Into the Canyon Came Love

Four years ago today I was in Havasu Canyon home of the Havasupai. The experience that follows is always more with me especially at this time. 

In 2009 my friend Karen Johnson and I backpacked into Havasu Canyon.  This area was unfamiliar to me yet many of the Havasupai still live in this remote western end of the Grand Canyon home of Havasu Falls' blue-green waters. Traditionally considered the Guardians of the Grand Canyon, the tribe in 1919 was restricted to the area into which we hiked when the national park was designated. 

When the anniversary of our trip rolls around each year, I'm especially mindful of a particular vision I was shown while at the Falls one day. 

Each afternoon we'd make our way through the campground to the cool blue water, the gathering place of many campers in the mid-day heat. To the Havasupai these waters were healing and sacred.  Knowing this created tension for me as hikers often climbed the rocks and jumped turning these sacred grounds into a water park.

One afternoon while lying on my towel immersed in the sounds of the Falls and the people around me, I had a vision.  At first I was shown a five-pointed star. Then from the star's center, a ramp came down as if someone could walk from the star.  Then the star's edges took a cloud-like shape and the star became a heart.  Slowly the heart separated into pieces then vanished. 

I turned this over and over in my mind so as to not forget the symbols amidst the surrounding noise and distractions. I intuitively sensed I had been shown Sirius but I wasn't sure and didn't know why. 

As I noted the vision, I was joined by a dog. I called to his owners as they played cards on their nearby blanket and asked his name.

"Moses," they shared.

As soon as I heard "Moses" I knew I had seen Sirius for all I knew about Sirius is it's called "The Dog Star."  This four-legged, friendly confirmation affirmed my hunch. 

I have kept this vision close since then and have wondered why, why, why it appeared to me.  Now I'm given a glimpse as I realize:  

Into the canyon, Love came.  

From the void where all appeared dark, Love came from the stars 

and Love on Earth was born. 

Love, Love came from the Stars to dwell in our bodies, minds, spirits and hearts. 

Imagine the Shift of Earth's people remembering we are each Love and we come from the Stars.

-Dawn! The Good News Muse 30 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

The Never Ending Story of Love

I returned to the city from the country this week happy to be home and glad to see Jerry who I hadn't seen in days.  After work, my good mood and I opened the back door to go outside and as we did a startled hawk flew from being perched on the deck.  In most settings, I would have been amazed by the massive brown and tan wings opening as I glanced up.  In my yard, I was relieved it flew.  I heard myself call out, "Stay away from my birds."   The suddenness with which this came surprised me.

Just last week, I was pondering my birds - the cardinals, titmice, chickadees, starlings, blue jays, sparrows,downy woodpeckers and mockingbirds- all feeding their babies around my postage-stamp size city yard as several of us have bird feeders.  I am attached to the birds as most parents are attached to their children. Judge me as shallow if you want, but the birds around my home bring me joy and their deaths hurt my heart.

I was relieved the hawk flew away empty clawed or so I thought until moments later I found dove feathers scattered beneath the table and on the nearby bench.  This was the third dove in the last week.

Dove and hawk were the reason I had stayed in the country longer than expected.  I spent much of two days being mindful of the personal messages of these specific birds from previous encounters.   

I scooped up a handful of petite, downy feathers and walked to Templeton's grave.  Doves became significant to me as my cat died in 2006.  During the days we knew she was leaving this plain, I told her the doves would arrive to help see her home. I didn't know why this thought came to me but it did.  And true to what I told her the cold January morning we buried her, I came inside only to look out moments later and see several doves sitting encircled around Templeton's grave.  Those doves came to her but they also came to me.

They arrived again unexpectedly three years later in France.  Each day, but one, I heard the coo of a dove at synchronistic times.  Each time I was reminded of the message I received through Templeton's death. 

This week though something happened unexpectedly as I placed the feathers before my cat's grave.  Weeping overcame me as I heard myself say:  "Stop hurting my children."

