There is no forgiving -- Survivor PTSD.

I've been here before. I'm sick. I have come down with bronchitis once again. Just a bug? For me it's a sign that my PTSD is active. This is what the Stanford rape is bringing up.

Trauma at work
weakens my defenses as I take my eyes off
As I tell myself I am ok,
and I am, but I am not
not ok.
 I am ok now.
I am ok today.
Mantra, keeps me sane.
I am safe, today.

There is no present danger,
except inside my head.
I move through daily life,
take the car into the shop,
cry in the car before I go into work
put on a smile and think,
if I make no fuss,
if I give them no power,
the feelings will go away.
But they stay.

Underneath it all,
I'm operating on alert
fight or flight,
thankful to go to sleep at night,
tiring my body
day in and day out.
Sometimes I can't tell,
if I'm trying to foget,
or staying busy not to
recreate the scenes again.

Tell no one.
Tell not.one.
kiss the children good morning,
go on, have a  good day,
tuck them to bed under stars,
tell them they are safe,
though mom is in pain,
remembering
what happened on that day.
Keep on moving.
You'll be ok.

The news of Brock has unearthed a storm of feelings about my own rape 18 years ago. One, that like many, I swept under the rug in shame and fear of more judgement and rejection and pain. I read her letter and wept. Wished I had that kind of healing, that fast. I am only now in therapy, breaking patterns of abuse and here is, this.  Rape, dysfunction, self-esteem, worth. Poster kid am I? Part of my birth to consciousness, my teacher says. I know, he's right, my story is mine to tell.

I went to marry
I went to college,
I ran obstacle races
accrued trainings and degrees
badass I wanted to be.
I wanted to be the best
to be loved,
to be cared for,
to care for others,
to show everyone,
I was success.
Look! at what I can do.
Love me,
I've earned it.
When the truth is,
I don't know,
didn't know,
how to love me
just for me,
and not judge me
and not be afraid,
of me and you
and rejection and regret.

So in my own narrative I hear myself, my own worst critic. "I could have helped it," I could have made different choices. I could have chosen not to naively go out that night. I could have I should have, I shouldn't have. I could have fought, though I had been date-drugged, I wish I had...

I wish I had,
superhuman strenght
to say outloud what my head
screamed at that moment.
To say:
No!, stop! I don't want to be here.
Take me home.

I wish I had,
pushed him of,
told the cop, who did come,
and did nothing,
that I wasn't his girlfriend,
that he was 23,
that I was only,
15.
That it was dark,
and I was scared,
and I didn't feel like myself.
That I was ashamed.

That I only had 1 drink,
something wasn't right,
I went to the bathroom
I didn't feel well
and then
like I zombie, that's all,
out of body, I was there.

"Oh, I didn' think it was your first time"
He said,
and he dropped me off,
at home, in shock,
parents mad because I was late.
Shower, blood, bed.

Truth? I have more anger towards myself. I try to place it somewhere else. I want to own that speech, that says "No, it wasn't my fault, I didn't ask for it."

So yesterday, coughing, with a fever from stuffing all the feelings that are coming up, in therapy I was frozen when I was asked to talk to my 15 year old self. What would I say?

-I love you. Yes. It wasn't your fault.
       My voice cracks. I can almost believe it. Almost.
-You are still a beatiful soul.
--Stupid bitch-my head interjects- Why didn't you stay home that day? Why did you have to be a rebellious teenager who thought she'd go have drinks and play pool for a couple of hours? Why didn't you listen. It is your fault. You are dirty. You will always be dirty. That's why you feel unworthy. Stupid stupid young girl. It's your mother's fault, she taught you how to act like a lose woman, like a whore. Libertinaje. Estupida. Eres una estupida. Te lo dije. Pero no.... On it can go. That voice, that litany of unworth.

The voice of my father. Still now, in me, just as cruel, just as cutting, just as judgemental. The voice of catholicism. The voice of all the unlearning I chose to do today.

I fight on. I cry. I muster out loud:
-No. I am a beautiful soul. You've worked so hard to forgive yourself. You can forgive yourself.

