Saturday, March 30, 2013

Mary, The Contributor

Easter weekend 2011 (when Earth Day was the day before Easter) I met Andrew a homeless young man standing near Centennial Park selling "The Contributor" newspaper.  I bought a copy. 

I also bought the poster for I saw Mary, the Mother of Jesus, the embodiment of the Divine Feminine prayerfully contributing energy to Earth, to us, energy embedding the sacred pattern of Love.

On this Easter weekend, I imagine our shifting even more deeply to that powerful, encompassing Love.

What do you see in Andrew's work? What do you imagine?  What do you contribute?

-Dawn, The  Good News Muse, 30 March 2013
dawn@imaginetheshift.com

P.S.  The following link will connect you to the story of my coming upon Andrew along with the amazing portfolio of his work.  "Out of the Blue"

Stepping Stones - Thoughts on Sustainability, Earth, Artists, Actions and Easter

It may be cloudy outside here in Middle Tennessee but the sun shines at my feet thanks to a young woman from Lexington, TN.

I met Kelly Conklin at Linden's Blooming Arts Festival where her work was for sale last weekend.  Her mother in Kentucky told her of a local bowling ball plants need to turn their scraps into something sustainable.  The  scraps weren't suitable for  the local land fill. 

She paints and seals the compressed scraps, heavy as normal stepping stones. These two especially appealed to me for their feminine and masculine feel. 

Artistic endeavors incorporating sustainability are a beautiful thing.

Living is an artistic endeavor, isn't it?  We have the opportunity to take actions with awareness or not every day.  The results of our actions are sustainable long after we have acted. Angry actions potentially beget more anger unless the recipient is forgiving and compassionate.  Happy actions breed happiness unless the recipient is bitter and afraid.

We never know the outcomes of our actions only that they are stepping stones into the future, sustained long after they are made. 

Artistic endeavors ensuring materials avoid the landfill while incorporating sustainability are a beautiful thing.

Landfills are filled yet does the land feel? I believe so. 

While sitting in line at the local landfill with my truck bed overflowing with the wet stuff resulting from Nashville's 2010 May Day flood, I noticed a cardinal singing away in honeysuckle climbing the landfill fence. I had been sitting there stunned by the visual of all the garbage heaved into Mother Earth.  Upon seeing the cardinal I immediately began thanking Mother Earth for taking all we dump and asking forgiveness for my ignorance and negligence. 

In my truck that day and at times since I have deeply known the land simply wants gratitude and appreciation most.  Yes, I recycle, compost and such but if I do that motivated by fear and anger I am generating fear and anger in the quantum world and ultimately burning myself out. (Been there. Done that.) 

These stepping stones will be visual reminders of the joy felt by the land beneath my feet when I am aware, tuned in and grateful.  The land within me, my inner terrain, likewise feels joy as I'm reminded of the sun within, within me as well as the energy residing in Mother Earth.

As I write this on Easter weekend, they also remind me of the Son celebrated by Christians around the world.  Whether you believe the Easter story surrounding Jesus you've got to admit this story of deep and great Love has sustainability, doesn't it?  This story of Love, despite a world in which fear fuels so many, has been sustained over centuries. 

I often wonder what role the energy in the Earthen tomb played in Jesus resurrection.  Did the inner Sun keep alive this most loving Son? 

Artistic endeavors incorporating sustainability are a beautiful thing and even more so when sustaining a deep and great Love. 

What will your life sustain?  Are your actions stepping stones to love or fear for others and yourself?
-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 30 March 2013
dawn@imaginetheshift.com

P.S. Contact me if you want Kelly's info. I have her # but don't want to post it to the internet. 

Friday, March 29, 2013

Honey Bees, Wooly Mammoths and Me - Thoughts on Playing God and Biotechnology

This morning the vanishing bees were on my heart and mind. I stood at my altar and held them in meditation and prayer. I energetically held many small things like bees, bugs, butterflies and seeds. Earlier I had seen a post referencing honey bees dramatic decline due to neonicotinoids in pesticides. 

Standing in the quiet another biotech post crossed my mind.  What is it with so many scientists and investors needing to play Spirit/God/Source with food? How many scientists now in the biotech world are motivated by money, financial gain?  Once upon a time, science and capitalism did not go hand in hand.  How many are motivated by a sincere desire to prepare for what they fear is our bee-less future? 

