summertime . . .

and the living is easy.

IT IS SO BEAUTIFUL HERE.

And, you gotta love the chickens.

Here is an excerpt from my last e-list newsletter. Sign up at www.devadancing.com to receive monthly updates.

love to you!


Summer Solstice was yesterday, I find it somehow hard to believe that the peak of the sun has come, even as the heat of summer increases (I still so viscerally remember the dark of winter). Clearly reality does not need my belief in it to continue.

And here I am, sitting, listening to the birds after spending some of the morning watering the plants and visiting our chickens. Daily I am opened by the beauty of nature. The green growing things and the blue, blue, blue of the sky. What a gift it is to be inhabiting this body, and what interesting times to be doing so. The conversation in my house has been around permaculture and sustainability, love, living together, practice, relationship and distraction.

How do we live in an awareness of the wholeness that we already are, and from that place, take action?

What do we habitually use to distract ourselves from being in the present moment: thoughts about the state of the world, work, money, relationship and what he/she needs to do to make me happy (this includes ourselves) -- forever?

It's a moment to moment choosing of wholeness, of the awareness of presence, of the returning to simplicity. "Come here to this moment now. Don't wait until your hair is perfect. Don't even wait until you have both shoes on. Come." ~Jeannie Zandi

Often there's still a thread that says the “me” is going to get it, the “me” is going to wake up. And it just isn't true. It actually wakes up out of the "me." ~Sharon Landrith

"Our practice is acceptance. It's a subtle thing. I include anything as practice that is focused on being present and conscious. In awareness practice—this is heart of what Buddha and every spiritual leader got to and tried to communicate—the little self (who you think you are) is not who you are. You have to recognize and realize who you are in order to bring compassion to the illusion of the separate self/ego you thought you were. It's a case of mistaken identity—no wonder we are struggling!" ~Cheri Huber

spppprring

Spring has sprung and it is treating me well.

oh my. next month I'll be 30. Something about that seems important and I'm not sure where. I'll let you know.

I can see the winter blues in that last post, it was a hard one and it broke all at once, which is pretty amazing. My family returned to the valley and I got some time in satsang and some time in Boulder and some travels and some good work.

So many incredible opportunities and connections. . .

Working with Julie Hart of Carbondale has been great -- she teaches Nia there: www.sol-nia.com and rocks it on the dance floor. We are teaching a workshop together in a week and a half and I have so appreciated her support of my work!

I spent a week with Michael Regan and friends -- Dynamic Oneness Gathering www.michaelregan.us and I walked out clearer than I have been in awhile. Yay!!

And so many beautiful people.

I'm looking forward to hanging out at the Oasis with Djero and crew for the next Muse installment here on the western slope in mid-May.

Playing with weekly (or bi-monthly) community dance jams. Monthly laughter yoga and Deva Dancing. Working at the local co-op. Public radio. Kids. Making pottery. Playing in the earth. Helping good people in their offices. The career thing isn't as tidy here as I think I would like it, but really, I am SOOOO blessed in this life and the work I get to do in the world!

It's so beautiful to feel in alignment with my Self.

Still looking for that soul-mate, life-partner person. . . and so much clearer in myself than ever before that I'm not holding that desire as an agony anymore, which is relieving :) If you happen to be him, or know him, drop me a line :)


kisses and hugs to you and your sweet beautiful hearts!
Arlyn

wobbly, wobbly

well my loves. . .

I've been in Hotchkiss now for 9 months. I love it here. I love the pace and the landscape and the people.

And, I'm missing Boulder like a mo-fo right now. Contact improv, crazy parties (or just good peeps), a little bit of diversity, coffeeshops that are open on Sunday, a bit more live music, dance performances, ya know. Small town life has its ups and downs.

So you-all had best come and visit me :)

Sigh.

Everything in this earth realm has been moving more slowly than I'd like it to. . . my transition to super-enlightened master is taking way longer than it seems like it should. Or rather, the recognition that I already am the superenlightened master :). . . . ya know?

And moments of pure bliss too. Looking out at the sunrise most mornings, feeding the chickens, fresh eggs, warm fireplaces in the winter, cats in my lap, good conversations, baths, random moments of pure okayness.

The trees are starting to poke green life-force into their tips. The grass is showing green. Spring is coming even through the snow we've been having every night.

And there is dancing and music here in this little mountain town, so that's been good. I LOVE PUBLIC RADIO.

send me hugs and a remembrance that this tribe, this family, this gathering of souls here to raise the vibration of the earth plane is so much bigger than I can fathom. Help me remember that when I forget, cause sometimes it looks like this species isn't going to learn fast enough, and I'm rather fond of us.

kisses.
~A

www.devadancing.com

my website is up and running.
please check it out.
www.devadancing.com

superexciting for me!!!!

love to you!

eco-effective

From cradle to cradle by William McDonough and Michael Braungart:

"The key is not to make human industries and systems smaller, as efficiency advocates propound, but to design them to get bigger and better in a way that replenishes, restores, and nourishes the rest of the world."

