Beyond Thunderdome 2

Get out of your thunderdome! You get to create the rules and tools to get you to the next part of your life. Beyond the ideas we’ve been programmed to believe. Past our personal and societal impositions.

Belief in your future before it has happened is the most powerful instrument in your toolbox of creation. When you continue to walk in the direction of what you want and what you are being called to the way presents itself to you. You are always walking on your path.

I’m coming to learn the detours just means you are in the process of creating what you really want, and hopefully finding the fun of it all along your way forward.

So I began to settle into the beauty of the desert. Letting go of the fears of possible outcomes I cannot control. Realizing my brief fear of camping in the desert was also symptomatic of unconscious fears of my upcoming future.

Much of our anxiety comes from previous trauma or unprocessed past events. Once you are able to pinpoint the source of uncertainty you can be guided to a solution.

I am leaving my career soon. Moving from Portland at the end of June. Taking a break before moving to San Francisco. Again the next steps of my journey unclear. Ready for this record of unsure futures to be taken off of repeat.

I reminded myself that are many subtle signs from the Universe I am going in the right direction even if I can’t perceive it all right now. The unsure are new steps to pathways I haven’t crossed yet.

This is true for all of us. The more we learn how to communicate with the Universe and are open to guidance- it will be revealed to you. Our finite understanding says more about us than it does of Universal limitations.

I sat present in a Utah desert canyon. Watching with the land as sunlight fades. Being present & mindful wherever you are guides you to finding beauty in places you would not have dared to go.

I did some grounding work. Deep breaths and opening of the root chakra. Opening of the mind and heart. I was reminded we are part of this planet and we each have a right to here. The anxiety began to fade as I watched the sunset slip beneath the horizon.

Out here you see the Earth for who she is without a facade. Rugged, unyielding, resilient. Life goes to incredible extremes to exist. Without the assurance of trees, water, and trappings of civilization you also see yourself for who you really are in that moment.

The desert teaches anyone who takes time to be present with her. You find love that transcends the physical and material world. A love that one must take time to observe, to appreciate, desire and allow.

The more purposeful you become in your expansion- you can attain most anything you desire or put time into creating. For I found that there were trees, and scrub bushes, and small animals- rabbits, lizards, even deer living out here.

If the smallest of creatures can find a way to survive- how much more prepared for survival we humans must be? There is much brilliance in this world of which we are also a reflection.

The challenges you face may be larger than a desert or more long term and discouraging. Systemic injustice is so prevalent and larger than anyone of us alone. How can we achieve our goals and societal transformation with so much outward oppression?

There is no simple solution or answer to our ceaseless quandaries. But we must know that we are always part of the Earth even if it seems she has forgotten us.

When we feel this way it just means we need to take a breath, let go of the fears, use the tools we have to get us to the next moment, remember our true power, rinse, and repeat as necessary.

When you surrender into the acceptance of your present reality- that’s when true freedom comes. Releasing the resistant thoughts and feelings about your own life and about others will free you in ways you didn’t even know were holding you back.

The journey to our freedoms have all been individually tarried and carried often alone. Those of you who are on difficult journeys remember your light. Be encouraged that life exist everywhere.

The edifice of true beauty will always remain even after the surface is washed away. It is in the crucible, the mortar pestle, you find who you really are. Isn’t that a great place to be?

Once I let go- camping in the desert ended up being my favorite part of this roadtrip from Portland to Texas. A reminder that your whole life is out there waiting to be lived and great possible futures ready to expand into reality.

Quantum Leap

Just go for it! Jump at those chances. Listen to your calling. Follow your impulses. Move to that city. Climb that mountain. Say “yes” to things you want more often.

Do what your secret heart has been waiting to do. Make that quantum leap towards your full potential. Release your doubts into the sky. This is your time to set yourself free!

You are worthy of living the life you want to lead.

Draw upon your inner resources for you are more than capable to achieve your goals.

You are experiencing life in a myriad of circumstances & environments of which no other being has brought forth until now.

Even when all goes dim and you are at your breaking- look at the challenge as an opportunity for change, as growth, and personal revelation.

Walk with the knowing that you are on your path.

You are always being guided by your highest self to your next step.

Often we hold ourselves back from accomplishing our dreams.

Don’t let fear of the unknown keep you clinging to the habits, relationships, jobs, religions, expectations that do not promote your highest good.

Break the patterns which no longer serve you.

Fall into the trust that the Universe has your back.

Surrender to what you cannot control.

Ask for guidance about the things you cannot change on your own.

Allow the greater part of you to come through in every situation.

