Occasionally I'll go on about how in a "functional" (aka "love-based") society instead of the quasi feral one in which we live, the storefronts below us here at The Beach in "Little New York" would vend human contact instead of stuff, attitude, and illusion. ...
This satirical vision of the future evolved one particularly funked out day in my life when I told my therapist I was so deprived of human contact that I wished there was a "cuddle parlor" somewhere so I could just go be held by loving arms, a reminder that I still exist, that there is still lava and life force moving somewhere beneath my malnourished epidermis. Side hugs, "take cares," and other perfunctory (or politically correct) gestures of affection were no longer working for me. Sure, it was a particularly tough time for me, but as a touchy-feely Californian, these half-life gestures of affection were more painful than the lack of the real thing. ...
I've written and prompted endlessly about the danger of our quick-fix I-Culture leading us to a future in the Matrix, evidenced by the insidious dearth of human connection/concern/affection/love in our modern world. Also I've written and prompted about what I mean by "feral" world and how as writers our job is to "write our truth" or else we are only contributing to the feralogy (feralpathy?) that is slowly eating up our limbic loving brain. Remember my thing about face-to-face (not face-to-facebook) human contact? Boy howdy, I've written all about it. ...
But not today. Why? ...
There is a benefit to a world calling out, begging, for satire: The more I envision this world of happy storefronts, the more I like it. The more I start to think, "hey, why not?" One day (and many since) I stole from Field of Dreams' by declaring mid-class magical that "if you write it it will come," and the more I do this work, the more certain I am of that truth. This weekend at the Wild Women Writing Retreat here at the Beach as the wild hours roared on, I realized, as I was writing, that maybe, just maybe, this sort of love-based storefront future is not too farfetched. Except maybe everything is free. Well... sure it is. ...
The Cuddle Parlor now has an entire block of likeminded neighboring storefronts here in Little New York of the future, including the "Boutique of Unconditional Love," the "Empty your cluttered Head Shop" (aka "lobotomy" shop) where all negative OLD self-talk and thoughts are emptied/cleaned out), the "House of Eye Contact", and many more. ...
At the Wild Woman Writing retreat this past weekend (thank you, again, deeply for your wild writing you most excellent divine singing, poeting, angelic women!!!), we hatched a few more, importantly remembering what happens when night falls over the city of love...
WHAT IS YOUR STOREFRONT OF THE FUTURE? You fiction folk will love this one. It's a great way to be the next Huxley or Orwell... Anyway, have fun with it and send it my way, blogway... perhaps we can build us a new city right here, right now...
With love, with hugs, Rox, who hopes to write with you in-person very very soooon.....
WRITING WITH ROX weekly
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Writing with Rox Weekly Prompt—Since I Saw You Last...
"Since I Saw You Last" is one my students' favorite prompts. Without fail, it delivers major yardage of writing memory, depth, and feeling and like most other Intuitive Writing exercises, can go anywhere, perhaps to the long forgotten, dormant, or unseen. Part meditation, part writers' block buster, pure bliss, it's one of those prompts that you can no-way—no-how predict where and when it will go... you just have to follow its lead and ride the ride. And every time you do it, it's different, wherein lives the magic.
It hatched one morning with the Friday Writers about three or four years ago when I for the life of me could not come up with an "impromptuprompt" as per youshe. Occasionally it will happen. We'll be sitting around the table, naked pads of paper rolled back, white pages glaring with anticipation, hungry for lick of the pen...
God, the pressure!
"So... shall we write?" I say.
The answer comes in hound-hungry clicks of the pen, chairs cawing up toward the table, enabling the writing posture, glasses donned or removed...hair going up... or down...rings and bracelets abandoned in coiled sparkly clumps for the sake of creativity. Soon we will be off to the races....Except I have either lost my prompt or still haven't found one. So I say something—anything—that might inspire the all too familiar "skritching" of pen hemorrhage.
On this particular day, I launched with "Since I saw you last, I..." and instead of finishing the thought, I had them finish it. However they wanted to finish it. And when they did, they'd come back and start over with the same line. And so on and so on, allowing it to take turns and dips and pacing all of its own.
