"A Rose By Any Other Name..."

The power of words. This quote from the play" Romeo and Juliet" was written 400 years ago. It is still quoted today for how powerful it is. These were words that Juliet said when confronted by the fact that because Romeo was a Montegue, she should shun him and her love for him. His name mattered not to her, what mattered was the love they felt for one another. "A rose by any other name  would smell as sweet". What infinite wisdom did this young woman have. She knew that a word/name had no meaning to the power of Love. She was willing to die for her Love. Imagine having that much faith today.

I relate this to my faith. My long search for meaning. I have been a traveler for truth. I have always known I was guided. I have always known there was a power greater than myself. I have known It to be named God, Goddess, Spirit, Universe, Buddha, Allah, Hu, Angels, Jesus, Yahweh, Creator, the Divine, Father, Mind, Soul, Life, Grace and more. God, by any other name, is still God. A Power beyond ourselves.I care not which one is used. I am open to that Voice inside me now.

We are guided. He is the tiny voice inside us that says, 'Yes' when we are unsure. She is who affirms our right decisions with a swish of sweet feeling in our hearts. He is who we called to in those events when we think we cannot take another moment and we cry out His name and ask for help. And are answered. If only we would ask more often and sooner and avoid unneeded  fear, sadness and pain. 

In the depths of sadness after my Mother passed, in the middle of a snowstorm with my heart filled to the blink with confusion, fear, sadness, resentment, blame, anger, I stepped out into the storm and raged. I cried, I screamed, I asked the universal question , "WHY?!?!?" until I had no more in me and I asked for help. "God, help me", I said, "please help me, I cannot do this anymore, I cannot go on this way, with this burden of unhappiness and misunderstanding. Help me, please God". I walked inside, I took off my clothes and I went to bed. I slept as though I'd been through a storm and I woke cleansed. I felt that a great weight had been lifted and that I was finally seeing Light in my darkness. Within the week, I was introduced to the opportunity to begin The Course in Miracles. She'd heard my prayer.

Maybe I have told this story before. It is important in so many ways. Miracles happen. We have to be open to them. If we carry the burdens of the past along with us everyday, we are blocking all the possibilities today. We can say the words, we can remind ourselves of the past  to pretend that we are getting the Now, but, ultimately, to be healed and whole we must let go. I had to let go of the grief, the misunderstanding, and see past the behavior to the true essence of the Love in all of us. At first, it took tiny steps. Looking at small grievances and looking for understanding there. Trying to see each situation through someone else's eyes. How would my mom look at this? How would a friend advise me on this? How would Goddess want me to see this? What if how I was looking at it was wrong?

There is a purity that came from this time in my life, what I call my three years of grief and growth. The studying of The Course in Miracles brought understanding. The connecting to the Divine through prayer, contemplation, study and yoga were the steps. The re-examination of past events and finding the Grace in them, showed me what I missed by being attached to the meanings I gave them. And then forgiving myself or the others and moving on. I would ask myself, "why should I forgive them?????' and the answer would come. "Because it is time, the weight has been much to bear and it no longer serves." It reminds me of the fabulous pictures of the people of India releasing the flower and candle bouquets to the Ganges River. Or blowing a Dandelion to the wind. Or writing a letter and then burning it and burying the ashes, like old lovers, in the yard. Creating ceremony for the past and letting it go so I can make room for a more peaceful approach to my Life. 

Roses are in bloom here. I smell them and find the small differences in their scent. I see the beauty and light in them as part of God's plan for salvation and peace. I stay away from that which does not serve the greater good. I pray for the children. I pray for Love to overtake those in need. I send Light and Love to everyone who reads this blog. And to the million of women who walked their talk in Washington in funny pink hats! God Bless!!

My Mother's day

Happy Mother's Day to my Goddess friends! 

I hope that you are surrounded by love and light from family and loved ones  or, like me, you are infused with the love of all the women in the world loving you from near and far.  I send out love and light to you all. As I sit here at my computer in Hood River I look through the eyes of love to every family I see walking by. 

