tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25908950227664517902024-03-13T05:35:45.458-07:00GatheringWOmentumDoris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.comBlogger34125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-44359838624514623122012-02-19T12:37:00.000-08:002012-02-19T13:11:16.889-08:00The 12-Year-Old Boy's Question<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;">Culver City, California</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;">Sunday, February 19, 2012</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;">1:08 p.m.</span><br />
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<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div style="font-size: 12px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-size: 12px; white-space: pre;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">THE 12-YEAR-OLD BOY’S QUESTION</span></b></span></div><div style="font-size: 12px; font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 17px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Since returning from our 6 1/2 month mother-daughter cross-country American walkabout which began last March and ended in September, I have not added to the 33 “Gathering WOmentum” blogs. The last one was written in late November, 2011.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">In the last few weeks, however, I have begun to share something of the essence and flavor of our journey with a few groups of friends with the understanding that in time we hope to produce a book and a documentary film about our journey. The working title we have come up with is, <b><i>“The Mother’s Road: A Pilgrimage to the Heart of the Matter.”</i></b></span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Recently, I was captivated by the straightforward question of a 12-year-old boy when he learned I had spent half a year walking the American landscape with my daughter, Viveka. <b>“What did you learn?” </b>he asked. What follows is my attempt to answer his question.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">* * *</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">After some reflection, I have come up with 13 things I have learned. But the first of them doesn’t really count. Let’s call it “ZERO,” for it is the ground zero, the context, or center point from which all things begin. The first, or “zero” point is not something I learned, but something, rather that I knew and had forgotten. You might say I had to “re-learn” it. THEREFORE: </span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Even before the beginning:</span></b></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>0.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>KNOW thyself -- meaning, know that you are loved unconditionally and that you are (already) worthy as a creation of G-d. </b> This means knowing what, who and whose you are. If I had not forgotten this, I might not have ventured out, so I am happy for all the richness that forgetting has brought into my life: the joy of re-learning and re-discovering. This is both the starting point and the ending point of all my exploration.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I learned that we are all on a journey virtually without distance: from Source back to Source and that <b>we have co-created and are presently co-creating our destiny</b> with Spirit / Source from start to finish.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Because I had lost sight this perspective it was as though I knew it in my head -- conceptually -- but not in my heart -- experientially. Therefore, the journey of the greatest distance turned out to be the 16+ inches from the head to the heart. At first it seemed as though I had something to prove, something to fix, a wrong to right, and that was my mission or “reason” for the trip. In the process of taking the journey, the reason for taking it “magically” disappeared. The mission somehow fulfilled itself by virtue of finding the courage to take it and see it through. Does that make sense? If so, then you will have no trouble with the 12 additional things I learned.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Along the way I also learned my A-B-C’s.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">A. In the beginning:</span></b></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>1.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>BEGIN</b> with the end in mind. Have a shining image or thought form of a destination so you know your conditions for fulfillment, always referring back to “0” above. Know the difference between <b>a goal</b>, which will be attained (or not) and <b>a purpose</b>, which keeps you moving forward through goal after goal after goal. My goal was to reach Washington D.C. and meditate under the capstone of the Washington monument. I was hoping to receive a new vision of America and for our time in which <b>women are equally valued decision-makers in partnership with men worldwide. </b> Ironically, the monument has been closed for earthquake repairs, so that particular goal was not attained. My purpose, however was of a different order: “to know G-d in every person I meet.” And that purpose is ongoing. That purpose always refers back to “0” because in truth, there is only One of us here!</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>2.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>MAKE</b> a plan -- all the time knowing that “If you want to make G-d laugh, the best way to do that is to make a plan.” Still, it is always important to start with the map, and to create a design. That way, no matter what befalls, the map will be useful in getting back on track. Submit the plan for higher approval, and also, surrender the plan, letting go of it. Spirit often has an even better plan, so don’t be too attached to your own. Our map served us well to help us get back on track, even when we were blown “off course” by following and obeying the leading of Spirit.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>3.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>COMMIT</b> -- Nothing really happens unless you do, and this will involve </span></span></div></div><ol style="list-style-type: decimal;"><ol style="list-style-type: decimal;"><li style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> standing up and being counted; </span></span></li>
<li style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> stepping up and signing up; </span></span></li>
<li style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> stepping out into the flow of life; </span></span></li>
<li style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> stepping beyond your preconceived limitations established by the fear of the </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">unknown. <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span></li>
</ol></ol><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The immediate rewards of commitment are astonishing: The Universe rises to meet you and bring you aid you had not dreamed of. I kid you not!</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>4.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>RISK </b>-- To risk means to have something valuable at stake. The death of something is assured to bring about new life in you. That “something” can be a physical or an emotional or a mental “reality.” Are you willing to trade an old life for a new one? Caterpillar for butterfly? “Life is either a bold adventure or it is nothing,” said Helen Keller, who was both blind and deaf! <i> </i>This is where alchemy comes in. To bring about transformation, there must be something to be transformed: the lead must become gold; the seed must die to sprout. Something must be placed on the altar to be <b><i>altered</i></b>! You have to risk the possible loss of something of value with the understanding that transformation and change can look very threatening to the old order of things.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>5</b>.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>INTEND</b> -- for practical purposes, intention is everything, for it is what gathers momentum, and gets the ball rolling. Even the word itself <b><i>leans</i></b> into the enterprise. On your mark, get set . . .<b><i> intend.</i></b></span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">B. In the middle:</span></b></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>6.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>TRUST</b> all of the allies, guides, mentors, friends and angels who appear along the way. Rely on their support, and above all, <b>trust your self and your intuition</b> to choose the best path forward. Obi Wan Kenobi taught Luke Skywalker to trust the Force within himself. Sometimes, when flying blind you just have to surrender to higher guidance and higher wisdom, which can come in an unexpected form, like Marcelina, the lame street vendor who sold me a “magical” amulet, a hematite necklace of the Virgin of Guadalupe. This symbol of the Divine Mother served as a symbolic reminder of the universal mission we were on, which transcended any and all religions.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>7</b>.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>FACE</b> all of your fears, anxieties, shadows, enemies, adversaries and hecklers, because although they appear as obstacles to be overcome, these are, and will prove to be your greatest teachers. You will thank them profoundly in the end. Jesus warned us that our greatest enemies would be those of our own households and families. . . If I wanted world peace, as I proclaimed, I learned that after my own heart, my family was the best place to start. Like all true spiritual gifts, peace is an inside job.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>8.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>PERSEVERE</b> -- through the tedious times, the unforgiving minutes and hours, remembering, always, to choose the most positive possible interpretation of any given circumstance. At the risk of being considered naive, it pays to look on the sunny side, and choose to be upbeat. You may not always be able to choose the circumstances, but you can always choose your attitude toward your circumstances. This is not denial, but it is reframing to affirm a positive outcome.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>9</b>.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>LAUGH </b>along with G-d. Joy is the sure sign of the Presence of G-d.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>10.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>DIE</b> and be resurrected. But also know that you do not have to die in the body to die to the false self (ego)! Death is not the end of life, it is merely a change. Andrew Cohen rightly said, “Everyone wants to be enlightened, but nobody wants to change!” A miracle is the change that always results when love is chosen over fear.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">C. In the end:</span></b></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>11.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>PASS </b>all of your tests -- not by the ego’s might or will power, but by consistency, fidelity to purpose, and especially by humility, trusting in G-d’s grace and guidance through the Holy Spirit which is as close as breath and breathing. Let SIMPLICITY become a lifestyle choice, and it will become an ally and a great source of strength and renewed energy.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>12.</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>SHARE, </b>with gratitude, the healing elixir you have been granted. The precious learnings and gifts of your journey will inspire and support others on theirs, as they, in turn, learn <b>to choose</b> to follow their bliss.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">* * *</span></i></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">But there is more:</span></b></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Taking the longest view, if it is all just a play in the mind of G-d, as the Hindu worldview purports -- <i>(maya = illusion; lilas = the play of G-d) -- </i>it will all disappear, “an insubstantial pageant faded. . . leaving not a rack behind,” as Shakespeare said in<i> The Tempest. </i>If this is indeed so, then by developing the ability to play one’s role with impeccability, witnessing the joys and sorrows, the achievements as well as the atrocities with compassionate equanimity, we will truly be of service in healing the suffering and heartbreak of the world. We will not be deceived, but will clearly be awakened as from a dream. What a relief! What freedom! What joy!</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b>This glorious possibility: not just to wake up<i> </i></b><i>in</i><b> the dream, but to wake up<i> </i></b><i>from</i><b> it -- is the most important thing I learned on my pilgrimage.</b></span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The greater, collective healing always begins with healing oneself first; finding the source of one’s own heartbreak and receiving the healing there first. It was precisely because I had lost touch with the source of my own original buried traumatic incidents that I kept manifesting them as projections upon my outer world and circumstances. There they continued to appear and reappear and threaten me (and us) until I recognized my own role in creating them and took responsibility for that. <b> </b></span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">That is precisely why I set out on this journey, apparently, to tilt at windmills, believing them to be monsters, until I realized what and who the real enemy is: the disenfranchised shadow self. Some have called this Satan, some have called it ignorance, some ego, and some “maya” or illusion. Regardless of the name, the effect of this negative force is the same.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The original buried traumatic incidents seem to be universal: <b>fears of abandonment, betrayal and inferiority. </b> All of these are supported and fed by the one ultimate fear: <b>annihilation of being,</b> which is the ego’s nightmare. This is what the ego imagines death to be. </span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">We are all on this journey of self-discovery. A few of us have completed it and have directed all of their energies to helping the rest of us complete ours. These are the avatars, the masters, the bodhisattvas, also known as the angels and spirit guides, etc. If you want Spirit/God/The Divine as a partner in fulfilling your Divine Plan, you must be willing to live the <b>TAO</b>, which I see simply as a path of </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b><i>T</i></b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">rust, </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b><i>A</i></b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">cceptance and </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b><i>O</i></b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">bedience. </span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The TAO simply means “The Way.” It is the same “Way” Jesus’ first followers understood, and saw exemplified in him. Before they were called “Christians” they called themselves “followers of the Way.” Jesus taught “I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life.” I believe that what he meant by that is: to <b><i>arrive</i></b> at the destination you must not only <b><i>find </i> </b>the way, but <b><i>walk</i></b><i> </i>in it to the extent that you also <b><i>embody</i></b><i> </i>it, as he did. In dedicating his life to walking the way of Truth, he <b><i>became</i></b> that Way, or that bridge over troubled water <b><i>that we also can become</i></b> which connects us -- and others -- with the Kingdom or Promised Land. </span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">And when might we expect that? Must we wait for some vague future time, “afterwards”? Or may we realize that we are in the Kingdom when we are fully present in this NOW moment, and the next NOW, and the next.</span></span></div></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">When your life is a pilgrimage, every step becomes a prayer, connecting you with the eternal present, the TAO of the NOW, and its ever-new joy.</span></span></div></div><div style="font-size: 12px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; min-height: 14px; text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></div></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-49541769082989481182011-11-30T12:43:00.000-08:002011-11-30T12:43:38.618-08:00Fade to White<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Windsor Fountains Condo</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Culver City, CA<br />
November 30, 2011<br />
9:49 a.m.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Fade to White</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 22.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">There is one story and one story only that will prove worth the telling. . .</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> -- Robert Graves</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Joseph Campbell suggested that myths are public dreams and our own personal dreams are our private myths. We live in a time of shifting public dreams, with not much certain to believe in “out there,” although many of us cling to traditional paradigms for the comfort they provide. Others of us turn to our private myths to provide meaning for our lives with the hope that at least we may be able to control -- or at least influence -- the environment “in here.” These, who are increasingly tuned to “the beyond within” are the individuals who would be “masters of their fate,” but who realize <b>that such a course must be undertaken with the greatest humility -- surrendering the entire outcome to a much greater <i>destiny that shapes our ends. </i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Where do I stand? Somewhere between comfort and mastery. I’m not ready to buy the old myths just because I’m attached to the stories and their happy endings. Nor am I ready to throw out all that has gone before just because it seems to have failed to provide all the answers. I do want a sense of control, a sense of “destiny,” to “take arms agains a sea of troubles,” not simply to be a passive observer, paralyzed with fear, on the deck of a sinking ship. I want to find what is “mine to do” and to do it -- to play my own role to the best of my ability in this great human drama, in which I seem to be a single point of light in a vast tapestry of immense design. I think of the musicians who played “Nearer My God to Thee,” as the Titanic went down. It was a choice they made as a group. If that is my role, let me play true until I can no longer breathe to blow my flute. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I undertook the cross country walk with my daughter with a specific myth in mind: I was Demeter the outraged mother, she was Persephone, the daughter who had been abducted by Hades, King of the underworld and taken to his underground realm. Viveka’s husband, Richard was Hades. The story was complicated, for Persephone’s father, Zeus had approved the marriage to his brother, Hades, without consulting Demeter, who was sister to the two brothers, which made Persephone Hades’ niece. (Incest was common to the gods, apparently.)</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Believe it or not, this ancient Greek myth fit my relationship with my daughter Viveka and my son-in-law, Richard to a remarkable degree. Richard is much older than Viveka, more like a brother to me than a son-in-law. I was not consulted about this match beforehand, and there were many things about it that angered me, not the least of these being the fact that Viveka had been living in a marginal, depressed and “underworld” environment ever since she married Richard. They had suffered great reversals of fortune, and were living hand to mouth. I had been called upon many times to “rescue” my daughter by loaning money, even buying property for them to live on, but the fact remained that my outrage and anger were always lurking beneath the surface. Something about this family situation was not “right.” I wanted to get to the bottom of it and discover what was really going on. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Backstory:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">What I discovered -- to my surprise -- was that Viveka had felt abandoned by me when she became an emancipated minor at age 16 in order to pursue her film career. I did not feel I had abandoned her, after all this is what she had wanted, and had begged for. It was a decision I must have regretted on some level, for I also discovered remorse and a feeling of responsibility for Viveka’s (apparent) inability to manage her life. I did have to acknowledge that I felt grief over signing away my parental responsibility before she was emotionally mature. This fact was the source of my guilt and contributed to the anger I was feeling -- anger at myself for letting her make the choice, and not insisting that she enjoy a few more years of childhood. I was afraid she would blame me in later years: “I could have been somebody, and you stood in my way.” It was a Catch-22. There was no “correct” choice. I did what I did.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So as the 198 days of our cross-country Sole 2 Soul walk fulfilled themselves we discovered that we were filling in those lost years. We were completing her teen-age years, and I was fulfilling my responsibility as a parent. Richard was really not the enemy. <b>The real enemy was the unacknowledged feelings of grief and anger and outrage over decisions that were made in my family history where I and other women had no part in the decision making and therefore had no say-so, and no control</b>. I truly got in touch with this deep cause of anger, and could identify with women throughout time and history,<i> literally</i> <i>back to mythological times! </i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Here is the real issue I had to confront: cowardice.</b> </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">If one makes a decision one has to live with the consequences and take responsibility for it. If one lets a decision be made for her, she can be a victim and blame others. She takes no responsibility, but she can be angry because she was not part of the decision-making process. But this is entirely dishonest. The truth is she chose not to choose. Why? She was afraid. She was more afraid of choosing than not choosing. And still she does not want to be accountable for choosing to be a victim!</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The answer: </b> </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Getting in touch with the confusion and the anger smoldering underneath. Seeing that it is misplaced. Knowing that it is anger with myself for making a choice from fear instead of love. But how could I have known this? Without this bitter experience I could not have known the difference. Therefore, coming from love, I can now forgive my unfortunate choice and start again with a clean slate.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>What did Demeter do? </b> </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">She was not a coward, but she was a women in the company of very powerful men who weren’t disposed to consider her point of view. She protested in the only way she could: she threw a tantrum. (See my blog on Tantrum Yoga.) But what a tantrum! Since she was the Goddess of harvest and fertility her tantrum meant that the earth did not produce its fruits. The people were starving. So the plight of the people found its way up to Zeus who had sanctioned and permitted, even suggested the marriage of Persephone to his lonely outcast brother, Hades. Zeus was asked to resolve the world crisis. How did he do it? With the aid of Apollo (the Sun God) and Mercury (the messenger of the gods) a compromise was reached. Persephone wanted to be returned topside, but she had eaten some pomegranate seeds and this meant that she was in some measure bound to the King of the underworld. How many had she eaten? 3? 6? 9? </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The resolution / compromise:</b> </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Zeus decreed that Persephone could dwell in the sunlight with her mother for a number of months of the year, but must return to the realm of the underworld for the rest of the year. This created the seasons: Summer and Winter. How long will winter be? 3? 6? 9? months. In different parts of the world the length of the seasons differ. The world would suffer no more, but would harvest the grain and fruits in their seasons. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Here is my challenge to all readers of this blog as I conclude:</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Get in touch with your personal myth -- something that resonates with you and informs the story of your life. Plunge deeply into the subconscious and unconscious sources of this strand of story. It is like a piece of wood floating after the shipwreck. Grab it. It has the power to carry you along. It is no accident that this particular piece of debris has come to your aid. Its appeal is both personal and universal. It reaches out to you. It sings to you and will bring you to shore.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The reason it appeals to you is that you are the hero / heroine in this story. It can be no other way. When you find that story it will be like a key that will open up the starry night like the stories of the constellations have always opened up the cosmos: from the standpoint of the merging of both the collective and the individual mythos.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And is there only one story? Yes -- and -- no. To be sure there are many individual stories, but the hero and the heroine’s journey have common structures that bind them all together: a going out and a coming home with the elixir which brings joy and healing to those at home in the community. And those waiting at home are of two types: (1) those who are waiting to venture out -- the youth; and (2) those who have already ventured out -- the elders and ancestors. All are waiting to welcome you home with the gifts you bring.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span> * * * </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Viveka and I will be making a film about our adventure, G-d willing. It may take a year or more. There will be some surprises, for I have not here told the whole story. For example, Viveka’s version of the story differs from mine, as might be expected, which leads to some interesting moments of truth. Another surprise involves the fact that the hero’s journey is not the same as the heroine’s journey. And this is an important aspect of what we discovered. For the purposes of this last blog, I have merely suggested a story-line, which we will be fleshing out with the footage we have gathered.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Stay tuned. . .</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>. . .Fade to white</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-16645020869903676372011-11-18T10:22:00.000-08:002011-11-18T10:22:48.975-08:00Home 'n Stuff<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Windsor Fountains Condo<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Culver City, CA</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">November 17, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">2:15 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Home ‘n Stuff</b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Does a girl have to have cancer to make a wish, or have a dream come true?</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> --Viveka Davis</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>This is blog #32 in a series of 33 -- the next to last. It’s time to look back and see if anything still needs to be said before we turn our attention to making a documentary film about our adventure, which could easily consume the next year -- or two.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Yes, there are several things.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>GRANDMOTHER JOANNE</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>First and most of all, I would like to acknowledge my mother, Viveka’s grandmother, Joanne, who not only made our journey possible financially, but who made it necessary and desirable emotionally. You see, Joanne (may she be remembered fondly) was of that “Rosie the Riveter” era -- some have called it “The Greatest Generation,” who weathered the great depression and waged World War II, and wanted to see their children have a better life. “Better” to them meant more affluent and better educated. They succeeded. Because they provided for us materially, we had the luxury of hanging out in libraries and coffee houses, marching in protest parades and starting a revolution against the very values that our parents had made such vast sacrifices for. I realize, with great gratitude and appreciation, that these words are being written because my mother, a child of immigrants with an eighth grade education, believed in me, and provided a way for me to have a voice. She did this by working in her little beauty shop, dreaming of a better future for me and my brother, one pin-curl at a time. Thank you Mother. May your labors of love not have been in vain, and may the beauty you brought to others forever abide with you as well.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>11:11:11: STAR KNOWLEDGE GATHERING</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Second, I would be remiss if I did not mention the Cahokia Star Knowledge Gathering in Collinsville, IL 11:11:11 which Viveka and I participated in both as attendees and presenters. Here is a description that went out prior to the event:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #232323; font: 13.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Chief Golden Light Eagle and many others invite you to join us for the 11:11:11 Cahokia Star Knowledge Gathering<br />
