Though I can connect instantaneously with almost any animal, and communicate with the wind, and hear the songs of birds song and unsung, I am still learning the language of humans. And in my heart I know, the great reckoning occurring right now is an expression of love. Even though there has been a lot of death, and there will be a lot more. Even though there is a lot of uncertainty and people don’t know what is coming down the road. I know what my work is, and it is work of the heart reconciling with myself and humanity. And as that happens, and it is already happening…as that remembering the heart of a child that loved everyone easily returns as my main guide…then the work is helping humans remember we are the earth. What happens to the earth happens to the humans, and thus we have Covid 19. Healing the separation does not occur if I am feeding separation. So, I give such a deep bow of gratitude to my root teacher, who lived and worked in the midst of the Vietnam war refusing to take sides, but speaking up for peace and life. At that time too, there was a lot of hatred, a lot of emnity, a lot of propaganda, and a lot of death.

When I find myself shaking my head at what our leaders are doing, or not doing, what I am doing or not doing, or seeing any of the powder keg areas where it is such a precarious time…I come back to the words of Thich Nhat Hanh in his poem Please Call Me By My True Names. This is a long haul, and having a clear call back into seeing our interconnection, with humility and love is much needed. I need both of those right now, and am sharing the offering…written in during the Vietnam War by venerable monk, Vietnamese peace maker Thich Nhat Hanh.

Please Call Me By My True Names

Don’t say that I will depart tomorrow— even today I am still arriving.

Look deeply: every second I am arriving to be a bud on a Spring branch, to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings, learning to sing in my new nest, to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower, to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry, to fear and to hope. The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death of all that is alive.

I am a mayfly metamorphosing on the surface of the river. And I am the bird that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.

I am a frog swimming happily in the clear water of a pond. And I am the grass-snake that silently feeds itself on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones, my legs as thin as bamboo sticks. And I am the arms merchant, selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl, refugee on a small boat, who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea pirate.

And I am also the pirate, my heart not yet capable of seeing and loving.

I am a member of the politburo, with plenty of power in my hands. And I am the man who has to pay his “debt of blood” to my people dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.

My joy is like Spring, so warm it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth. My pain is like a river of tears, so vast it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names, so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once, so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names, so I can wake up and the door of my heart could be left open,the door of compassion.

In these times we are going through collectively and individually, it is good to have elders who you trust. I am blessed to have several, and it is also good to know we can trust our own inner guidance on our next steps on the path. Re-reading and sharing this poem at this time is one step and the journey continues.

What better time then Sheltering in Place, or as I call it Dream Weaving at Home to unwind some of those pesky old habits of thought/emotion? After all, being at home with loved ones almost 24/7 or being at home alone with your mind almost 24/7 are perfect conditions to trigger old B.S. (Belief Systems) to the surface and be seen. Without the perpetual distraction of action there is some sublime opportunities for internal reprogramming if we are willing to catch auto reactions. Business as usual in the outer world is dissolving rapidly and for more conscious ways of doing business to emerge, that dissolution is needed to make room for the new. Same is true with our inner machinery.

Last night I felt like an elephant was sitting on my chest. You may know the feeling, tightness in the chest area, shallow breathing, kind of anxious. That is after a day of really practicing whole heartedly habits that foster peace, like yoga, walking in nature, singing. When the chest elephant comes to sit, the first thing is to be in your body enough to notice it, which I did, and smile to it. We don’t try to beat stress off with some kind of spiked club. We notice and look gently into it, it is after all part of us.

I took some more action on my unemployment claim…at 10 pm, because during the day the website always crashes. And I found myself looping from one part of the screen to another without really going anywhere else. Do you ever see that happening in your head, looping from one thing to another…back and forth without really getting anywhere? Underneath that was, “I SHOULD HAVE GOTTEN A DAMN CHECK BY NOW.” Exhale, feeling of futility.

Laying in bed, I was awake. Like I used to be so many nights before Covid 19, when I knew something had to change. We are on a death path as a culture stampeding towards the cliff as a herd…that was how I felt PRE covid, because the ways we were interacting with the earth was to ignore the damage we were doing to other species and ourselves. I’ve slept a LOT better since Covid 19 because the earth is receiving a rest and there is a collective Pause. Birds are super happy, air is crisp and clean, there is much more quiet in the oceans giving whales and other beings sonic relief. WE have shown as a society that we are capable of world wide change, very quickly, when focused and motivated. Yet, some people are sick people dying, some people are overwhelmed, some people are frustrated and where is my damn unemployment check? It SHOULD be here.

Unwinding the Shoulding machine can only happen when you have noticed it is there. I do get to be right when I should on another ( including the unemployment department) , but I don’t get anything else. It doesn’t really alleviate the tightness in my chest, sometimes it makes it worse. There may be some folks out there, like me, that should on themselves on a regular basis. I should’ve done this by now, I shouldn’t have reacted that way, it is so silly. Making a shouldie mess of things, which rhymes with sh-tty mess of things.