It took me a while to embrace this raw moment as a great gift for prompt giving...there's nothing like sitting in the unknown and using that revved up place of panic to serve. Who knew?
So, here's how it goes (and goes and goes...): Since I saw you last...I got two flat tires, both with Jude, one at Home Depot where some kindly car neighbor left a note on a yellow stickie: "looks like you got a flat," and today we got a flat on the bike tire and had to call Dada 911 to bail us out because I was in no shape to walk a half a mile with a flat bike and bad feet. Since I saw you last I got three separate diagnosisese for my "bad feet," including, thank the angels, the world's most amazing physical therapist who looked me straight in my tearful eyes, one hand resting on my knee as I was just as convenient a hand rest as any in the PT world, and said: "Your feet are your feet. That's not good or bad. It just is. They will always be your feet... they will not be different feet and you can not treat them as though they are different feet or attempt to bend them into feet that they are not... however... you can work with them and work on strengthening...you do not have to be in pain...Do you see?" I nodded as I might have as an incredulous child. Since I saw you last...
Now you! SINCE I SAW YOU LAST..." there are no rules, no right and wrong, only just keep writing and start over when you have run out of thought or feeling or both...AND is a great way to keep the momentum going AND SINCE I SAW YOU LAST... because if you play around with pitch and tone you will yield new memories and trains of thought that go highwaying around your very large inner galaxy... Have fun... enjoy the ride!
If you do this and love this, remember I am starting a new summer INTUITIVE WRITING CLASS at the Loft in mid July (details here https://www.loft.org/adult-classes) on Thursday afternoons and of course, there's tons more of that to be had here at the Beach.
As always, share if you'd wish and I sure hope to write with you super soon!
It hatched one morning with the Friday Writers about three or four years ago when I for the life of me could not come up with an "impromptuprompt" as per youshe. Occasionally it will happen. We'll be sitting around the table, naked pads of paper rolled back, white pages glaring with anticipation, hungry for lick of the pen...
God, the pressure!
"So... shall we write?" I say.
The answer comes in hound-hungry clicks of the pen, chairs cawing up toward the table, enabling the writing posture, glasses donned or removed...hair going up... or down...rings and bracelets abandoned in coiled sparkly clumps for the sake of creativity. Soon we will be off to the races....Except I have either lost my prompt or still haven't found one. So I say something—anything—that might inspire the all too familiar "skritching" of pen hemorrhage.
On this particular day, I launched with "Since I saw you last, I..." and instead of finishing the thought, I had them finish it. However they wanted to finish it. And when they did, they'd come back and start over with the same line. And so on and so on, allowing it to take turns and dips and pacing all of its own.
It took me a while to embrace this raw moment as a great gift for prompt giving...there's nothing like sitting in the unknown and using that revved up place of panic to serve. Who knew?
So, here's how it goes (and goes and goes...): Since I saw you last...I got two flat tires, both with Jude, one at Home Depot where some kindly car neighbor left a note on a yellow stickie: "looks like you got a flat," and today we got a flat on the bike tire and had to call Dada 911 to bail us out because I was in no shape to walk a half a mile with a flat bike and bad feet. Since I saw you last I got three separate diagnosisese for my "bad feet," including, thank the angels, the world's most amazing physical therapist who looked me straight in my tearful eyes, one hand resting on my knee as I was just as convenient a hand rest as any in the PT world, and said: "Your feet are your feet. That's not good or bad. It just is. They will always be your feet... they will not be different feet and you can not treat them as though they are different feet or attempt to bend them into feet that they are not... however... you can work with them and work on strengthening...you do not have to be in pain...Do you see?" I nodded as I might have as an incredulous child. Since I saw you last...
Now you! SINCE I SAW YOU LAST..." there are no rules, no right and wrong, only just keep writing and start over when you have run out of thought or feeling or both...AND is a great way to keep the momentum going AND SINCE I SAW YOU LAST... because if you play around with pitch and tone you will yield new memories and trains of thought that go highwaying around your very large inner galaxy... Have fun... enjoy the ride!