I think back with enormous gratitude for all the beautiful births I witnessed and the power of women that were becoming mother's for the first time as well as again. What a gift!!!! Every single person I see came from a mother, a Goddess, a believer, a saint, someone who looked down upon them at their birth with awe and love and connection. In thirty plus years I rarely saw anything else. Those magic moments being present to the Goddess in each one, I am eternally grateful to each woman for the courage and strength it takes to give birth to another human spirit.

Motherhood evaded me, it was not my plan, I thought I'd have a bucket of kids. Not that I did not love a bundle of them, oh yes I did. I thank my friends and family for sharing their babies with me. I learned so much from these sweet children, I learned about the love of a child. I learned the preciousness of a tender hug, a sigh of release after a tearful tumble, the sweet smell of a tired child in my arms. Yes, I loved me a few!!

 And life happened, I moved around the country,  I had freedom to travel and see the world. It was what I worked for, to see, to learn, to experience life in other countries  and through books, each countries history. I admired art in every country from museums to street art, beads, etchings, paintings, tiles, pottery, jewelry. My home a collection of my memories and experiences. I followed a path to spiritual awakening, and I began to understand the world I inhabit. I shared this all with my mom. We shared many things.

She was a risk taker, too. She courageously met and married a man who lived in Central America, he was a pilot (as was her stepfather and stepbrother) and she moved to Nicaragua. Brave! For the next fourteen years she lived and brought to this world four children. And when it was not enough, she left him with her four children and moved home to Miami, got a job driving a school bus and soon became the first woman realtor in Miami. She pursued her love of art taking oil and acrylic paint classes at night. 

My mom had secrets. Unhappy events that molded her. It gave her a rough edge, which showed up in her child-rearing. It was difficult to understand her as a young woman and the result was conflict and alienation. 

Yet, looking back she always got me. She was hard on me, but she was  my "go to" shoulder to cry on. She was so smart. Yet, she was the product of the events of her life and unlike me she developed a strong shell. I was always transparent and "sensitive", as though this was a dis-ease. It wasn't until later in my life that I saw this "sensitivity " for what it was. A Gift. The ability to feel deeply. But, in the beginning nothing but shame was attached to it. And fear, as I was also very sensitive to other peoples feeling, even when they weren't.

From as far back as I can remember, I felt bruised by words and actions of others until I embraced this gift. I realized that in my sensitivity was my strength.

I see now that she did the best she could. And I couldn't be more grateful for the good times. And through my spiritual learning there is nothing that ever happened that was beyond forgiving. Nothing. It just was what it was. My mom was brilliant, she was funny, elegant, an artist, someone I always admired as did many other Goddesses. And I miss her deeply.

So today I celebrate my Mom! May she rest in Peace and Love. May she live in my heart forever. May she know that I loved her to the best of my ability and I thank her for bringing me to this earth at this time. I thank her for my looks :), my travel addiction, my Art background, my strength and whether she likes it or not, my sensitivity.

 Love and Light to you Mom! Happy Mother's Day!

The Stories....

"Spiritual growth involves giving up the stories of your past so the universe can write a new one. You are not denying your childhood; you're simply transcending any of its negative aspects."
 These words are written by Marianne Williamson in her book "The Law of Divine Compensation". I was moved by them this morning.

 So many of us think we have this huge bag of rocks of events that happened to us in our past that are responsible for all the things that are happening to us today when in fact they are just stories. They no longer have any real meaning other than the meaning we have attached to them. And we convert meaning into feeling.

There comes a time in our lives when we must set aside the bag of rocks-maybe create a rock garden, maybe bury the rocks but at some point we need to let go of the stories and move on into our real life. this is a difficult task, I know I've done the work. But the outcome is the whole opening of our hearts. The freedom to feel the love that is around us. The freedom to extend the love within us to others. Every event and every story that we create about our past is a brick in the invisible wall that we surround ourselves with. It makes it difficult for love to flow in and to flow out.

