Archive for the ‘Berry Family Gazette’ Category

I wrote this journal entry in 2003, right before my family’s life changed drastically.  It felt appropriate to share it here and now.

Form Follows Function

A journal entry by Licia Berry

www.liciaberry.com

8-03

Who am I?  God, please tell me.  No, I mean, who am I REALLY.  I have allowed myself to be defined by others for much of my life.  Now I need to find the truth within myself.  I need to know what I am supposed to be doing with my life.  I need to narrow it down because I have signed on for too much that doesn’t feel like the right fit!

Since I was a little kid, I saw myself living in an old white farmhouse on a quiet farm or land, growing my family’s food, home schooling my children, creating a family business, and married to my one Beloved.  Leading a simple life together as a family. We would have all that we needed because we were together.  My picture of this was so solid as a little girl.  It brought me solace when I felt how chaotic and off-balance my actual childhood home was.  This picture felt so peaceful, so heart-centered, like the priorities were straight.   It gave me comfort that someday I would create this picture.

What happened?  I left home, graduated from university with honors and became a sought-after art teacher in the Atlanta school system.  It was joyous to witness children in their process of creative discovery.  I taught for almost 5 years and loved it, but became disillusioned with “the system” and the politics involved in being what I considered to be a responsible educator.  I began the long process of recovery for incest.  My husband and I moved to Tucson, Arizona to change our lives.  There I was a teacher to developmentally disabled children and adults.  It was somewhat satisfying, but a step removed from my beloved creative process.  I had naturally ruled out teaching school because I was burned out by my experience in Atlanta.  After a couple of years, I was promoted to evaluate adult trainers of the same population I had worked with.  Another two steps removed from my early love, this time from children, and from teaching.  I became a dry expert on how to do a job well.  I couldn’t stand myself.  When I moved to Asheville I wanted to start all over again and go back to my initial vision.  My then 3 year old son and I spent delightful time together awaiting the birth of my second son.  After being in Asheville for one year, tragedy struck and I jumped into working in the non-profit sector.  How many steps removed from my heart was I now?  I’ve lost count.

I have made some strides back towards my heart-centered picture of childhood, especially since the wake-up call of 9-11.  I have a healing practice that allows me to connect with and teach others as well as work on my own healing.  I write, make art and play and compose music.  I have maintained a stubborn conviction to buy and grow organic food.  I’ve canned my crops, made candles and soap, sewn clothes, dowsed earth energies and been trained for years in my early healing interests.

I continue to be informed by my childhood picture, with compromises.  I actually do live in an old white farmhouse on a couple of acres, but it is in city limits on a busy road.  I work with my creativity in my healing practice and my writing, but apart from my family.  I grow organic vegetables and fruit, but haven’t had time lately to devote proper attention to the garden.  I send my children to the best public school in Asheville, but I still feel a gnawing in my belly when I drop them off for the day.  I love my husband dearly, but we don’t have much time or energy for each other at the end of each day.  My heart hurts.  Something is wrong.

I have wondered in the past year as I have felt a growing anxiety what was wrong with me.  I have such a blessed life!   Who am I to complain or to feel that something is missing?   As the summer began, I wondered if I was on the edge of nervous breakdown, or perhaps my midlife crisis (a little early, I hope?)  The vague sense of unease that has been growing in me for years has gotten to the point that I can’t ignore it.  I went on a 7500 miles month-long odyssey in July to the southwest and California with my children in hopes that the change of environment would give me a little perspective.  We saw many places and people and had many adventures.  SO what did the solo-pioneering mom and her two fabulous sons find out on this epic journey?   That the problem is I’m living someone else’s life.

Whose life am I living?  Ask the media.  There is an assumption made on the part of the media/corporate machine that we will trust what is being told to us.  We are fed images and messages of what the perfect family, mother, child, and parent looks like many times a day.  We must be involved in our child’s school to positively affect their learning, we must take our child to a multitude of life enriching classes and activities per week, we must make quality time for our children (in between all those afternoon classes).  We must have a pet, music lessons, and devote time to homework each night.  As a mother, I must be fully available for my children, yet seek time for my own inner balance.  Yoga classes, smoothies, a low-carb diet, and facials will help me regain my inner peace.  But I am also to be fulfilled in my work, fully attentive to my husband and home, keep a cheery attitude and look great while doing it ALL.   How am I supposed to balance all that needs to be balanced?  I think it feels impossible because it is.  I have to make some decisions about what is most important.

If it is true that I am the architect of my life, then where did my design go wrong?  Why the hell did I build this hectic life I’m living?  How often have I said “yes” to something that was not really in the interest of my highest good?  How often have I just gone along with something because other folks wanted me to?  Because I didn’t want to create an inconvenience?  Because I wanted to please others?  How often I have ignored my own inner guidance because it is too risky, too much work to change circumstances, or someone might be unhappy with me?  When it comes to hearing the quiet, wise voice of my inner wisdom when presented with a choice, what’s the difference between “yeah, okay” and “YES, I must ABSOLUTELY do this!”

