RE-FINDING DIRECTION

(“Direction” – from John Curtin Gallery – by Nicole Slatter – 2008 oil on linen)

Well we are definitely  well into winter around here.  I have to say the snow is still  a powerful healing presence in  my life. I battle with it to get places or to stay dry or warm. But visually  and in some ways sensually it is very opening for that part of me that resides within myself.  I am still grappling with my idea of snow and what it conjures up in my mind.  I still find myself  saying that I don’t like snow, and I really do not like driving on mountain passes in blizzards.  But part of me really does like it – its healing and mystical presence in my life makes me feel cozy and complete inside.  Kinda how you feel when sitting on a river bank, or a mountain top, in a meadow or some other peaceful place of beauty.  Serene…

I feel serene here in Silverton in our wintry wonderland.  I just  have a difficult time seeing this as home. One of  this blogs readers commented on the last post Introspection – Walking The Red Road and brought me back to myself with her insight. See why I write my thoughts down here for all to read? You never know when some sweet spirit will come along to present a new world to journey through and investigate. Thank you My Shiloh Ranch for being that beautiful being in my life.  Your comment made me think past my emotions and desires to re-relate to my true self, I then set out to find other insights that would boost the power within me to be my true self in the face of my recent experiences. Another healing process I guess.

I came along this blog -  Allow Happiness and was pleased at how much beauty there is out there.  Allow Happiness shared a post listing their favorite blogs on happiness and I found them to be fabulous. So wanted to share them here with all of you.  The one in the the list that really spoke to my current situation is the Happiness Blog. Great stuff to think about.  So I am off of my recent introspection of how I got here and am back on what I am finding to be wonderful about being here.  I am also looking at the possibility that my ultimate happiness resides in a very different place  than what I have perceived or desired in the past.  When we think of what makes us happy, we have so many things to weigh that happiness against and those things come from our past as ideals or memories or experiences you want or do not want in your life at present.  Longings that you have nurtured, whether they are truly correct for your ultimate happiness or not. I’m going to do a little experiment on myself this winter. I am going to look to things that are new to me and unfamiliar and seek what within these odd to me things solicits joy from within me.  The first thing that comes to mind is bringing another greyhound in to my life.

(My Greyhound, Future  – 2004-2008 – in her favorite spot – How I miss her!)

Another is bringing Pro back home and getting back into the saddle making project.

(The Hope 1840′s saddle that I plan to build for Pro someday)

For just those two things to happen I am looking at another move and where is that to be?  I’m being pulled South. Toward Bayfield or Pagosa Springs or even Taos, New Mexico.  Taos would put me closer to the Spirits I crave to be close to.  It’s also a long way away from Heather, like 7 hours hours away from her.  There is a town an hour and fifteen minutes North of here called Ridgeway that might just be the ticket also.   The oddity to me here is that I have never considered Colorado a place I would permanently call home. It feels foreign to me to do so and I find myself searching elsewhere for that familiar homey feel.  But maybe I am home.  Maybe having horses in snow is a mystical magical beauty that my inner joy will abound with.  Maybe going camping near the Spirits will be my Church.  I don’t know yet. But I’m going to recreate my optimism for the adventure and see where I end up.

These are some of the things that bring instant sense of joy to me.

1) my horses on pastures

(found at: Western Open Edition Art Prints by Marye Roeser)

2) being near the Spirits

3) being near my daughter

4) my friends

5) being a free agent

6) being intimate with a/my lover

7) caring for and communing with my animal and plant friends

8 ) wearing pretty skirts

9) reading Terry Brooks Shannara books

10) eating breakfast outside

( I think I am going to go get me a breakfast and eat it outside to enjoy our beautiful white magical town)

11) being in control of my happiness

12) experiencing the most subtle beauties in any one moment.

13) creating (anything)

A lot of White Medicine I see here…

Popularity: 4% [?]

It’s time for some introspection.  First of all I had a wonderful time in Arizona with my friends.  Each with their own unique beauty  and experience to share with me.  The trip to AZ caused some confusion for me though.  First off I miss Arizona, the desert and of course my friends there.  I was however reminded that I am ill affected by the number of people, housing, cars etc that have encroached upon the desert.