-There is no forgiving
 He interjects, after I am quiet. Not my father this time. My therapist, my teacher, my guide.
The thing is Marcy, you don't earn forgiveness, and you didn't do anything that needs forgiving.

That's the crux. Right now. There's no forgiveness needed. My brain can't wrapt itself around it.

But I must grieve. I must grieve what I never did. I must grieve what I was too busy hiding from everyone then. Too afraid of judgement, too caught up judging myself.

To let go
I must grieve
what happened then
to that kid
who had barely
given a first kiss,
who had never
been touched tenderly.
Who didn't get to say yes.
Who didn't get to chose
how she
a woman became.
Who hurt,
and didn't have parents
who could help her
too caught up in their
addiction,
drama and codependency
the cycle
repeats itself.

It wasn't my fault. I need not forgive me. I need to, let go, to be well. I chose to, feel, and release.
One day.
Today,
One night,
Tonight.
Permission to feel,
now,
with all the fear
and all the doubt,
onto uncharted territory
slowly walking
sometimes crawling
the misery otherwise
to great to bear.
The road to healing,
sometimes,
is born of desperation.
One day,
if I keep soaking
in forgivness without regret
in forgiveness without judgement
in forgiveness without
condition
or consequence,
I hope that feeling
will stay.

Enough. I owe love to myself. I owe kindness to myself.  I owe distance from those harsh patterns devoid of compassion and love and embrace. Enough. So, if you find yourself being angered, regressing or getting triggered, you are not alone. In bringing light to hard issues, perhaps we can come together as a village to bring eachother healing, to face the challenges that come before us, as they pop up. I'm often reminded I don't pick my own healing agenda, and avoiding it, or sidestepping it -if I am paying attention- gets me all twisted, and even physically sick.

In love and light,
May you feel the warmth and embrace that it is often easier for me to extend to you, than it is to me. We are not alone.
Namaste.

Open letter about love and appearance

Throw Back to 2013. Very handy since I'm about to tackle issues of negative talk again. The universe is awesome this way and here I was looking at this nuget of wisdom to bestow upon myself today.

Open letter about love and appearance.

Please do not compare love with appearance, they are very different things. I love the children, they love me. They know so and feel it in every bone. Our home is filled with love and hugs and kisses. We go to sleep and wake up to hugs and kisses. We speak of carrying our love in our hearts even if we are away. We talk about internal beauty and being the best we can. I allow them to be themselves and to feel secure in who they are not because of how they look, or what the world will think, but because of their innate invaluable nature. They are bathed, they wear clean clothes which they pick themselves, they brush their teeth and eat and play and are happy children. I hope they grow to see appearance is only that, and they should only worry about it until and unless they must, for it has a purpose, but it does not define you, or your relationships.

Plenty of successful people and plenty multimillionaires do not put success on their appearance or their kids' appearance. I cherish their innocence. Soon, the days of messy hair will be over and the need to look attractive (hopefully in high school and not middle school) will arrive. Soon, they will go to college and hold jobs and will have to worry about it. At five, he has the privilege to not have to worry yet.

Written in context, since Marcos' messy hair means to his father, that I don't love him and he "looks homeless."

Sometimes I lose myself in the toxicness, at times I am reminded that I can and do find the good in a toxic situation; so long as I stay focused on love. smile emoticon

Happy Birthday Johnny!

Last Thursday was Johnny Cash's birthday and I've been immersed in Johnny and June. Oh what a love. What a life he led.  Below, a Birthday note from him to her:

"Happy Birthday Princess,

We get old and get use to each other. We think alike.

We read each others minds. We know what the other wants without asking. Sometimes we irritate each other a little bit. Maybe sometimes take each other for granted.

But once in awhile, like today, I meditate on it and realize how lucky I am to share my life with the greatest woman I ever met. You still fascinate and inspire me.

You influence me for the better. You’re the object of my desire, the #1 Earthly reason for my existence. I love you very much.

Happy Birthday Princess.

John"

Happy belated birthday Johnny Cash, and thanks for showing us how not to give a fuck unless it really mattered.

I Pretend

I glide my fingers
gently
over a page
and think it’s your skin
instead.
I think of yesterday.

I glide my fingers softly again,
and again I pretend,
that for a marvelous moment,
I can see your face.