This is where you take your power back.

We live several lifetimes within our lifetimes. We are the only constant in our constellation of creation.

Each day, each new city, each career change, each relationship brings us farther ahead in our journeys.

No one else knows the purposes which you are meant for.

Your passions are within you for great reasons. 

You need no one else’s approval to be who you know and want yourself to be. 

We are born to diverse callings.

We will each answer in different ways.

We are fractals exposing and replicating a unique pattern of existence.

We are the culmination of generational multitudes.

You are living out the dreams of your forebears just by being alive.

It’s time you start living your own.

Look at each person and experience through eyes of unconditional love. 

Shift your mindset to one that allows you to be who you really are.

Give grace unto yourself.

Believe in your beauty.

You are a success.

You are flowing with joy and freedom.

Let your radiance shine forth! Light will reflect from yourself unto another.

In living your truth you help bring the whole of creation into wider expansion!

People all over the world will awaken with us and without us.

Revolutions have always begun as flickering thoughts.

Visualize yourself as if you are already where you want to be. For within the mysteries of time we have already lived our futures.

May these simple words inspire you to action.

For the greatest journeys take us beyond anything we have lived before.

All of Life exists

to ready us

for the next leg

of our winged journeys,

and lead us into who we are all becoming.

Within You Without You

Joseph Campbell explains the hero’s journey as a circular cycle of polarities common to all human beings. The call to adventure spurs one to leave their home and travel into the wild. The hero encounters many obstacles on the journey to their destiny.

Traversing through the dark roads filled with various real and imagined terrors & foes one begins to doubt their calling. Some even abandon their quest altogether and question the gods and themselves for a way out. Clarity comes during a period of introspection and acceptance of mistakes and losses which have occurred.

Eventually help is given in the form of “supernatural” or subtle aid enabling the hero to return to their goal much wiser and reinvigorated than before. Each one of us is the hero in our personal narratives. There are many years have some have lived the song of the downtrodden. Some never get a second chance or become to afraid to venture out again. Some succeed and arrive at their destination immediately (i.e. Billie Eilish & all overnight sensations.)

For most of us mortals it takes a longer more arduous route to get there. We are being forged while in the inky darkness.

Chipping away chunks of marble eventually reveal the intended sculpture.

But we are not marble. We are beings of light in corporeal forms. The chisel strips away excess on an internal level.

The work happens in our hearts our minds; in quiet corners where we cannot objectively peer deeply nor can others wholly understand. We are even mysteries to ourselves.

This start over in Washington state feels surreal and is very welcomed. It takes a while for the new normal to set in. I find myself wanting to go back to a sense of normalcy, but there is only going forward- at least in the traditional Newtonian sense. It’s been hard to reconcile certain events that occurred during my recent travels but I have come to accept everything as it is without too much romanticizing or self-critique.

I let the world in on my life and in some ways feel the distance this openness has allowed. Private battles and past challenges have been disclosed in hopes of helping others own their journeys. The one-sided judgments on the other side of the tablet and cell phones are not known yet I have felt the sting of silence too. Vulnerabilities begin to harden the longer they are exposed to the elements of time and social media.

The brightness of the world has dimmed in some ways. The bushy-tailed optimism still intact but more myopic in focus. Broad reaching hope for people to live their truest selves will never diminish in my heart. Despite my own failings & disappointments I still believe that we are good and worthy to be fought for.

I didn’t try hard enough to find a literary editor to publish Break the Violent Fetters. I’m more in the business of build it and they will come than the other way around.

Yet over the past few months, I found there exists a stigma when you release art or self-publish on your own. It’s almost as if self-publishing delegitimized the gravity of my message.

As if these words were not good enough to be traditionally published- which was not the case at all. I just didn’t want to wait upon other people to judge and evaluate my life’s content. I had already lived through the threshing ground of societal judgment. 

Or maybe people felt like I hadn’t lived a hard enough life worthy to write a book about.There are billions of people on this planet that have experienced physically, environmentally, emotionally harrowing events in their lives. I speak of an experience that is unfortunately almost stereotypical for LGBTQI+ people throughout all societies and most time periods.

Putting pen to paper about my experience is an honor because so many other people have been silenced and never given the opportunities to share or live their truth. My first book is for those who haven’t gotten to tell their story and for those still figuring out their own.

We are not fair judges to ourselves but what happens when others are also unfairly judging you? The most shocking aspects of it all were people forgot to look at my heart as I blew up in minor crises for miles across America. I don’t recognize aspects of the person I was last summer/fall while in the throes of mania. My sister told me that I won’t ever be able to separate the manic behaviors and my true self. She’s right. They are bound to one another in a chemical compound that was its own venomous form. That also means I don’t have to stay the same.

