I dreamed of Badger

Often times, when I am percolating new ideas, I do not sleep very well. The nights are long and I can't wait to start moving around  in the morning. This was the case about two nights ago when  I dreamt about a badger. I had started thinking about a new way for my healing  work to proceed. I have been fantasizing about holding a Mystery school in the barn. A mystery school is ,succinctly put,  a school for "soul work". It is funny since I went to school for social work  . Maybe it is the precursor for some of us to get more involved in our own personal  journey. The night that I decided to do this different form of work. When I dreamt of a badger. I was sitting in my chair and I looking  out the window at a badger. He was quite friendly and  he was smiling in at me. It was lovely exchange. I thought about being afraid but then  let it go. The next day, I went on the internet and found out very interesting information about the badger.

Mind, Body and Spirit

Animal Voices: Telepathic Communication in the Web of Life

I have talked about mind, body and spirit integration for so many years now that it has become a cliche and no  one really thinks about it very much anymore. However It still remains a wonderful  metaphor for healing ourselves. If we do not actively acknowledge all three parts of us, then we only partially heal. We all have comfort zones which are places that are easy to talk about. I love to explore my mind and I am not as interested in exploring  the physical sensations of a ride on a zip line in Costa Rica. Other people love to be in the spiritual zone and they forget to take care of daily challenges, like paying bills and mowing the lawn.

troubled teenagers

Pixie relaxing in her Subaru cave

  I have had  the good fortune to work with many teenagers who have struggled to join our world. They do not fit into the school system either in their classes, with  peers or  family. Everyday, they wake up and struggle to find meaning in their lives. When they cannot find authentic connections , they quickly turn to alcohol ,drugs, sex  and anger. From this vantage, they have sufficiently isolated themselves from any feeling and often pose a threat to self and others. As adults we   become afraid of them and then it really turns into a mess.They know we are afraid and then  everyone becomes terrified.

When we do not show fear but genuine interest, they are willing to begin the journey to meet us part way. I have found that many of these teens are  quite spiritual and interested in everything that relates to nature and spirit. They often see spirits, healing colors   and talk to  their animals. I allow and encourage these conversations so that they can express their true natures.  What they hate is when we deny our own true natures and pretend to be what we are not .  So I urge everyone that has teenagers in their lives to begin talking from the heart about the passions in their lives. Things may change dramatically and quickly.

 The following link is from a friend of mine, Kat Katsanis, an intuitive healer. She wrote an excellent article on being Indigo in this world titled, "Ferocious Grace".
"Since the 1990s, a new "famous" has emerged. This famous isn't associated with
magazines or record labels; it is derived, rather, from a widely recognized trait. The
famed, winning quality is spiritual intelligence. The "Indigo Children," who have been
dubbed so by pioneering metaphysical authors including Neale Donald Walsch and
Dr. Doreen Virtue, are an exceptional generation. One might term them a "vibrational
generation." Yet, what exactly, is a "vibrational generation?" And what are the
implications of having a leading-edge "vibrational generation" come into adulthood?"

For the rest of the article please click on the following link:

http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=449742441227&id=840162

Scrabble Ladies and Friday nights

Fairies and butterflies at home

This past Friday, I played Scrabble™ with a group of eight women.  We all sat around a large wooden dining room table in an 18th century farm house and played three games.  Some of these women have been playing since 1998 on a biweekly basis.  I have been part of this wonderful group of Scrabble™ players for the past several years.  We all live in the same village and share a passion for Scrabble™.  Of course, we have our own rules for the game, which include: using cheat sheets with two and three letter words, helping each other by giving clues for extending words already on the board and generally cheering each other on.  The location of the Scrabble™ meetings changes each time as we rotate through our homes.  We generally serve food and a variety of drinks, including wine if it has been a particularly long week.

yoga classes, flexibility and icy driveways

Due to the accumulation of ice and snow recently, our driveway has been a  sheet of ice. Getting older, there are  definitely more fears about slipping and sliding on it. Currently, taking down the garbage is one of those monumental tasks. I realize that I need to continue to be flexible and strong  as I age.  So I am always on the look out for ways to exercise in the winter. I have tried many different yoga classes and most leave me with serious neck pain . I have to admit I am competitive and  I wish to do the postures better than the person next to me. Also, many classes are in themselves very competitive and  strenuous.

Goat's cheese and English food

Goat’s cheese and English food.

Did you know that they refer to goat cheese as Goat’s cheese?  The English feel that it is disrespectful to the goat and the English language to call it goat cheese.  However one calls this cheese, I do love it.  At my daughter’s wedding, they used goat’s cream to make the cream sauce for the chicken entrée as well as a whipped cream for the dessert. The taste was fabulous.

meditation and things that we hate about ourselves

Everyone is complaining about the relentless snow and ice this winter, including me. It feels like we are asked to hibernate like the bears but we still need to work and do our take care of  daily life. How can we make the best use of this time . Probably not by blaming the snow and ice  Gods, or weather .com or even global warming. Since  hibernation is a slowing down of body function perhaps this is a time to slow down our thoughts and develop some compassion for ourselves and others. While watching a video of the Dalai Lama, last night, he talked about how easy it is to be compassionate for lovely people and events and how hard it is to be compassionate for what we hate about ourselves and others. In the following link, he talks about the use of meditation to  train our minds so that we can feel grace even towards  things that we hate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFY4KgOAwzs&feature=related

The storm is starting to dissipate outside, my driveway looks like a gigantic slush runway and the sun is coming out. What we know is that the winter  will last for about 6-8  more weeks    with ample opportunities to practice compassion towards these difficult  weather events.

mental photographs

We just returned from England and our daughter's wedding.  It was an amazing time. As you can imagine traveling in the middle of winter has serious challenges. Before I left, I remembered saying that I wanted to recall everything from the trip and create  many special memories. I was able to do that by really focusing upon moments in time and taking a mental snapshot of it.  Just like photographs , we can take  a moment like the one below, we can mentally freeze the image in our minds.  The first time I thought about this was with my friend and art teacher Liz Adams. This was a few years ago and she had graciously agreed to see some of my art work while we had a picnic lunch in Princeton.  During the lunch, she said that this was a special time and she wanted to remember it always. By focusing on the moment it seems to slow time down, set the intention  and bring it vividly into recall. So here it is several years later and I can clearly remember that lunch. I  have practiced this mental photography many times since and used it again for the wedding festivities.  Try it, it works very well.