It all glazes over,
I lose my sight,
tears stream unstopped now
down from my eyes.
Until I regain focus,
regain my strength,
at least for a some time.

I glide a finger over my hand,
absent minded for a while
and I wonder
if you feel my touch
When we’re away.
I pretend.

Trail of Hope

Lately there's been some dark feelings in my life. The valleys through which I've been traveling have a good destination. That I know, but the road of Doubt, which is where I've been hanging out for the last couple of months led me to a lot of time sitting down and looking up at the tops of smoke black canyons; wondering how I was ever able to get up there and if I remember how beautiful it was to look down at this valley and through it.

I also spent a lot of time wondering if I'm ever leaving. I sat and waited and embraced the cold. I didn't want to get up and go because it was easier to say I got lost. Died trying. Oh well. The journey was too hard. When I tried to just let go and to let myself sink into the quicksand below me, the pain was too great, and here's what came of if:

Before the advent of vehicles and flying machines, starting a journey was a life-altering decision. People traveled for months or even years crossing through deserts, and snow, and wars. When someone left for travels, you  didn't know if you'd ever see them again. Ever. Goodbyes were forever. If a father left for war he'd often come back to find grown children and distant wife. No Wi-Fi, no Skype, not even  a broken up telephone call.

That ancient travel is what my journey through life feels like and I've walking through the road of Doubt at the lowest and most trying point of my valleys of darkness. This road is set in stones made of the past. It's where we go to look back and think we lost it, made mistakes, made wrong choices, can't escape and worse, there's no other way, there's no way out. The road of Doubt is also the road of self-criticism and not of the constructive kind. In the middle of mine I found some acceptance and with that thought I was reminded that mistakes and what ifs didn't matter.

That was the sign pointing to Hope. Once I turned to the dirt trail of Hope  (it's not a magnificent paved road, sorry), I sat down and was able to see that the journey I've completed so far with its struggles and perceived lack of rewards, has been beautiful. I should be proud of myself instead of beating myself up for not doing enough, or not being enough. Up until this point, if I am not yet at the apex, if I am only conquering one small leg of my trip, I should still be happy and ready, because the future journeys may demand more sacrifice and letting go. They will demand more Faith and Trust and Hope. If I can't hold on to Hope now, I'll be in trouble later.

Besides that, I also realized that in the journey is where I will find myself. Sitting around and thinking "Who am I?, Who am I really and deeply, and truly?" is almost a futile exercise, that's for yuppies. Doing, going, experimenting, testing, and following your heart, and fighting when you're in the dark, that's what answers the question. I expect it  will be a grueling discovery.

So, I went back to gratitude exercises yesterday as part of my fight to focus on the light. It's the second day only and I already feel it help me wake up focused on the small white light, on the trail I must travel.

Here's todays:
Today, I'm thankful for waking up feeling the waves of inspiration, again.
I'm thankful for the beautiful people in my life, who hold me up and check up on me and tell me I am so when I don't feel it.
I'm thankful for the ability to write. I've been furiously writing;

and for Internet, because now I have no excuse but to edit and send out material that has been collecting dust.

Hope, Faith and Trust is my wish for you today too.

Oh Ragnar be Kind!

If you're going to do it or you have to it you may as well do your best. There is a lot going on and taking off  and not enough time to tell you all about it yet! Stay tuned!!!

We are about to start quite an adventurous and rewarding journey. Coming up this weekend I'll be doing my best to share photos of the Ragnar-Vail Lake race. My team, "We came for S'more Running"

participated in the Utah Ragnar last April, and we got snowed in.

 I was on crutches. Hobbling around in the snow, was already way beyond the permissions I had obtained from the medical professionals. Of course I tried talking my Physical Therapist and Dr. into letting me race, but they recited all these things that could happen to my bones and my future adventures if I did. So I went anyways, and my not doing anything turned into walking around the camp until I couldn't feel my foot, but I didn't run. I was moral support. They did awesome, of course, until the course closed due to visibility problems and injured runners. The joys of obstacle and cross country races!!!

This year's Vail Lake is held at the location where the last Spartan Beast was cancelled. Yay.