The personal toll taken in telling this story is still yet to be determined but at this point I don’t think I would do it again. At least not in the way this all unfolded. Sometimes I cringe when I think about certain personal details I’ve allowed to disseminate into the masses, my friend and peer group, people I will never meet on various ends of the world and its wide web.

The dismantling of a life in progress at the height of its young successes has been hard. I was going to buy a house. That was the original plan, but this wanderlust would not be tied down or settled. I still find the wanderlust fighting and resisting the urge to stay. But maybe my stubbornness wouldn’t have allowed it any other way.

I was not ready to settle down until the pieces all fell apart. What is it in our wanderlust hearts that keeps us wanting more? This call to adventure is not so much a running away from problems as it is a hopeful, somewhat nebulous, expansion we are running towards. The saboteur and hero are one in the same. Dualities cannot exist apart from the other. Within you Without you.

It is tempting to judge yourself and present situation while you’re in the midst of a shit show. How can you see anything else when your present existence, one you’ve worked so hard to create backfires and your left with scarce remnants of what once was. Some friendships left in fragments. Others joined in the sea of so many little regrets.

Writing about the psychological, societal, and emotional chains I had broken in turn broke me all over again. It’s a cruel irony. It has spawned a new slew of regrets. I’ve wanted to press the reset button on my life so many times this past year. There was a way out of it all that kept calling. An unholy echo bidding me to an undug grave, yet again. I hope that call has been silenced for the last time.

You can’t see the way out when you’re mired in the reality of the shitshow you’re digging out of. We will not know how our actions truly affect another person, our families, our own lives, generations of people we will never meet.

The present is a confounding experience and difficult to describe. For we are not impartial to ourselves. We each possess a degrees of unreliable self-narration because it is difficult to remove yourself from the reality of your present circumstances. An exhausting difficult period of your life feels like it slowly spreads to all aspects of your psyche. Clouding your vision and hope of ever escaping the dungeon of regret.

A lot of times the current sorrows will not matter in the long run. Epitaphs aren’t filled with credit scores, or how shiny and straight your smile was. Even still, there exists a compulsion that drives me to write and to share that is insatiable. Our lives aren’t often remembered for the mistakes we have made- unless an egregious act was committed.

How many times have you regretted an action and let it play out over and over in your mind’s eye? You remember the events that led up to certain actions and thoughts. Your body revs with anxiety as you relive the event in your mind. The human body cannot qualify whether an action occurred in the present, past or future.

Whatever you focus upon will also reflect in your body as your neck tenses, heartbeat increases, etc. In essence we are reliving that past trauma every time we talk about it AND have an involuntary reaction. It feels like a haunting at first but distance from a problem or a situation helps you to see things with a broader perspective. 

A tragedy, an ordeal by fire smolders long after the flames have been extinguished.

Sometimes there is little to retrieve back from the ashes. In that case the embers of a former period of life are the beacons. They are the guides on our way forward. You can only see what’s up ahead when you are nearing the destination.

We are our own maps. Each day a thread running through paper folds.

I had been living in patterns of devolution for months. A persona unrecognizable to others who knew me well. I hit upon a rage that had never been expressed and a volatility of shockwaves that rippled beyond the bounds or intentions of my person.

I’m almost back to my normal self and personality. Now the dust has settled. The scattered pieces have been recollected. Some pieces and people will never fit again. There many more pieces that are still here and ones yet to find.

“We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us. People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive,”Joseph Campbell.

Life is no longer stuck in a long looped waiting room. I’m finally where I wanted to be. There’s still so much left to explore, to enjoy, to live.

The Rolling Stoned/ Halfway Home

I’m halfway through writing my second book, re-planning my move to the PNW, & waiting for 2nd interviews. The words flow much more freely this go round, but will they see the light of day? It’s been difficult to get out of bed since the end of December, but I’ve been getting out and up each day all the same. Looking forward to the future with a much tempered hazy optimism.

I wish I could be a plastic. That I could fake it. That I didn’t have a heart which feels and cares so deeply. Call me Blondie. She breaks like crystal glass these days.

It’s been a decade since I’ve experienced long term depression. The deception of depression is making you think that the real things aren’t there any longer and that you will never escape.

Sometimes I wish I could just be a corporate sellout, make a shit ton of money, and live happily ever after with a six packed boyfriend in an easy-bake oven life. But then I wouldn’t be me. I am here & who I am for a reason. Aren’t we all?

