DAILY Welcome to Daily Breath Journal’s update~ A vibrant Graffiti-Expression inviting you to explore, expand, and link Yoga’s transformational facets of healing and vitality. We’ve chosen a graffiti signature because like Yoga it radiates life force. It is a ‘practice’ of the street ~ for everyone, created in the moment with passion, and a desire to make the world more colorful. Invite Dailybreathjournal.com to paint your life with regenerative joy and beauty. Looking forward to your feedback! ~ Samantha Garden Graffiti The Wild Lilies have bloomed~ orange and miraculous. A collective consciousness exploding lush greens. Massed without structure or restraint Simple faces on over-tall stems nod in warm downdrafts Arranged with neither permission nor care Accepting a weedy inheritance. These graffiti of the earth Reveal a sacred nonchalance. Their persuasion lies in relentlessness As bloom after bloom they lift to the sun, then death. Untamed images sprayed across a summer’s landscape Appear and disappear Designed for destruction. Twelve hours they stand replete, neither longing fame, Nor desirous to be other than Holy as the day is long.
Read moreInspirations: Change & Re-Invention
On The Road Again
Have you, like Willie, been itching to ‘get on the road again?’ Is the uncertainty, at best, and terror, at worst enough to make you press petal to motivational-metal and roar off toward new horizons? Is the inner emotional current growing such an insistently high decibel that you feel something within about to give way…the old brick and mortar cracking? Perhaps the edges of consciousness hear the resonance of Rumi’s dictate, “Seek the path that demands your whole being. ” This is an admirable directive at any time, but as life grows precious and precarious; precious because of passing time, and precarious from greater reluctance to risk, we cannot postpone this rough road. Despite it being steep and arduous, we are on the road again because most of us postponed it as long as we could. We chose the seduction of safety, or like Willie, we made music with our friends. We allowed turmoil to waylay intention, and wept when fear obliterated courage. The road of wholeness rises into the mountains, toward unknown destinations. It requires dreams, and faith to keep it going through steep, and twisty terrain. I am struggling with this road because I have not dreamed for too long, nor have I allowed the delicacy of fate and free will to hang in the balance. I have not wished upon the Moon, nor thrown coins in a fountain. If I cannot dream, or believe in my wishes, I cannot seek the path of my ‘whole being, ’ for the mystery of faith and fate stand side by side to the pragmatic good soldier. The voice of the dreamer opens the factual researcher to the unknown. The whole being contains and balances the visible, and invisible in equal measure. Becoming whole is to become efficient in what we… Read more »
Read moreBarn’s Burned Down, Now I Can See the Moon
If after tragedy we step out under the stars and actually look at the moon, we shall survive the tragedy in good form. If after profound loss we feel a new life growing somewhere within, then the good guys win. When we can move beyond the burned barn that housed our stuff, our beautiful stuff, the accumulation of life-memories, we are lit by a transcendent light off the moon. The Chinese got this proverb right. Great loss, whether of stuff or worse, of life, is a test of both courage and compassion, a time when choices take on greater poignancy. Are we able to standstill and admire what is, or are we paralyzed back to childhood fears? Can we recalculate and respond to new, unknown goals, and wider perceptions of dharma? When discussing dharma, life, loss and tragedy, the hidden planetary energies of Pluto are present, for She is the Goddess of the underworld, moving underneath times of crises and death. Her presence does not signify we remain in Hades, rather that we pass through its gates. Pluto’s real job is to offer life-altering experiences so we may learn to choose. She asks if we have we grown fortitude and muscle to cross the river Styx. Are we willing to relinquish the old life so it may die? Are we capable of transmuting its shadow? Pluto evokes the divine in its most primitive and powerful expression. Her love is willing to let us die so that we learn what we must in order to transform, and embody our divinity. Because we have a good friend whose house just burned down, we have been standing as witnesses to the transformative process within her. Hourly, we observe her ‘see the moon,’ despite the barn housing what she owned burned to ash. Sharing… Read more »
Read moreAngels All
Today is the anniversary of the death of the woman who gave me a second life, Helen Rosenstock. Because I am a late bloomer, she entered my life late, when I was finally ready for her vision, her tools of a transformative baptism. The person you know as Samantha, is not the person I started out to be. It’s true none of us are, but some of us are unrecognizable. When I found Helen, she saw I had walked to replace the original imprint. A year ago, when Helen died, she appeared to me as a plume of smoke, stopping by as if to say, ‘remember~ life is magical. She was magical, but part of her mystery was in her gifts being of the earth, and for the earth: She said, “In order to see what you think is mysterious, open your eyes wider to possibility. To perceive and listen to the invisible is a talent everyone has. She taught that I need only be willing, for transformation to begin. To grow intuition she reminded me I required silence to hear what is unspoken. To heal, I needed to become an empath, and to maintain a body strong enough to heal itself so that it could hold that power for others. One day, as we stood at French doors, she said, “To heal others, you do not need to know what they should do. Simply open the door so they can walk through on their on own legs. Stand as their witness.” She taught me to be an ‘ambulance chaser’ one night, by asking what I thought as sirens filled the air. “Loud,” is what I replied. She said, “You have a choice in consciousness. You can direct healing light to a stranger in need, or you can think, ‘loud.’… Read more »
Read moreTrash Talking ~ Stories, Lies, and Myths