<br />
</b>The energy of the 11:11 has been building for many years, and the long awaited 11:11:11 offers us the opportunity to step through a portal of love, a window of opportunity to transcend from third dimensional beings to the next step in our evolution of consciousness to functioning as being multi-dimensional beings and honoring our connectedness with all there is.<br />
<br />
During the Gathering we will focus on the importance of our Guardianship of the EARTH, AIR, FIRE, and WATER. What better place to merge with all there is than Collinsville, IL, near the WATERS of the Great Grandfather Mississippi River in the Heart of Grandmother Turtle Island (North America).<br />
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Your heart has the memory of the 11:11. Join us as we activate the memory and answer the Call to Awaken.</span></div><div style="color: #232323; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #232323; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Now, writing one week after the fact, all I want to say is that I hope that you were in ceremony or in some spiritual gathering on 11:11:11 which allowed you to experience the remarkable energies that found expression on that occasion. I and many others witnessed with great joy as we, as a planetary consciousness, passed over a threshold to mark a milestone in our evolution as a species. </b></span><span style="font: 13.0px Arial; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><br />
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</b></span><span style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; letter-spacing: 0.0px color: #000000; text-decoration: underline;"><b>RE-ENTRY AND THE CHALLENGE OF “STUFF”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>When I left on my journey last March, I cleared out my apartment so that I could rent it. Because I lived in an RV for 7+ months I got used to the discipline of “stuff-less-ness.” I discovered that there is very little that I actually “need,” and it can all fit in a few suitcases. What freedom! Now that I am back I am faced with the “problem” of what to do with all of that stuff. Part of me wants to dump it ALL at a charity thrift store. Another part of me wants to sift and sort through it, and re-establish the attachments that time and distance have severed.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><br />
</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The truth is that the person who is returning home is not the same person who left. She sees with different eyes, hears with different ears, and feels with a different heart. She has tasted the freedom of detachment, and is not willing to enter once more into the bondage of things.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>In any case, it is a high class problem to have, and I see it as a luxury. </b></span><b>In my next -- and final -- blog I will let you know how it all turned out. </b></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b> </b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 22.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-51394496641335649172011-11-05T07:36:00.000-07:002011-11-05T07:36:32.648-07:00How Are Decisions Made? (Part II)<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">WildeRose Guest House</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Rogers, KY</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">November 4, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">8:57 a.m.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>How Are Decisions Made? (Part II)</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 22.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“If you want to make God laugh, make a plan.”</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> -- source unknown</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Ideally, here is how I make decisions: <i>I gather the most complete set of facts and information available; then, using my reason and logic, (left brain) I consult further with my intuition and imagination, (right brain) and I select a course of action from an array of possibilities that best serves my highest ideals.</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I said “ideally” because that is how I believed decisions “should” be made. However, as a result of this recent cross-country trip with my daughter, Viveka, I have had the opportunity to observe my decision-making process in slow motion over the past few months. I have concluded that I very rarely have the opportunity to make the “ideal” kinds of decisions. In fact, I’m not even sure that I make decisions at all, although very often I do exercise my preferences, and seek consensus with others. What I have called decisions in the past are merely the means I use to keep myself believing that I am in control. And I am not. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Am I a fatalist, then? Do I believe in predestination? No, neither of those. But I have seen that my so-called free will is limited to a very simple kind of choice: not what actually happens -- for that is determined by forces far more complex than I could possibly command or control -- but only <i>what attitude I assume about what actually happens, i.e. what I make it mean.</i> </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>That is what I can control. And only that.</b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b> I have direct control over my happiness when I choose or “decide” to accept it all with gratitude and joy, and learn the lesson that reality is affording me in this now moment. What a privilege! This is what I call “practicing the art of the possible,” a concept given me by a wise Guatemalan woman, Yoland Trevino. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>That is why, as the adventure unfolded I grew less and less fearful and appalled by circumstances that threatened our progress, and more and more amused and delighted with the seeming obstacles that turned up in our path, for example a sudden death in the family of our driver (which called him away unexpectedly); our rejection / banishment by 1/2 of our team members; our vehicle’s mechanical failures; and the difficulties we had in keeping to our “schedule.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Because of the people we met and the relationships we formed, very often it was no simple matter to say goodbye and move on. It was as though we could not leave certain places until we were “released” from them. That was certainly the case with Sedona and the Santa Fe, Kansas City areas.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>So we came to ask ourselves: “Who” or “what” is calling the shots and doing the “releasing”? As we surrendered more and more to “Divine Order” and “Divine Will,” which we often referred to as “The Divine Feminine” or “Divine Mother” we found that our path was strewn with blessings. Amazingly fortuitous things happened every day to convince us that we were living out a script or a plan that we could not possibly have devised. And it was all designed to provide me with an opportunity for optimum, joyful spiritual growth.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>But the grandest obstacle of all was encountered in Kentucky in August when my adversarial relationship with my son-in-law flared up. This brought up all of my issues of personal heartbreak from childhood involving my mistrust of men, and brought to the forefront my need to work on my own shadow and heal my wounded inner child. (See blogs entitled “Tantrum Yoga,” and “Golden Wedding Day.”)</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>* * *</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The successful completion of the walk and the inner gifts I received from Spirit as a result, coupled with the work with Andrew Harvey at his Sacred Activism retreat in Oak Park IL early in October have given my life a new sparkle and verve. What I am learning is to live my life more consistently and consciously from the inside out, taking into account the rich array of options in front of me. It is as though half of me is sensitive to the beauty in things -- I’ll call that the feminine part -- and the other half is sensitive to the truth of things -- I’ll call that the masculine part. There had been unnecessary misunderstanding up to now about the nature of these two ways of appreciating reality. But, as with the ages-old conflict between religion and science, there now appear to be ways to reconcile these alienated partners -- who actually started out side by side on the path to human knowledge. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Just as science and religion are attempting to answer different questions: the how and what (science) as opposed to the why and wherefore (religion) so the “masculine” and “feminine” parts of my make-up are giving me two different versions of human value. But I am now clear that one is not more “valuable” than the other. They must work in partnership as the poet John Keats suggested in his poem “Ode on a Grecian Urn”:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><i>Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -- that is all</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. </i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i></i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I can only begin with myself. My heart is both an art studio and a science laboratory for this grand experiment.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b> </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-54439568411267683112011-11-03T14:07:00.000-07:002011-11-04T03:46:01.429-07:00The Game's Afoot! (But Why Am I Walking?)<div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;">November 20, 2010<br />
Culver City, CA<br />
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(Please note: Originally published in 2010, this blog was the first in the series. It was recently revised to correct an error.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">* * * </div><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">Rev. Doris Davis, a 72-year old Interfaith minister and three others, supported by an RV and driver, plan to walk 2700 miles from Oceanside, CA to Washington D.C. in the 6 1/2 months from March 8 to September 21, 2011. They expect that local walkers -- both women and men -- will join them along the route (Oceanside / Phoenix / Albuquerque / Denver / Kansas City / Indianapolis / Washington D.C.) for a little or a lot. They will welcome the companionship and the conversation. She writes:</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b>Why Am I Walking?</b> </div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">First of all the dates are significant: March 8 is the 100th Anniversary of the International Day of Women, and September 21 is the International Day of Peace, declared by the United Nations.</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b>Why Am I Walking? </b></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b></b>People always want to know. But really, <b><i>I want -- and need -- to know</i></b>, and I ask myself many times a day, and get different answers. If you ask me a year from now I may have a better answer, I may even have a book put together about what I saw, felt and learned from this adventure, but at this point, as I begin my training, I can say that I am inspired by a group of women (sole2soulwalk.com) <b>who are imagining a world where women are equally valued decision makers all around the world in partnership with men. </b>The call has gone out for women to step up, step out, and step beyond their previously perceived and accepted limitations to make this happen in meaningful ways.</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b>Why Am I Walking? </b></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b></b>As a 72-year-old White-Anglo Saxon-Protestant (WASP) woman who has had the benefits of being a wanted child, born into a stable, prosperous and orderly society, I have been blessed by abundance, opportunity and good fortune. I have had a first class education, enjoyed excellent health, raised beautiful, healthy children and found meaningful work and advancement in a society where I have been free from want and fear. I have no complaints whatsoever. But I know that the blessings I have received are simply not available to billions of my brothers and sisters across the planet -- especially my <b><i>sisters.</i></b></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b>Why Am I Walking? </b></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b></b>Really, there are two kinds of answers: outer ones and inner ones. Outer answers are the ones people want to hear so that they can label them and perhaps dismiss them more easily, like: "I am walking to help cure cancer," or "to end world hunger" or "for nuclear disarmament and world peace." But always between the goal and the reality there necessarily stands a great abyss. The kindly well-wishers will say, "Good luck." The cynical will add under the breath "That will never happen." And quite often the bottom line will be the amount of money raised because that seems to justify everything in the end.</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">But the inner answer, the one that satisfies me and gets me up in the morning is more mysterious: <b>I am walking for no reason that I can put words to. I am walking because in some deep inexplicable way I know that I was born to do this very thing -- crazy as it may seem. It is not a matter of survival, it is a matter of completion. Knowing this, I have arrived at a very meaningful and joyful place -- by G-d's grace. I aim to be celebrating my gratitude every step of the way. </b></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><b></b></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">Let me be careful to explain that last paragraph, because it is important: I am walking because I have already arrived at a place where I can see that ALL ARE NOT THERE YET. Still, I want to draw others -- especially women -- out of striving and efforting into the circle of celebration, where they can experience the perfection and the completion of the NOW moment. <b> I am walking because I can, and because I choose to integrate walk and talk; because my life is about the unalienable right -- meaning the power and freedom -- to CHOOSE to have my life be exactly the way it is. </b>All else flows from the first choice to be at peace from within. With my head in the clouds and my feet on the earth I am choosing to integrate the spiritual, mental, emotional and physical aspects of my existence in the most meaningful way I can imagine. <b>I am literally walking my talk.</b> This is a pilgrimage, and every step is a prayer.</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b>Why Am I Walking?</b> </div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">When men's feet touched the surface of the moon and walked, there was great rejoicing. A small step for man was a giant leap for mankind. Similarly, I am holding a vision for this walk: When women's feet walk the earth with that kind of intention we will see giant strides for humankind. The sleeping sister giant will awaken with all of her latent potential for decency and compassion. The Dalai Lama said in 2009, "The Western woman will save the world." The Dalai Lama and I agree, and <b>I am walking to gather the WOmentum for the next quantum leap in our collective evolution. </b>There are many ways that men as well as women can join this movement. For details, e-mail me at <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;">walkdoriswalk@gmail.com</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><b>And Finally: Why Am I Walking? -- NOT!</b></span></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;">Firstly, I am NOT walking to demonize or blame men or "the patriarchy." I am not walking to defy, fight against, or change anything. I doubt that anything can be changed until and unless it is fully acknowledged, as experienced, and therefore completed. It must be allowed to be just the way it is, and the way it is not. No doubt the critical change I want to see in the individual and in the co</span></span>llective will come from within. I will be writing more of this in future blogs.</div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><br />
</span></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;">Secondly, I am not walking primarily to raise money for myself or for any cause. All I want is for people to use my example and whatever inspiration it may spark to get in touch with whatever it is that they are passionately committed to, and to find a way creatively to embody the new paradigm that they want to operate from in their own reality. Yes, our little expedition will have need of money, for gas and food and many contingencies unforseen, but we are stepping out on faith, knowing that our needs are known before we ask and therefore we will be provided for. Love offerings will always be gratefully accepted in the name of the Divine Mother.</span></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><br />
</span></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;">Always Victory!</span></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><br />
</span></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;">Doris</span></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0000ee;"><br />
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</b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-54990640107035404372011-10-29T11:34:00.000-07:002011-10-29T11:34:08.237-07:00How Are Decisions Made? (Part I)<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">WildeRose Guest House</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Rogers, KY</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">October 28, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">5:16 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>How Are Decisions Made? (Part I)</b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” --Yogi Berra</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">One of the main themes of this Sole 2 Soul adventure -- which began last March as a celebration of the 100th Anniversary of International Women’s Day, and officially ended on September 21, 2011, the International Day of Peace -- has been the issue of decision-making. As an individual, as a pair of partners, as a group, as a family, a tribe, a nation, the same question always begs for clarification: How are decisions made? When faced with a choice of paths forward, how do we eliminate all but the one we select? How do we settle on the one that shows the most promise?</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It’s complicated, as brain research is showing us.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I have often assumed the popular notion that our human brains, divided into left and right hemispheres somehow affect the decision-making process. And I must confess I have often greatly oversimplified the matter by assuming the left brain to be associated with the more rational, linear, focused kind of thinking, hence “more masculine.” and the right brain to be associated with the more emotional, global, and intuitive kind of thinking, hence “more feminine.” </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">For the purposes of our cause -- i.e. <i>women as equally valued decision makers, whose full participation and contributions are essential now to resolve our local and global challenges</i> -- it was convenient to say that if there was an imbalance in the world, it was because we had become too weighted in the direction of left-brain thinking. Therefore, we were advocating a shift in the balance, loosely identifying this as a greater emphasis on “feminine values,” and in an even more mystical and dramatic way calling for “The Return of the Divine Feminine.” </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I have recently seen a presentation which casts a great deal of light onto this subject, and I invite you to consider it as part of this blog presentation, which I am calling Part I of a two-part series. Instead of reading anything more I have to say, please take 12 minutes to view the TED presentation by psychiatrist Iain McGilchrist: “The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World.” McGilchrist, a psychiatrist makes the case in a very engaging and humorous way -- supported by brilliant graphics -- that left-brain thinking has tended to take precedence. A very notable imbalance has resulted, which some might call a cultural bias. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #001ba6; font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/iain_mcgilchrist_the_divided_brain.html">http://www.ted.com/talks/iain_mcgilchrist_the_divided_brain.html</a></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">His summary conclusion works to correct our previous oversimplifications. He says, “For <b>imagination</b> you need both [hemispheres] and for <b>reason</b> you need both hemispheres as well,” implying that both imagination and reason require cooperative interaction of the whole brain. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">He does not make the case that one kind of thinking is “masculine” and the other is “feminine,” for the fact remains that <i>both men and women have both attributes.</i> But he does state that the divided brain offers us two versions of the world, and that there has been a tendency to value one kind of thinking and hence <i>(my inference)</i> one kind of decision-making over the other. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">After having viewed the presentation several times, I am struck by the fact that all of the cartoons (with only a couple of exceptions) are of male figures -- doctors, patients, historical figures, etc. I am also struck by the fact, supported by the research, that <i>the right hemisphere tends to lack a voice with which to express and project its views</i>, whereas the left hemisphere is more comfortable with the control of the media of conceptualization and expression. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">He concludes with a striking quotation from Albert Einstein: “The intuitive mind is a sacred gift, and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant but has forgotten the gift.”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">This blog will be continued in Part II, and I heartily invite comment.</span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-75128645268662391822011-10-21T12:46:00.000-07:002011-10-21T12:46:22.769-07:00A Grandmother's Lesson for Advanced Beginners<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">WildeRose Guest House</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Rogers, KY</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">October 20, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">11:09 a.m.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>A Grandmother’s Lesson For Advanced Beginners</b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Verdana; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Verdana; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>To move forward the understanding that women’s full participation and contributions, in partnership with men, are essential now to resolve our local and global challenges and to create the positive future we all know is possible! </i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Verdana; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span> --Mission Statement of Sole 2 Soul Walk -- 3/8/11 - 9/21/11</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">For several months on our cross-country journey I had been considering how to summarize and condense what I was learning about what might be involved in a movement which could be described as “The Return of the Divine Feminine.” I see this as a mighty and powerful possibility dawning on the world horizon, but which, I learned, is by no means is a shared reality in our collective experience. The journey of the past seven months has taught me that turning a possibility into a reality begins with intentionally creating a conceptual framework which can be used to organize thoughts, feelings and actions.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">At the conclusion of Andrew Harvey’s Sacred Activism initiation retreat which took place October 1-7 in Oak Park, IL,* each of the participants was given the floor for a few minutes to teach a wisdom lesson. This would be our “graduation ceremony” and evidence of our readiness to bring our gifts into the world. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">What follows are excerpts from my platform talk -- a very simple teaching designed to reach any human from the preschool age forward. It was given before 30 fellow “classmates.” I dedicated my talk to my own mother, Joan, who gave me the priceless gift of unconditional love, and to my very earliest elementary teachers -- I still remember their names and faces -- who grounded me in the beauty of their radiant mother wisdom.