These were not words made pleadingly.  As I made my demand, I suddenly knew this was the voice of the Divine Mother coming from me, speaking these words to those involved in sex trafficking:

 "Stop hurting my children."

My voice was the voice of mothers near and afar who have lost or forgotten their voice, mothers whose children have been seduced, stolen and sold into the sex trade.  My voice was of the Divine Mother in that moment speaking to buyers and sellers of children's bodies everywhere.

"Stop hurting my children.  This soul-killing practice must stop." 

I sat on the deck listening.

Hawk, considered the Messenger, is a bird of prey reminding me of those who prey, those who prey sexually and financially upon the vulnerable.  Yet I was also reminded of those who pray, those who pray, meditate and focus Love's energy on behalf of the victims of human trafficking, an obscene and thriving business.

How beautiful this bird of prey would remind me also of those who pray.

I thought this story had ended until....

The killing of the dove haunted me throughout the night. I would awaken thinking of the killing of the doves and the killing of Love.  This stayed with me even more so because I had the visual of the hawk flying six feet away from me and the feathers and blood that remained.

Then in the wee hours of the morning, the memory of three dove feathers came to me.  I found them while roaming a church in LePuy France.  It was my 50th birthday and I had gotten up early to roam.  We had arrived the day prior and I had been overcome with sadness as I walked the city's streets up to the top of the hill where the church stood.  Walking into the circular hotel stairwell an hour before, the words "Joan of Arc"  went through my mind yet it wasn't until I stood in the church weeping that I learned her mother and friends prayed in the crypt of the church to the Black Madonna for Joan's freedom.  Prayers on Joan's behalf did not work.  The powers of the time that killed her burned her body, then her ashes two more times to ensure nothing was left. 

The sudden sorrow I felt in this town prompted my early morning walk around the church where I found three dove feathers outside a back entrance.  Tattered and worn they reminded me of the beauty of Love over time.

These were the feathers I thought of early this week.  They and the killing of Love were on my mind as I resisted going outside as is my morning routine. Yet I went out and as soon as I sat down, I saw two doves.  I saw them and thought, 'Doves like Love continue arriving as opportunities to keep my heart, though pained, open.' 

Love like the doves arrives every day on the front page of the newspaper and through internet headlines.  Love keeps arriving through events that are hard to see in order to open my heart even as it's breaking.

This was the end of this story until....

A bit later as I took my walk, I came upon a van idling a few houses away in the middle of the street.  A man sat inside on the phone.  I walked past, made my turn and found him still there unmoved.  This time I walked on the other side where I saw the message meant for me.

This transportation company's emblem was a blue circle. Inside the circle was the silhouette of a white dove its wings spread in flight above the silhouette of 4-5 human body shapes   The companies name was "Charter" and this was vehicle # 11.

I thought, 'How perfect.'  A charter is an agreement under which people are organized.  For me the number '11' is a doorway although I found on-line at one site that depending on what and who you consult '11' can represent the spiritual messenger, extravagance and sin or internal conflict.   And in a way these things are all connected to trafficking.

It feels to me that something is unfolding on a profound soul level and that we all arrived for this time as part of a charter coming together to create the opportunity for deep collective and personal healing as has never happened prior.

I came in from my walk and opened the book "Animal Speaks" to read of dove. I had not read it the day prior.  I read that dove represents maternal instinct, the essence of the voice that arose from me the night prior as well as Joan of Arc's mother and friends as they joined together in prayer. 

I came upstairs to add to this story what I had seen on my walk and found in the book. As I wrote and rewrote, I looked out at our bird feeder from the window above.  It was time to close the feeder for awhile.  The birds needed to find food elsewhere as did the hawk.

This was the end of the story I thought until.....

I walked out, closed the feeder then walked around front to get an unopened bag of mulch. I wanted to cover any leftover seed that might attract a dove.