This time, I'm closing the race. Back and kicking ass no matter how hot and humid it gets. I'm not in the best shape yet, --that's the next part of this journey-- but I will be in the company of friends getting little sleep and a lot of running done. Really, I just want my decal, and maybe a t-shirt, and the memories of pushing through and spending time with friends who run.

Of course I haven't packed. There's a pile of supplies I did buy today. And sure enough I got the busiest schedule for the rest of today. As I write this , it's 24 hrs til I wake up to drive away at 2 a.m. Friday Morning.

Race on my friends, and be kind.

Dancing Life Away

 Last July when I never published this post, I had the pleasure to attend the 10th annual Salsa Congress 10th annual Las Vegas Salsa Congress  here in Las Vegas. Dancers from all over the world travel and gather at the Tropicana for 4 days of dancing, workshops and shows. After 2 hours of watching the top performers from all over the floor, everyone proceeds to the ballroom and by 1 am it is full and throbbing, people, most who are strangers to each other, dancing away until 4 a.m. when the music stops and those whose feet are still standing may go up to someone's room for even more dancing and merriment.

Sleep a few hours, get up to take classes, eat, shows, dance, repeat. For a few pictures and video click here LV Salsa Congress

I remember my first congress. As a newbie to the scene I was self-conscious. I worried about 'messing up', not following correctly, stepping on the wrong place. The times I asked someone else to dance, I felt that fear of rejection guys are certainly more used to than us.

As the years have gone by, my dancing has improved some. I still sometimes let worry get to me. That Saturday I danced with some worry: Worry that I am not as good as others, that I am not a performer, that I would make mistakes or that I have bad habits in my dance. Saturday I had more trouble hearing the music, and blamed it on my not-good-enough abilities.  Saturday I danced less and I smiled less.

Sunday night, not even pretending to dress up for the occasion:

 I made it a purpose to just go and have fun, enjoying the last few hours of this year's dance marathon. I had the best dances of the weekend and I danced better than I had all weekend.

Congress ended and I caught up on fluids and sleep yesterday. Then, this morning I rose before the sun and taught yoga. I have been working on projecting strength but with a sense of peace and evenness. Today, my inspiration was that exhilarating and calm feeling from Sunday. Dancing away with happiness, floating in the movement. I found my teaching. I found my voice, steady and strong, urging for challenge and form and breathing. I found the peace in teaching, like I found the peace in the dancing of Sunday, and there was no fear.

Fear holds us back. No matter whether we are talking about workouts, hobbies or daily decisions at work and at home. Fear hinders us. Without fear, we can soar. Fear, most often, begins with us and towards us. We are our biggest critics. If we can love ourselves, forgive ourselves and give to ourselves, we can shatter the fear at least long enough to get a little closer to our true selves today, and as we dance and repeat, we get through life with peace and strength, and maybe even happiness. So dance away and remember:

repost from 2012: The world I like to Live In

Is different from the world in which I exist. In the world that I exist in there is a maze of compartmentalized reality and an absence of illusion. I deal in musts, in haves and have nots, in facts and in probabilities and the fickleness of memory.  Every day however, even in the darkest hardest moments, there's an opportunity to look at someone in the eyes and see a person in all it's complexity, and not to judge.

It is the ability to empathize and to distance oneself all at once, to make a hard moment a little bit easier, which drives me. On hard days you walk away feeling drained from the energy poured out of me, or from the energy expended holding up walls that were necessary at the time.


Still, the work that I exist in comes easy for me. I can move in and out, I can open and close I can let you see and make you believe. I've had practice, years of practice in learning to exist. I can go on my own path and wash away the drainage and tuck away the feelings that I may have experienced.

 The lessons, those I like to keep. I can exist without feelings, in that world. I save those; for those who are very dear.

Now, the world I like to live on is a different thing. This world exists under my existence, every day, every moment. In this world the tiniest thing is important, and noticed and acknowledged as a miracle. In this world there's a quiet but perpetual love surrounding me, cushioning my movements. I walk as if I walked on water. I feel embraced by the day. I breathe in and it's not air, it's purpose. I am alone and so happy. I need nothing. I have me. I feel intensely but I have no need to share other than to share kind actions with others and make sure that if I have the chance to brighten the path of someone else, I do, and I thank the universe for the chance to do so, before I move along. I'm like a butterfly...softly landing and taking off.

