Season of Stories

"The universe is made of stories, not atoms."

~ Muriel Rukeyser

As we enter the year's prime shopping season, stores tend to replace stories as the gift source of choice. I grew up in Paramus, New Jersey, the shopping capital of the known universe, where it's easy to get "malled", so I understand just how seductive — and soul diminishing — the material mindset can be. 

Emerson said: "Rings and jewels are not gifts but apologies for gifts. The only true gift is a portion of thyself." How do we put the "I" back in "stores", supplant material-eyes with empath-eyes? How do we create the new story of Now? We can begin by sharing who we are, as keepers of culture, guardians of wisdom traditions, members of a vast community belonging to something greater than ourselves. In re-storying the holidays, we restore a sense of continuity that is soul nourishing for us, and everyone around us. READ MORE

Dude, Where's My Energy?

Are you exhausted, stressed, tethered to technology as if you're part Borg? Welcome to the club.

The energy crisis in our outer environment reflects our inner depletion: we scan news about climate change on our smartphones, sipping a pumpkin spice latte made with coffee beans from a rapidly vanishing rainforest, while stuck in traffic behind the wheel of an SUV.

But it's unfair to tar everyone with the same brush (to use a macadam metaphor). Half of today's Millennials don't even bother to get their driver's license by age 18 — and many don't want to get behind the wheel at all! Social media has replaced the car culture of yesteryear.

Yet the car-detached may be exchanging one energetic fuel for another. Cars and cell phones each have the power to hold us in thrall... READ MORE

Have You Paid Your OUTCOME Tax?

We talk about taxes as if they're a cycle of Nature: "It's tax season". (Brace for collective groan.) Maybe that's how spring fever earned its name: from people boiling about the money they give to the government.

However, there's one place taxing is good, welcome even: your mind. The more you s-t-r-e-t-c-h your grey matter, the greater the probability you'll come up with stupendous (as distinct from stupid) ideas, and become more effective, magnanimous, and satisfied, in business and in life. Think of it as the outcome tax. READ MORE

Imbolc: In the Belly of Wonder

February 2^nd traditionally signals Imbolc, the return of the Light. As a harbinger of Spring, it's one of the most powerful portals on the Wheel of the Year: the exact midpoint between Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox. A time to honor and go deep with the natural world.

Stephen Buhner's Plant Intelligence and the Imaginal Realm is a Mystery School disguised as a book; a work that opens the doors of perception with wisdom and humor. On p. 301, this piece by William Stafford sang to my Spirit as an ideal invocation for the Return of the Light in your soul:

If you don't know what kind if person I am

and I don't know what kind of person you are

a pattern that others made may prevail in the world

and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.

For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,

a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break

sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood

storming out to play through the broken dike.

And as elephants parade holding each elephant's tail,

but if one wanders, the circus won't find the park,

I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty

to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.

And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,

a remote important region in all who talk:

though we could fool each other, we should consider —

lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.

For it is important that awake people be awake,

or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;

the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —

should be clear; the darkness around us is deep.

    

A Subtle Shift Makes the Diff!

I'm a huge fan of subtle shifts. Sometimes just moving a letter, or changing where you place the emphasis, can completely alter the meaning and intention ~ and thus, shift your world.

Play with these pairings:

Scared ----- Sacred

Toxic ----- Tonic

Nowhere ----- Now here

Reactive ----- Creative

READ MORE