Eat. Drink. Sleep. Pee.

For the past few days I have been sick. Well, maybe a little longer than that, but not until Friday did I feel the need to spend the day in bed. Then Saturday. Then Sunday, today. Albeit I'm starting to feel better now, but just in fits and starts. Enough to run to the grocery store for juice and soup before feeling run down and needing a nap again.

Anyway, this comes directly on the heels of a conscious decision I made to again "return to the cave." To pull into myself a bit, retreat from the world, to nurture and nourish myself. And apparently, from what I heard about the recent New Moon in Cancer, this is perfect timing, for that's exactly what that moon signifies.

The past months have found me becoming highly distracted and mesmerized by the dramas of the world and the dramas of others, and without belittling or judging what anyone else is going through, my personal boundaries and goals were beginning to blur. I realized I had lost sight of my personal north star as well as my inner compass, and so was just sailing in circles at the mercy of wind and wave, my senses lulled to sleep by the siren's song of the world.

But then there came a couple of instances where, though totally emotional, I literally felt as though I'd been kicked in the gut by a couple people. And though it took me a bit of time to recover from those instances, I am so grateful for them because they were the wake up call I needed to rouse my dazed senses and to reset my bearings.

It seems to be at the point where I was resetting that I began to get sick, starting in my throat, the 5th chakra, which is about expressing oneself. Coincidence? I think not. And as I continue to find my way, and set my course of true expression, I am releasing the foreign matters that I had taken aboard and mistakenly identified as my own -- Clearing myself of excess weight and baggage that I may become airborne and set my sights on the second star to the right.

Does that make the sickness any easier? I don't know about easier. I still feel like crap. But it does place it all in a different context, giving it a purpose and a pearl of wisdom which, by itself may not add up to much, but when placed with the treasure trove of other such pearls of experience I have gained, it becomes harder to deny a higher purpose in all of this.

But that's not actually what I had intended to write about in this entry. It has been a long time, since childhood possibly, that I have been this sick for this long. Especially anymore, I may require a day of sleep to feel good enough to re-emerge into the world, but three? So this time has thrown me for a bit of a loop, and made me wonder if I'm taking care of myself enough to heal. I mean, it is 4:30 in the afternoon and I have yet to eat anything. I haven't been drinking a lot of liquids either, except on my occasional trips to the bathroom. That's not, according to the way I was raised, how one gets well.

So this afternoon, those doubts swirling in my head, along with a general cultural guilt for laying in bed for so long, I checked in with my Upperworld Guide, Fred, to ask if I was alright or if I should be doing more to take care of myself through this.

"Are you thirsty?" he asked. "No." "Then don't worry about drinking. Are you hungry?" "No." "Then don't worry about eating. Are you tired?" "Yes." "Then sleep."

That was so simple, so Taoist. Like another Taoist saying I remember hearing: "When hungry, eat. When thirsty, drink. When tired, sleep. When Nature calls, answer."

Thank you Fred. See you after my nap... zzzzzzzzzzzzzz...

Grandfather Raven, Brother Eagle

Last Sunday was a very interesting day. I suppose it shouldn't have surprised me, two separate otherworldly occurrences... um... occurring in the midst of such a Spiritually charged weekend (Between Jeshua, Gaia's Temple, and Jyorei), but they did, and both left me sitting back going, "Whoa!"

Sunday afternoon I had just gotten back from Gaia's Temple when a friend texted me. There were six ravens just hovering over her home calling back and forth to each other and she wanted to know what it was about. "...um ...MAGICK?!" was my smart aleck reply. "Duh!" she texted.

So I went into Medicine Card mode and started calling up what it means if Raven shows up in your card spread. "Raven is deep, mysterious, cosmic, creative magick and miracles." Then I tuned into them, and I quickly texted her back, "I think they are blessing your place! Six ravens like the six directions: North, South, East, West, Above (Father Sky), and Below (Mother Earth)! Holy crap!" I believe she replied with a similar explicative.

And as I sat there I started to hear singing in my head. I tried to process it and listen closer, it just feeling more and more familiar, until my mind was finally able to pinpoint where I'd heard it before. Holy crap! It was the same chanting I had heard from the Grandfather stones after spending the night in the sweat lodge on my vision quest! The same chanting I heard when the Grandfathers named me! "It's the Grandfathers! They're singing to you!"