Sometimes I think I am going crazy; I feel a tension inside as the gulf is widening between the part that I am playing and my inner Self who wants something else from me. Why am I so attached to this part?  Perhaps because there are consequences for relinquishing it.  I was guided last year to step out of my role as PTO President at my children’s school; that in fact it was costing me spiritually.  But did I do it?  Nope, all I could think about was how unhappy folks would be with me if I quit.  I sensed that this guidance was accurate, and felt how miserable I was playing the role, but that wasn’t enough to change my mind.  I would be seen as a quitter; I would make people mad at me; I would be letting folks down.  When I see this, it makes me think that a 3 year old is making these decisions in my life.  An actualized, empowered adult would not worry much about disapproval from others if she were making a decision that felt right to her.  Am I mothering my inner 3 year old?

On a macro scale, we are coming into the Aquarian era.  With this shift, there is huge transformation in the way we fundamentally think about and do things.  It seems that culturally and politically, more and more people are feeling inner stirrings that things just aren’t right as they are.

Am I on the edge of this?  Am I feeling what many others are feeling right now?  We are taught that family and school looks like this, we are trying desperately maintain these dinosaur ways of being, and they don’t work.  We are trying to patch what really needs to be replaced.  Divorce, stress, major life unhappiness happens because folks are so anxious….we feel that something is wrong, but society doesn’t support us changing.

If I decide to follow the soft pointing-of-the-way that my guidance provides, how do I let go of the things I am attached to?  How much will I need to release to change my life?  Is the structure of my life congruent with the architecture principle of “form follows function?”  How might I restructure my life to that it follows my higher function?  For that matter, what is my higher function?  Might I get a clue from the secret whisperings of my heart?  My intention is to find out what my best use is on this planet right now…here it comes…..wait, I can ask the question, but am I really ready for the answer?

My experience tells me that sometimes I must let go of what seems so important so that I can open to the free flow of life energy that will carry me to where I need to go.  May the Highest Good be Served.

Adventuress, by Licia Berry 2006

However, there is an even larger cycle in our lives that has become apparent.  Peter shared with me a few days ago his realization that we have come to the end of a 21 year cycle, 3 seven-year chapters, which began when I made the choice to wake up from my slumber and go into recovery work to heal.  This choice changed life utterly for many people.

It was in 1988 when I was 23 years old and Peter and I were about to be married that we were living with his parents at their property in Suwannee GA.  At that time, I became very depressed and wondered why.  It turns out that being in the immersion of Peter’s family invited my old family dynamics to come forward within me.  (Folks that read my writing know that I am an abuse survivor, sexual, emotional, and physical primarily.)  I made a choice to enter therapy to discover why I did not want to be on the earth any longer.  It was a hard decision to confront my beliefs about myself and my biological family at that time, and to turn them upside down and look them over critically to see if they were indeed true.  I’m grateful that I had the strength and insight to choose this path many years before I had my own children.  The desire to break the cycles of abuse and to NOT pass on the illness that was passed on to me was a primary motivator.  However, in the end, it was a decision to honor myself, no matter what hell may come as a result.

Hell did come…when I confronted my father by certified mail, he did not respond at all; nine years later, I called him to have a truth-telling at the top of the mountain because I realized I was stronger and more courageous than he was.  He couldn’t hurt me any more.  When I told my mother, she slurred her words in her usual drunken stupor, and accused me of ”always being warped”, despite my reputation for having the best memory in the family.  After that lesson, I chose not to speak with her unless it was in the early part of the day before she started drinking.  My sister hoped it was “all a misunderstanding”, and shared with my brother the hope that our family could reunite and be happy together despite the years of affairs, drunkenness, unhappiness and divorce, the definition of sheer insanity to me.  It was a rough time for me, the lone truth-teller.  I have been blamed, called names, been seen as “making conflict for conflict’s sake”, and otherwise rejected.  Subject to the projections of my biological family, I had no one except my helping professionals and my beloved husband to feel truly safe with.

Over these 21 years of reclaiming my life, my mind, my body, my spirit and my center, I have gotten clearer and clearer that I am not to blame.  The mantles of shame and projection have become more obvious as others’ issues rather than mine.  I have been less willing to take them on, less willing to carry the burden of other people’s unconsciousness.  The more I have reclaimed myself, the stronger my voice has become, and the more I have attracted others, women in particular, who share or find strength and solace in my story.  It is one of the obvious tenets of an abusive family to keep the secrets….to not tell, to not share the story, to keep it under wraps of darkness.  But the only way the cycle can stop is if we talk about it, regardless of the threats or entreaties to cease.  No, mom, I won’t be quiet….I won’t stop talking.

There is goodness in this…some sweetness after all the years of pain to hear another woman say “Thank you for telling your story, because it gave me permission to tell mine.”  Whatever wisdom I offer has been hard won.

Now, something has happened in these last months within me…some immense shift of knowing, an awareness of my strength, a vision of a light within me like a beacon….it is getting stronger, and I feel I am finally beginning to become what I was meant to become.  What I offer to the world, what I am meant to express, how I am to walk in a way that is in integrity with my soul and spirit…it is coming forward at an ever faster pace.  After all the years in the mud and darkness of putting my pieces back together, suddenly it is time to be Whole.  The process has been nothing short of remarkable, and is speeding up each day, it seems.  It appears to be coinciding with our departure of our quiet sanctuary into a larger world, as well as the outer world’s intense changes as if there is a larger knowing coming to fruition as well.  The work that our family has done these 11 years will be needed in the world.  And the work I have done these last 21 years will also be needed in the world.  When we arrive in Tallahassee, I have a sense that we will need to hit the ground running.

