Winds of Change

A GREAT Book!

There is a peculiar courage required to dare to imagine a different world when our current reality is wracked with crises. It’s a daunting task to try to light up the dark when we’re huddled down trying to avoid monsters … Rivera Sun (from the Author’s Note, Winds of Change, 2020)

I sense many threads standing by perhaps wanting to be woven into the fabric of this week’s post. And I sense blustery winds of change blowing from many directions. Do I have the courage to trim my sails to catch the winds creating a future grounded in love and unity?

Over this past week I’ve experienced insights, mechanical breakdowns, curiosity about words and how we use them, pesky rodents, concepts and ideas that feel right yet are beyond my mental understanding, extreme winds, and a death in my extended family.

Over that same week the moon reached its phase of fullness. Venus and Jupiter were in an auspicious conjunction, adding beauty to the early evening winter sky as they call forth love, abundance, happiness. Saturn moved into the zodiac sign of Pisces. I’m no astrologer, but ‘change, big change’ is the theme that flows from those whose work I follow. In the words of one, we are shifting from the love of power to the power of love. That’s wind that I want to catch!

And somewhere between my life experience and these galactic events, the world continued to turn with all manner of mayhem and violence along with abundant acts of courage, creativity, and care around the globe.

Consistent in my awareness this week has been the phrase ‘the winds of change’. I feel that change deep within and I observe it in almost everything that is out there in the world beyond my door. I aim to not label these changes as ‘good or bad’, ‘right or wrong’ as I navigate, intending to choose winds that will point me to live in greater alignment with my values and my planet home.

As I dip into this soup pot of change what I find in the ladle is the importance of words and how we use (or should I say misuse?) them. Not a new topic or thread for these weekly musings, but important for our awareness and consideration now.

Wordsmithing has become an art, crafting messages to get attention, get results, incite action out there. The deeper root meaning of words all too often has been lost, changed over time to fit the narrative of those in power or of marketing and (so-called) ‘public relations’.

Two ancient words came into my awareness this week that fit this pattern. The word ‘abracadabra’ is mostly used as a term to describe magic, something that isn’t real. Yet it’s root meaning from myths and legends of the ancients is ‘I manifest what I speak.’ That’s the true power of sound, our power!

A word often used to evoke fear, ‘apocalypse’ means revelation, that which is uncovered and is rooted in a Greek word meaning to pull the lid off of something. Perhaps the winds of change are about to blow the cover of untruths … but Muse says that’s a topic for another day.

Perhaps it’s obvious, but it occurs to me that the words we use and how we use them are grounded in our perspective, our beliefs, and our intentions. Do we believe in unity or in separation? Love or fear? Are we consciously choosing our words to align with our beliefs?

What we believe matters. What we speak from those beliefs matters. Abracadabra! What I speak is what I manifest! What we speak is what we manifest! Perhaps the true apocalypse is that this and other truths understood and lived by ancient peoples are being revealed.

Do we have the ‘peculiar courage’ required to embrace and live from this perspective? To imagine and dare to speak a different world? To catch the winds of change toward harmony with Nature, Gaia, and one another? Do I?

Grainy Moon in Fullness

REST: Pathway to Self-Trust

Fresh Snow on the Peaks

Wisdom is knowing when to have rest, when to have activity, and how much of each to have. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

It's very important that we re-learn the art of resting and relaxing. Not only does it help prevent the onset of many illnesses that develop through chronic tension and worrying; it allows us to clear our minds, focus, and find creative solutions to problems. Thich Nhat Hanh

I woke one morning this week after a good sleep with an acronym for rest:

               Rest

               Elevates

               Self-

               Trust

The message was clear, as if a printed card had been taped to my bathroom mirror. It resonated deeply as rest is a key ingredient in how I design my life during the cold, inward winter months. I was aware that my rest has looked different this winter: fewer naps during the day and longer periods of sleep at night. ‘Am I getting the rest that I need?’, I wondered.