The 10 hour trip home was a very difficult experience and threw me into a space of self protection.  First off what use to take 20 minutes to get onto the Beeline (hwy 87), heading North to Payson took one and half hours because of the clusterfuck (excuse my language) of new freeways and housing developments that have arisen over the past  couple years.  I felt like I was being thwarted at every turn to just get onto the Beeline.  Once on it, there was more road construction, then people setting up road side bargain shopping or something, then snow in Heber.  Finally everything settles down and I feel a little like I can cruise along and I’m hit with rain and fog.

( Photo from “The WIT Continuum” post titled “The All Knowing Fog”)

It felt like Arizona had its massive fingers tightly wrapped around me with their iron grip and that I was battling every step of the way to cut myself loose. So when I finally hit Hwy 40, I booked it.  Yep I booked it so well I ended up with a speeding ticket.  Driving through the Navajo Reservation was simple as always – I always feel so good driving through there, but by now I am frazzled. This is when Heather calls me and wants to know how far out I am because they are having a blizzard in the San Juan Mountains.  I’m thinking someone or something really does not want me to return to Silverton, or leave Arizona. I was in tears for most of the trip over the mountain passes pushing snow ahead of me on Coal Bank Pass. Thankfully to our CDOT road crew stationed in Silverton, Molas Pass and Silverton were plowed and the last 3 miles was uneventful down the worst section of narrow cliff-side road and into town.  I arrived at 4pm went straight to Heather’s and dipped into her rum. Emotionally torn up and just plain beat, it’s taken several days to gather my thoughts and get settled in again.

The feel of being squeezed in by Arizona reminded me of the Apache Spirits that some believe live in the Superstition Mountains. I spent approximately 52 hours under the Sups and thought of those Spirits more than once.  While driving home I remembered my connection to those people and to the Thunder and Rock Beings whom I miss so much.  I remembered a trip my parents and I took some 20 years ago from Canyon Lake to Apache Lake on hwy 88. You end up going along  a sheer wall of the Sups as you make the hairpin curve of Hells Canyon.  It’s for the most part a single lane  with two way traffic along the cliffside.  My mother was an athiest, she loathed any  kind of spirituality and regarded any discussion of any such spiritual or religious topic grounds for a debate.  All of a sudden she calls out as we’re driving along the sheer cliff wall, “This is where they all are!”.    My dad looks at me kinda a funny while I ask her what she meant.  She said this is where the Apache jumped to their deaths and their spirits are here with us.  Well there is a story whether true or not about Apache’s falling to their deaths but which mountains that happened in is debatable.  I think there is a story that refers to the Chiricahua Mountains, but I believe that there may have been more than one incident.  I have no proof,  just something I have gathered having spoken with different local Apache.  It may all be in a my head, but I too believe that the Spirits exist there.  My trip home made me think of them and wonder if they wanted me to stay. I know a wee bit voodoo-ish for some to grasp,  but  my Native American Path grasps it just fine.

So on to other introspection’s.  I also realized or rather acknowledged, that I am still not home. Home is in the heart, and in that sense I’m very well adjusted to my home. But as for location… I’m still in limbo.  When Pro comes home I’ll  be looking at moving again Will it be this coming summer or the next I have no idea. I was telling a friend that I have been considering Bayfield, CO. It is close to Heather (2 hours away), less snow, possible work, place for horses and reasonable cost of living.  She suggested that I consider living in 2 places like so many people in Silverton do.  She suggested that I move back to Arizona for 4 or 5 months out of the year.  It would mean Id have to  keep two places, both cheap, and haul my horse back and forth or just see him at certain times of the year. ACK!!!! CONFUSION!  I’m thinking I’m going to let go and let whatever comes in the future, come in the future.  I can’t seem to plan for anything, and that frustrates me.  I really dislike the feeling of frustration or anxiety or any other negative feeling, so cast them away as soon as I realize they are haunting me. I know this, I want to be close to the Spirits again!  I also understand that you cant call out Spirits Guides to stand with you or give you hints  about life.