(As a result, I will be creating a new blog attached to my professional website.  My professional writing website as well as services for clients will also be evolving.  Keep an eye out…my sabbatical is over!)

The pendulum has swung…the years of intense devotion to our inner life have been rich and fed our souls; we have drunk at the wellspring of our spirits and been filled to the brim with goodness and wisdom.  New outer life, new expressions, new invitations, new opportunities.  Now it is time to balance the years of inward motion with expression in the outer world, to take what we have learned and live our lives. 

When my beloved family of four began our traveling and inner search for our “family heart” in 2003, I thought it was something new for us.  We had certainly never done anything like what we did before…leaving behind all of society and its demands and obligations, a completely selfish and enclosed journey into our own processes, and permission to allow that to unfold on its own time, despite pressures from the outside world to interrupt or end it.  It was a remarkable period of years, to be sure. 

Lately as the old world seems to be falling apart and our own family has been going through intense inner change, I have been reflecting on the cycles that nature brings as well as the more subtle energetic cycles that seem to be universal indications of a larger order. 

I see now how these last few years while my family tried to make Del Norte, Colorado our home were a time of “landing” after being mobile for a few years, of integration into the outer world after being so internal during our RV trip.  It was a perfect place to land, a perfect place to slowly make our way outward from that inner chamber of our family and individual hearts.  It has been quiet, a blissful sanctuary of nature, and a testing ground for trusting our inner guidance, something we worked keenly toward during our family journey. 

Now that we are leaving our beloved San Luis Valley, with its high windswept plains and 14,000 ft. rocky peaks, we are aware that this kind of quiet is not something that we will find in many places.  We are sad to leave behind our sweet 40 acre homestead that we have put so much work into.  We are aware that this place has provided a womb of sorts for our further evolution and expansion into the rest of our lives.

We leave for our new life (and it does feel that way, brand spanking new, almost can see the shiny packaging and big red bow around it!) around the full moon of August, a great time to come to fullness and completion with a phase in one’s life and to honor all that has been.  The timing just happened to work out that way, and I shouldn’t be surprised.  The more I have intended to align with the natural cycles of earth and the universe, the more in tandem my actions have been and the more supported I am by that larger energy wave.

I was reflecting on these years of change, thinking that our family was coming to the end of a 6 year cycle since we left Asheville for the Big Trip when I was corrected by my angelic friends.  They told me that we were actually coming to the end of an 11 year cycle.  Really?  I thought about this, counting backwards from 2009 to 1998, and realized that this was true. 

It was in 1998 that Peter and I had construct shattering experiences in our lives that cracked us open to our larger Selves, what some would call spiritual awareness.  It was that year that we bought our “dream house”, Pete was subsequently released from his position with a mortgage company, and I met my first true spiritual teacher.  It was a year in which we jumped on the fast moving treadmill of spiritual growth.

Ah, now the 11 year cycle comment makes sense.  If I were to reflect on the last 11 years of my life and of my family’s life, we have clearly been on the fast track to our Authentic Selves.  As if a great horn sounded, we were called by our souls to line up, and the universe came together in quick order to support us in so many remarkable experiences and learnings.  It boggles the mind. 

I have heard others talk about 7 year cycles in their lives….perhaps that is true.  But I was reminded by my angelic friends not to make too much of the number eleven, or any number for that matter…what is more pertinent is the essence of this sea change.  What has been accomplished over these 11 years is nothing short of a brand new life.       

Well, more changes to report in the never-ending stream of it our family has seen in the past year!

Since the ankle break forcibly sat me down, I have become a person who is more still and who is becoming more quiet.  I learned LOTS of amazing things during the whole ankle incident (and am still learning, although it seems the insights are slowing down a bit to a steady, manageable flow rather than a torrent).  But what is interesting to me right now is the change that has happened in my family as a result of me not taking energetic center stage.

Each of my fellow Berrys-in-the-patch is stepping up in a new way into their own power.  They all got to see how much I do and how much I manage (read: control) in our lives, even subconsciously.  This shifting of power has been a positive change for all of us.  The burden for me of carrying such a load has been too much, and I have paid the price in some ways in my own creative life.  Peter has stepped up in new ways as a man and caretaker of his family, and that is a miracle and a delight to witness and be part of.  And my two boys are stepping into their own power and knowing, as well.

Part of the miracle of this change is that my family of peacemakers (read: people who don’t always speak up about what they want in the name of not making waves) is now being more real about their feelings.  Honesty has always been a core value for me, but sometimes I don’t say what I feel for fear of creating conflict, getting hurt, or fearing I won’t be believed anyway.  I also bought in to that crazy “spiritual” myth that if I am an evolved person, I should not feel angry, sad, frustrated, miffed or otherwise less than blissful, and that if I did, that meant there was something wrong with ME, not that a boundary had been crossed that was my job to defend…that’s another story for later. 