The only thing worse than not pursuing your dreams is to achieve them and realize that it was probably all for nothing.

This wasn’t part of the plan. Neither was MAGA. A great many unplanned things have come and gone in the world that weren’t supposed to. I wish these mistakes could all be rectified.

Clawing forward is proving to be more insurmountable a challenge than I thought because the wind in these sails have lost their fury and also some of their desire. But claw ahead we must.

I must have been delusional to think that people cared to hear what I had to say, at least enough to finally make writing my chosen profession at this time.

Why did y’all lead me to believe you wanted to hear my words? Or was it intriguing to watch from the sidelines hidden in sheep’s clothing? The wolves are out for blood most nights.

To quote the Talking Heads, “and here am I the biggest fool of them all,” and the only one to hold responsible. Perhaps I’m being too hard on myself, or just brutally honest. The truth lies somewhere in between.

The signs were there and I didn’t heed them. I should’ve left Mexico the day my wallet was stolen, but I had a book to publish, and a new life as a writer with fantasized royalties to earn.

The pouring of my life story and message of encouragement for other people to live their truest lives went mostly unnoticed and without interest in book form. I posted a chapter from my book to a newly purchased website for 7 days in July.

Why did I get so much appreciated and unexpected attention 3 days after launching my blog site? That was the most crushing blow of all. I was fed a cruel deceit and lapped it up thankfully.

Tears pooled into an endless stream of gratitude for weeks. I would have been way more responsible with my heart and savings had that not happened. But I was so confident that writing was/is my destiny. Just didn’t realize Ms. Destiny wasn’t going to pay the bills at least not right now.

Control is illusory. We are at the helm of our ship but no amount of skill or years at sea can steady the ocean’s waves. After all, “the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”

The difficulty is discerning if the roadblock is an obstacle to surmount or a wall dead-ending the future. I’ve always preferred smashing through than waiting out the resistance.

Perhaps I have perfected the art of subconscious self-sabotage because I was taught to hate aspects of my core identity since childhood. I lost focus on the things and people important to me. I spiraled briefly out of control when I tore my foundation asunder.

I looked into the abyss and found the abyss. I toppled over the edge and plunged downwards. What happened to finding mountains instead? Cloud cover isn’t limited to sky alone.

The deception of depression is making you think that the real things aren’t there any longer and that you will never escape. Depression feels like this state will always last. It is a caustic companion that seeks to snuff out all joy and promise of better days to come.

I’d rather take the long road ‘round than sit in gridlocked traffic. Maybe there is still hope upon the horizon. How long will it take to find it? As long as it takes to find yourself or until you settle. Maybe it’s a little of both.

I have to trust this will all turn into something really grand, and if not, at least I tried my hardest. At least I tried at all. A mountain is still a mountain.That’s got to count for something even if the haze won’t let me see it now.

Hope is the great unknown. Kingdoms have been overthrown by less. Some days it’s the only thing I have more of.

How long will it take to resolve this existential quandary? As long as it takes to find yourself or until you settle. Neither have yielded fruitful thus far. Forward marching I will go. Trying to accept grace along the way.

The Rolling Stoned-

The stoned days are over. I dropped mine in the sand.

You looked at your own Then outstretched your hand.

An opulent few once parted a river. The ancient practiced craft of a Summer Indian giver.

Two seasons have gone by. You’re a little bit closer. I’m farther than crows fly.

A whipping wind sears across this prairie-crone.

All’s been begged and borrowed. Nothing to call your home.

Islands traded for beads. Wasteland riches spoil the hands that feeds.

Black gallons slither round a corporate greed.

You can’t always get what you want. You don’t get to see me bleed.

I cashed in our love for a jettisoned heart

The leaf scattered oracles herald defeat & then depart.

Magdalene had time to lean. Blood’s never made anyone clean.

A Tomb rolls open. Just a spin of the dice. What’s left for white-washed Jesus Christ?

Here I wait amongst setting sun.

Sleep folds in waves a coarse blanket, shadow-spun.

What becomes of dreams once followed and dreams undone?

Days of nightly wondering and the promise of days to come.

Bridal Veil Falls- Revisited

Bridal Veil Falls- Revisited

Lost within an alpine forest

hours spent outside of sound.

Dawn breaks the night worm’s seeking

Life propelling ceaseless rounds.

Orbits swirl through swans’ long nests

their ivory planets clothed in down.

Tens of talents left ungathered

pearl yolks- the taste of gold.

Revelations ripe abandoned

Miracles unhatched,

and fucking undersold.

