My Blog

Bioregional Catechism

erinlangley — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 22:33:40 GMT

This'll be an ongoing topic. It comes from a thread in Bioregional Animism, and I want to explore it more fully over the next several months. I am trying to sketch out my beliefs regarding dreams, ancestors, land, and traditions. I will present my conclusions in Montreal this year at the 25th Annual International Association for the Study of Dreams Conference: Dreams Without Borders. Our ancestors are alive and waiting for us to reach out to them. We can dream back the rituals and recontextualize them on this land. As my friend Fishbowl says, this has been happening in an automatic way since Europeans arrived here. Appalachia country gave rise to the expression of bluegrass, a combination of Irish and Scottish music with African Slave culture and Native American tribes of the region. Fur trapping cultures of the Russians, French, and English collide in the Northwest. The Chinese rail workers brought pieces of China with them to the Plateau and Pacific Coastal Native cultures. All of this is Northwest Americana. I also believe that cultural pods of people who have done work to recover the indigenous mind are capable of dreaming back--as a community--the traditions that bloom through a sacred tribe. I have witnessed this happening as my dream circle strengthens and grows. We dream with Spirit, and with the ancestors, for each other in an indigenous way. Personally, walking on Celtic soil (Ireland) reminded me who I am on a level I would not have experienced on any other land. The stone circles enlivened my ancestors through me and caused an overhaul of my insecurity of a woman with white skin. I am trying to call my heart back to California and make roots away from Ireland. But I cannot deny the impact that the land of my bones had on me. I'd not be capable of bioregional animism without first knowing where I come from. My experience there lasted only 3 months, but it was enough to metabolize cultural shadows, boons, lessons, and wisdom of the Celtic land and people. Only those rocks could have taught me what I brought back to Oakland. Is it possible to engage in the land in a true way without having first walked on one's ancestral soil? How can we recover the traditions of our ancestors and implement them in proper context? What roles do our ancestral stories and mythologies play in our lives? How do we bring the past to the present with consciousness and balance? What do dreams have to do with all of this? Feedback welcome.

Magic Mushrooms

erinlangley — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 18:02:30 GMT

So, yesterday I went to the fungus fair, specifically to hear Paul Stamets speak. I'm so moved by the work that he and his wife Dusty are doing that I had to honor them for their unyielding dedication to restoring the sanctity of the mushroom. Paul and Dusty do extensive work with bioremediation, a process whereby they inoculate biohazardous land--diesel cleanups, oil spills, etc. and the mushrooms magically transmute these toxins to purify the land extremely quickly. And you can even eat the mushrooms afterward! Here is one of his recent uses of mushrooms to clean up the oil spill in the SF bay: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/14/MNPQTBLE4.DTL Politically, Paul and Dusty work to preserve and restore our most biodiverse forests because these highly robust, alive areas yield the most potent medicinal mushrooms. Paul works closely with the government to ensure the survival of these biogems because they're promising antidotes for bioterrorism! (Who cares why the government is motivated to preserve land?) Without going into the shortcomings of Western medicine, the overuse of antibiotics will also make other forms of medicine (mushrooms) necessary in the future. Finally, Paul showed a many-millennia-old picture found deep in some labyrinthian caves in Algeria. It shows a seven foot-tall man with a bee head and mushrooms growing all over his body. He explained that scientists and anthropologists had "no idea" what the painting was about, though fermenting psilocyben mushrooms in a mean concoction is a known sacred concoction, probably used in those caves. He then went on to show figurines from South and Central America, small squatty figures holding mushrooms. Again, experts had "no idea" what they were holding. When one of them went up for sale, Paul called the curator and asked, "Do you have any idea what the figure is holding?" The woman said, "No idea." He said, "Have you ever considered it may be a mushroom?" "No." Then he told her to check for gills below the mushroom. If they're there, it's definitely a mushroom. She checked. The gills were there. The piece sold for 1.5 million dollars. Mushrooms are teachers. Paul would not discuss his spiritual experiences on mushrooms, as they are too personal. We scoff at mushrooms' wisdom today and chalk up their spiritual symbiosis with us to hippie recreation. Without the ritual contexts our ancestors employed to contain ceremonies involving psychoactive mushrooms, many experiences on mushrooms may be mere hippie forays. But I dream these rituals will return to us when we are ready to hear from our ancestors. I dream that the language of the mushrooms, the animals, and the plants will awaken within us. I'm so grateful to see this happening through the work of Paul and Dusty Stamets.