Then there is the feeling of Grace…I am totally supported by the universe. Like, when my dad called Pre Lay off, and Pre sheltering….90 year old dad calls out of the blue… “I’m sending you a check…not listening to you saying no…it’s going in the mail today.” He actually saw this coming before I did. And that check paid for this months rent. Thank you Universe; that I have enough for Right Now, and that is all I need to deal with.

Right now I am listening to a bird concert outside my window, I don’t get any sense they are shoulding. It makes me smile to hear them. It brings me out of my mind loop for a bit.

These are times when I am using all of the tools that I have in my tool box to stay positive, yet that is not a box to shove myself into and try and lock the lid with the label “Staying Positive”. It’s a time to welcome all aspects and embrace all parts of ourselves. Emotions and triggers happen.

What do we do when we see we are creating thoughts that may not be leading in the direction of the outcome we actually desire? Well, this morning I received a new tool and it’s really fun. When I am thinking thoughts that are creating separation or anger or fill in the blank…I say out loud, “Shabakazah!” “Shabakazah, shabakazah, shabakazah!” Try saying that three times fast without smiling.

I actually have no desire at this time to go back to work, I have plenty of work right here. It is called, transformation, which is the work of my heart. I don’t have to should on myself about that either, just like I don’t have to should on others for desperately wanting to go back to work and reconnect with their work tribe. Isn’t it cool how we can all go through these adventures differently…that is my new thought. It is much more enlivening than, there must be something wrong with me that I don’t yearn for work people, and don’t really think they are dying without me in their lives. Shabakazah! Walking a path of light, does not mean there won’t be shadows….just keep walking and if you get tired of walking, do the Shabakazah Boogie Dance. Just a thought, another new thought, which is the point.

I don’t know about where you live, but where I live there has been a renewed Dreaming IN Place order (not into the whole ‘shelter in place’ language) and it goes out to May 31. It is not a surprise, but still. On top of that, the word from Governor Newsom is that my profession (massage therapist) may be months out from going back to work. And who knows what that will look like when it happens. Regardless of the future, I felt like a rebel, when I decided to add to my ‘essential travel’ to the pet store a Joy Detour to the ocean. It was so worth it, eye popping beauty in a new hood with co pilot at my side.

Those of us who are not seen as ‘essential workers’ know what I am talking about when I say, ‘yes!’ to taking the long road home and getting a change of scene. We were close to Asilomar, (one of my favorite places on the California coast) and I was a bit unsure what the rules are; they seem to change daily. I was apprehensive at first, but still soaked up the beauty, breathing in the ocean air. People were walking their dogs, jogging, even a few fisherman, but underneath it was… ‘is this okay?’ There were no packed crowds. I found a tree to lean next to and texted my brother…face-masked tree hugger texting bro… ‘this is my walk today…’, ‘what does yours look like?’ He lives in L.A and we have it in common now that walking is often the high light of the day. Even my dog was getting a little bit bored with my neighborhood, we both needed to smell new flowers.

There is this strange mix of knowing there is a lot of death going on, a lot of sickness in places, a lot of financial stress and joblessness in other places…so there is this kind of, ‘Dang, maybe I should just feel bad.’ It takes some reprogramming to really get…feeling good is a good thing, even in the midst of a Pandemic. Refueling the joy tank will help your inner stability, immune system, and personal relationships. When we are more fresh, we simply have more to offer life.

It was kind of odd, I would have loved to spend the whole darn day out there, but then the…”no you better get back in your car now” voice popped it’s head up. Like, can’t have too much fun in the sun, get to the pet store and get home. Being by the ocean, joy from that uplifted my energy for days. Taking a Joy Detour out of your normal Pandemic Routine is highly recommended, but don’t tell anyone you heard that from me. With dog walking, it’s allowed here.

If you can’t get out in nature in the real deal, I have even found that nature beauty on the computer raises my vibration and calms my nervous system. I am experimenting in taking in as much damn beauty as I can during this crazy time. And guess what? I don’t find that on the news. Limit the news intake, or even be more bold, cut it out completely for periods of time. I try and do regular news fasts. I used to do electronics fast (no electronics for a time), but with this situation I am not doing that now.

Besides walking in nature, which is obviously a passion, nature photography makes me happy. It is actually connecting with the nature beings, and animals that brings joy. This is the first Butterfly photo of the spring, from today’s walk. Find ways to water the seeds of joy, whatever those ways are for you and you will lift your energy level and decrease the likelihood of illness. Whatever is wholesome and brings joy can become a daily habit, and right now it can be an antidote to very dense energy in the collective field. This is the time to build in joy on a consistent basis to balance out all the stress from daily life. Good Luck!

During such intense times I am finding it is really important to walk every day. Usually, I walk twice a day, sometimes more. Often times I take the same path, but it never feels the same, because when I walk, I am super present. Every part of my being is listening. Listening to the light, listening to the wind, listening to the earth, and always listening for animal movements. And other times, I take different paths. Every time of year, this looks different, every time of day it feels different. I have no title of ownership, but for sure this feels like my land…in that I love it. When I am in nature, my mind stops spinning…thank Goddess.

