It's time to unplug for awhile.

Move away from the computer screen.

Re-center.

Perhaps sit in some extended silent meditation.  Perhaps reflect.  Perhaps sit with the depths, dream to the moon, watch the ripples of the lake spiral out and out and out.  Or would that be in and in and in?

Before I settled into this Gaia world in Winter, 2008, there was a glorious month of retreat.  By the end of that cold January month, there was no inside, no outside.  The lifelong core fear of emptiness had abated and it felt like a peace had plumbed down to the center of soul. 

I seem to have lost that center lately, although that's perhaps an illusion as what is there to really lose?  Yet, my soul seems to be longing for some extended time away...or time near...who knows?  I just need to listen deeper and reconnect with that beloved awareness.

So the leaves and the green trees and the lake and the moon and the wildflowers murmur,  "come, come, come..." and I have resisted their haunting melody for far too long and now it's time to turn off the computer, except for the daily posting of the outdoor blog and perhaps a daily checking of email.

I hope to see you all again after several weeks of retreat.  But who knows where the wind shall blow us?  Feeling much love and gratitude and appreciation for Gaia and all you beautiful folks.  Love to all...

It's been a year and a half since we've seen Christopher in three-dimensional physical reality.  And I can't wait until this weekend when he arrives.

He'll be bringing with him his girlfriend of nine months, a young woman from South Korea.  It will be so interesting to see them both together, to learn more about her, and to just re-connect again.

He's twenty seven now, the oldest of our two kids.  He's in a PhD program in San Diego and has been really working hard for the last two years.  He wasn't expecting to get a master's degree (the actual diploma) but the department head called and asked what name to put on it.  So he'll have his master's degree by the time he gets home!  (I think...maybe the following week.)

When the kids were growing up, I sometimes compared them by saying that one was my heart; the other was my spirit.  But as they've grown into young adults (Kiah is now twenty three and living in NYC since January) it keeps getting mixed-up.  The one who was the spirit, becomes the heart, and then visa versa.  But mostly they just keep becoming their own unique individuals.  Separate from us...but then again what really is ever separate from us in the larger picture of love?

They both make us very proud.  And, since they live on opposite coasts, provide more opportunities for travel!  (sayeth the gypsy.)  I am starting to plan a possible trip out to San Diego for next Thanksgiving. 

The airplane should land before 9 p.m. on Saturday night.  A very happy mom and dad will await the arrivals out of the gate.  So happy for the next week together.

This may sound really corny.  Or too airy-fairy-pie-in-the-sky.  Or too "of course". 

But I want to commit myself to love.

To remembering that I am love, we are love and Gaia (in all of her many guises from this community to a shining gleaming Universe) is love.

It's so simple.

We make it way too complicated sometimes.

In the past five days my meditations have been simply Being in that space of love before the first thought, before the emotion from that first thought, before anything else.  Returning to love like a Disciple of Love.  Bathing in that light which shines through all of us without effort.

Over the years I have come to this space from many different angles.   From dreaming.  From thoughts.  From physical actions.  From love.  From awareness.  From presence.  From the moment.  The pendulum will probably swing back to another doorway. 

But all the doorways dissolve in this feeling which presents itself in every green leaf, in every wildflower, in every face, in every song. 

I love you all.  Thank you for being.  That's all.

I am playing answering this question!

But is it enough? 

What might "enough" play be?

"Enough" must be when you feel the edges of play and silliness and fun in your lives many days.  When you let go of expectation and just goof around.

I play Scrabble with my son on Facebook most days.  Cribbage with my daughter when we're together.  And sometimes computer games like Mahjong Solitaire, Suduko, Spider Solitaire, Freecell and Hearts.  Sometimes it's fun and sometimes it just feels addictive and sometimes it's miserable and sometimes glorious.

Like everything else, play encompasses so many possibilities. What we call "play" can be drudgery.  Or it can be lighter than a feather and so much fun!

