Yesterday, someone told me he had never been to Easton. He’d heard too many bad things about it.  On the contrary, I find Easton picturesque, and sometimes even quite romantic!!

P.S. I am not a photographer…  For better photos of Easton, check out Laini Abraham’s Facebook page!!

Photo copyright Laini Abraham 2013

Stillness

by Kelly Prentice

Stillness… how rare and fleeting,

If only waters ran deep,

Shallow pools lack depth and meaning.

If we could dive in with all of our soul

Instead of treading water,

The slightest disturbance empties our bowl.

Reactionary. Disturbing.

Then chaos evokes a stream of breath,

Deep waters from within.

Time stands still, life comes back,

Only the surface disturbed.

Just this morning I had a moment of synchronicity. I was laying in savasana after yoga practice and thinking of my “inner resource.”  In the yoga nidra I practice, this is a safe haven where you chose to go in your mind any time, any where to feel completely safe and at peace…

Today my inner resource was in the Botanical Gardens in Wollongong, NSW Australia, where I spent much time alone in contemplation and peace in 1996.  As I pictured the gazebo where I’d sit, the red bridge, the fragrant flowers and the yellow cockatoos, the feeling it brought up was one of fresh starts and newness.  And then it hit me ~ One of the lines from the Easter Bunny in The Rise of the Guardians (who in my mind, represented Australia) was, “Easter is all about fresh starts and newness.”

I love making connections. Some may call it an “Aha” moment. Australia was my place of fresh starts.  Plus, I connect Easter with Australia in another way, since I spent Easter break that year traveling in Oz.  Soon, I will be back, friends.  “I feel it in my belly”–my favorite line from the Santa in the movie.

I believe 2013 is a Wabi Sabi kind of year. You can fall down the stairs and get a call that your son is throwing up on the floor all in one day, then the next day you get the news you’ve been promoted and your son makes you smile with pride. It is the epitome of one of my favorite articles, “Life Dancing.”

The message from Phillip Moffitt in this Yoga Journal article published back in 2000, is that of clinging and non-clinging. “If something good happens, you have a reflexive tendency to try and hold on to it, and if something bad happens, you have a tendency to push it away. Likewise, if you see something you like, you move towards it; or if something is distasteful, you pull away. This clinging response is inevitable if you believe yourself to be the same as or ‘the owner’ of all the desires and fears that arise in you. You become trapped in an endless web of tension and contraction.”

He goes on to talk about what the Buddha taught: For most people the good things either go away or lose their appeal, while the bad things come despite your best efforts. So when you try to manage your life by clinging and aversion, you are left dissatisfied, uneasy, or without a sense of meaning or wholeness. Being identified with the clinging Self and its endless wants and fears means that even when things are going well, there is no room to breathe, to experience the spontaneous joy that is the basis of happiness.

The alternative?  In Moffitt’s words, “…to fully receive every experience, knowing them to be pleasant when they are pleasant and unpleasant when they are unpleasant. You consciously practice not judging your life by the outcome of your preferences. Instead, you organize and measure your life by how well you follow the intentions that arise out of your values.  This is the essence of living the inner life.”

But here is my favorite part: “Life dances and you have to dance with it, whether it is taking you on a wonderful ride or is stepping on your toes. This is the necessary price and transcendent gift of being incarnate — alive in a body. But it is just life dancing. Life will move you in the rhythm and direction of its own nature. Each moment is a fresh moment in the dance, and if you are lost in clinging to the past or clinging to your hopes or fears of the future, you are not present for the DANCE.”

Sending out much love and compassion to all. Enjoy your dance. Always think of what you are most grateful for. Try to take a moment to stop, take a deep breath and smile, even when you fall down the stairs and your child throws up all over the car.

Hot air balloons can often be spotted from our home in Easton, PA

Each house we passed told its own story, each from a different time in history. No house the same shape or color from day to day. I think most of our neighbors truly understand the beauty of imperfection (more next time on our wabi sabi house) and how fortunate we are to have such a beautiful, imperfect spot to live. Oran played with a metal post in front of a little white cape.  I explained that men used to tie their horses there. “Back in the old days?” he asked. Exactly!

The smell of the red leaves beneath our feet made me smile as my son asked, “Mom, is it Fall?” As we neared his preschool, I noticed parents outside picking flowers and leaves off the ground.  I came to find it was “Show and Tell” day for October. Many of us Moms had forgotten (myself included), so there we were, gathering up the signs of Fall wherever we could.

He sprinted into his classroom to play with friends and I was off again, taking a new route home and dropping off a bag at my neighbor’s house along the way. I returned containers from soup and cake that she’d shared with me the week before. After dropping it off, I turned the corner and came across first one neighbor, then two, then three, so I stopped to chat for a bit.

Then as I climbed the hill home, a bird sang the sweetest song from a bush in front of an old brick garage. Never heard a song quite like it. I searched for him, to no avail, so I just listened as quietly as I could, embraced by the Autumn sun.