I got engaged.

erinlangley — Sun, 02 Sep 2007 00:23:34 GMT

After Jake got ripped off for $50, bribed a Mexican police officer, ruined his favorite sandals, lost his sunglasses and jacket, and got a nasty parasite, we decided to tough it out and go to Chichen Itza. We waited until late in the day since Jake had been so sick. After driving the three hours to get there, however, a parking attendant told us the park was closed. Shit. So, Jake tries to bribe a man (again) to let us in. It doesn't work this time. Fortunately, the man conveys in broken English that the park will reopen in a few hours for a light show. We wait around in our car, and eventually buy tickets, along with translation headphones so we can understand what's going on. The guards corral us over to El Castillo, where we are told to sit and stay. The show begins and neither of us can figure out how to work our headphones. I decide to start wandering the ruins so that one of the guards will stop me. That way, I can ask him how to work my headphones. Only no one stops me! So here I am roaming this ancient sacred site at night by myself, now completely out of the guards' sight. I make my offerings and speak the prayer I carry with me to all the sacred sites. And then Jake comes over to me. No one has stopped him, either! He says, "Thank you for taking such good care of me when I am sick, and all the times. You always take such good care of me. I wanted to bring you to a sacred site and give you this flower from the land and ask you if you will marry me." I say yes. We squeal in delight, and then look around us in awe. The full, orange moon is rising over El Castillo. We are in pitch dark, but fireflies light up the sky all around us. We wonder where we are and see a temple before us that turns out to be the Temple of the Jaguar. It exudes such power that I don't know if I'd have gone up to it without Jake. We realize that we are standing in the Mayan ball court of a game that represented the movements of the cosmos when it was played. I can't think of a more magical moment.

Fire the Grid

erinlangley — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 03:21:05 GMT

This morning at 4:11 Pacific time, 7:11 Eastern time, we have the opportunity to change ourselves and our planet. Of course we always have this ability, but this morning it will be happening en masse. So, if you will not be awake, simply set your intention to create peace, balance, wholeness, gratitude, or whatever it is that you would like to see happen. Give your soul permission to connect with this movement. If you want a firsthand account of why Fire the Grid is happening at this time, you can hear it from the horse's mouth at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqUAluDvuU4&mode=related&search= Or you can go to firethegrid.org, though it will probably be jammed from too much traffic.

I have a website now.

erinlangley — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 00:22:06 GMT

www.erinlangley.com I am an official e-entity.

Tribute to Mr. Wizard

erinlangley — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 22:12:44 GMT

Mr. Wizard, who ignited countless kids' interest in science, died today. May he have a happy, rewarding afterlife fraught with love and new, exciting experiments. As a tribute, my boyfriend and I are going to do his experiment where you slice a banana using only a needle and thread. Do you remember that episode where the kid put that powder on his hand, reached into the fish tank, and then pulled out his hand, which was NOT WET? I was so enthralled by this magic substance, which I learned today is lycopodium powder. Thanks, Mr. Wizard.

dream-people.net

erinlangley — Tue, 29 May 2007 02:11:12 GMT

I finally finished the website, dream-people.net. It was lots of work and hopefully will be useful! If you want to log and track your dreams by theme against an astronomical ephemeris or see how your dreams relate to the planets and stars, check it out. It's fun.

Surprise Mural for My Roommate

erinlangley — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 01:49:58 GMT

Today while my roommate Dan was away, I painted this on his wall. BIG. I hope he likes it!!

Good News.

erinlangley — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 04:56:59 GMT

I have really good news. At the risk of sounding like Jacqueline Mackie Paisley Passey, I would like to share it. I finished my thesis, and all three of my advisors told me that it needed no revision. Jeremy Taylor, the dream "expert", recommended it for mass-market publication. I worked hard on it, and it's always nice to have some tangible payoff. I'd forgotten about that part. I've been wondering if post-modern society with indigenous awareness is possible, and if it is, what it looks like. Even if cities fall apart in our lifetime, we will probably not return to traditional indigenous living. In the relative short-term, the mutilated eco-system alone would make it nearly impossible. Many Westernized people have grown attached to the perceived sophistication of "urban mind". Indigenous wisdom rarely acknowledges a global perspective because the depth and breadth of the native perspective is localized, which is not to say provincial. A natural ecosystem, including human life, is chock-full. Because the original intent of tribal communities is to live in balance with the land and its inhabitants, these inherited ancestral, geographic ties have evolved to sophistication and intimacy beyond our Western understanding. The old technology is called magic, and it uses the language of nature. How do we evolve a post-modern indigenous mind? Technology, fleeting and ephemeral as it is, plays a role. I have much more to say on this. When my website with my thesis is up, I'll post a link.