Unbeknownst to me at the time, she was also texting another of her friends, who is very intuitive and very in tune with Native ways, and he was telling her almost the same thing. I sat there listening to the chants, tears filling my eyes, and I texted back, "Part of me thinks that's crazy. But I know it's true cuz I can't stop crying." Her response was something along the lines of, "I know. I can't see through my tears right now."

Phew!

The second event happened that same night. I went to receive Jyorei (an energy healing technique in the same family as Reiki) at a weekly gathering at a friend's house. Toward the end of the evening I was in between personally receiving energy, but, having found out how powerful this energy work is, I closed my eyes and began taking advantage of the 'overflow' energy from an exchange taking place next to me.

I was just minding my own business, enjoying melting into the vibes, when suddenly Eagle appeared to me. It usually takes me a little bit to determine if these kind of visions are real or just random thoughts bouncing across my neural receptors. The eagle's head was pretty persistent in not dissolving from sight, so I concluded he was really there. He patiently waited for me to reach this conclusion before he spoke. And as his words floated through my head, I watched him spread his wings and soar through my mental skies, my perspective switching back and forth between watching him from below, and looking over his shoulder.

"Let others believe they are birds of the field. Your natural habitat is the heavens. The sky is your home. You are supported on the breath of the Mother -- effortlessly. All you need to do is open your heart by spreading your wings. You can not fall."

And with the last words he passed closely over my head, exposing his unprotected chest to me. It was a total "Aha!" moment as I realized the perfect trust he displayed, and the need to let go in order to fly. If you keep your wings tightly around yourself in protection, they are basically useless. You can not become airborne until you open yourself up. And when you do, you are carried by the winds with no effort on your part.

Since his appearance, I have felt Eagle's presence daily, particularly when walking through a challenge, helping me maintain my perspective as I feel his/my wings spread wide, in perfect trust that I am supported and safe, and true to my path.

Thank you Grandfathers. Thank you Brother.

A Soltice Gift

It is usually around Winter Solstice (Christmas time) that we think about giving and receiving presents, but this year it was Summer Solstice when I received a very special, touching, and fitting gift for the season.

Actually it was Solstice Eve. I was on a beach on Puget Sound drumming my little heart out with a group of kindred souls, sending prayers, music, and energy of healing to the Ocean and Her peoples. It had been a long day, having spent 6 or 7 hours at a psychic fair doing readings all day, on top of the 8 or so hours the previous day. Though happy, I was pretty knackered. I've also been having difficulty getting to bed at a decent time, experiencing organizational challenges for all the myriad projects I am trying to work on concurrently. So after a few hours at the drumming ceremony, I decided it would be a good idea to head home and get some sleep.

I said good-bye to a dear friend who had just shown up out of the blue, after not seeing her for quite some time, and then went to find someone else who was there that I wanted to wish good night. I found her, and after saying my good-byes, she kind of pulled me off to the side away from the crowd, saying there was something she wanted to tell me.




Though I don't remember her exact words, they touched me deeply, bringing tears to my eyes. What she expressed to me was a gratitude for my presence in her life, and how that presence had made a big difference, demonstrating to her and helping her to understand the gentleness and humbleness of true balanced masculine energy, and what that looks and feels like.

I couldn't help giving her another hug and whispering a thank you to her, which seemed to surprise her, since she was the one thanking me. It may not seem like that big of a deal, but it is a relatively new thing for me to have these qualities seen as strengths, and I don't know if she still understands what a gift she gave me. I mean my inner circle of friends have told me similar things, but this was someone I see only on occasion, and someone I hold in very high esteem. It is more usual, and this started in my childhood, to be thought of as weak, a momma's boy, or even gay. To hear this validation out loud, to have some one really see me and recognize these parts of me as balanced and strong rather than imperfections or inadequacies that needed to be fixed or at least compensated for, was huge.




I felt that just by the integrity of walking my path, I had helped heal something in her, and by her sharing that with me, I can almost feel, even now, the little boy inside of me who was always misunderstood, to the point of believing those judgements about himself, stand a little taller in his/my own healing.




And it was perfect timing, a Summer Solstice gift, as we celebrate the peak of active, masculine energy with the sun reaching its zenith on the longest day of the year, before starting to slip closer to the feminine energy of winter dreams.

I left and drove home, still wiping the occasional tear from my eye, with a prayer repeating over and over in my head:

"Thank you!"