The question seems on target, aligned with my strong sense that self-trust is needed now more than ever to navigate our changing world, a world which some have declared is ‘post truth’. In a world where ‘alternative facts’ vie with ‘just the facts, ma’am’ who among us doesn’t wonder what’s the truth? What’s accurate? When I’m rested, my craving for accuracy and knowing gives way to resonance, an inner sense that I am ongoingly learning to trust.

The message was also timely, arriving while I was providing background support for a group of college students who had come to Crestone for a short retreat. A return trip for most, they had planned quite an agenda for their short time here. I learned from their faculty advisor that at some point, as if tapping into the wisdom that Sri Sri Ravi Shankar speaks of, they realized what they needed most was rest. Recognizing that the pressures of their intense courses of study, health challenges experienced by some, along with the ups, downs, and stresses of life on the planet had drained them, they spoke their truth and they honored it as their time here unfolded.

When you rest, you catch your breath and it holds you up, like water wings… Anne Lamott                     

We need not just the rest that comes with sleep, though that’s important, but the restoration called forth by relaxing, creating and playing with others, communing with Nature. We need the rest of daydreaming, of settling in with a good book and letting ourselves doze. We need breaks from technology and the addictive power of our devices. We need to put on our water wings and float.

 We need this kind of deep rest, not to make sense of the world as it is (I gave that up long ago) but to navigate that world as a we create a more beautiful one. We need rest to give us the strength to make choices that support our health and well-being individually, collectively, and for all of life. We need the clarity and focus that comes with rest to discover what resonates as true for me and to honor that what resonates for me may not be resonate with you, but that both can (and must) coexist in a world where our differences held in love are the strengths from which the ultimate truth of unity arises from the ashes of conflict.

 Let’s rest in that!                   

Another Storm Building …

Spiraling Kindness

Cool Hand Luke Skywalker (2008-Aug 1, 2019) in the Labyrinth

Practice random acts of kindness and senseless beauty. Anne Herbert

Kindness is top of mind and heart this blustery, snowy morning in the sacred Sangre de Cristo mountains. I’ve been spiraling through numerous thoughts and stories about kindness since last evening. Muse seeming to go happily along wherever the journey leads, including sidetracking to talk briefly with a visiting friend. ‘Hey, we could even simply share random quotes about kindness …’, Muse suggests.

Oh Muse, I like that. The day moving from wind and clouds to sun back to more clouds to blowing snow seems random in a way. This day I notice my own thoughts and energy following that pattern.

That individually and collectively our world would benefit from more expressions of kindness is so obvious that I wonder why the words land on the page. ‘Reminders,’ offers Muse. ‘Everyone needs a reminder from time to time,’ adding ‘and, intention. What if kindness was intentional not simply random?’

Hmm…, seeds of kindness spread randomly with intention. How might that spiral through our lives, our world, our planet home? The idea aligns with, perhaps flows from, seeds planted earlier this week, acknowledging a new moon cycle on Monday. Walking the labyrinth with the intention of planting seeds of peace, love, joy, I found the varieties of seeds growing as I walked and gently chanted. Each time I chanted ‘peace, love, joy’ a new seed presented itself to be added to the mix: courage, gratitude, curiosity, laughter, and kindness among them.

I felt myself planting these seeds anew in the garden of my heart, in the spirit of these woods, and in the consciousness of the fields of activity where I put attention. Today intentional kindness seems to be rising to the top of where I’m guided to focus my choices, my deeds.

That’s not surprising as this week I’ve experienced two seemingly random stories of kindness that loom large in my awareness. It seems not so random that each touched my heart and has stayed with me. One was a friend’s beautiful story about rescuing a turtle that was on a heavily travelled road and a later encounter with the person whose pet that turtle is. The depth of my friend’s kindness didn’t surprise me, rather it served as a beautiful example of the magic that flows when we follow guidance as we receive it.

There is a kindness that dwells deep down in things; it presides everywhere, often in the places we least expect. The world can be harsh and negative, but if we remain generous and patient, kindness inevitably reveals itself. John O’Donohue

Kindness in the midst of heavy traffic. No question that would serve humanity well.