Ancestral Apothecary

erinlangley — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 10:52:21 GMT

Last night I arrived back at Newgrange Lodge from several days of traveling this beautiful emerald Isle. As a quick recap, I am in good old Eire just across from Bru na Boinne in the Royal County of Meath, seat of the High Kings of Ireland. I get to recommence my mural, my baby, which I've sorely missed over the past week. Ireland is working all the kinks out of me so that when I return home, her rivers will course through my veins, her rocks will be my bones, her "tombs" my womb, her songs in my heart, and ambrosial drops of Boand milk showering me with light and life like fey lanterns from the night sky. I love my homeland. I have found that I know many of these places already. The recognition I felt at Emain Macha shook me. Killarney felt like an old childhood haunt. Newgrange continues to feel like home. I was so happy to come back onto familiar roads last night. I've been traveling with a woman named Gretchen, who has stories that you wouldn't believe. And you may not believe them if I told you so rich and diverse and fraught with persecution are they. She would scoff at the label, but Gretchen is a horse whisperer. She talks to all animals, really. I've seen her call them over with a glance. . . cows, horses, birds. She heals them. She's got the most healing hands I've felt, though she'd not be caught dead calling herself a healer. She is a woman of the old ways, of herbs, of warriorship, of knowing that pulses through her body. She can hunt and craft things from leather. She knows how to fight. I have seen her urge the weather to change its course. Truly I have not witnessed more power in any one person. Perhaps this is because hers is so demonstrative, though she does not intend for it to be this way. She's been kidnapped, had her house burned down, been poisoned (twice), experienced torture, and been stalked in her dreams to awaken with the injuries she'd incurred in the dreamworld. Instructions from that abhorrent book The Witches Hammer have been used against her. She has traveled the world and worked with many tribal people of Africa and Australia. She's an animal tracker and biologist. She's here mapping a long distance trail in Ireland, and we are hatching some projects of our own. We're such a complementary duo that when we're together we feel as though anything in the world is possible. I do not know how much longer I will be here in Ireland. This week I will finish my mural of County Meath and then we'll see if Newgrange Lodge will allow me to stay a bit longer. The apex of my voyage has passed; I feel the pull of the States once again. This is both a regret and a relief. I was beginning to wonder if this island was going to reclaim my flesh. I have even thought I'd be content to die here. But a life and a child await me back home. Who knows what will happen between now and then. . .

The Motherland

erinlangley — Sat, 08 Jul 2006 09:44:10 GMT

Thank God I'm in Ireland. I love it here already, though I haven't seen the countryside yet. I'm trying to book camping for Newgrange tonight. I spent last night in a Dublin flophouse hostel, the only one open. I'm lucky it was, though, because tens of thousands of people are flocking here for two big music festivals this weekend. When I arrived in my 10-bunk bed dorm, I fell asleep to the romantic creaking bunk of two people banging. This morning I had a EuroLite! breakfast, consisting of two white pieces of bread. It was complimentary, no less. Stroud was beautiful and nothing like I was expecting. I got the dreams I needed under that magnificent tree. It is the "Keeper Tree" of the place. Everything ended on a good note, and I happily got the hell out of there. I traveled 13 or so hours yesterday from Stroud to Dublin. Now I'm off.

I am alive.

erinlangley — Wed, 05 Jul 2006 15:24:46 GMT

In Stroud now staying at Hawkwood College, camping in their field under the most beautiful tree. The jury is out and I will soon hear whether they allow me to attend the workshop I traveled 30 hours to attend without a way to pay for it. Send your good thoughts over here to Stroud.