Was this all a fruitless offering?

Letters plucked a century too old?

Nets sliced opened to free a people

who recoil from every verb & noun.

Worms are born already banded

Why then, was my neck so also bound?

What becomes of unwed wearers

Of Hope broken from her shells?

Plumbed the farthest depths,

and I have braved the highest sails.

Who then weaves for free-born spirits,

Brides who never don their veils?

50,000 miles traveled

There is no where left around

30,000 dollars earned

All was spent to every pound.

20,000 worldwide-people met.

No one is bothered to be found.

I saw one red rose reaching through the snow.

Life always finds a way to rise above,

to thrive,

to astound.

Gimme Shelter/Walking on Broken Glass

While here at this beautiful sea, during this time of ‘wait and see’, I published my first book- my life blood- 6 days ago. My wallet was stolen 2 weeks before, and while waiting for my 401 check to clear my physical possessions were sold off to strangers, 4 days ago.

I should’ve budgeted better and been more financially responsible, but a mental breakdown and night in jail weren’t accounted for in my ledger.

20,000 physical miles I have travelled since leaving Texas, this past scorching August.

So many things I am thankful for- quiet lush forest walks with deer, the American road stretched out before me, hope reveling in summer abundance. Some things I would change, words I would take back in a heartbeat- since leaving my career in June. This year has left me forever changed.

It already feels forever, a different person, a former life, ago.

Was it the right choice to have let most of my worldly goods be sold off, without asking for help? Do I make this quandary known? This sacrifice feels more personal than so much I’ve already laid bare to be seen, ignored, or judged by strangers, by friends, fake friends, and Fate.

I also thought I would have a home by now. The plan was to move to Portland, then later to San Francisco, or now is it to some obsequious city in the near future?

I am still in thankful disbelief brought, now that these words are finally printed in paper and on screen. In this experience of a lifetime, there have been many unintended sacrifices, shock, & endings along the way.

I didn’t plan to keep traveling for this long, and I bravely fear I may have made a huge mistake. Or have I set myself Even farther into the depths of liberation?

Dangling now, past the safety of coral reef and into the the open sea. Will we ever be truly free? Do the freed captives still carry within them a secret mark, a scar that unconsciously pervades each movement and step? Can others see the healed inner wounds? Sensing the tender hearts, Smelling the blood, chum bait for shark’s prey. We, who have been broken to pieces, bend more gently when reassembled.

Come tear my limbs, my life asunder. Aricnade, knit the web, strands only seen in the reflection of moon beams and dew drops. Is this seeking, this journeying forward assuring my future or ensuring financial disaster?

I need to space my words out. Need more lines to see clearly, and let breathe the sinews in great big gulps of waves upon the sand. Each Star a footprint, each life turning back into the sand and dust which comprise these fledgling bones. We are more than sands and bags of flesh.

The cruel twist of irony that our own beauty is hidden from us.

We live ensconced in mirrors, filters, and black screens. Never truly, justly reflects the beauty that lies within.

To what purpose, extent, do I reveal my hand? I feel more at ease laying out the flushes and the bluffs, heart on my sleeve, letting the confidence the judgment fall as it may. Thankful I have the time, the ability, the privilege to ask, to debate, contemplate, these words, these unnecessary projections. I am thankful for the ocean. For the glorious sunlight. Thankful for the birds, for butterflies, for winged things that set sail and fling themselves through Air and above the Earth.

Will I even heed my own advice- that there is always something more that there is always another way??

Is this the way I would’ve have chosen? Glass is hardened sand and both are illusions, after all. Neither death, or change do I fear, any longer. Whatever happens Gimme Shelter or Gimme Death.

I am thankful for the ocean. For the glorious sunlight. Thankful for the birds, for butterflies, for winged things that set sail and fling themselves through air, in waves, above the Earth. If Life has shown us and our frail eyes anything- always there will be something else, something more to come.

Setting Free the Captive/Free Man in Mexico

I am sitting at a bench in Chalputepec Park overlooking the lake. My edible is kicking in. I only have 6 or 7 left. The day is beautiful. Sunny with a cool breeze. Children blowing bubbles, laughter and hundreds of voices heard in the near distance. I believe I’m supposed to stay in Mexico for a while- or maybe travel farther a field. Against the advice of my sister, who works in finance, I am going to withdraw some funds from my 401k. This may seem like an unwise financial move because this is the last of my safety net to only be used in emergencies. But I believe I am on my path and it is to be transient but stable a little while longer.

I spent Thanksgiving with my friend Stephanie and her host family. This is the second time I’ve spent Thanksgiving abroad.