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">The lesson begins:</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Here we are all ‘Advanced Beginners.’ So I would like you to remember your kindergarten teacher. In kindergarten teachers often teach lessons with their hands <i>(she makes the movement of the “Eentsy Weentsy Spider climbing up the water spout)</i>. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’d like you to start by drawing the outline of your left hand with your right hand, starting at the base of the thumb. Remember, we used to do this, and we drew a handprint which became a turkey for Thanksgiving, when we colored in the feathers, remember? Or we made an impression in clay, which our mothers cherished, remembering that your little hands made that with so much love for Mother’s Day. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I want you to feel your left hand when your right hand draws around it, and know that when the right side of your body engages with the left side of your body, the two halves of your brain light up in a special way. Wholeness is experienced in a neuro-psysiological and neuro-psychological way. And now I am going to drop the adult language and speak to you the way I would to my 3-year-old grandson, Ashton.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Ashton, there are five things your grandmother wants you to know -- and these may sound like big words, but I know you can understand them because there is one word for each finger of your hand. As I speak, do as I do with your hand. It will help you to understand.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>(Pointing to left index finger with right index finger, with left index finger pointing upwards)</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“The first one is CONSCIOUSNESS. <i> (tapping on the index finger) </i>Consciousness is yours -- It is how you know that you are you. And it points upward, reminding you that your little consciousness is connected with God -- the biggest consciousness of ALL. Never forget who you are, and your connection with the creator, <i>the All in All.</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“The second one is next to it. Because it is next door it is a neighbor, or a sister, or a brother, or a friend. And you discover it after you go down into the gap between them. (Drawing the “V” space between first and second finger) This finger is called COMMUNICATION. Once your <i>consciousness</i> realizes who it is, it wants to <i>communicate</i> with the one next to it, and it does this by words and movements. And words and <i>communication</i> are the second thing I want you to remember, because with <i>communication</i> now, there is a bond between you and the other -- and any and all others.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“The next thing -- and by the way in order to get to the next thing, you have to go through the gap once again. I’m going to name those gaps for you. The first gap was called COMPASSION; and the second gap is called COMPASSION . . . (laughter). I think you see how this is going to go? </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And when you go through the second gap of <i>compassion</i> you come to the third finger: CULTURE. And this is what your grandmother wants you to know: </span>(Reviewing by continuing to count on the fingers) </div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“<b>Connected </b>with God, <b>communicating</b> with one another, we <b>create</b>, always through the journey of <b>compassion</b>, a <b>culture</b>. We agree that certain things are important, certain things are valuable, and this becomes our shared <i>culture</i>. It’s the story of us -- of who we know ourselves to be, in relationship with the one <i>(pointing up)</i> and the many <i>(counting on the first three fingers)</i>. If we value peace, for example, we create a culture of peace. (Makes “Peace” sign with fingers.) And we Work together for it. (Three fingers make a “W”.) But that all comes later, much later, when you begin to learn the alphabet!)</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“For now, I just want you to know about the next finger -- about this pinkie here -- the littlest finger. This one is a little weaker and a little smaller. It is called COMMUNITY. It means all of us together in a family or a tribe or a nation or in the world. But I want you to know that, even though <i>community </i> can be weak, through <i>compassion</i>, once again (tracing through the gap) <i>community</i> can also be strong when these four stand together.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“And these are your fingers, Ashton. And do you notice that even though your fingers are all different, they are still all the same! They look like a family. Like your family! They can stand tall, and they can fan out, and they can curve and bend, and wave and wiggle. Show me what your fingers can do! Isn’t that fun?</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“But I know you want to ask me about this guy here. (She sticks out her thumb.) Who is this guy?</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Your thumb! That’s right. He’s not a finger. He is different. Did you notice that Consciousness, Communication and Culture and Community all start with the sound “C?” That is the letter “C?” and we will get to letters and their sounds later. But for now, what about him? Is he part of or apart from the rest? Let’s see. The <b>compassion</b> gap between him and <b>consciousness</b> is the greatest of all. And he does stand apart. He stands in opposition. He’s short and thick and a bit squat. Definitely odd. So what do we do with this guy? Do we ignore him? Do we cut him off? Pretend he is not there? Make him disappear? Make him ashamed?</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“We will call him the CONTRARIAN. The one who won’t fit in. But again, if we use the power of compassion to move in his direction, to really get to know him we can see that he has a very unusual ability to give power and energy to all of the others -- if we work with him and let him work with us. He is not a finger. He is different. He is a thumb. But he gives power to all of us -- if we work together.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“He is that which, by his opposition, gives wholeness and strength and articulation to our hand -- intelligence. That’s right. The thumb makes the hand much smarter. He is the one who helps us to be different from the animals who only have paws. He is the one who can make a fist, or a wonderful tool. He wants to be useful for carrying and caressing and giving and helping. He helps us to grasp things! What a wonderful power he gives us. And someday, Ashton, you will understand that because of the extra power he gives us, our minds have grown to understand and grasp a great many things. The way we use our hands makes us intelligent human beings!</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Ashton, this is your hand. Give your hand to your hand. Shake hands with yourself! Make friends with the two halves of yourself, and use your whole self to do good things, like making friends, and seeing the wholeness in others.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>(She uses her hands to make the gesture of namaste.)</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“And remember that it is your grandmother who taught you these important things when you were just a wee beginner.” </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">__________________________</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Verdana; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">See previous blog gatheringwomentum.blogspot.com posted October 13, 2011 -- <b>“Sacred Activist:” Is There A Badge For That?</b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-77531671372327034242011-10-13T10:59:00.000-07:002011-10-13T10:59:05.697-07:00"Sacred Activist:" Is There A Badge For That?<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">WildeRose Guest House</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Rogers, KY</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">October 11, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">10:15 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>“Sacred Activist:” Is There A Badge For That?</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 22.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Andrew Harvey</b> was so right. This was not a “workshop.” There was no “shop,” and there was no “work.” It was neither a class nor a seminar. Not a symposium, forum, or a salon. It was not meant to be any of those.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">For the week of October 1 - 7, 2011, at the Carlton Hotel in Oak, Park Illinois, a suburb of of Chicago, I was one of 33 who were privileged to share something very rare: <b>an initiatory retreat. </b>In fact, it was so rare as to be almost mythical, for the impetus and intention was coming from another realm, deeply shrouded in history and mystery. It had the air of an experiment; and the results were not guaranteed. Success would depend upon an “X” factor, which would have to be supplied by each one of us individually. “Worthiness” would be a key issue. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The candidates wishing to become “Sacred Activists” would be subject to an initiatory template. They would be drawn into “a celebration of the integration of light and dark, chaos and order, rapture and agony, desolation and hope in a mysterious marriage of opposites that births the radiant and committed divine human being.” No less! (see <a href="http://www.onespiritinterfaith.org/havrey_intensive.pdf"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px color: #001ba6; text-decoration: underline;">http://www.onespiritinterfaith.org/havrey_intensive.pdf</span></a> )</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I knew I was supposed to be there because a few weeks before I had received a message from a trusted spirit guide -- (some of my readers will stop reading at this point -- and I cannot blame them) -- that it is time to re-enact the Eleusinian Mysteries, and that Viveka and I, as mother and daughter, representing Demeter and Persephone needed to take part. <a href="http://www.pantheon.org/articles/e/eleusinian_mysteries.html"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px color: #001ba6; text-decoration: underline;">http://www.pantheon.org/articles/e/eleusinian_mysteries.html</span></a> </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The Eleusinian mysteries, from ancient times, have been an initiation experience. They involve a guided journey, originally inspired and led by the mother-daughter presence of Demeter and Persephone. Initiates are ushered into the realms of the subconscious and the unconscious where we do the work of liberating energies that have been bound up in the psyche. This is the shadow work, brought to light in modern times by C.J. Jung and others, and it is best accessed, we found, through radical forgiveness techniques. I had the distinct conviction that we were all there by divine appointment, working out the next steps in our spiritual evolution. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Although I did experience “an initiation,” I was also very aware that this is not a one-time pass or fail exam. Rather it is a lifelong process and practice, to be undertaken with great care, patience and humility. We were a roomful of “advanced beginners” approaching a distinct energy field, passing through it, and departing with every cell and atom and molecule of our being having been affected -- recharged and reoriented -- like iron filings passing through a magnetic field.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Don't get me wrong. It was not as though we were encountering any of this material for the first time. All of the participants were mature individuals who had clearly done extensive personal work prior to this experience. What was unique about the opportunity was Andrew's ability to help us to understand the urgency of this work on the planet at this particular time. He helped us to confront our levels of disbelief, denial, dread disillusionment and even our own death wishes. It was not the nature of the work itself, but the way that he encouraged us to engage with it in a deeply feeling way that made the difference. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The sacred marriage is the meeting and fusion of the divine masculine with the divine feminine within the individual: head and heart, rationality and intuition, left and right hemispheres of the brain learning a new dance. And all of this activity is offered and dedicated to the birth of a new humanity: divinely human, and humanly divine.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">As a mentor, Andrew is absolutely unique and absolutely inspired. There is no teacher on the planet like him today. He is not a manipulator. He is careful not to be idolized. He is not someone who “jacks them up and glazes them over,” as are so many teachers in this age of feelgood new-age spirituality. Andrew sees the need for individuals to be willing to confront their own shadows, which in all of us are legion. This is messy work, which can involve coming face to face with extremes -- despair and grief, even madness. And the reason Andrew is so effective in this work, in my opinion, is that he is constantly working on his own material; fiercely, and without compromise. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Andrew’s work is about the celebration of the return of the Divine Feminine -- in consciousness, communication, culture, and community -- with compassion for the rejected aspects of the self. It also integrates body mind and spirit by using a gentle, fulfilling yoga practice, which I have now incorporated into my daily routine. Most importantly, however, I am enjoying an entirely new level of freedom having confronted new levels of darkness in myself, and having accessed the grace of self-forgiveness. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Blessed by a mind immersed in the very highest levels of scholarship, and with the rarest gifts of poetic expression and the power of the spoken word, Andrew’s teachings are laced with humor and an endearing gift for self-mockery. He and his expert female co-teachers, Karuna Erickson and Diane Burke, guided us from joyful mountaintop experiences, through the confusing straits of duality, plunging us into the realms of starkest horror and anguish as we viewed the current world situation, coming face to face with the specters of our own responsibility, abdication and powerlessness.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Miraculously, we all surfaced to breathe in new strength and hope for the individual and collective tasks in the challenging times that lie ahead.</span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-23054877328252519722011-10-11T19:02:00.000-07:002011-10-11T19:02:45.559-07:00The Abnormal Is Not Courage<div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Chicago, IL</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">October 3, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">7:54 a.m.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The Abnormal is Not Courage</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>. . .</i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Not the marvelous act, but the evident conclusion of being. </i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>. . .</i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>The real form. The culmination. And the exceeding. </i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>. . .</i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Not the month's rapture. Not the exception. The beauty </i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>That is of many days. Steady and clear. </i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>It is the normal excellence, of long accomplishment. </i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 10.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>from “The Abnormal is Not Courage” by Jack Gilbert</i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 10.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 11.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It’s been a couple of weeks since my daughter Viveka and I completed our cross-country pilgrimage from Oceanside, California to Washington D.C. We’ve had a chance to enjoy a few “victory laps” -- absorbing congratulations and bathing in the glow of accomplishment: a sizable task completed. </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I almost said “monumental task” but it wasn’t. After all, I did not walk every step of the way as some have. I only walked about 750 miles. For instance, I recall the example of “Granny D” (whose name was also Doris) who, at 89, <i>actually did walk every step of the way for her cause celebre:</i> campaign finance reform. After her walk, she made an unsuccessful bid for a seat in the House of Representatives. And of course, there is always the legendary journey of Mildred Norman Ryder, a.k.a. Peace Pilgrim, who walked well over 25,000 miles -- the distance of the circumference of the earth -- in fulfillment of her vow “to be a wayfarer on the earth until mankind shall have learned the ways of peace.” Compared with her hard core, 28-year commitment, our journey of 6 1/2 months, supported by the nightly comfort of an RV seemed like school-girl play acting.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I have to be honest. I began this journey with much soul searching, and I finally discovered the “reason” I was walking: <i>I wanted attention.</i> And the thing that terrified me most was the very attention I would certainly get. (Be careful what you wish for!) I was genuinely afraid that when the camera was on and the interviewer asked the pregnant question “What is this walk about?” what would issue from my mouth would be insignificant dribble. No memorable sound bites. No quotable quotes. I was afraid that my true motivation would somehow leak through and would appear mean and selfish; an exercise in ego gratification. So we gave ourselves a statement of intention -- a banner to walk under: <b>We are walking to further the understanding that women’s full participation is essential NOW to solve the global challenges facing humanity today.</b> It sounded good. But the nagging question still remained: Could the mere fact of walking really make a difference? How much of a difference? To whom? </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Many people we talked to were skeptical. When I shared the truly monumental mission of Peace Pilgrim with one gentleman he said, “Well, you can see how much good that did!” Often we could tell, even though folks listened politely, they were threatened on some level. Some were even bold enough to say our mission was flawed; that women were simply not, nor would ever be “equally-valued” decision makers. Decision-making (on “important” issues, i.e. issues other than domestic ones) was not the purview of women. Still others thought our cause was passe; that the “women’s lib” train had already left the station. They could not hear that we were not feminists, or “womanists” but were advocating a greater balance between masculine and feminine -- left and right brain -- values both in the culture, and within the individual.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Since it was not our purpose to raise money we didn’t appeal to people to vote with their checkbooks. With all due respect to people who do raise money and contribute it to good causes, like finding a cure for cancer, Viveka and I were stubbornly insisting that one doesn’t have to have cancer or be at death’s door to have a dream. One could make a difference by simply having an intention, and taking steps -- literally -- to walk one’s talk and to be the change we wanted to see in the world.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">We soon realized that people thought what we were doing was courageous. I was called “a saint,” “a prophetess.” I had to laugh, and yet I had to pay attention to what other people were seeing and projecting on to me. They saw an old woman walking with intention. Some were touched, moved and inspired, and the exchanges that took place between us, time and time again as we walked and talked, left us all enriched and energized in a good way. </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * * </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Was Don Quixote courageous? If you say “yes,” then you believe that a desperate and demented senior citizen can dream an impossible dream -- an antiquated but noble dream of chivalry undertaken to prove himself worthy of the love of a worthy woman (Dulcinea) -- even if she is not the pure and spotless creature he imagines her to be. One questionable quester, by taking himself seriously and refusing to listen to the fears and taunts of others, can climb on to a broken down nag (Rocinante) and sally forth to become a legend in his own mind. If you say “yes,” then you are a romantic.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">If you say “no,” then you belong to another group who sees the world more “realistically.” That is not “courage,” you would say, with a cynic’s air. “That’s just weird, strange or foolish. That’s abnormal.” As, for example, when the Poles rode out on horses to battle Hitler’s invading tanks. Where was the nobility in their fruitless sacrifice? Better they should have simply surrendered, and saved themselves the heartbreak. They should -- at least -- have spared their noble horses.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In the end, I found that the only thing that could rescue this enterprise from hopeless narcissism was to pray each day as we set out, that our efforts would be received as an offering, an oblation; that a higher purpose and power would receive and use this effort and energy for the greater good and for the liberation of all sentient beings. </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">How is that possible? How will that happen? I do not know. That is not my department. But I am confident that my daily offerings were heard and received, and like the fluttering of butterfly wings in the Amazon, they can affect the weather patterns in the Arctic, and somehow, in concert with many many others who are making similar offerings each day, we can, together, create a shift that will benefit the whole of creation.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world makes us immortal.” <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>--Albert Pike</i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><br />
</div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-81547051886575336882011-09-28T05:34:00.000-07:002011-09-28T05:34:25.817-07:00Apotheosis<div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Washington, D.C.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">September 22, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Apotheosis </b></span></div><div style="font: 10.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 12.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 12.0px Georgia; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 10px/normal Helvetica;"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>noun (plural </i><b><i>apotheoses</i></b><i> /-siːz/)</i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 10.0px Georgia; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Georgia; letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>1</b> the highest point in the development of something; a culmination or climax</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 10.0px Georgia; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><b>2</b> the elevation of someone to divine status</span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><br />