I’m so thankful that we found this place we call home, where we talk with our neighbors daily and things are magically imperfect.

Photo of me by Greg Mauger, P&G Photography

As I’m reading the book Three in a Bed, a book about co-sleeping and the benefits of keeping baby close day and night, I came to a section about how babies in third world countries are so much calmer because they are carried on the mother’s body through most of her busy day. They are jostled and snuggled and danced about in the mother’s work and play.

In contrast, the book mentions how babies who are most often put in cribs and strollers often need to have the kind of energy release that people who have desk jobs need from sitting at a computer all day… Hence they flail their arms, become rigid and scream more, sometimes throwing a tantrum.

Bingo!  What a good reminder for me.  I am a dancer, a yogini, a hiker, a snowboarder – I have always needed to move!

I would be so in tune to tribal life, living off the land and by the rhythms of Nature. But how do you create that kind of living here and survive? I am doing my best to find it.

One of my inner resources is a forest in Tasmania where a small group of American friends and I found ourselves one April afternoon in 1996. We had followed a winding dirt road until the road ended and there was only wilderness. It was just completely wild and free, for what looked like forever.

Tasmanian wilderness

A road to nowhere – but it is really a road to everywhere.

So maybe my path can at times seem like a road to nowhere, but really it’s the road to EVERYWHERE.

Does the idea of meditation intimidate you? Not to worry!  You don’t need to meditate.  But you might want to try these simple steps to find clarity about issues you thought were beyond your comprehension.  Or you may even find clarity arise about something you thought you already understood.

Photo by Michael Prentice

1. If possible, sit comfortably in a quiet place, light a candle and close the door.

2.  Listen inwardly as if you are trying to hear a message.

3. Let the words bubble up. Allow clarity to form in your mind.

4. If you are too distracted to listen, not to worry. Try to follow your breath.  Bring yourself gently back to the present moment.

5. Relax as if you were demonstrating how to sit quietly for someone else who needs your help and compassion. Try to stay defense-less. Value the not-knowing place.

Start with just one minute, and see how you feel.  Let me know how it goes!

Image courtesy P&G Photography:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/PG-Photography/259072154126455

I was afraid to feel, when it came to becoming a mother. I was always ambivalent about becoming a mom. But my husband wanted kids, so I had really struggled with this for years. One day, I had a major shift in my consciousness (or should we say in my biological clock?). I was ready.  That’s precisely when we got pregnant.

Then I went right through the fire in childbirth and my years as a new mother.

I tried to ready for the needs of a new child, and the loss of independence that I forecasted. Being pregnant was really exciting and beautiful knowing that we had created this tiny life growing inside of me. But, pregnancy was not without trials – it was tough to let go of how my body was morphing to create another soul inside of me. A complete letting go of all of the years of yoga and dance training. They say you can keep on exercising through month nine, but really? My body felt like another person altogether. Invasion of the body snatchers is the best way I could describe the feeling.

And I knew the birth itself would be a “going through the fire” kind of experience. I was readying for that, too. Getting my birth team together and doing all of the research I possibly could to find the best place to birth my baby. My intuition told me that all would be well as long as I stayed at the center of my birth experience and trusted my care provider fully.

All through the early contractions I was handling the discomfort well. It was uncomfortable but I could meditate and go somewhere else. Then it got more intense. In transition in the car, I made the most primitive sounds.  I knew the discomfort was temporary though, so I didn’t panic. I let it happen, I let my body do what it needed to, not trying to stop the flow. I remember being in the Jacuzzi tub and saying over and over, “You didn’t tell me it was this hard!” How could I have ever known what it would feel like?  The pushing, that was unbelievable – real fire. Then, my son  came into the world with his fist first, such a life force. He was full of ferocity and love from day one.

The first year in this new role—Mother–It was difficult for me, taking the joy with the utter sleepless struggle of it all. My body had not been my own for almost a year, then after birth I had to go through surgery to remove my placenta – leaving me anemic and itchy. The itchy rash. I’m still not sure whether it was hormonal, effects of Celiac on my body or something else –but it was like nothing I had ever experienced. My skin itched and burned, burned and itched. It was the year of discomfort.

But now I am on the other side of the fire.  I now understand from a deep place that “feeling is healing” – as Jessica has told me.  Having a son has been such a gift. It has helped me to realize the brevity of life…. It has given me more reason to pause and look at my spirituality. It’s given me reason to be a better person. To really listen from the heart.  When I think of my son I love to picture him in the future, who he will be and how his God-given talents will rise. It really gets me to realize that I will be an older woman before I know it, and I should be using my own God-given gifts.

I want Oran to learn from my actions more than my words.  I committed to myself that I will live my passion and I will dance until I am 90, or until I die.  There is nothing that can stop me. I am ready to learn from the Universe just how my creative gifts can be put to good use…. And I am no longer afraid to feel.