GreyWolff Dancing

October 28, 2011
Beloved Friends...
Portland, At 'Crema' my current favorite coffee (Garage? Look at the big overhead doors that open on warm days) It is right next to the ‘Grilled Cheese Sandwich’ food truck that makes gourmet sandwiches. You can eat outside or take your grilled cheese & tomato soup into a double decker ‘school’ bus to eat. Yummy Comfort.

I love writing ‘in public’. Somehow it inspires me. What you can’t see in the photo is the 3 tables to my right and the 3 tables to my left... Every one of them with a person at a computer facing the same way I am... Tapping away.

It was a beautiful full-of-color morning walk here. In SE Portland the gardens flow all over the sidewalks. I love walking these streets and watching the change of seasons through my favorite trees & plants & gardens.

It is the fall season of harvest, of dying back. Of change. Soon to enter the quiet, dark stillness of winter. Of course I cheat by going to the bright vibrancy of Kauai... But The Pacific NorthWest is not lacking of dark (wet) stillness. So I still get plenty!

My 54th birthday is in a couple weeks. And the karma (choices/action) of a lifetime has me in a long, slow in-breath. Hanging out in that silent, momentary pause before the exhale. it is a great place to gather information & energy. Focus. It is a great place to ask questions.

And the question at the forefront of my attention is simple: ‘What the hell am I going to do with the rest of this lifetime?!’ What flows from my Heart & Spirit to manifest into the world? What do I have to offer? How can I best serve? What is the clearest expression of my dharma (purpose in life)? Who? Where? How?

Sound familiar?

I believe the Divine Universe is asking us to Wake Up! We are in a period of crisis... And opportunity. I continue to resist temptation to get political on Facebook. That does not mean I am not placing careful and thoughtful attention on the direction/mood/movement/action/reaction in this country I love. I am watching/feeling very carefully. I simply choose to Tend Spirit. Tend Heart. Tend Consciousness. This is my political action. And it is a powerful one.

And back to ‘the questions’. What is growing stronger in my life is a need/desire/impulse... To write. I have been writing a lot this last year. And my rambling, wandering thoughts are beginning to find a foothold. A direction.. (s ;) (I do have a vata brain) (Vata is the Ayurvedic principle of air & space. Changeable, creative, expansive).

To focus all this wandering vata thought I have chosen a path. The first step is to begin to write in a format that appeals to the ‘teacher’ in me. The ‘public’ format of a blog. I have found it doesn’t matter if anyone is actually reading it. There is something inherent in the way my voice forms into ‘speaking’ words, with even the idea of other people 'listening', that helps focus my attention.

The next important piece of assistance will come from the structure offered by my writing coach, Kristen Leathers, who is fresh from co-authoring and publishing: ‘One Hill, Many Voices: Stores of Hope & Healing’. A beautiful book about the people of Harmony Hill Retreat Center. Kristen has open-hearted creative focus and a sharp red pencil.

And a bit further down the creative process... My talented, bright daughter Brianna will be an editor extraordinary. She will be busy all of November because at the stroke of midnight on Halloween, she and her Portland writing tribe will gather at Voodoo Donuts to begin and offer support for each other to write a novel (50,000 words) in a month. www.nanowrimo.org They join many thousands of writers around the world.

I don’t write fiction (although it is all a bit slippery the concept of ‘real’ vs ‘not’). I will be writing the reflections of my life. ‘GreyWolff Dancing’. And the reflections and understandings of the people, places, wisdom & insight of all I ‘dance’ with.

I would like to invite you along for the ride. I invite feedback and your own reflections. My blog writing is where thoughts and experience will first form into words. A book(s) will be growing from the soil of the blog. I will be asking some specific people to be readers as the book manifests.

The. Time. Is. Now.

I am in a very interesting place in my life. I will tell you it is magnificent and it is quite difficult. I am allowing my Heart to OPEN WIDE. Even in the face of the pain & fear that is present as I do so. Yet inviting pain out-of-the-closet for a dance... Releases it. My Voice... Lives in My Heart. And for My Voice to move up and into my throat... To Be Expressed. I choose no hesitation. I choose to dance with Shadows. I choose to Be Alive.

In a practical expression, I am playing with several blog sites and am not yet happy with any of them. I also do not want to flood my Facebook tribe, who are not interested in reading my ‘notes’. So for now my blog will live on my Facebook business page which I have not used much. So if you want to follow along, like ‘Embracing Wisdom’. Who knew the word ‘like’ would ever get so much attention or carry with it so much power.

I 'like' Life... I 'like' sharing The Journey... I 'like' that YOU are walking, crawling, howling, running, swimming, laughing, crying... With me. What a Ride! 

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