It feels weird to celebrate a holiday in another country that does not share the same traditions or revered days.

Instead of feeling homesick for the holidays, it’s actually a relief to miss them all.

I’ve come to believe that Life brings certain people into your life for a specific purpose and reason. Sometimes they are lifelong friendships, or the meeting of our soulmate, and at times your worst enemy. Were I to trace the connections I’ve made with people who have introduced me to other people and so forth- it would probably be astounding.

There is magic in this world.

It surrounds and permeates us every day. I have zero conflict or have come into contact with one unbearable person the three weeks I have been in Mexico.

I’m not saying it is perfect here- every country has its treasures and things that are in process. I am trying to not rate things as positive or negative experiences. Huge emphasis on the trying aspect. But it becomes easier day by day to release the things that no longer serve me so that I can embrace who I am becoming.

I have assets and a few financial obligations in America that have been stressing me out. I am paying over $1000 a month to keep a life on hold. And now I am not so sure that I want to return to it.

I have been asking the Universe what my path is and it keeps sending me signs and emotions that it is to keep on this journeyman’s path. I don’t know the reasons but it just feels right. When I think about returning to America- it fills me with dread. I have come to trust my intuition. When I think about Mexico or living farther a field- I feel happy, satisfied, fulfilled, even exhilarated. The Universe is dismantling my former life, my ego, my priorities.

I’m selling all of my possessions or giving them to my mom so she can start her life over in Fort Worth. 4 days. That’s all that separated my mother and I from reconnecting and seeing each other in Fort Worth. The irony of so many things. The year I quit my job and have money saved to travel is the year Lauren, gave her benefits to her partner- as she 1000% should have. I’ve said this before, Lauren gave me the greatest gift I have ever been given in my life to this point- the gift to see the world. I think that it all happened this way so I would continue to learn and rely on the Universe and my own knowing. Free Man in Mexico.

Colorado took my Texas driver’s license the day before I came back to Texas, and Mexico police took my old Texas ID my first full day in the country. I am now officially an American citizen with no ties to any particular state. I guess I’m still technically a Texas citizen because I haven’t changed my residency yet. I don’t know exactly where to go next. But I’ve been craving mountains and green again.

A primal force is calling to me to go farther. To where and for how long I don’t know. But I feel Life keep calling me forward. The path of the wanderer is a gift that bears a special kind of aloneness.

The great quaking of self. Of breaking open the sacred parts of me. I am in service to a higher ideal, a purpose of unity and light. I don’t always stay in that place but my heart and thoughts are thinking about Ultimate good and love for human kind and for our Earth. We spend out whole lives building a life we want to live.

I am living the life I want by shattering it to pieces, and I don’t know exactly why- except I feel I am supposed to. My heart quells with a secret ache as I stretch myself and bank account out further. When does the stretching cease? Do I even want it to stop? Will I know how?

The scabs on my right knee are about to fall off. And when they do I will take that as a sign to leave Mexico City, for now. The scales, falling off Saul’s eyes on the way to Damascus. How many things in this world have only begun with only a hope and a prayer?

Certainly our parents felt that when they discovered we each were to be born. Statues, monuments, movements, are moments that have been previously thought even if it was just a second before we make the choices. we send the dreams the vibrations outward. Like the nuclei of a cell, the building blocks of stardust, and all the things in the Universe call out for what it needs and wants.

I believe that we are the Earth’s projected concsiousness and it is calling forth children and beings of light to bring about harmony and balance to humanity. I have traveled 30,000 miles this year- for work and while on this journey. I don’t see a world plunged in complete chaos.

There a pockets and countries, human beings experiencing unimaginable pain and injustice. It is time to set the captive free, to wake the sleeping self. To shake off the scales and scabs in our hearts. Opening the hearths to our hearts. I have wrestled with this bitterness too long.

I offer my frustrations onto the threshing grounds. I offer my life onto the altar of Life, as a sacrifice. Do what with me you will. I trust that the Uiverse will come to fulfill my needs and purposes. For why would it have called me forward to rescind the offer?

I believe I have fortunes. There have been times that I have had nothing. Tina Turner started her life over with 33 cents, a dream, and her name. The Earth creates and brings life forward with even less. I am a little nervous and unsure of the next steps, but I am no longer afraid. I let go of all that once held me or called me by certain names.

A mystic in Maleta told me my life’s vision and my path. There wasn’t a way she could have known my dreams and what I had been through, and the areas I need to grow without some higher/other knowledge.

