DAILY 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 »
Read moreInspirations: Transformation
The Magic Hour
I began this year writing of Wizards and magical mastery. Oddly, I close the year in similar fashion. This time, the magic was not intended, but random…or fated if you consider its birthing. Perhaps the fated aspect came from having grown Wizard roots these past months in order to appreciate and connect to haphazard mysteries? This mundane moment was born unexpectedly, and became more…well, magical, as it was unexpected, an unlikely confluence opening bodies to the numinous. During Saturday’s Yoga class, with a Full Moon guiding its structure, we began by circling the torso, inhaling through the nose and whistling out the exhale. I played an exquisite piece of music, The Magic Hour, by the Ahn Trio, and within two to three circles we had a whistling choir. Amazing harmonies emerged as though rehearsed. The sound filled the room, rising and falling to the lyrical waltz. It was as if the moon’s light, its joy and expanded vision had entered bodies. What began as an exercise in Pranayama became a magical gift, an alchemical transformation of holding hands to cross the street, a memory to be savored through the cold, dark months ahead. It reminded me of ‘Wizard-Mastery,’ so I returned to the opening salvo of 2014 Breaths to pull up the training paper, In case you have forgotten. January 2014 ~What do wizards’ in training require for alchemical transformation? Silence Time alone in the crystal cave Trust that wisdom unfolds in every moment. Awareness- everything in the Wizard’s world is a reflection of Self. Perception to see ‘what is.’ Courage to call the next adventure. To stand un-defended~ the only way we meet spirit. Truth has infinite versions. Try them all on. All time is now. We are a web of mortality and immortality. We are a web of… Read more »
Read moreLife Links
What is your primary link? If someone asked, “What is your life-line? Your staff of life”? How subtle, how deep, how intangible is your shifting paradigm of bridges connecting you to life?
Read moreA Wow Week of Sexy Shifts
This wow week of sexy shifts includes Fall Equinox, one of the earth’s four transformative gateways; Pluto, the sexy planet, more powerful and regenerative as it stations; A New Moon in Libra~ruled by Venus; and a Jupiter-Uranus trine for courage and breakthroughs. Love the one you’re with!
Read morePreparing The Equinox Table
Preparing for the equinox, like designing a tablescape, offers an opportunity to re-set the imagination. When we set a table to celebrate, we lay out the best, designing alignments from highest vibrational desires. We hope to integrate and navigate the celebration with judicious use of memories from past experience, a creative intellect, and good gut intuition.
Read moreShow Me The Quan!
The world has lost a treasure trove of notable talent recently, and personally, I have lost loved ones of some extraordinary talent. There are many endings to the world we have known opening confluence to large questions: What is disappearing that I have loved? What were qualities in those famous lives that gave them value? Why do I care when I hear they have died? How have I been transformed by those I loved that are now gone? How did they share their wisdom and grace? Poignant endings are opportunity to review: What am I funding that will be missed when I’m gone? What healing can I offer? Am passing on anything of true value? How do I carry and translate the light of those who have gone before? Confluences create un-expected recognitions. Does it take loss to comprehend what we have, who we are, what we value? The ending of a job, a long distance move, a child leaving home, and the big one, death offer windows to regenerate, reconsider, re-animate, and re-value. Questioning the value of a life is impossible, that of an event or a season, a bit easier. Using Labor Day as a marker to summer’s end I ask: “Did I wander and waste enough time? What of value did I glean from the garden? Have I laughed enough? What about the worth of a single summer’s day? Do I assess 24 hours, by how alive I have been, or how many days I have left? $1000.00 is a crass amount for one exquisite day on earth, and if it’s the last day, a $1000,000.00 doesn’t begin to cover the bill. Tomorrow, I shall wake and call out, “Show me the ‘Quan!” By sunset, I shall murmer, “I have grown this day by heart. I etched… Read more »
Read moreFurther Wizard Notes With Astrology Back up
In several classes this past week, I referred to the following words by Marianne Williamson. Many of you requested the full quote from the real deal, which Marianne is. So here you go! Continue growing your Wizard muscles, hold her idea in high regard this year, because it is a time of liberating ourselves, and manifesting…. two difficult and demanding requirements, but oh so necessary. “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people will not feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone and as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” Part of the demand that we manifest is a Cardinal T square that is action-oriented, connecting us to the world. If we are to play well together, some of our ideas and philosophies might have to change, (Jupiter/Pluto thrust.) But the commitment and effort, required by Mars, could pay off in very nice dividends, if we are willing to listen as often as we command. Venus went retrograde at the Winter Solstice and remains backward in Capricorn through January. This is a Venus that may feel inadequate, out of place, or shy,… Read more »
Read moreMagical Seeds
Any garden is a source of light because gardeners work soul-mulch, digging their passion into the earth. They grow unique spaces of beauty and retreat needed in dark cycles. In preparing new ground, it’s amazing what appears to fertilize the soil. What that soil produces is often surprising, sometimes extraordinary. The original seeds tossed out to create Shakti Yoga Dances were from my garden of linking Yoga and dance, spirit and body, creativity and emotion. My students’ response formed its strong and pliable roots. They are the ones who have grown and fertilized the seed, expanding this remarkable plot. Their light has opened new seedlings, unfurled luminous leaves of translation. With fortune and muscle, the harvest is shared, nurturing many. Shakti Yoga Dances is expanding to larger workshops, and ritual celebrations, producing plants with exotic fruit and sweet scent. The second harvest has grown the first Shakti Yoga Dance teacher training, alive with talent and full-hearted instructors. We close out 2013 in launching the new website http://shaktidances.com/ which shares this magical garden, acknowledging it is time for the next seeding, and a larger garden. The radiant vegetation, expanded far beyond its first imagined seeds, now links into layers made marvelous by the Yoga Tribe. This Breath is in deep gratitude to each and every one of you who has grown this garden, especially my students. I thank you for your guidance, for sharing your hearts and enormous talents. You may not be among the bodies on the website, but you are part of Shaktis’ roots, having fertilized her soil in un-imagined ways. You know what that makes you….very special. Samantha Cameron as Chauncey.
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