My family is like this, too, but fortunately are relearning this pattern.  In the name of this occurring, my Beloved husband shared a deep truth that he had been withholding for fear of the very things I’ve mentioned above.  It all happened one Friday when he got home from a brutal work week (he is working extra hard in his business to make our income and having a rough go in this economy); he was just exhausted and beaten.  We had been trying to figure out how we were going to manifest a move to California with the financial difficulties we are having, as well as California going through a really crazy time right now.  I offered to massage his neck and shoulders, where he holds tension.  As I worked on him, he softened under my touch, and then, out f the blue, he said in a small voice, “If it were just me, I would live on the gulf coast.” 

Something opened up in the energy field between us…and I felt a sensation of being “breathed” (channeling sometimes feels this way), and heard come out of MY mouth, “If you deal with your issues about X, I will follow you to TALLAHASSEE.”  As soon as I said it, my eyes got big, and Peter turned around, and his eyes were big, too.  We looked at each other and felt our energy expanding from the inside and getting bigger.  It felt GOOD. 

We sat with this, talking amongst the two of us for weeks, not wanting to say anything to the kids (or anyone else) due to the number of times we have changed course with this whole moving thing.  We finally felt sure enough that we were on to something because of how genuinely good we felt, and we told the kids,  To our great surprise, they were ecstatic, and shared that they had wanted to go to Florida to live, but thought we would never go there again.  Ah.  The truth finally outs.   

So, we went for two weeks, staying at no cost in a friend’s house.  We fell in love with Tally; it has all the things we are looking for in a place to live, is even better for us as a family than the lovely central coast of California, is half the cost to live…the list goes on.  We plan to move in August in time to get the kids in school.

No, we haven’t sold either of our properties in Colorado yet (see here to check them out  http://www.berrytrip.us/Sanctuary.htm and http://www.670grande.com/)

No, it is not logical, especially at this time of old systems break-down, to move across the country and take on more expense.  But it is a mental health issue at this point.  As much as we have loved the land and some of the people where we have lived the last three years, we MUST move on.  There is no other option. 

So, I ask for your prayers and cheers and encouragement….at the hardest and most uncertain of times, we are choosing to do what is right for our family regardless of what it looks like to others (this is getting to be a familiar pattern!)  We are running into the arms of a new life, new community, new soul family, and a new opportunity for goodness in our lives. 

 “He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.”   Friedrich Nietzsche  

Like most babies, I learned how to walk the first time by the age of 11 months.  I crawled successfully at 8 months (seems a little late, but I’ve always been on my own timing), pulled up to standing at 8 ½ months, then the world was my oyster before one year old.

I say that I learned to walk the first time by 11 months because I am learning to walk a second time at the age of 44 years.  Yep, you read right; after 44 years on this earth, this girl is learning how to walk again.

Due to a violent and (pretty gross) compound fracture and severe dislocation of my right ankle in February, I experienced surgery, metal plates and screws, and 8 weeks of weightlessness; for me, a new meaning to the word “stillness”, and the sudden and complete absence of forward motion in my life.

Well, not entirely; the movement that I have been experiencing since my injury has been on the inside, and lots of it.  What I’m noticing is that the movement on the outer world can sometimes be a distraction from the movement in the inner world.  I discovered that I sometimes used physical movement to help me run from feelings that I didn’t want to feel.  Feeling powerless or afraid?  Go for a run or a bike ride.  Feeling angry?  Go clean something.  Feeling anything uncomfortable?  Go MOVE, do anything, but don’t sit still or else it might catch up with me.

I’m exaggerating a bit here; for the last 10 years, I have been working consciously on myself to wake up, and much of that has been about getting more still and paying attention to my feelings.  In my house, I am the one who is most vocal about her feelings, and the one who is most actively reflecting on what I am feeling.  But I live with three guys (one husband and two sons) and a cat.  Well, okay….maybe the cat wins the most vocal about how she feels award…

But all the work I’ve done had taken me only so far; then my ankle met with a series of metal stairs on a rainy day in California, and my knowing of being still so I could feel my feelings got a whole lot deeper.  That’s how it works in process, doesn’t it?  We go so far with something, then find stasis and equilibrium, then a new expansion experience is introduced and we get to grow again (oh goody!)

I am happy to say that I chose to go for it with this experience; I know that when things happen, there is the opportunity to relate to it as a victim or as a choice maker.  I wanted to harvest all of the AHAs and lessons and insights that I could from this experience.  I sure never want it to happen again!  And I haven’t been disappointed; the amazing healing and awarenesses have been profound and bountiful during my weeks of convalescence.  I can look back on it with just a little perspective now, and it feels like a precious gift to be allowed to be so vulnerable. 

I was given the okay to bear weight on April 27, “letting pain be my guide”.  I took off my “Darth Boot” (my affectionate name for my big, black, kick-ass removable cast) and started learning to walk with the aid of my crutches.  Within a couple of days, I noticed that I started to forget where I left them; that’s a good sign!  By the end of that week, I was hobbling around without any help from my rickety metal friends.

