casablanca tonight

Rick, Ilsa, Sam and Louis...a perfect Friday night...

"You must remember this, a kiss is just a kiss, a sigh is just a sigh,the fundamental things apply, as time goes by...the world will always welcome lovers, as time goes by..." - Herman Hupfeld

la poesia de mi madrina

Dame la dulzura de tus labios,
El calor de tu cuerpo,
El placer de tus manos,
El milagro de tu amor,
Llename de ti y así los dos revalsaremos de pasión.

------------------------------------------

Tu eres mi cielo siempre rodeandome de amor.
Tu eres mi sol siempre dandome calor.
Tu eres mi luna siempre mi luz en la oscuridad
Yo te prometo ser lo mismo y crear para los dos un paraíso hasta la eternidad.

- Edda M. Sevilla (b. 1949)

Happy Birthday Beloved Godmother Tilly...truly a God Mother to me, to my son and to so many...

a sacred initiation

"Both the yogi and the shaman do away with their past and the ties that keep them bound to their karmic and family histories. They also learn to break free of time to taste infinity; and in doing so, reach an unconditioned, natural state where they recover their original Self."

- Alberto Villoldo

I dreamed with shaman healers last night and feel a sacred initiation has begun...

discover the sacred in the humble and ordinary

Zen mind is not Zen mind. 
That is, if you are attached to Zen mind, then you have a problem, and your way is very narrow.
Throwing away Zen mind is correct Zen mind.
Only keep the question,
"What is the best way of helping other people?"
- Seung Sahn

"Zen is about standing back, letting go - and getting in touch with the peace and wisdom that lies within us all.  It's about the discovery of the sacred in the midst of the humble and ordinary. About not getting caught up in the rat-race and the endless search for material possessions.

With its emphasis on looking within, enjoying the moment, detachment and compassion, Zen offers a refreshingly different slant to life. To experience Zen is a bit like looking through the other end of the telescope.

Meditation, as practiced by Buddha, and brought to Japan by the twelfth-century monk Dogen, is at the heart of Zen." - M. Pinkney

love like a rose

"What is love? Take a look at a rose. Is it possible for a rose to say, 'I shall offer my fragrance to good people and withhold it from bad people?'

...the first quality of love: its indiscriminate character...Contemplate in astonishment the sheer goodness of the rose...for there you have an image of what love is all about.

How does one attain this quality of love? Anything you do will only make it forced, cultivated and therefore phony. There is nothing you can do. But there is something you can drop. Observe the marvelous change that comes over you the moment you stop seeing people as good or bad...To see this is to acquire the indiscriminate quality one so admires in a rose...And here is a second quality of love - it's gratuitousness...it gives and asks for nothing in return...

The third quality of love is its unself-consciousness. Love so enjoys the loving that it is blissfully unaware of itself...The way a rose gives out its fragrance simply because there is nothing else it can do, whether there is someone to enjoy its fragrance or not...Love simply is, it has no object...

The final quality of love is its freedom. The moment coercion or control or conflict enters, love dies...Think for a while of an the coersion and control that you submit to on the part of others when you so anxiously live up to their expectations in order to buy their love and approval or because you fear you will  lose them. Each time you submit to this control and this coersion you destroy the capacity to love which is your very nature, for you cannot but do to others what you allow others to do to you. Contemplate, then, all the control and coersion in your life and hopefully this contemplation alone will cause them to drop. The moment they drop, freedom will arise. And freedom is just another word for love." - Anthony De Mello

- from my morning meditations

become intuitive

Are you a good listener?

Can you listen without simultaneously preparing a response?

According to the herbal Yogi Tea I am sipping, when we practice listening, we become intuitive...

letting go

- a corner of my studio -

"Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what next or how.  The moment you know how, you begin to die a little.  The artist never entirely knows.  We guess.  We may be wrong, but we take leap after leap in the dark." - Agnes de Mille

surrendering to uncertainty

accepting change as the only constant

staying curious about impermanence

letting go, letting go, letting go

beauty in everything

How do you connect and communicate with your soul? 

"As you awaken to your divine nature, you'll begin to appreciate beauty in everything you see, touch, and experience." - Dr. Wayne W. Dyer 

Blessings surround us.

chaos

What is our response to chaos?

Can we manage to view chaos as something positive?

"Chaos should be regarded as extremely good news." - Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche 

"One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star." - Friedrich Nietzsche 

"In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order." - Carl Jung

"Chaos is a friend of mine." - Bob Dylan

hold the space for each other's beauty

"The only beloved who can always be counted on is God. The ultimate partner is a divine one, an experience of ourselves that is totally supportive and forgiving. Until we know this, we keep seeking sustenance from men that they cannot give us. Most men and women today are wounded. The search for some one who isn't in pain is unreasonable until we ourselves are healed of our own dysfunctions. Until then, we will be led to people as wounded as we are in order that we might heal and be healed together. What this means is that NO PARTNER can save us, deliver us, or give meaning to our lives. The source of our salvation, deliverance, and meaning is within us. It is the love we give as much as it is the love we get. The passion we need to feed is our relationship to God. This is ultimately our relationship with ourselves.

