July/August 2009

Remember to breathe this summer, because it is going to be a wild ride.

Every moment is so full of meaning it is vibrating leaving us all feeling too busy for anything extra. Ironically, I am most aware of the ‘quickening’ by how I will suddenly stop, mid-action, and disappear for a few moments, and then waken to where I am. Part of it is an exhaustion that comes from adjusting to the new pace. My personal theory is that we are being re-tuned, constantly, taking in more information from unexpected things, like the quality of light reflected off the water or in the vibrancy of a red nasturtium or in the presence of others. According to those who track the stars this is going to be the pace of the summer.

We are being opened, expanded and filled from all directions these days as Chiron, the ‘wounded healer’, is aligned with Jupiter and Neptune. We’ve talked about this before, in the sense that we need to let go of our attachments to past beliefs, past hurts, anything that is preventing us moving into creating a new world for ourselves. All of us are going through this right now, and the stars are nudging us along.

At a simple level we might notice we are absolutely bored with the violent, competitive, degrading and dysfunctional world TV offers. We’ve moved on, and turning it off.

At a more profound level we are exploring and facing deep wounds. People are sick, people are in pain, people are dying. Maybe we are just feeling deeply vulnerable or frustrated or alone. Right now we are being supported to move into the pain. The deeper we go,  the sooner we will be set free, to evolve into co-creating a new world. The Iranian people are doing it right now in front of the world.

Recently I was part of an incredible event, which I highly recommend for women and girls of all ages, where one can dance, drum, chant, didgeridoo, make rattles, do pipe ceremony or just connect and camp with like minded women and girls. (www.drumcamps.ca) The event was about finding our voices in order to express ourselves in the new world and exploring where we are going, what we have to do to get there, and how good the process can be. We opened vortexes, we laughed, learned, shared, played and we cried.

It was in this group of 140 women that many of us were able to go into the pain we share so profoundly, and release it thanks to the work of  two of the incredible African-American women facilitators, Queen and Afia Walking-Tree  who led us in a ‘Nu-Traditional Afrikan dance’ on three occasions.

We danced hard, and with intention. I called into the circle the names of people I knew were in pain, and I danced for them. We danced till we couldn’t dance any more, we called on the earth to sustain us, we let everything come up, we sweated water in gratitude  We danced as slaves in chains, we danced the slavery of all limitations to our divine spirits, and we danced the world free. We held each other as we collapsed and wept, we kept on dancing. We called in a future released from fear, full of promise, as the drummers moved into our bodies and we sent the vibration of our prayers into the heart of the earth. There is nothing quite like physical exhaustion and a room filled with women willing to be present, to open your heart and release what needs to come.

Equally moving was all of us coming together later for kirtans (sung prayers  using call and response best known in India) led by Toronto drummer and singer Shara Claire (sharaclaire.com). It was so gentle and beautiful, bringing our voices together in praise of love in all its forms. No question, I think the feeling that brought  captures the ecstatic communal bliss I would like to create in our future.

As Ubaka Hill said to me, now is the time to ‘glance back, but move forward’; we’re living in sacred times. Breathe deeply.