Was I “playing God” asking the world of pollinators to keep coming to Earth to assist us? I didn’t feel this way as I sincerely asked them to continue returning to us if it’s for Love’s highest good.

Just this week I’ve wondered whether it’s possible to use genetic engineering ethically. I participated in a study for Vanderbilt on stress, economics, race and aging. I feared my blood samples taken to be studied genetically would eventually be used to just create more drugs. Is it possible a medical university today, also heavily influenced by pharmaceutical purse strings, can actually encourage lifestyle changes and mindfulness based on these research results? I am doubtful and at times regret having given them my blood.
 
How is it we seek cures rather than look beneath the surface of our lives to see what’s potentially causing disease, dissension or the decline of bees? Is seeking cures and blaming more exciting than finding causes? Does finding the cause create tension in the companies manufacturing the chemicals slowing killing us and much in Nature?

As I continued to hold the bees energetically and ask for their return, the wooly mammoth went through my mind! Ah, another biotech connection. Months ago during a morning walk I saw two different cars with wooly mammoth bumper stickers.  I came home only to read a story in the local paper about a biotech company hoping to eventually recreate the wooly mammoth.

If we do not connect the dots and tend to small things like how pesticides and chemicals in our plastics and throughout our homes contributing to disease, how in the h_ _ _ are we going to tend to wooly mammoths? I don’t get it.

So I stood before my altar and held the all of this in love.  I volunteered to be part of what is unfolding here on Earth in the name of Love and our highest good.

I left the room, grabbed my jacket to finally take a much delayed walk and picked up a letter in yesterday’s mail.  Under the letter staring back at me was the April issue of “National Geographic.” A wooly mammoth led a parade of ice age creatures marching from a chemistry beaker beneath the headline “Reviving Extinct Species – We Can, But Should We?”

I will read the story later.  For now I will take my morning walk three hours late and get to a lunchtime meeting. I will walk and feel deep appreciation especially to the bees, bugs and birds.

I am not a scientist but I often wonder and at times bee-lieve the bees are vanishing because we have not appreciated them or valued their integral role in our survival.  

I don’t need a study to prove this. It is enough to kinesthetically  sense and experience this inside my body, heart and mind. Mindfully paying attention to my insides yields the research results I need at just about any given moment revealing whether I’m using my attention and spending my energy in the ways that are best for me and how I want to relate to species. 

This is how I want to live from a place of listening to my inner biological technology.

Dawn, The Good News Muse 29 March 2013

(After writing this today, I learned at lunch that NPR reported the bees are not dying but are in a drunken state and therefore get lost due to the neonicotinoids.  Drunken and lost our way - sounds like a lot of humans today. I don't say this with judgement. I've lost my way for huge portions of my life, way too much of the time.  And yet my body is my GPS, always revealing whether I'm off or on my track. Here's the NPR link for "Are Agriculture's Most Popular Pesticides Killing Our Bees?"

Thursday, March 28, 2013

When Altering is Altar-ing - Routine, Ritual and Resonance

This week as I altered my morning ritual, I thought of my mother.  Usually the first hour of my day involves watching nature, walking my neighborhood, feeding the birds and visiting the yard to see what's unfolding before I sit down to write.

This particular morning for some unknown reason I found myself preparing lunch thanks to local Triple LLL beef, the small stash of remaining garlic and oregano grown last year, organic brussell sprouts, beets and one last softball size pumpkin that grew from a two year old seed by the compost bin.

Within a half hour everything was baking or boiling.  I had lunch 'on the stove' a phrase I sense I grew up hearing but can't quite recall.  My morning would not consist of changing sheets and cleaning as many of my mother's generation did yet I was happy to think I wouldn't be scarfing down cheese and crackers fifteen minutes before clients arrived.  I was at peace.

As I altered my morning ritual, I thought of my mother. How many women throughout time 'got lunch or dinner on the stove' first thing in the morning as part of their daily routine? Was this routine, ritual or both?

In the last few months I've told my mother of the joy I find in food and cooking.  I asked if she ever felt she had to cook for us as a family.  Without hesitation she exclaimed, "I loved cooking for you."  The look on her face and her tone conveyed the truth.  The resonance of love in her voice told me this routine was ritual for her.

I understand that.  Cooking is ritual for me.  And this particular morning altering my ritual, altar-ed something in me.

Alter means to change.

An altar is a place of sacredness.

Connecting with women through time, my kitchen became a sacred place.  Connecting with women in time altared my insides reminding me I hold sacred space.