Play can be married in whatever activity we're doing:  balancing budgets (oh that's one of my favorite kinds of play, believe it or not!  It's like putting together a giant jigsaw puzzle), sizzling up some stir-fry for dinner, writing blogs (oh that's the best kind of play!) , splitting and piling firewood.  OK, OK, I kinda played with that last sentence.  I have had a bad attitude about our wood pile the last couple of days.

Today's assignment:  Play with the wood pile!  Watch it be funner than fun.  I'll let you know if it works.  Whether it does or not, I think it's "enough".   :)

I am thinking about Passion this morning and what fills the nooks and crannies of our souls with delight.  What are we doing right now that ignites the fire of passion within us?  What sparks our joy, our excitement, our smile of delight for what's blossoming in this strange and confusing and beautiful world?

Someone, perhaps Emma on Facebook (for those of you who remember EmmaTree from here on Gaia) posited the question recently, something like "Tell me something that matters to you or excites you." For some odd reason, after she asked that question, nothing sizzled up to the surface in my life.  Excitement?  Hmmm...  Maybe going to NYC last week? Seeing my daughter?  Watching spring flowers bloom?  Splitting firewood? (nahhh, not really!  at least the firewood part of it. The NYC trip, my daughter & the flowers qualify, though.)

Yesterday our Artist's Way group met in our living room, moving deep into sharing the way we resist our passion and creativity, the way we sometimes avoid, turn away or block our creative streams.  Suddenly, the passion which has sustained me for so many years consolidated crystal clear and I realized:  I love words.  I love the way words dance together, the way they marry, the way they dive in the creek and splash in the cold waters of the stream, breathless.  Just watching that sentence appear filled my whole being with heart-pumping joy. 

Words sing cantatas in my cells, trapeze from the third eye down into the solar plexus, waltz with shy does under a full midnight May moon.  Words sizzle the stars.  They blossom. They wither.  They grow wrinkled and wise or soft and gentle as milky babies breath. 

They're magic to me.  And they've been that way since age nine, sitting before that old Underwood typewriter in my bedroom, pushing down the stiff keys with unpracticed fingers, filled with disbelief the way the words etched in smudged black-and-white and created the heavens.  The words provided a back alley to God. 

Don't get me wrong.  I love viewing photography, art, visual media.  Listening to songs, music, rhythm.  Especially merging into those that gesture toward that same passion, that igniting of feelings... Art in its many-bursting colors can burst our doors wide open, so that hummingbirds dart in the living room, circle around our heads and buzz outside again.  

So may I ask any of you who care to share:  What ignites your passion?  What do you do in your life that starts the juices flowing, the heart pitter-pattering, the smile gladdening?  (and it can be a little thing, a simple thing, a small shard of a shell of passion or a big grinning sun in the bright blue sky...)  **And if Siona has already asked this question, which she probably has, substitute "What's Your Passion TODAY?" because each day's passion might taste of a different wild tea, a frothy latte, a luscious raspberry pie.

You know how you just sit down to meditate and pretty soon you're thinking about mirrors.  Like, is everything we see really a mirror?  So you need to go searching back through the Q & R until you find the one which discusses relationships as mirrors...and forget about the meditation.  Let's meditate instead on those little glass mirrors that you hold up to yourself or the world. 

Opinion as of 9:59 this morning:  Relationships are mirrors; Relationships are not mirrors.  They're both.  I think we kinda get into shaky ground when we steadfastly hold the view that they are totally mirrors, or when we steadfastly decide they're not mirrors at all.

Sometimes the world mirrors us and we can learn lots from seeing ourselves in the actions, thoughts, dreams and feelings of other folks.  We can feel the external world as a reflection and it can really teach us.  It keeps us humble.  It shows us really clearly where our own Mind is.  The mirror is a great tool to keep us seeing that which sometimes becomes hidden or too familiar.  It shows details.  Even those details we have difficulty accepting.

But in another way, the world is not a mirror.  Joe Schmoe's problems may not be our own.  He may be struggling with a different piece of the Oneness Pie.  Jan Schmoe's anger or frustration may have nothing to do with us today.  It may be her ball of wax which she's shaping and creating.