The Eire L'angle Fund

erinlangley — Sun, 02 Jul 2006 18:29:55 GMT

I have a one-way ticket to London for my ancestral journey. I'm going to the Cotswolds and to as-yet unknown locations in Ireland. I have no money and no way to pay for the $512.67 course that Anglo-Saxon/Celtic elder Robert Moss is offering on Reclaiming the Ancient Dreamways of our indigenous ancestors. Nor do I have a ticket to Ireland or a ticket home. My visit's purpose is twofold: to fulfill my obligation and desire to visit my ancestral homelands, and to round out the research for my thesis, Reinstating the Role of Community Dreaming Using Traditional Protocol and Open Source Technology. If anyone would like to make a donation to the Erin Langley Fund so I can get to Eire and L'Angle, please let me know. You can write me at holywampum@hotmail.com or call me at (510)338-0982.

Death

erinlangley — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 02:09:27 GMT

My grandma died. A feeling of comfort welled up in me as I kneeled over her corpse. I can't say why. There was something about seeing her body completely devoid of life that reassured me. I don't know of what. As I looked at her, my mind began thinking of the employee who must have glued her lips shut to prevent her mouth from gaping open. Later, as we were puting her in the ground, green golf course-looking material carpeted the dirt, even down inside her grave. Men came and peeled it back to reveal the earth, and we each got to sprinkle a handful of it on top of my Grandma. I gave her my necklace. My native Uncle sang her a song in Nez Perce. I am very thankful for this song; it enabled my dad to cry. I couldn't stop my mind from thinking about how my grandmother's body would look in a week, two weeks, three weeks, down there inside that coffin. It was made of beautiful wood. Would her fluids leak onto the clean, white lining? I do not know how maggots work. Can they spontaneously hatch in there? Are these thoughts disrespectful? So far I have not been able to celebrate Grandma's life. I have only been able to think about death and its implications. How do we so solidly form concepts of ourselves? How do we achieve the continuity that enables strength of identity without becoming rigid? Everything is always changing. My physical form is changing, the thoughts running through it are changing, the environment around me is changing. Change moving through change moving through change. . . Still there is a spark, or maybe it is a fluid, that makes me who I am, makes you who you are, even after we have surrendered to all this change. After we pass through the shock of losing our egoic minds, something new arises in their places. Something wiser and better, something that is not afraid of losing its life because its life is fundamental. This is a subtle state, I'd imagine. Is my mind ever quiet enough to even recognize it? This fundamental part of myself? How long will my mind ride its illusions? How long will it try to preserve their lives, as I try to preserve the lives of my loved ones around me? How does one get used to this part of cyclic existence? This huge part of cyclic existence. . . My seventh grade English teacher, Mr. Long pulled me aside in class one day to say, "I enjoy your poetry, but have you noticed it's all about death?" I had not noticed. The trend started long before this. When I was just a little girl, I'd lie in bed thinking about everlasting life in heaven. This is what the Southern Baptist faith had said happens when I die. The thought shook me to my core. I would have to live forever? Forever? Forever? Forever? FOREVER? My stomach turned; I felt sick with fear. Living forever in an unchanging state terrified me. If I let my mind think about it today, it probably still would. So, if forever terrifies me, and not-forever terrifies me, then I'd better reexamine this "me" thing. Terror is not a fundamental essence. Can I witness my own slow death, the death of the thoughts I hang on to, the me that is not me? I suspect the feeling of comfort I felt looking on Grandma's body came from meeting death face-to-face. Finally, here it is. Here is death, Erin. It's real. It's here. Oh, thank God. Thank God you exist, Death. Thank God you claim us all. Thank you for your incessant labor. I can finally breathe again.

