Sometimes there is so much energy rushing through me
I want to explode with color
to paint, to write, to scream, to design, to make love
something anything to express this energy flowing through me
I want to give my all
it's not something small
it's as big and tall as Donald's skyscrapers
as Davinci's code
it's as magicalas licking the back of a toad
I am an artist and I want to create
where do I start and what do I do
my days are so empty like a black canvas
I'm not even sure what to do
when I focus my mind up to the third eye
I ask for inspiration
the answer is clear
be present and it will come
it doesn't matter
just need to let go of the judgment to allow the flow uniterupted
like the pipe, let the waterflow
like the fountain let it gush out and pour forth unto all who will receive it
I am just a humble young woman
who is so much more
seeing the light shinning brightin my eyes
I am learning how to realize instead of despise
who I am
the medium I have been given is me
just let her free to be
enjoy the ecstasy of creativity and individuality
that God expresses through me
the little I am joining one day back to the sea
The night I had this dream I was sleeping alone in bed. Jo was sleeping in his mom's vacant room, on the other side of the resort. He had been in there locked up and alone, not talking for two days and at this point I didn't know what was wrong. He wasn't eating and he was angry, very angry. I didn't know if it had to do with me but I felt hurt as he wasn't speaking to me at all. We were almost a year into our relationship at this point and this felt like the worst thing that had ever happened to us.
Finally I got the courage to go knock on his door and ask him what was wrong. I felt maybe it would be best to give him space but I just couldn't stand it any longer. He let me in the door and slowly, he began to open up. He tells me he is hurt and says he is uncomfortable around me. He feels judged about his appearance, he feels bad, depressed and just plain turned off and doesn't even want to look at me. I am a little stunned but he goes on to tell me he has felt compared all his life as a boy by his mother and not accepted by his family. I am open to listening without judgment and accept what he has to say. When he is done I leave, deciding it is in fact best to give him his space to work things out. I accepted much of the blame for his feelings of insecurity although it was fairly clear at the time, that the issue was much deeper. I had compassion but maybe too much by accepting responsibility for his emotions. Finally, clarity allowed me to be removed and see the issue a bit more clearly than I usually would have.
I enter my room and look in the mirror and suddenly this huge lightness fills my being, I feel almost overjoyed. A sudden contrast from my recent and heavy interaction with Jo. "I'm pregnant", I hear the words so strongly in my mind it's almost as if someone has said it aloud. I know it and I feel it, something is different with me.
Jo suddenly enters the room in the very next moment, uses the bathroom and comes out to grab something before heading for the door. I can barely contain myself I am so excited and scared about this idea, but it's like I know. Something is different, I feel a presence with me. What else could it be?
"I think I'm pregnant", I say as he is about to leave. Bad timing. He tells me he doesn't want a child, he is not ready and is angry and upset. He goes back to his cave and stays there for another day and a half.
I set up my bug net as I nestle myself into bed for the night. I am feeling very, very lonely alone in our bed.
I am sad and confused, being in this foreign country and my closest friend, who now feels so far away.
I have no one to talk to and I can't call back home because everyone is asleep.
I finally drift off to sleep and I dream.
The Sacred Dream:
A girl and a young man are in love. They are laying together on a hillside in an old graveyard that is covered in lush grass. The couple is laying on a blanket together and acting very sweet and innocent teasing one another. The girl is pulling away joking with the boy as he tries to kiss her. Finally, she leans in as if to kiss him but at the last minute pulls away smiling. The girl is very simple and pure, she is not wearing make-up and wears very simple clothing. The boy loves her very much and their love is pure, deep and real.
Suddenly, another young woman the same age, approaches the boy and the girl. As she approaches she cannot see the young girl, concealed behind the hill. She glimpses the boy and approaches fast, recognizing him. The girl arrives, telling him she has been looking all over for him, that her family is about to leave and she has wanted to say goodbye. The boy stands up, the girl's family is waiting for her at the gate. This strange and very superficial looking girl leans in trying to embrace the boy, trying to kiss him with her red made up lips. The boy pulls back, un-wanting of the affection being directed towards him. She makes one last attempt to kiss him and when he denies her, she waves, turns and leaves.