If we hold fast to the view that Joe is a mirror image of us, then sometimes we can cause ourselves lots of grief.  He is part of the All that we are.  And his problem may mirror problems we've had.  But his problems today may simply require our compassion (because we can see he's part of the All that we are) and not a mirror image of who we are today.

I think we need to dance between the concept of life as a mirror, and life as not a mirror.  Some days relationships will mirror issues for us.  On other days they won't.  Our Center knows.  It knows whether it's helpful to utilize this concept or a hindrance. 

If we shatter the mirror and the glass breaks in a thousand pieces, we're losing a valuable tool.  If we stare in the mirror all day, we may miss out on so much of life beyond the mirror's view.

When you hug someone, do you melt?  Or do you just do a quick arbitrary almost-mindless hug before moving on to exchange pleasantries or other conversation?  

Carla has had me thinking lots about melting hugs lately.  'Way back in June she posted this lovely blog about melting hugs.  And lately there's been conversations about them once again.  When I first read her words back in June, I didn't really get it.  But for some reason it all sunk into the cells this time around.  And I don't think it will be possible to ever hug the same way again.  

How often do we become truly present to our hugging?  (If we even become truly present enough in the first place to realize it's time for a hug!)  To slowly feel the essence of the person whom we're embracing or being embraced.  To truly surrender to the hug.  To be fully feeling all the edges of it, the silvery beauty of it, the heart-fluttering way our heart expands and expands and expands and expands.  

I know I often cut it short because it's so intimate to hug a person at that level.  And, you know, they may get the wrong idea, the Mind says.  Fear kinda nips its little bud at us saying "stay separate, stay apart, don't you dare merge into my space that much." It can be a merging, a melting, a Oneness kind of thing. And how many of us are ready to be that vulnerable to hug so completely?  Sometimes, in some situations, I've hugged to that level.  But what about dedicating more effort to being mindful when hugging ... and then let's see where it brings us.  Maybe to the heart of more personal interaction?  

So the other night in meditation (you know when you're suppose to be watching your thoughts instead of following them where they may lead) I had a thought...what about giving a person who's hurting a spiritual melting hug?  So I closed my eyes and felt a friend's presence and then just melted into her.  Wow!  Incredible.  It feels like your heart is shimmering inside her heart and spirit.  Just sitting there feeling love inside the image of that person takes away the false sense of boundaries and you're there, present, One with one another.  It feels like you truly have merged.  It felt totally as real as a "real" hug, maybe even more so.  

Then another thought surfaced.  What about giving ourselves melting hugs?  So I turned awareness toward myself...and especially an area of the body that was hurting...and then just melted into a hug that went on and on and on.  Tears came.  A feeling of incredible love flowed through.  The hurting part loosened its hurting grip and release.  It was...almost orgasmic.  It was like flowing in this feeling of love that moved and moved and moved like a river throughout the body.  And the hug went on until a thousand years of glaciers had melted into a puddle in my heart.  

I had to share this with you guys.  Do try it!  There's enough people hurting around and perhaps we can't hug them all in real life to the point we've melted together.  So how 'bout trying it on a spiritual level?  But don't forget...hug yourself, too.  And have the kleenex nearby just in case all that love triggers some tears.  

Blessings, all!  

When you go directly to the Center of yourself, in the silent awareness,  amidst the swirling voices and dances and movements, your truest answer will come.

The Center then directs you where to go for help.

You surrender to the Center and the Center guides:

1)  I need help filling the woodroom.   Center:  how 'bout ask your husband?

2)  I need help figuring out what to do at work.   Center:  (this time does not answer in words, but answers with this sense to surrender fully to your work, and all else will be provided.)

3)  I am worried about ________ (fill in the blank)   Center:  sit in awareness with  that person and let us love him/her together.  Let's just sit quietly and see the beauty of that person shine forth with knowing of the perfect unfoldment of the highest good.

4)  I need to pee!  Center:  Use the bathroom, use the woods. (Sorry guys, couldn't help it.  Just wanted to show that the Center does not separate the "mundane" from the "spiritual".  It's all One and the Center can assist with all sorts of help.)