If you do this and love this, remember I am starting a new summer INTUITIVE WRITING CLASS at the Loft in mid July (details here https://www.loft.org/adult-classes) on Thursday afternoons and of course, there's tons more of that to be had here at the Beach.
As always, share if you'd wish and I sure hope to write with you super soon!
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
WRITING WITH ROX WEEKLY PROMPT—Your Prayer-Stories Wanted (And Much Needed!)
Prayers are speaking to me. They seem to be coming out of nowhere and everywhere...as in just earlier today as Jude and I hiked the amazing trails of the Caponi Art Park, every rock I ambled over was in the shape of a heart, each sending out prayers of love.
I've taught my boy well. He ponders this miracle beside me, in the shadows of the tall skinny pine trees, where his deeper gaze finds an owl's feather nestled among the fields of heart stones. How he saw it right there in front of him I'll never know. More accurately, how I missed it I'll never know. Then he turns to the sky and says "look at all the heart-clouds, Mama. They're all full of love."
If you can believe it, this is the same child who just a few months ago stopped me mid-walk-to-the-park and said, "Mama, why do you always talk about love?"
"Because that's all there is, Jude," I said.
"Oh," said he.
Did it take? Can I really teach my boy how to regard the world through loving eyes? Before night-night, we lay in bed singing our "prayers," repeating a single verse of love over and over, each one dedicated to those we want to send love to in the universe. It can be anyone from Grandma Rose to Superman.
Are these prayers? Is "prayer" as interchangeable as "mantra"?
Personally, I did not grow up on prayers and hold only dim somewhat traumatizing memories of perching bedside with my Catholic friends, pleading to have my life spared before I wake. I also remember biking in several circles around the driveway at my friend Kim's up the street and singing over and over "the Lord is good to me! And so I thank the Lord for giving me the things I need..." I believe I later went home to Ma singing the catchy tune and asking her, "Ma, who's the Lord?"
To which she likely replied, "Jesus Christ, Roxanne, we're Jewish for Christ sakes!"
The irony of prayers speaking to me now, let alone having any meaning in my life, let alone having the word show up in any writing attached to my name, is a miracle, perhaps the answer to someone else's prayer. In my previous superficial life, anything having to do with prayers or god or blessings or spirit caused the same "Jesus Christ!" reaction as Ma's. She'd taught me well.
Fast forward to post superficial life (born again Bu-Jew?) and I'm a bit more open to this sort of talk. Granted I'm still happily cynical about a lot of things, but I am much more happily open to many more things. I realize this newborn openness every time a student finishes reading something and I say with absolute certainty: "I TELL YOU. THESE ARE THE WORDS WE OUGHT TO BE READING IN OUR PLACES OF WORSHIP."
Like I know what goes on in places of worship. Like I have any clue at all. Certainly I have no idea what is being said really in synagogue. Or the church across the street... But I've heard and read enough stories to assume it a'int so always good. Or a'int so always true. Or a'int so always based first in love.
Usually there are the recognizant nods around the table when I make this decree. You betcha, sister! Right on! Amen! We know when we write from our truth we are imparting wisdom in the form of story, our experiences shared from the heart. And as writers, one of the reasons we write is so those stories will be heard and witnessed. So we can be seen for who we are deeper than the surface presentation of conversation. And, like the oral traditions of yore, we write with perhaps some hope that our wisdom and insight may be of support to another human being, perhaps several. Perhaps over time our stories become prayers, or perhaps prayers answered.
Last night in healing group one of the gals wrote about pulling over and crying in her car due to the chronic, always mounting pain in her poor, innocent, aching feet. Though my feet issues do not compare one tenth to hers (nor does my warrior spirit when it comes to the chronic pain), I relate at prayer level to her story. I suggested last night that we in response to her reading about her aching feet that we "write a prayer to her feet."
It felt right. Earlier in the week a friend suggested he might "say a prayer for my feet" that night and it moved in me something deeply profound. Maybe it was the image the comment evoked— my swollen feet wrapped in a baby blanket tied with a white bow.
