Gratitude

I woke up extremely conscious of the passage of time yesterday and am feeling directed to make better use of it. There is no shortage of it- as well as the opportunity to spend a lot of said time in solitude. My intention this winter was to focus on immersing myself in the experience and study of sound and its effects in various forms. Of course that has been my path for a very long time but there is an opportunity right now since there is no gathering in groups and I am in a new place and not particularly inclined to promote private sessions right now until the spread of Covid begins to subside.

To that end I have joined a 7-day mantra practice with Jai Uttal as well as a 40-day kundalini yoga practice which begins on January 4. Those are the formal practices I am engaging in. Then there are my personal practices. I am definitely exploring the effects of Richway’s BioAcoustic Mat since I do not have my Soundweaver here. I haven’t been using it as often as I could but that is going to change too! I am using it with the BioMat on top which is a great combination. Yesterday I gave myself a 50-minute session while doing long distant healing for a friend at the same time. The music I used was Nawang Khechog and Carlos Nakai’s recording “Winds of Devotion” which is so beautiful and one that I have always found to be very powerful and effective on the Soundweaver.

Today I went for a beautiful walk in the woods. I found myself filled with deep gratitude… gratitude for time, for beauty, for the experience of being in a body where- because of the apparent separation- we have the gift of appreciation, for my teachers- past and present, known and unknown, for my ancestors, for my family, my parents, my siblings, my children and grandchildren, for all the masters who have walked the earth, for all that is past and all that is to come. It was an endless, expansive and totally joyful experience. From gratitude I moved into prayer. i walked and I prayed and I prayed and i walked. The prayer became the simple mantra from Dr. Emoto, “I love you, I thank you, I respect you.” As I looked at the trees, the water, the ferns, the rocks, the sky, felt the air on my skin, heard the sounds of the running water, thought about the molecules, atoms and particles that all matter is composed of… “I love you, I thank you, I respect you.” And myself, a hand on my heart “I love you”, joined by my other hand on my heart “I thank you”, and one hand then raised to my third eye “I respect you”. Over and over, tears streaming down my face.

I love you.
I thank you.
I respect you.

Where Everything Is Music

So much time has gone by so quickly and so full of deep emotion that it has all been a blur. The recent losses have hit me hard- Henry, my sister Jenny and most recently a dear and beautiful friend in Sedona who had brain cancer. Losses punctuated with feelings of deep love and gratitude. I feel that a major chapter of my life has closed and I am standing on a threshold. I know I will be making some big changes soon- I do hope that they will lead me ultimately to the creation of another sound healing center but right now I am just taking a big breath.

A friend sent me this beautiful poem this morning and it was so perfect that it inspired me to finally post on my blog again!

Where Everything is Music

We have fallen into the place
where everything is music.

The strumming and the flute notes
rise into the atmosphere,
and if the whole world's harp
should burn up,
there will still be hidden instruments
playing, playing

This singing art
is sea foam.
The graceful movements
come from a pearl
somewhere
on the ocean floor.

Poems reach up like spindrift
and the edge of driftwood
along the beach
wanting, wanting

They derive from a slow
and powerful root
that we cannot see.

Stop the words now.
Open the window
in the center of your chest,
and let the spirits fly
in and out!

-Rumi

Music, Tears and Gratitude

Mostly I am “okay”. Home and putting things away that Henry had saved for me. A three-week road trip which in many ways felt like an inner pilgrimage. Even though I was on the road I couldn’t really just leave everything indefinitely so instead I just tried to hold an open space for myself on the inside.

And like I said, mostly I am “okay.” And then there are those moments, which come further and further apart but still arrive… when I hear a piece of music like this and I am hit with a tidal wave of sadness and gut-wrenching tears. I am grateful that I can allow myself to feel and cry when I need to.

Grateful for the power music has to pick us up, carry us on a river of emotions and drop us on the other shore!

My Beautiful Life

I woke up this morning to a clear, windy, bitterly cold, snow-covered world. It is beautiful and fortunately I don't need to go any further than my house today. I have a warm fire and a couple of apples filled with rice, pecans and currants baking in the oven as I write this! It doesn't get a whole lot better- unless, like me, you have some fabulous sound healing technology in your living room! I decided to have my coffee in the Somatron recliner this morning (which is located about 6 feet from the woodstove).

It was an interesting excursion. I decided to put on a CD I had never heard before. Apparently it was a sample White Swan Music sent me a few years ago that I'd never listened to. The CD was by Philippo Franchini, called Magic and Grace. Initially, I didn't love it. It sounded too pretty and melodic and New Agey for my tastes and a little too weak for a deep therapeutic experience on the Somatron. I decided to give it a few minutes though and at some point some nice low rumbling tones came in and I began to feel more of the vibrotactile effect, the resonance of the frequencies coming through and massaging my cells. The second track had more of this and some nice deep percussion. I was still thinking about getting up out of the chair and putting something else on but the vibrotactile effect was beginning to have a hold on me.