To me this awareness makes sacred not just the preparing of food, but those involved in the plowing of the field, the turning of the soil, sowing the seed and the grass on which the cows feed, tending the plant and picking or digging the fruit.

This earthly kitchen is a sacred place and things certainly are cooking here, aren't they?  So much is coming to boil as corporate America tries to take increasing control over how food is grown and genetically altered.  I didn't learn until last night that as I wrote this yesterday President Obama was in the process of signing a spending bill in which buried dozens of pages into the bill is "a provision that protects biotech corporations such as the California-based Monsanto from litigation." (Link HERE.)

At the same time, more and more people are taking charge, educating themselves as to growing their own food and knowing the origin of the foods they eat from other sources.  This week's Tennessean reports UT's local soil testing program had approximately 2,300 local gardeners mail or bring soil samples to them for testing.  In 2004, the number was 1,500.   Last Saturday Nashville Urban Food Forrest (NUFF) began transforming a local yard into an edible yard with a "Dig-In."  Monday night they won the Seed Supper money at SLOCO sponsored by Community Food Advocates. It is impossible if you're paying attention to avoid seeing stories of events related to growing one's own food all around the country. 

How might altering routine, altar or make sacred rituals involved in Earth's food scene? How might dynamics shift if food on Earth were really seen and experienced.  Would Monsanto hold the power we have given them?  Would so many of us sit in front of  TVs or with our heads into technology or might we be outside getting dirt under our nails beneath our feet mesmerized by the mystery and magic of ecology.

This earthly kitchen is a sacred place.  All around and within us is sacred space.  It holds the ingredients from which we choose - awareness, ignorance, intention, will, compassion, fear.  We choose the ingredients with which we create.   

How might seeing as sacred altar the unfolding story of food on Earth including Monsanto's ongoing efforts?  Is it possible to altar genetic altering?

I sense it is.

On Thursday before the sun came up and the moon was still visible in the Western sky, I sat outside under the stars and held between my palms Monsanto as well as the many animals used by AgriBusiness in factory farms.  I held both the animals and corporations in compassion and gratitude for Monstanto is potentially waking us up to our capacity to alter through altar-ing all of life here on Earth.

I choose to stand, speak and hold the resonance of compassion even with politicians and Monsanto.  It feels better within to me to intentionally hold them in this way rather than fight them in the energy of anger and fear. I have burned myself out one too many times fighting in anger fueled by quiet fear.

Which holds the better resonance for you?  Routine or ritual?  Have to/got to or want to?  Fear or Love?

How might altering our attitudes, thoughts and beliefs altar or make sacred our inside and the outside?  How might altering our insides altar our world?
-Dawn,  The Good News Muse 28 March 2013
dawn@imagninetheshift.com
P.S. Click HERE for information on the May 25, 2013 March Against Monsanto!! 


Friday, March 22, 2013

"Going to Water" - On the 20th Anniversary of World Water Day

(In honor of World Water Day - 2013.) 

(Going to the Water in Cherokee)
A recent summer while in the Smoky Mountains and Cherokee, NC, I learned of the Cherokee ritual of "going to water."  

Early each morning the Cherokee would wade out waist deep into the river where they would throw water over their head and ask that any thoughts or feelings that hindered them from being closer to God be taken away.  (Note: Their God was not a caucasian, white-haired elder fellow casting people into hell from his heavenly throne. Nor was "He" to my knowledge used legislatively to administer or sway political POV's and policies.)  They would also ask that thoughts or feelings hindering them from being closer to all their brothers and sisters on earth, and the animals of earth be also taken. (from Living Stories of the Cherokee by Freeman Owle.)

What does your 'going to water' involve? 

Mine revolves around showering, flushing, brushing (my teeeth), perking and washing but not cleansing or forgiving in the Cherokee way.  Are your associations similar?  These aspects of going to the water have more to do with one's exterior than interior, don't they?

There are times when instead of going to the water the water comes to us as happened to Nashville and many TN communities during the flood of 2010.  This was followed by the tsunami in Japan, flooding in New England, along the Mississippi then Russia where 100 were killed in a flood and more recently in the Northeast with  Hurricane Sandy

Then there are times when the water doesn't come at all as has been evidenced more recently through drought resulting in loss of crops and livestock.  Even wildlife suffers in ways I was not aware.  Last summer while taking a baby raccoon to Walden's Puddle, the local wildlife rehab sanctuary, a woman arrived with a frail fawn in her arms.  She had found this lifeless animal immobile in the middle of the road.  The technician said this was an increasing problem with the drought. She quickly determined it was dehydrated and took it away to administer an IV. 

