The Wheel of the Heart

This weekend I went down to Chapel Hill, North Carolina to be with my dear friends Catherine and Jesse, to deepen my Nonviolent Communication practice, and to join in the ecstatic dance of life in Dancing Lodge. Dancing Lodge draws us through the four quadrants of relationship to life: the dance of Self, the dance of Partnership, the dance of Community, and the dance of the Universal All One. My body was yearning for this movement, this prayer, this mythic, nonlinear meditation so that I could enter into questions that I have been sitting with recently.

My hope was to explore my woman-being in this dance, to move into the depths of my feminine heart, and to feel a deep connection with the part of me that resides there. To practice moving in the world with a deep connection to my heart, to my radiance, to my receptivity. And as I have come to expect from all ceremonial space, the insights that were gifted to me during Dancing Lodge were completely different than I could have expected. I was shown how I fall off center, how I intuitively flow to fill all available space energetically, and how I lose myself in the midst of that. My water nature is deeply receptive, and tends to flow around all obstacles, to embrace all things, to hold space for all that arrives. But I am learning that my true water nature is more like the ocean - all things arrive into her depths, and she is still the great Mother of all, holding all things within, but never losing her deep power nature. The ocean doesn't get rocked by the boats upon her surface, or the whales swimming deep in her belly. Not at all. Too, my own sense of being a container for all things tends to overwhelm me - I feel like I have lost my center, my sense of self - energetically, I tend to feel deep connection, deep intuition with the presence of other humans, and not always by choice. Like the waters, whatever spills within them cannot be easily removed, and I tend to feel this energetically with people in my life. When what spills within me is love and joy and connection, I am aglow with life energy! But when what spills within me is toxic, conflicted, or volatile, I find my own waters swirling with those things. Water takes in whatever is poured into her, and like the oil spills and toxic wastes and excrement, the entire ocean is slowly poisoned by diffusion. I know that I have a lot to learn about how to purify myself of these kinds of energy. I have a lot to learn about how to allow these things to flow through me and not become absorbed. I also have a lot to learn about how to be a powerful container for all, without becoming rocked by the boats upon my surface and the whales in my belly.

So goes the dance of Self, solo.

But what has been coming up more powerfully in my life is the dance of Partnership. Things are coming up to teach me so much so quickly. Past has danced around me in the form of an old partner, one who wants to reconnect with me in some way. The past with him feels like ancient history, and I feel like I have grown exponentially since we parted ways. The reflection of that change is a gift. When I entered into the dance of relationship with him, I carried great pain and violation in my heart and body. Our connection was primarily of the mind, and our conversations were often non-personal and arguement-based. Our heart connection was small and fearful, and our body connection was rough and angular. Now, as we have shared some conversation, I feel that we have already shared all the connection that is possible - our conversations still tend toward the non-personal, and his tone still tends toward arguing. His heart is still absent. My ocean yearns to hold him in a Mother way, to rock him gently and let him know that tenderness and surrender are possible, and that the risk is worth it. But he will be as he will be.

In the dance of this present moment, I have connected with another partner, one with the most difficult of circumstances. In our togetherness, there is great heart and great lightness and freedom. His mind spins with the stories of his life, stories that he is allowing to define him and hold him within their walls. My own mind has been through some process of discipline in my spiritual practice, and yearns to connect with him, to show him what it would be like to enter this moment of now, and live free of those burdens. Our heart connection is open and radiant, and connected honestly with the limitations of his story, and in spite of those limitations, I feel deep acceptance and joy in being present with exactly what is possible in this heart connection. I am receiving that without any desire for it to be different, and this is new territory for me. The mirror of our connection is a powerful teacher for me right now, and I am grateful for all that it is.

In the midst of this present moment dance, the future has come to haunt me. The part of my heart that yearns for a heart connection without limitation. That wants to meet a partner who is ready to meet me where I am on my spiritual path. My heart longs to connect with a man who can meet me in my strength, my passion, my heart. In the midst of my present situation, with its beauty and limitations, someone danced across my life who could mirror to me what I am truly longing for. Partnership that is sacred, that is bold, that is powerful in shattering the walls of the heart, and feeding the fire within. In spite of my own wounds that believe that I will never receive what I truly want in a relationship, that I will never be truly loved for all that I am, this man appeared like a shooting star in my heart. He reflected to me what I yearn for in partnership - one who is devoted to loving and worshipping the radiance of my heart. One who loves all that I am, without fear. One who is ready to arrive on this path with me, carrying his own path too, and to grow together in deep, soulful partnership in spite of all fear. This brief, fleeting connection with the dance of the future completely blew me wide open. Tears spilled forth for days. Burning filled my body. My mind went completely still. And then, just as quickly as he appeared, he vanished - indeed, like a shooting star. Perhaps the Universe merely took over him for a brief moment, soliciting him to carry forth a reflection of my greatest desire, my deepest longing, telling me that it is possible, it is true, I am worthy, and it is coming. My heart is saddened by his disappearance, and my mind is longing for understanding. In this moment, I have to trust that he was merely a messenger of the truth, not the one who I will enter into the practice of living that truth with.