"Taking an eco-effective approach to design might result in an innovation so extreme that it resembles nothing we know, or it might merely show us how to optimize a system already in place. It's not the solution itself that is necessarily radical but the shift in perspective with which we begin, from the old view of nature as something to be controlled to a stance of engagement."

"Let's use our ingenuity to stay here; to become, once again, native to this planet."
___________

I spend time thinking about how we, as a species, are going to guarantee our survival when it looks like we are doing everything we can, as fast as we can to wipe ourselves out. I know in the big picture it doesn't altogether matter, the earth will survive, consciousness will find another school. But I like this species. I think we have promise.

The doing of it still confounds me a bit.

The spiritual teachers say, "go within." And yes, as far as I can tell - that is the place to start. But once within, where?

The quotes above lead in a direction that gives me hope. Intelligent people thinking about re-designing the very substance of our lives, from books to homes to factories to cities. This is the good news.

For today, this is what it is.

And I trust that the guidance leading me will be informed by these ideas so that I may receive a broader spectrum or possible actions.

love to you, to the ones who are no longer waiting, even if full clarity isn't available just yet.

The journey is the destination.
~Arlyn

back on the western slope of Colorado

well,
a year and a day since I moved to Boulder most recently, I find myself back in Hotchkiss at the family "ashram". Aaron joins us from his recent travels in India. And now we garden, landscape, eat meals together and watch movies.

I can feel myself slowing down and this is a good thing. I can feel layers of armoring that I seem to require for "city-life" dropping away. To leave me Here. Innocent. Curious. Feeling incredibly blessed by this gift of quiet time, integration time. Only a little bit of impatience as I wonder, "what next?" But, that hasn't yet been revealed. . . .

Yesterday some friends and I went for a hike in the "high country" oh my, it's gloriously beautiful up there. Aspen forests and streams and meadows and a beaver dam or two. (not pictured above -- this photo is from McClure's pass a few years ago, but it does describe the landscape.)

lots of love to you!!
Blessings,
Arlyn

To Whom It May Concern:

I am angry.

And more than angry I have been afraid.

Afraid to speak that which I know to be true, and afraid to speak the obvious in a way that anyone could hear me. I have liked to say, “there are those that fight the old system and there are those that are here to build the new.” And I have been afraid of my anger, people are killed every day for the privilege of speech. In addition, I have the visceral body-memory of being burned at the stake as a witch and it’s no wonder I do not speak. There are lines and I dare not approach them.

Several years ago I became a performer and developed a nearly paralyzing hatred for my body. “Every time you hate your body, society’s doing just fine keeping you down,” ~Rebecca Riots. I am angry how distracted most Americans are by the image of themselves, they/I are too busy to pay attention to the state of the world. Are too busy being held hostage by themselves to step outside of the construct of our reality to take action. I am very clear that this hatred of my body has also been an attempt to still this voice that might began screaming and attract attention to this body that is so tenderly vulnerable.

And death is inevitable.

I have heard that it is deliberate on the part of the government of this country to create hopelessness in it’s citizens so that we do not speak, gather, rally, or steal power that is rightfully ours. It has worked. I have been afraid, and hopeless and convinced that nothing that I say or do will make a difference. Hopelessness plus fear = paralyzed.

What I see, if I was willing to see and speak is a country running so fast towards a brick wall we barely have time to put up our hands before we hit it. And paradoxically, I am hopeful, that maybe this, maybe something so obvious and big will be the catalyst for the change that is needed in order for sanity, justice, and kindness to prevail. However historically, that has not been the case. Historically this type of destruction of a known system gives rise to more fear and more controlled forms of government.

My anger more often than not turns inwards on myself rather than outwards to the world. I am angry at my own limitations, my own humanness, my own failings. I am angry that I have not found a way to take action that feels sane and satisfying at the same time. I am angry. If I had a sword to cleave through my reality, I would first free myself from the hatred of this body, then free myself from the fear of seeing, then free myself from the fear of the death of speaking, then free others from their cages.

I want to believe that humans are inherently good and that if we were free from our habitual conditioning, we would be kind to ourselves and others.

This is not what I see reflected from the world.

I have clean drinking water. I have enough clean drinking water that I can bathe in it every day, as can the other members of my house. I have done nothing to deserve this privilege and I’m not convinced that I have done anything useful with this privilege.

“If you’re not angry, you’re not paying attention.” And yet, with so many mis-uses of anger, it’s no wonder that it has become such a distrusted guide for us humans.