Last week I heard myself trash talking. It was sarcastic and funny, but hurtful. If I had been talking about a friend, I would not have wanted them to hear. This was not about a friend. The trash was about me. Once again I had found a sneaky way to open a well-worn scab, gouged since childhood. Aside from feeling disappointed I had pinioned myself to that old wound, I was pleased that this time I heard myself. Why does it take most of us so long to hear our stories binding us as prisoners to the past? Why is it so difficult to hear how we unconsciously create our lives? Hopefully, when ‘enlightenment’ does occur there is enough shock value that we stop to reassess. Instead of washing my tongue with soap, I’ve decided to re-script the old myth. In creating a new story I’ve needed to ask: Who and what formed the original version? What mythos moved into place when I began believing and speaking that story? How has it served me? Have I made my external world match my internal script? What requires liberating in order to no longer unconsciously trash talk this wound? How conscious must I remain in order to participate fully in a new script? What is the muscle I need to move into the yet untold story? With ears growing more acute, I hope to feel into energies that create assumed myths. As I choose to un-hook from well worn inner identities, I seek useful tools to make myself known to me. I shall rely more on symbols for they are more powerful than words. I will turn ever more strongly to music and dance for they are far more compelling than lectures. I shall remember that joy trumps fear every time. I… Read more »
Read moreRecalculando ~ A la Izquierda
Today is my birth date. I am an earthy Taurus being with simple soul-tastes, and big demands. What am I demanding of this re-birth? “Who has the GPS? Where am I headed? What do I need? Will I arrive safely? When? Why go there?” Last month we went to Spain and used a Spanish GPS whose every second direction was, “recalculando, a la izquierda, a la izquierda.” This is to say, you are to recalculate direction and go left. It became funny very fast. We spent lost time with wonderful family, discovered new places, had adventures, ate large lard sandwiches, and drank rough red wines. The balancing~the recalculating that life required. I’ve chosen to see the silly GPS symbolically, a directional guidance for the year. Despite fears telling me to drive headlong and hard toward a goal, the reverberation of “recalculando” offers an image of a musical, circular path, one of unknown turns leading left, or listening to the left; that feminine, invitational voice asking for trust; She of inspiration and intuition~ A la izquierda, That Left of subtle realms and inner guidance. Is my GPS right to go left? My history of trusting the Cosmos has brought its share of disappointments. It is not without anxiety and fear. For a Taurus of practical bent, learning to move toward the visionary has been a long and arduous journey. My Spirit hopes for happy. My soul sings to surrender limiting beliefs. But the mind is mule-ish, reluctant to trust, to not work hard, to not step on the gas, to not know. As I watch news of Syrian and African refugees fleeing home and country, throwing themselves on the mercy of ‘coyotes’ who abandon them at sea; the fateful portals of Scylla and Charybdis loom in the imagination. My fear is inconsequential,… Read more »
Read moreMelt Down
This is a March for the record books. This is a month we usually try and high step through sleet, mud, and relentless frozen landscape. It is a tippy time of chaotic polarities, weather and otherwise. Bodies, like the earth, are bursting with a spring desire that cannot yet be expressed. In warmer climes, where the scent of jasmine defines March, the madness is less tippy, but nonetheless imbalances are alive and well. Consciously, and un-consciously, we anxiously await new birth. Easter, Passover, and Holi, or Phagwa, did not happen from, “Oh, by the way, we need more eggs.” They are rituals of regeneration; festivals that affirm that this earthly birth is partially formed from spirit. They ask us to re-boot, re-confirm, and re-align matter, spirit, and soul intention. This March happens to be a seminal, pivot point for transformative and highly charged options in the arena of birth, as the electro magnetic field is being pinged by extraordinary possibility. The body may be exhausted. The mind~ over-loaded. But the future calls, and it calls from the alchemical polarity of spirit and grounded reality. You may feel in meltdown mode, but it’s time to step up and learn a new dance. To move into the nebulous, no-boundary territory of spirit, the ego must be solid, of firm structures, and clear realities. Before we can move beyond anything we must be it. We rely on the ego’s foundation to support movement in the world. The mystic, or spirit-self has no boundaries, no structure and this is terrifying to the ego, especially a weak ego. For the ego to be well it must do. For the mystic to do well it must be. Being requires attentive loving. When the ego loves, it goes outside self to find affirmation. The mystic goes within…. Read more »
Read moreCrossroads & Intersections
Opening a New Year is a visible intersection between past and future. Other junctures are trickier, more difficult to see and identify. It is usually 20-20 hindsight that shows a roadmap revealing the crossroads. When beginning any new cycle, it’s a good practice to stand still, even better, lean back, open up a big map to take stock and allow the invisible world to collude with the visible. It’s helpful to comprehend and sensitize ourselves to the powerful undercurrents mobilizing our sense of direction. If you ask what are the most powerful directional influences in this moment, most of us respond with a list including: Self, relationships, work, and health. ‘Self’ being far and way the most important as all else flows from our sense of Self. It is also the most difficult to see and manage for most of what creates it lives far beneath conscious mass~ icebergs below the surface of the sea waiting for the bold, the imperious, the ego driven Titanic. Those icebergs force re-evaluation asking, “What prevents me from my destination? Who do I need to become to get there?” Providing an assessment of Self is a powerful way to begin any journey. Begin with acknowledgement, not a damnation of failure. Start by seeing your particular genius. I’m not referring to what we have come to think of as genius, such as the talents of a Mozart, or an Oprah. Rather, I return to the original sensibility of genius, that of a ‘guiding spirit.’ The Greek’s used the word ‘daemon,’ or divine nature to convey a similar essence. This is the essential marrow to suck, taste, enjoy as you expand and honor yourself in a New Year’s evaluation. As you head out from this new crossroads ask, “Am I in touch with a Spirit that… Read more »
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