Ironically there is a relational beauty resulting from flooding and drought that allows for a cleansing of sorts.  People typically separated by differences reach out to help one another.  Those who value animals are keenly tuned in to the needs of wildlife and pets in flood and drought conditions.  These events in nature prompt a sudden removal of the things that hinder us from being closer to our human brothers and sisters. 

My other association with " going to the water" entails a spring in the country where I've previously filled containers for drinking water.  The last time I was there I found the owner of the property just above the spring had cut most of the trees above where the road plateaus to land that looks out for miles.  

My distress was so great I avoided going to the personal waters of my heart that were stirred by the scene of dozens of trees whose lives are now evidenced by stumps. 

I spring water to mix with sacred water from England's Glastonbury Well, a gift from my sister-friend Carol in NY.  With the drought at the time, I was uncertain the spring would be flowing.  To my relief, a steady stream poured from the pipe.  To my dismay not only were the trees cut, but a bag of trash had been tossed down the incline by the small parking area.  The contents of the bag were scattered about likely by a raccoon or squirrel.  By the bench at the spring lay a plastic Hooter's to-go bag alongside two cigarette butts.

This prompted the appearance of trash from inside the fountain that's me.  Yes, my inner-personal trash was energetically thrown out onto whoever had thrown trash into the woods.  I truly didn't think people still did that kind of thing.  Then I energetically 'trashed' the Hooter's patron and all those who create businesses that objectify women regardless of how "good" the food tastes. (Did the designer of the Hooter's logo, an owl, know the owl is symbolic of the Divine Feminine?  There's a story.)

I found relief in imagining the Hooter's patron having dinner by the spring rather than in the restaurant.  As for the bag of trash in the woods, I envisioned it being thrown out by a teenager trying to avoid trouble because he or she had forgotten to take it to the nearby county garbage site as a parent possibly asked.  Maybe Earth became the receptacle so these individuals could avoid being the receptacle of scolding.

Ironically I left the Spring happy.  Being there washed my negative thoughts away - until we drove home a different way.  The Cumberland Plateau like much of Tennessee is blessed with springs.  On this particular day, the abundant water sources visible as we drove reminded me of hydraulic fracturing called fracking, the questionable process used by gas companies to extract natural gas from earth. Tennessee seems open game for those with fracking interests.  As recently as this past week, a controversial plan was approved for the University of TN to lease nearly 9,000 acres of university owned land in the Cumberland Forrest. The land leased to an energy company would be fracked in order to research the effects of fracking.   

These are the days in which CEO's, politicians and those with overt power are literally 'going to water' for great monetary profit thanks to greed, negligence and power.  Simultaneously they and their hired hands, lobbyists, go to the airwaves to stir dissension and increase the division between the common people. They emphasize they're creating jobs and increasing our energy self-sufficiency while denying the potential short and long-term effects associated with the chemical cocktail used in the fracking process.  These chemicals may create toxicity in our waters leading to increased disease not to mention the harm done to the ecological system.  

Most people today I suspect have forgotten or not heard of "Erin Brockovich" the movie based on a real life situation in which a  corporation is negligent in acknowledging their toxic and deadly impact on a town's drinking water until a tenacious, tough woman, the movie's namesake, begins to research the company and the community members health issues resulting in their winning a large settlement from Pacific Gas & Electric.  

I found myself wondering what the Cherokee would have to say about fracking.  The Navaho and Hopi have battled companies for years regarding the mining practices contaminating the underground aquifer from which they get their water. 

What is the path to right relationship with those who litter the spring in the country and roadsides as well as those who sell Nature with seeming disregard for health and long-term welfare of the planet and people?  Does the wisest path lie in the Cherokee story?  

This path suggests I always start with clearing the fountain within, forgiving those I judge and asking that they forgive me my judgment.  It involves "going" to the personal waters of my heart and staying with the things that stir me rather than ignoring or avoiding these things.  This means allowing my personal waters to flow and be felt whether in sorrow or joy. 


The worst thing I can do is allow the fountain in me to become clogged or "trashed" with judgment, resistance, fear, rigidity, pessimism, grudges, despair, a sense of threat or hatred.  This distances me from the personal waters of Me and from my fellow man.   