To my surprise there along my driveway, the one we had walked up and down only two hours prior were feathers.  Thick piles of dove feathers of all sizes along the asphalt.  I picked up a handful and walked to Templeton's grave again. This time I did what I did not do the prior night.  I joyfully thanked doves for coming to Mother Earth and I asked them to continue returning to be with us.

Then I joyfully thanked Maternal Love rising in so many people right now, people symbolized by the feathers.

I did not see the hawk, yet I heard blue jays in a neighboring yard.  Then I did something for which some will judge me.  I have had beautiful exchanges with hawks yet I stood in my yard and asked hawk to leave.  Honestly I heard myself say, "I DEMAND you leave."  I saw the flap of wings and realized hawk sat twenty feet above me.  I clapped and it flew away.  I returned to the feathers and placed several in an open container for a ritual at a later time. 

This was the end of the story I thought until.... 

Diana and Rhonda at Berry Hill's Wild Birds Unlimited told me hawk feastings such as ours were common this time of year as hawks were feeding their babies as well.

Of course.  Hawk is driven by its own maternal instinct to feed and care for its young.

This time I did not assume the story had ended. 

Before bed that night I remembered the container with the feathers.  I was tired and worn out, but took the time to find a baggie in which to place the feathers.  I was upset and impatient with myself for not returning to the country. I had intentionally arranged my schedule to return and write yet had distracted myself by running errands on my never ending list.

Allowing myself to get distracted and the self-judgment that ensues are two of my personal soul-numbing practices.  These do not compare to the soul-numbing brutality of sex trafficking yet the results are similar in that I shut down to everything around and within me and live on auto-pilot until I am again awakened.

Rather than feed into my self upset-ness, I went outside the next morning with the bag of feathers to listen and write.  What I saw took my breath.  At the closure of the bag, was a fleck of a feather.  Its pattern was a shape I've seen in visions recently and have been unable to discern. 

Tears of joy overwhelmed me as I looked at this smallest of feathers that I knew was Love's pattern. Love's pattern exquisite, beautiful and small embedded in everyone and everything. 

And as I sat there over my shoulder from the neighboring yard came a sound met by another.  Two doves cooed back and forth to each other as I sat holding Love.  This was the very same back and forth I heard three days prior in the country while sitting outside.  These are the only two times I've ever had doves cooing to and fro in stereo.

Their perfectly timed, gentle back and forth reminded me of fear and love over time.  Fear in varying shades of control has reigned and is trying to hold on tight.  Yet I sat in my yard swing with dove's echoing the reminder that Love's small, potent pattern has held through time. 

Try as they might, in Joan's time and ours, the pattern of Love will not be killed for the maternal is rising as part of Love's charter in this Time across races, religions, economic levels, in all ages and in women and men.   

This is the beginning of the New Story of soul healing in the never ending story of Love.  

With deep gratitude to the hawk and doves, 

Dawn, The Good News Muse 29 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

Of Bears, Caves and the Times

My neighbor in the country just dropped by to ask about our yard and before leaving asked if I had seen the bear photos on-line.

Two weeks ago, we initially heard of the bear sighting just up the road. The night prior we had both fallen asleep in the back yard while watching the stars.  News of bear paw prints in someone's garden and another person whose garden was left in disarray presumably by a bear made me, an animal lover, cringe inside.

While hiking in Glacier, I've come upon fresh bear scent which smells like wet, dirty dog x100.  In that moment, I learned on the spot that my internal ipod held a boatload of show tunes I didn't know I knew. (Noise, in our case show tunes, tends to make bears leave humans or at least us alone.)

