The Myth of Opposition

Can I just say that I love Facebook and the internet? Love love love! Recently a friend posted as her status:

more telling than how people treat their loved ones is how they treat those they are in opposition to…that is ones true self.

I sat with this for a few minutes, and my Higher Self said, “Yes, kind of. There is no such thing as opposition.” Another friend asked me to explain, and this post was born.

In our experience of our worlds, we project our beliefs on everything and everyone. Pretty much all of us are raised to believe that there are enemies. We then see the world through those lenses, that our tribe is right, and the other tribes are a threat to our existence.

But really, they’re not. The other tribes believe the same thing. God is always on our side. Every side. No one says “I am the evil, the wrong, the hater.” So when I feel the dance of opposition, my task is to look inside and see what it’s activating. That’s the treasure. That is the beginning to finding there really isn’t an opposition – someone is triggering my fears for my survival.

When I no longer “oppose”, then the “other side” has nothing to root in.

From C. G. Jung:

If you imagine someone who is brave enough to withdraw all his projections, then you get an individual who is conscious of a pretty thick shadow. Such a man has saddled himself with new problems and conflicts. He has become a serious problem to himself, as he is now unable to say that *they* do this or that, *they* are wrong, and *they* must be fought against. He lives in “The House of Gathering.” Such a man knows that whatever is wrong in the world is in himself, and if he only learns to deal with his own shadow he has done something real for the world. He has succeeded in shouldering at least an infinitesimal part of the gigantic, unsolved social problems of our day.

The shadow, the part that activates in me in a visceral way below the heart, is the indicator that I am seeing from projection. Maybe I can win the argument, pass the law, but has anything really changed? No. I am still me, the other is still my opponent. Same. And in our culture of majority rule, it is the others who are a threat to our existence. The pendulum can swing either way, whichever side has more members, whoever is louder.

This, my friends, is a call to unity, a taking back of our power. Wrongs call for righting from our place of our greatest integrity, and from the place of compassion for our sisters and brothers, rather than from hating and pushing against our “enemies.” We already know what that dance reaps. Are we brave enough to withdraw our projections? Are we ready to create a new world based on a new way of being?

It’s time.

On Anxiety

Ah, anxiety.

I feel wired, hypersensory, my skin crawls.  Everything is overwhelming, and I can’t stop fidgeting.  It’s hard to find words.  Ugh!

And I think often it isn’t even mine.

I had lunch with a dear friend yesterday, and I apologized for my quietness and under-responding.  I explained I was dying with anxiety, for a second day in a row.  So she took my hand from across the table and held her thumb near the middle of my palm, told me to keep on talking and breathe deeply and smoothly.  The spot is Pericardium 8 in the acupuncture world.  She said it was bubbling.  Bubbling is too much chi, if it feels sunken, too little.  I guess I can be the too much chi queen.  In a matter of minutes, my chi had come into greater balance, the anxiety was gone.

Pericardium 8

There are also six healing sounds for the organs.  Oh, I have some learning to do!  What a gift from the Qi Gong world!  I wonder how many people’s lives would be vastly improved with these simple tools!  How many people could live well off of medications!  My family history is full of anxiety and panic attacks.  What if we just have an energy management issue?

The anxiety started up again today, and I held that point for a few minutes, breathing smoothly and deeply. Paying attention, I can feel the bubbling.  After a few minutes, much better!

 

Thank you, Anne!

New Year’s Eve Fire Walk, 2011

So y’all who know me know I find walking fire really fueling. The Light Institute in Galisteo, NM, hosts the New Year’s Eve Fire Walk every year, and it is facilitated by the lovely Gwen Feisst.

This year two friends joined me, which was wonderful! It is easy for people to say they want to go, but actually showing up is a very different thing! Kudos to Lori and Lory! So I gathered my friends and we headed the hour and some change northeast to Galisteo. After we settled in and three other brave souls arrived, Gwen began the workshop.

We head out into the clear winter night when it is time to light the fire. The wind has slowed, but is still blowing pretty hard. The cedar is stacked beautifully, in two rows of stacks. We place the kindling along the bottom, and Gwen stuffs balled-up newspaper strategically among and behind the kindling, and then douses the beautiful creation with vegetable oil. We distribute books of matches, and get to the business of lighting the fire.

In spite of, or perhaps with the help of the wind, it lights quickly and easily. A year ago, the year of the bitterly cold NYEFW, it was very stubborn and difficult to light, and behaved much like the year we walked into – intense, sometimes chaotic and unpredictable. The fire grew amazingly quickly, and along with the wind and the roar, seemed like a train traveling so fast that flames frantically lapped its exterior. (Forward explosion, as Chris Griscom referenced in the New Year’s Day Knowings the next day.)