As the boy turns to go back to his beloved, he notices a wolf standing nearby, staring at him. The wolf finally looks away and walks away silently, the boy follows. After a short distance, the wolf stops at a fence and the boy sees why. Attached to the fence is a bouquet of flowers. The wolf gives a glance and putting his furry head into the air, bites onto the dangling string that is holding the flowers to the fence. The bouquet falls to the ground in front of the boy. The wolf looks at it and walks away. The boy intuitively knows that these flowers are for his beloved. He takes them and runs to the hillside where his beloved is awaiting him. He is excited and looks forward to a sweet kiss from her. He runs to the hill but when he arrives the blanket is empty, she is gone. He calls out to her, searching and looking everywhere but he cannot find any trace of her.
Finally, he looks over to the beach which is not far and sees someone.
A little boy, two or three years old, with blond hair and blue shorts is standing there on the shore alone.
The toddler holds a little girl doll by the arm as he walks along the shore towards the park.
When he gets to the grassy park he sees a little boy doll laying on the ground. He picks it up and walks away with the two dolls, the boy doll and the girl doll, one in each arm.
The young man watching immediately understands as he is being carried away with the boy.
"We are God's dolls", he hears in his mind.
This is God and we are his dolls.
I awoke and immediately and wrote this in my journal :
We get so caught up in our own little drama but when God takes our beloved away
it's because God wants to play with them. It's his world and so we must surrender to the will
that he wants for us.
God was telling me I didn't need to be sad or worry about Jo, he was being taken care of. God has Jo in his arms and he was playing with him, working with him and healing him. I had so much peace descend on me when I awoke that night, the loud bass music from the next door club didn't even bother me. My heart was at peace and I felt overjoyed. The next day, Jo did come around. He found his peace on his own with God and so did I.
**Funny enough, our closest friends from El Nido, a Swiss couple stopped by last night. "Guess what", Diego say while trying to conceal a huge smile, "Virginie is pregnant". All I could do was look at Jo, wide eyed and smile. Turns out it was not even I who was pregnant, I simply had felt the presence of their new child and thought it was me who had conceived.
I followed my own advice today. I took the day off.
I awoke at 8:30 and decided that today it would be nice to do my sadhana out in nature.
I let Jo sleep for another half hour and then at 9 asked him if he wanted to go for a walk out to my favorite spot, a secluded beach about 20 min walk from our house.
Armed only with water bottles we made our way along the shore into the warm morning, Philippine sun.
Everything felt so sacred, walking through the small seaside village on our way with the smell of leaves and bamboo burning thick in the air. It felt like we were part of some beautiful ceremony.
As we got further and further from the rustic villages we entered the most amazing part of the walk. A densely wooded area right along the beach with huge trees that create this overhanging canopy. It looks as if fairies and spirits might live around this particular spot.
As we break through the tress, the ocean sparkles today with it's clear, turquoise blue waters. It really called me to take a dip.
When we got to my favorite spot, Jo decided he would do some stretching while I opted for a swim and a bit of alone time. I stripped down naked, bringing me such a feeling of freedom and joy especially since I knew no one passed by these parts and I was free. I was in bliss in that perfectly temperatured water, the gentle waves rolling in lifting me higher in the air. The coral beneath me soft with seaweed and almost felt like a carpet under my feet.
After my swim I sat to meditate under the trees facing the open ocean. Ah... what a treat to just be carefree and enjoy the natural beauty God has to offer. I felt an inward voice telling me that my current living situation which is in the densely populated area of town, amidst night clubs and bars was a large part of my spiritual training. I felt in that moment, high, sitting amongst this untouched nature. Realizing, I probably wouldn't be feeling this way had I not been exposed to the opposite extreme of the restless hustle and bustle of tourism, alcohol and party atmosphere.
I felt so high in meditation, like I was soaring higher and higher, I could barely bring myself back to earth after sadhana was finished. Jo and I spent the rest of the day walking, swimming, joking around, making lunch and our very own kimchi and just enjoying life. A rare treat with my workaholic mind, but hey, sometimes God calls and I am more than willing to listen. Especially when it involves a retreat into nature.
