As light faded Venus came alive.
There were no starched linen napkins.
She gutted the trout with panache.
Kiss a poet, she said, laughing.
Silent auctions gave her screaming fits.
The hike was postponed for rain.
Journaling as Sacred Practice is on the way!
Last weekend, I co-faciliated a labyrinth, meditation, and journaling retreat with my partner in Yoga Retreats Napa Valley. We spent the day with 15 women–and it was fabulous! During one of our writing sessions, I urged my tribe to journal about “my dream.” It was so powerful. This is what I wrote:
My dream is the success of my book on journaling, Journaling as Sacred Practice: An Act of Extreme Bravery.
I see myself being interviewed by Terry Gross. “What a great book,” she says. I laugh. “I had a bad break-up,” I tell her. “Instead of getting sad or getting mad, I started to write. I wrote 48 chapters in 48 days. And then I put the book in a drawer. I moved to Portland, Oregon. I moved to Napa Valley, California. When it was ready, it hatched.
Oprah calls. I don’t do the interview.
Louise Hay calls. She says, “Come to I Can Do It!”
Elizabeth Gilbert calls. She says “You go, girl!” We become besties.
Dreams, dreams, dreams. A book is a dream put down on paper. A song is a dream you can listen to. Did Mozart dream in color and did his dreams come with a soundtrack? My dream is for 2016 to be like one long, rolling, lazy summer day; an impressionist painting of picnics and watercolors clouds; of bread and wine and honeybees. I dream of the sound of water, the touch of a lover. The year 2016 should be a dress floating on a breeze, the sound of a train in the distance, a piano recital, the smell of apple pie through a window.
In my dream I rise up. I lift my heart and swallow the turquoise sky, the emerald river, the comb’s teeth of a vineyard row. I will calibrate my breath on the hush of waves. Let me rest there.
My wish for my WordPress friends is that 2016 is BIG and BOLD! Decide who you are and do it on purpose.
It was the most amazing, powerful, insightful, fabulous Yoga and Creative Journaling Workshop for Women, well, ever! We got your Crow, your Eagle, your Down Dog. Plus, we got your expository writing to not only knock off any proverbial socks, but to actually take you to that place you’ve always wanted to go but didn’t quite know the way. Yeah, it was like that. And just to prove it, here is a little creative journaling sample: I
n my tribe I am loved, appreciated, and seen. There is no apology no room for shame, for what-ifs, if-onlys, no be seen not heards. This is a party palace, baby! This is where I am the celebrated and the celebration. I am the fireworks and the parade! But wait — is this the same as hunkering down with syrupy sychophants? Oh, no my dear. My tribe both supports me and calls me on my philosophical slight of hand, my fancy emotional tap-dancy work. My tribe loves music and animals and sustainable living. It appreciates beauty, even the most imperfect beauty. This is a tribe of passion and compassion. This tribe has good taste and isn’t afraid to use it. Oh, Tribe of my dreams, I would climb into your mouth and sleep in the shadow of your teeth. I would brush your hair 100 strokes before tucking you in for the night. I would make you hot chocolate from scratch with baby marshmallows for breakfast and I would cut all the crusts off of every piece of toast in the world for you. My tribe speaks like a Windigo from Love Medicine. My tribe has eyes so deep you could drown in them. Namaste, peeps! — Cynthia G.
When I meditate, the big things fall into perspective. When I sit and let my body relax, I can feel my bones and muscles, my blood and tissue, letting go of all the big ideas, the big worries, the Big Bad (as Buffy would say). My breath deepens, my shoulders drop. I would like to say that I let my worries go but it is really the other way around. When I fall into the sweet relaxation that mediation opens in me, worries let me go and my consciousness expands and rises up into the sky like a soap bubble. From that high-deep place the “big things” that occupy so much of my waking life seem as small as marbles in the dust and I wonder how they ever seemed important at all.
It took a couple of whole-day meditation retreats to reach this place. I like to think that I have meditated for years, but now I realize, I dabbled. I would do it when the timing was right or the moon was aligned or if I had not hit the snooze button and rose naturally, and meditation was a yummy doorway between dreaming and awake. But I never did it for more than 20 minutes. Tops.
I began attending a weekly Satsang in Napa and got to practice 30 minutes sessions. They were challenging, but I got the hang of it. Then, I did a couple of full day retreats at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre. These took a little more concentration, a little more physical discipline. I struggled at first, but when I stopped efforting so much. . .and when I forgot to try, it happened. The world and everything in it (including me) simply expanded and I found my mind floating in a sparkling pool of iridescent blue. I call this feeling Suspended in the Blue and it is completely, utterly, and deeply delicious. I won’t pretend that I get there every time, but now that I know how, it has become an unfolding, and I appreciate the practice as much as the experience.
Big worries? Meh. I breathe in, I breathe out. Everything else is optional.
I recently started journaling. Again. I have always been a faithful journalista. In fact, I’ve filled literally dozens of journals, and every once in a while I actually go back and review them. I’ve even created some of my best work by throwing words at my journal. Somewhere along the way, journaling morphed into my writing process. I created the structure of my short stories through my journal. Strange, right?
I once had a mentor who said: “Just write. Don’t expect it to make sense consciously. Your subconscious knows what it’s doing.” Though I didn’t fully understand what she was saying, she was my mentor, so I did what she advised. And guess what? It worked and I created some amazing fiction as a faithful journalista.
Then I stopped journaling. I know! I took a hiatus, a rest, a break from the ritual of creation. I gave myself permission to not write, and guess what? The world didn’t come to an end. I did however, stop creating amazing stories. It was okay for a while, but now I’m back to journaling. Not everyday, mind you, but often. It’s like going back to yoga. I’m getting more agile, more flexy. I can feel a story starting to form, and it’s the most delicious feeling a writer can have.
So, I’m back to zero, which is exactly the right place to be.
persephone's step-sisters 