My second powerful encounter with kindness brought home how we simply don’t know how our kindness will land, the impact it will have. In this case it was my own, a choice in 2010 to open my home to a young canine, Cool Hand Luke Skywalker. If you’ve been reading for a while, Luke was sometimes front and center of a weekly Zone or Pivot post. For me he was that kind of teacher. He crossed the rainbow bridge in 2019, but often seems present as I walk through life. While I knew that he was beloved by all who met him, this week, another friend’s story of her encounters with Luke Skywalker first while he was still a vibrant physical presence in my home and later when she encountered him in service to others in the etheric realm, poignantly reminded me that all our choices seed the future. Not just our individual future, but our futures collectively.

With every choice me make, with every thought we think, with every word we speak WE are seeding the future. This is our power.

The steps we take now make new earth grow beneath our feet. The steps we take now decide what kind of earth that will be. In every moment we have the choice to find the fight or to make delight. We have power. Anne Herbert & Margaret Paloma Pavel (Random Acts of Kindness & Senseless Beauty)

As I’ve reflected on kindness since hearing these stories, it seems clear to me that intention supports us in touching the kindness that dwells deep within, a natural part of our design and our being. While most, if not all of us, would never intend to be unkind, do we intend to express kindness in life? Do I?

Be kind. Be connected. Be unafraid. Rivera Sun

Let’s spiral kindness randomly, intentionally, individually, collectively in all that we do. I’m intending a world of kindness. What about you?

P.S. Did you know that February 17 is Random Acts of Kindness Day every year? A little late this year, but already on my calendar for 2024!

Creating Our New World from Inside to Out

Fuzzy, Snowy Morning Reflections

The mythic story of the earth and the gods whispers within us. John O’Donohue

May we increase the volume so that we can hear. Then, may we listen.

I found myself challenged to settle in, put pen to paper, and to invite Muse to join me this snowy, blustery morning. (Yes, The Pivot starts life on paper in my journal before making its way to the digital realm, cyberspace, and to you dear reader.)

Simply writing that sentence takes me on a quick journey through the vast technological developments in my lifetime and reminds me of the current pace at which technology is advancing. Muse smiles reminding me of recent exploration and reflections about just that.

With much of our cultural context continuing to focus on conquest, colonization, competition, comparison, and control unaware of new scientific discoveries that debunk those approaches, I wonder how we will apply new technologies such as artificial intelligence to all areas of life. I wonder how we might be more informed and mature with these advances than we were with the discovery of atomic energy? Will we make choices from the wisdom or our souls? Or will we …?

As I reflect on such questions, Muse reminds me of the wisdom in a recently read essay from a current inspiration, John O’Donohue: There is a labyrinth within the soul. What we think and desire often comes into conflict with what we do. Below the surface of our conscious awareness a vast unknown rootage determines our actions. … Outside us, society functions in an external way, its collective eye does not know interiority, it sees only through the lens of image, impression and function.

Individually and collectively we have separated our inner world from the choices that the set our direction. We fail to call forth the wisdom in our souls, the wisdom of Nature, of Gaia, and of the cosmos of which we are a part. And yet, as O’Donohue further nudges: The mythic story of the earth and the gods whispers within us.

May we increase the volume so that we can hear. Then, may we listen.

That story, that wisdom, that knowing is not new rather it is ancient, known to our ancestors, and imbedded within our DNA, and accessible to us. We access it in any number of ways: meditation, time in Nature, inspirational reading, connection with others, practicing heart coherence and deep gratitude. The list goes on.

My favored paths to connecting with my inner wisdom include time in the woods, walking with Zadie Byrd, heart coherence, and gratitude. Each offers a welcome mat and friendly environment when I invite wisdom in.

To help expand possibilities and to bring insights into daily life, I seek out those who are telling new stories about life. Those who are innovating new systems and structures to build a world grounded in the truth of who we are and our interconnectedness with one another and with all life. Those who challenge the mainstream and inspire me to let go of my old stories and the choices I’ve made based on them by offering a delectable menu of new ideas and discoveries. Gregg Braden, Nassim Haramein, and Woody Tasch/Slow Money are among my current areas of interest and exploration. Along with the plethora of individuals and small groups worldwide creating the new, these luminous beings help me maintain my curiosity, open new doors for exploration, and point to a world being created from the inside out.