A few days ago a wonderful nurturing kirtan friend and talented musician, singer and overall giver of light and love, Pascale of Kirtan Path asked if she could sing a prayer, the Maha Mritunjaya mantra at her next satsang for a friend of mine (and Jude's surrogate/truest Grandma), who is in the final stages of brain cancer. The Maha Mritunjaya mantra, says Pascale, is typically sung either for healing or for transition.
As a newbie to all this prayer talk, I'm still not sure if it is kosher for me to suggest we write prayers during writing class or healing group or whenever... so perhaps if we call them story-prayers or storyers or prayries, we can get away with a little creative writing spirituality and rewrite the book of prayers. And as my new faith reminds me in the sharing of stories in community, methinks our collected "prayries" may write us into a miracle.
Would you, could you, write a prayer for her feet and toes?
Would you, could you, write a prayer for Jude's Grandma Rose?
Or is there another in need of some healing prose?
There's no right or wrong,
just write from your heart
you can make it a simple song
of nonsense or wordart...
It can be in poem or in story
fiction, fact, or fancy fancy lore'y
Whatever you write, please
Prayer-share right here
wherever that may be
knowing your prayries will always be near (you've got my ear) (okay, I know that's corny, but thats' okay. It can be corny. It can be purple. Who cares? Certainly not those tuning into prayers...
Deepest gratitude. Hope to write and prayrie with you soon. Hugs, Rox
I've taught my boy well. He ponders this miracle beside me, in the shadows of the tall skinny pine trees, where his deeper gaze finds an owl's feather nestled among the fields of heart stones. How he saw it right there in front of him I'll never know. More accurately, how I missed it I'll never know. Then he turns to the sky and says "look at all the heart-clouds, Mama. They're all full of love." If you can believe it, this is the same child who just a few months ago stopped me mid-walk-to-the-park and said, "Mama, why do you always talk about love?"
"Because that's all there is, Jude," I said.
"Oh," said he.
Did it take? Can I really teach my boy how to regard the world through loving eyes? Before night-night, we lay in bed singing our "prayers," repeating a single verse of love over and over, each one dedicated to those we want to send love to in the universe. It can be anyone from Grandma Rose to Superman.
Are these prayers? Is "prayer" as interchangeable as "mantra"?
Personally, I did not grow up on prayers and hold only dim somewhat traumatizing memories of perching bedside with my Catholic friends, pleading to have my life spared before I wake. I also remember biking in several circles around the driveway at my friend Kim's up the street and singing over and over "the Lord is good to me! And so I thank the Lord for giving me the things I need..." I believe I later went home to Ma singing the catchy tune and asking her, "Ma, who's the Lord?"
To which she likely replied, "Jesus Christ, Roxanne, we're Jewish for Christ sakes!"
The irony of prayers speaking to me now, let alone having any meaning in my life, let alone having the word show up in any writing attached to my name, is a miracle, perhaps the answer to someone else's prayer. In my previous superficial life, anything having to do with prayers or god or blessings or spirit caused the same "Jesus Christ!" reaction as Ma's. She'd taught me well.Fast forward to post superficial life (born again Bu-Jew?) and I'm a bit more open to this sort of talk. Granted I'm still happily cynical about a lot of things, but I am much more happily open to many more things. I realize this newborn openness every time a student finishes reading something and I say with absolute certainty: "I TELL YOU. THESE ARE THE WORDS WE OUGHT TO BE READING IN OUR PLACES OF WORSHIP."
Like I know what goes on in places of worship. Like I have any clue at all. Certainly I have no idea what is being said really in synagogue. Or the church across the street... But I've heard and read enough stories to assume it a'int so always good. Or a'int so always true. Or a'int so always based first in love.
Usually there are the recognizant nods around the table when I make this decree. You betcha, sister! Right on! Amen! We know when we write from our truth we are imparting wisdom in the form of story, our experiences shared from the heart. And as writers, one of the reasons we write is so those stories will be heard and witnessed. So we can be seen for who we are deeper than the surface presentation of conversation. And, like the oral traditions of yore, we write with perhaps some hope that our wisdom and insight may be of support to another human being, perhaps several. Perhaps over time our stories become prayers, or perhaps prayers answered.