This morning I cringed because I thought of my little raised beds and a dozen bird feeders hanging about the yard.  (Bears appreciate bird seed I'm told.)  The cringe was also related to other thoughts that followed.  If bears return to this area, how long will it be until bears are hunted here?  (Well, I'm not surprisingly behind the times yet again. Bears are 'harvested' already in TN.  Harvested?  That's what happens with crops, not animals!)  It's fascinatingly disturbing to me that as soon as a species bounces back from near extinction, take the sandhill cranes for example, hunters petition to hunt them and/or wildlife management's wheels start turning to sell permits to hunt them. This very thing is in the works yet again in relation to the Eastern Sandhill Cranes. Many winter over near Chattanooga, TN on land set aside as a refuge for them. There's something wrong with creating a refuge that becomes a hunting ground. That sounds more like a trap to me.  Similarly as eagles have increased exponentially, I've wondered when they'll be hunted.  That will certainly create a debate.

As my neighbor walked away this morning he asked, "Have you heard about the caves?" I told him I had yet he added a piece I had not yet read.  The art ranges from 500 years to 6,000 years old. (The caves are in our area.)

At one point, our conversation came around to the end of the world.  I referenced wishing to live in a world full of animals instead of around people at times.  This gave my dear neighbor an opportunity to preach as he called it though it was not preaching compared to what had instilled fear in me growing up. He spoke of a coming time when God would start over and people would go to heaven (not all of them I presume).

Jim walked away and this came to me in light of bears and caves and the Times.

Worlds are blending.
Time is bending.
Past is present.
The future is now.
Circling and cycling
Betwixt and betweening
Love is the message. 
We are the how.

It certainly feels to me that God, Creator, Source has already started over as we are in a place of getting do-overs to see if we can live with greater awareness as to our relationship with Nature and Earth...and for me at least in relation to humankind. 

Imagine that Shift.

-Dawn, The Good News Muse 28 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

Are You a Bee Keeper? Imagine the Shift of Calling Forth Creation

(Reading the recent story of America's oldest known cave drawings found on the Cumberland Plateau here in Tennessee prompts me to share this creation-related story.)

As I walked past a table in my home this week, a book caught my eye, a book I bought on a whim two years ago at Pangaea in Hillsboro Village.

The "The Beekeeper's Bible" got my attention.  I had forgotten that it was on the second shelf of the end table, yet as I walked by a thought crossed my mind: 

'Many of us are here to be bee keepers.'

I knew this thought was not in reference to keeping bees in the traditional sense although after seeing the movie "Queen of the Sun" I seriously imagined having bee hives.  I'm referring to another aspect of keeping bees which relates to the story of the cave paintings.

I write periodically about laying to rest dead animals I come upon in the city and the country.  As part of that ritual I always ask that the particular animal's star kin help it find its way home.  Also as part of this ritual, I ask the animal I find to continue coming to Earth if it is for our highest good. 

What I do not write about is how I know many of us are here to "call in" creation.  We are the ones  to 'keep the bees' on Earth or be 'bee keepers' of another kind.

The cave art story referred to these Native people reaching into the earth.  Over the last few years, this is what I've sensed occurred.  Keepers of Creation called forth the energies of the animals, plants and trees from the stars within holding the energy of the stars without.    

At times I do the above ritual several times a week.  This spring I found a dead squirrel and rabbit in my small city yard on the same morning.  I had no idea what killed them but I knew we found one another so I could bear witness to their living and their dying and ask that they return.

More recently I've also found myself asking for balance.  I add this because I do not know ultimately what is for Love's highest good on Earth or in the Universe. I know my wants and preferences yet am acutely aware this may not be best in relation to the unfolding Mystery. 

I ask for balance for another reason too.  Last year I became weary from finding dead animals along the interstate as I traveled to and from the country every weekend.  I began asking for specific protection for the animals along the roads.  After I began this, the roadsides cleared.  I was overjoyed to find the interstate I travel each weekend void of dead deer, raccoons and opossums until Jerry came home with a story one day.

The vultures in that particular area were attacking cows and calves because roadkill was not available for them.  Therapist friends, if there are any reading this which I doubt, may think I need anti-psychotic meds, but I knew the ritual I had been intentionally and sincerely doing twice a weekend had an unintended affect. I love cows and vultures.