What if the waters of our world are healed as we honor the waters of our hearts, the tears of joy as well as sorrow wanting to flow and be felt? 

The implications of  'going to the water' are stunning. Can you imagine the difference made if each of us practiced "going to the water" every morning. Imagine the resulting shift in our nations capital, our state capitals and our communities?   Imagine the changes that would occur in broader energy company policy if we first consciously tended the energy company each of us personally holds? We are the CEO's in charge of how our mind, heart and will's personal energy is spent?

I was about to write, "There are no easy answers."  Yet something tells me if we each practiced 'going to the water" as the traditional Cherokee did the answers would come, the shifts would flow and our world would see great change.  

What better time than this, the 20th Anniversary of World Water Day, to begin 'going to the water' each morning as you shower or bathe, to ask that all that comes between you and God as well as life on Earth be cleansed and washed away. 

I commit. Do you? 
-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 22 March 2013

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Healing Power, Feeling Power - Imagine the Shift

I clipped the hyacinths this morning not knowing they were frozen until I tried to smell them.  Their intense purpley-blue buds were scentless.  It may be Spring but I came inside to find the thermometer read 23 degrees.

It is cold outside. 

It is cold inside. 

This winter more than years prior I have been chilled to the bone, chilled to the bone a lot.  Last night I lay in bed and said aloud, "I may have to move." 

The cold inside and out not only permeates my bones.  At times it seeps into my heart. Although I care, I do not care.  It is hard to live in this world of such beauty, a world I came here to love so, yet a world in which I experience such heart break. 

Yesterday my heart break was related to learning vultures in Middle TN are attacking cows, live cows and calves in farmer's fields, because there is not enough roadkill to sustain them.  I find vultures beautiful and I love cows.  Yet my heart is broken more by people and politics than vultures attacking cows. 

I sat on the sofa this morning and wept. A backed up river of tears came pouring out of me.  Some small portion of this sadness was even related I suspect to my negligence in letting the hyacinths freeze.  Why did I not think to cut them a day earlier? 

The river slowed and I picked up the vase again.  I picked up the vase to find the hyacinth scent had returned with the thaw. 

I kept my nose buried in that simple purple bouquet as ribbons of sweetness found their way within, wrapping themselves around my heart. This was only temporarily interrupted by the scent of Bogeysattvah using the liter box in the nearby bathroom.  Isn't that a perfect metaphor for life? 

I could not put the hyacinths down. Thawing hyacinths emitting sweetness are like thawing hearts doing the same. Hyacinths hold a healing power.  Hearts hold a feeling power. 

This is my homeopathy, coming upon things in Nature that return me to me. When I can't imagine the Shift, Nature quietly, subtly, gently creates it.

May frozen hearts around the world experience the sweet smells that allow them to thaw. 
-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 21 March 2013

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Imagine the Shift - The Conductor and Creation

I saw this bud on the lilac bush and immediately called it The Conductor as all
around Spring rose from Mother Earth.

Three days later the Conductor's arms had shifted, extended. They waved mid-air urging orchestra members green and growing, to not delay, to play as bluebells and bleeding hearts, daffodils and hyacinth broke ground.

I thought of Creation and the Creator and how we argue, debate and separate from one another over who the Conductor is. Some say God while others say Goddess, Great Spirit, Higher Power, Allah and Vishnu. Others attribute Creation to the Big Bang.

How many wars have been fought, how many people killed over whose God is the God meanwhile the symphony plays on in the beauty of the flowers and all of Nature and in the beauty of human nature, the capacity of the heart to love, appreciate and forgive.

As days passed, the Conductor's arms were eventually open wide, welcoming all.

Imagine the shift if we did the same.

-Dawn! The Good News Muse, 20 March 2013 & 24 March 2011


Sunday, March 17, 2013

I Hold Earth - Do You?

Last week I awoke one night hearing, “You hold Earth.”

I lay in bed smiling inside and out feeling such joy because I could easily feel love for Earth’s blue, green orb.

Then I realized I was being told I hold Earth not in my arms but within, inside me.  In the still of the night, I felt Earth within my body.  As I did I also deeply knew that it is imperative not just to love Earth but to equally love my insides.

Often it is easier for me to love Nature than myself, to see the beauty around me and not the beauty within me.  I quietly yet more harshly judge my insides than the outside.

This message in the night reminds me of a Truth related to the Oneness of the Whole.  It is not one or the other. It is both, without and within.  If I love Earth yet don’t wholly love myself, I am contributing to separation and division in the world.