Last night in healing group one of the gals wrote about pulling over and crying in her car due to the chronic, always mounting pain in her poor, innocent, aching feet. Though my feet issues do not compare one tenth to hers (nor does my warrior spirit when it comes to the chronic pain), I relate at prayer level to her story. I suggested last night that we in response to her reading about her aching feet that we "write a prayer to her feet."
It felt right. Earlier in the week a friend suggested he might "say a prayer for my feet" that night and it moved in me something deeply profound. Maybe it was the image the comment evoked— my swollen feet wrapped in a baby blanket tied with a white bow.
A few days ago a wonderful nurturing kirtan friend and talented musician, singer and overall giver of light and love, Pascale of Kirtan Path asked if she could sing a prayer, the Maha Mritunjaya mantra at her next satsang for a friend of mine (and Jude's surrogate/truest Grandma), who is in the final stages of brain cancer. The Maha Mritunjaya mantra, says Pascale, is typically sung either for healing or for transition.
As a newbie to all this prayer talk, I'm still not sure if it is kosher for me to suggest we write prayers during writing class or healing group or whenever... so perhaps if we call them story-prayers or storyers or prayries, we can get away with a little creative writing spirituality and rewrite the book of prayers. And as my new faith reminds me in the sharing of stories in community, methinks our collected "prayries" may write us into a miracle.
Would you, could you, write a prayer for her feet and toes?
Would you, could you, write a prayer for Jude's Grandma Rose?
Or is there another in need of some healing prose?
There's no right or wrong,
just write from your heart
you can make it a simple song
of nonsense or wordart...
It can be in poem or in story
fiction, fact, or fancy fancy lore'y
Whatever you write, please
Prayer-share right here
wherever that may be
knowing your prayries will always be near (you've got my ear) (okay, I know that's corny, but thats' okay. It can be corny. It can be purple. Who cares? Certainly not those tuning into prayers...
Deepest gratitude. Hope to write and prayrie with you soon. Hugs, Rox
 |
| Grandma Rose with Jude, Thanksgiving 2011 |
Friday, June 8, 2012
Wild Woman Writing Returns!
Come on sisters now... smile on your Wild Woman!
Wild Woman Writing! Solstice Retreat: Write yourself wild, free, and reborn!
Saturday June 23, 2012
10am-7pm $65 (or what you can!)
Register now, 8 max. rox@writingwithrox.com or 612-703-4321
Feeling a little half-life-ish lately? Waiting for your "happy" life to begin? Nostalgic for the free spirit you used to know? Come on over to the Beach and write to remember the wild authentic joy star sister that you are! Write to remember your voice, your "true" self, your spark.
*Come celebrate your most authentic, creative, spontaneous fully alive self!
* Connect with your wild woman tribe!
*Reawaken to your most fully alive authentic self!
* See how sparky and amazing you truly are!
* Write and witness the combined creative voices, poems, stories, and memories that rise up in wild authentic celebration!
Regularly scheduled programming...
WEEKLY PROMPT (another WritingwithRox prompt rerun (9/03/11) brought to you by the fine folks over at whenyourtimeisnotyourown.com. Justkidding.com, but, it's the darndest truth). The Writing with Rox Weekly Prompt will return to it's regularly scheduled Sunday slot sometime in the near future.com. Thanks for your patience and enjoy the rerun. Cheers, the Network
This past week I was out of town and again hit by many odd and obvious clarities about myself, others, the ground, the sky, shopping places, ice cream, attachment theory, and much too much more. I saw enough miracles to last a lifetime. I had lingering talks, sang camp songs, played the ashiko to the tune of a slight crescent moon, laughed until my esophagus detached from it's dry grip on joy, biked winding creekside trails, hiked ancient hills of stone, downward dogged against agates wide as night, swam in the St Croix river at the crepuscular hours of dawn and dusk, and allowed the smooth and always forever stones to cradle me in their always forever embrace. And more and more and more.All reasons for endless happiness. And endlessly happy I was. Of course there were the reliable burs of travel, the venomous ones we all know and remember when waiting in line at a remote gas station bathroom miles and miles from home, attempting to make fire when there is not enough kindling, those darn pesky mosquitoes, an endlessly sticking ziplock amidst tangled plastic bags, and the whiny cry of a tent zipper at three a.m. when you really got to go...So what's the issue? The darn clarity? The buzz kill? The bittersweet? It wasn't the moon, the light against the water, the melancholic notes that took me back to my summercamp days... I mean, it was, yes, but moreover, it was the time and space to linger in those moments, to not have to rush to the next. Of course this is something I "know" or offer myself platitude-aly when the world begins to crunch inward, but I got a good reminder of the gifts of the here and now and what happens when I linger there/here a little longer.So, your prompt: "Right here, right now..." Go and stay. See what you find. Meet yourself right here and now. As always, write until you feel done and always, always, share if you'd like.