Now you come into my worlds. But you must pick one, you see. I can't dream of you in my world and love you in the other. For if I dream of you I dream of love that is soft kind and effortless. If I dream of you I dream of certainty, trust and forever. If I dream of you, I fly far away with just a blink of an eye and I soar above in contentment. Oh, and I dream of you.

If you want the dream, it's yours. Know it's grand. Know it's there, but be ready. There's a flood of me that's been stored away, kept away from wasting, waiting for a reason to be released. If you want it, it is yours and I'll be yours and I... I will love you. I will love you like I love the air and the sun and the earth beneath my feet. I will think of you and all that is you as me. I will plunge into the abyss without asking for anything... except for you to know the delicacy of the occasion, and for you to enjoy and dream with me. I will love you with passion,  like the passion of the birth of a volcano. I will love you slow, and I will love you deep and I will forget for a while, that we are two.

But you must dream. You must dream, or you won't see that world. If you don't dream,  it will happen all around you and you will miss it.

If you don't dream with me I will dream it in my world and let it go, but keep it forever, just so I remember what it felt like. If you don't dream with me the rain will come and wet the flowers as they dance to the mounting breeze. If you don't dream with me the storm of my love will come and pour itself and the lighting will thunder with excitement and like the storm, you'll see it pass and watch it go,  as forever leaves you.  So dream with me, dance with me, let the rain wash away your worries and your fears, and come away with me. As you stand beneath the willows and feel the air on your skin, know it's my touch. Let me soak you, and take you away from your cold reality, so you can be a part of mine, under my skin.

Originally: from the old blog

The pros and cons of crutches: All the things you wouldn't learn if you didn't break your feet.

Broke my foot. Again.

Same culprits: running and turned out dancer's feet and this time add a  bad choice of terrain.

I know better. I just don't exercise what I know, you know?

So I ran on a treadmill with my Vivo. Then there was a crack.. I rock at efficiency! break your foot in less than 15 minutes may be the title of another post. I'll explain further how to enhance your chances of injury.

So yesterday I did something unheard of for me. I had it looked at. I had an x-ray. I confirmed my fears, although I have self-treated for this before, as evidenced here or here or I have a few more of those... somewhere.

In any case, thus ensued a forced adventure in slowing down, looking at the bumps on the road, and learning to graciously accept door openings, and here are my listed findings, for those curious enough to walk in my shoes. Or in my one shoe and my one air cast boot, more accurately speaking:

1. Crutches fit in a small size sedan. I was worried for a minute. (plus)
2. You gotta make sure you really secure it under your armpit. (con)
3. They are great conversation tools. One day, I might just wear them for fun instead of need and see how  many more people I talk to that day. (plus)
4. You can trip.  OMG can you trip. On whatever you call the bottom of the door frame, the rugs, you name it. You have to watch out for separations between elevator and floor, and it is toootally an exercise in caution. (con).
5.  People open doors for you. Pick , plus or con. I normally do the opening, so it's a con for me, but I'm learning not to feel like a wuss. This is the exercise in help-acceptance. 
6. Upper body work out. (total plus).
7. Time management.... (total con). I want to go fast I want to go fast I want to...almost fall, no, not going that fast.
8. You could trip others. May come in handy if needed. (not assigned).
9. Can't get coffee. 
10. This is really the worst. So much so I'd assign it 3 times the bad points. Upon parking, exiting vehicle, donning my backpack and safely and securely unholstering my crutches, I realized there would be NO COFFEE!!! on my walk to the office, for logisitical reasons obviously. This was the day I saw myself  forced to pick between crutches and coffee and it shall live in infamy.
11. Getting off on the wrong floor is so close yet so far away... no stairs for you today. Reminder: Count your blessings! --so plus.

 Overall, a plus, if not for the coffee, my third  world problem, which turns it all upside down.

All the things you wouldn't learn if you didn't break your feet.

Here's One of today's lessons:
"The central question of a warrior's training is not how we avoid uncertainty and fear but how we relate to discomfort. How do we practice with difficulty, with our emotions, with the unpredictable encounters of an ordinary day?" Pema Chodron

--with a smile and a gentle disposition. whenever possible. (me). 