I was going to say, whatever path you are on, be sure to enjoy it. But it occurrs to me, during this time, many people may not feel joy. So, listen for whatever gifts the path does present. I have a friend, a veteran who is a Native American elder that I had been trying to reach for weeks. He was not picking up and his voice mail was full. I know him well enough to know he could just be laying low, but was concerned. Today was my lucky day…he decided to pick up the phone. He is hunkering in, enjoying hiding out. He is elderly and definitely staying away from people as much as possible. Even though he sounded a little rough, he was in gratitude, as always. Meals on Wheels delivers a meal every day to his house for he and his wife. And they, like many of us who can, walk every day. It’s enough.

Talking to him about Covid, and where it may lead…I struggled for words. He said, “Don’t try and figure it out, just be present.” Million pound load rolled off my shoulders. I had not realized how much I felt like I had to know what is next, like it was my responsibility. But not having to know how it will go just gave me so much relief.

I am settling into My path. I have the awareness of all these other people, but I am on my path, just like everyone else is on theirs. What if we could just focus on this one step and let go of having to know where it will go? There is so much habit energy to want to speed up and get somewhere else, or hop the tracks. But this is actually exactly where I want to be. Outside, walking in nature. It’s difficult that it came about in this way, it’s difficult not knowing if I will see my dad again. But I get to talk on the phone with him now. At 91 he learned to send his first Selfie. And because I am unemployed and at home so much, we are talking almost every day. He is telling me things that he would not have before. I am able to listen to him talk about death, without flinching…just listen. What is opening up, while your ability to travel is closed off?

I’m not a nurse or a patient or a family member of someone with Covid 19, but I am learning to embrace all of it, and smile to the unknown. I had wanted a month off, I had wanted to be home with my animals and write and walk in nature and re invent myself. I just didn’t want it to be because of Pandemic. But here it is, and a month is already gone.

At first it is like all of us, can we get stuff at the grocery store where shelves are empty, is anyone in my circle sick, is there money for rent? Some are laid off and some are not. But now we are at a different stage, and at this part of the path I am opening up my heart to enjoy every part of it I can. Even though it is during such a crazy time, difficult, uncertain and painful time for many. Part of what I can offer is solidity in this present moment. What I can offer is being a healthy cell in the body of humanity walking on Mother Earth with love .

Every morning we wake up, we have another chance to dance with whatever comes our way. But dancing with death is also a way to come back to life. We go through our lives half asleep acting as if we have a free pass to an infinite number of days. But when death is in the air, and we know that thousands of people are experiencing it at the same time, Global Pandemic style…that is a chance to reprioritize.

We aren’t guaranteed another day. If I get another day, do I fixate on when the Dream Weaving In Place order will end, or do I let my dad know I love him. Do I get mad at myself for all of the things I haven’t done yet, or do I forgive myself and begin anew. Do we look at who to blame or be mad at, or what to fear may be coming around the corner? Or do we remind ourselves…. “I don’t have to figure it out, just be present and SHOW UP.” We never know what good is going to pop up from this, but we can listen for it.

Rather than calling this time mainly alone at home (we are never really alone) Sheltering in Place because of Covid 19, I am choosing to call it my Dream Weaving time. Language is so powerful and we often times use it so carelessly. Shelter in Place is something you do when you are at a school or some other place and their might be a shooter coming in. Or an earthquake. Yes, there is a virus and there is the Flatten the Curve effort, which most humans know by now, but I invite you to reconnect with the child of yourself, and ask that child’s heart, what is this time for…for me? What do I want to name this time that lifts me up?

This morning I saw an old line in my internal programming that sounds like… ‘wow, I’m not doing this right…and I totally don’t fit in here’. (Facebook community post reaction). It is an old familiar story that is very predictable in where it leads to…feeling bad, sad, mad…some concoction of those. Wanting to take my marbles and go home, oh yeah…I already am home, almost all of the time. This is such a rich time of being able to inspect our old wiring and ask whether it is something I want in my hard drive program, or not. I witnessed it, saw the familiar upset rise and smiled to it. The pattern of taking myself away if I feel some upset is a pretty old one. And it predictably leads to this feeling of isolation, like who knows me deeply? Who do I know deeply? Again, we weave stories, then they become habitual reactions and patterns.

When I was little, I loved everyone. EVERYONE. One day I went outside my house and at the top of my lungs I sang a Stevie Wonder song. It was the days when I was still a magical child with invisible friends (still have those) and felt I could love the world back into harmony…literally. I belted out, “Ebony and Ivory, playing together in perfect harmony” on the top of the stairs outside my house in East Lansing, Michigan. So inspired, so determined, so loud. Then I noticed my sister laughing at me. She is nine years older than me. I made some decision then, as we do as little kids. And I stopped singing out loud like my song could heal the world. I felt like I got the message, that isn’t gonna make a difference you silly kid!

But now…many decades later, I know it really does make a difference, because it came from unconditional love, and how beautiful and rare is that? I am adopting my five year old version of myself, and nine and many ages…to help me reweave the dream in a way that honors the spirit of the child within me, and others. Who would want to weave a new dream from cynicism, apathy, anger, or desperation? That’s not a new dream at all. With the concerns about climate change, with the concerns about what has appeared to be indifference or numbness to the loss of so many nature beings and animals (pre covid) from how we have been living…the adult me has some Issues. So I cannot birth the dream for the next generations alone by my adult self, I need some help. I need the heart of a child, we all do. What is the new heart song longing to come through? May need to quiet the adult voices in our heads to be able to hear the heartsong of a child.