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Writing with Rox Weekly Prompt—Read it and Weep
As much as I can, I like to spotlight the amazing cool people I know. Because I know so many amazing people, this is a lifelong project, this spotlighting, and likely why I am so called to the writing life. (And by the way, knowing so many amazing people does not suggest I am using the term lightly, the way people in my Hollywood hailing/revering childhood family tend to overuse the term "genius") ....
But before telling you about one of those amazing people, I have to first tell you about the group of amazing people writers (and friends who love them) who came over to the Beach Saturday night for a reading. It was the first time I organized a writers' mingle over here, though for years I'd been saying everyone had to meet each other and get to know the other coolest literary raw writing family in all of the Twin Cities.
There is no way I can begin to tell you about the magic that was Saturday night. Members from my current writing groups arrived, introducing themselves as "so-and-so: Fridays" or "so-and-so: Wednesdays." A few attendees even received their sacred Writing-with-Rox Writing Names, thanks to the spirit of the writing tribe. We played a few writing games, shared, and then moved on to the reading. Amidst the reading, there was spontaneous heartfelt expression of joy and unjoy and all in between, including a few rounds of song including everyone's childhood favorite, Fire and Rain by James Taylor. And yes, of course, we busted out the drums. I mean, come on. It's The Beach.
Some things are too soon to write about with any particular depth, Saturday night's reading among them; it's still happening in my body, in my mind, in this now empty after-Beach-party room, still sporting its aloha-lei party decor. I think the reason I fail to put the Beach back in order for days after events like this is because I just am not ready for it to end. In the meantime, thank you to all my students. And all writers out there who write and share their stories.
Prompt #1: What was the most amazing night of your life? As always, you can write this in fiction as a character, or slice it out of your own life (or someone's you know if you want to play around with Voice). Write until you feel it is enough and then post it here or share with me via email for private.
Moving on...
Speaking of Stories being shared... this leads me to the Cool Amazing Person I was going to tell you about.
Jaime Meyer is one of a kind. He is one of the urban Shamans I drum with, a man who is so very much in his truth that you cannot help be inspired to live, express, occupy your own evergiving beautious truth. He is a healer besides, versed in the Shamanic practice of Native American traditions (and much more than that, I am sure) who blends his unique quirk and gentle nurturing spirit into the drum jams and ceremonies. He loves his Mother Earth. He sings to us. He personifies the great spirit ancestors by bringing them among us in his down-to-earth easy to understand language so we all nod in agreement, embracing this as the everyday normal. "Well, yeah, that makes perfect sense," we say, "Spirits like it when we bathe our stones of pain in Mississippi River water." He makes us laugh. He reminds us to look around the room and acknowledge the brother and sisterhood and to "talk to each other" because these are our people.
Last week, before the healing drums, he sent out this story to prep us for the drumming. I read it and wept. Tears of happy and sad and truth. It moved me deeply (er... this is a "tell" by the way; I already "showed" you that it moved me. Jeez Louise, Rox...).
I asked him at once if I could publish it on my blog and elsewhere. He said, yes. Below is an excerpt from the email he sent out...Read it and weep. And afterwards, for Prompt #2, feel free to do a response write. You'll really want to.
Thanks for reading and hope to write with you soon! with love, Olly Olly Ocean Free (my writing name)
But before telling you about one of those amazing people, I have to first tell you about the group of amazing people writers (and friends who love them) who came over to the Beach Saturday night for a reading. It was the first time I organized a writers' mingle over here, though for years I'd been saying everyone had to meet each other and get to know the other coolest literary raw writing family in all of the Twin Cities.