Snowy in the Woods Out Back

In Search of My Political Home

Morning Shadows in the Labyrinth

With the sense of hearing, we listen to creation. … It is lovely to have the gift of hearing. John O’Donohue (Anam Cara: Spiritual Wisdom from the Celtic World)

Mourn what no longer is and call forth that which wants to be birthed from the heart.

This morning finds me a bit wobbly, not unlike when I overindulge in food and adult beverage. Yet last evening I indulged in neither. Rather, feeling a sense of civic duty along with curiosity, I plugged into the mainstream/legacy political scene to listen to President Biden’s State of the Union speech, the Republican response, and just a tad of post speech commentary.

In hindsight I wonder how my feeling might be different if I’d chosen to just listen and not watch. But alas I watched, enjoying the splashes of color worn by many of the women members of Congress amongst the drab suits of the men and trying not to get caught up in the political theater of who clapped and stood for what and when.

I listened, hopefully with care, to both speeches. While I lean more toward one ‘side’ than the other, I found both empty of vision, of new ways forward in our rapidly changing world. A world barely recognizable from the world I grew up in and the world I expected. Today I’m struck more by what I didn’t hear than by what I did hear. I’m struck too by the hollowness I feel as this day dawns.

Each side touts and promises freedom, each claiming theirs to more and better yet both promote policies that limit our sovereignty and the choices we make in walking through the world. Each claims their freedom is better than the other’s.

I want more from our leaders. I expect more. I expect better, honest, truth, integrity from the inside out. WE deserve it! I expect and long for the new stories that are emerging within so many individuals, groups, communities to be sought out and shared so that all may know, participate, thrive. WE deserve it!

I long to hear leaders speak about the truth of who and how powerful we humans are and for them to envision creating frameworks, scaffolds, support for tapping into this potential  to heal, to create, to live truly free, at peace and in peace. I long to hear political leaders address the necessity of clean, toxin-free, nutritious food in creating and maintaining health and offer a vision for creating, sustaining, and maintaining life enhancing food for all. I long to hear leaders speak to what science is revealing about our true nature and the nature of Nature and to recognize that we are not victims of our genes, but rather that we hold the potential to master them from the inside out rather than controlling from the outside in.

Yet while I long to be inspired by our leaders, I find inspiration in the grassroots. In the farmers practicing bio-dynamic farming and soil regeneration. In movements such as slow money, providing zero interest loans for such efforts. In local health initiative and healers who practice natural medicine first. In innovators and entrepreneurs who are shucking the cloaks of the old to create the new.

Having been deeply engaged in politics for many years in my younger days, I’ve long had an interest. Today, as the political game’s dark side comes more to light and highlights the darker side of our humanness, the upside is that we are becoming more aware and with that awareness comes greater potential for change. We need to acknowledge the world that no longer serves to create a world that does. Gregg Braden suggested in a recent talk that we need to learn to mourn and let go of what no longer works so that the new can rise. For surely, a new world IS rising.

So I’m without a political home, something that I’ve had, participated in, and even cherished throughout much of my adult life, starting as a Young Democrat years before I was old enough to cast a vote. Somewhere in my memorabilia is a hat autographed by Hubert Humphrey during his 1968 presidential campaign. I was present at the 1992 Republican National Convention when President George H.W. Bush gave his acceptance speech (a Clinton-Gore button in my pocket).

Just last year, I supported a friend’s campaign for County Commissioner, not because of her party affiliation, but because of her commitment to a positive vision, to justice, to fairness, and to local foods. Earlier this week I chuckled upon receiving an invitation (with words sounding more like a plea) to a meeting to ‘reorganize’ the county party. Not me. I’m no longer a party animal.

Since I no longer desire to be identified or to participate as ‘this’ or ‘that’, it seems I’m mourning what no longer works and that my search for a political home isn’t the search that’s needed. Muse reminds me that the same is true for me in other of life’s domains. Health care, financial, etc. The old stories, the old molds, the old ways no longer fit. My search is for those creating the new.

Mourn what no longer is and call forth that which wants to be birthed from the heart. That is where home truly is.