But the hobbling is a little troublesome; I look like Frankenstein, arms flailing out in my attempt to keep balance.  All that’s missing is the metal bolts in my neck and the mantra, “FIRE BAD!”  The scars are not pretty, my ankle gets swollen quickly when I am up on it, and it does hurt a bit when I come down on it.  But it’s a good pain, or so I think.  It is the pain of learning to use something in a new way.

Amongst my reflections and ruminations during this time of forced stillness, I have wondered if I was walking in a way that was not good for me.  Maybe not the physical way I walked, but from a symbolic standpoint, where was I leading myself?  How was I getting there?  Was I being forceful or was I being discerning?  Was I afraid of moving forward, or was I walking in balance and ease? 

And now that I have the opportunity to walk again, I also have the opportunity to learn to walk in a different way, perhaps a way that serves me and the world community better.  How do I want to walk in this world?  Confidently, in balance, knowing that I am supported…at ease in my own power, looking forward to my future, knowing I am part of this world and that I have something to offer…with grace, strength, discernment, wisdom, and love. 

I can’t help but reflect on what it must have been like to learn to walk the first time; I can’t remember, although I wish I could.  What would it feel like to feel the inner impulse to move, to get up on one’s feet and take a first step forward?  What kind of innate trust is there in all children as they fly through their developmental stages?  What kind of crazy motor drives the impulse to get off your knees and start walking?!  How amazing is it that we go from being born helpless to moving around at light speed in under a year’s time?  I seriously doubt that we could handle that kind of rapid growth as adults…if I picture me trying to assimilate so many changes in one year as a new baby does, I think I would explode!

I say this because I am a grown woman, in her mid forties, and I have learned to be afraid.  Life has taught me about people and things and events that hurt, and that I must be protective and watchful and wary, lest something bad happen to me.  Even when I am all of those things, sometimes bad things still happen.  That innate trust we are born with can slowly erode over time, to the point that it seems quite unbelievable we ever possessed this gift.

However, I am hopeful.  When I put my injured foot to the floor, I am in essence saying, “I trust that this leg will hold me up”.  When I choose to engage my body with the earth by walking, I am saying I WANT to trust again.  I WANT to be part of the earth walk again, I WANT to move and run and dance and play.   

As I learn to put my foot down and do the careful dance of rolling my heel and pushing off with my toes, I wonder what kind of a little girl I was when I took that first step.  Was it a joyful and exciting adventure?  Was it a feeling of complete trust and knowing that I was supported?  Can I harness that level of trust again as I learn to walk this time?  I pray that I can.   

view from our front porch looking towards South Fork CO, early spring

We are back in Colorado after our almost 6 month journey to find our new location; we have been here for a couple of weeks, getting settled in and focusing on healing.  In a little while, we will start packing up and making our arrangements to get back to California.

Snow Beauty

But in the mean time, we really want to enjoy the rugged and pristine beauty of the San Luis Valley here in south-central Colorado.  It is a little known gem that has yet to be discovered by the mainstream for its amazing resources.  Skiing at Wolf Creek Resort is 45 minutes away.  We have sunshine over 300 days a year.  There is organic farming and ranching, and a thriving arts community.  There is clean, artesian water and pure air to breathe.  Alternative energy abounds in solar and wind farms.  There are very forward thinking, super cool people here.  In fact, one of the world’s most revered spiritual places is here in our majestic valley in Crestone.  

Emergence Place

What I fell for when we first got here three years ago was the vast open space, the immense sky, and the stunning beauty of the mountains that ring the valley.  When you look at a map, the San Luis Valley literally looks like God made a thumbprint on the southern edge of Colorado, hugging its southern neighbor of New Mexico.  The valley floor averages at 8000 feet in elevation, but the peaks that protect the valley all around go up to 14,000 ft.  They remain snow covered until the depth of summer.

The Indians that lived in this valley for generations called it a holy land; the San Luis Lakes were considered to be the emergence place, or the center of the universe, and Mount Blanca was the home of the Thunder Beings, perhaps a nod to the many UFO sightings this mysterious valley boasts.

Crazy Colorado Skies

Many people have second homes here; summer is an ideal time to get away from the hot cities, as here it only gets up to a mild 80 degrees.  With property as inexpensive as it is here, it is easy to get a nice spread to have as a second home or one to retire to.  Hunters and fishermen flock to the valley for the outstanding wildlife opportunities and the mighty Rio Grande, whose sparkling headwaters are 30 minutes from my house.  Others love to come up in the winter to access the excellent skiing.  We cut our own Christmas tree from up the road in the national forest, where we hike in the summer to load up on geodes and crystals. If you love the outdoors, this is definitely a place to come experience.

Exquisite Summer

The San Luis Valley will always hold a special place in my heart.

To Carry-to take, to bear, to hold, to bring, to lug, to transmit, to transport, to convey, to transfer, to move, to pass on, to conduct, to relay, to contain, to include, to involve, to store, to supply, to keep (from the English Thesaurus)

As a result of my injury, my sweet family is feeling some pretty big adjustments.  The tasks that I usually have done in daily life towards maintenance of our family and our home are now meted out amongst the remaining three family members that can walk and carry things at the same time!

