Wolf tail

Lighthearted to the end

Today was tiring.

I close the cubicle door behind me. The walls smell of disinfectant and floral spray. I want to cry. I breathe deeply. I want to understand. I get up. I sit back down. I breathe. I ask for guidance.

I came home and curled up in our cob building. Surrounded by thick earthen walls I allowed life, followed by pins and needles, to flow back into my numb brain.


I walk with Florian. Late afternoon shadows dance through leaves. I pick up a black bug and watch his wings vibrate. The wind whispers softly. Trees shiver with delight.

I stroke Fey's beautiful grey fur. I sniff the hollow in Florian's neck. I talk to my sister. Although I’m still almost too tired to write my heart is light.


“May the precious bodhi mind
Not yet born arise and grow;
May it have no decline,
But increase forever more.”

Unedited

I have been wanted to write an unedited post so here it is. The bits in italics I wrote with my left hand.

I woke up crying this morning. I have been feeling slightly of balance all week. It started with the post about the sun. What is it about the sun that bothers me?

That speaking about the feeling killed it? That the sun is too bright and I will loose the ability to just be? That life will be filled only with doing? That I am killing the sun, not allowing its healing?


That sharing my thoughts on this space is robbing me of the ability to be honest with myself? Am I editing my innermost feelings to reflect them in a way that is understandable and acceptable to others? Should well alone be left alone to do its thing, to boil under the surface and explode into colour every now and again?

Florian has been slightly absent. I feel like my words bounce of his force field without being heard. What I say does not influence him because he is just not there. He is here now but when will he leave again? I don't want to mind if he is not here.

When is there time in the everyday world to be real? Work and friends and dogs and shopping all demand me putting on masks and roles so fast that this one goes missing.

The one that needs to write with her left hand to be there.


And with studies starting next week when will there be time for her? For blogging, for listening to the leaves, for the space that opens when there is nothing that needs to be done. Has to be finished. I don’t want to rush, rush, rush. I want to stop working every day.

This is what I’m scared of. That the sun will fill all my spaces, leaving no place to curl up with the blessed darkness enfolding me, that there will be no time to dream of the timeless.


How does one cultivate friendship in a world where there is always more to do? More to finish?

I want to see my mother. I also want to swim, to write, to truly listen to a friend.

I need to shop. I want to feed my dogs because I want them to be healthy and happy.


I want to take my dogs for walks. I want to meditate, to read. To just sit and look at a flower. To write to update my blog, to read other blogs, to reflect, to write, to make love.

To colour my new tarot card. To rewrite my CV. To do more tarot exercises. To listen, really listen to Lourens, Michelle, Helen, Allison, Florian, Matt, my mother, my father. To wonder at life and all its facets, not to see it flashing past as I speed down the highway.


If only I could slow down time. Within each minute I can spend an hour marvelling at the complexity of every moment. Turning it around, sniffing it, shaking it, putting it against my check, trying to sense it, feel it inside me.

But I also want life, friends, movement speed, experience.


And don’t forget the other stuff. Cooking, eating washing dishes, washing clothes, feeding dogs. Taking a shower. Going to work. All the intermediate steps forming part of existence.

I want money so that I can concentrate on building a new life, exploring myself, studying. Doing volunteer work. But all in my own time. To travel to India and to finish our cob house.


I think it is time to start the path of the moon

Selfportrait: Lighthearted shadows

My heart grows lighter each time I allow one of its shadows to reveal themselves.

Each one has a story to tell.

One wants to lie down, close her eyes, drift off and never come back. A bright future pulls her from this quite space and dumps her in the limelight where her gentle voice cannot be heard.


Another lightly dismisses a hurtful friend. She knows she stills loves her because she feels a bitter joy at the thought of being missed. Her heart burns with protective anger.

This one shouts: "Shut up, you don’t know who I am. You have no idea what I feel. You are ignorant, narrow minded and insensitive. Stop turning me into what you need to believe in."


That one criticizes my writing. "You sound self obsessed and proud, you are not being honest. You edit reality to sound good. Why can you not say what I mean without sounding pretentious?"

There are many more. Some are known to me, some I might never meet.


They rise up and show themselves because they trust that their voices will be heard. Must be heard. Without them compassion might not exist.

See more selfportraits here

ps: Below this mail is another, quivering in fear that it might not be noticed because it was posted earlier today. Please be kind to it...

Lighthearted stumblings

Oi, I have to apologise for not showing up the last couple of days.

I start typing but the words get thick on my tongue. I read what I've typed and delete it.

Again and again.

And I have so much to say. About Jen's beautiful posts. About being back at work and the challenges that go with it. About my dogs playing in the bath we keep our cob mixing water in.


About the silence before a highveld thunderstorm.

My heart knows the words I want to say but my head swirls mist around them. By the time they fall onto the page all their colours are washed away


I realize that to be truly lighthearted I must sometimes allow the mist in my head to obscure the clarity. The heart senses that clarity can be like a noonday sun which hurts the eyes. It then longs for the reflected light of a full twilight moon.