Before I knew it I was sitting there filled with a profound sense of gratitude, tears streaming down my face- grateful for my beautiful life, grateful for the work I am blessed to do and blown away by the power of sound and music- and specifically this amazing technology which enters through the body and touches the soul.

Falling Into Place

Falling...

            out

                        of


s        

         p        

                   a        
                              
                              c       

                                            e

             
                             into place and time

Life is good. 

Opportunities. Connections. Movement. Growth. Gratitude. 

Thank you. 

The Richness of Life

I am just so happy today. No reason. Just life. Life is good. I am happy. Singing Pharrell's song, interspersed with my own gratitude chant. Loving life, loving music, loving my beautiful boys who just knock me out with their brilliance, their insights and their humour (and are all grown men- they are only boys in my mind;)

What a life, what a world, what a gift our emotional body is! We get to experience gratitude! How amazing is that? We could be born into a bland world- no colours, no smells... Instead every moment is rich with experience and sensations- this tiny little window in the infinite life of the universe and look what we get! Our life force is contained within our breath, and yet there are these moments when life is so full that it takes my breath away.

Ceramics, Gratitude, Sound and Blogging (Not Neccessarily in That Order)

The next week is going to be crazy busy for me with a house full of guests. My good friend Brian Ransom, maker of ceramic instruments extraordinaire, is coming up from FL with 3 of his best students for the NCECA (National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts) Conference- , which is being held in Providence this year. They are all going to be staying at my house and we will be spending a lot of time in Providence listening to talks, going to different shows, etc. and I know I will be very preoccupied with that and making sure that everyone is comfortable, etc.

This weekend I have another dear friend visiting for the weekend to celebrate my 60th birthday with me- which we have been trying to do for the last two months but the stuff of life kept getting in the way.

That being said I know that I am going to have very little time to write so I am thinking about how I want to proceed in the coming week so that I don't lose my momentum. What is coming to me in this moment is simply acknowledging some of the things I am grateful for in my experience of sound and music in my life.

Deity of Sound- Brian Ransom

Deity of Sound- Brian Ransom

"All things hollow, or those that are in the form of a vessel, we humans among them, have the capacity to resonate." ~Brian Ransom~

Today I am grateful for the opportunity to work with oncology patients through the Integrative Care Program at Women & Infants Hospital. I feel so incredibly fortunate and blessed to have been given the opportunity to work with these women of all ages and their caregivers, some currently in treatment, some survivors, all grateful and proactive about their health and welfare with amazing attitudes and commitment.

Shipping News

Almost a month ago I accepted Winnie Kao's challenge to ship every day for a week- she was referring to blogging. I didn't actually know what it meant but got the inference as I read about it. I haven't read Seth Godin's book Linchpin, where apparently he introduces this term. (I just ordered it!) It seems to mean something like putting your idea, project, product, inspiration out there- sharing whatever it is that is important to you and hopefully benefiting others in the process. Doing what it takes every day to make a difference. So it's not necessarily just writing a blog, although that was really what the challenge referred to.

I was afraid to accept the challenge and didn't actually commit until about two days before it was scheduled to begin. Consistency is not my strong suit and I was afraid I would fail- which meant letting myself down. What actually happened was quite different- and exciting! A group of people accepted the challenge and every day thousands of blog posts were going up on Tumblr- so many that on the third day they actually crashed the site temporarily!

As I began writing every day and randomly reading other people's blog posts I began feeling surprisingly connected to this group. Somehow I thought I would be out there failing on my own! Haha- surprise! We had all made a commitment and we were going to all do it together in the same timeframe. We were joined in our intention. On one level it didn't matter what people were writing about- they were doing it. On another level, they were writing about what was important to them and so of course it mattered.

So there was this very powerful energy of being part of a group and suddenly I felt like I would be letting others down if I missed a day- not because I thought anyone was necessarily even reading what I wrote, but that simply we were all in this together! I felt like the group carried me, like I was riding a wave. It was fun to write every day. It was the first thing I thought of in the morning and I couldn't wait to see what was happening of everyone else. I wrote 7 entries in 7 days. And on the 8th day I wrote again! I have been writing every day since except three days ago when my computer was down and by the time I finished messing with it, trying to figure out what was wrong I had to leave the house. It didn't come back online until after midnight so I missed that one day- however I sent out a link from my iPhone to a global event that I was participating in so I still shipped.

After the 7-day challenge ended a group of people who had participated started a Facebook page and we all continue to ship every day. I feel like I have a group of new wonderful supportive friends and am part of a community that is amazingly powerful! I feel connected. I feel grateful. I feel like I am still riding the wave and I have had a huge shift in energy. I had been in transition in pretty much all areas of my life for the past 3 years and due to a number of circumstances had not really been putting my own sound healing work out there. This week I have led a community chanting group, I have almost completed my new flyer and I have shipped every day.

To my Your Turn Challenge group and to all my other friends, family and clients who believe in me and support me in my process, thank you!

In the words of Dr. Masaru Emoto, "I love you, I thank you, I respect you."

Water Crystal "Thank you" From Dr. Masaru Emoto's Hidden Messages From Water