Sometimes it takes baby steps, yet every step towards love is huge. Learning to have compassion and love for ourselves and others even in the face of diversity and anger and resentment changes the world. And each time we remove a brick from that invisible wall the wall becomes less powerful. And as we take each brick and look at it and examine it and find the goodness in it we can set it down. The wall becomes weaker the love become stronger. The strings that bind our hearts begin to break and we begin to let go of the stories, take the gifts from the events and move forward in our lives. We see the miracles. It might be at the grocery store, it might be with a new friend but we see the miracles because we've let go of that which no longer serves. When we are open Love flows, when we are closed Love is blocked. This is the origin of pain, these blocked places in our bodies and souls. Miracles can only occur through the eyes of Love.

So, open up and open out. Spread your arms out to the Universe and God and let it flow. Feel the sun on your face, the breeze brush your cheeks and be open to the flow of Love now. Be in Gratitude for all the Miracles in your life. Be the Miracle in someone else's life by flowing Love their way! Amen!

Our Republican Sisters

A friend called me recently. She was very upset. She was almost estranged from her family because of her views on politics. She was almost angry but more than that, she wanted to understand how and why they could not see what so many of us see in the present president.

I remember waking up the day of the election. I didn't know the results yet, but somehow I felt so heavy. And of course when I found out the weight of me could hardly get out of bed. But what I found fascinating was how many other people, many my women friends, felt the weight of it as well and somehow felt it was our fault or responsibility. Imagine the power we have in sensing our sisters this way. We were united in this feeling.

Suddenly there was rumbling among the masses. Protests by high school students and the LBGT  community, women were marching in the millions. People of all races were standing up. Something in our great country had changed. The question is- had it changed for the better or the worse.

The cries that call to me the most is how do we talk to our Republican sisters. How do we make sense of it. One thing is certain- sometimes we do not get to understand why people think the way they do. That does not preclude us from understanding that by loving them and allowing our differences to just be, we can get closer to them. Just because other people don't like what we're saying doesn't mean it's wrong. And that goes both ways. Our reality may not be their reality. And judging them invites them to judge us and that create separation.

If we want to reach our sisters we must let go of judgment. For judgment is separation. How do we do that? By coming from a space of love regardless of our conflict and ideas. Be the love you want to see in them. Communicate from the spiritual depth of who you really are. Know that unkind words and actions are of the mind of a body in pain. We cannot reach them by attacking them. We can only reach them by being respectful and having faith in their journey.

"We do not heal by pointing outward we heal by the pointing inward. To recognize where we ourselves need to atone and be made aware."- Marianne Williamson.

What does that look like? Sometimes by simply saying "I'm sorry you feel that way" can lead to opening communication. Sometimes by just agreeing to disagree and loving anyway can lead to a better understanding and an openness to listen. We are not at war with our sisters so put down your swords and open your hearts and love them. Accept that you may not agree with them but we are not at war with our sisters. It is our job as women to love one another and to be respectful and show them the way by our actions.  In so doing we allow them to open their hearts as well. And so the world is healed.

Have faith my Sisters and Goddesses!

My Path all along

I can't say how long I have known that my path has to do with God. But I have known this for a long time. I called it many things; Spirit, Oneness, Goddess, a Higher Power and more. But I have always known that there is a path and I wanted to be on it. Where it got difficult was how others felt about it. Because, I thought that what others thought about me mattered-for years. And so I veered off the path here and there. I questioned my beliefs, my thoughts, my reality. I wondered, "am I wrong, am I fucked up, why does this seem so wrong to them, what if I am wrong, what if God does not exist?" But, I keep coming back to the Path.

Why didn't I just put the gauntlet down? Why didn't I get it, what others told me about what to believe or not believe? What have  I been searching for? From when I was a child in Miami at The Little Flower Catholic Church where I received my Holy Communion. I was fascinated  by God. I wanted to be a Nun for a time, then I wanted to be an Astronaut. But when I committed my first documentable sin, I was lost. It was a simple thing, I was walking along the sidewalk one day and I saw this beautiful Hibiscus and I plucked it off its limb-just like that. And suddenly, I thought, "oh no, I have broken the seventh commandment "Thou shall not steal". What do I do now? Do I throw it away? Do I keep it? Do I hide it? I remember it so well. I was 7 years old. I was a sinner. I was going to hell.