Or if you have kids, to let the heart of your inner child listen to your kid, rather than the exhausted or exasperated adult. I tried a bunch of times to imbedd the link to Rylan Clark singing his little 4 year old heart out to the world, “Don’t Worry,” by Bob Marly. Alas my tech skills are that of a dinasor so it is up to you to google it. Rylan Clark was singing that song at home in NewburgPort Massachussettes and the world is so hungry for kid magic that it got seen by over nine million people. I cried when I saw it, it reminded me of the purity and love of a kid heart. We all have the capacity to awaken that part of ourselves, even if it has been hiding or resting. In the spirit of that awakened kid, Gonna write love notes and post them all over my house.

Nothing quite like Covid 19 to make obvious to me what I had not quite grocked at a cellular level before this new reality; my world is not like everyone’s world. Six weeks into this adventure and I keep looking back with awe at how much and how little has transpired in those six weeks. We are in alternate space/time reality without the drugs to induce that state. How cool is that? Even if at times it can be disconcerting, this journey down the collective rabbit hole will hopefully have us all emerge more human, less automated.

As a massage therapist, looking back I can see I successfully blocked out all of the obvious signals that this virus was impacting all of our society. I like to work, I kept working, blocking out the ramifications that this wave was a big enough deal that all the kids were home from school, the campuses were closing, kids were having to do their classes on line, parents were having to deal with kids home all the time. I am not a parent, so it was easier to block the magnitude of this out…for a few more days of work. The point is, we have a massive capacity to live in and function from denial. As you may guess, I was laid off as millions of others were and the spa was temporarily shut and I am writing this from home in California, still sheltering in place.

When I was first home and unemployed, my mind went out to everyone else and how they are doing. I have the white cape and white horse I keep in my closet for just these sorts of occasions. Certainly, if I”m laid off and having difficulty getting my unemployment sorted out, everyone must have that going. Certainly, if I have days that now without structure or work feel like they have 48 hours in one day….sometimes one hour in the beginning, others must be there too. So I reached out to a neighbor who is a mom of three…to see how she is doing, concerned she may not have enough money.

She replied, “Great…I got a $3 raise and I dropped one job…have weekends off now.” Light hearted, playful and employeed did not match my mental pictures of how anyone would be that first week. Yet, as I kept reaching out I kept finding surprises. My dear friend who works from home as an editor for an on line education company was swamped, stretched, and in an entirely different reality. A friend I wanted to hike with was, “too busy” because she too had not lost her job and was working over the internet in her normal office.

Phase one of enlightenment, not only am I not the center of the universe and how I see the world not the only view, but everyone is on their own path…even in Covid 19. Perhaps, even more so in Covid 19, parallel universes are living side by side now just like they always have. My false assumptions that everyone got laid off, or everyone must be suffering, are not accurate. Some people are painting walls in their houses, some people coloring with their kids, some people are deepening their connections with family or friends. Some people are cooking. Some people volunteering. Some people don’t have enough money for rent and are financially panicked, some people are working their asses off delivering packages, or picking produce in the fields. Some people are wearing facemasks handing lattes over with gloved hands through a drive thru window. But, a LOT of people are at home…a lot more time than before. For those of us currently not employed that is a blank slate…what do we with our time?

Again, I am in my own reality…what you do with your time is to dive deep inside and be quiet. In the beginning, rest and let it sink in what has happened and is happening. Look deeply at how we as humans are living and how out of balance we have become; how this virus is a wake up call. Listen to sages and guides and reflect deeply. Be in nature, walk in beauty and come back into my heart…that is on my Pandemic to do list. And as time passed and things periodically got heavier my list now includes daily antidotes or injections of music, performing ceremonies, and singing songs that uplift my energy level instantly. Also grieving, letting tears come through when they arise. That is the web that I am currently weaving.

One of my teachers in an online class on Strengthening our Spiritual Immunity kind of scoffed that people think they are doing their part by just staying inside and learning to make different sound effects from their iphones, while native elders who know what is happening are doing ceremonies and praying to mitigate harm. When I heard her say that, I saw the mirror of my own feelings…”I hope people are doing their inside work!” That, in the beginning was kind of a big thing to me, to send out links in emails…to send out invitations and nudges…please look deeply at what is happening right now below the surface. When will we have this kind of opportunity to dive deep inside again? But that is just trying to control other people’s path, that comes from ego. Exhale, put the white cape, and the director’s chair in the closet and come back to my own desk.

Do you notice the birds are super happy? The quiet is so amazing, the trees dance in the wind, the birds sing all day long. One bird is not trying to tell another bird…”hey…you…blue jay…you’re out of key!” “Get your act together while we still can.” I speak birdeze, and I have never heard that.