I am here to love, to love Mother Earth and Me.

For what are you here?  Can you imagine holding Earth within and loving Her as much as you love yourself?  Can you love yourself as much as you do Earth?

-Dawn, The Good News Muse,  13 March 2013

Saturday, March 16, 2013

Participating in the Turning Times- Inspired by National Quilt Day

(I thought of this Musing after learning today is National Quilting Day.  First posted last year and inspired @ the time of  Nashville's Flood, it seems more appropriate now than ever. I hope you take the time to read it and share it. - Dawn)

Not knowing the magnitude of the coming rains the day of Nashville’s 2010 May flood, a friend and I went on a field trip of sorts.  (Field trips aren’t just for school kids.) She had driven to our house in the country for lunch and I suggested we go to a nearby quilt show. 

I grew up with grandmothers who sewed but one in particular who I remember periodically quilting.   She suspended her quilts from a frame in the middle of the living room floor. I recall the magic and safety of sitting under one of those quilts as it hung suspended like the starry heavens overhead as she stitched above me. 

At the show, my friend and I oohed and ahhed struck not only by the beautiful fabrics and patterns but the intricate stitching that held each quilt together.  Threads visible upon a closer look spiraled and curled with extravagance. Not being bold and colorful, these stitches were easy to miss unless one stopped to really see and be with each quilt.   

I walked the aisles created by hanging quilts in the exhibit hall aware these works of art and heart would in two weekends be replaced by guns, yes guns, as the building we were in would be house a gun show.  

I quietly walked and wondered, contemplating the symbols of quilts and guns.  Both, I realized, are connected through love.  I thought of the millions of quilts stitched by the caring hands of women over time desiring to protect loved ones from the cold and the guns held in the hands of men desiring also to protect loved ones from perceived harm.  I walked and pondered the metaphor of patterns.  Our personal patterns sewn together make up a life and when combined create the larger patterns of community, culture and society. 

One of the scheduled events of the day was a quilt turning.  Neither my friend nor I had seen a turning so we decided to watch.  Decades old quilts neatly stacked on an antique bed were held up one at a time by two women as a third woman described the origins and pattern of the quilt shown.  The quilt was then turned down at the foot of the bed as another was held for viewing.  

Four or five quilts into the turning the potential high winds and rain were announced.  Being nearly two hours east of Nashville, we didn’t yet have rain but we parted. I took my friend home then worked in the yard and considered returning to the show before finally turning on the tv. 

The first image I recall is etched on many minds I suspect for there floating by a Nashville interstate was a portable school building with cars and trucks bumper to bumper in rushing water.     

I sat in shock and disbelief watching the city I live in and love inundated with rain.  I sat listening to the commentator yet in my head I heard these words that were not mine.  I heard, “We are bearing witness to the turning of the quilt of time.”

I didn’t know where this came from nor what it really meant but I knew I had been given a truth.  

Three years have passed since I began contemplating patterns and heard the above statement.  In that time, I’ve been a Watcher, one of the many today similar to the women who stood on either side of the bed holding up quilts of personal and societal patterns for those who will to see including myself.

As with any crisis no matter the size, opportunities abound for the disrupting of entrenched patterns and the rising/piecing together of new patterns.  In the flood crisis, Nashvillians were exemplary in this regard. People reached across the divides of zip codes, color, gender preference and religion. Our one-ness was amazing and our one-ness was felt as patterns related to competition, control, detachment and isolation were replaced by compassion and connection.   

Since Nashville’s flood, there have continued to be crises especially of the environmental type.  From Japan’s tsunami, flooding all along the Mississippi and super storms in New England, to tornadoes destroying homes and killing many North, East, South and West of Middle TN and even wiping out a rural town.  Nature has continued to bring challenges. 

Does Nature know we've this pattern of easily forgetting we are more alike than different?  Does Nature know we need to be reminded of the pattern of love we hold within?  In crisis we remember patterns that are ever present in the heart yet have been forgotten over time and stay buried midst our busy lives.

Politically on the other hand, things could not seem more divisive.  Muslims, immigrants, women, organic farms, wolves, the Arctic, Mother Earth and just about everything related to Nature and democracy seem to be under attack primarily by systems run by men (and women who act like men) with monetary influence and entrenched power. 

