Hey friends!  Head over to https://marieofthemeadow.wordpress.com/ to keep following my new blog.  I'm not actively updating this blog anymore and would love to continue connecting with you.

:)

Art As Medicine #1 - Mandala con...

I struggled with the bright Fuschia at first thinking it was too "much" but I charged along with it anyways.

Water
What is flowing through me?

As I color I pay attention to the thoughts, feelings, memories, impressions etc. that surface.  I also pay attention to what other themes pop up when I am not creating.

• a deeper understanding/acknowledgment of my trauma history and the direct effects the unhealthy ways I've adapted have on my everyday life
• currently in transition and uncomfortable in the unknowns

All finished!

Earth

What is shifting and integrating?

After finding myself thawing out of a cycle of stuffing and freezing my feelings it seems that my emotions are relocating themselves into my daily life.  Feeling into the discomfort as it arose during the creation of this mandala helped me to understand, accept, and integrate this rather than revert to older patterns of stuffing, judging, and condemning my experience.

Art As Medicine #1 - Mandalas

Amazing fungus found along the trail...looked very ethereal in the forest....

Yesterday, I woke up from a dream where I was an apparition standing over my sister's bed with two other apparitions.  She was just starting to wake up because the other two appartitions were doing things to get her attention.  When they would make movements and noise to mess with her the lights would blink and there would be wind moving at her.

I didn't realize I was an apparition and was growing quite frustrated that every time I tried to talk to or get my sister's attention she couldn't hear me.  Eventually, the other two increased their efforts and she started to yell into thin air, "What the hell is happening?!?" and started clawing at the air trying to feel around for something causing it.

I started to become pretty distressed watching her struggle and increasingly frustrated that I couldn't get through to her.  I increased my efforts and started yelling and realized my words and movements were creating wind and light.

That's when I realized I was an apparition too!!

Mask Off

My voice

Underneath these tears

The thick welling caught in the back of my throat

Still I chant

Extremities of my skin

Tight with holding

Still I chant

Emotions

Trapped deep within

Buried from long ago

Rise to the surface

Still I chant

You can know no pain

Like the present

Facing it fully

Steeped in vulnerability

Still you chant

These moments

Doorways

A deeper experience

Into walking as you

You chant

Mask off

Eyes open

Thank you

Grandmother Maple - Keene, NY

The universe dances in mysterious ways

Do you dare to call them in

Your dreams

They await you

The Doorway

You stand at a doorway

You are so full

All it can do is pour forth

And expand those around you

It is up to you

To allow your fullness to exist

To be and believe in that stillness

That fullness

These are your gifts

We are waiting to be opened up

To experience the depths

Of who we are

To experience the depths

Of being alive

Thought

Is a pathway into that

You hold the key

To your doorway

For yourself

And those who resonate with you

Move Water Move

Move water move

I need to make it

Move water move

I need to breathe

Move water move

There's no more room here

Move water move

I need to breathe

Move water move

This place is crazy

Move water move

Nowhere to go

Move water move

No time to waste now

Move water move

No more to hold

They told me young

No room for tears here

They tell me now

To stand up strong

Move water move

There's no more room here

Move water move 

I need to breathe

I know this place

Is filled with guns now

I know these men

That they'll use bombs

I know this place

There might be children

Move water move

No time to waste

I know our hearts

They hold the world's song

I know our eyes

We see it all

Just one more day

Of holding in me

Move water move

It won't be long

Move water move

This place is crazy

Move water move

I need to breathe

Locust? growing from Maple - Interspecies Canoodling

Move water move

No time to waste now

Move water move

Please let me breathe

I know our hearts 

Can hold the world's pain

I know our minds

Don't make no sense

Move water move

We need to stand strong

Move water move

This has to end

I know our hearts

Want something different

People I meet

Don't want this pain

So tell me friends

What can we do now

Don't hide yourself

Don't hide your pain

Move water move

We can do this

Move water move

We will breathe

Move water move

We are ready

Move water move

It's time to change

Float

Chapel Pond - Adirondacks, NY

There is a beautiful moment held between this land looking up at the clouds

Heart turned towards the skies, floating in a mountain pond

Ears under the water

The only sound is the effort of my breath

It doesn't sound so effortless after all

The earth can support us

That which we are made from

A beautiful space to be

Dragonfly dances around me

There is beauty everywhere

Practicing Is The Practice

The Weaver - Point Au Roche, NY

That moment in meditation when you decide to return to the practice.

Even when you've opened your eyes a couple of times.

Started to talk to someone in the room.

Picked up your phone to search for something online.

These moments are the juice of the practice.  It is easy to sit when life is in the flow that you want.  But, do you abandon your practice when things get tough?  How about when there's people around?  Or, when your mind is racing over and over and over?  I know I do!

It is in these moments that the practice transmutes into life and the two become much more woven together.  The need to achieve something from the practice lessens.  It won't be another thing to add to your "I'm not good enough at this" list.  You'll know there is nothing to be good at here.  

The practicing is the practice.

The beautiful practice.

Your strength is in choosing to return.  Each time you choose to return your path becomes stronger and more woven together.  It's a shift from placing attention on all the things you may be doing wrong or not doing enough of.

When you focus on returning to the practice, you build a "muscle" and begin to see your inner strength.  It is important to see that.