</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 10.0px Georgia; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 11.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I began my pilgrimage with an end in mind. Very often I would imagine the culmination of the journey as we plied our way across and about America. I had promised myself that I would arrive on September 21 -- God willing -- at the Washington monument, and would take the elevator to the capstone, and that I would find a place to meditate, or reflect. I prayed to receive a vision of some kind that I could share with others.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">The capstone of a pyramid has special significance in occult lore: it represents “the all-seeing eye of God.” This idea is reinforced on every U.S. dollar bill. I could think of no place in our country that would be more charged with the energy of intention than that space, knowing that our first President was a man of spiritual attainment who was very conscious about the selection of the capital city, and the key governmental sites.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">In addition, Viveka and I had begun our journey on the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day, March 8, and we fantasized about a “flash mob” impromptu performance of 100 women representing the most influential women of history dancing along the edges of the reflecting pool in front of the Lincoln memorial.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Finally, since it was the International Day of Peace, we also expected that somewhere in the city there would be some kind of meeting or demonstration or commemoration of the day, which we would be drawn into.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Well, nothing remotely like any of that happened, or was even possible.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">First of all, we had learned several weeks earlier that the Washington monument had been closed due to structural damage resulting from a recent earthquake.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Second of all, the reflecting pool was being renovated. There was only dirt and noisy excavation taking place in the pool area.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Third, we could find only one event in celebration of the International Day of Peace -- some comedians would be “Standing Up for Peace” at the Improv, a comedy club, later that night.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">So we changed our plan, and arrived before dawn at the Lincoln memorial so that we could sit on the steps and have our meditation before the crowds arrived. The Washington monument was only half-visible in the fog across the mall, and we sat sharing the space with security guards and a few dedicated runners and joggers. </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">We then “did our last miles” by visiting each of the impressive memorials and monuments in the area: The Viet Nam War, World War II, The Washington Monument, The Korean Conflict, The Franklin Delano Roosevelt memorial, and the newest one, for Martin Luther King, Jr., which will be inaugurated in October of this year. </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I knew my journey was complete when I saw a black woman in her 60s standing in front of one of the memorable quotations by Dr. King which adorn this impressive memorial, built to express both a mountain of despair and the emergence of hope. </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>“Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. </i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.”</i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I could tell that she was on the verge of tears, as was I. My heart went out to her and we hugged each other, complete strangers, soul sisters. </span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Martin wouldn’t want me to cry,” she said.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“I’m not so sure,” I said. “You won’t mind if I do, will you?” We cried together.</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I told her that I had just completed my walk “across and about” America for the last 6 1/2 months. Some people overheard me, and soon there was a crowd gathered around. These were people, I soon learned, all in their 60s and 70s who had all lived through the struggle for civil rights, like myself, and felt defined by that era. There was a man who had walked with Dr. King in Selma. There were interfaith people there, people who had been at the Parliament of World Religions in Capetown and Barcelona. I had been in Barcelona and Melbourne as well. We all started singing and celebrating and taking pictures. “We Shall Overcome . . .”</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Yes, we even sang “Kumba-ya!”</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I couldn’t have planned a more touching or fulfilling “Victory Lap.” Somehow it felt as though all my friends had showed up!</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">What I had expected, planned and envisioned as a culmination was not what I got. Even later that night at the Improv, where we expected to at least see comedians “Standing Up for Peace,” there was no such program! But I will say this:</span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Later that afternoon in the garden of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, where we stopped to rest and have a cup of tea, I did receive a vision. I am not quite sure I can share it with you in this forum, or if it is appropriate, but I was left with the distinct knowledge and assurance that everything unfolded and is unfolding exactly as it should, and in the great scheme of things, <i>all is well!</i></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-16888242724684813642011-09-18T20:21:00.000-07:002011-09-19T06:31:53.428-07:00Go East, Old Woman!<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Hagerstown, MD</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">September 13, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">2:44 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Go East, Old Woman!<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></b></span></div><div style="font: 10.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 12.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 10px/normal Helvetica; letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Step-by-step my rhythmic mobility seeks equilibrium while </i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Still small roots ground me in beliefs, loves, and fears.</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>These twisting energies drag yet pull me along.</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>One foot in front of another,</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Is it the one or the other in the lead?</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Trusting the movement is my anchor and my raft.</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>* * *</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>from “Seismic Dream” by Pattie Porter Firestone, 2011</i></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 10.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 12.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Last week I was interviewed by two reporters for all of the major networks’ affiliate stations in Buckhannon, West Virginia. One reporter asked me what had inspired me to undertake this 6 1/2 month American-Cross-Country-Mother/Daughter-Walkabout Adventure. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>I thought about the one nagging question people had always asked me before we began our walk: “Why are you walking?” I remembered my inconclusive -- if truthful -- answer in my first blog months earlier, which was, in essence: “I’m not really sure I can answer that until after I’ve done it.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>It was not a cop-out, it was recognition of an observation my son Brian had made, which came in the form of advice. He had ridden his bicycle across the country twice: once from West to East, and again from North to South, and he said, “Whatever you think this journey is about, it’s not that. I can assure you that you will discover it has a completely different purpose and meaning for your life than you can possibly imagine.”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>So, faced with the reporter’s question, I jumped in at a completely different level, from a place I could not have imagined in the beginning. I answered, “You’ve heard ‘Go West, young man!’?” I asked. The reporter nodded. “Well, this is a matter of ‘reverse pioneering’: “Go East, Old Woman!”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>* * *</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Since that television interview I have contemplated our journey’s direction from sea to shining sea, from where the sun sets to where it rises. All of that Western expansion that took up so much of the energies of the 18th and 19th centuries in America we have recapitulated in reverse as we have traversed the land “at the speed of life.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>It is true:</b></span></div><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>We became intimately acquainted with Route 66, the “Mother Road” linking the Mid-West to the Far West, and by which my own family came to Los Angeles, California in the ‘40s from Omaha, Nebraska. </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>We physically walked across the Great Divide in New Mexico, and pictured the water draining into the Pacific Ocean in the West, and into the Mississippi River basin to the East. </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>We logged many miles along the Santa Fe Trail, which allowed settlers to pour into the South West, where the Spanish had already established their version of civilization, still very visible and palpable in the art and architecture and culture. </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>We found the traces of the Wild West that still remain in Dodge City, Kansas, where the Texas longhorns were brought to the rail head along the Chisholm Trail. The story is told that when an old, bedraggled gold prospector got on the train, the conductor asked him where he was headed. “Hell,” he replied. The conductor looked him over and said, “That’ll be eighty five cents. Get off at Dodge.”</b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>We came to appreciate the covered wagons, and more than once realized what a deluxe accommodation our old 1984 Ford Lindy Econoline RV was, when compared with the original prairie schooners. </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>We also marveled at the true grit of the Mormons, many of whom were single women heading West pushing hand carts to find their “promised land.” </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>We saw a sod house preserved on the Kansas plains, very similar to the one in Nebraska where my grandmother, who lived to be 99, had been born. </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>When we came to the Mississippi River at St. Louis we began to appreciate the great good fortune of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 and the import of the expedition of Lewis and Clark, <i>and the important roles that their female Native American guide, Sacajawea, and the black slave York had played. </i></b></span></li>
</ul><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The reporter also asked me what I had learned, what stood out in my mind, looking back upon the journey, now that we are within a fortnight of our destination. I touched on a few impressions in the interview, but now have had more time to consider my answer in more depth. This journey has brought:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>An opportunity to be enriched by the experience of Native American culture first hand. Both descendants and living tribespeople have generously shared their ways with us, notably in California, Arizona, New Mexico, illinois, Ohio, Kentucky and Pennsylvania.</b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The shattering of stereotypes all along the way. For example, as a West Coast person, “the flyover states” will never again be just a blip on my radar screen! Many individuals we met in “the heartland” of America have given me a real appreciation for the meaning of the term. And there is a lot of heartbreak in the heartland just now as young people move away, and families and farmers scramble for ways to make ends meet. </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The discovery of my voice and my audience -- especially women over 50 who, like me, find themselves wanting to fulfill their lives, and mend their own heartbreak by finding ways to make a positive impact with the time and energy that remains to them. The world needs the special music of the grandmothers, let us not die with that music still in us. Let us step up, step out, and step beyond our fears to express, in the most positive way possible what we have learned -- even if it means teaching what we most WANT to learn.</b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The strengthening and deepening of the mother-daughter bond between myself and my daughter, Viveka, and the discovery of a joint spiritual work, best described as “spiritual activism,” which we pursue joyfully together like a passionate hobby, without attachment to outcome!</b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The appreciation of all those who settled and built this country -- both male and female, slave and free. </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>A bittersweet recognition of tragic valor, as we took account of all the lives lost -- on both sides -- in the struggle to preserve the Union.</b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The solemn recognition of all who fought and died, both “winners” and “losers” on every side of every conflict, both foreign and domestic -- may they rest in peace with the fervent hope that human kind is learning a better way. As a PeaceWalker, I often think of my great inspiration, Peace Pilgrim, who walked a distance of more than the circumference of the earth (25,000 miles) to honor her vow: “to be a wayfarer on the earth until mankind shall have learned the ways of peace.” I believe the 20th century did show us that we’ve<i> </i>concretely demonstrated that we <i>HAVE</i> learned the ways of peace, <i>but we are not very good, as yet, at applying what we already know. </i> Peace is a choice made by individuals, first, from the inside out. I am clear that I aim to see, in my lifetime a “Department of Peace” in our government.</b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The deep contemplation of the maxim “Know Thyself” which has a wide variety of interpretations, from “practice moderation and humility” to “without Self knowledge, all other forms of knowledge are meaningless.” In seeking to know myself, I have discovered my own shadow, and my own wounded inner child. I see that my answer to the question “What is wrong with the world?” would be the same as G.K. Chesterton’s: “i am.” (meaning the small self) And the answer to the question, “What is the remedy?” is "I AM" (meaning the greater Self) </b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The importance of a personal daily devotional practice -- for spiritual grounding.</b></span></li>
</ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The extreme gratitude to providence for our health and stamina, and the ability to exercise our freedoms, and to complete this "walk your talk-a-thon."</b></span></li>
</ul><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>* * *</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>In just a little over a week, G-d willing, we will reach our destination. I have been told that it is not possible to ascend the Washington Monument any longer due to structural weakness caused by a recent earthquake. That had always been my goal: to sit in the capstone -- if I might be allowed -- and pray for a new vision of this country that could sustain us into the new millennium. Since this is not possible, I hope to receive a new assignment in the form of a new ritual of completion, which I look forward to sharing with you.</b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-83468660717282016642011-09-13T11:22:00.000-07:002011-09-13T11:22:48.987-07:00Golden Wedding Day<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Patoker/Gamble Horse Stables and Campground</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">near Paintsville, KY</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">September 5, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">1:45 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Golden Wedding Day</b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Put on your old grey bonnet with the blue ribbons on it</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>And I’ll hitch old Dobbin to the shay;</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Through the fields of clover we’ll ride down to Dover</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>On our Golden Wedding Day.</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Before I can tell you how Viveka, Richard and I resolved (or failed to resolve) our differences so that the Sole 2 Soul Mission could continue, I must fill you in on an important part of the process.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>While I had chosen to confine myself to the RV during my 4 days of prayer and fasting, practicing what I have called “Tantrum Yoga,” it became clear to me on the “inside,” and to Viveka and Richard on the “outside” as well that I was embedding myself into a “cocoon” for the purpose of some kind of a transformation. From Viveka’s point of view as the director of a documentary film, she had a “star” who was refusing to come out of her trailer! From my point of view as the “star” -- the heroine of my own play -- I had come to a point where I simply could not move forward or backward or side to side. I had to find a way to boost the energy to make a quantum leap into a different orbit. I had to move into another dimension, as from a two-dimensional to a three-dimensional reality. What was needed, although I wasn’t even fully aware of it at the time, was some new thought/energy/spirit perspective from “outside the box.”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>As luck, or divine order, or providence would have it, I was praying and reading sacred texts, and meditating with the full concentration that only fasting can bring. I was leaving no possibility out, no stone unturned. I was invoking all forms of help, from saints, and angels, avatars and ancestors; exploring all pathways, minor and major. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>It was probably on the third day -- although I can’t be sure -- that a series of events conspired to give me a great gift -- from another realm.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>When I fast I begin to become aware of the fat disappearing from my bones. One of the places it leaves first is from the underarms, and then, also from my fingers. After three days my rings were feeling looser! It had been close to 30 years since I had worn a wedding ring, but on the fourth finger of my left hand was a very handsome amethyst ring, with a cluster of four good size stones and a small diamond in the middle. It had been a gift from my mother. Tears began to flood my eyes as I recalled the story of the ring:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>In the Spring of 1984, when my father was just about to leave on a Grand Tour of the Far East with his third wife, he called me with a request. “I am sending you an anniversary card and some money,” he said. “I want you to buy a beautiful ring for your mother and give it -- and the card -- to her <i>on what would be our 50th wedding anniversary.</i>” (I believe the date was in May.) I agreed, and took my two daughters -- Lila 16 and Viveka 14 -- with me to the mall to make the selection. My father’s birthday was February 5 and my mother’s was February 12, so we agreed that an amethyst ring would be best to honor their joint Aquarian birth signs. The ring we chose was the one that pulled my focus to it that afternoon while fasting in the trailer “cocoon.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>And in that moment of musing it also occurred to me that the date -- that very day -- was August 27, 2011. Exactly 50 years ago to the day, in 1961, I had been married to Laurence Edward Davis at Fallen Leaf Chapel near Lake Tahoe, California. Our honeymoon had been a bare bones camping trip into the high sierras above the timber line in a wilderness area called “Desolation Valley.” How well I remember the adventurous spirit with which we had chosen to begin our married life. And what a prophetic metaphor we had chosen to challenge ourselves with: “Desolation Valley.”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>This very day was my 50th Anniversary, and I was celebrating it in a very intimate, fully conscious way with my parents’ beautiful anniversary ring, and with only the memory of my deceased ex-husband. And yet a great gift of healing was given to me in that moment. The best way to describe it would be like a golden balm or elixir dropping down from above. </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The words from Shakespeare’s play “The Merchant of Venice,” accompanied the feeling: </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><br />
</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>“The quality of mercy is not strained, </i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed --</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.” </i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Suddenly the world was illuminated with the freedom of forgiveness: My father wanting his ex-wife, my mother, to know that there was still a special place in his heart and in his life for her. And my mother making sure that I had the ring to remind me always of that love. And my daughters‘ part in selecting the graceful and distinctive piece of heirloom jewelry, symbolizing the family bond that would always exist. A gift of mercy and forgiveness had dropped down, like a balm from the realm of the ancestors.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>There came upon me at that moment, a great sense of completion and fulfillment. I was overcome with gratitude for everything in my life: the way things were as well as the way things were not. It was all so perfect, just so, as it was (and was not) and as it is (and is not) and as it will (and will not) be. I had reached an unattached and neutral space, simply enjoying the way it IS.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>On the following day I came out of the trailer, transformed from the inside out. I was ready to talk to Richard and Viveka, and to begin to discuss ways that we could come to a win-win-win solution. After all, there was nothing that I needed to learn or know other than that I was loved, and always had been, and always would be, and that because of this I could reach out to extend that same love to others.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>* * * </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Viveka and I decided to move on together towards Washington, D.C. on the Sole 2 Soul Walk that we had begun on March 8, 2011. Richard and I chose to move on through our impasse as well. Materials were purchased in order to complete the project. My only request was that we put our agreements and understandings in writing this time, so that there would be no more vague recollections. I have put my ideas and requirements in writing, waiting for Richard’s response. At the moment I have done all that I can do to let my positions, preferences, requests AND boundaries be known. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Clearly, we are not out of the woods, yet. It still remains to be seen whether we can leave off the recriminations and mutual assaults long enough to get on the same page to put our signatures to our mutual understandings. But for the moment we have agreed in principle that we want to work something out between us that will benefit all and bring the family healing that is so dearly required.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>We left the Cliff View Resort in Rogers, KY on Friday afternoon, September 2, headed towards Campton, KY and the West Virginia border, with only 19 days remaining to arrive in Washington, D.C. on September 21.</b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-45322543764024005572011-08-29T06:13:00.000-07:002011-08-29T06:13:22.270-07:00Prayer and Fasting as a Form of "Tantrum Yoga"<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Cliff View Resort</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">(near Rogers, KY)</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">August 28, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">4:26 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Prayer and Fasting as a Form of “Tantrum Yoga”</b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Don’t just DO something. Stand there!</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>I must apologize for that last blog, “My Old Kentucky Home: Where Push Came to Shove.” I probably lost half of my readers by spilling my guts in that way about a family dispute. On re-reading I felt embarrassed and quickly revised it. It was unprofessional, unfocused, way too long, and just plain bad writing! <i>Mea culpa.</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>On the other hand, there is a bright side. At least I have had the opportunity to discover that what I am upset about is exactly why I am on a cross-country walkabout “imagining a world where women are equally-valued decision makers in partnership with men.” I had no idea how angry I was, because I had almost never -- in my whole life -- allowed myself the luxury of feeling anger focused at another person! That is, until I went head to head with my daughter’s husband, Richard.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>To have arrived at this advanced age and suddenly discover a roiling sea of anger seething inside of me? Why it’s just plain shocking! <i>Let’s face it, I </i></b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b><i>really</i></b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><i> have issues with men! </i>And Richard, is the one who is allowing me to experience that in spades. I probably should be grateful to him for playing that role in my life. I’m not quite there yet, but I am working on it. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>I suspect I am not alone, especially in that group of women over 50 who were taught to be quiet and submissive and not make waves. My own mother was very mild and deferential to my father when she was younger, but as she got older, after two divorces, she became a curmudgeon. I remember her hitting my husband -- her son-in-law -- with her purse in a parking lot, shouting, “You don’t <i>deserve</i> this family.” It was tragi-comical at the time, but she had a point, and there was some justification.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>I also saw my grandmother unleash a tirade at my father -- her son-in-law -- in our front yard. She was almost hysterical. My father looked down upon her pathos in a patronizing way. Is it something about mothers-in-law? Do they feel empowered to speak up in their later years when they may not have been able to while they were raising their families? Is that what is happening to me? Should this blog really be titled, “In Defense of Mothers-in-Law.” Do we get to a point where we are “Mad as hell and just can’t take it anymore?” The 17th century playwright William Congreve tapped the roots of women’s anger profoundly when he penned: </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><br />
</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, </i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>After I wrote and (too hastily) published the last blog, I decided to fast and pray and invite Spirit to guide me, because clearly I had lost all perspective and needed to declare a moratorium on all actions and decisions -- giving myself a chance to look at things from all sides. For the past four days (except for a crumb of bread and a thimble of wine at a church service) I have had only water, and one cup of coffee each morning. I’m not sure how long I will continue. Jesus fasted 40 days in the wilderness to conquer the ancient foe, Satanas. The Buddha sat under the Bodhi tree in meditation until he achieved enlightenment. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>During my fast I have talked and prayed with a number of people. It has helped to find compassionate listeners who can use their insights to shed light and offer new perspectives. Still I am full of sadness and grief, and I cannot shake the fear and embarrassment over the tyranny of simply </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>having</b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b> emotions that I cannot control. Fasting allows me to have a tantrum in slow motion and observe what it is really all about. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>For example, last night I was inspired to write down just what I am upset about. It is the feeling that I have compromised with boundary violators in very unhealthy ways. Here is what I wrote:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>“What part of ‘NO’ don’t you understand? I will no longer be </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><i>threatened, shamed, guilt-tripped, bullied, influenced, coaxed, baited-and-switched, lobbied, debated, manipulated, strong-armed, railroaded, cajoled, brainwashed, led, sold, won over, humored, backed into, co-opted, encouraged, bribed, ‘counseled,’ tempted, bought, tricked, bludgeoned, convinced, forced, deceived, browbeaten, badgered, hounded, harassed, pressured, seduced, propositioned, sweet-talked, tortured, debated, ‘jawboned’ or otherwise talked into</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><i></i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>thinking, saying or doing anything that is not in my best interests.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Now some questions arise immediately:</b></span></div><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>What are boundaries? </b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>In God’s view are there such things? </b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Do I always know my best interests? </b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Am I a boundary violator without even knowing it? <i>Moi?</i></b></span></li>