It's not as easy as a good date, as much fun as sex, or as dramatic as romantic tension. It is work. Personal growth, recovery, religious practice, spiritual renewal - whatever words we care to use - these are the keys to our return to sanity and peace. When we have reclaimed our wholeness, we are ready to face the worldly beloved. Until then, we will look to a romantic partner to give us peace rather than remember that our role in the relationship is to BRING peace, by receiving it from God allowing him to spread his peace through us to all mankind.

How often I have betrayed myself, forgetting - or more accurately, resisting - the twenty minutes of meditation, the hour of reading, the spiritual meeting or recovery group that would prepare me for the roller coaster ride that always lies potential in an intimate relationship. Part of our problem is that we expect love affairs to always feel good. They don't. Actually, relationships don't feel good anyway. We feel good. Unless we are centered within ourselves, we cannot blame a relationship for throwing us off. No man can convince a woman she's wonderful, but if she already believes she is, his agreement can resonate and bring her joy.

This is our function in each other's lives: to hold the space for each other's beauty, that our beloved can leave us and we still feel in his absence how beautiful we are." - Marianne Williamson

I received this passage after my daily ritual of morning meditation, prayer and yoga just now...and my dear, if the word "god" turns you off, simply substitute it with one that connects you with the Divine Life Force that resides within.  

the illusion of an intimate relationship

"At its peak, the "in love" experience is euphoric.  We are emotionally obsessed with each other.  We go to sleep thinking of each other. When we wake up that person is the first thought on our minds. We long to be together.

The person who is "in love" has the illusion that his beloved is perfect.

We have been led to believe that if we are really in love, it will last forever.  We will always have the wonderful feelings that we have at this moment. Nothing could ever come between us.  Nothing will ever overcome our love for each other.

Eventually, however, we all descend from the clouds and plant our feet on earth again. Our eyes are opened, and we see the warts of the other person.  We recognize that some of his/her personality traits are actually irritating.  He/she has the capacity for hurt and anger, perhaps even harsh words and critical judgments. Those little traits that we overlooked when we were in love now become huge mountains.

Welcome to the real world...What happened to the "in love" experience?...The euphoria of the "in love" state gives us the illusion that we have an intimate relationship.  We feel that we belong to each other.  We believe we can conquer all problems..." - Gary Chapman

so my darlings, how long does the euphoric state of love last?
six months? nine months?
the romantic one year anniversary perhaps?

I have neither answers nor judgment, as every relationship is quite unique.  What is essential is a strong foundation of friendship over time, built on mutual trust, respect and a great sense of humor.

the power to act

"A moment of stopping, turning inside, checking yourself out, noticing how you feel, and observing your thoughts without buying into them is a profoundly significant moment. It will give you the power to act from a resourceful, skillful place." - S.Kempton

2013 mixed media on canvas from a series exploring painting as poetry and meditation 

morning affirmations

I surround myself with fragrant colors.

I believe in the beauty of my dreams.

I create. I love. I forgive. I laugh. I dance. I kiss. I write. I stretch. I heal. I pray. I feel. I surrender. I play.

...hoy me visto de pétalos...

hidden meaning behind all events

"Whatever relationships you have attracted in your life at this moment, are precisely the ones you need in your life at this moment. There is a hidden meaning behind all events, and this hidden meaning is serving your own evolution.” - Deepak Chopra

full moon valentine

"It doesn't interest me what you do for a living,

I want to know what you ache for
and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me how old you are.
I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon...
I want to know if you have touched the centre of your own sorrow
if you have been opened by life’s betrayals
or have become shriveled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand at the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
“Yes.”

It doesn’t interest me
to know where you live or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.

It doesn’t interest me who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the centre of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like the company you keep
in the empty moments."

© Oriah Mountain Dreamer from the book "The Invitation"

mother nature: mama linda

- 2010 unfiltered photograph -

my son is only 18 months old
and is fascinated with Mother Mary

he calls her "Mama Mia" - "My Mother"
he calls her "Mama Linda" - "Beautiful Mother"

in this photograph, baby placed a favorite figurine in front of the window

perhaps he recognizes the sacred connection
between Mother Nature and Mother Mary...

originally posted in 2010

inhabiting dreams

- from 2007 journals, mixed media collage -

"In our lives, we are many sizes, experiencing ourselves as both large and small.  Often a change for the better can cause us to actually feel worse.  We doubt our worthiness of the good that has come our way.  We temporarily feel small, out of our depth, off-center.  Our dreams are coming true and we do not feel large enough to inhabit them.  We shrink back in the face of the life we have created.  In such times of self-diminishment, I remind myself:

I am the flower of God.  My life blossoms through God.  The good which comes to me is God's business, not my own.  When I allow my life to open and bloom, I am allowing God to find expression in the world."

- J. Cameron

freedom

"I have no fear of losing you, for you aren't an object of my property, or anyone else's. I love you as you are, without attachment, without fears, without conditions, without egoism, trying not to absorb you. I love you freely because I love your freedom, as well as mine." 