After that I began asking for balance and that the vultures have the food they need to sustain themselves.

I'm not suggesting concrete things on the bees behalf aren't important.  The bees need us and we need them.The bees need us to not use pesticides and insecticides. They need us lobbying our government demanding they take a cue from the dozens of countries where GMO's are banned, seriously restricted or labeled.  We need to demand that Monsanto be taken out of government.  And the bees and beekeepers need us buying local honey . It not only tastes good but it may help fight allergies.   

And the bees need those of us who are here to be 'bee keepers' to continue calling them in and honoring them through our sincere heartfelt gratitude.  

I imagine the shift of our realizing of what we are truly capable.  

I imagine the shift of our calling forth Creation. 

P.S. I wrote this story last Saturday and procrastinated posting it probably because on some quiet level I wondered what people might think.  Then as I drove into Cookeville later that day, I felt compelled to go to the Corner Coffeebar and Art House. I walked in and knew immediately why I was there.  The first things that caught my eye were two encaustic art pieces for sale by a local woman.

The two small pieces were of horse and bull-like animals on cave walls.  These pieces had been up for three weeks long before the story broke and I immediately thought of a voice I heard years ago that said, "Enter the collaborative journey with the Muse."  The Muse I knew was giving me a sign through this local artist and business to stay my path, put this story out into the world and invite "Creation and Bee Keepers" to join me.

Will you be a "bee keeper" with me? 

-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 27 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

Feather in the Darkness - A Message from the Underworld beneath my deck

As I sat on my deck one recent morning an all too familiar site caught my eye.  Scattered nearby was a handful of dove feathers.  What was a meal for hawk became a meditation for me.

Cupped in my palm, I held wisps of life's beauty and brevity mindful of Love's sweet preciousness giving of itself.  I thanked Hawk, the messenger, and Dove, symbol of Divine Love, and went about my day.

At dusk, I returned to my spot outside yet as I walked across our deck for some reason I looked down.  The 2" hole through which the hot tub electrical chords once ran remains open.  I don't ever recall specifically looking in the opening, yet this particular evening I saw suspended in the dark Underworld beneath me, chords and current of a different kind.

I wish my recorder was sufficient enough to show the detail as several speck-size spiders weaved at different levels.  In the midst of it all floated one lone little dove feather held by unseen strands. 

My day had held tears, joy and anger, a range of emotions as I tried to come to terms with our world of beauty and cruelty, light and darkness.  The night prior I watched "Nefarious" a documentary on the buying and selling of girls used in the worldwide sex trade.  This combined with horse soring, water fracking by gas companies and Monsanto’s genetically modified foods had left me immobilized, shocked and stunned.

Being outside in Nature even in my small city yard usually helps me find me and reconnect with my heart.

In the darkness beneath my deck was a powerful reminder of another reality, the story unreported by mainstream media, the Story I'm here to live yet  forget when caught up in fear and hate.

As I watched the spiders working away around the feather of Love, I heard their message of "Trust."

Earth and we are suspended and ascending, held by unseen threads, chords of Love, as Grandmother Spider and her kin, our ancestors and the angels weave on our behalf.

We and Earth are Loved.  We and Earth are Love.

-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 22 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

In Wonder of Bats

Last weekend I awoke in the night feeling pressure to incorporate facts into stories I write. This was especially strange since I'm a story teller not a fact sharer.  Facts today seem to be used for scaring us into caring as 'facts' are often supported by research funded by corporations selling a product or a pill. This monetarily enriches a CEO, lobbyist and share holders while trying to convince us we'll live longer, be stronger or look sexier.  You know the storyline. 

I also don't easily remember facts as I did for tests in school.  Decades later, I now remember and value experience, bodily felt sense experience and the ideas and words that come to me during experiences.