New York

erinlangley — Fri, 03 Feb 2006 01:05:47 GMT

I have learned a lot since I started teaching. I'm more organized than I've ever been before, and I'm working more than I ever have. These, combined with having established lasting friendships, amounts in increased sanity, health, and productivity. As CEO of Erinhood, I foresee interminable exponential quarterly growth. However, if by March I haven't met the goal of 24% increase in production and sales, I will have to terminate my advertising facet, time management group, and possibly several other members who aren't good for the team. I have to remember to ask myself, "Is this good for the company?" I am learning about the art of concealment. I can't say much about it, really. It is interesting to me that vaudevillian humor pops up where I would have once revealed what shouldn't be seen. It is like a patch on the ass of my favorite pants. I recently went to New York City, where I unwittingly snubbed some good friends of mine. First of all, I didn't realize I know 80 million people in the city. Second, most my time was spoken for. Thirdly, no one knew I was coming. Fourth, my head was full of photo shoot frenzy. Fifth, I plumb forgot. For most my life I have been a bad friend. That is, up until recently. Now I am a good friend to those whom I've befriended since the time I've become a good friend. Apparently I still forget about the friends I had before. . . maybe because it was okay to forget about them then. I didn't want to be relied upon, see. Friendships that required little to no effort afforded me the isolation I craved. Alas, I wrote to one of these friends, who called me an inflatable head for not coming to see him. To my mind, he will always live in Philadelphia. My memory places him there, since that is where he lived when I fell in love with him on the internet when I was 14. Same story with the other friend. I met him online years ago when he lived in Toronto, and so to my curious brain, he still lives there in some way even though another part of the same brain knows he goes to Adelphi in NYC. I'm still amazed I forgot this since he often comes up in conversations. Nearly anyone who knows me also knows Michael. NY was rough on me, though. I had a hard time orienting myself, I was PMSing, having a photoshoot, meeting lots of new people, fighting with Jake, trying to get in touch with family members who live there, and staying with Jake's friend who does not like me because I spend more time with his best friend than he does. (Though he may also be secretly in love with him.) I haven't written a thing in way too long, so please excuse the flood gates. Let me just tell you about my fight with Jake. When we arrive in NY, something about this place makes me panicky. Mind you, this is enhanced manifold by PMS. So I'm in the back of the cab, trying to remember that I actually can breathe and I'm actually not going to die. I tell Jake the city is big and scary. He tells me, don't worry. You're here with me. Good, I think. Great. Two days later as we're leaving the Met, he says, "Is it okay if you take a cab back to Friend's house?" Meekly and to my dismay, the word "okay" comes out of my mouth. I'm nervous about the shoot I'm going to. I have to be there on time and "relaxed." Friend takes good care of me here. He says, "Jake, I'm going to go with her. I don't trust a cab to get her all the way back there. The drivers usually have trouble." Jake replies, "That's just stupid! There's no reason for you to go back there with her." So, what happens? The guy gets lost. I finally get to Friend's after paying a $30 fare and call another cab to take me to the studio. I am late for my shoot. I am not relaxed; I am crying because I am waiting on the corner in the ghetto of a city I don't know for a cab that never arives. Instead, an illegal cab comes and I reluctantly get inside because I don't know what else to do. And when he passes the street we're supposed to turn on and I say something about it, he doesn't reply. He just keeps driving. At this point, I don't know if he's going to take me someplace dark to rape me. He doesn't. He goes around the block and drops me off at the right spot, even charging me proper fare. But I don't know these things. I don't know if I'm supposed to get in that car. I don't know if it's a good idea to be standing on that particular corner in that particular neighborhood (I learned it's not). I don't know the rules of this culture. I don't know the layout of this city. I don't even know how to call a cab. Folks, I'm not from 'round these parts. I was livid at Jake for even asking the question, "Is it okay if you take a cab back to Friend's house?" Especially since he knew I was having a hard time with the city. Especially since he assured me more than once that I didn't have to worry because he was there to show me around. Man, I was pissed. I vented to my friends at the shoot, who said they'd experienced a similar incident with Jake. So later that night after dinner at Diner, we made our way back to the studio while Jake was in the bathroom. The studio is a block away, and we said at the table we'd be going back there to pick up our stuff. Again, the studio is a block away. When Friend asks, "hey guys, shouldn't we wait for Jake," we look at each other and say, "Nah, he'll be okay." I am still pissed because I haven't been able to talk to Jake about this yet. He gets to see these people once a year maybe, and I don't want to ruin his two hours with them. But I should have. He didn't know where we went, and he was livid. We got in a big fight that night. He still doesn't understand why I am upset. Yesterday he asked me, "Are you mad at me?" at an inappropriate time, which alarms me because this is what you ask your psycho girlfriend. Oh well. It's over. New York, I mean. New York, you are big and scary, but I'll probably be back. And when I come back, I will visit Lester, Jeremy, Michael, Kate, Jessica, Tom, Cathy, and Blythe. And I will not be on my period.