So, the dance of partnership is open and I am calling on all my teachers to come to me, to show me the way. I am listening, and I am praying.

A Day of Healing

I am feeling strange in my body today. My head is foggy, and full of energy. My heart aches more than I have ever felt before. I feel completely ungrounded, sometimes lightheaded. Given the last couple of days of my life, this is no great surprise. I feel like my body is being rearranged to hold this great sorrow, alongside so much deep love. And I am grateful that tomorrow afternoon will include acupuncture, to help shift me back into a place of balance.

Thursday afternoon, my friend Sarah came over, and we spent some time clearing the house energetically with sage and sweetgrass and palo santo. It was so smoky at times that it was hard to breathe. As we walked around, from room to room, I spoke to the spirit of my little kitty, telling him that it was okay to leave energetically, that he could move on into greater adventures in the universe. I asked that the heavy energy of sorrow, trauma, pain, suffering, fear, and all the rest be lifted from the house. We opened the windows fully, and asked the energies that needed to leave to go through the windows, through the water (faucet, turned on), and through the Earth beneath us. I offered gratitude to my little buddy for all our beautiful years together, and told him that just because he had been in our house for the last almost eight years didn't mean that he had to linger. I told him that I let him go completely, not from my heart, but from my house, my life, this physical realm. And I told him that when the spirits/angels/guides/whoever are ready to take him on to whatever is next for him, that he should absolutely go with them.

We cleared all the places where he had been lying and suffering - the nook in the living room by the bookshelf, the futon, the music room by the dresser, the hallway, beneath the chair in the meditation room, the shower, and mostly the green bathroom. We saved the green bathroom for last, since that was where he passed. Sarah told me that she felt intuitively that I needed to clear that room alone, and we waited to do that room last. She stood outside as I spoke to the spirit of my sweet little one, and I faced her. As I spoke some of the above things to Familiar kitty, I felt something poke me in my right leg, below the knee, with enough strength to cause my knee to buckle a bit. It surprised me, more than scared me, and i realized that it was my kitty asking me to turn and speak to him directly. I sensed that his presence was right there with me, standing in the place where he passed. So, I turned, and continued to speak to him, to offer him my love and gratitude, asking for forgiveness for anything that I was feeling guilty about, and encouraging him to go on to his next life.

I also asked that if he did choose to continue to visit me, or to stay around, that I needed some time. I need some time to mourn him, to grieve this loss of him in a physical body that I can touch and see, that I can interact with in the only way that I know. I told him that that was too much for me, that it would make my grief even harder, and that it would probably creep me out for now. I asked that he give me some time before visiting me again - not because I don't still love him, because I do, completely! But because I need to get used to living without him there in my house every day, always nearby, always getting into something, always crying out, letting his presence be known. I think that there will be a time in the future where it would be deeply moving to know that he is nearby, that he is still my little companion, if only in spirit. But not yet.

When I came home from class last night, the energy in the house was so much lighter. It feels empty. So empty. My little Familiar kitty would always be right there - on the stove, on the kitchen counter, on the table, on the coffee table, by the front door, on the stereo cabinet, in the music room...and always moving, moving, moving. He kept the energy of my house stirred. And now that has shifted. I keep expecting to see him. I know his rhythm in my life. But now, after the clearing, that has shifted. It is quiet. It is still. Friday kitty doesn't move around a whole lot. It feels empty. But it feels clear. The heavy energy of trauma and suffering has lifted. I am grateful. I need to be comfortable in my own home, and I am so glad that he could hear my needs and honor them. I am also grateful for whatever beings/spirits/guides that were there, for them taking him onward into the universe.

What an honor and blessing it has been to share our lives together for these thirteen years. My heart was opened by him in those sweet first months together. And as he died, my heart was opened and stretched beyond anything I've ever felt before. I will write more specifically about his passing very soon. But it was still too soon today.

I decided that today I needed to take care of some simple, practical things. And that I also needed to connect to Mother Earth to begin my process of healing. So, I decided to go to Larriland Farm to pick apples. It was such a hot day! The sky was blue, and I was sweating as I picked Jonagold, Cameo, Braeburn, and Fuji apples. And then, I went on to harvest my own broccoli - yum! At one point, I walked past some grass that was super fine and soft, and I followed my heart's desire to recline in the grass in the sun, to feel the Earth holding me. She is holding me as I grieve. She is holding me as I stay open, allowing my sorrow to move me, to flow through. She gives me strength to not close myself to the transformative power of love, a power that clearly flows far beyond life and death in the physical realm. Before I left the farm, I also bought some fresh apple cider, and some little pumpkins and gourd - and I put one of each of those on Familiar kitty's sweet little grave.