</ul><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><b>Boundary violators care more about their interests than the “owners” of the territories they are invading. When it is “your” territory, they are often convinced you don’t know your own boundaries. This is the perfect set up for a “trespass,” or a “grievance.” </b></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Then again, if life is all about growing spiritually, how can I learn </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>except by</b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b> making incorrect choices and then learning to choose once again? </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>I don’t know the answers to any of these questions. But I do know this: While fasting allowed me to slow down and deconstruct my emotional upset, putting a magnifying glass on it, so to speak, still, <i>it is the prayer that makes the difference.</i> Prayer means that I have the intention to have a breakthrough, no matter what, and it acknowledges that I cannot do this by myself.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>The key issue, at least from the wounded ego’s point of view, seems to be domination, and how to avoid it. It is the fear of not being in control of one’s own life and resources, and frankly, feeling unsafe from predators. In the present case, I have never felt such insecurity before. As I am about to go into a meeting with Viveka and Richard to attempt to resolve some of our issues and move forward through our impasse I am just noticing, and observing. . . and wondering how it will all turn out. . .</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>A lot is riding on having a breakthrough in communication. If we cannot, I am prepared to go on to D.C. alone, and frankly it saddens me to consider that. In any case, may God help me -- and us -- to find a resolution that leads to spiritual growth. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Peace is the goal -- though not at <i>ANY</i> price. If I can have this victory over my self, the whole world will benefit. Of this I am certain.</b></span></div><div><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b><br />
</b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-9621022006598530682011-08-25T18:22:00.000-07:002011-08-30T12:51:42.724-07:00My Old Kentucky Home: Where Push Came to Shove<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><br />
<div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px;"><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Cliff View Resort</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">(near Rogers, KY)</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">August 25, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">2:37 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>My Old Kentucky Home: Where Push Came to Shove </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>(Revised Twice for condensation and greater accuracy </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>at Viveka's request)</b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>The young folks roll on the little cabin floor</i></span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>All merry, and happy, and bright; . . .</i></span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>Let us sing one song for my old Kentucky home</i></span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>My old Kentucky home, good night.</i></span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i> --Stephen Foster lyrics</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I was asked to officiate at my daughter’s wedding about seven years ago. To me, all wedding ceremonies are memorable, but this one was especially unique on several counts. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>First of all, it was my first wedding after having been ordained, and it was in my own family -- my own dear daughter. To have an in-law be the officiating minister meant that we were following in a family tradition, for I myself had been married by my venerable father-in-law, Rev. Haven N. Davis, some 43 years before at Fallen Leaf Lake near Lake Tahoe. Rev. Davis was the founding minister of the Westwood California, Presbyterian church. Viveka, who, incidentally has chosen to adopt “Haven” as her middle name, was marrying a man nearer to my age than her own. For some time I had struggled to come to terms with this, her second marriage. But it was clearly her choice to make, as an adult in her mid-thirties.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Secondly: The wedding took place in Las Vegas in a sound stage, rather than a church or chapel. The ceremony was part of a dual event -- both wedding a musical extravaganza replete with a host of professional musicians, singers and technicians. And it was being filmed to showcase Viveka’s musical talents, as well as the talents of other performers.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Thirdly: instead of a conventional center aisle and altar set-up, guests stood around a perimeter in front of a stage. Entering the space, Viveka came dancing with her brother down a curved pathway to stand before me and the bridegroom in a small, roped-off “boxing ring” area. Instead of the traditional “Wedding March” (“Here Comes the Bride), the music was a recording of Viveka singing a song written by her years earlier, “When Push Comes to Shove.” The song was an aggressive but lighthearted warning that this marriage may be rocky (as in Rocky Balboa, <i>my pun)</i> but we are going to fight our way through it, and, as the refrain kept reminding us, <i>“it’s gonna get ugly when push comes to shove.” </i> It looked to me that Viveka was putting her community of supportive wedding guests on notice that she had no illusions about the fact that marriage can be a battleground, but that she was willing to “duke it out” with her partner, if necessary -- in love. Apparently this marriage would require a large dose of necessary toughness.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Viveka had seen in her parents’ marriage (mine) just how embattled marriage can be. But I, in contrast with her, had not stood up to my partner. I had received no training in this skill. My mother and grandmother had had nervous breakdowns. That was what their level of coping their skills and imaginations came up with. It was effective, and in some ways even clever. It removed them from the abuse, as they could literally seek asylum. Other women in my family had simply quit their marriages, choosing to bear the awful stigma of divorce (in the first part of the 20th century) rather than the suffering of abuse. I, like so many women of my W.A.S.P. culture and generation simply caved in to aggressive, hostile, hurtful and criminally unjust domestic partners in the interest of “keeping the peace,” and keeping the family together at all costs. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I chose to tolerate the abuse, even though it was extreme, because it was “only” verbal, not physical or sexual, not fully realizing what a heavy burden I was forcing my children to bear. After all, I had borne similar abuse as a child, and my mother before me much worse, because hers was physical. I justified the abuse with this kind of reasoning: “My children are really not suffering any more than I did, and much less than my mother did. Isn’t that just the way it is in families? Aren’t all families this way?” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>One of the main reasons for my purchase of the “Wilde Rose Guest House” cabin in Kentucky last year was to provide a sanctuary for individual and family healing and transformation -- especially for our own family, and possibly for others‘ in a beautiful retreat setting. During his recent trip to Kentucky for Viveka’s birthday, my son and I had some long talks into the wee hours about our family dysfunctions, and especially the part I had played in that, through my inaction. As a conscientious young father, struggling with his own childhood traumas, he pointed out to me in no uncertain terms how wrong this was. But in all truth, I simply was ill-equipped to know what course to pursue other than divorce, which I had vowed not to do, because I had solemnly promised, before God and witnesses “to love, honor and cherish, in sickness and in health, until death do us part.” I remember, during my wedding ceremony, how one part of the vow stuck in my throat. In trying to repeat “in sickness as in health,” I broke out in tears, as though I knew this would be the toughest part of the vow to honor. Just so, it turned out to be prophetic. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>My tears and hesitation were delaying the ceremony, so Rev. Haven told me with compassion, “That’s O.K., you don’t have to say it.” But I insisted on actually pronouncing the entire vow, choked by my sobs. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Alcoholism is a sickness, although at 23 I was scarcely aware of such things. Without even suspecting that my wonderful, brilliant, handsome young husband could be sick, I failed to recognize that, in time, my husband would need mental and medical help on so many levels that I could not give him. As he failed to support the family, despite his many talents and gifts, I eventually moved into the position of breadwinner. I also needed more help and support than I was able to realize or ask for. My failing was the arrogance of trying to bear this burden on my own, thinking that through the sheer depth and power of my love -- and with God’s help -- I could provide the help he needed. Also, and perhaps more importantly, I was afraid to bear the feeling of shame around my failure. Nowadays we call it denial. In those days, people just said or thought things like, “Poor Doris, saddled with those four kids and that maniac,” or more kindly, “Love is blind.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>* * *</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Why am I telling all of this? Unfortunately the impasse I have reached with Viveka’s husband is severe, and I see it as relevant. After 10 years of knowing each other I regret to say that we have made very little progress in our relationship. Mutual grievances pointed in opposite directions are piled on top of each other, like ammunition. It pains me deeply, but I also know that it pains me for reasons that are very germane to this walk. Richard represents to me that kind of “Alpha” male energy that I find ultra-offensive because it pushes all of my buttons, harking back to my own grandfathers and father and husband. I also recognize that Richard is not the enemy. He simply represents (in my mind) an archetype of the unjust (tyrannical) male authority figure. Truth be told, I probably push all of his overbearing (wayward) feminine archetype buttons as well. To him I probably appear like the mother-in-law from hell.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>My time spent with him here, recently, has shown me that I need to make a distinction between what Richard represents to me (because of my past experiences) and who Richard IS. I must learn to practice new patterns of behavior with respect to this archetype, separating Richard, the human brother walking down the path of life beside me, bearing his own burdens, soldiering on towards his own goals and objectives. The role I have assigned to him may merely add to his burdens. I want to do all in my power to release him of those extra burdens by assessing the situation with greater accuracy. If I cannot do this, the Sole 2 Soul Walk and its purpose and mission are doomed to failure. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>It’s like this: if I cannot, as a PeaceWalker succeed in bringing inner peace to myself </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>no matter what the circumstances and no matter what the appearances</b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>, I will have failed a most important test. But there is no doubt in my mind that I aim to pass it this time, with G-d’s help.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> <b> </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I would devoutly like to see divine healing accomplished in my family, but I must start with myself first. I cannot take responsibility for another but I CAN take responsibility for how I see that other, and how I choose to speak with and relate to that other. And, while not disrespecting another, I can remember to respect myself as well</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I have known this all along, but have acted as though I didn't really believe it. Self respect and self confidence are two large issues with me, and areas where I am learning to </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>walk my talk.</b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b> I will not stop until inner peace is a complete and permanent reality in my experience.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>In the past I have always opted for appeasement and compromise when faced with domineering and bullying tactics. I don’t know how to establish boundaries. So I see the same pattern bearing itself out in my relationship with Richard. My response has been either roll over and play dead (escape emotionally) or “Throw the dog a bone” (appease). At this point, however, I see that these are no longer a viable options for me. In practical and personal terms, it comes down to this: without feeling that I am an equally-valued decision maker, I cannot be in a partnership with anyone. Our family partnership vis a vis the Kentucky property which we own (our lots are next door to each other) involves a family business, construction projects, family money, and real estate values. Richard and I have not found ways (yet) to communicate due to long-standing issues from the past involving repeated breaches of trust and good faith -- perceived on both sides. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>So, in short, “push has come to shove” in my relationship with Viveka and Richard, and I am poised and prepared to leave here in a few days, </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b><i>without her, if necessary</i></b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i>, </i>to continue and to complete this pilgrimage. God willing, I aim to arrive in less than a month in Washington, D.C. and sit in meditation in the capstone of the Washington Monument, and to ask the Divine One to allow me a vision of this nation and its destiny and my part in it as a woman, as a mother, as a grandmother, and as a minister and Sacred Activist. That is the end that I have in mind. That is the passion that I am walking for. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Viveka need not be part of that unless she chooses to do so. Richard and I could be at a standoff for a very long time, but I am clear that I will not make the mistake of having my boundaries violated without clear and effective signals of my protest, and appropriate action taken to ensure fairness to myself as well as those whom I love.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>But I can say this without judgment or prejudice to anyone, or without making anyone wrong: our stated mission on this walk, “To imagine a world where women are equally valued decision-makers in partnership with men worldwide” is at the very core of this radical departure of mine. I am frightened to take this position, for there is a lot a stake for me, but I need to break old patterns that no longer serve me.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>It remains to be seen how Viveka, who is caught between her husband and her mother, will respond to my very clear intention to continue this walk alone, if necessary.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div></span></span></div></div></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-42756292652769267772011-08-19T16:29:00.000-07:002011-08-25T18:27:24.813-07:00Serpent Mound, Ohio: More Than We Bargained For<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><br />
<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Peebles, OH</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">August 15, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">11:26 a.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Serpent Mound, Ohio: More Than We Bargained For</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>“What is Truth?” said jesting Pilate, and would not wait </i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>for an answer. --Sir Francis Bacon</i></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 13.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 15.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Getting to Serpent Mound, Ohio, had some tension wrapped around it because Viveka and I were having our perennial standoff. It goes like this: I keep wanting to pack up and move on and get on down the road, and she likes to arrive somewhere and start spreading out her art supplies, creating art, meeting and talking to people (at length) and taking stills and shooting footage for the documentary we are making about this adventure. As a result of her leisurely style, my intention to arrive at Serpent Mound in the afternoon of the full moon, August 13 was frustrated, and we arrived well after 8:00 p.m. We missed the sunset and the moon had not yet risen so I felt a bit angry and shut down, as though I had missed out -- and it was all her fault! (ha ha) However, if I have learned anything on this trip it is that Divine Order is always operating. We are always exactly at the right place and in the right time. So what was <i>really </i>going on was that I clearly needed to examine some parts of my shadow. . . for I had given them the power to rob me of my tranquility. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The gates to the complex, which are closed at dusk, were poised to shut. As we drove into the parking lot there was a man standing by his car. Viveka noticed that he had a leather medicine pouch around his neck. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>"There's our guy," she said. She was right, it was as though he had been sent from central casting to be waiting for us. His name was Chuck, and he had the assignment to close the gates that evening. He had a scruffy white beard covering a face deeply lined with character and experience -- with Cherokee heritage, it turned out. Chuck is a healer from Colorado, who is spending a lot of time at the mound this summer. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serpent_Mound) </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>"We're so glad you're here!” we admitted, relieved. “We came a long way to get here on the full moon." When we explained that we have been "Walking America" since last March with this place as a key destination, Chuck was impressed in his low-key way. Clearly he was there for the full moon as well. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>About that time we began to be aware of lightening and thunder with rain threatening. "You don't want to be here in a lightening storm," Chuck assured us. The place has a lot of anomalies, and one is that lightening is attracted here. Another one is that compasses are off about 8 degrees. He showed us around the mound briefly, which is a quarter of a mile long in the shape of a snake with spiral tail and open mouth about to devour a mysterious oval object, which could represent an egg, or the sun -- nobody knows. Oddly, there was a snakeskin in the coil of the Serpent's tail. Chuck thought it might have been placed there by human hands, for there was another one in the "heart" area of the effigy. Another mystery. Chuck wanted to know if we were interested in “spirits.” I didn’t know how to answer, for I <i>am</i> interested in “Spirit,” but am not particularly interested in “ghosts,” if that is what he meant.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>We knew we would come back the next day to learn more, so all we needed was a bit of orientation. He also told us about a gathering in a home in the hills nearby. Still feeling the residue of my anger over being "late," I was "tired" and didn't feel like a party, but Viveka went and it turned out to be a local group featuring a fiddler, percussion, and didgeridoo that meets every Saturday night for home grown music and a potluck. She fit right in, and was able to make them all laugh with some of her stories. "You're welcome back anytime," they told her when the party was over.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Meanwhile, back at the RV, after a meal of buttered sweet corn I had a distinctly strange experience which I cannot explain. As I was lying down to sleep I felt my "astral" body float upward about 6 inches and re-orient about 20 degrees clockwise. This happened twice before I fell asleep, and I have never felt anything like this in my life. I hope someday to learn what that was all about! (On reflection, it does occur to me that the earth's axis is tilted about 23 degrees . . .)</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The following morning we met a man named Bob Wallace in a convenience store where we had stopped to get ice. I asked him about the Mound and he said his family had owned the property where it was found. In fact, his grandfather had been born on it! That led to a longer conversation about other Native American sites, and his experiences growing up in the area, and combing the land for artifacts. <i>Unlike</i> many other locals, he had a keen interest in the site and other Native American archeological locations in Ohio and the greater Mississippi valley. All the time I was talking to him he kept looking around a bit furtively and speaking somewhat “confidentially” as though he might be overheard, or discovered talking too much. It was a bit strange, but later I discovered he was a mortician, and a guy who knew a lot about ghosts and spirits! He was on his way to prepare the body of a friend for burial. A man who had been the venerable historian of the area. On the following day I saw a very long funeral procession involving a couple hundred cars -- a lot for this sparsely populated rural area -- and wondered if it might be in honor of that man.” </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>He told us we should meet a man named Tom Johnson who, it turned out, was a world class paleontologist with a simple hole in the wall "rock shop" by the side of the road. After a few minutes in conversation I asked Tom, “What is your passion? I often ask this question to deepen a conversation, for I don’t always have a lot of time to speak with people as we pass through. I explain to them that I would really like to know what THEY would be willing to walk across the country for -- if they believed it would make a difference in a big or even a small way. His answer took a few minutes to develop, but is one of the most powerful ones I have heard:</b> <i>“With patience and persistence,” </i><b>he began,</b><i> “and taking Free Will into account, I want to pass forward and make understandable -- especially to young people -- the science of the Universe.”</i> <b> He seemed grateful for my asking, and happy that I had helped him to articulate it.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Clearly, Tom is a teacher, and all kinds of people "magically" find their way to him -- like us. The day before some Native Americans had made a film about him. A short time ago he appeared on Ancient Aliens TV program. His exhibits have appeared in the Smithsonian. (See: </b><a href="http://www.aradias-garden.com/house-of-phacops.html"><span style="font: 14.0px Arial; letter-spacing: 0.0px color: #001ba6; text-decoration: underline;"><b>http://www.aradias-garden.com/house-of-phacops.html</b></span></a><b> ) It was from him that we learned about the crop circles that had appeared in the field near the Mound several years ago. He gave me a colored picture of the crop circle which was oriented in such a way that its key feature pointed directly to the head of the Serpent. <i>The same crop circle appeared the following year in the same field, only this time as the reverse or negative of the design. </i>Tom had actually walked in it just after it was formed. These were made in a field of soybeans, but he said he had walked in crop circles in corn fields and had felt such heat that the kernels in the ears had swelled as though about to pop. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I spent some time in the field, trying to trace the design I could see from the photo, which appeared to be more in the shape of an oval than a circle. Tom had told me that the crop circles are likely to appear in fields where there is water underneath. According to him, the water definitely has something to do with the energy responsible for the the formation of the designs. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>This morning we got up before sunrise. Viv spent a very early hour in the crop circle field across from where we were parked, and a bit later we walked up to the Mound one last time to watch the sun rise. Viv found a beautiful snakeskin left in the road on her way up, which she will incorporate into her art somehow.</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I am fascinated with the crop circle phenomenon and look forward to doing more research on the latest insights into the interpretations of what they might mean. . . </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>* * *</b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>With this Serpent Mound adventure we officially end the third of four legs of our journey as planned and on schedule. Now we have an hiatus for a fortnight to go to our property in KY and celebrate Viv's birthday on August 19. Some family will join us, and a few others we have met along the way. In addition, one of the original Sole 2 Soul planning group, Sandi Thompson is flying in from Mexico to complete the last leg with us. </b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #333233; font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Viveka's husband Richard, who has been holding down the fort at our family cabin at Cliff View Resort near Natural Bridge, Kentucky, told me in the very beginning, "Doris, if you get this far, I will walk the rest of the way to Washington D.C. with you!" Clearly, he didn’t expect we would make it to Kentucky! It remains to be seen if he will remember -- and honor -- his word.</b></span></div></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-33898764607062016242011-08-12T05:44:00.000-07:002011-08-12T05:44:05.096-07:00A Twinkle of Mirth is Needed on Earth<br />
<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Vandalia, IL</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">August 8, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">7:12 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>A Twinkle of Mirth is Needed on Earth</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Arial; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>In my belief you cannot deal with the most serious things in the world unless </i></span></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Arial; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>you also understand the most amusing.” --Winston Churchill</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>The Odd Couple</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>If you have been following this blog I want you to understand one thing about this American Cross-Country Mother-Daughter Walkabout: whatever our mission and intention purports to be, it is still and always </b><i>a seventy-something mother and her forty-something daughter traveling together in an RV for 6 1/2 months! </i><b> </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>My daughter Viveka played country music superstar Wynonna Judd, in the 1996 mini-series “Love Can Build A Bridge.” Wynonna said, “Every woman should spend a year in an RV with her mother.” I believe I now know what she meant. It is a situation in which the relationship is tested at every turn, especially if the two individuals are so different in temperament and style as to form an “odd couple” polarity -- as Viveka and I do with her playing “Oscar” (the freestyling “messy” one) to my (prim and proper “controlling”) “Felix.”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b> </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The Sufi poet Kabir wrote (and I’m paraphrasing from memory)</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>“God and I are like two old fat men in a small boat, </i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>bumping up against each other and laughing.</i><b>”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><br />
