Gratitude

 This morning I am grateful for food. I'm grateful that I can grow it and that I can eat it. This last week has been a tough one. Before I get into that, let me quickly back up tell you what i've been up to the last few weeks.

In my last entry, I said I was going to be taking a series of primitive skills classes. This is the same series that brought my partner to this valley four years ago. I was interested in taking them, not because he did, but for the personal challenge and the knowledge to be gained (back to the earth kind of stuff). When I first moved here last fall, it seemed they weren't going to be held for a whole list of reasons that I won't get into here. Then, a couple of months ago, when it turned out they were going to be held, I jumped on the opportunity even though it meant it would take me away from farm life and helping my man grow food for us this year. I made this decision with his full support. So off I went.

The first week was great! I learned how to use rocks as tools, how to make fire by rubbing sticks together, and began to know a group of like-minded folks who were there for the same teaching. A highlight for me was being asked to teach a breathing segment during our morning circles. It was well received and I loved being able to share that part of myself. 

Ah, how the lustre quickly fades! Part of the shine of the experience faded for me as I became ill, like parasite-ill. Any of you out there had parasites? Not fun. Today is the first morning I woke without a queasy feeling in my stomach. And I actually wanted to eat, which was a huge thing after having no appetite and eating next to nothing for the past ten days. Still not sure what dis-ease process inhabited my body but it did get almost everyone in camp, I was just the lucky first. Thinking it may have been something in the spring water we were drinking, I attritube my years of drinking filtered water to my body's sensitivity to this pathogen. (I'm so grateful for filters! Love you Berkey!)

With so little food for fuel, my energy levels dropped to nearly zero. Fun, Fun! I went home that weekend thinking it was just a bug and i'd be better on Monday. I returned to camp to find out that everyone was in some stage of the bug and I still had no appetite. Not only that, but when I did eat, I felt sick to my stomach. Having returned and not experienced the renewed enthusiasm I was hoping for, I started looking deeper. (I'm grateful for my years at Barbara Brennan for the tools to look deeper!) I asked myself, what is it i'm not able to digest about this experience? What is it I can't stomach? Most of you know my, how can I say...passion(?) for connecting the mind, body, and spirit. This experience, asking myself this question, has again confirmed the power of these connections between one's thoughts, emotions, and physical experience. I am grateful to the universe for providing these opportunities.

Sometimes when there is something one desires to do, like this class for me, one is willing to go through all kinds of hardships to do so. Sometimes these challenges are a part of the learning...well, challenges are always a part of learning...what i'm trying to say is that sometimes the challenges we experience are simply signs telling us this isn't the right path for us. Has anyone experienced that? You're trying to achieve some goal and it feels like you're just constantly running into brick walls. There are times when the brick wall comes down the third or fifteenth time you run into it or you find a way to climb over. Yet, there are those occasions when you stand back from the wall and look at it to notice that you've been trying to travel through a very narrow portion of the path. While standing back and looking objectively at the entire landscape you notice that it's not blocking the whole path and you can easily walk around it if you take a few steps in another direction. Does this resonate with you? It's not the challenge itself, but what we can learn from it.

So my new perspective, my alternative path, is to move home and not live at camp. I'm still looking forward to being involved in classes and learning the skills I signed up for to learn, but there will be more space in my involvement. The culmination of this series is a month-long primitive project. We walk into the forest with stone-age made clothes, gear, and food. This means buckskin clothes, felted blakets, clay and gourd containers, and dried foods. I feel that even with the space I'm creating around the classes, I can still prepare for this stone-age experience. I'll keep you posted.

Having made this decision, I felt a comfort move into my mind, emotions, and lo & behold! My body. So today i'm eating better, haven't felt queasy...only a little off after eating too much lunch (it was soooo good! Thank you Paco's Tacos!). I have no doubt that my susceptibility to this bug was due to my lack of enthusiasm for this class experience. (Note: there are a lot of details about why class wasn't all it was cracked up to be. Most of it has to do with organization and leadership though i'm not going to get into details here.)

Feeling this shift and knowing it was right for me, my next question was: Now that there is all this space created in my summer, what can I do with it? In other words, how am I now to spend my time? This morning I received the gift of meeting a wonderful woman who I have a feeling is an angel who came to show me a possibility. She is a physician involved in many ways with the large number of care-givers in this area. We were talking about a mutual client, whom she sees as a physician and I see as a bodyworker. In the course of our conversation, she invited me to be involved in creating more holistic health awareness in the valley. I thought, wow! this is right up my alley. I can't see the path clearly before me, unable to see what peaks and valleys it holds, but my mind and body and spirit became excited with this possibility. I'll keep you posted on this too!

So who knows what the future holds, I have some ideas and intentions but will I hit more brick walls? (Um, I think yes.) Will they be of the sort to break through or walk around? (Not sure yet.) It takes a lot of willingness to open one's eyes, mind, and heart to see clearly though it has continued to come back to what Joseph Campbell said: Follow your bliss. I pray that I am always willing to do so.

I pray that all of you, in whatever small way, find the part of your path that will bring more joy into your lives. There's no need to bash into those same brick walls over and over again.

Om Lokah Sukhino Bhavantu

Om Shanti Shanti Shanti