While It Lasts

On love... of some sort. On love of the free kind. On love of the wanderer, the traveler, the free spirit that roams the earth without being tethered to anything or anyone for long. On a love without demands, other than to enjoy and to be and let it be. Could we? be more like this? Can we, be more like this every day in all our interactions with everyone around us?

 Isn't this, in a way, how we love our children too? Irony, that the most demanding position asks for the most egoless love, and you give your all, while it lasts.

Edel Juarez---Mientras Dure

Mientras Dure

While It Lasts--Edel Juarez
I don't mind showing my weakness when I write

If I am not yet strong, and haven’t ever been.

I do not know to love in the way here we play to do so.

I love with my elbows, with my dreams, with my voice and have no objection to not being loved in return.

I do not care how long my loves live,

I love while it lasts, while I can, while the glass gets emptier and I get on my way.

I do not understand how humans love,

That is why I am here with you, because of your doubt,

Because of what you don’t know and you don’t find out,

Because of everything you give without even knowing what you had.

I love your wings, your flight, your hips where my nights end, my nostalgia.

I do not care if you don’t understand that I love you, that you doubt it and you cry and you ask it and you demand. I love you. While it lasts.

Catch Your Breath

-Hang out with me!

 He begged. In that annoying high pitched voice, because he read right through my reluctant stance.

--Oh but it is so hard to do that when it hurts to be with you!

-Come on! Hang out with me!

--I don’t want to be here, not today, not right now, can we reschedule? I can just get up and leave. Sorry if it’s rude, it’s just not working out for me.

-You’ve hung out with me so many times before… even when I’ve made you cry.

--Well, yes, yes, I have, but right now it is too painful to be here. I’m not even talking emotionally painful; forget that, that would be nice. It is physically painful to be with you. I just want to leave.

-If you leave, you come right back; in ragged, torn and uneven shallowness. It really takes you nowhere. Why don’t you just listen, take a slower breath. Just a tad, just a little.

--It’s too hard. Can we reschedule? Maybe this was not a great idea. Maybe we should not have met today.

-Just give it a chance, slowly, and open up. Haaaaaannnnngggg out. Say it slow. Say it on the inhale; then you’re home. Work through the anxiety. Hang out please.

The pain doesn’t go away. Not at all. Not today. But I hang out, and it gets a little easier with every slow breath.

New soreness all over from bodywork, adjustments and a self-inflicted ass kicking is threated through my back. Forward bend and pigeon instantly became my mortal enemies, until that Small victory, a minor recession and it dulls. The more I pull away from it, the more it lulls. Me away.

I give.

I am now coming out of a bright  mighty ocean threaded with white strings, I free myself and I sit on the beach to contemplate from far away, following his voice, he sits next to me. I watch the waters expand, and roar and settle down, just a tad. Bright and mighty; tranquil and unperturbed at once.

--I didn’t want to hang out. I wished you cared, Breath, but you don’t give a shit. You are the most insensitive to my selfish stride. Even my ego cares more!

-duh!, you have the nerve to say.

--Ha.  I’ve given you the confidence to be relentless, to keep on edging on when I rather you hang back and frankly, let me leave. I can’t unknow you. I can ignore you, but now it’s hard when I know the climax of release and peace you bring.

--You’ve become the silent voice in the back of my head. Great.

Breath looked a bit sad at that.

--Wait, I mean that. Great! Thank You Breath.

-- We hung out today, I pouted and threw a tantrum and you just held me steady, so I could bend.

--You didn’t take my struggle personally.

--You showed me how to expand and show you new and old places alike.

--We made more room for what’s good for me and my soul.

--Besides the mat and the floor, thank you for letting me catch you when I fall.

If I Died Today.

If I Died Today

I would be happy and I hope you would too. If died today I would leave this world content. I don’t have my shit together, not at all. I am in between as usual. I am working towards, as always. But if I died today my bases are covered: The kids know I love them, I tell them so much every single day that they repeat it with the drawn out kid-speak of “we know, you love us” or the usual sigh when I say “guess what?!” Only to be followed by another 100^th bout of I love you for the day if they don’t fill it in first. I hug them enough. I kiss them enough.