Things of Beauty

I close my eyes and deeply inhale the scent of a camellia. The cool white scent slips down my nose and locks longing around and into my heart. I allow myself the sniffing of flowers and can therefore forgive the occasional need to over analyse.

Rain on leaves


Green on green

After rain sun on cloud


Sleeping dogs

To allow life, relationship and the magic of another to rearrange reality.

The sun

I am currently working through a book on the Qabalah and Tarot. I colour a picture of the Tarot card and meditate on the card and the path associated with it.

My relationship with the process is an interesting one. I will suddenly have the urge to complete the next path. I will read what the path lead to and it will be exactly what I wish for most.

The card I finished colouring yesterday is called the sun and the path associated with it is called Resh – the collective intelligence.

It is a path of regeneration, creativity and forming a deep connection with inner teachers. It leads back to the source we originate from and a feeling of child like wonder.

Does that not sound super amazing?

For the last couple of days I have been filled with vitality and light. A soft radiating vitality.

Yesterday I realised that a part of me fears this feeling. I don’t understand it, I don’t want to loose it. The final reward might lead to disillusionment and end of what I have been working towards.

But it is not the end. It is the beginning. I want to sustain this feeling. I want to build on it. I want to become something more.

A sunflower turns its face towards the sun. A tree allows its heart to explode into molten gold.

I laugh at the beauty of it.

be lighthearted : self-portrait challenge

I sit on the floor to take a light hearted portrait of me, Fey and her two puppies. They jump all over me, sniffing my ears and kissing my nose. Fey sings about us, me sitting and them jumping.

The aperture of my heart focuses, then opens. Light floods in. Soft wolf paws enfold my heart.

We go for a walk.

I can smell the rain approaching. The wind’s hand gently enfolds the giant blue-gum tree, shaking loose a few leaves. Together we whirl downwards.

The cicada clears its throat and starts chanting. The wind’s grip tightens. It starts shaking the rattle. Shaking and shaking, softly then faster. My heart leaps up and joins the dance. Branches are swaying together; thousand of leaves stamp their feet together. Heart beats accelerate, chests heave. The dancers swing around. They breathe as one. Faster, nearer, closer, further.


The first raindrop falls. The dogs run ahead. My eyes follow leaves twirling across the sky.

Then I run.

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Future calling

Back at work. The small room, the blue computer screens, the loud voices and the endless discussions. At first I panic. I go into the bathroom, sit down and breathe deeply. Please let this be over soon. I want my future to reach into my present and pull me out of here. If I need to stay help me open up to what keeps me here.

I'm not crazy about being back at work but my future points it nose towards the walk she knows will happen. When it does not immediately manifests she sighs and settles into her blanket, all the time keeping a hopeful eye on me, knowing I've never let her down before.

She lays waiting, dreaming of a walk filled with interesting smells and distant barks. There will be tall grasses to leap over and a last burst of sunlight will illuminate a tree revealing it's true form before dusk absorbs it. Turning the corner we will meet up with a few horses.The moment will be filled with long remembered memories, sounds and smells.

I can hardly wait.

be lighthearted : self-portrait challenge

“Visionary activism invites us to participate actively in shaping and creating our personal and creative reality by embarking on an adventure of joyful maximum self cultivation. “

Caroline W. Casey



“Believe nothing, entertain possibilities.”

Caroline W. Casey

My boyfriend Flo says I look a bit silly in this photo, like Maya sniffing at a flower. I said that is ok it is meant to be funny
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A new year, a new me

The year now past has had many outer world changes. I started a new job, worked for three different clients, ran interactive workshops, started a blog and had my dog Fey spayed. I made new friends, lost touch with old ones. I discovered new fields of interest. I turned thirty five yesterday.

The worry was ever present in my mind that not much spiritual work has been done. There was simply no time. Weekends were spent doing washing and shopping and dodging friends. I started yoga and stopped several times. I found myself staring at my laptop screen, my mind tapping against the wall separating me from the creativity needed to update my blog.

Despite this my being has subtly shifted. Outer triggers caused small seeds, germinating in the darkness beneath my consciousness, to sprout. Their delicate flowering changed me. I have become more accepting, loving and patient. Relaxing my control has allowed the brown and gold moths of the everyday to flit through my being. The movement of their wings gently transformed me.

An unfinished painting must be completed

New friendships wait to unfold and fierce conversations want to be uttered. Jen from one plus two has started a social awareness challenge that I want to participate in. Our cob cottage will get a living roof.

Oi! When to do my job? My plan is to negotiate a shorter week or find a less time demanding job that aligns with my studies. My year will be filled with more trust, creativity and colour, and less multi tasking, control and fear. I will take more walks, plant vegetables and make my first pesto.


A seed I want to surrender to the soil of the goddess. I had to spay my dog Fey on Friday. Regardless of it being the right thing to do it has filled me with much sadness.

lkj

She was perfect in every way with a fierce wild spirit. (Her mother is a wolf, her father a wolf/alsatian mix). At present she can not run or play. She lays under the table looking sad. I pray that she will heal and that her spirit stays free.