I don’t believe in God in the traditional mono-theistic sense. I believe that everything, we are all expressions of Higher Conciousness of the Universe.

Maybe it was us humans, or sentient beings, that brought forth the Universe into existence, the big bang caused just because we thought of it. And even if that’s not true- what a cool concept. At the very least we are calling ourselves forward. And I am listening, following, with earnest intent, scales, bruises, hope, dancing, and hangovers along the way.

Setting free the captive

I took leave of my bed Dripping accusations on the threshing floor.

Sunlight does not hold the night for ransom.

My eyes were last to see this caged heart was flung open long ago.

It takes a river to tell the glacier’s story.

It says, “Fall and add your tale to the streams.”

I’m a seed in cursed soil. I have no rain to spare.

I’m always with bread,

alone.

“Even in your barrenness- There are desert creatures thriving.”

Life forever finds its way. Two lips can be an oasis, or a divide.

Spit out the copper coils of your tongue. You’ve dined at ash heaps too long.

It is the mad who deny themselves a banquet seat.

Come taste the dew drops once again.

Why is my heart always the wager for such high bets?

“My friend, there would be no spring without winter sacrifices.”

Tectonic plates crash-created continents.

Life comes forward from the rubble from the dead places inside of me.

I have split my life open, An atom rising A sky god in the clouds.

There is no higher offering than Meat of the soul.

Love is not a slaughtering yard. “Then what else do you call a garden?”

I blame you not for the scales grown upon my heart

I forgot they were there, like Saul, until you caused their shedding.

Stripping great piles from this rusted gourd.

Okra, from my garden, 10/2018

All this time I’ve been Flowering in secret kept even from myself.

One doesn’t have to see a blue jay to hear its song.

You don’t have to say the word For love to permeate me.

I feel it surround me like fingers of the wind.

I have been blinded; by eyesight far too long.

I’ve learned, now, a different way

to shine.

This Harvest Of Woman Born (Part Two)

#tbt last year. For my mom & all moms this Thanksgiving, abroad. “Harvest of Woman Born.” Part 2- ✨❤️

Mary and Gaia, Tierra, Lucinda, Earth

Your tears, the melting glaciers, spill from your cheek mountains

Cascading down through all realms where life and lives abound.

A farmer plants his seeds knowing in time green stalks will rise.

Bury your worries in the secret garden

Herbs burst from soil, strong and unbaptized

In time fall wind blows away all blooms

Your children thrive in houses and streetsides.

Each a thread woven in a street beggars’ looms.

Our blood is mixed with your’s flowing and entwined

as an ancient fermented wine these streams have flown born in eons before our own.

Through thousands of lines Children, birds, & trees

keep finding a different way to shine.

In this Autumn Harvest our bound eyes now open.

We give bounties of thanks

For the plenty for women, grandmothers, and weavers,

Aunts and sisters, presidents and teachers

gratitude to the cosmic and Earthly mothers

For while these long gone years your sacred tears, kept flooding forth

Inside we once were, Before we leapt, Inside you we slept, We, this harvest of woman born, bring abundance

Stretching tall like

Redwood forests. Beyond generations

Of clay and mortal dust.

I’ll Only Know in the Moment/I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got

It’s my 13th day in Mexico City. I did not feel so brave today, but I can pinpoint its origins. It feels like lifetimes have passed since I left Texas in August. The countless lives and identities we have lived before today, yet this moment is all we have. We can’t ever be sure what the next one will bring.

I went to reheat leftovers & found my food was stolen from the hostel/hotel kitchen. I’ve never stayed in a place that functions quite like this one. But there is an unwritten code amongst travelers and it was broken.

I scrawled a letter to the thief, telling them that if they were poor & hungry- it was wrong & hoped that they were nourished and enjoyed it. But if the person who nicked my food was just lazy or uncaring- I told them to “go fuck themselves.” I later left a postcard- apologizing for that tone along w/ a smattering of pesos if someone needed them.

I returned & two notes in Spanish had been written next to mine- rebuking the robber. The postcard & pesos still left on the counter. A shred of hope in humanity restored.

I wasn’t as upset about stolen food, it felt like a betrayal to my quest or whatever this half-planned and half-flying by the seat of my pants thing I’m doing. Perhaps that’s how life is supposed to be. We live on precarious edges each moment. We take waking up, sex, food, & limbs for granted. We withhold love from those we love or are “supposed” to love the most. We cannot give what we don’t have. And “I do not want what I haven’t got.” That’s a lie, & the name of Sinead O’Connor’s debut album. 😆 Still, there is some truth in that sentiment.