 So if I died today I know I gave them all my love, every chance I got. Maybe I didn’t get to spend all the time I would with them. Maybe I was being a mom and “being mean.” But love?; that I gave enough of. If I died today what they remember should be good, so I’d be happy. The rest is irrelevant when I am dead. Will they forget? What will I miss? If anything I’ve seen is the universe will work it all out with the imprint you leave, or without.

If I died today I would be happy and I hope you would be too. If I died today I would leave this world at peace. I know my family knows I live my life to the best and the fullest every day. I’ve quit my job and gone to yoga, I’ve gone out on Sunday nights and gone to woken up to work Monday mornings. So I hope they’d have no regrets and no words left unsaid, because I don’t. I hope they’d know I enjoyed my every day. I hope they’d have comfort in the fact that I missed out on nothing, and I put an exclamation at the end of always every day all the time and I always loved them even when I disagreed, or didn’t pick up my phone or told them it was easy not to give a crap about some people or somethings and drama and be happier that way.

If I died today I would be joyful and I hope you would be too. As my friends, I would hope you know I appreciated you. I saw you, I cherished you, I gave thanks for you and every crossing of our paths was moment that shaped me. You were all my teachers and life was better because of you.

If I died today I could only die happy as I feel because I know I did some good, today and yesterday, not to perfection, but to the best I could manage then. I made mistakes but I tried not to dwell and just to learn how to improve from there. If I died today I would die knowing I lived a purposeful life and lined my thoughts and actions with the stars. I laughed and danced and did dangerous things and safe things and took risks and loved and hurt and cried and mourned and learned and explored and worked hard and served and fell and laughed again. I took my breaths towards the sky and the light. I did yoga in the dark of the moon light. I held the fire both in my heart and in the palm of my hand. I shone my heart with fear and courage. I kept my feet on the hard solid earth where I am headed back, and it held me when I was unsteady and it will hold me when I am scattered ashes, when dead. 

If I died today I would want you to dance. I would ask you to close your eyes and feel your soul and let yourself go and hang, suspended, in the place where the world of body and the world of spirit meet; and smile. If when you open your eyes you take a breath just a little bit deeper or with a little more happiness, or you give an extra kiss, or flip someone off one less time on the road; then you honor me, and you honor yourself and everyone who has been here and left.

So make your own peace, pick your battles, take a nap and have some tea this afternoon. Talk to a friend, sing in the car or in the shower. Dance in the elevator. Smile to a stranger. Go to bed knowing you loved and made a difference in someone’s life. Thank for every day. Time here is fucking short and all I can hope for you is that if you died today, you would die happy too and you cuss a little today too. Every body should. 

If you died today I shall dance for you anyways, maybe have a little whisky too. Cheers! For what you brought to me and to those you loved and for all the good you were. Cheers for all your mistakes and for being free while you were here and now there, wherever or nowhere, who cares. I would celebrate, and then I’d take a deep breath and kiss mine more today. 

Musings of Palm Tree Trimmings

I've stayed home completely this week. Cooking, cleaning, painting and putting away palm tree leaves. Even though I quit my full time job in October 2012, I have stayed busy with part time work, a semester at UNLV, and yoga teacher training. Since the SO is back to work as of yesterday after a month hiatus between jobs, I am now the sole daytime guardian of the children of Summer; those little people who wake up early on Saturday and Sunday; late on Tuesday; want to live in Cartoonland and turn into bottomless goblins.

Today I taught yoga at 530 a.m. and came home to the usual duties. I ended up tackling work in the back yard. While I poked myself with big thorns and cursed (admittedly not yogi behavior) I held some thoughts about my past lives. Recounting what in retrospect, seems like quite a full life already.

I've seen dead people. Up close and personal. I have touched and medically handled them. That's not so bad. Death is peaceful. It's telling the family that is hard. I've seen people dying. That's harder; especially when they die alone. I've seen people wake up from a long sleep to know everyone they loved and cared for was no longer here on Earth.  I've seen too many mothers be told their babies won't make it, and shared the grief of even more too many who have bid good bye to their babes too soon. I've been there for some closer to me when those unthinkable sorrowful moments have happened.  I've rescued drowning children and hauled drunks out of the strip in Las Vegas on New Years Eve.