On the media, there is one channel…at least all news media are broadcasting one message…Covid 19 global pandemic. On that channel are the following; death toll, number of cases, bios of people lost, numbers of unemployment claims, and the latest guidelines on various shelter in place directives. What is often not on that channel are the stories of people caring for each other in random acts of kindness, people having new levels of intimacy in their relationships, super happy gardeners with their hands in the soil tending their gardens and any other form of happiness. I have friends that have inspired me in their level of focus…one friend has followed her dream to prepare to move…got her home in shape, closed her business (by choice) and put her house on the market. Another friend landed a dream job during the pandemic. Multiple alternate realities are unfolding simultaneously all over the world. The friend with the job and the house on the market are in kind of an inbetween stage, but they are manifesting their best dreams right now.

I’m currently inside of my unemployed, waiting for unemployment check after six weeks reality. But I am also in my walking in nature, hearing the birdsongs, cooking really healthy meals reality. I could be in my, inventing the best year of my life reality, in the midst of great losses and opportunities. In this liminal phase in between the worlds sometimes I feel lethargy or a blurry feeling, kind of like the photo below of the dude reading, “How to Get Up…” Our external structures, for millions of us, have been swept out from beneath our feet. Our internal structures may not be solid enough yet while we are re envisioning and imagining what our individual and collective lives will look like…there is magic in these times. Liminal magic. Still, it can be hard to get out of bed some days.

You can’t be a butterfly while you are still a caterpillar. Focusing only on the virus, will create more virus. There is a lot of magic in threshold times like now. Can we see through the eyes of trust and acceptance of what is within us and around us? Just really getting, we may all be in this together, but we are all going through this from entirely different realities, some more difficult than others, some more joyful than others and the only reality I can know intimately is my own. I get to see over and over that we not only have different conditions we get to choose how we are and what we focus on in this liminal period. For many who are employed…there is not this kind of spaciousness.

Yesterday I checked on another neighbor, again concerned…wanting to know he has what he needs. My white cape was hidden under my sweatshirt…if he needed help, I was ready. “Oh yeah, I”m set. Just need one thing…beer.” He chuckled as he kept shuffling towards his door. “Hey, you have your priorities and I have mine.” He was joking…kinda. But I am putting that on my wall, so I remember…”Hey, you have your priorities, I have mine.” Some days my priority is getting out of bed. Some days, it’s climbing a tree and some days it’s following up on unemployment benefits. But just like the birds, it is such a relief to really know we are all singing our own song and they are not the same notes, isn’t that great?

I have to admit there have been days since Sheltering in Place, when getting up out of bed is harder than it used to be. There is this part of me that is in so much relief that there is a wake up call loud enough that everyone is finally paying attention, and the earth is getting a breather from our automated human ways. And then there is part of me, that thinks I should be about fixing it, so that people don’t have to suffer….or any other beings for that matter. There is a part that is in grief.

On one of my daily walks I was so yearning for direction I shouted from my heart “What do I do now?,” with the big bold font on the word Do. At that very moment I noticed a spider land on me. A jumping small spider. Answer, weave a web of light. I kept walking. I think, if I remember correctly, I actually have heard that before. But I forgot. That is such an invisible do, such an intangible do. Nevertheless, I had received my answer immediately. So there was a nice big, relaxed exhale. Okay, will do do.

When you go on the web, the internet, to check in with the ‘world out there’, have you noticed there is not a web of light? The internet news (don’t have tv) is ALL about Covid 19, and unemployment, and death, and flattening the damn curve. Yet, nothing is about how we got here, or how we may re-imagine where we go from here…as a species. Because if you notice, Covid is a world wide opportunity for humans, not just a nationalistic one.

Back to weaving a web of light. Every thought, every word, especially every emotion emanates a frequency…a vibration. The pictures we imagine or the pictures we take in correlate to an emotion and a vibration. For me, my happiest place, is in nature. So if I have the task of weaving a web of light then I want to be outside as much as possible, so I feel happy inside.

If I’m angry, if I am fearful, if I am agitated, all there is to do is to come back and take care of that emotion with love and kindness. A master gardener knows the art of composting, a master energetic gardener also knows the art of composting. We don’t make ourselves into a battlefield and forbid some emotions or try and cut them out of ourselves. We learn the art of composting fear, anxiety, irritation…anger. Any heavier energies that are so commonplace in the energetic field right now can transformed, but first it is realizing that emotion is arising within, and greeting it with a smile, ‘I know you are there and I am here to take care of you’.

When I went to the magic meadow on Earth day, I just sat in one spot and sang songs of appreciation and gratitude. I felt the birds, and the trees and the bugs and the bees heard me. I also imagined children, very young children of all races happy and laughing and playing together. They sang to the trees too. They could connect with other species easily and lovingly from a very young age. They felt safe, they knew they were loved. They knew water is sacred and they played joyfully in clean cascading water. The elements were known, the elements of air, water, fire, earth were beloved in this community. This is my web weaving, calling in now, in the very midst of Covid 19, the future that I know is possible…as if it is here now. These are my prayers for future generations, now.

Singing is the quickest way to shift your vibration. All of nature has a song. When I am walking out on the land I can tap into different songs. I know the songs of many, many different birds, and I relish learning the language of a new bird friend. When I am in the meadow I often hear guidance to take my shoes and socks off and walk barefoot. And I do that. Then I come into even closer contact with the earth. I feel her in a different way. I can feel the temperature and it may be hot in one place, and cool in another where a ground animal has recently dug up cooler earth. And I see how many beings live under the ground, there is a whole different universe under the earth.