There is no way I can begin to tell you about the magic that was Saturday night. Members from my current writing groups arrived, introducing themselves as "so-and-so: Fridays" or "so-and-so: Wednesdays." A few attendees even received their sacred Writing-with-Rox Writing Names, thanks to the spirit of the writing tribe. We played a few writing games, shared, and then moved on to the reading. Amidst the reading, there was spontaneous heartfelt expression of joy and unjoy and all in between, including a few rounds of song including everyone's childhood favorite, Fire and Rain by James Taylor. And yes, of course, we busted out the drums. I mean, come on. It's The Beach.Some things are too soon to write about with any particular depth, Saturday night's reading among them; it's still happening in my body, in my mind, in this now empty after-Beach-party room, still sporting its aloha-lei party decor. I think the reason I fail to put the Beach back in order for days after events like this is because I just am not ready for it to end. In the meantime, thank you to all my students. And all writers out there who write and share their stories.
Prompt #1: What was the most amazing night of your life? As always, you can write this in fiction as a character, or slice it out of your own life (or someone's you know if you want to play around with Voice). Write until you feel it is enough and then post it here or share with me via email for private.
Moving on...
Speaking of Stories being shared... this leads me to the Cool Amazing Person I was going to tell you about.
Jaime Meyer is one of a kind. He is one of the urban Shamans I drum with, a man who is so very much in his truth that you cannot help be inspired to live, express, occupy your own evergiving beautious truth. He is a healer besides, versed in the Shamanic practice of Native American traditions (and much more than that, I am sure) who blends his unique quirk and gentle nurturing spirit into the drum jams and ceremonies. He loves his Mother Earth. He sings to us. He personifies the great spirit ancestors by bringing them among us in his down-to-earth easy to understand language so we all nod in agreement, embracing this as the everyday normal. "Well, yeah, that makes perfect sense," we say, "Spirits like it when we bathe our stones of pain in Mississippi River water." He makes us laugh. He reminds us to look around the room and acknowledge the brother and sisterhood and to "talk to each other" because these are our people.
Last week, before the healing drums, he sent out this story to prep us for the drumming. I read it and wept. Tears of happy and sad and truth. It moved me deeply (er... this is a "tell" by the way; I already "showed" you that it moved me. Jeez Louise, Rox...).
I asked him at once if I could publish it on my blog and elsewhere. He said, yes. Below is an excerpt from the email he sent out...Read it and weep. And afterwards, for Prompt #2, feel free to do a response write. You'll really want to.
Thanks for reading and hope to write with you soon! with love, Olly Olly Ocean Free (my writing name)
....
"To me, the difference between the Machine Mind and The Indigenous Soul can be seen most clearly when we ask, “How do I deal with this pain in my mind?” The machine mind answers, “Buy something to dull the pain.” So we buy a pill, a drink or some blinking or shiny thing. And before we know it we are wrapped in debt, stress, and “I have no time.” We teach our children that this is the “real world,” and they better get used to it. And we send them off to become part of the immense factory of the Western mind creating more gizmos to amuse us and then throw away.
To the question “How do I deal with this pain in my mind?’ the Indigenous Soul answers, “Lay on Mother Earth and weep. Give her your tears, your moans, the sea water of your confused misery. She will take it and cleanse you, as she does everything else.”
Nothing to buy, nothing to believe, no skill, no dogma, no professional religious authority needed.
I want to tell you a sad story. I’m in a divorce. As they go, ours is not so ugly, but it’s full of pain and fear and that potential to be ugly at any moment. It’s heart-twisting, heart-wrenching, and I’m doing my best for my two shining boys to keep it from being heart-breaking.
A couple of weeks ago, my 8-year old, who cries over having to close down the computer game, but has not cried much over the divorce yet – this is a pain too real and deep, so he’s holding it deep down in his muscles – went into deep weeping. It spilled out all night long with moans and gasps and shattered phrases like “But why did she have to leave us? It can’t be forever, it just can’t be. I don’t want ot live in a boy’s house. We need a girl in this house.” On and on.
