Shut. Them. Down.

No, this is not about the NCAA Tournament.  Although, given my having been raised in ACC-Land and having gone to Chapel Hill, I can see how you might mistake me for that much of a basket ball fan.

Instead, and brace yourselves, I am taking the opportunity to harp on you, once again, about Earth Hour.  Please please please.  Every year, once a year, people around the world unite in their time zones to celebrate the Earth, Mother Nature, Gaia- whatever you want to call it- by turning off their lights for an hour.  Just an hour; and just the lights.  It is a beautiful thing to gift the planet- an hour of rest.  An hour without electric light.  This year's Earth Hour occurs tomorrow (or today, depending) March 31, 2012.

This event means more to me than I can possibly express- even though I do try valiantly every year to do so.  To me it is about more than lights.  The lights are important but the planet is the Star- ya know?  These days seem to be so convoluted, so polluted with danger, distrust, high emotions- polluted with everything physical, mental, and emotional we humans can create.

But when you take this hour, just this hour, to gather with your family or flatmates or whomever and turn the lights off, you return to a sense of the way the world was before.  Before you and me, before the hum of electricity became a constant companion.  Seriously.  Get together some of your cohort tomorrow night.  Turn the lights off, light some candles, and just be.  Be there with each other, enjoying company, enjoying the ritual burn of fire- the soft glow of candlelight vs. the harsh glare of electricity.  Or sit out under the moon and LOOK at the stars- see them!  Embrace the absence of the light- which is not darkness but restorative quietude.

Please Please Please.  Just turn them off.  Just an hour.  And just your lights.

Much love,
Much grace and lightlessness,
Until next time, Friends...

A Good Day

It has occurred to me that any day which I get to spend entirely in Yoga clothes is a good day.  This thought occurred to me yesterday- a day which I got to spend entirely in Yoga clothes.

Cheers, Yogites!

Ostara-or-The Spring Equinox

Equal Parts
Light and Dark.
Equal Parts
Light and Dark.

Today, March 20, is the Spring Equinox, or, Ostara.  It is a day to celebrate balance and equilibrium.  Nature is balanced- 12 hours each of daylight and night.  Go out, light candles, do your thing.

But always consider the balance in nature, the balance and beauty and perfection of the natural world.  Earth celebrates the next stage of her seasons today, in Equal Parts Light and Dark.

Gironzolare (Wander)

One of the more appealing side affects of coming so beautifully back into the world- yogi blitzed and pretty regularly blissed out on breath awareness and meditation- is that I have discovered this passion for language.  But not just my own native language; and not just the Sanskrit of my practice, which is, needless to actually say, ancient, perfect, and austere- but Italian (ha, of all the choices...), and French, and Maori.

These languages are potent.  They are delicious.  They are like ice cream to me.  Italian is sharp yet rolling- like bitter, dark coffee.  French, sophisticated, lilting French, is like caramel- creamy and sweet.  But Maori.  Maori is exotic and traditional all in one- it is unlike any other taste in my mouth.  I wish I knew more of all of these languages.  I wish I could eat them all at once, digest them, and wake up speaking all three fluently.  Once upon a time I could speak French rather fluently.  But that was once upon a long long time ago.

And what this linguistic buffet has caused me to do is continue on my travelling bender.  I want to go and go and go.

So now it is open season for suggestions- for votes.

A tour of the Mediterranean (of course starting in Belgium with my perfect Tante Annette)?  Or perhaps working my way South of the Border in the vineyards of Argentina and Chile?  Back to New Zealand?  For more study and more Maori?

My manuhiri, mes amis, Amicos,
HELP!

Until next time.  Love and happiness and happy thoughts.

I Was Not Magnificent

Yep.

I have had too much to drink tonight.  And I have had a HUGE serving of ice cream with peanut butter and toasted nuts tonight.  And I am loathing the self- most especially tonight but this is the general theme of my oddly self-centered life.

Again, this is what I do in general.  But alcohol and ice cream make it that much worse.  Because my brain and my body both feel oh so funny and oh so over the top.  While they are delicious, they are also undeniably guilt-inducing for my stupid psychology.

A few entries ago I wrote that some things never change.  And some things don't.  And some things truly never will.  There is a part of me that worries that regardless of all the profound transformation I have just experienced, all of the impressive growth and motion into the realm of self-love, that I will never, never, never ever heal to the point of being healthy.  It is not a comfortable notion to deal with but it is one that I deal with day to day to day.  Every nanosecond, these days, is a challenge.  The kind of challenge that I face upon sunrise is the challenge to maintain gracefulness and the goodness I have recently attained; the challenge to maintain the wholeness and wonderfulness I feel on the inside.  

Suggestions are welcome.

Not that I will listen to anyone but myself.  But they are welcome.

Until next time, Manuhiri,
let's hope for continued growth.

The Last Night- Aotearoa, the Giver

I have been staying at a yoga studio in Auckland for the past five nights.  To be more specific, I have been staying at what we affectionately refer to as 'Cheshire Street', the nickname for the studio who's intensive I took in order to become the yogic creature I am presently.

But tonight is my last night here.  Tonight is my last night in Cheshire Street, in Auckland, in New Zealand.  At least for the next 10 months or so.
More on that potential financial disaster but intellectual goldmine as it develops....

I have seen indescribably beautiful things, I have seen wilderness, I have seen city life and country life in cities and countrysides that really live.  They have life, vibrant, bold, sometimes touristy but often earthy LIFE.  In considering New Zealand, I have finally come to the conclusion that this place gives.  That is what New Zealand does.  She gives.  She gives what she has to those in need.  And we are all in need.  So she gives to all of us- what she has- what we need.