Weaving a web of light puts the power back in our hands. To know every thought makes a difference. In the present Covid-19 era we don’t know when we will be able to come out of our houses to travel freely, many of us don’t know when we will see loved ones again, some of us don’t know if our loved ones will still be around for us to see. We don’t know when we will go back to work, if we will have jobs, there is a lot that we don’t know. And what if that was okay. What I do know is that I trust the universe and that with every thought, word, action we are part of co-creating our own world and the collective world out there. It starts in here.

So find your happy place, the place that grounds you into a content and joyful space and start imagining what you would like to see. And feeling what you would feel if that were to be so now. This isn’t new wisdom, it’s just a darn good time to be reminded. I am grateful to the jumping spider, and the invitation to weave a web of light with thoughts, words and actions….and our daydreams. We all can fall into the trance that media, movies, our mind in it’s auto worry spin may gravitate towards, then it is a practice to come back and be a dream weaver of a dream that honors all life. There is already so much beauty all around us, it just takes our presence to notice and say I see you, I honor you and I thank you.

Like a lot of people, I can get so immersed in my own reality that I don’t sometimes see the bigger unfolding reality around me. In our pre Covid 19 world, I heard/intuited a large number of animals are dying…in September of 2019, I heard millions were, though I didn’t know where. Then I would put that information aside and go back to being a massage therapist in a four star resort where it is beautiful, and all is well. And if I am working a lot, there was not a lot of focus on anything other than my daily routine, which doesn’t include much news.

Being in love with the earth (as many of us are), when I heard of the Amazon fires it was heartbreaking. As they kept going and going and going, I journeyed to the spirit of the fire to listen to the message of the fire. I heard our way of life here, our consumption in the West, is feeding the fires. Greed and anger, also were in the fires. What I noticed in my fire ring ritual, was how distracted those around me are from the Amazon. It is not in their reality at all, and to so many it may have felt irrelevant. But the Amazon jungle fire was not irrelevant, to any of us human beings.

On the week of September 20-27, 2019 the the biggest global climate strikes ever occurred. Over 6 million people gathered for climate change strikes in all different countries, including a teenager (Greta Thunberg) who took a boat to New York where she joined over 200,00 others. Yet, we have carried on with Business as Usual as a society…until Now. The things we were not willing or able to do collectively for the sake of future generations of all species are now happening with great speed in a valiant effort to save human lives.

In late December 2019, I pulled my head out, so to speak…of my daily routine enough to hear…One Billion animals had perished in the Australian fires. So, at that time, I had not paid much attention to the Australian fires. One Billion animals died in fires, how does my heart even hold that? Then, there is the news….34 people died in those same fires. Even now, that is such a stark story in itself. It’s hard to be with knowing that level of death, it’s easier to shut it out, and not look. That has a cost too, called Covid 19, a lung related disease that is here to help us wake up.

On my birthday, I wanted to invite others to perform a sacred ritual called Honorable Closure for the wild life and nature beings who perished in the Australian fires. I didn’t know if anyone would come. It is a way to say we see you, we thank you, we honor the life you spent here on this earth and send you back to spirit with love. It is a beautiful ritual, and people did come. People made their own altar offerings from photos of animals and put their own prayers on the alter. We did art, created our collective altar and sang songs. We held the intention of a beautiful transition. That was February 12th, and we all lived in a different world then. I collected donations for Australian wildlife relief.

I kept the money and the art from the altar. I tucked them away until I knew how I wanted to honor the art from the altar and where I wanted the money to go. Then I kind of forgot about it for a while. But it was tucked in the back of my mind.

Being called to be a voice for the earth and all the beings we share this planet with, I was delighted to participate in the Earth Holder retreat in San Diego at the end of February. I was called to be there like millions of us are being called from all over the world to find our ways of offering our medicine to help transform our collective dream. Deer Park monastery offered an electronics free retreat…where we took a deep dive in acknowledging the damage we have done as humans to our Mother Earth. Not only damage to the earth, but to each other. We did ritual and ceremony to apologize to the earth, to honor our ancestors, and people of color that are in communities that are systematically marginalized and manipulated for profit of a small often times white few. It was a deep, cleansing dive in making amends. I still tear up when I think of it. What a sacred opportunity to go within and do deep cleaning, while others are doing the same.

Then I came back to my business as usual world and tried to make money to make ends meet from being gone. This compartmentalized clash of the worlds smashing into each other was upon me. I had not paid attention to Covid 19, I had not thought that news had anything to do with me. I had not seen any news for over a week. Then all of the sudden I found myself being laid off along with millions of others. And as my friend likes to put it, the humans have been sent to their corners to have a time out. Many of us are dazed and adapting while nature is singing and dancing.

It’s not a laughing matter for those who have lost loved ones, those that can’t put food on the table or feel daily stress of children home all the time, yet laughing and crying are both medicine. Can we see this time as opportunity rather than seeing it as a war, or seeing ourselves as victims? This is a collective wake up call, not just for people in the United States, but for human beings everywhere.