I held him, and cooed and stroked and whispered “It’s going to be all right” for two hours, and it just would not stop. I became afraid he was going to need to be hospitalized and sedated. That’s the Machine Mind.
I asked him, “Do you want to go outside and lay on the earth with me?” He suddenly stopped crying and said simply, “Okay.”
He wrapped himself in his bedspread. I got a candle and, on the way out the door, I remembered this rattle I had made to sell at my Winter Solstice event. It’s made of fragile reindeer hide, and was the last one of about a dozen and the only one that didn’t sell. Someone had dropped it into a box of stuff as we loaded out of the theatre, and when I found it later, one side was crushed in. It was now useless for making money. I grabbed it and my boy and I trudged out in the dark back yard. It was about 11:30, later than he had ever been up.
We sat in the quiet, cool night. A tiny candle burning, wrapped in his fluffy comforter. I said, ”You know whenever you are upset, you can go to Mother Earth and put your hand on it, or lay down on it, and you can give all those tears and all the sadness to her. She will take them and help you feel better.”
He put his hand on the grass. I asked him to close is eyes and breathe, and as he breathed out, let the sadness and confusion run out like trickling water, down into the earth to feed the grass and the plants. His face became calm and radiant as he breathed his pain out into our now sacred ground of the back yard. I asked him if it helped and he whispered so serenely, “Yes.”
I asked him to look around at the enormous elm tree embracing our yard, and the canopy of Elms and Maples all around us. I said he can also take his tears to these mothers. He is surrounded by mothers. I told him he has a human mother who loves him, and also many other mothers who love him and who will help him and all of us through this. We all hurt, and She can help us all if we ask. I rattled over him and sang a quiet healing song for few moments. His energy had completely transformed.
I gave him the rattle. I told him that now I realized maybe that rattle didn’t sell because it wanted to come to him. It, too, is smashed and wrecked on one side. But it has a soft, beautiful calming sound. I told him that I made it with love, with prayers that whoever owned it would be healed and calmed and strengthen. I told him it had the power of the reindeer in it. I told him how I had found the handle – the leg bone of a deer – in the woods when I was helping someone do a ceremony. I wasn’t looking for bones to make rattle handles, but as our prayers for her moved forward, suddenly I noticed that a few inches from me, these four bones were sticking up from the autumn leaves. At first I didn’t want to take them, but it seemed like they were shouting to me that they wanted to go with me. On the way home I realized they wanted to be rattle handles. I said the power of the Minnesota wild deer is in that rattle – and the power to come back from dying and become something else, something beautiful and useful.
He turned the rattle over and over in his hands. He drew his finger slowly around inside the smashed-in side. “Did you ever notice how the wrecked side is in the shape of a star?” He said. “When I draw a star, I draw it just like this.” He drew his finger in a star shape, over and over in that wound. “The power of the stars is in this rattle too.” He said.
I told him that someday when he is ready we will take that rattle apart and fix that smashed side and put it back together so it’s whole again. I told him I don’t think that will be very long from now, but we will do it when he says it’s time.
He looked up me. “Will you teach me that song someday?”
“Here is a secret between you and me,” I said. “That song was taught to me by a little river in New Mexico, 20 years ago. I was learning from a teacher, and during the work I fell into a great grief. She said to go lay in the little river for as long as it took until the grief had been washed away. I laid in that river for 30 minutes and it was freezing – it was snow melted from the mountains, running down, over me. I nearly turned blue laying there, weeping from regret, sadness, and shame. That river took it away and taught me that song, and it’s the song I’ve used a thousand times to sing over people to help them.
His eyes were as wide as moons. In an astonished voice, he whispered, “You’ve been to New Mexico?”
We went back inside and I think we both slept for 11 hours. I guess that story is about many things, but for right now, it’s about how to move into the Indigenous Mind to help us wrecked beings living in the Machine, how we mend the holes we create in the net of life, or that are created for us.
May you lay gorgeously on the Mothering Earth.
May your tears shine.
May the holes in your net be mended by Her.
May you be sweetened by Spirit
May you be sweetened by Spirit.
from Jaime Meyer at drummingthesoulawake.com
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