I am halfway through my 8 weeks of no-weight-bearing, and get around quite well on crutches, holding the right ankle above the ground and depending on my left to move me forward.  I have gotten good at being Hop Along Cassidy out of necessity!  But when you are holding yourself up with crutches and have a somewhat unstable balancing act going on, it isn’t possible to carry anything in your hands.  Having that possibility now removed, I never realized how much carrying I was doing!    

This has inspired in me a desire to examine the concept of carrying.

All moms know about carrying….we carry our babies in our bodies and in our arms and on our hips….we carry the food from the fridge to the sink and to the stove, we carry the groceries from the store to the checkout line to the car to the kitchen,….we carry our kids to school and carry their coats, their homework, their lunches…we carry our laundry to and from the washroom and then carry folded piles to the dresser drawers….we carry information from one place to another…we carry the intention of well-being for our families and our communities and our earth….we carry the well-being of our loved ones in our hearts, and we (sometimes to our detriment) carry the burdens of others simply because we care about them. 

I know that in my experience of being a woman and a mother that I see the feminine as a vessel, and that vessels are great for carrying and holding things.  Think in terms of the clay pots hand crafted by our ancient women ancestors, in a search for something to hold water and to cook in.  Think in terms of the female body’s amazing capacity to grow and nurture and carry a child within the vessel of the womb, and our arms as a vessel to cradle the baby while nursing and to rock the child to sleep.  I think in terms of the universe as a giant womb in which All Creation is held and carried.  Nothing can exist unless there is a space in which to exist, right?

I’m not suggesting that the masculine does not carry its share of things; of course it does.  This exploration is not a discourse on women or men being “better” than the other, or an argument about the roles that each should play; that seems ridiculous and a waste of time to me. 

But the concept and experience of carrying itself seems to me to originate in a feminine principle of being a holder of space, a vessel within which creation can occur.  Is this why the female of species have tended to be the carriers of home, hearth and procreation since the beginning of physical life on this planet?

I consider myself to be a feminist to the degree that I believe in equal opportunity for all regardless of gender.  If a woman wants in her heart to go for it and succeed in business and career, I say it is a free will universe and she has every right to do that.  Certainly, I feel there should not be any human-made constraints to limit her in her desire.  I am a strong woman myself, and in my early years achieved a 5 year university degree and went into the professional realm because I wanted to work and make my mark on the world. 

But as I became a mother, my sense of self has changed (and continues to!)  I saw that it wasn’t possible for there to be equal opportunity for my husband to carry our babies, nor to breastfeed them once they were born.  It was my unique role to do that due to my design.  It was his unique role to provide for us, to keep us safe and protected with a house and healthy food to eat so that I could tend to the raising of our children.  Home and hearth suddenly became very important to me.  I found myself gardening organically, canning vegetables, learning to make candles and soap, learning herbs and homeopathy and other non-invasive health modalities, learning how to heal with my hands, learning how to listen to the subtle guidance of my inner wise voice.  Having children cracked my heart open and my spirit came pouring out, looking to make up for lost time.  I began the journey to own myself as a woman and therefore an embodiment of the Sacred Feminine.

Perhaps one of the backlashes of the feminist movement is that some of us have felt we owed our allegiance to those amazing and courageous women who first stood up and said “Enough!” to being treated as second class citizens or even property at the hands of men.  I certainly respect and admire them, and know that their brave work has benefitted me and other women in the world.  I also honor that their inner journey led them to do the work they felt was right to do. 

However, in this physical world, for every action there is a reaction.  There has been a consequence for some of us.  For me, it was my belief that I should be out there conquering the world in business and making my power felt on men’s terms.  Who am I to not follow up on my fore-sisters work and pave the way for women to become “more” in this world?  Wouldn’t I be betraying them if I did not succeed in my professional life and have all of the benefits of making it in a man’s reality?  For me, the consequence of being a child of the feminist movement has been a confusing of who I really am and who I thought I should be. 

To this day I struggle with this inner part of me that pushes me to do, to make money, to have credibility, to gain notoriety, to be recognized as powerful in the man’s world. What is coming ever forward is the acknowledgment and acceptance of my role as a woman, a vessel, a carrier of the subtle mysteries of life.  I want to succeed in the woman’s world.  I want to nurture and create and hold space for my ever-unfolding.  I want to carry and nurture and hold space for the creation and unfolding of my beautiful sons, who will be a serious catch for some special women in this world once they are ready to be set free from my arms!  My true, authentic expression in this consensual reality right now is to BE the feminine.  It is a constant process of coming into greater balance within me.  I choose to give myself permission to BE this that I truly am.

My examination of my slow and steady reclaiming of my Sacred Feminine self as vessel and carrier for creation has been a constant meditation and realization since I broke my right (masculine) ankle.  My masculine side has been put to pasture for awhile, while my (left) feminine side has had to step forward, to be the one who leads.  How beautiful that my earthly body is being used as a metaphor for this balancing act, as I put my left, feminine foot forward in order to move through my day! 

The insights I am receiving are jaw-dropping, at least to me!  For 15 years, I have been reclaiming my Divine Feminine/Great Mother self, letting her move forward and through me, embodying me, letting her work be done in the world.  It is an evolving process, and one that inspires me to watch, to observe, to record the journey, and to be ever thankful for the mysterious and beautiful way that life continues to unfold.