Volcano

erinlangley — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 01:14:38 GMT

Them kids is wearin' me out. I'm different now because I don't have to individualize experiences of despair, anger, confusion, hilarity, joy, or any of the other ones. There's plenty to be angry about. Plenty to cry about. Doesn't mean there's something wrong with me. . . means I can feel. Means I listen when Earth speaks. Means I'm Earth. So my teaching is raw. I teach the high schoolers the value of public expression of grief by crying the tears of the Earth. Freaks them out, and spellbinds them in a way that is perhaps voyeuristic, but they will catch on and begin to understand the value of despair. Here in the West it is still not proper to cry. It means something is wrong with YOU. With you! Not with the tremendous injustice occurring all around us. One girl complained about my class to a director, and the little me feels anxious about it. She tried to kill herself over the weekend, and in class I ended up telling about my own suicide story, and how back in the day I would have received training from elders, and there I was trying to kill myself because I didn't have guidance for my gifts! I had no meaningful work! Now there are few elders, and few youth willing to listen, and neither constituent feels they can contribute anything meaningful to our culture! There is something wrong! My friend Carl lives in a Quaker community and says, "Kids need meaningful work! We send the eight-year olds out to collect the eggs. No one can collect an egg better than an eight-year old, and it's an essential job." So I am putting the motherfucking smack down to bring meaning back to these precious kids. They're so bright, and so cynical, and so ready to learn something that matters! I did not mean to single out the girl in my class by telling my story. I meant to say, "WHY IS THIS HAPPENING OVER AND OVER?!" I can't imagine not being alive now. And this girl is just beautiful. So sweet. So pure. I can see to the quick of her, and it's all beauty. We have meaningful work to do. What happens when your sense of self suddenly extends to all relations? Suddenly it doesn't matter if I make an ass of myself for doing something that speaks for the Earth. Suddenly the immediate outcomes of my actions aren't so important. It's not my business what comes of my actions so long as my intention stays grounded in the wisdom of the ancestors, which is to say EVERY RELATIONSHIP THAT HAS LED TO MY MIRACULOUS EXISTENCE. I get to unwrap each emergent property like a gift. Sight. Fine motor skills. Self-awareness. Self-as-nested-holon awareness. The collective experiences of 150,000 years of human existence!? Wow.

Systems

erinlangley — Wed, 22 Jun 2005 00:45:31 GMT

Lately I have been thinking about cycles and how it's okay to be a human being. I just got back from Sibley Volcanic Preserve and poured my heart out to the land there. I'm still very confused, partly because I'm a human being who is made of change and partly because I'm on my moon. The cleansing time. I have learned that awareness provides the container necessary for the change I precipitate in myself by opening to it. I will always be part of an open system, even if I choose to live my life as though I'm a closed one. Sustained awareness of change enables chaotic times to move more quickly through me by reminding myself, and physically opening myself, to the infinite feedback loop writhing through my neat little vessel. Change: Me = Sun: Earth Matter provides the limitation necessary for the sun to take form. If it weren't for Earth, the sun wouldn't have a medium to paint with. I'm trying my best to stay grounded by communicating the movement of change through me in many ways. When it becomes stagnant is when I feel sick or emotionally burdened. I've been doing yoga and hiking a hell of a lot, and playing didgeridoo. Started playing with a drum troupe, and am being asked to play it left and right for various occasions. Oh, and I've been crying and laughing. A lot of that especially now because of this point in my cycle, and because the moon is full. Pacing myself with nature has been a huge theme lately. I'm making a new calendar, a lunar one that I can relate to easily. It's a three-dimensional calendar to drive home the point that I am part of a living sphere that is hurtling through space, and whose movements in relation to other hurtling balls can be tracked in predictable ways. I fear I'm moving off the grid more than I'm ready for. That's a fitting metaphor, too, because we know they Earth is round, but we're still living like it's flat. A grid. My wiring does not operate smoothly or naturally with linear systems. That money is the way it is distresses me. Direct exchange is so much more balancing. I am so grateful to be able to feel. I'm open to joys and sorrows that many people don't remember how to feel. It's difficult to maintain a state of such openness. I'm super sensitive, which is a gift in some environments and a painful way to experience life in mainstream Western culture. I'm in such a serious mood now. Still getting shit out of my system. Getting the heaviness out in the ways I mentioned earlier makes me buoyant so I can be playful again. I think pleasant exhaustion is setting in now. Thank God.