A Moment by the Lake

I have forgotten my camera at the tent, and I don't want to disturb the dogs by retrieving it.

I am sitting in dappled morning sun, over-looking Lake Charlton. There are no ripples on its mirrored surface, only steam rising from it. The sun peeks through pine needles on an adjacent tree, and I can almost look at it with my sunglasses.

The silence presses against my eardrums, and then I hear past the silence. Birds, insects buzzing, a camper's slow rumble of a snore, a camp-mate's propane burner for making that first cup of camp coffee.

Soon kindling is being chopped and I wonder again about retrieving my camera.

I've only come out for one night of camping--and it seems both ridiculous to do so, and absolutely necessary.

A micro-adventure into nature to hear The Piper playing his songs. I hear them in the birdsong across the lake, in the breeze that flutters past my ears and dances in the spider webs.

The kindling catches and the campfire smoke floats out to the lake.

My coffee has grown lukewarm and so a trek to the car to get another bottle of propane is next. I will eat instant oatmeal without guilt and make a cup of chai.

There is a half-hearted talk between the only other two campers awake yet of taking the canoe out, but I don't want to move from my spot. I'm enjoying the quiet like I haven't since I arrived yesterday afternoon. Soon enough the quiet will end.

I was hoping for silent epiphany last night, but I was kept engaged with my friends--enjoying the night--and without sleep late until the wee dark hours of the morning.

But maybe this morning's silence by campfire and following the sun rise higher in the tree's needles is enough.

The Piper card from the Faerie Oracle deck said for me to come camping, so I did.

I'm confident that I have received, or will receive, whatever infusion I needed to clear my head and center into me again.

The more I think about it, the more I believe my healing and personal growth were aided by this view this morning. This still lake, this crackling fire, this quiet morning with the scent of infusing each breath.

This moment is why I came out to Mother Gaia--why I'm here today.

Dream Dissonance

Instead of wishing and wanting N to be here RIGHT NOW so he could cook me biriyani and snuggle with me, I will dutifully (with love and accountability) call upon those feelings I had this morning in the office I share with Brittany -- energy worker extraordinaire.

I discovered today.

I acknowledged in my body today.

I felt a Truth rise up in me today.

I knew a felt sense today.

After my lovely energy session was almost complete and I was relaxing and breathing deeply and without panic for the first time in weeks, B took me through a couple of meditative visuals. Halfway through the second one, I spilled over with tears, and continued to be highly emotional during the next ten minutes while I explained what had happened internally for me.

We often discuss what the body does, or says, during sessions.

Here's a WILDLY ABRIDGED version of the visualization exercise:

• Imagine the soles of your feet in contact with soft earth. 

(I immediately thought Costa Rican soil and saw huge green leaves coming up from the ground at the base of a giant tree. It was in this soil that I imagined my feet.)

• Feel the earth energy entering you from the soles of your feet, through your gates, into your calves and shins, past your knees ....  

(I could actually feel a tingly rushy feeling going everywhere she led me. I felt content and joyful, and all of a sudden I knew. Costa Rica would be good for me. A place of healing and good energy.)



She continued leading the earth energy up my body and when it reached my center -- my womb -- I could see the little light zipping around and joyfully doing figure eights around my belly. (I would find joy and healing and nourishment in Costa Rica.)

And.

I started crying.

I struggled with the earth energy going higher through the upper chakras. It did. It was dimmed and not so joyful, but it made it.

I struggled with feelings of un-worthiness.

Was I crying because I felt like Costa Rica was the right place for me, but that it might not be for my kids and I can't get there yet, until my kids are grown up? Was I crying because I didn't feel worthy of obtaining/attaining this dream, when I should be focusing on my kids' dreams?

Or was I crying because I felt unworthy of earth energy? Maybe because I was blocked in one of those chakras? Or because I wasn't worthy of feeling joy? (GASP)

I don't know the answer to any of those questions.

Then or now.

B's hypothesis is that I've been disconnected from Earth energy for a long time and I was reunited with it today. That I felt joy and longing for it today. And the tears were a mixture of relief, love and longing.

That rings true, too.

When I asked her what to do with it, she just said 'sit with it.' Let it be there. (Of course she did.)

I'm concerned that since I wasn't able to process those feelings right after the session (due to a business meeting) that the impact -- the import and impact -- are missing now.

This is a faithful accounting of what happened at the session, but the ... longing and relief ... are missing.

I wish I could re-capture that ... in case there were extra messages there for me.

I feel like I have the clarity now that Costa Rica is definitely that place I need to be. And that it will be good for me there. Being with nature in that way will be healing for me, like the island was for that character in Lost that didn't have cancer as long as she was there. Eventually I will live there. I know it now.

But what about that other part?

The part about Costa Rica being my longing, and not my kids' dream. And the dissonance of having a dream that is different from theirs. And when is it okay to act on a dream that is in contrast to your family's? And how do I go about doing that in a safe and respectful way?

"...I pledge allegiance to Turtle Island, and to the beings who there on dwell ..."

There's nothing like Nature for clarity and grounding ...