Full Moon on the Rise

Sea of Expectations

A Colorado Blue Sky Day

Expectation is resentment waiting to happen. In contrast, friendship liberates. John O’Donohue

The attachment to our expectations is the obstacle … Myra Jackson

We swim in a sea of expectations. Befriending our expectations means releasing our attachment to life unfolding in the ways we expect. It is indeed befriending all of life.

Exploring the idea of expectations and indeed examining some of my own has been ‘up’ for me in recent weeks. I’ve long had curiosity about how expectation weaves into life and has been an occasional thread woven into these weekly musings. One explored the distinction between expectations and promises (read it here).

Settling in with Muse this morning I recalled O’Donohue’s words that caught my attention some time back. While he was writing about relationships in particular and our expectations of others to be/do certain ways/things, Muse guides me to consider that perhaps expectations might become our friends.

In response to my quizzical look, Muse winks and prompts, awareness as a first step. We swim in a sea of expectations. Our lack of awareness of what we expect in the details of life is where the potential for resentment hides. Curious, I took a few minutes of self-inquiry: what do I expect in life/of life? In less than 10 minutes I’d listed 26 expectations, many of which are multifaceted (e.g. I expect my health care provider, my attorney, etc. to have my best interests) and all of which underlie daily life, actions, choices.

Until I took those few minutes to bring them to awareness it seems that my expectations were lurking in the darkness, resentment waiting to happen, ready to kindle a spark of anger should an expectation not be met.

Let’s say for example the internet connection is down, my computer crashes, the car won’t start. Or it’s raining on a day you’d planned a picnic … you get my drift here of all the things we expect to go a certain way without being aware that we expect it UNTIL something doesn’t.

What is your habitual response? A fiery reaction of anger? Springing into action to ‘fix’ the ‘problem’? Curiosity that the Universe seems to be redirecting you? Do you perhaps journey through all the above?

While I strive for the later (curiosity), I’m inclined to leap into action. Muse reminds me that sometimes the fiery Aries tiger reacts, suggesting that the trigger is that I’m attached to things being a certain way, to MY expectations being met. And to a tendency to ascribe some fault to myself when they aren’t. What did I do wrong? What error in my thinking ‘caused’ this?

Just as developing and maintaining friendships requires the nurturing care of awareness and to not being attached to our friend being/doing certain ways/things, perhaps expectations can be nurtured as friends with the same awareness and releasing of attachment to them. Muse says it more clearly: Befriending our expectations means releasing our attachment to life unfolding in the ways we expect. It is indeed befriending all of life.

As we put a cap on this week’s musing a few thoughts and queries dance into awareness:

• Gratitude is a key to releasing my attachment to how and what I expect life to be.

• What is the relationship between expectation and intention? Is there a pivot from expectation to intention?

• Innovation, calling forth and being open to the new, requires releasing any attachment to the details of how life unfolds.

It seems a door has opened … fodder for musings another day.

Last Light of Sunset

Humility: Voice of the Soul

Tracking

Through prayer we learn to see with the eyes of the soul. … It refines your eyes for the unknown narrative which is quietly working itself through your words, actions and thoughts. In this way prayer issues from, and increases, humility. The normal understanding of humility made it out to be a passive self-depreciation in which any sense of self-worth or value was diminished. Humility has a more profound meaning. Humility is a derivative of the Latin word ‘humus’ meaning ‘of the earth’. In this sense, humility is the art of being open and receptive to the inner wisdom of your clay. John O’Donohue (essay in Eternal Echoes: Exploring Our Hunger to Belong)

In the early morning quiet with warming fire in the woodstove on this cold morning, I rediscovered this O’Donohue wisdom that I’d  read sometime back. It shined light into the darkness that I’d been holding around humility. I understood that my story about humility held the limits of the “normal understanding” that he speaks of. A new story could now emerge in the light.

In the past couple weeks, I’ve made passing reference to humility here in The Pivot. The first was mentioning that I bristled when a bio-field scan suggested it as a priority. ‘What’s wrong with my humility?’ I bristled, ‘I have plenty…’. Then, as I wrestled with the teaching style of the leader in a class I’d just started, I recognized that a dose of humility might be an antidote worth exploration.