Those enmeshed in the patterns of the patriarchy try to maintain the hold of the patterns of competition, control and dominance.  Most of us have participated in this pattern's conveniences and benefits.  These patterns though have also contributed to toxins, chemicals, cancers and stresses unimagined by prior generations.  These patterns have contributed to the exploitation and rape of Mother Earth, women and children, the exploitation of the poor, the people and land of Africa and many Asian countries.

Ironically those at home at least on the attack would say they are under attack.  They live in fear of their guns being taken, their children wanting to live with someone of the same sex or have an abortion and their money being taken.  Their attitude is “I made it so I deserve it all” and “If any one comes to take what’s mine I will attack.”  They live in fear of communism so much so that it’s nearly impossible to have a dialogue about taking care of the poor or the environment without being called a communist. 

As I reflect on the words I heard in May 2010, “We are bearing witness to the turning of the quilt of time” I now see these struggles as symptoms of the turning of the quilt of time. 

We have before us the quilt of these Turning Times. Let's thank Mother Earth for being the exhibit hall that holds the display of our many patterns and ask her forgiveness. I ask forgiveness for my unconsciousness and ignoring. Let's honor the male souls who came to Earth and took on the karma of the wounded masculine, especially men in power married to the patriarchy who have caused such damage and pain.  Let's honor women who have held patterns of fear and apprehension causing us to not act and take risks or when we do the risks are measured.  

Let's lay to rest at the foot of Time's bed the quilt of these dying feminine and masculine patterns within us and between us.  

Then let us sit down around a frame like my grandmother had and begin the piecing of new patterns in peace, welcoming the quilt of living and loving from patterns of greater awareness, compassion, understanding and feeling, the quilt where patterns are sewn with threads of love stitched side by side.  

Just as I felt the security of sitting under my grandmother’s quilt like it was the sky above me, we live under the starry heavens quilted with constellations, the moon and sun.  Like the field trip that started this story, life on earth is a field trip from the stars as we experience the field of love in physical form.   

We are the quilters. We each hold the threads in this the turning of the Quilt of Time. 

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Dark Matter Wants to Heal Dark Matters - Imagine the Shift

Last night as I lay in bed my field of vision opened, the curtains of darkness parted and I was suddenly in the stars.  Lines of translucent light reminiscent of crocheted doilies kaleidoscopically turned, unfolding before me.  I heard the word Dreamweaver.  I recorded what I saw then fell asleep.

Granny's handmade doilies
This morning I knew I was shown the fabric of the Universe, the unseen lines of energy available to be accessed and weaved by us for beauty and good.  Scientists call these energetic lines dark matter.

Dark matter is availing itself to us.  It wants to be used to heal the dark matters of this world.  
So many of us are here in this time as participants in the weaving of a new dream, a new Earth. Through deep listening, intention and awareness, Dark Matter partners with us to weave and make manifest a new world in which violence, abuse and harm are no more. 

Are you a Dream Weaver?    

 Open up.  Spend time listening.  Imagine. What is your deepest, highest dream for yourself and our world?

-Dawn, The Good News Muse  12 March 2013

Saturday, March 9, 2013

Reflections from a City Yard - Deep Beauty and Unexpected Grace

In twenty prior years I have never before sat in my front yard.  I dig and plant in the front yet the backyard holds bird feeders and a bit more privacy from traffic and neighbors moving to and fro. 

This week thanks to a little bench purchased at Nashville's recent lawn and garden show I've found a space and place in my front yard tucked between rhododendron and an oak leaf hydrangea. 

The first day I sat on the bench  I realized I was surrounded by blossoms, last summer's dried blossoms from the surrounding flowering bushes.  Spring is near yet I noticed another of Nature's phases mirroring what is labeled death.  Yet death is another aspect of life, letting go, sweet surrender and return to Earth.

The second morning I noticed buds and leaves of green.  I did not set out to be a botanist when I arrived with coffee, paper and pen in hand.  I came out to listen and be yet there I sat mesmerized, filled with awe and wonder.

Early Americans came to mind, those like John James Audubon who studied birds and their habitats and John Bartram who studied plants. 

Then I thought of the other early Americans, men who killed millions of birds so women could wear feathers and wings in their hats and hair in the name of fashion.  I thought of the forests razed, cleared for crops, home supplies and heating.  

Did these early Americans realize they were living in paradise?

Do I?

I laid aside my paper and pen and opened to the paradise around me in the barren limbs above and brown leaves at my feet.  I spoke aloud, "I appreciate you and thank you for being here." 

