucky. So blessed. It is almost Christmas. I am late in my preparations, as usual. But it is OK. It is good. It is not about lots of presents anyway.

Today is my day to write – to begin to unwind that which needs to come out – is it me – is it a blockage – is it something more? What does that mean, anyway? Let it go. Don’t delineate. Don’t define. Allow. Allow. Allow. Organize it later. Let it tumble. Let it emerge how it will. You don’t have to control it.

Love. I am so very blessed. I am afraid of it. I don’t know what I mean by it. Surrender. Complete surrender. It brings out my fear of hierarchy and abuse – resentment – fear of being hurt and hurting. Fear. Fear. But this is anything but fear. It is a giving. A giving of self. Surrender that does not diminish, but magnifies and multiplies. The energy is more, not less. We become one and yet we are each ourselves even more deeply than before. Reaching down down down to our roots until we find our common ground. Reaching up up up and opening our senses – all of our openings, physical and non physical – opening all orifices, all pores, all abilities, all senses. Opening to allow it all to enter and then, twirl us around into the next swirl – the next pattern, the next commutation, the next structure, and we cannot control and yet we are it. How is it that we are available for the new pattern that the river requires? Yet be in contact with the earth. . . are we connected to the Earth? Are we connected to each other? What does “each other” mean? How is this vision connected to me sitting here in front of the pellet stove watching the snow outside? Can I do both? Can I open open open open open open until I no longer exist? I am the movement. . . I am the river . . . and I continue my day as I sprinkle salt on the sidewalk in front of my house and wonder about all of the yard work that has yet to be done around the house. What is the relevance of this bill I have in front of me? If I don’t write that check for the electric company, maybe eventually they still will turn off my electricity even though the flow – the flow – allowing – allowing – the silence – the silence – the incredible lightness – it is all perfect. Even my electric bill is perfect. It seems that there is a connection between not paying my bill and the electricity being turned off. That is what I have learned. You hit a billiard ball with your stick and that ball causes another to move. Cause and effect. It sure seems to work. Causal mechanisms sure seem to exist. You do this, and that happens. You step out over the side of the cliff and you fall. I would like to fly. But maybe I am not ready to fly yet. My intellect tells me that I will fall. But what about Faith? If you have Faith you will Fly.

This seems like the material of delusion. But when you have a new experience, beyond the usual, how do you bring it into your old way of thinking? How do you integrate it into your world view? It comes to a point where you just can’t anymore. It is no longer a case of integrating new information into what you think of as reality. Your ideas about reality have to change. But during that period when your world view is changing there is a sense of the world falling apart. The world is falling apart. There is nothing to hold onto. Nothing is solid anymore. Then you begin to reconstruct. But it has to begin with silence. Silence. Silence. Then the world starts to come in again. The fire is still flickering/roaring. The snow is still falling. Dakota stands up and shakes, hoping that I may finish with what I am doing so we can go outside and walk together in the falling snow. The world still exists even though my standpoint has fallen apart on some levels.

It sounds like illness – this falling apart. But it is actually a supremely healthy response to a necessity for a change of direction. I hope that this same thing is happening to all of us on some level. The beginnings of a necessary shift that will save us if we let it. Allow. Allow. Allow.

Technorati Tags: abuse, compassion, Emergence, fluidity, giving, hope, renewal, Spirit, Vision

People are already solving carbon footprint problems, community problems and economy problems through grassroots organizations and businesses. Check it out! I got these videos from Green For All.

“Omar Freilla and members of the Green Worker Cooperatives talk about their work to saturate the South Bronx, with worker-owned green businesses.”

” Orrin Williams and the folks at Growing Home demonstrate how urban agriculture is reconnecting people to their communities and the earth, and revitalizing Chicago.”

” Aundre Collins talks about his work with Solar Richmond, and how it has shaped his life.”

Technorati Tags: economy, hope, renewal, survival, Vision

Several months ago I was running. I was walking my dog. We had just crossed the bridge and crossed over to the right side of the road towards the pond closest to the road. I was so happy. Dakota and I were running together and I felt so strong and so free and the happiness seemed to be fueling my run into flight. I was proud of my ability to keep up with my running dog. The air streamed back across my face and the rest of me and I felt sure that I could fly. In preparation for take off my body was beginning to lean forward and my legs were not keeping up with my head and shoulders which were leading me. I fell forward with great momentum and as my left hand let go of the leash I jammed my left thumb hard against the ground back towards my wrist.

It hurt, but not that much. I cried out a little and laughed too. I picked up the leash in the other hand and continued on my way around the pond to go and see my friend. My thumb swelled up some. I took care of it for a couple of days and then figured it would take care of itself. I stopped playing the guitar for a little while but then started up again. I could play, as long as I was gentle in my use of the hand. It did not continue to resolve itself. I let my friend who is a masseur at Kim’s Healing Center look at it and pull it back into place. It seemed to be a little out of joint. He did pull it back into place, but a couple of days later after playing guitar some more, it went back out of joint again.

I guess I don’t need to recount all of these details. The fact is, after almost three months, this thumb still has not healed the way I hoped. I have gotten advice and followed it. Part of what I have needed to do is to stop playing the guitar while it heals. I had gone for nearly two months without playing the guitar when two days ago I decided I just had to pick it up and since then I have been paying the price again.

It seems to me that my story is an allegory for me. I find that more and more I can look at my life and see patterns and I interpret meanings from those patterns.

In my wonderful happy run, I got ahead of myself. I leaned far forward with my head and even my heart and my feet left the ground. I thought that I could fly. I thought that if I believed with great intensity, the world would lift me with my vision. But in this case, it wasn’t really vision. It was heart and desire. But my feet apparently still have to stay on the ground if I am to avoid a fall.

I have let you all know a little bit about how a couple of years ago, maybe more at this point, I had held back on myself for so long that it felt like either I was going to let myself sink and die, or I was going to let go and allow. So I let go. I let go to a very large degree. I let go of so many boundaries and definitions that I had felt imprisoning me that it took me a while to catch my bearings. Actually, I think I am still catching my bearings. I love the freedom that I have felt. I love the vibrancy. I love expressing without fear. But I went from being in a curled up ball to curling back into as wide an embrace of reality as I could muster. My spine is not bent forward like an old woman. I have a tendency instead to lean back. I have a tendency to look upward all the time. Even when I meditate, my head tends to bend back and upward. It is like I want to understand the sky.

When I begin my qigong active exercises I remember the cues that Chunyi Lin gives about how to stand. One of the things that he says almost every time in every exercise or meditation is to tuck the chin downward just slightly to keep the whole spine straight. The strongest and most natural state for the spine is to be straight. The spine is the energy channel which is most basic. My spine is still not straight. I have gone from one extreme to the other.

I look up like I want to understand the sky. But it is more powerful, perhaps, to straighten my spine so that I can see what is directly in front of me. It is called having a level head. I guess that phrase has a literal meaning for me.

Dakota, my model in flight:

Technorati Tags: Bursting, Chunyi Lin, guitar, meditate, qigong, renewal

And that is what it is all about for me. . . Hello World, but revised. . . This is how I am feeling these days. And much of this can be expressed and experienced through music. I think that a lot of people are feeling a sense of renewal these days. And I have great hope for all of us. What appears on the surface is not always to be relied upon. I think that we are emergent. The surface is sometimes just a hardened shell that will soon be cast aside. Like the shell of an egg. And what better way to bring along a birth but through the joy of music.

Technorati Tags: birth, Emergence, joy of music, Music, renewal, Spirit