I was realizing that I have not written a straight family-whereabouts-update in ages, so for those of you who might be a little weary of my philosophizing, this is for you!

We are in Pismo Beach, California and enjoying the most spectacular warm, sunny days and cool nights right on the Pacific Ocean.  We moved down here on January 18, and will stay until February 6th.  The park we are staying in is a mega-resort-thingie….usually not very appealing to us back-to-nature types!  But we have had uninterrupted internet service, laundry right on site, a place I can spread out and do DDR (hard to dance like a maniac in the RV), and a place to ride our bikes for hours on end…the waterline on the beach.  We have had the BEST time here. 

It has been a nice break from the intensity of the inner work we were doing at the campground in San Luis Obispo.  I find that SLO has an energy of healing, which means to ME that it helps to bring up, in the most loving way, those energies within that are outdated and ready to heal.  Sometimes this feels very good and welcoming (in fact, that is how we have felt about SLO most of the time!)  Other times, it can be intense and a little trying.  Asheville NC was that way for us, but we are much more conscious now, so we are not experiencing the whumps-on-the-head that we did in our 7 years there. 

Coming down to Pismo has been literally that…it has felt like coming down into an easier vibration, one in which we can relax and assimilate all of the inner changes we have been making. 

SO, what’s the plan?  Well, here we are in the most fabulous winter I think I have ever experienced, enjoying the heck out of it.   We feel we have found paradise, and we have no desire to go elsewhere.  The Central Coast is a gem and definitely the right place for us.  

But we have these properties in Colorado that we need to sell, which are located in a spectacular remote region most people have never even heard of.  Colorado’s real estate market is doing pretty well, but in the San Luis Valley of Colorado, you have to WANT to live there.  We believe someone very special will feel called to own our homestead in the largest alpine valley in the world.  Here is a link to our house if you’d like to have a look: http://www.berrytrip.us/Sanctuary.htm.  Until we sell THERE, we can’t become permanent residents HERE. 

So we are kind of floating in a grounded way.  Sounds funny, I know! 

We are being welcomed into the community here, we are doing our homeschooling and working and living our lives, but doing it an RV in parks surrounded by people that are on vacation or retired, full-timing.  We want so much to be in a house and get the kids in school and SETTLE IN.  But it is not time yet.

We are developing a “PLAN A”.  PLAN A says that we will remain in the RV, bouncing around the RV parks in the SLO area until the end of March, at which point we will put the RV in storage and go back to Colorado to pack up our belongings.  We will plan to be there for four weeks.  The snow should be fairly gone by then; it will still be pretty chilly compared to coastal California, but we can buck up for a month.  We will pack up a moving truck and bring our belongings to California, where we will rent a house May 1st.  At that point we will become residents enough that we will feel part of things and can get the kids in school.

It is not ideal, for sure…I would rather not have to move twice; for once our properties sell in Colorado, we will want to buy a house here.  But I suspect a larger logic; perhaps it is a timing issue.  California is going through a very difficult time economically (except for little pockets such as San Luis Obispo, for some reason that I could pontificate about for many hours).  Perhaps it is not good to be tied to the state in a more permanent way just yet. 

And so we will remain as grounded as we can, as much a part of the community as we can, while we also remain stretched and flexbile.  Fortunately, we learned on our 2-year journey that our groundedness is in our own Beingness and in our family.  We have been practicing this ever since, the way the Buddhists practice meditation.  This seems to be something that we have become good at as a family, as we have been called to do it many times now.  Perhaps it is a skill that will serve us well in the future.

Wendy and Ruby 2008

Well, my last biological grandparent has left this earth and become one with the All That Is.  I wish she had realized that while she was living!  Ruby died this morning around 3:00 a.m. mountain time in Tucson. 

It was not an easy death…my Aunt Wendy has willingly bourne the brunt of caring for Ruby in her last months, so she got to watch, up close and personal, as Ruby struggled to let go.  

It was back in August that I got the first call that Ruby was “on her way out”.  Her heart had stopped, but then restarted.  Everyone flocked to Tucson to see her and to say goodbye.  Much ado was made.  But Ruby had other plans.

I would receive 5 calls in the next 6 months, all saying the same thing….”It looks like she is heading out.”  But Ruby, an actress right to the end, could not resist another curtain call. 

Truly, though, what Ruby wrestled with was her fear of letting go and moving forward, as is the case with so many humans, in death and in life.  It is a hard, hard thing to watch.

In this time of crashing and burning for so many of us on the planet, we have a choice of whether or not to let fear rule us.  Just like Ruby did.  There are times when our spine is tested and it is good to stand against what touches us.  But there are times when we are facing a tsunami and we simply cannot hang on.  Do we face the inevitable with dignity and choose to cooperate with it, or do we succomb to fear and resist change, clinging to what cannot be sustained any longer?

Sometimes it is the right course of action to SURRENDER.