No sooner had these word been said than I heard a rustling.  A mouse or fairy or a mouse acting as a fairy or a fairy acting as a mouse moved along in the leaves for two or three feet and I smiled.

It is chilly at least for now on this side of my house, yet Paradise without reminds me of the paradise within.  My insides are warmed by the colors, sights and sounds on this small spot of Mother Earth. 

There is deep beauty in this small space and an unexpected grace in finding the new and hearing the messages offered by Nature in a space in which I've lived for twenty years.

Earth offers itself to us.

I imagine a world of people noticing, seeing with new eyes and hearing with new ears. I imagine a world of people turned on by the living, breathing pulsing presence of life in this Earthly paradise.

-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 9 March 2013





Imagine the Shift - Mother's Return


Sometime ago I came across this children's book. The baby owls had lost their mother.

The last line of each paragraph on the back cover got my attention.  The owls asked, "Will she come back soon?" The author reminds the reader that every young child needs to know "Mommy will always come home."

 
 I read these lines and thought,  "Yes, Mother is returning.  She does not abandon her children, her winged, hooved, furry, feathered, creeping, crawling offspring.  I feel her in the wind. I see her in the sun, the moon and flowers.  I hear her in the ocean.  She is returning in every tear that falls from my eye, the quickenings of my heart, every time my breath is taken, my heart smiles and my mind looks up.

The Divine Mother is waking up and this time She won't be stopped."

How do you experience the Divine Feminine or feminine aspects of the Divine in your life?

-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 9 March 2013
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Friday, March 8, 2013

Imagine the Shift Golden Hearts

If anyone told me I would go for days neglecting the tree with the heart on it down the street, I would not believe them.  Yet I have recently done this very thing.

Two weeks ago while running during a morning walk, I was focused on the sidewalk before me when suddenly I stopped.  It felt as if something from the outside stopped me.  I looked up to find I was by the tree.  I had forgotten the heart tree, a tree that has meant so much to me.

I took a few steps up the grassy incline and for the first time in three years of visits thought, 'The heart looks like an ear made of an elephant's trunk.'   Two days prior, I had read that the elephant's trunk is highly sensitive and that elephants greet one another through touching trunks.

On this particular day I also noticed the eye above the heart.  Concentric circles like the ripples created when a pebble is tossed onto a pond's smooth surface surrounded the eye.  

I was reminded of the energetic ripples moving across the unseen field of energy about each of us when an intention is spoken or energetically sent out.  I wondered how my days would be different if I practiced more diligently living from the place of seeing and hearing with my heart's eyes and ears.  Might I not so easily disconnect?

I recorded these thoughts then rushed home to work forgetting this encounter as the day unfolded.

In the ensuing two weeks, I found a dead bunny and squirrel in my yard and was present to the living and dying of a tiny goldfinch that hit the window as I stood looking out one morning.  I experienced grace with each of these dear animals yet eventually I slowly disconnected.

Early one morning this week, I set out specifically for the heart tree. I had awakened in the night hearing "Go to the Sun within."  I knew this Sun was my heart yet thought, 'How do I go to my heart when I can't feel its presence?'  Something in me needed to see the tree even in thirty degree weather. 

I arrived and immediately knew why.  Two icicles hung from the bottom of the heart. My breath was taken as one released a golden drop just as I walked up to the tree.  

Here on this tree passed by thousands of cars and people each week were the moving hieroglyphics to heal the world's ills.  I was being shown how the golden tears of deep compassion dropping into Earth's energetic field send out ripples of healing love touching all.  Golden tears flow from thawing golden hearts. 

I so know this to be true.  My personal challenge is to stay connected to my heart amidst busyness, distractions, the world's injustices and suffering.  Yet this is easy when I live through my heart for in the flowing tears I also feel great joy.

Isn't this one of the reasons those of us with golden hearts are here especially in this time ?  Our hearts have the ability to turn pain into peace and sorrow into joy. 

Today, in this moment, I imagine the millions of Golden Hearts on Mother Earth thawing and flowing with golden tears bringing healing and peace to all. I imagine millions of us "touching trunks" welcoming one another to this time on Earth and being reminded we are not alone.  


Live this Shift with me!

(After experiencing the tree, I ran home and grabbed my camera to share the experience.  This quick little video is all I could capture as one icicle had already melted and my battery was running low. You get the message. - Dawn) 
-Dawn, The Good News Muse,  8 March 2013