</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>After Viveka and I heard this delightful poem we began to use the insight as a life-saving method for diffusing tension. We began channeling the personas of the two old hecklers in the balcony from “The Muppet Show.” For some unknown reason we took on Italian accents. Immediately all the tense situations we found ourselves in stemming from our respective “odd couple” natures -- disputes over little things, territorial squabbles, power struggles -- were transformed into scenes of hilarity in the style of <i>comedia del arte, </i>ending with a fluorish: “What’s a matta’ you? Boomba, Boomba! </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>In this way we are healing the mother-daughter relationship by using humor to soften the shocks and blows of the inevitable role reversals that happen when children become adults and find themselves more in charge, and parents start slowing down letting go of memory, vision, hearing, and their interest in coping with technology and the pace of modern life. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I can’t tell you exactly where this transformation to a kind of humorous detachment took place, probably somewhere between New Mexico and Kansas, but ever since we learned to resort to humor to diffuse tension I have found myself having a lot more “fun” than I ever imagined I would, given the serious nature of our enterprise. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>* * *</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>R.O.M.E.O.s</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>When I first began to train for this walk last January, I would stop after a few hours of walking at a MacDonald’s restaurant in my home town, Culver City, California. Every time I stopped I noticed a group of 6-8 men having breakfast. They were the regulars -- most of them retired. Even though it was clearly a “men’s club,” I couldn’t resist the opportunity try out my mission statement on them: “Imagining a world where women are equally-valued decision-makers in partnership with men worldwide.” When I explained that it was my intention to walk across America with my daughter carrying that message, one of them quipped, “What do you women want? We gave you the vote!” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Since then, in countless MacDonald’s restaurants I have seen similar “men’s clubs” gathering between the hours of 6 and 9 a.m. I presume they gather in local diners as well as fast food places all over America. They are a tough crowd to play to, for they don’t know what to make of a woman like me -- although I have come to appreciate them and what they stand for. Because of their age and experience, they really <i>do</i> have all the answers, and, as I learned in Sedona, they are quite frustrated that no one seems to want to listen to them any more. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>One man I met in Amboy, California, himself a member of this floating group that can gather almost anywhere like a pick-up basketball game, told me that he knew of one group in Florida that called themselves the Romeo Club. He spelled out the letters, R.O.M.E.O. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>“What does that stand for?” I asked. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>“Really Old Men Eating Out,” he answered.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>One morning, eating breakfast at the Corner Cafe in Gallatin, Missouri, we learned our breakfast had been paid for by one gentleman in a group who saw the sign on my backpack which says “Sole 2 Soul Walk -- Walking Across America.” When I shared the observation that without knowing it they all belonged to a men’s breakfast group numbering in the millions nationwide, one jested, “We just like to get away from our wives.” Then I told them about the R.O.M.E.O.s and another one said, “I like that name better than ours.”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>“What’s yours?” I asked.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>“‘The Rusty Zippers.’”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>* * *</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>Movie Trailer Concepts</b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b> (written with Viveka)</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>As Viveka is making a documentary film about our cross-country adventure with the working title “Gathering WOmentum,” we are constantly receiving inspiration around how to market our film to the international festival circuit. Here are some possibilities. . .</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>(Imagine the following being delivered in that rich baritone “movie guy” voice:)</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>You’ve always heard, “Go West, Young Man.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Now it’s time for. . .“Go East, Old Woman.”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>or</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><b><br />
</b></div><div style="font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Arial; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span><b>In a world where women must. . . </b></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>step up, </i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>step out, </i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>and step beyond. . .</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Can she birth a movement </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Without stepping <i>in</i> it?</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>or</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>You’ve heard of Sky Walker</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>You’ve heard of Planet Walker</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Now watch Doris walk</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>IN-CONTINENT WALKER</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Will her mission hold water </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Even when she can’t?</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Humanity’s future DEPENDS upon it.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>------------------</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Do you think AARP might want to fund this movie?</b></span></div><div><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><br />
</b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-49268483419700108892011-07-31T09:42:00.000-07:002011-07-31T09:42:28.374-07:00Equal Is Not the Same<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Columbia, Missouri</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">July 25, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">12:53 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Equal is Not the Same</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #181818; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>If particular care and attention is not paid to the Ladies we are determined to foment a Rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice, or Representation." --Abigail Adams, 1776</i></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>I was told recently by a man I respect greatly that </b></span><b>in his opinion</b><b> our Sole 2 Soul Walk mission was flawed. His argument centered around the notion of equality. “Men and women are not equal,” he asserted, implying that to “imagine a world where women are equally-valued decision makers in partnership with men worldwide,” as our mission statement suggests, is not only a vain hope, it is out of sync with the divine order of things.</b></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>As I listened intently to this accomplished and highly successful gentleman, and observed him in several contexts, both personal and professional, I realized that his view was consistent with deeply held beliefs -- more like truth principles -- to which he had dedicated his life. In several sessions of conversations over a three-day period adding up to more than 10 hours of face to face conversation with my daughter Viveka and myself, combined with deep immersion into his domain and lifestyle, we marveled at the beauty and harmony of what he had created. In all of the areas which I value: consciousness, culture, community, creativity, and communication I saw nothing but integrity, consistency, wisdom, power and love operating through and through. He had established among his family and employees a workable paradigm for a happy lifestyle.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Although he clearly admired me and our efforts and dedication to higher principle, he considered our mission to be at best misguided and therefore ultimately insignificant in the greater scheme of things. Our espoused cause added up to a waste of time and therefore was doomed to fail. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>As I lack the skills of debate I did not enter into an argument or try to defend my position. I was in his territory, after all, a place where he presided. Rather, I listened intently to his point of view in order to understand how it was that I could love and admire someone so deeply and still feel, and maybe even fear, that we could not resolve our differences and come into a place of unity. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>So what were the differences that appeared unresolvable between us? I believe it was the idea of subjection: the principle that men take precedence over women in the hierarchy of things, and therefore are entitled to a “divine authority” over them. Perhaps this is an oversimplification, but it has implications and ramifications that can lead to injustice in my view.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Clearly my discontent stems from personal experience in my family history where male dominance was asserted, and women (and children) were expected to comply with demands which did not seem to take their ideas and needs into consideration. In a society where “all men are created equal,” some were definitely more “equal” than others, and women, long considered as “property” were discounted as decision-makers, and were expected to go along with those in authority -- even when they perceived that authority not to be in their best interests, nor in the best interests of the whole. Insubordination to the dominant authority was met with forceful wrath, violence and abuse. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>This was clearly not the case in the example of my esteemed friend, for those in his community had freely subjected themselves to his authority and leadership. But I could not help but wonder what would be the position of women who are unmarried and / or choose to remain so, or widowed, or seek a greater measure of independence or autonomy? How are such women viewed by this strictly patriarchal system? Their gifts may go largely undervalued and underutilized. And what about the males who do not fit into the “alpha male” paradigm? Would they be found unworthy?</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>In a theocracy these questions are resolved differently from a monarchy or a democracy or a republic or a dictatorship or even a tribal council. The huge question that Viveka and I have been asking ourselves from the very beginning -- in our relationship as in every human endeavor -- “How are decisions made?” Where does the power lie, and how is it wielded? </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>There is a lot of confusion in the world today around this questions of equality, inclusion, and authority -- for there are many different models, different methods for coming into unity. Since beginning this inquiry, I have seen that it begins within the individual, not between individuals. Each individual has a whole council within him or her, all vying for a voice around the table of consciousness. How does one rule this unruly tribe within, where very often ego has been allowed to rule. Even as a woman, I have experienced both “masculine” and “feminine” aspects of myself, and am constantly aware of the need to balance these energies within myself in order to function effectively. Personally, I have found it more satisfying to submit to a “higher power” than to a temporal authority, whether it be a parent, a boss, or a government official. If my allegiance to that higher power is first established -- as in “Seek first the Kingdom of G-d and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you,” I can support the authority of others over me when I know that it is also motivated by the same allegiance. On the other hand, when I do not sense that righteous authority is being properly asserted, I find myself in conflict, and must speak up. <i>Finding my voice and overcoming my conditioning as a female to remain silent has been one of the most challenging aspects of this walk.</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>To walk one’s talk, one must also talk one’s walk, and that is what I am learning.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>* * *</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>I began this essay with the hidden assumption that men and women are and should be equal -- an assumption that has not been shared by human society at large. At best it has recently received some lip service. While I would agree that male and female are not the same, just as two sides of an equation are not the same, yet there is, in my view, a spiritual equality that links them together. Two sides of the equation appear very different and yet they are the same in a very real sense. As it says in the book of Genesis, “Let <i>US</i> create man in <i>OUR</i> image. Male <i>AND</i> female created He them.” This implies a plural agency at work -- a creative divinity that is <i>BOTH</i> masculine and feminine -- or as some have suggested, <i>NEITHER</i> masculine <i>NOR</i> feminine! </b></span><b>(my italics and capitalization)</b><b> </b></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>My powerful (and charming) friend did allow that women, although not “equal,” were very possibly “more equal” than men. He elaborated on this paradox by explaining that in his estimation women are worthy of the greatest respect and consideration in the marriage relationship. He then described the process by which he and his wife made decisions: they discussed the issues and alternatives and came to a point of agreement. They worked together in their marriage at becoming unified and acting as one.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Several days later a word came to me that seemed to satisfy me in expressing how it is that equality does not have to imply sameness -- thus, the title of this piece “Equal Is Not the Same. If we were to recognize and celebrate our uniqueness and individuality we could rightly call both men and women not merely equal, but <i>UNIQUAL.</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Thus are equality and uniqueness abiding together in a single concept. I will sleep better knowing that my friend and I can possibly agree on a notion that leads to more powerful and more satisfying partnerships between men and women. </b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-71604555364397444722011-07-19T14:50:00.000-07:002011-07-19T14:50:58.503-07:00"Virtual Walkers" Wanted<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Lee’s Summit, Missouri</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">July 19, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">2:14 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>“Virtual Walkers” Wanted</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Just as many hands make light work, many feet abbreviate the journey”</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> -- Doris and Viveka Davis</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>We expected this: summer heat and humidity making our walk more challenging in the midwest. For the past two months traveling through Kansas and into western Missouri, temperatures have often been over 100 degrees. Nevertheless, we have been holding true to our promise to walk a total of 11.1 miles a day 5 days a week. For us this means that two people walking 5.5 miles are the same as one person walking 11.1 miles. In this manner we have been accepting the help of friends who have walked with us. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Most of these have walked beside us, enhancing the walking time with engaging conversation. You might call them fellow travelers. </b></span><b>But some of these have been logging their miles on their own, in remote locations -- we call them “Virtual Walkers.” They are letting us know that they are walking with purpose and intention in support of a specific cause or idea. </b></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>We absolutely love it when people -- men AND women -- e-mail us at </b><a href="mailto:walkdoriswalk@gmail.com"><span style="font: 14.0px Arial; letter-spacing: 0.0px color: #001ba6; text-decoration: underline;"><b><i>walkdoriswalk@gmail.com</i></b></span></a><b> and let us know they are walking. This is the way we are literally gathering WO-MEN-tum. By the time we arrive in Washington, D.C. in September, we expect we will have many more in our ranks, both literal and virtual.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Here are a few of their names as best we can recall.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Zachary in Needles, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Ivory in Yuma, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Kaeylarae in Sedona, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Geneva in Sedona, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Celeste in Sedona, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Marilyn in Sedona, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Nancy in Sedona, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Uqualla in Sedona, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Ken in Sedona, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Dan in Sedona, AZ</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Sarb Nam (and other Sikh women) in Espanola, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Guru Kiren in Espanola, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Harimander in Espanola, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Rahmaneh in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Cameron in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Annie in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Bashira in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Sulis in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Asharaya and Issael in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>“Mudman” in Abiquiu, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Leah in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Carol in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Edwin in Santa Fe, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Sulis at Lama Foundation, NM</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Marty G in Kinsley, KS</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Marty P in Kinsley, KS</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Ruth in Platte Woods, MO</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Tom in Platte Woods, MO</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Patience in Platte Woods, MO</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Mona in Lee’s Summit, MO</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>LouAnn in Lee’s Summit, MO</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Gary in Kansas City, MO</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>and</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Sandy in MEXICO!</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>If you want to become a “Virtual Walker” for Sole 2 Soul Walk it is easy AND simple. Just e-mail me at </b><a href="mailto:doriswdavis@gmail.com"><span style="font: 14.0px Arial; letter-spacing: 0.0px color: #001ba6; text-decoration: underline;"><b>doriswdavis@gmail.com</b></span></a><b> and let us know how many miles you walked and what you are walking for. It needn’t be the same as our purpose: “Imagining a WORLD where women are equally valued decision-makers in partnership with men,” it just needs to be something you care about enough to walk your talk about.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>We look forward to joining with you in bringing positive change into our lives and into our world.</b></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-56828217421994448982011-07-11T12:54:00.000-07:002011-07-11T13:31:00.046-07:00Our Mother's Mission Part III: Connecting, Thanking, Praising, Trusting<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Kansas City, Missouri</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">July 11, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">11:42 a.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Our Mother’s Mission Part III:</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Connecting, Thanking, Praising, Trusting</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Deeper into the woods the path itself becomes illumined”</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> --anonymous</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Crossing the Missouri river, swollen with the threat of flooding, we drove from North Kansas City to the older section of town. For a moment we caught a view of the skyline. One roof in particular stood out. It was the golden spire of a church ablaze in the setting sunlight. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Half an hour later we were in the sitting room of a senior housing facility in the city, interviewing the 90-year old mother of a friend, let’s call her Sara. We had realized we hadn’t talked in depth with many women older than myself -- I’m 72 -- and we wanted her perspective, for she remembers butting her head up against the so-called “glass ceiling” of limited career advancement in the 50s and 60s. Being a self-described rebel (and a single widowed working mother) she knows that she played her part in the 70s to shatter the barrier, if only through her attitude of support for other women in their struggles and victories. Needless to say, Sara was very supportive of <i>Sole 2 Soul Walk</i>, and but for her weak knees would probably be walking with us -- at least for a few symbolic blocks. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Scouting for a quiet place for the interview, away from background noise of the residents’ conversation and television, we went into the patio and Viveka noticed that very church -- the one with the gleaming golden cupola -- was standing right next door! What were the chances? We hadn’t planned it in the least. So when I had the opportunity, I asked Sara about the church.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>“That’s the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception,” she told us. Clearly it had been there for a long time. The original building, I later learned, dated from 1833, and had taken on its present shape and status as a cathedral in 1882. It was built on the highest ground in the city, and for many years was the tallest building around. in 1960 its copper cupola was replaced with 23 carat gold leaf which allows it to dramatize the skyline with the rich grace of gold. Sara told us stories of growing up in this neighborhood, and the strange sensation of living in the spaces of her childhood, now so dramatically altered.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Now I am not a Roman Catholic, although one side of my family tree is rooted in that faith tradition. Believe me, I would not be going on about a building were it not for Our Mother’s Mission, which I have been blogging about these past three weeks: first in detailing the development of my relationship with my daughter on this trip; second in talking about Death as the Mother of Beauty, last week; and third, this week, showcasing Mary, as the Western world’s chief exponent of the Divine Mother herself. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Oh yes. Mary is the subject of the Immaculate Conception to which the Kansas City Cathedral is dedicated. Most people think that “the immaculate conception” refers to Jesus’ conception at the time of the Annunciation by Archangel Gabriel. But no, the immaculate conception refers to the <i>circumstances of Mary’s birth. </i> The Catholic church -- bless them eternally (and I mean it!) -- found a way to honor Mary especially, by giving her an exalted status. Her very conception, they reasoned (and decided) must have been free from the stain of “original sin” a doctrine they had devised and named to explain why the world is so off purpose and out of joint due to Adam and Eve’s disobedience. Mary was “full of grace,” because God in His eternal prescient wisdom had set her aside for a special mission at the time of her conception by St. Anne and St. Joachim. Otherwise how could God have chosen her to be the Mother of His Only Begotten Son?</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Why am I, a Protestant, an Interfaith Minister, a Freelance Mystic, and only an advanced beginner on the spiritual path, writing a blog about this marvelous piece of religious history and doctrine? It is not because I am a fan of “original sin,” -- I would prefer another way of talking about "the separation" -- but I won’t belabor its role in Christianity here. I only mention it because I want you all to know about “The Magnificat,” if you don’t already. It refers to the powerful and prayerful words Mary is reported to have spoken to the Archangel when she accepted her Divine Assignment. Her prayer is modeled after Hannah’s. (Hannah was the heretofore barren mother of Samuel) in the First Testament. Most Christians of whatever persuasion have sung or have heard the prayer set to inspiring music. Here is the version I like the best, archaic language and all, although there are many:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">My soul doth magnify the Lord : and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.</span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">For he hath regarded : the low estate of his handmaiden.</span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">For behold, from henceforth : all generations shall call me blessed.</span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">For he that is mighty hath magnified me : and holy is his Name.</span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And his mercy is on them that fear him : throughout all generations.</span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">He hath shewed strength with his arm : he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.</span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">He hath put down the mighty from their seat : and hath exalted the humble and meek.</span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">He hath filled the hungry with good things : and the rich he hath sent empty away.</span></div><div style="font: 13.0px Helvetica; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">He remembering his mercy hath holpen his servant Israel : as he promised to our forefathers, Abraham and his seed for ever.</span><span style="font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Arial; letter-spacing: 0px;"><b> </b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>As I let the words sink in one more time, I hear newly the Spirit of My Mother’s Mission, and it fortifies me on my chosen path. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Hannah prayed for G-d to hear her, and give her a son. He did, because of the effectual, fervent nature of her prayer. But the child, Samuel, was to be dedicated to G-d’s work. She made this deal, and kept her promise. </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>And Mary, we are told in the book of Luke, (1:26-38) accepted her astonishing assignment (for nothing will be impossible with God) with these words: “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>To me, these words ARE "The Magnificat." By connecting with and calling upon G-d -- which merely means talking to G-d simply and directly, by giving thanks, by praising the Divine Will behind Creation, and by letting go of our attachment to an outcome we might prefer, and trusting in an outcome that is beyond our understanding, we can be about Our Mother’s Mission on this planet.</b></span><span style="font: normal normal normal 14px/normal Helvetica; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px;"><br />