I love this time of being with the fire. I love being mesmerized by the flames, looking at the colors in the flames, the shapes, the invitations. I sit with the fire from different angles. Fire is my teacher. This one is hot and furious. Strong and unified.

We have had rain and snow several times over the past few weeks, so the normally hard ground is soft and wet. I volunteer to tend the fire while the others return to the building and do some activities. I love this time alone with the fire. I do my own exercises, releasing what no longer serves me to the fire, bringing in the new.

fire and the moon, coyotes serenade in the background

Shortly before midnight, Gwen and the group return. Gwen grooms the coals, raking the pile into a long, narrow line. Another woman and I carry the large pieces away. Three others, fire walking veterans, join us. We take our shoes off, join hands and practice breathing through the soles of our feet, feel the oneness with the coals, and all who walk fire before us and after us. We take turns patting the coals with a shovel. The wind has almost completely stopped.

Then it is time for whoever feels that it is their night to walk first, to walk across the fire. Not even a minute passes, and our first walker crosses the fire. Then the second. I love this time. I look in, ask my Higher Self. She says, “Yes, now is a good time.” I walked a short distance. This fire is soft, gentle. Not particularly hot, though I know it is really sizzling hot. I feel excited, magical! Others are walking, laughing, too. Walk for family, for love, for conscious evolution! I walked the full length several times – it feels great! By now my feet are getting really cold! It is about 20 degrees, and the ground is moist. When everyone who wants to walk the fire is done, we hold hands and whoop and holler through the fire! Woowoowoowoowoo!!!!

Me walking fire in April, 2010. Look at all those spirits!

Oh, it is great fun to find my boots and socks in the dark. When I set them down, I always think I will remember exactly where they are. Ha! I could bring a flashlight, but what would be the fun in that?

We wander back up into the building, into the warmth and light. We celebrate with sparkling cider and decadent chocolate cake! The resident dogs offer to help with the cake. We sit on blankets on the wood floor, sharing our experiences. Gwen gives each of us a souvenir post card – we have walked fire, we perform miracles! After helping to pick up and many hugs, we load back in my Nissan and head home to Albuquerque.

Off with the smoky clothes, into the shower. It feels so good to shower the soot off my miracle feet! They are fine, perfect! Rosemary mint soap smells and feels delicious!

My friend Anne and I returned to the Light Institute the next day for Chris’s New Year’s Day Knowings. I always feel uplifted when I go. I endeavor to maintain that feeling, and not just bask in it for an hour or so, and then slip back into the same old same old.

Panther and the remnants of our amazing fire the next day

Welcome, 2012! You promise to be strong, transformative, magical! And thank you, Gwen, Chris, and my fire walking sisters and brothers – past, present, and future!

Over the Acequia and to the Bosque…

The mercury is up, and I am off to the Bosque. The Bosque is the narrow band of woods the hugs the Rio Grande in these dry parts. Corrales is pretty rural, and acequias are man-made irrigation ditches that loosely parallel the river through agricultural areas. I live by several of them.

One image is future wine, and the other is sandhill cranes having dinner. Honestly, I am not just sharing a part of my life, I am learning to blog from my phone. Thank you for your patience!

I feel peaceful here, it is one of my happy places.

Welcome!

Today is January 2, 2012. (1-2-12) I have been intending for a while to start a blog, and now feels like the time!

Thank you for joining me on this journey!

Light & love,

Yvette

2012

Are we there yet?

YES!!!

2012.  The end of the Mayan Calendar.  Soon, the Year of the Dragon.  A 5 year.  The dawning of the Age of Aquarius. <insert music here ♪♫>  What an exciting time to be in body!

I am excited by the opportunity, enhanced by cosmic events, to really do something here on earth, to be a part of conscious evolution!  Especially as this is an election year, we have a fabulous chance to reevaluate how we think things are.  Really, is choosing the “lesser of two evils” the best we can do… REALLY??  What do we really want?  In our lives, our children’s lives?  My hope is that we will out grow the Democrat/Republican game, outgrow the conversation of my tribe vs your tribe, we right ones vs you haters, survival.  We already know what the old way creates, it no longer serves us.

My vision is that we unite on a community level.  Share our skills, share resources, share our regard.  I would love to see education in the hands of the community.  What do we want our children to know?  What do we think will serve them best?  I am working to buy and eat as locally as I can, as organically as I can.  More simply every day.

In my dream, we outgrow money.  Money is for managing scarcity, and in this day and age, scarcity is  no longer a necessary reality.  Abundance is the truth of the Universe.  In my dream, we also outgrow cruelty and embrace regard. Regard for self, others, for unfoldment.  From regard, from compassion, from love, the ills we currently “battle” can evaporate.  When we remove the causes, the results no longer show up.

So the choices are ours.  What do we really want?  Not how has it been before, but what are our wildest dreams?

What are yours?