Catholicism mattered to me. I loved going to Mass and being able to recite it. When we lived in San Juan I went to Catholic school (Spanish speaking) and I learned to recite it in Spanish as well as Latin. The churches were so beautiful there with life size statues of the Virgen Mary and the Christ Child. Each week the Christ Child would be dressed in the same robes as the Priest. The windows streamed with color and light. The statues bled. I felt the connection to God there.

But something changed when we moved back to the states. The church there in Naples seemed so sterile. St Ann's was a round church and the Cross of Jesus was just a big gold cross, there were no bleeding figures or baby Jesus statues. It did not feel right to me. So, I played hooky, hung outside through  the service and got caught. My parents did not attend, my brother and I just walked to church on Sunday mornings by ourselves. We would just hang out outside until the service was over and walk home. One day a priest came up and asked us what we were doing. He was really nice and not threatening. We told him it didn't feel right here. He asked us , "what would you like to be doing to celebrate God this morning?" We said, " Go to the beach"? "Then go, celebrate there and be in gratitude of His gifts".

When I got to college much about what I knew about the church had changed. The Catholic church had rules that I did not think that God would really send down. Not the God I knew. I stopped going except for holidays. I asked questions, I got "Spiritual". I Read "Be Here Now".  I listened to the Beatles after they returned for India, their music moved me with their sitars and psychedelics. Yet I was trying to make my way in the world and conforming became the norm. So I sucked in my curiosity and followed the fun. I moved away from God for a while, but not from the search.

I hung with cool people who said, God is dead. I bought into it. I let go of the traditional God. I learned about Buddha. I fell for the 100+ Gods of the Hindu. I searched the Inner Child. I listened to Wayne Dyer, Depok Chopra, Marianne Williamson. I got curious about who I am. I read Byron Katie, more Marianne, Ekard Tolle, Carolyn Myss, and so many more. I was looking for the God/Goddess in me.

I became involved with the Oneness movement. I became a Deeksha giver. Now there was a feeling of Godliness. Suddenly, I started to feel alive in a different way from Martini's and good food.
I felt like I had been given the privilege to channel God's Light. Something in me cracked open. I did not know if I was seeping out or the world was moving in. But, God mattered now.

When my Mother passed I nearly died.No matter how much I prepared for this inevitable event, no matter the hardship we had been through as mother and daughter, nothing prepared me for the overwhelming sorrow I experienced. And the loss. Not just of her but of what had been my family. What had been my friends. It was a crushing and numbing blow. I could barely stand up. I had none of my power, my strength, my gumption, my get-it-done.  I had and was -nothing. I was alone up in the hills of Mosier. Fulfilled  to get one thing done a day.

And I was still searching. I read my Marianne books and decided that I wanted to find A Course in Miracles and six months after mom passed a class became available. I jumped in. I did my lessons each morning before I left the house. And slowly the pain eased. I felt able to connect to others, in particular my yoga group of Dudes. I felt as though I was coming up for air after a long, deep dive into murky waters. The simple gift of kindness demonstrated by my group was amazing in simplicity. And the course was opening my heart to forgiveness.

The Course changed me, it opened me up to love and forgiveness and faith. After my mom passed, I did not think I could ever survive the betrayal I felt. But the Course taught me that to hold all that, would never free me and that only in asking for atonement would I ever be at peace. And  by surrendering my unhappiness and disappointment and fear, would I ever be present to the love available all around me. I have looked back at my life and know that this has been all I have ever wanted. To love. To love the beauty in the world, in all those babies I witnessed being born, to all the sweet laughter of children, to love people just because I can. I was never wrong in this, just off the path. I thought that what other people thought about me mattered. I thought I was too sensitive, when I was just gifted with sensitivity. I thought I was not like other people, I was different in a bad way, when all I was was just like them in search for a more profound meaning in my life.

As a child I wanted to be wise, like my father, and now I am. I own it, my knowledge about many things is endless and available. I did not live this life with my eyes closed, with my hands over my ears. I have been awake all along. I have been paying attention. And it all brings me to the now, the present that which matters, that which I have control over. This is all there is in this lifetime. And I am loving it and every other person, sight, sound I can. Just because-I can.