“The instinctive, natural way to express anger is to respond aggressively. Anger is a natural, adaptive response to threats; it inspires powerful, often aggressive, feelings and behaviors, which allow us to fight and to defend ourselves when we are attacked. A certain amount of anger, therefore, is necessary to our survival.”(www. www.apa.org/topics/controlanger.html) It is no surprise to me that we have “anger problems” in this culture which are so obviously a natural response to a violation of one’s boundaries misdirected at a system that is difficult to touch. As Joanna Macy says, “reframe their pain for the world as evidence of their interconnectedness in the web of life, and hence of their power to take part in its healing.”(www.joannamacy.net/html/work.html)

A friend of mine spoke vividly about his fear of our collective inability to take action or make decisions in clear, clean and responsible ways. It’s not a matter of “if” change is needed right now on the planet. Obviously, change is needed now. And I hope that it is not already too late. I do have a certain human desire for this species to continue. Even if consciousness itself, who we truly are, will not be affected by the destruction of the species, I would prefer human intelligence to win this battle that I see us engaged in.

Complacency and hopelessness are so clearly linked. A culture designed to distract and prevent us from hearing our internal truth is not random.

I suppose then it all comes down to power. Who has it and what they do with it. When a friend suggested that I write to the president, I responded with my disbelief that he is anything but a mouthpiece for the current power structure. I don’t know how to speak so that those who are actually in power might hear me. I also see the double-bind they are in as actually taking change to redistribute power would strip them of their privilege and everything they know to be true and I can see from my own life how few are willing to make that leap.

How do I become an accomplice of systems of oppression? When that system is part of the reason that I have the privilege that I do. I have a good life. Am I willing to jeopardize that by speaking what I know to be true? I find this a daily struggle for myself, at work and with my housemates. Can I stand in the face of disapproval and possible loss to speak? Sometimes. Am I really willing to give up my privilege for justice? Am I really willing to give up my safe life for the benefit of all beings? Are you?

To vision a future that is truly sustainable, it must work for all humans, not at the expense of 90% of the humans on the planet.

There is power in the many. There is power in standing in Truth and stating our perceptions.

It is possible to re-claim power that has been given to “the authority.” And it happens moment by moment. It happens in beginning to notice. In beginning to listen to the call of pain echoing through the psyche-scapes of so many. It begins with standing in the Truth of who we are as vast untouchable consciousness while staying connected to the human lives that are at stake here. It begins by staying connected to one another, listening, gathering, honoring, being honest, being human and being seen.

It begins by taking action. Now. To commit to live more fully as the person you imagine being “if only. . .” What is one thing this person would do? Donate money, bring reusable bags to the store, buy organic, create sustainable community where you are, with the people you love – now, before we are forced to see how much stress this system can actually take.

My prayer is to be willing to stand in the power of the energy that moves through this body and to open ever more fully to the power that wields the sword of my clarity. Amen. May you find your voice and use it to speak the Truth.

~ADH. December 11, 2006

spring

spring has hit and I am sprung.

This is exciting.

Lots of breath and invitations and possibilities.

I am going to be in Boulder for the summer, which feels really good after being able to take a retreat in Hotchkiss for the last year.

Life is so full and rich, it's amazing. And my experience of the world is deliciously rich, especially when I remember to welcome the whole spectrum that shows up here.

Presence. Basing my life on presence. What a blessing. It would seem that returning to reality would be easier than it is, but that's just a story.

lots of love,
Arlyn

graduation (?)

well.
I sent in my graduation portfolio today to Prescott College. I have one meeting left and then I'll be done, as far as I can tell, with this crazy journey called Adult Degree Education in Expressive Arts. What a trip.

I of course, am freaking out. Wondering what I'm going to do with my life. My dad says, take some time off, but it feels like that's what I've been doing since I moved to Hotchkiss from Boulder, but I guess that depends on how you define "time off."

I know how I want it all to feel, I'm just not sure what it will look like.

Luckily, I'm going on retreat for the next 5 days.

lots of love,
Arlyn

hiding out

well, i just noticed that i was hiding out on tribe searching for like-minded individuals instead of dealing with the rolling, boiling bin of sadness/anger etc. that is stalking me.

tigress. caged by the ways i think i should be, think i should look, and then the self-destructive habits of addiction ~ mostly to food and negative thinking and the longing to lash out and tear the fucking place to hell and holding myself back and questioning myself and tying myself in knots of should have been, could have been. ..

healing my feminine lineage with my mom - looking at our habits of turning ourselves into the victims of our world so as not to have to stand up and face it. seeing how i martyr myself to get energy from her and from others. an aching in me. wondering how to make it through this time that feels so hard that has been my whole life that feels so hard that is the whole world that feels so hard.

aching.

longing to be held and loved while knowing that it can only come from within to really touch the places of deepest hurt because only i know where that is and only i can hold me there, but i can't right now. and i know that i am loved and i know that i am beautiful and i know that i offer a great deal of light into the world and yet. . . feeling like if there was less of me, that would be better somehow.

why this heartache? why this inconsolable longing?

and so i pray. for grace. for knowing. for healing. for surrender. for help. for love. for guidance. for gentleness. for my tribe to meet me and hold me when i cannot.