If not front and center in these early days of the new year, humility has certainly been highlighted in the soup of my reflections and musings with ever-gentle Muse nudging me along. Today, thanks to O’Donohue, I’ve come to better understand why the suggestion that humility needed to be addressed triggered my defensive reaction. Likewise, his wisdom further opened my heart and the door to create a new story.

Reading the scan results with fresh eyes and heart, I wondered if the language had changed since my first reading. There was no ‘problem’ with me that needed to be ‘fixed’. Rather I found an invitation to walk through a door opening as another closed. Endings and beginnings. Phases and stages. Dissolving and evolving. Life.

Muse and I chuckled as I read the scan’s introduction: As we start to recognize the greater forces at play in bringing us through a Choice Point, life often invites us to gain humility. As we end a cycle in our lives and begin another there is potential for some of our old world to dissolve (or collapse in some people’s experience). This is because nature follows cycles. As we are part of nature we can expect some aspects of our lives to follow the same kind of cyclic pattern. (NES Health - Personal Scan)

Muse nods with a smile as I recognize that these ideas are familiar. I am Nature. Nature is me. My soul speaking its wisdom and calling forth the new. Clay being placed before me for co-creating, discovering my part in bringing forth the new world that is gently cracking the shell to burst into new life.

I am not alone. Much of our world, our old stories, our systems, our thinking is dissolving and collapsing before us. What a time to be alive and co-create the new future rising!

This is my soul gently speaking her understanding of our connection to Gaia and to one another, indeed to all life. Soul has a better understanding of our true nature than either body or mind. The soul knows! And now I understand the necessity of humility to hear her voice.

Humility opens the way to let go of resistance, to surrender to the flow of life, to discover the freedom in non-attachment, and to relinquishing the quest to control that which is not mine to control.

The door of the old is not completely shut. Yet, as the door and light of the new are shining, an unknown, yet somehow familiar, narrative is taking shape within to guide the thoughts, words, and deeds of the days ahead. May that light shine gently and brightly for one and all. And may we each hear the voice of our souls.

Crestone Peak

Names Create Spaciousness (Or Not)

Blessed Snow in the Woods Out Back

We need to exercise great care and respect when we come to name something. We always need to find a name that is worthy and spacious. John O’Donohue (The Danger of the Name – essay in Eternal Echoes: Exploring Our Hunger to Belong)

Oh, how O’Donohue speaks to my soul and kindles both memory and reflection this morning, connecting dots and opening a door to exploration as I sat with the weekly question: what do Muse and The Pivot want to point to this day?

As I re-read the essay that I’d landed in I was reminded of how my canine companion of nine, all to short years, Cool Hand Luke Skywalker, came to the name given him by his ‘foster mom’. Her story was perhaps my first conscious encounter with the importance of naming. She explained that she wanted to give him a name that “he can live into”. Given what little she knew of this pup’s life before the shelter, she was inspired by Paul Newman’s line in the movie Cool Hand Luke, “Sometimes no hand is the best hand of all.” In renaming him Cool Hand Luke, she opened doors of possibility for Lester, the name given him at the shelter.

But what about the ‘Skywalker’ part of his name?

I loved her story and Luke’s name as much as I loved the amazing dog. The importance of a name stayed with me. While observing Luke, I noticed some of his ways seemed Jedi-like, so naturally one day Cool Hand Luke became Cool Hand Luke Skywalker. I like to think that he lived into that name fully until the moment he took his last breath on this plane and that he continues to do so in the unseen world beyond the Rainbow Bridge.

I was also reminded that when ‘Sadie’ adopted me as her forever human three years ago, I wanted to give her a name to live into, one with greater possibility and potential that what I associated with the old comic, Sarge, Sad Sack, and Sadie, or Sadie Hawkins Day dances. I chose the name Zadie Byrd based on the feisty, loving, revolutionary character in Rivera Sun’s series, The Dandelion Insurrection. Ms. Byrd has her own way of living into that. Only later did I research the name Sadie and learn its Hebrew origin and meaning, princess. Perhaps she’ll become Princess Zadie Byrd someday. Hmm…Princess Leia she suggests.