I've worked in hospitals, prisons, courtrooms and visited the homes of killers who warn you they could kill you if they wanted to, or seen them in jail interviews room where the same could happen by the time help arrives.

I'm 30. I'm picking palm tree leaves and stuffing them in bags; breaking only to cut more fruit up because breakfast was an hour ago and there are cries of hunger, yet again. 

I've seen enough. Palm tree pickings are easy times, even peaceful happy times.

Any more than those memories hardens me. It changes me. That's why when I worked I ran to yoga 2 times a day between double workload. I over-trained myself into injuries doing crazy things to relieve the stress. All the years of studying policy and political science and all I realized at the end is: without money and without will there is no changing, and there is little will and too much money spent on other things.

From my years in the legal field I came to believe it was just a well-oiled machine. For all my 14 hour days and sleepless nights, in the end it made little difference to the system and the people involved on both ends, aside from a couple extraordinary times when we rocked the boat, the times that keep many others going.

I trim palm trees. Make lunch, mop floors and review summer work. I play with water, I snuggle on the couch.

Still, I make more of a difference now, solving disputes over make believe, guiding a class through breathing, or guiding my own breathing when I write in the middle of a hide-and-seek operation in full force.  I have a chance to change the world. I can change my world when I live practicing peace. I can hopefully make a small impact in the life of a fellow yogi, even if it's only for a day. I can make this summer memorable for my kids by slowing down, if you can call being home for the summer, slowing down.

I'm 30, and I have seen enough to realize there is no additional benefit in living life stressfully for success.  Do what you love, don't let it get it to you, because in the end, life is about connecting to our inner happiness and figuring out that being happy with ourselves is more fulfilling than any paycheck or an ego boost of self-importance.

Can we ride the sun?

It's fitting that the first blog is today. Today's the Day of the Sun. The summer Solstice. My daugther's birthday and the day I became a mother. Today this project is born out of the sun and my personal suns.
Eventhough today is E's birthday, it is my son, M, who is attached to the sun.

 It was a conversation with him which gave me the image for this blog. It went like this:

-Mommy, can we ride the sun all the way until tomorrow?

I paused. I was in yoga teacher training. We had been paying our respects to the sun every day and some mornings he would join me, chanting "Shanti Shanti Shanti Om" before giving water to the sun.

I didn't want to say no, because the sun is a powerful force in how we go from one day to the next.

So I answered:
 --I suppose we do, every day we wake up with the sun and we follow it until nightfall and then we wake up to follow it again.

He didn't bite.
-No! I don't mean that. I mean can we travel to the sun and ride for a whole day!

-I don't think anyone has invented a way to do that yet.
-Well, I will work on it when I grow up.

That is how dreams begin. He wants to be a ninja, or a scientist. I keep telling him he can do both. No need to let go of any one thing you want to do. He goes on to bring up The Hulk and Ironman of course. Then he momentarily debates if maybe he wants to just be Batman when he grows up.

In any case, be it Batman or ninja scientist, he also wants to build a car that loves back.  He figured this when he heard the Bluetooth in the car and I explained the car talks but doesn't feel. So he will build a car that can have feelings and love mommy like he does.

In the middle of superhero scientist discussion and cars that love back, I nurture his dreams. I want him to reach and leap forward. I imagine that if at one point a NASA engineer to be had a conversation with his mother about traveling to the moon. I would want to think she encouraged his spirit, instead of domesticating it with what's real or what is practical.

Thus, we have a ninja practice station:

A.K.A. the couch.

Every day without prompt he is tumbling, leaping over pillows and showing me his latest ninja combination. Then we spell and he builds Legos; for science's sake.

I can go look around for wisdom all over, in books and on the mat. The most raw and bright, I find when I look through the eyes of my children, or in the miracle of a sunrise and a flower.

I hope this blog to be a place to share those moments, along with yoga adventures and wisdom on the sages depending on what comes my way. I hope this is a place that serves my teachers, big and small and brings something to your life as well.

Happy Solstice!!