I needed a lifeline.  She provided me not one but many.  I needed perspective, peace, humility, and belonging.  My God did she provide those things.  And then some.  On so many different levels, this place just gives.  That is the thing I could never quite put my finger on in describing her to people.  It is the unnamed (but now named) quality of her existence which has given me so much pleasure, so much peace, and so very much perspective.

Alas.  Tomorrow I leave her, my Aotearoa, my Gifter of Life.  If I could truly describe the immense intensity of this second visit to New Zealand... well... actually, no.  I do not think I would even if I could.  I cannot describe the place in general- it took me nearly two years to happen upon this giving clarity.  But this visit, this visit in particular, is mine.  It is mine on a deeper level than you could possibly grasp or imagine.  So I shall selfishly keep it to myself for a little while longer.

At least for tonight, at least on this last night.

Until next time, my Friends,
Hei Kona Ra

Humility- Back to Basics

If you look very carefully at this photo, you will notice fencing.  You will notice caution tape.  You will notice flowers, bouquets of flowers, stuck in the fencing, woven into the caution tape.

This is the Bridge of Remembrance in Christchurch.  Initially it was meant to remind the city of war heroes.  Now I believe the meaning has taken on a new, and equally as humbling meaning.  A little over a year ago that huge earthquake struck Christchurch, shattering her foundations and essentially changing her.  The city has not yet recovered structurally.  Not really.

But there is a spirit here.  A spirit of recovery that is half impossible to comprehend.  It nearly shamed me and my American-ness.  These people have suffered unimaginably and have yet to wallow in it.  Instead of looting, rioting, and generally making a mess of things (yes this judgment I am passing on the way disasters are handled by citizens of other 1st world nations is indeed less than subtle), the people of Christchurch and the surrounding areas have instead pieced together a plan of hope.  As I visited the downtown yesterday, two years after the last time I was here, I found myself saddened but simultaneously so impressed.  Sad because the city is not and will never be the same.  Impressed because the people of the city have accepted that fact and are making the most of it.

For example.  Where once there were buildings and buildings of shops, literally rows upon rows of them- where now there are too many soft spots in the earth for buildings- there is now a container mall.  That's right.  Recycled shipping containers made into cafes and boutiques.  Temporary but testimonial.  And colorful- so bright and cheerful as though to brighten up the memories of everyone's day.  It is a reflection of the city and the people- currently in a state of flux but still bright, still beautiful.

Still very much Kiwi.

It is amazing what people can do in the spirit of rebuilding, rebirth, and healing; amazing what people can do for each other and for themselves.

Until next time, Friends.
Cheers.

"Have Ashram, Will Travel"*

*Quote stolen but happily attributed to Devananda- Dee- one of my beautiful yogis- one of my courageous guides- one of my friends.

For the past twenty six days I have watched the sun come up into the trees at a remote retreat on the Coromanel Peninsula on New Zealands North Island- livening and awakening the earth and my soul.  I have listened to birds squawk themselves (and myself) into wakefulness.  I have witnessed my breath streaming out in front of me in a frigid tent in the dark before dawn, lit by candles and lanterns and love.

As I practiced my yoga this morning, I was filled with such gratefulness for this place, this land, these people who fill it, and the experience I have given myself.  New Zealand itself is a land of land.  It is vast and alive and I can't help but be filled by sweet longing for liveliness when I am here.  The earth is infectious.  It seeps into every bit of the culture and like tea, steeps into the soul, staining it with ruddy naturalism and prehistoric earthiness.  It is without equal, this quality of LIFE.

How could I not want to live?

For twenty five days I lived yoga.  I learned yoga.  I learned how to embrace what it is and make my life richer for it.  And learned how to teach it- to give this gift of yoga to others.  To have gifted myself not only this course, but this journey, saved me.  The distinct combination of this place and this practice literally saved my life.  Because it reminded me of what there is to live for- the bigger picture, the infinite expanse of possibility that is really only possible if I am still breathing.  The breath  is everything.

How could I not want to live?

More to come, Friends.  But my advice as of right now is if you don't feel like doing yoga- at least book a ticket to New Zealand.

Love at First Light- or Valentine's Day 2012

Love in the pre-dawn darkness-
the slow rise of light,
pinkness, redness-purple-orange
I love at first light
   the birds, the squawking, chattering,
   chipping birds
who love me the same-
who love me at first light.
I love the sun
I love him at first light.
As I love the moon all night-
the perfect sun-the holy-one.
The beauty of all gracefulness-
contained in one holy-one moment
of sunrise
light, Light, LIGHT.
Love at the first- and I am loved in return.
God, what love.
What love at first light.

Happy Valentines Day, Jo.  And thanks.

*I wrote this poem in the middle of an evening discussion at yoga intensive.  As I did with the poem below but this one is a bit more about the amazing people surrounding me and loving me and caring for me than it is about me.

Cheers, all, and Happy Valentines Day.

 

A Poem

The most beautiful bounty
I keep hidden-
I hide
Without grace but with Shame.
I ground it
and grind it
and keep it milled-crushed-powdery.
Insubstantial.
I keep the mill always moving, always
Always crushing.
Like a coward- Like a fracture.
And within that fracture
I have spread the residue
of my most beautiful bounty-
sprinkling the detritus
of esteemed treasures
and packing it down so it cannot be found.
But what is the bounty?
But what is that most beautiful bounty?
But mine?