Last Friday night's experience is what prompted the in-the-night pressure referenced above.  The evening's  experience is for me what's most important to share for it was:  

Otherworldly 
Magical 
Exquisite
Filled with wonder and amazement. 

These simple words came as I sat outside Chattanooga on a pontoon boat at the mouth of a cave on Nickajack Lake.  This was the 2nd year I had won the evening's event at the Sandhill Crane Festival's silent auction. The first year I spent much of the time behind my camera recording.  I was determined to win one more trip so I could experience more fully the thousands of bats flying above us from the mouth of the cave.

This particular cave is home to over 100,000 endangered gray bats.  (This is a fact meant to stir wonder not fear.)  This years official count isn't in but last year TN Wildlife Resources (TWRA) staff counted over 130,000 gray bats.  It's called a migratory cave because pregnant mothers have their babies here.  Gray bats travel up to 20 miles a night eating insects.  They weigh only 7-9 grams yet they relieve the Chattanooga area of 110 tons of bugs yearly that otherwise would be eating crops and foliage and 'bugging' people.  These facts are from "Bats of the Us and Canada) by Harvey, Altenbach and Best.)  Of course Round-Up manufacturer Monsanto and pharmaceutical-hosptical industries treating possible Round-up related diseases may not care. This is not a fact just my personal opinion for which they could sue or harass me.  That fear aside Friday night for me was filled with

Wonder

Amazement

and 

Irritation. 

Irritation?

I would be dishonest to omit the irritating aspect of the evening. 

As we neared the cave, I saw several canoes clustered around the gate at the cave's mouth. The cave was closed by TVA in 1981 to protect the bats.

My heart sank seeing other people.  Chris our TWRA guide anchored the boat in the same place as last year and acknowledged the people.  Initially all I could acknowledge internally was my disappointment.  As a couple of boaters began asking Chris about the bats, I thought 'This isn't so bad.  These people are getting information they wouldn't normally have if Chris weren't here.'

I had to hand it to these people for being out on the lake in the first place.  At least they weren't in a temperature-controlled hotel room watching tv nor had they succumbed to the fear of bats perpetuated by myth and movies.  (Before the trip, a handful of folks asked if wasn't afraid of being bitten or getting rabies.  I'm not and here's another fact I've read:  You've a greater chance of being struck by lightning than contracting rabies from a bat.) 

I thought of how I prefer bats to people although these people weren't so bad until the wait began.  In the boat nearest us an exchange was overheard regarding Logan's vs. Sizzler.  Internally I gasped and cringed.  When I eat meat, I ensure it's locally raised or not from a corporate chain. 

None too soon, a bat arrived.  A scout flew around and around before flying away.  Within moments the stream began as someone in a canoe commented on how great the Nashville Zoo is which somehow led into a discussion of Disney World and how an employee dressed as Cinderella had something happen to the back of her dress.   

At this point I wanted to scream, "We are witness to something so much fucking better than Disney. THIS is the REAL thing. This is where Disney got his inspiration!"  

Cinderella's dress actually got me closer to the front of our boat where I could block out distractions and witness the wondrous force of Nature flowing above me from the cave.

Here's 8 seconds of that wonder.

Since that magical evening, I've pondered why it is that people talk about random, unrelated things midst nature and art.  (Recently at Cheekwood's Light exhibit two women standing before a stunning piece went on and on about their knitting group.)  Is silence so uncomfortable?  Are some people walking about unaware they're having OBE's (out-of-body experiences)?   I'm not judging. I've been there and done that and still do at times.

Do bats especially stir discomfort because they've been associated with the dark, mystery, the unknown and thus fear? I get that too. 

Many of the same entities, forces and powers in the form of religion, corporations, advertising, science, academia and authority (today selling us things) have conspired over the ages in getting us to look outside ourselves for just about everything.  

To viscerally feel a sense of wonder and awe requires at least for me that I be inside myself.