Will we choose separation, division, fear, greed? Or will we choose compassion, courage, wisdom, perseverance, and love? For a new dream to emerge, the old one dissolves. This is a period of acknowledging our collective shadow. Seeing where people are left out, not valued, put in harms way while some of us stay comfortable and safe.

Right now we can honor the farmer picking the lettuce, honor the wharehouse worker packing our food, honor the grocery store clerk who gets paid low wages so we can eat. Honor the courageous voices speaking up for their own worker rights in this difficult time. A lot of us are honoring the medical workers, on the front lines as well. This is a time of connecting the dots in a painful a-hah moment that we are not separate but our own well being is wrapped up and dependent upon others.

While the earth rests, we can grieve the lives lost and our personal losses as well. I have compartmentalized the human loss, just like so many humans are oblivious of animal and nature beings loss. But now I take my heart into the human suffering as well. We are being cooked in a stew of awakening, and if we are willing we can all expand our hearts past previous edges. We can go deeper than the surface and we can embrace our own discrimination, to become more inclusive.

I know why I had not yet buried the elements of the honorable closure ceremony now. It’s because I was not yet done with that ritual. After the Amazon, after the Australian fires, there is now Covid 19, and I am reweaving the altar, with the awareness that all of these things are connected, just like all living things are connected. Before sitting down to write this I did honorable closure ritual for some of the ones still transitioning from dying of Covid 19. Some photos of people I added to the altar represent nearly 50,000 other human beings in this country with families, dreams, gifts and stories. Honoring their lives, I wish them a safe and blessed transition. We are in a time that can be honored in ceremony of releasing what is dying with love and surrender, and call in through song, prayer, art, intention…that which can feed all of life, all forms of life with respect and love, for ourselves and generations to come.

My mother used to live in California and she taught English as a second language for a few decades in Southern California. She carried all of her teaching gear in a piece of luggage on rollers that she stuffed in her trunk as she wheeled a big ole car down the L.A. freeways between three different college campuses. Her students loved her, adored her and bought her gifts and threw her parties. Language after all, is necessary for life and other cultures honor teachers in a different way than ours does. Plus, she was just a damn good teacher and made it fun. Her students were immigrants from all over the world.

After reaching burn out on the two to three decade three job juggle, my sister offered to move her from California to Florida. She spent the next decades in Florida and I watched her move not only in geography, but political party and outlook. She started telling me about books by people I had no idea who they were (Bill O’Reilly). She and I were still close and love was still strong, yet there was a big shift. Now she was part of the collective consciousness that was around her and I was still in my California bubble.

When we are in our various bubbles we kind of expect others to think like us, believe like us, vote like us, eat like us, care about what we care about. OR at least a few of those…but part of the bubble is that we don’t often recognize those expectations going on silently from within. And if the other person falls into the category of OTHER, well…then there is fixing or convincing which are always popular. Judging and condemning are in vogue in our country right now. Us and them is pretty thick in the political field right now and the media feeds that at times.

I participated in two Compassionate Listening delegations in the middle east so I had a different perspective and feeling about the Iraq war than many. It was a long time ago, but it forever changed my view to travel and sit with people and listen to their stories. Florida and California were very different bubbles when it came to where people landed on that war. Some people would categorize middle eastern people as dangerous and label them and fear them and discriminate against them, much like what is happening at the border now with other nationalities. I, on the other hand, feel nationalism and doing things from fear to huge groups of other human beings is wrong. So, we all have our things that we feel we know best, and the other side just really doesn’t quite ‘get it.’.

Fortunately, I have a dream team that can sweep into my sleep states and give me bread crumbs to guide me in the right direction. I am sharing those bread crumbs now because like when the Iraq war was just getting started, we are in highly polarized fields of energy…unless you consciously step out of it. I had a dream fragment right before flying to Florida to see my mom for a visit. In the dream I was talking to someone in Florida, a man who was a stranger. I asked him, ‘Do you like beans?’ He nodded his head and smiled in a curious kind of way. And I excitedly shared, “I like Beans too!” Isn’t that great? We both like beans. We have Liking BEANS in common. Let’s hang out in that common ground for a while and see each other has human BEANS.;)

Got it! Dream fragment taken in before stepping onto the plane, I re organized my mind from thinking I am going into the land where people just don’t get it…to where I have something in common with probably everyone there. Even if it is as basic as liking Beans. Let’s try and look for that while I am on this trip.

It usually isn’t from being told how wrong you are that people shift their world view. It is usually from experiencing something different that opens their hearts and old beliefs just naturally fall away and make room for new possibilities. My co-pilot in life is a pitbull. I don’t think I can count the number of stories there are out there about how vicious and unsafe pitbulls are; how they eat children and devour smaller dogs and people if they get the chance.