Some things got confirmed for me as I witnessed this struggle:

• Life flows much better if you don’t resist
• The same is true of death
• It is good to get your earthly life in order before you are making your exit
• It is good to live your life AWAKE and fully present, not in FEAR and in a triggered place of the past
• Drama does not do anyone any good, except in the case of entertainment 
• In facing death (as in facing challenges), we are revealed for our truest essence
• Ruby is exactly who I perceived her to be in my wisest moments

I am grateful for seeing her twice before she died; in these last months, she seemed to get clearer and clearer.  She said kind things to me that she did not ever say before; I felt that she saw me for the first time in my life.  What a gift for me to feel her acknowledging eyes upon me, and to hear her say she now understood some things.

I assisted in the ways that I know how; praying that she release her fear, asking for the angelic spectrum to assist her passage, and yesterday, doing polarity work to ground her in her body so she would know that the earth would take care of it for her. 

I pray for my sweet Aunt Wendy that she easily release the emotional energy that she has not allowed herself to express that has built up over these months.  I pray that the trauma of watching someone struggle in terrible fear will be a wise learning and a healing.  I pray that she will take care of herself now, and selfishly.  I pray she does not allow this to cost her too much in her life.  And I pray for her to now get some rest. 

I pray that my death is graceful and in integrity with my heart and soul, and that I continue to make peace with myself and my life so that I leave feeling clean.  I strive to live a good life; perhaps I can hope for a ”good death”. 

The family and I watched the inauguration with excitement this morning. 8:30 a.m. on the Pacific coast.  Jess said as we woke him up, “It feels like Christmas!”  I had to agree…the anticipation and exhilaration of this day feels like all goodness to me.

Hearing Obama speak has been such a learning experience for me; I am aware now that I am a serious patriot of the original intent of our country.  I have always known this to be true to some degree, but have a fuller awareness of this now. 

Perhaps my earliest recall of doing anything remotely political in nature is sitting in my grandparents’ living room in Charlotte at the age of 7 with my Aunt Wendy, who played the Fifth Dimension’s 1970 Medley: The Declaration / A Change Is Gonna Come-People Gotta Be Free, a song that puts a section of the U.S. Constitution to melody.  She played it over and over again until I memorized it and was able to sing along without looking at the words.  It instilled in me a deep and passionate understanding of those words that have continued to inspire me to this day.  Thank you, Wendy!

As a fifth grader, my class embarked on a field trip to a fort on the coast Wilmington, NC; there as we toured the swamp beyond the fort, I had a spontaneous experience of being a soldier, dying on the ground in my Revolutionary War uniform.  The feeling I had along with this surprising vision was one of pride, sadness, confusion, and being willing to die for what was right in my heart.   That was the same year I developed a sudden interest in the presidential race and campaigned heartily for Jimmy Carter, even growing peanuts in a little terracotta pot on the kitchen windowsill as a show of support. 

When I was in seventh grade, I won an award for an essay that I wrote on “Why I am Proud to be an American”.  The writing was informed by an idealistic child’s understanding, but it came from a genuine and pure love of the ideals this country was founded upon.  I remember flushing with pleasure when my seventh grade social studies class jumped to their feet in standing ovation when I read it aloud.  Apparently I’d struck a nerve. 

As an adult, my idealism has been worn down into a feeling of being jaded; my observation is that most Americans don’t think very much about the outrageous courage it took for those rebels to break away from England, and to be so very committed to their vision and true to their hearts, they were willing to risk everything.  I have not seen that most Americans, even in their robotic shuffle to the voting booth, understand the gravity of their ability to choose a leader in a peaceful manner.  ”Are they thinking about anyone but themselves?” I would wonder.  “Are they thinking about the good of the whole?”

I took to carrying a copy of the Constitution in my purse a few years ago.  I think it was in part due to my wanting to keep it closer to my consciousness, and in part to bring it out in case I was confronted by someone who did not value my right to free speech or to believe as I do.  Kind of a back-up.  I have felt threatened by our country’s past leadership, plain and simple.  I have felt my hope for a brighter future for my children dwindle with each passing year.  I have felt that I would need to take matters into my own hands in order to defend the liberties my forefathers and foremothers so bravely fought for.  I have felt an unnamable grief, one that has come to the surface now that that era is over (read more about that here).

I feel differently now.  My family and I watched the election among the company of new friends in our new location here in San Luis Obispo…the feeling of Obama being elected was like a dream come true for so many of us.  How many years have we hoped and prayed and wished for the leader at the top of our nation to shine?  How many years have we hoped for equality for all races, all religions, all beliefs?  How long have we felt injustice and unfairness and known it could be different?  It is almost as if many of us were encoded with this data, the data that would bring change to the world and launch it into its new era.

I LOVE that our new president is so well versed in the Constitution. The highest intention of our country, the principles it was founded upon….what other ideals would we want for a leader, whose sacred task is to hold true to the vision that caused this country to be born in the first place?    

Well, Obama said more than once in his inauguration speech that we are entering a New Age.  I feel that to be true.  We were so inspired this morning that my family had a little ceremony in which we chose to consciously align in the new administration’s efforts.  We asked to know how we can be of service to the noble goals of Obama’s leadership, to be shown the ways we can assist the Whole of our country to be the sparkling model of freedom that it can be.