Muse has patiently waited as I reminisced, eager to link my stories with recent experiences: my guidance to reflect on humility (mine and how I might tweak my engagement with it) and experiencing not having words (or that the old, usual words no longer fit) to describe something (several ‘somethings’ to be honest) in numerous conversations.

I’m coming to understanding that we/I are often so quick, and thoughtless Muse adds, to name things that we/I miss the richness of the experience. We limit ourselves to the known, the stories we hold about whatever name we’ve chosen. I’m often quick to name a feeling, an emotion so that I can move on, limiting my opportunity for reflection, deeper understanding, and, perhaps, even healing. What if the ‘sadness’ I named a few days ago was something else and had more to say had I given it space, time, and my lens of curiosity?

Perhaps that sadness held gifts like the ‘guilt’ that I carried deep inside (mostly unconsciously of course) for decades around an action against a family member when I was a child. Recalling the incident recently I discovered that the guilt named and put aside perhaps with some slight act of forgiveness long ago continued its life in me. It had gifts and insights to offer. When I dared dig deeper I discovered there had been no need to name and feel guilt at all. My action had been a blessing.

I sense we’re in a time where we need to give ourselves the skills, the time, the grace, and the spaciousness to name our experiences and our observations with greater care. How might our stories about disease, poverty, war, violence, etc. shift if in the darkness of their names and our stories we shined light? Light of possibility. Light of love. Light of care. What if we shunned the prisons that we’ve named ‘realities’ and bless them with new names?

I feel our world changing, sometimes gently, sometimes not so gently. A new age is rising. How we name the changes upon us will determine just how those changes look in our world. And how we experience them. Let’s be care-filled as we do!

Nature’s Sculpting

New Year, New Stories

Full Moon Spiral

I am a person who constantly is trying to liberate myself from my socialization and the weight of the culture that I was born into . . . so that I can choose in every moment how I want to respond based on my values and care for the whole. Miki Kashtan (8 January 2023 – This Nonviolent Life: Daily Inspiration for Your Nonviolent Journey – Pace e Bene Nonviolence Service)

More and more I’m noticing places where my values, my dreams, my care are at odds with so much what’s brought forward in mainstream culture, so it was no surprise that this daily quote caught my attention. Its declaration of aiming to be at choice about how to respond in every moment based on values touched a resonant chord in me. That very idea itself is liberating.

As I began to explore, I wondered, ‘Do we need to struggle? For me, the language of ‘constantly trying to liberate’ suggests struggle.  Muse sighs and tickles another question or two: On what foundation is our culture built? What’s beneath the surface of our cultural habits and our socialization into that culture?

Stories. And stories about stories. Our stories. Old stories. Accurate stories and those that are not. Stories. Conscious stories. And those of which we are not aware.

I’m no stranger to how stories form our world, the culture, and ingrained habits of living and walking in that culture every day. Or to how our own stories about those stories (yes Muse, MY stories!) form the life we experience and how we experience it. Indeed, The Pivot is replete with stories as was The Zone, its predecessor. And with calls for new stories to create our world anew.

I believe that every thought we think and action we take is based on layers and layers of stories and beliefs, many of which we are aware of and far too many of which have been lost to our awareness. Yet conscious or not they inform our choices, build our world. And they inform our snap reactions, as I was reminded by an experience – and my reaction – this week. (‘Now we’re getting to it!’ encourages Muse.)

Despite a good amount of work and attention to shifting over the years, I discovered that a long-held story that I’m not enough still lingers in layers of my being, popping in at inconvenient times without invitation or conscious choice.

I experienced such a ‘visit’ several days ago when I received results from a recent body scan, a tool intended to provide insight, direction, and support. But rather than seeing my results as they were intended, I reacted as if they were a personal affront, criticism, clear evidence to support the old story that I’m not enough.

I spiraled (‘downward’ notes Muse) for a bit, holding the results as an indicator of something ‘wrong’ in me that needed to be ‘fixed’. It was familiar, if uncomfortable, territory until a different story rose in me. That story invited a different view, a view that the results are an invitation, not to fix, but to grow, to learn, to deepen understanding and awareness. I embraced the invitation into new territory or to familiar territory in a new way, opening curiosity about what I might discover. A path of exploration became clear.