It took me over six months to find a place to live because of the discrimination against pitbulls. That kind of pissed me off. Eventually I got a letter from my doctor that I need my pitbull for emotional support. True Dat. Then we found a place to live. He is snoring as I write this entry. Trying to convince people that pitbulls are not evil is not how I choose to live my life, however if someone fearful meets my dog, they will have an experience that will shift their perceptions. And I am sure I have my blind spots, my fears that limit my experience, my own wrong perceptions. How much of my time am I trying to convince others to see it my way and how much time am I listening to another persons’ story? It feels like it is a nice time now to shift the balance, and be just another human BEAN. That doesn’t mean I can’t live my passion and purpose, it just makes room for everyone else’s passion and purpose, whatever those may be.

Did you know that when lizards are stalked by a predator or get into a life threatening situation, that they can lose their tail? The tail keeps moving for up to thirty minutes which gives them precious time to get away. It can actually break off in a predator’s jaw.

It isn’t like the Lizard thinks to itself, “You know, I”ve had this tail all my life and I don’t feel quite ready to give it up yet. I’ve even named my Tail. Bontail.” No, the beauty of nature is, creatures adapt tools for survival in a variety of conditions. It may be part of why Lizards have been around millions of years.

I am finding some solace in hearing the young people speak out about what seems obvious enough to anyone willing to see…that there is a Climate Emergency happening right now on Planet Earth, but only if you want to stay on a live able planet. The Earth herself is fully capable of shaking humans off on her own. It’s happened before on multiple occasions. My guess is that she has her own state of Emergency plan. The question is, do we?

I keep coming back inside myself to ask, well…what is your plan? And as tempting as that cape and superwoman costume is, my plan is to love my way through it. All of my own fallibles, all of my own hypocrisies, all of my own shadow. Start there. One finger points out, four more point back to me. That doesn’t mean anger doesn’t arise, it does. It doesn’t mean grief doesn’t come in, it does. Or that wanting to stay numb and silent doesn’t occasionally pop it’s head up. But of all of the auto reactions, the one I am re-wiring in is “We Cannot Judge Our Way Through this, we need to Love Our Way Through this.” Starting with me.

That may be my tail, letting go of judging it, like it really-really-really should NOT be this way. Fires in the Amazon, a climate change denying president in the White House, and all of the species and animals dying because of human greed and ignorance. To top that off, this very familiar sense of complacency within my every day life and often the absence of a sense of urgency to Wake Up. So, yes, start within…we all have some control over what happens within our own hearts and minds. Even though it can be so much more juicy to should on others.

I have to admit that until Greta Thunberg entered my personal consciousness, and she took a boat to our country to partake in the UN Climate Conference in New York, I had never before thought of paying some kind of compensation in carbon off setting for any kind of air travel I may choose to take. It took a sixteen year old walking her own talk to that degree to plant that seed in me and make me aware of how many of us with means just go where ever we want. Without a lot of thought of future generations. We have not really been trained in our culture to think in those terms. But some people still do think in those terms.

There have been strikes inspired by Greta before but this past week, she invited adults to participate with the children for the first time….4 million of us showed up. 250,000 listened in New York to her address. Showing up for a strike for a few hours is one thing, then there is the actual, re-organizing ourselves so a shift becomes integrated into how we live, speak, think, and act.

As I have said before, this is not only a climate emergency as much as part of consciousness call…to shift our dream of consumption and materialism to know in our being that the earth is a living being with her own voice, will, and right to thrive. People in other countries have as much right to live able conditions as we in the United States have that right. Animals have as much right to having a home, as humans. When we are as out of harmony in that awareness as we currently are, reminders will keep occurring. Reminders that help us remember, everything…every thing comes from the earth. So what can I do to help bring in more harmony?

Knowing when I am out of harmony and taking action to correct that is a start. So that is where I am looking right now. It is so auto matic to go outside of ourselves, but where to start is within. Am I giving thanks for the air I breathe? Am I giving thanks that I have clean water? Am I giving thanks for the vegetables the earth supports me eating?Am I giving thanks that I have a president that makes it so obvious that all of us need to step up our game , rather than count on some leader at the top to take care of everything? I am giving thanks for the courageous youth who are collectively standing up for their future and calling out our collective complacency. Yes, giving thanks for even that which makes me uncomfortable, because where I am uncomfortable, is where the most growth can occur.

Inner and outer work go hand-in-hand. There are things I see, that others are not ready to hear or cannot hear. That doesn’t mean they are bad. There are things others see, that I am not ready to hear or cannot hear. That doesn’t mean I am bad. Yet, helping each other wake up, is what time it is on the planet.

Another gift of the lizard, is it’s ability to move into different terrain and blend in. There are times when it is wise to lay low and not be visible. Sometimes it’s wise to hide. Like when we need to replenish our energy, or when we are in a polarized field of energy that is intent on war. Lizard can go into so many different environments and not really be noticed. But it is present. We can make a difference simply through our presence.

Earth care and self care are really the same thing. We are the earth, and the earth is us. If we can start re weaving this wisdom into current culture, than our children will not be carrying the burden that some are now feeling. Part of my work is helping people dance with this knowing, so that they can see attention and love for both of those things will bring health in individually and collectively. If we are only in touch with technology, then the earth is not really real, and neither are we. What actions can you take, can I take, to honor the Climate Action Week, a call that the children of the planet have put out to us adults? Today, I start with this writing, and share it freely. Because for me, it’s time to pop back up and see how I can play in a new way.