But I miss Pasquehela a Native Spirit who use to sit at my side when I needed strength in making decisions.  Where oh where have you gone?  Who or what is out there that I am missing?

My friend in Apache Junction lives his life much by the teachings of Buddha and I have been kinda reading up a bit on the “religion”  ummm… “way of life” in order to understand him more deeply.

What I found was a similarity to  Quantum Theory. Now that is something that I can grasp onto and run with.  Here is an article that simplifies  Quantum Buddhism and makes much sense to me.   Since coming home I have been struggling with some things and feel like one giant contradiction.  Then reading this article I realize that I am not contradicting myself at all, but am experiencing varied self awareness’s.  Read the article to understand what I mean.  But here is an excerpt to  spark your curiosity.

This cycle of events can be called a unit of eye consciousness or a QUANTUM of eye consciousness. (QUANTUM = a packet). The cycle of events is the same with all six types of sensory modalities. This is the fundamental unit of LIFE. After one sensory quantum wanes, another sensory quantum comes up like the waves in the seashore. Life is a pulsatile interrupted flow of these cycles (sensory quantums). The time duration of one quantum may be about 1/20th of a second (=50 milliseconds). Then per every one second there is an interrupted flow of about 20 quantums of life, with each and every quantum there arises a NEW SELF, with new perception, new volition and a new body lasting only for about 1/20th of a second and dies off.

SELFLESSNESS

In the analysis of a quantum of life, it is very clear that there is no permanent, unchangeable self inside the body who can perceive, think and act. Instead there are different SELVES coming up with each consciousness and passes away with the same consciousness which lives only for about 1/20th of a second (=50 milliseconds).

My point being is that I don’t always agree with myself and I find myself  debating within on various thoughts and how I handle myself during times of confusion. Usually like today I handle myself by writing them down – voicing them. I’m really looking for a discussion on the matters with those who may have sparked the flood of thoughts to help me clean them up.  As usual though like all of us I have to wade through them alone and look for ways to see through the mess to find the self I prefer to be.  What I love about the Quantum Buddhist theory and some of the teachings from “The Secret” is that I am in control and can choose which self I want to be. Meditation is one way of getting there, yet I spend so much time alone I am almost always in a state of meditation so again its how to gain control of those varying SELF’s  culling them toward who and what I want to be… simplify my self.  There it is again… simplicity – my best friend.

Where peace, growth and ultimate joy flourish.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Blahhh…   I’ve been sick for the past couple of days.  Seem to be getting over it though fairly quickly.  Which is good because I need to be working as much as possible the next week prior to my trip back to AZ.  Even in illness I find beauty.  Things like Pam sending over EmergenC and Heather making me soup – and how yummy it was too! I spent the whole day yesterday listening to tantra music and tribal belly dancing music. I love the primal feel of both and the images they conjure… the journeys they wisp you away on. So I spent an entire day journeying  to places only my mind can take me. It was nice to be so in tune with ME.

Only 8 more days and I’ll be visiting my bestest friend, Krissy in AZ.

(Here is Krissy with her best buddy Celt’s Kindlewood – or more lovingly known as Wooders)

She just had her second son and I am so looking forward to seeing her and both her boys.  Then I venture off to meet up with Ron, my old buddy from yesteryear, and someone with whom I am starting a new adventure with.  I’ll be visiting Rebecca also and maybe even Sheila while I’m there.

(There goes Rebecca riding Sophie, her paint mare, on one our trail rides)

I could use a good old fashioned Inipi (sweat), so maybe that’s in store for me too, along with a nice spa day.  Man cant ask for anymore than that. I am so excited.  I’m one lucky girl!

No…   I worked hard to get to this place… never will I forget those who passed, the battles I waged…  the losses… the gains…  the people who stood beside me…  the ones left behind, and those present in my life today…  all that has culminated in who I  have become.

One lucky girl.

Isn’t life wonderful!!

Popularity: 2% [?]