Stranger in a strange land. The Man Who Fell to Earth. Will I ever find a place that is home- which can contain these multitudes? “Have you forgotten? You are multitudes. You can never be contained in words or bodies, alone.”

Someone’s only pair of shoes had been stolen as well- and they were more of a Kmart blue light special rather than a blue plate special which had been taken.

I have stolen before- usually in the self-checkout line when I don’t feel like an avocado should be $4 and mark it as bananas. I’ve even stolen clothing from a place I worked at as a teenager. Not my most shining moments, so perhaps I don’t have a lot of room to complain.

Stranger in a strange land. The Man Who Fell to Earth. Will I ever find a place that is home- which can contain all of me? Whitman was not alone in containing multitudes. Sometimes the closest to multitudes I’ve come to are from a box of Whitman’s chocolate samplers. Then I look out of my rented bedroom window to the Ochre red Cathedral- which has greeted my gaze several times each day. Doves and pigeons are nestled in the rafters. Bits of grass and flowers growing from the walls and cracks on the city’s uneven pavement. Mexico City is literally sinking an inch or so each year. The colonialists dammed up the rivers and drove the Aztecs out. And now those descendants are reaping the ultimate Montezuma’s revenge. Even then, there is a place for all of us.

Mexico reminds me of China in a lot of ways- tribal, unconventional and lax with driving and jay walkers, yet a stickler for certain letters to the law. Guess we all do a bit of pick and choosing for what we believe, ourselves. And like China, and America, there are numerous people who are houseless. It gets overwhelming because you want to give each person you see some pesos. Again, it’s in the moment that we must make that decision and trust that just as it is no one’s responsibility to ensure our needs our met- it’s not entirely up to each one of us to meet everyone else’s needs- if it were supposed to be that way then it maybe it wouldn’t feel so impossible.

Leaving the metro in Condesa, I saw -walker laying sideways on some stairs, last night. A few stairs above was a man lying on the ground. I rushed over, picked up the walker, brought it to the man, asking if he needed help. He pushed the walker away and muttered something I couldn’t really understand. I tried to move the walker to a higher step- thinking that maybe this would be of better assistance to him. Laying on the ground, legs twisted, the older man pushed the walker away and let it fall down the stairs. I looked across the stairwell facing opposite of us and saw a middle-aged middle class male and female couple looking as dumb-founded as me. The male on-looker told me, in Spanish, that they had been trying to help him as well; but the man also refused any assistance.

There was nothing more to do, but let him languish in his squalor. He was railing against the thing that is his support, and I don’t blame him one bit. He has every right to be pissed and mad at the world and god. Haven’t we all refused the help of a tender hand? I tend to rebuke the help of those with forceful hands and words. Am I doing that now in my own way, by leaving everything and everyone I know behind, for now?

I have 5 days left booked at the Downtown Selina, and I am not quite sure where my next step is. Still in Mexico, but for how long will I live in impermanence? Until my money runs out, until I finally decide somewhere to settle down these restless bones and heart? Until my first book gets published? The answer will come. I will know in the moment when it’s right to make a choice. I can feel it’s getting closer.

I have a room to myself in a beautiful city from which I am writing this post with a cool breeze entering the window, sounds of cars and passers by echoing in the night as well. I am thankful for my blessings and the lessons- albeit a bit begrudgingly at times lol and I think that its okay for us to have those moments of doubt and reflection. We have been catalyzed into camps of yes and no, republican and Democrat, Christian and sinner. We are all stronger together as a nation, as one human race- and it will come, unfortunately I don’t see that coming, yet. It’s getting closer. That’s all that I can hope for and that is enough, for now.

There are miracles and lessons happening every day around us. I have not had the same experience as the man I met on subway stairs, but I understand the forlornness, the sometimes apparent cruelty and injustice of the world. Still, I have seen so much beauty to know that the uncertain times are the falsities. We cling to anxieties like tails of a paper tigers. Leading the fear along with us on our trail. One man throws down his wheelchair. Another man takes of his bed and goes walking forward.

I feel more certain with the words written out. The aloneness releasing me outwards and my heart opening again. The words of the ancients and of Eckart Tolle, Abraham Hicks, Tame Impala, LCD Soundsystem, Camus, and Rumi. An eclectic grouping of multi-media and dimensional beliefs and sayings. The confounding impossibility of being present in every moment for that is all we ever have. The next moment is getting closer, for which I am thankful. I am ready to be ready for it when it comes and take wing, like seedlings, like hope spreading out its feathers and flying, with the wind guiding and directing our paths.