The last few days, my mind has been specially restless with the idea of posting my most deep and intimate thoughts on this blog. Today I figured out I have been writing for over ten years now, actually since grade 5 class with Mr Wood. After hearing one of short stories read aloud to the class, he encouraged me as writer and commented I had much talent. But all these years most of my writing has remained hidden amongst journals and many a printed pages scattered to the wind and the recycling depot.
I have decided, to alleviate the stress, that I'm going to write for myself. As a practice, a discipline, for fun and as a way to discover myself more and more. If it helps someone or inspires them to something within themselves, that's amazing too.
So this article will remain unedited and I will just accept myself as I am.
Sometimes I need to stop and slow it right down. It's amazing how caught up we can get just going through the day. First thing in the morning I meditate and center myself and then the day hits and it can get pretty insane sometimes. I have to force myself to consciously stop and remove myself, go for a walk, take a deep breath, and turn the computer off.
Last night I had a dream that I was in a prison with a bunch of others I knew. I can't help but think this dream has some truth to it. The prison being mostly in my mind, my thoughts of limitations, worries and constant fear of failure. It has taken me moving all the way across the world to see that my life in North America was way out balance.
It has been three months since I moved to the beautiful island of Palawan, Philippines and I feel like I am going through major detox from city life. My mind... it's crazed, constantly going and the more I meditate the worse it seems to get. Maybe it's just in the moments of stillness I experience in the time of deep meditation that magnify the voice inside my head when it comes back strong. Today during yoga I even caught the internal dialogue saying "come on yoga girl, you're supposed to be so peaceful and calm and here you are worrying away." Is this my voice? Sounds more like that of a crazed workaholic. Paramahansa Yogananda suggests a "worry fast" where you consciously tell your self not to worry for days or weeks. It works but it's the constant watching of the mind that I find harder I guess.
This idea that we always have to be busy, if not in body than in mind. My mind races with feelings of guilt and shame when I allow myself an afternoon to do something I love, like read a book or go for a swim. If this is not jail than I don't know what is and unfortunately, I am my own police.
In my dream last night, I packed my backpack and a I told my friend in jail I was getting out.
I met a man on the beach here the other day named Allen Sneidmiller from California. A retired forest fire fighter, Allen now spends most of his time travelling in Asia. He first tasted freedom when he started working three months a year with the fire fighters, made some big bucks and then spent the remaining nine months traveling the world. A lifestyle he found extremely freeing and feasible since his money went so far primarily in Malaysia and the Philippines. He said that after several years of part time working he could never go back to 9 to 5 with 2 weeks vacation. Eckart Tolle and the Power of Now is one of his major influences and it's the one item he takes with him everywhere he goes.
I took last Sunday off to take a long walk by myself to a secluded beach that I often go to when I need to be alone. I was having some major emotional issues come up and couldn't help but direct my feelings towards Johan, my partner. Sometimes there are things a woman goes through that a man just can't have any understanding about. On the beach from where I sat, I can see my house from across the bay. It took awhile but after taking a naked dip in the ocean, I could feel the heaviness washing away and I finally allowed myself to relax. Mother nature is always good for that. I felt like I had an eagle eye view of my life from where I was sitting and saw many things about myself and what I was experiencing more clearly. I realized how out of tune I had become with my own emotions and everyday experience of life, trying to suppress and tell my self that everything was alright. I wasn't spending the time to nourish and accept myself for the feelings that were being brought up yet expecting to receive this acceptance from Jo. When I didn't get that I re-affirmed to myself that my feelings weren't valid. Loving myself was what I needed in that moment, acceptance and letting myself know that what I was feeling was ok.
The biggest thing was how good it felt just to spend some time alone with me, just me and God. Try it, it's fun and I have never regretted those times I have listened to my heart and just gotten away from it all. Not only that but everything becomes a lot lighter when we acknowledge ourselves and remember that this life isn't about slugging away, it's about being at peace with ourselves and acting from that centered place in the midst of the activity. I guess this is part of Yoga after all. OMMMMMM