</span></span></b></span></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-65981860902197072802011-07-04T10:47:00.000-07:002011-07-04T10:47:56.765-07:00Our Mother's Mission Part II: Listening, Mourning, Healing, Birthing<div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><b></b></div><b><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Kansas City, Missouri</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">July 3, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">11:37 a.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Our Mother’s Mission Part II: </b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Listening, Mourning, Healing, Birthing</b></span></div><div style="color: #666666; font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Death is the mother of beauty; hence from her,</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Alone, shall come fulfillment to our dreams</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And our desires. Although she strews the leaves</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Of sure obliteration on our paths --</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> -- from <i>Sunday Morning, </i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i> </i>a poem by Wallace Stevens</span></div><div style="color: #666666; font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>A little more than halfway through our journey, in Kansas City, Missouri, I have been given a great gift: a week-long sanctuary in the home of a <i>Sole 2 Soul Walk</i> friend, Ruth Beedle. With plenty of undisturbed solitude and quiet respite from the soggy heat outside, I sleep in an air-conditioned room, under a fluffy comforter like a pudding in a cloud, between clean, white sheets. A pool is nearby for refreshing dips at leisure. This physical comfort, combined with great conversation laden with insight and humor -- especially contrasted with the relatively rough and primitive life in the “tin can” (R V) for the past 3 1/2 months -- has made me seriously consider the possibility that I have made my transition to a higher plane.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I have had time to reflect on our enterprise up to this point and can summarize in one sentence what I feel identifies my underlying motivation for undertaking this journey: <i>“This walk is nothing more, nor less, than an attempt to discover, address and heal ancient wounds -- both personal and planetary -- still charged with fear and injustice.”</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i></i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>For all the world our stated purpose has been “To imagine a world where women are equally valued decision-makers in partnership with men, worldwide.” We are planting the seeds of in idea, and the response has been varied, from <i>“Right on! You go, girls,”</i> to <i>“That will never happen,”</i> to <i>“Just what is your problem? We gave you the vote.”</i> </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>But in this last week, with all this tranquility and safe silence, I have had a chance to look more deeply into my own personal motivation, and it is as though my female ancestors have been present to me, sharing their stories.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I don’t know a great deal about my female lineage, I was never close to any female relatives, including my mother, nor was I told many stories, but I have surmised that in my family there was no such thing as a “happy marriage,” with the possible exception of my father’s third. Mother, grandmother and even great grandmother chose divorce over oppressive relationships. One grandmother, a catholic for whom divorce was not an option, was “institutionalized” for her aberrant behavior, diagnosed as manic-depressive (and no wonder). Here is a litany:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>My great grandmother’s second child was the result of marital rape.</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>One grandmother contracted a venereal disease from her husband.</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Another grandmother took her “vacations” in an insane asylum.</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>My mother and her siblings were beaten with a leather strap as children -- not considered cruel or unusual punishment, apparently.</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>My mother had a nervous breakdown and shock treatments because -- like her own mother -- she rebelled against her loss of autonomy.</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I was sexually abused as a child by a family acquaintance.</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I was the victim of a date rape in college. I did not press charges, for fear of ruining the young man’s life. (!)</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I divorced my husband only after an incident of child abuse caused my children to be taken to foster homes.</b></span></li>
</ul><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Almost none of these things were openly discussed in my family, so it now appears that these are the skeletons in my closet that need and want to be exposed and exorcised. Still, I would be very surprised if my family was unique with regard to these kinds of events. Given that these hurtful incidents all occurred in the past and there is nothing I can do to prevent the harm done, my question becomes, “To what extent are they affecting me in the present?” And further, “How can they be healed in my psyche and their frightful energy transformed into a positive force for good?”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The first step would be acknowledgment: “These things happened.”</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The second would be outrage at the injustice </b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The third would be sorrow for the pain and loss</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The fourth would be compassion </b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;"><b>for both</b></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b> victim and perpetrator -- finding the way to forgiveness for all</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The fifth would be noticing how the damage perpetuates itself in present time as generalized and universalized guilt, which results in low self esteem in all human beings</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The sixth would be cultivating and accepting a new self image founded upon true self worth and worthiness</b></span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>The seventh would be vigilance to ensure that new behavior patterns take root and flourish. </b></span></li>
</ul><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Much easier said than done. The method I have chosen to do this important work is through spiritual practice and deep meditation on my matrilineal line, back to my very first ancestral mother. She was the Mother we all have in common. Much has been made of our paternal ancestor: Our Father, but in recent ages, much less attention has been paid to Her. By getting in touch with Her and her sorrows and travails -- especially as I have known them through my own female ancestors -- I feel I have contacted the very source of the springs of sorrow. I feel that all of these women are asking us to listen to them, to hear them to mourn with them, to heal them and be healed by them so that the great work of the Divine mother -- a new birth -- can take place out of death itself.</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>With everything that is going on in our world, reflected in the possible collapse of the global economy, the threat of nuclear proliferation, our failure to sustain an ecologically sound environment, the unethical greed of corporations, the wantonly unprincipled media, the failing educational system, and the hectic pace and “busyness” of our fractured lifestyle, I feel that now is the time for women -- especially women who have arrived at grandmother status -- to stand together as “doyens” -- a word I like better than “crones” for wise women, and with one voice say: “Thus far, and no farther. It doesn’t have to continue this way. We may have chosen to be silent rather than to express our fear and anger in the past, but we can choose differently now.”</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b> </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I call all women and the men who support them in this effort to rally behind this intention:</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i>“Leaving all burdens of the past behind, we seize the opportunity of this now moment to practice the art of the possible.”</i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i></i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>I am walking across the country holding all of my “co-madres” in my heart because I can; I do have all of these women and girls inside of me -- daughters, mothers, grand and great, who want to shine their light to brighten the future for all man-and-woman kind. They want to tell us to sorrow no more; they are healed, and released, and are reborn in us!</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b><i></i></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Out of death comes life and beauty as the poet Wallace Stevens said in the quote at the beginning of this piece. The German mystic Frederich Holderlin reminded us, “At the moment of greatest danger [and heartbreak]*, creation is born.” </b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>This is my “NOW MOMENT.” Will it be yours?</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>______________________________________</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>* my insert</b></span></div><div style="color: #666666; font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="color: #666666; font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 18.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div></b>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-69124944415878567882011-06-27T17:23:00.000-07:002011-07-05T07:33:27.485-07:00Our Mother's Mission Part I: Walking, Singing, Laughing, Weeping<div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px;"></span></span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: medium;"></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: medium;"><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Kansas City, Missouri</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">June 25, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">1:15 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Our Mother’s Mission Part I: </b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b>Walking, Singing, Laughing, Weeping</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Every woman should spend a year in an R V with her mother.”</span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">--Wynonna Judd </span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Before my daughter Viveka and I set out on this Sole 2 Soul Walk across America on March 8, 2011, an astrologer whom we barely knew offered this comment about our relationship: “You are like two ships in the same part of the same ocean. That means you share a lot of important things in common. But you are facing in different directions.” This has proven to be a valuable observation which has helped us to understand and to diffuse the inevitable tension between us. If this walk has been about anything, it has been about addressing and healing our mother-daughter relationship, which has been showing up as follows:</span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><ul><li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">First of all we <i>are</i> mother and daughter, which means we have personal, family history -- some would call it <i>personal karma </i>-- to work through.</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">We are from different generations -- I’m in my 70s, she’s in her 40s, therefore as far as life cycles go:</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’m “waning,” and tend to conserve my energy; she is “waxing” and has energy to burn</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’m a Taurus, grounded, loyal and practical, she’s a (double) Leo, powerful, creative and dramatic</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’m a quiet introvert; she is a talkative extrovert</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’m a bookish writer; she is a flamboyant performer</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’m academically inclined with advanced degrees; she has street smarts with no degrees, but professional credentials. (Google Viveka Davis for her entry in Wikipedia)</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’m deliberate; she is spontaneous</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’ve raised a family; she has not</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I lead with the head; she leads with the heart</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I like things neat and tidy; she doesn’t mind “creative chaos.”</span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">For the artist in me, “less is more.” All I need is a quiet space with a computer; the artist in her needs a spacious studio, equipped with materials ‘n stuff.</span></li>
</ul><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">When we started out on our journey in our 1984 Ford Econoline R V, “The Lindy,” I was (and still am) neatly confined to the back bedroom with 3 suitcases, which I keep stacked on my bed and 3 overhead cabinets for books, files, maps, CDs and personal supplies. Except for our common areas for food, dishes, and kitchen and bathroom supplies, Viveka’s “stuff” completely filled the rest of the R V, including the aisles, seats and shower area. </span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">There was no room for Smitty, our driver, to keep his personal effects, so he lived out of his jeep, which we were towing. After three weeks, Smitty left for home as planned and Viveka got the front “upper” bedroom, which she quickly lined with stuff. </span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Then she began bringing in stuff she found along the road. I hesitate to call these “art materials” trash but it’s all a matter of opinion: rocks, pieces of tire tread from the road, rusted bottle caps, colored glass, a hub cap, a willow stick half the length of the R V, and literally anything that caught her fancy, like a dead bird with bright yellow feathers. I would cringe when she passed by a thrift store for fear she would find more stuff to cram into the space. This stuff was cheap, she reasoned. Besides, she needed stuff for costumes.</span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">“Costumes? What costumes?” I wondered. </span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">In Yuma, a fellow woman craftsperson we met, who walked with us, saw the kindred spirit in Viveka, and gifted her with a 30-year-old sequin-covered soft-sculpted cloth mermaid about 4 feet long, hanging from a frame. Viveka was delighted, for she immediately saw a way to incorporate this figurine into plans she had for a ceremonial costume and for scenes she plans to shoot as part of a film she wants to make -- a personal project on the side -- <i>in addition</i> to the documentary film she is making of our journey. But I was appalled, for there was no place for this creature to live unless we gave her what was left of the shower space.</span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Now I know Viveka will read this, and I have not written this to insult or demean her in any way. But I do have to be honest: For the first couple of months, I felt cramped, let’s say “unfairly spatially marginalized.” To her credit, however, she was aware that this was a problem for me and kept working on it. Finally, probably somewhere in Arizona, I got access to half of the dining table! When we arrived in Kinsley, Kansas -- the midpoint of our journey in both time and space -- she was able to downsize and consolidate enough for me to feel comfortable at last. I finally had access to the front passenger seat!</span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">It was at that point we both acknowledged that we had turned a corner, somehow, and this trip was beginning to feel like FUN!</span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">* * * </span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">If, as the astrologer said, my daughter and I are simply like two ships moving in different directions on a common sea I can now happily report that what we have in common -- the ocean beneath us -- far outweighs our differences -- the waves around us, although during storms it is tempting to overlook the ocean for the waves. </span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">What we have discovered in the course of the last 3+ months is that although there is much that separates and divides us, we are both on a mission from the Divine Mother, who daily reveals herself in both small and large ways. We are on a joint mission, as mother and daughter, carrying the message of the inevitable return of the divine feminine -- in culture, community, consciousness and communication. The fact that we have different ways of going about delivering that message, is much less important than it would have seemed in the beginning. The fact that we are mother and daughter, and that we are using this opportunity to address and to heal all personal wounds on behalf of ourselves and our family is a large part of what we hope to accomplish.</span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 14.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">If you would like to hear a very clear and compelling statement of this mission which we call “Sacred Activism,” please listen to Andrew Harvey’s Mother’s Day Address, 2011, “The Divine Feminine.” It can be found at http://beyondawakeningseries.com/blog/general/andrew-harvey/ </span></div><div><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><br />
</span></div></span></span></div><div><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><br />
</span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-30271326374278002082011-06-15T17:48:00.000-07:002011-06-15T17:48:10.983-07:00Just Two Dumb Broads Passing Through Kinsley, Kansas<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Kinsley, Kansas</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">June 14, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">4:30 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Just Two Dumb Broads</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Passing Through Kinsley, Kansas</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us.</span></div><div style="color: #454545; font: 12.0px Arial; line-height: 19.0px; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>-- Robert Burns </span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 21.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Do you ever fret over what other people may think of you? </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">I have never considered this to be a major issue in my life, preferring to adopt the attitude “What you think of me is none of my business.” On the other hand, <i>self </i>judgment and <i>self</i> criticism have always been much more daunting and severe than the opinions of others. But recently, in Kinsley Kansas, a grain-producing town with a dwindling population of about 1450 older-than-average souls, located on the railway route that followed the Santa Fe Trail, I <b><i>overheard</i></b> a man refer to my daughter (and by association, to myself) as “that dumb broad.” He had not intended for me to hear his remark, and so I had been gifted with a rare opportunity to hear this man’s raw, unfiltered opinion.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Dumb broad.” What did he mean by that, and how am I to respond? Since I’ve never thought of myself as “dumb” I was surprised to see myself taking it very personally, and feeling very misunderstood.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">All of this introspection has encouraged me to examine my thoughts much more carefully, and to take responsibility for ALL of them. I realize that I am as guilty of narrow minded stereotyping as I feel this gentleman is. And I must admit the world I have made for myself is a little out of joint here in Kansas.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Because I chose to confront him about his remark, I discovered that he had read the materials that we pass out to people we meet along the way. He had read the flyer describing the Sole 2 Soul Walk which states: <b>“Imagine a WORLD where Women are Equally Valued Decision Makers in Partnership with Men.” </b> He had also read the Peace Proclamation which I co-authored as a member of the Culver City Area Interfaith Alliance. It advocates the rejection of war and violence as “categorically unjustifiable and obsolete.” <i>This gentleman felt that our uncompromising stand for peace meant that we were being disrespectful to the brave men and women who have given their lives to preserve our precious freedoms.</i> </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">One does not have to travel far into Kansas, home state of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, to understand that Kansans have made patriotism a priority, vigorously defending the Union during the Civil War, and the Nation in all of the foreign wars and conflicts since that time. Evidently the assertion that “Peace is Patriotic,” is a notion that is difficult for many Kansans to embrace -- and many Americans for that matter.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Born in the midwest, I consider myself to be a loyal daughter of the Republic with immediate family members -- grandfather, stepfather, uncles, husband and daughter -- who have served honorably in every war, since 1898. But I have come to believe that in our day and age, we have to find a better way to resolve conflict. I am also hopeful that this can be done through what we have learned about non-violent resistance in the 20th century. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Still, it grieves me to be so misunderstood. I am a people-pleaser at heart, and do so desperately want to be liked and accepted by everyone! So I spent several days fretting over my unfavorable image, and dismal failure to communicate.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">A few days later we were still in town, and I was asked to speak to the Kinsley Rotary Club. As a result of the “dumb broad” remark I came before them with an attitude that was both defensive and apologetic, fearing that although they may be polite to my face, they may secretly harbor private thoughts which might range from dismissive to hostile. Do private thoughts count? They do, if you believe as I do that “thoughts are things,” and have real world effects.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Afterwards I felt disappointed in myself for having done a poor job of communicating what our walk is about. Except for a few, their faces were impassive, and I had a hard time relating to most of them. Try as I would, I couldn’t find a wavelength that would serve a two-way communication between us. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">On the following morning, while we were on our daily walkabout, we passed a lovely home, newly built in early 20th century traditional midwestern style, with rocking chairs on the porch displaying red white and blue buntings between the pillars. The lady of the house was out watering her yard and I asked her, “Why the patriotic display?”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Flag Day,” she said. Of course! It was June 14, how could I have forgotten? Then her husband appeared, who was one of the men who had been in my audience the night before, a pharmacist. Craving some honest feedback I asked him, “What did you think about my talk? Please be honest”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Frankly,” he said. “I couldn’t relate to your issue. I don’t think women are disrespected or treated unfairly here.” Then a light began to dawn in my head. “Maybe it’s because you are coming from a pioneer tradition and a farming culture where women are not only valued, they have always been downright indispensable.” Both husband and wife agreed. Finally, the communication felt complete. I had been able to acknowledge a value that we all shared: cooperation and mutual respect between men and women.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">As far as being a dumb broad -- if “dumb” means silent, or lacking speech, and “broad” is slang for female, <i>I must confess I have been a “silent female” for a good part of my life,</i> for fear of being dismissed or devalued, on account of my unorthodox viewpoints, which may seem impractical and idealistic, or even “unscientific.” In examining where that fear is coming from, I see that it is rooted in my childhood as I observed the way my father treated my mother (and me), and my grandfathers treated my grandmothers. Outspokenness in women was not encouraged in the mid-western culture I was raised in. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Is this what this whole walk is about? An attempt to address an ancient wound, which was both frightening and unjust? Perhaps it is just so.