5.  I have a real problem.   (Tell the Center your problem).   Center:  meditate with me all day today.  Think about your problem without seeking an answer, and when your thoughts wander, come back to the problem.   (This technique actually worked wonders with me last week!)

6.  What do I do now?  Center:  Be in this moment. You'll know what to do.

7.  What do I do now?  Center: Turn around your question to the opposite.

8.  Should I meditate now?  Center:  Yes...or maybe....No.  (only your center can know that answer)

The point is, the Center is what's constant.  It's awareness, it's God, it's the Universe, it's the All.  Or it's the doorway you go through.  It's the place where empty/full dissolves.  And its "answer" for help could be a million different answers.  The Center works to balance the individual, balance the whole, to help us see the sacredness in all that is.

We can only ask and receive our answer in the flow of this moment.  The secret seems to be opening the channel so we can truly hear the answer apart from the patterned re-active responses.  You could ask:  Center?  Should I turn on the computer now?  and your conditioned voice that loves to check email or play on Gaia will say "yes" really quickly.  But go to the silence and ask that question again.  Find the place in yourself that acknowledges the Whole/the All.  Ask again.  Sometimes it helps to touch lightly on alternate possibilities if you're not sure.  Then feel what answer seems right.  The answer that seems right is closest to the Center.

Hmmm, hope this is making a bit of sense.  Center, is this making any sense?  Center:  go for it, Kathy.

Be quiet.  Not talk (or rather, write, as much).  Listen to the spaces in between.  Listen to the growing lupines and what they're saying.  Listen to the dark of the moon and the way the moon opens up like a spring bud.  Settle down with a heart of prayer and just watch.  Listen some more.  Feel the aches of sadness and the swift rushing joy when they appear, and the emptiness too.  Drink emptiness instead of tea.  And maybe sometimes tea, as well.  Quit writing right now.  Turn off the computer.  Go outside and let the legs guide where they want to go, let the legs sing their walking songs, let the sun shine and the rain drizzle and the silence grow so loud it whispers itself awake, awake.

oh, Earth.  oh, Beautiful Creature spinning in the galaxies, how I want to see you as a living being, as something so alive that we talk together and make plans together and share blessings and tragedies and daily chit-chat.

oh, Earth.  On one level, we're One.  You know we're One probably more than I know we're One.  I have an intellectual idea that we're One, and probably some feelings too, but I don't think I truly get it down to the pores, down to the cells, down to the basic simple level.

If we understood You at this level we'd take you into account with every decision.  If you were our lover, or our parent, or our child we'd consult you.  We wouldn't drive to town so randomly, fly across the country so wantonly, stuff excesses in our hungry mouths.  We wouldn't fill up our gas tanks so thoughtlessly, wouldn't indulge so fruitlessly, wouldn't follow our whims and flimsy desires so heartlessly, thinking we were spinning toward God or Awareness or who-knows-what.

We'd make every action count.  We'd decide based on a partnership.  You would be ALIVE to us.  We'd quiver before deciding, wanting to please you, wanting to create a partnership. 

I went to the river today, the wild and cresting river filled to the brim with melting snow-water.  The river of Earth spilled herself on the banks and poured herself in me.  Did I realize our Oneness?  Only the edges of it.  Only the edges of it. 

With what do we realize our Oneness so deeply that we're changed to the core?  I hear words, words, everywhere which declare Oneness and yet actions so often declare personal desire.  And personal desire so often claims authority, thrusting the universe as a living thing to the side.

What ways do I see the universe as a living thing?  Are there ways which aren't blossoming forth in consciousness yet?  Are there ways?  I do see her as partner, as an Other, as a representative of Self come forth into the mirrored-world in which we walk.  She's a giver.  She gives nourishment, love, life, beauty.  She is Ourself staring in the pond of Possibility. 

I long to truly surrender to her so there's no separation, no background upon which we play out our lives, no inanimate background. 

This prayer on Earth Day:  May we realize your life beyond our intellectual ideals.  May we surrender to every flower, every tree, every bird song, every wave lapping on the shore of our uncertainty.  May our hearts fill with kindness.  May the kindness blossom as flowers in the damp spring soil.