Spring is here. I am so grateful.

New life, rebirth and flowers! Glorious, beautiful flowers in all their shimmering, transcendent beautiliciousness!

May we all find renewal and continue breathing life on our tender shoots of new growth.

the not-so-secret swing
Originally uploaded by torontofotobug.

There are times in life when I feel like I’m suspended by a chain, not sure where to go or what to do. I have so long been driven by the need to please others, so long pulled in the vortex of the needs of others…

and now….

I am stopping this. I am all done being all things to all people, wearing masks while suspended by the chain of needs and desires of those around me.

I am awakening to a new way. To being just me, to listen to my own heart and the call of my spirit.

I’m ready to jump and kick and be FREE to just follow my own heart.

(and it feels very good.)

Check out the work of the artist who did that picture by clicking on the link. Her name is Anne de Haas. She kicks ass and inspires me greatly.

I downloaded keri smith’s “100 ideas” and started doing a few of the activities. One of them is to layer pages from a magazine, cut them into shapes and make a collage. I did this today during my art time with Gigi (my three year-old) and came up with this.

Interestingly, I didn’t know what many of the images would be and the words, “start something” and “start planning your trip” were among the shapes that I cut blindly– not knowing what I was cutting because it was hidden in the layers. I had also randomly chosen the definition for “destination” and a fortune cookie fortune off of my desk to include them without even knowing what they said. I didn’t even know how cohesive the themes were until I put them together.

This is what I call oracular art. I guess I’d better start something.

I am holding my heart very tenderly while the shadow and light dance all around it.

I turn 40 in a couple of weeks, I’m in the middle of a divorce and I’m still working to get my career squarely off the ground while wading through all of this transition.

A little over a year ago, I did a meditation asking my guides to bring all of my life lessons to me. It seems that this has happened in a very concentrated sort of way ever since. I am so grateful for all of the lessons I’ve learned and I am left feeling a little tired and run down from it all. I’ve been sick a lot, my skin has been rough and my eyes are often puffy and red either from crying or lack of sleep. A big part of this lesson has been to just take care of myself and honor my own feelings and needs first, including the needs of my body.

Taking care of myself and allowing good to flow to me is always the hardest thing for me. I come from a hard-working family and my husband of 20 years has a run-yourself-into-the-ground sort of work ethic. It has been hard for me to allow myself to rest or just take care of my body and spirit without guilt among people for whom self-care is a foreign concept.

I am learning to shake off these voices. When I take the time to lay in a mineral bath, mask my face, relax or (gasp!) just do nothing, I get rejuvenated. I feel uplifted and have far more energy than I would have if I kept going or tried to take on one more task. I am learning that it’s okay to sleep if I’m tired and to sit and look out the window watching the leaves dance on the trees if that brings me joy.

My body is the temple of my spirit. If I don’t tend to my temple, I am not honoring the Life that is animated within it. So I am resting, nurturing, loving and appreciating my body and it feels good.

Nothing is more important than feeling good.

Photo by KnowWonNose

“He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much; who has gained the respect of intelligent men and the love of little children; who has filled his niche and accomplished his task; who has left the world better than he found it, whether by an improved poppy, a perfect poem, or a rescued soul; who has never lacked appreciation of earth’s beauty or failed to express it; who has always looked for the best in others and given them the best he had; whose life was an inspiration; whose memory a benediction.”

This has always been one of my favorite quotes which apparently was erroneously attributed to Emerson. It was actually written by a woman named Bessie Stanley. Here’s the story.

This is very much how I define success. I live my life for love, laughter, joy and truth both in the giving and the receiving. I am immensely grateful to those people in my life who bring me copious amounts of all of these things.

I’m going under. Wish me luck.

This is how you change
when you go to the orchard
where the heart opens:

you become
fragrance and the light
that burning oil gives off,

long strands of grieving hair, lion
and at the same time, gazelle.

You’re walking alone without feet,
as riverwater does.

The taste of a wine that is bitter and sweet,
seen and unseen, neither wet nor dry,
like Jesus reaching to touch.

A new road appears without desirous imagining,
inside God’s breath,

empty, where you quit saying
the name and there’s no distance,
no calling dove-coo.

A window, a wild rose at the field’s edge,
you’ll be me,
but don’t feel proud or happy.

Bend like the limb of a peach tree.
Tend those who need help.
Disappear three days with the moon.

Don’t pray to be healed, or look for evidence
of “some other world.”
You are the soul
and medicine for what wounds the soul.

~From “The Illuminated Rumi” translated by Coleman Barks