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So here I am, back in the Midwest, the heart of the heartland, halfway between the coasts. These words ring true in my ears: “Doris, you are not in Oz anymore!”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-38539083846307619432011-06-08T10:53:00.000-07:002011-06-08T10:53:56.604-07:00Taos, New Mexico: Looking Back On Enchantment<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Dodge City, Kansas</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">June 7, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">11:37 a.m.</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Taos, New Mexico: Looking Back on Enchantment</b></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">We left New Mexico a week ago, but I cannot quite bring myself into the “midwest mindset” engendered by the hot, flat Kansas plains, without one last, wistful look backward at some memorable moments in New Mexico, which aptly calls itself “The Land of Enchantment.” </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The Pueblo of Taos lent itself to mystical moments and memorable encounters in bookstores, old and new adobe buildings, all in earth brown tones with soft contours. We visited galleries, homes, churches and intentional communities -- not to mention the sustainable “earth-a-tecture” building sites. We attended spiritual services and were the object of a blessing rite offered by a radiant Peruvian brother in a Hindu ashram. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The “Divine Feminine” -- both as a concept and as a presence, is everywhere evident (both in Taos and in Santa Fe) in the Virgin of Guadalupe. We encountered a number of “heart-centered men” who were not ashamed to be labeled as such. Our message about the importance of balancing masculine and feminine energies in the critical social and environmental decisions affecting all of humanity received a favorable reception. In fact, among the people we met, it was a bit like preaching to the choir.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So much for the journal and travelogue. Let it serve as context. If you have been reading this blog you know that I am not confining myself to mere reportage, but am trying to add a dimension of personal revelation on top of that. So what I really want to share with you is a specific moment of mystical enchantment that happened in Taos.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>* * *</i></span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Deborah Marcum, a friend of a friend had graciously allowed us to park our RV on her property for a few days. She lives in a charming adobe house, tastefully decorated by her own hands, on an acre of lawns and gardens bounded on two sides by flowing streams. Her property is remarkable in that water is a rare and precious commodity throughout the Southwest. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">One morning I was sitting at the dining table in our RV, looking out upon a corner of Deborah’s garden when I noticed a couple of hummingbirds. Now you have to understand that I have been a reverential fan of hummingbirds since my 20s when I began to notice that they always seemed to appear to me at special times, bringing a clear sense of joy, hope and well being. I have adopted these remarkable creatures as my special “totem” animal, and am always on alert for them. Since we began this walking pilgrimage or March 8, I had seen very few -- one in Joshua Tree, California, and another one in Santa Fe, New Mexico. So you can imagine how excited I was to see two of them at that moment. As I looked closer, however, I realized that the flowers these hummingbirds were visiting were <b>wild roses </b>growing beside Deborah’s stream.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Hummingbirds and Wild Roses?</b> So what’s your point? But if you knew me at all you would know that the wild rose is another symbol deeply embedded in my psyche. Briefly here is the origin of the attachment:</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">One day, more than 20 years ago when I was living in Montana I climbed a mountain on some sacred land. While meditating in the sunshine at the top I noticed a small bush with a single rosebud on it -- a wild rose. The only flower around at such a great height, I thought it was remarkable and <b>it seemed to speak to me: </b> “Way up here on top of this mountain I have found a way to live and survive, and offer my flower. Thank you for noticing -- that makes us friends forever.” (It was truly “A Little Prince” moment, for -- if you recall that tale -- <i>The Little Prince learns from the fox that the important things in life, like the precious rose he loves so deeply, are visible only to the heart</i>.)</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Now the wild rose is not showy or exotic, just five pink petals that bud and bloom and quickly fade; but because they are the predecessors of today’s cultivated modern roses they can be traced back to the period between the demise of the dinosaurs and the most recent Ice age, 70 million years ago. This means that the wild rose predates the evolution of humans! Every time I look at these modest flowers in their simplicity I sense I am seeing something remarkable, literally, as William Blake has written:</span></div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">To see a world in a grain of sand,</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And a heaven in a wild flower,</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And eternity in an hour.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So when these two deeply personal symbols came together for me in time and space <b>in front of my eyes <i>for the first time in my life</i> </b>it was as though I was resonating through many octaves and layers of consciousness all at once. At the risk of sounding corny and impossibly self indulgent I must say that it was like seeing into the heart of my own soul because of the many layers of meaning that came together. It was a rare gift of the moment, and, I might add, thoroughly in keeping with our current knowledge of the more “feminine” or “intuitive” right brain mode of knowing.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">If only I could give each reader of this blog a comparable gift! I cannot do this, because a moment like the one I am describing must be personally meaningful to the individual on a level where his or her own personal mythology dwells -- a level deep enough to trigger the rare “music” of the soul. Every artist longs to make such a connection happen, and endeavors to tap into the underground rivers of feeling that we all share in common as human beings, both male and female. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">What I find most remarkable in retrospect is that every morning we stayed on her property Deborah and I would have a heart to heart conversation over an excellent cup of coffee. On the very morning this event occurred -- the last day of our stay -- she and I worked on a statement of intention in the form of an affirmation that we could each carry into the days ahead. Here is what she came up with, and I simply could not improve upon it: </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>“Today may you find what glows your soul and happys your heart.”</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 17.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In my case it was hummingbirds and wild roses. What is it for you?</span></div><div><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><br />
</span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-79941847097208334392011-05-31T06:52:00.000-07:002011-05-31T06:52:33.723-07:00Santa Fe Walkabourt: Convening the Cosmic Caravan of Crones<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><br />
<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Santa Fe, New Mexico</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">May 22, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">2:30 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Santa Fe Walkabout:</b></span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>Convening the Cosmic Caravan of Crones</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>“When one dreams alone, it is only a dream.</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>When many dream together,</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>It is the beginning of a new reality.”</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i> ----Hundertwasser</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">As with Sedona, Arizona, I have felt there was <b>work</b> to be done here in Santa Fe, New Mexico, so I have NOT been compelled to move on without “permission,” from the One who is orchestrating this cavalcade. She is known to some as the Blessed Mother, to others as the Divine Feminine, and to still others as the Female Principle of Existence, or “right brain” processing. You can call her what you will -- my Sikh friends call her the Adi Shakti; Buddhists, Kuan Yin -- but She is running this Walkabout show, no doubt about it.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The <b>work</b> I refer to above seems to be nothing more complicated or arduous than delightful encounters with many spiritually mature individuals who are deep into their own practices and welcome contact with others with a similar or matching level of commitment and activation. In these energetically-charged encounters -- no matter how brief -- the alchemical magick of this journey manifests itself again and again.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Most of these individuals are women 50 and above who are not afraid to use the word “crone” as an honorable badge of elder wisdom. But the heart-centered men and younger people who also show up to cheer along the sidelines have also blown our minds with their sensitivity to both the significance of,<i> and the need for</i>, invoking and thereby strengthening the feminine energies in the world in order to bring about a greater balance between masculine and feminine polarities.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">For example, I have been privileged to spend time with poet Tomas Myers and his wife Rahmaneh, on their two-acre spread, on the outskirts of this richly historic pueblo. In his book of poems, essays and journal entries, </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px; text-decoration: underline;">Spun Wonderment</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> (2009) Tomas has written:</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Invoking Holy Mother</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Loving Mother, lovely Mother. . .</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">She who mends and soothes. . .</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Bless us with your words,</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Embrace us with your tenderness,</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Engage us in your work.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">You who move the Earth. . .</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Remove our fears</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And bathe us with your tears.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Instill the voice of peacefulness,</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Yet waken us from lethargy, and hear our hearts rejoice.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Let us make a place within</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Which welcomes all your children home,</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And call gladness here to stay</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Where pain had dwelled.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">On Mother’s Day (May 8) and for a few days thereafter we spent time with Sikh friends at their ashram in Espanola 30 miles North of town. We got up with them at 3:45 a.m. several times for morning prayers, yoga practice, songs and chants. Actually, the turban I have learned to tie on suits me, and I may keep it!</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The following weekend we spent learning and doing Dances of Universal Peace at a the Hummingbird Retreat Center in the Jemez mountains with a diverse interfaith group. About 2/3 of those we danced with have chosen to change their American birth names to appellations like Tara Andrea, Kaeylarae, Maboud, Shems, Shivadam, Sat Jeeven, Shakura, Harnal, Gurubai, Hamida, Wahab and Tasmina, etc.. Many are Sufis, some Sikhs, for both of these traditions place a high value upon the integration of physical and spiritual practice, with dance as an obvious medium for connecting the two. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In Santa Fe, with our RV parked at Rahmaneh and Tomas’ place, we walked -- often along the Santa Fe River’s woefully dry bed -- with women who believe, as we do, that even seemingly small acts such as walking and talking with intention and purpose, if practiced consistently and prayerfully, can have a large effect upon world consciousness. That is why a number of women we have walked with along the way have become “virtual sole 2 soul walkers,” that is to say, people who commit to walk in their own neighborhoods with specific intention and purpose, asking and answering the question for themselves, “What is <i>MY</i> Walk About?” Another way to ask the question is, “What am I passionate enough about to use some time to focus my energy upon?” Your intention could be a single word, or a phrase; a heartfelt though wordless prayer, or a definite major purpose statement. It could be personal, or professional or planetary. Just let it be <i>your </i>conscious choice. And may you be determined to work with it until it absolutely inspires you!</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">The next step would be to find others of like mind to walk with, and so on and so on . . .gathering your own womentum and finding ways to express it with distinction in the world.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Women seem to have a knack for integrating such individual guidance into the collective consciousness to affect the outcome of events large and small. What I am talking about is not a “Movement” as such, but it certainly is an awareness that something BIG is afoot, because it truly does encompass a majority of humanity. We can be and in fact are all a part of it, in our own unique ways, as we join our light together, and shine it into the darkest places of our collective consciousness. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Women are also instinctively aware that the more we tune in to our bodies and the seasons and signs of nature -- such as the phases of the moon -- the more effective agents of change we become. We are not pushing the river, we are flowing with it, and are more likely to be in a position to gauge the timing of the tides as well as the seasons for planting divine ideas into the collective awareness.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Yesterday, driving with sister-crones Rahmaneh and Basira to a trail head in the aspen and pine forested mountains northeast of the city, we came upon three graceful female deer grazing by the side of the road. They raised their heads to take us in, and we made deep contact with them. As we began our hike a short time later, we acknowledged that together, simply by being in relationship, and by our “say-so” we formed a “receiving device,” and that we would be open to whatever came through us. We joined hands and set our intention that our walking would somehow help to bring in a fresh new wave of happiness, holiness and health for all mankind. Although I don’t recall the exact words of our intention for the walk, it could be stated something like this: “May our walking become a moving and heartfelt prayer to alleviate suffering, and spread compassion far and wide, in the name of the Divine Feminine.” </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">We hiked together, happily conversing and exchanging information and inspiration for about 5 miles wearing our three hats, one yellow (Rachmaneh), one blue (Basira) and one pink (Doris). I thought of these as the primary rainbow rays of grace and balance -- integrating wisdom, power and love. Later, when we stopped to meditate, I saw us as the three graces in Botticelli’s painting “Primavera,” and again the three graceful does came to mind. I had to laugh, for we three ageless grandmother crones truly were representing something every bit as fresh and hopeful as the world has ever seen -- an expression of ever-new joy.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Then, Rahmaneh shared a concept with me. “Do you know what the ‘trim tab factor’ is?” she asked. I didn’t. She said that a large vessel could not be made to change direction quickly simply by using its rudder. However, a rudder with a trim tab is one with <i>a smaller rudder within the rudder.</i> The little rudder can be more easily turned, and can be a very effective aid in the turning process.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Humanity’s boat, I ween, is in need of a course correction. Sooner or later, we hope you will join us as we embody the trim tab factor. Others have described similar concepts, for example: “the tipping point,” “the critical mass” and/or “the hundredth monkey.” When the Dalai Lama said, in 2009 that “Western Women will save the world.” He must have had something like this in mind because we are well-educated and seasoned, with the leisure and the means to put our minds and hearts to the task of positive change. A small but determined number of us could set our intention to be the rudder within the rudder that anticipates the way the ship needs to correct its course -- not as <i>we</i> would but as the greater good would direct. All that is required is a little willingness to let go of our past agendas (that have not worked) to be open to a greater one, that belongs to none of us, but truly serves us all.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So the working title of our film project, and this blog: <b>“Gathering WOmentum” </b>has now taken on a universal aspect: As we go, we are “Convening the Cosmic Caravan of Crones.” If you do not feel ready yet to accept the label of crone, no matter. Someday it may suit you just fine when you see yourself, finally, as one of the doyennes of a new dawn. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">As we journey, we gratefully follow after the ancestors who have gone before and paved the way for us. I am aware of them, both male and female, as concentric rings around us. They help me to see clearly that the path, the destination and the traveler are all one, as space and time collapse into each other. The joyful and glorious end, just around the next bend, although hidden from our sight, has always been known from the beginning. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2590895022766451790.post-45961395429933389082011-05-13T13:45:00.000-07:002011-05-13T13:45:23.495-07:00An Angel in Albuquerque<div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Espanola, New Mexico</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">May 13, 2011</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">11:02 p.m.</span></div><div style="font: 18.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b>An Angel in Albuquerque</b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><b></b></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>“Heaven itself is reached with empty hands and open minds.”</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>--from A Course In Miracles, Lesson 133</i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Do you know what unconditional love is?” The question came from the mouth of a 77-year old man named Carl Banks, a self-proclaimed nomad who lives in his van, sometimes parking in the lot of the Veteran’s Administration building in Albuquerque, New Mexico. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It was a momentous question. I paused to reflect. As a minister, I had read and had used the term often, and therefore thought that I must understand it. But I had to give an honest answer: “I thought I did, but maybe not. Why don’t you tell me?”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">It was Saturday morning, May 7. Carl and I were sitting in a McDonald’s restaurant in Albuquerque where I had offered to buy him breakfast. He had declined, but did accept a large orange juice. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Buying breakfast for Carl was the least I could do, for the way he had shown up out of the blue to help us. You see, the previous morning, Friday, Viveka and I had found ourselves in the Walmart parking lot, having stayed overnight, expecting to make the easy leap to Santa Fe the following morning, 60 miles to the Northeast. I was scheduled to make contact with with some American Sikhs at their Ashram 30 miles North of the city and address them in their worship service on Sunday, May 8, Mother’s Day. But when Viveka turned the key in the ignition, there was <i>no response at all</i>. Nada, zero, zilch. We were dead in the water.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">There have been times in my life when this would have caused a major upset. My mind would have raced in every direction, imagining the worst -- further delays, costly repairs, or perhaps, facing the very real possibility that dear old Lindy just might not be up to this journey, and we may need to look for a more reliable means of transportation! A very troubling thought. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">This time, however, I was rather surprised and amused to observe that I took a very relaxed attitude. <b>I simply prayed,</b> knowing that there are no accidents, and that we would be shown what our next step was. Our steps had certainly been guided this far, and I had utmost confidence that a way would appear through this challenge as well.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">That is when Carl Banks showed up in his vintage van with a “Semper Fi” sticker suggesting a connection with the U.S. Marine Corps. He was wearing a red long-sleeved shirt, a straw cowboy hat, and tinted sunglasses. His clean, white “Colonel Sanders” beard was distinctive. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“You ladies need some help?” His voice was polite and folksy, with a hint of “southern.”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Viveka and I were glad for the offer. After a few minutes poking around under the hood, and looking at the wiring, he determined that we needed more help than he could give. (The wiring had given Smitty, our original mechanic and driver, problems before, due to a prior electrical fire.) Carl left and came back in a few minutes with the business card of a garage nearby where we could be towed. The garage personnel worked steadily on the problem all day. Clearly puzzled, but with a little help from Smitty by phone, they finally found an unorthodox solution by quitting time, and the engine fired up -- all for a mere $160.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">But Carl Banks was not finished with us, nor we with him. He had visited us during the day to check on our progress, and again the next morning, Saturday, for we had decided to stay in the garage’s parking lot overnight, to do our walking miles in Albuquerque, and leave for Santa Fe early Sunday morning.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">In a series of conversations over two days, I learned that Carl had had an unusual life. The son of an alcoholic father he had joined the marines the first chance he got. After the service he, said, “I was insane, but I didn’t know it yet.” Carl had turned to crime and served two separate sentences for a total of about 7 years. He had a mentor in prison, a mafia member serving 115 years (with nothing to lose) who helped him see the insanity of his path. Eventually he found AA and has now been sober for over 40 years. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">But what Carl wanted most to talk to me about was his out-of-body experiences, and the fact that he had died several times and had experienced “the other side.” He gave me a book, “The Awakening Heart,’ by Betty J. Eadie whose prior book, “Embraced By The Light” -- detailing her vividly explicit experiences of the afterlife -- I had read in the early 90s.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“I like this book,” he said. “because Mrs. Eadie really tells it like it is.”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">To me Carl Banks is not just “an unforgettable character.” He <i>has </i>unforgettable character. He is an honorable elder, beaming with a wise secret, who now, after recovering from several heart attacks and strokes, lives only to be of service. Offhandedly, he revealed his secret to me: “I have learned to forgive myself. I like myself!”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Surprisingly well read and well spoken for a man who is not formally educated -- he taught himself to read -- Carl is no braggart. I believe him when he tells me that a judge often consulted him for advice on cases before her. After retiring from his business as a paint contractor, and completing his relationships amicably with his three wives, his step-children and his daughter, he now lives simply -- alone -- sometimes in the wild, communing with nature. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">On the back cover of the book that Carl gave me, Betty J. Eadie writes of her books: <i>“Embraced By The Light </i>was the plow; <i>The Awakening Heart </i>is the seed; Our harvest... Unconditional Love.”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">* * *</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Do you know what unconditional love is?” Carl asked me, as we sipped our orange juice. </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“I thought I did, but maybe not. Why don’t you tell me?” I answered.</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Four things:</span></div><ul><ul><li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">No conditions</span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">No demands</span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">No expectations</span></li>
<li style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">No judgments”</span></li>
</ul></ul><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Carl,” I said, “That is really quite illuminating, and helpful. I never really broke it down that way. Unconditional love is a practice, isn’t it? Not just a concept. Did you read that in any book?” </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“No. I just know it’s true.”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Can I quote you in my blog?”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">He nodded. “You want to know how I do it?”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“Sure.”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">“With humility.”</span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> </span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span></div><div style="font: 14.0px Arial; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 16.0px;"><br />
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</span></div>Doris W. Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08444157583759891242noreply@blogger.com1