- Anthony de Mello

path to serenity

"Do your work, then step back. The only path to serenity." - Lao-Tzu

doing the work seems to be the easy part...stepping back can be a challenge...

my secret vice

"Solitude, says the moon shell.  Every person, especially every woman, should be alone sometime during the year, some part of each week, and each day.  How revolutionary that sounds and how impossible of attainment...As far as the search for solitude is concerned, we live in a negative atmosphere as invisible, as all-pervasive, and as enervating as high humidity on an August afternoon.  The world today does not understand, in either man or woman, the need to be alone.

How inexplicable it seems.  Anything else will be accepted as a better excuse.  If one sets aside time for a business appointment, a trip to the hairdresser, a social engagement, or a shopping expedition, that time is accepted as inviolable.  But if one says:  I cannot come because that is my hour to be alone, one is considered rude, egotistical or strange.  What a commentary on our civilization, when being alone is considered suspect; when one has to apologize for it, make excuses, hide the fact that one practices it - like a secret vice!

Actually these are among the most important times in one's life - when one is alone.

Certain springs are tapped only when we are alone.  The artist knows she must be alone to create; the writer, to work out her thoughts; the musician, to compose; the saint, to pray.  But women need solitude in order to find again the true essence of themselves: that firm strand which will be the indispensable center of a whole web of human relationships.  She must find that inner stillness which Charles Morgan describes as "the stilling of the soul within the activities of the mind and body so that it might be still as the axis of a revolving wheel is still."

This beautiful image is to my mind the one that women could hold before their eyes.  This is an end toward which we could strive - to be the still axis within the revolving wheel of relationships, obligations, and activities.  Solitude alone is not the answer to this; it is only a step toward it, a mechanical aid, like the "room of one's own" demanded for women, before they could make their place in the world.  The problem is not entirely in finding the room of one's own, the time alone, difficult and necessary as this is.  The problem is more how to still the soul in the midst of its activities.  In fact, the problem is how to feed the soul."
- Anne Morrow Lindbergh

so, how will you feed your soul today?

questions



"I would like to beg you to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language.  Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them.  And the point is, to live everything.  Live the questions now.  Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."

- Rainer Maria Rilke

 

love the questions

 

live the questions

 

breath by breath...

 

 



kneel and kiss the ground

"Today, like every other day, we wake up empty and frightened. Don't open the door to the study and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument. Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground." - my beloved RUMI

how will you kneel and kiss the ground today?

satisfied

- mixed media on paper -

"Open your eyes, look within.
Are you satisfied with the life you're living?"
- Bob Marley

Happy Birthday Bob...

una mama leona

I am a lioness, fiercely protective of those I love.  With time I have become more and more intuitive. I pick up subtle energies and thoughts. I often seem to know things before they happen. 

Today after my early morning meditation, I received these words of wisdom from Louise L.Hay: 

"I allow others to be themselves. I cannot force others to change. I can offer them a positive mental atmosphere where they have the possibility to change if they wish, but I cannot do it for or to other people. Each person is here to work out his or her own lessons, and if I fix it for them, then they will just go and do it again, because they have not worked out what they needed to do for themselves. All I can do is love them, allow them to be who they are, and know that the truth is always within them and that they can change at any moment they want." 

- Louise L. Hay

around your neck

"You wander from room to room, hunting for the diamond necklace that is already around your neck!" - RUMI

vibrantly alive peace

"When you know who you truly are, there is an abiding alive sense of peace. You could call it joy because that's what joy is: vibrantly alive peace. It is the joy of knowing yourself as the very life essence before life takes on form. That is the joy of Being -- of being who you truly are."

 - Eckhart Tolle

el gran romance de mis abuelos

ROMANCE is a series of mixed media on paper featuring couples whose love and passion ignited the world.  

My grandparents continue to be pillars of strength and wisdom in my life, in my world....

hambriento como un puma en la soledad

"I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair.
Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets.
Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day
I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.

I hunger for your sleek laugh,
your hands the color of a savage harvest,
hunger for the pale stones of your fingernails,
I want to eat your skin like a whole almond.

I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your lovely body,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes,

and I pace around hungry, sniffing the twilight,
hunting for you, for your hot heart,
like a puma in the barrens of Quitratúe."

- Pablo Neruda translated by Stephen Tapscott

"Tengo hambre de tu boca, de tu voz, de tu pelo
y por las calles voy sin nutrirme, callado,
no me sostiene el pan, el alba me desquicia,
busco el sonido líquido de tus pies en el día.

Estoy hambriento de tu risa resbalada,
de tus manos color de furioso granero,
tengo hambre de la pálida piedra de tus uñas,
quiero comer tu piel como una intacta almendra.

Quiero comer el rayo quemado en tu hermosura,
la nariz soberana del arrogante rostro,
quiero comer la sombra fugaz de tus pestañas

y hambriento vengo y voy olfateando el crepúsculo
buscándote, buscando tu corazón caliente
como un puma en la soledad de Quitratúe."

- Pablo Neruda