Which takes me back to what was going on inside me last Friday evening.  Here I sit a week later aware a Disney dress malfunction caused me to have an address malfunction.  I could have addressed my desire for a few moments of quiet and didn't.  Silence for some stirs discomfort. Speaking does for me.  And in this way I am connected to my Disney-discussing, Sizzler-visiting, fellow humans in the canoes. Not being silent on the inside, kept me from listening to what I might say to these fellow adventurers.

So as I listen in this moment, what do I want to share with you?

Oftentimes people who have out-of-body experiences resulting from trauma or nearly dying return filled with greater enthusiasm for being alive and life on Earth. I left Nickajack Cave Friday night my enthusiasm for Nature and living refueled.  I want to share that enthusiasm and the wonder I felt.  I want to stir wonder in the masses so humanity returns to find and feel the wonderousness of Nature and Mother Earth.  I don't want to scare folks into not using Round-up. I want them to find their way through wonder. 

Being mesmerized by Earth would halt so many of today's ills including much of the use of Round-up and many pharmaceutical pills. I mean that. That is part of the Shift I imagine. If it can happen in me, it can happen in many.  I imagine Wonder Waking Us Up.

To get the wonder flowing here's one more little clip of the bats as darkness fell.  Wherever you are I hope tonight you will look into the sky and feel the wonder.  I am. I will.

-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 21 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

Call and Response

At dawn and dusk, wren and cardinal often call. When I listen long enough, a response is heard usually several yards away. This call and response of singers and song prompts an inner smile.

Life on Earth is a call and response.

Sunset
Moonrise
Squash blossom
Rose bud
Newborn anythings
Leafen trees
Flowing streams
Children trafficked
Water fracked
Land raped
Empty plates
Manipulated seed
Tornadoes, fires and hurricanes
A world of beauty and of need.

Like the wren and cardinal, Earth and Her children call.
I open my heart or turn away.
 
What call will you encounter today?
How will you respond?

-Dawn, The Good News Muse at Imagine the Shift,  21 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

For Solstice: Remember Who You Really Are?

Remember who you really are?
You're a child of the Universe,
You, you're a star.

You're the tree rooted
  yet stretching skyward so tall
You're a divine flower
  opening to all.

Filled with whimsy, play and delight.
We are god seeds.
We are the light.

We're here with a purpose, a plan so divine
Small mind cannot hold it.
See with new eyes.

All that has happened
  is meant to be.
All that has happened,
  now sets us free.

The heartache, the lessons
  help us unfold
The greater story we're living.
It's time to be told.

So look over the years
  in the patterns you'll find.
Clues to your being.
Keys to your life.

We are here open hearts
  in this time so ripe.
Filled with potential in this Solstice Time.

-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 20 June 2013

first posted Dec. 21 many solstices ago. 

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

"I See You" and the ICU - Healing and Healthcare Dollars

Recently a man at the post office said, "Thank you" as I held the door for him.  His eye contact and tone beneath these two simple words conveyed a level of acknowledgement not experienced through social media.  A dozen exclamation points after "Thank You!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" in a text or tweet do not for me carry the same energy as one's voice.

Similarly each Wednesday morning the trash collector honks his horn at the two year old next door.  James and his mother in turn exuberantly wave from their spot on the front steps.  This weekly ritual has continued for over a year.  It too carries the energy of acknowledgment.   And HONK on screen isn't the same as the sound of the garbage truck horn echoing around the neighborhood. 

These two encounters reflect a level of acknowledgment and appreciation related to deeply seeing and being seen.  These actions convey, "I see you." 

Yet our world today is one vast ICU, an intensive care unit with people in need, in pain, lost, lonely, isolated and forgotten.

Imagine the healthcare dollars saved and the problems related to violence, isolation, anxiety and depression relieved if we lived with intensive care and authentically embodied "I see you."

The Shift to actions and the sounds of living from a place of "I see you" would usher in healing in the world's ICU.