New stories. We need them individually and collectively in our chaotic world that is crying for a remodel, a reboot. No current writer/thinker that I’m aware of groks and writes about the importance of stories more cogently than Charles Eisenstein. And, given my experience this week, it’s no surprise that he published an essay a couple days ago outlining his ideas contrasting the old stories of separation with new, emerging stories of interbeing: What is the Next Story? (I encourage you to read or listen here).

With each choice, thought, and action we are following the old or making way for the new, supporting its emergence. I know which path I choose. May my choices be conscious, clear, and consistent with calling forth the new.

New Snow on the Peaks!

Making Home in New Territory

Snowy Mountain Morning

It is like a voyage of discovery into unknown lands, seeking not for new territory but for new knowledge. It should appeal to those with a good sense of adventure.  Fredrick Sanger (English Scientist)

Words are slow to organize themselves this first ‘blog day’ of 2023. Yesterday I said to a friend that I feel myself in some new ground that invites exploration, some inner terrain presenting itself, not yet clearly, rather shrouded like the mountain peaks here in the sacred Sangres. A few days earlier another long-time friend voiced something similar and laughing said ‘where’s the instruction manual for this?’

Her humor evoked a quick, simultaneous response, a duet from the two of us ‘there is no manual; YOU/we are writing it.’ I’m certain Muse chuckled and recognized the fodder for this and future Pivots.

I’m blessed that from the cozy comfort of home, I can voyage into unknown lands, uncharted inner territory dependent not on an instruction manual but on trusting my own internal GPS as signposts present themselves for discovery. While I feel quite at home here in this place I love, I wonder how I will embrace this new territory. What will I need to unpack, to resolve, to discover in order to make this new territory ‘home’?

So far each of the 7 Days of Rest and Return to Essence have offered up much to reflect upon, starting with day 1 and its theme, Presence. What is the Essence of Presence? And the Presence of Essence?

As I sink into exploring Essence, I discover it as a felt sense beyond any words – lofty or otherwise – to describe. In this new territory, it seems that logic is invited to sit quietly on the bench rather than actively playing on the field. Perhaps that is what makes way for Essence to emerge and inspires me to explore.

Each day’s offering of reflective questions (offered by 7 Days creator Shelly Ostroff) are nourishing not only exploration of this new territory, but its future development.

Day 2 Resonance -- What would it look like in your life to make choices that resonate with the core of your being and the wellbeing of the all? What are the stories, the noise, habits and the distractions that need to be to shed for this to happen? What practices and behaviors want to be amplified? What wants to be transformed, and what potential pathways reveal themselves as you slow down, simplify and attune to the language of essence?

These questions resonate deep within, not as new, but expanding territory where the surface has been scratched. An invitation to deepen.

Day 3 Radiance -- Invite in the consciousness of radiance to be present with you. What are the images and sensations that arise? Imagine yourself embodying the essence of radiance in the moment - how does radiance feel, how does radiance move?

I find myself tiptoeing into these questions, looking out to find radiance more than looking within. Muse takes note, and nudges that perhaps some excavation may be required to develop acceptance of my radiance in this territory.

Day 4 Gratitude is a personal favorite and territory that seems very familiar having developed practices of gratitude for many years. I’m grateful for recognizing that I’m in new territory and curious to discover how gratitude will guide the way. Among several beautiful reflection questions, Ostroff offers this: How do you experience the relationship of generosity and gratitude and how does this relationship manifest in your life? How does expressing and receiving gratitude cultivate loving sacred relationship?

Collectively and individually, we are in new territory, indeed many new territories in a plethora of domains. I’m discovering signposts resonant with my internal GPS along with some that challenge me to adjust course as I navigate to feel at home in new territory.

May we each find the signposts we need within and without to navigate and be at home in the new. Perhaps this lively, poignant tune, shared by a fellow explorer in her own new territory, will lighten your spirit for the journey ahead (Phillip Phillips Home).

Nature’s Patterns