-Dawn, The Good News Muse, 19 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

Grace in the Grass

Over the weekend, I was episodically enveloped in a "F- you" mood born by the shit, not the Shift, I imagine.  A musing on moods will probably be born of this, but for today here's what I found or found me on my morning walk.

As I neared home, I glanced left and there was the green, green grass once tended by JD, the father of my two favorite girls.  This is the same grass lovingly rolled upon years ago by those girls, their mom and me.  

This morning I saw this particular grass and thought of how the words grass and rolling  for some connotes joints.  Joints rolled alter one's mood. 

I prefer the kind of rolling done in this yard by Alicia, her two young daughters and me. 

This family of four, heart family, no longer lives here yet their memory dwells in me and our energy resides in this yard now tended by others. I smiled inside as I walked past.  Hillsides rolled down change my mood as do memories such as this.  For me this is good grass for I've a sense of grace.

When was the last time you rolled down a grassy incline or experienced a sense of grace in Nature? 

-Dawn, The Good News Muse  18 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com

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People and Plants - Seed Packs of Wonder

As June is underway, I've been perusing seed packets purchased late this Spring.  Until this week, these packs held seeds that hadn't yet made it to earth.  It was enough to enjoy the seeds as seeds for I experienced a bodily satisfaction just looking at and holding these beautifully adorned packets. 

Then yesterday as the rains stopped and I walked around my yard, it came to me.  The urge said, "I must plant the seeds.'  I felt a wanting to experience the joy of planting things, of remembering the magic that stirs releasing tiny orbs of potential into earth's darkness then bearing witness to what unfolds.

As I dug little trenches and holes, I wondered if God at times feels and thinks similarly.  Was knowing the beauty of human potential and the possibility packaged in people enough initially, enough even for Divine Source?  Then at some point did even God or however you think of Creator energy become so excited that He/She/Whatever decided to plant the seeds of Us to see what we might really grow into?

In 2-3 months if all grows accordingly, I'll be reminded of the rest of the story, the work involved in growing things.  Plants in my crowded  raised beds will overflow and entangle themselves in one another as snails and tiny critters eat some leaves.  I'll spread homemade compost, pluck yellowed leaves, add a few worms and if needed spray a bit of neem. Flowers will need to be deadheaded. The birds and squirrels will find my tomatoes. My garlic will be small for the fourth year growing as I forgot to fertilize on time.

If things progress as usual, days will arrive in which I'll feel negligent at times and question why I do this growing thing.  Truth be told, I will want to give up on growing things which brings me back to the Divine.

Does some Divine Creator look at us at times and realize we humans are a lot more challenging and troubling than anticipated?  Does the Divine feel negligent that He/She didn't do better with us or take more time? Does Spirit ever have regret and wish He/She had called it quits or never 'unpacked' us in the first place? 


At times I really wonder about these things especially when as recently I was immersed for a weekend in a sex trafficking conference involving people from around the world.  The numbers and information were stunning.  Similarly but in a different vein I wonder when I read about the drilling involved in fracking and the chemical cocktail injected into Earth to release natural gas.  I wonder when I think about Monsanto's fingerprints all over our foods and the honey bees vanishing. 

Then I remember the pimp at the conference who spoke to us and his work in recovery and presence on Atlanta's streets now as he educates children and tries to help young people get free.  I see my friend Eric in the newspaper speaking on behalf of Mother Earth and against fracking.  I see a child that's new to Earth or meet an older soul like myself who's young in spirit.  It's in these times that I am grateful the Divine continues to open light-filled seed packs of new souls longing to enter Earth's field to be participants in the experience that's being grown here on Earth.

And as I wonder, it occurs to me Life on Earth is a Wonder and whether I'm referring to plants in my yard or people near and far, both are seeds packs of wonder!

 -Dawn, The Good News Muse, 7 June 2013

dawn@imaginetheshift.com