A Haiku for the Heat. (In 4 parts).

I surrender, sun.

Burn me like a forest fire,

leave me half-way gone.

Watch my matter change,

disintegrate, fall, take flight.

It's all a rain dance.

When red is just red,

when clouds can be wet or dry,

you'll have found me, free.

Don't look for the old.

Familiarity's blind.

Taste me: I'm pulsing.

What if the Gift is the Ending? We Can Reimagine Our Lives?

The title to this post is an excerpt by Jen Lemen from the short film below.

We loaded our bicycles, panniers, salty-skinned bodies into the van. The door shut and the dog licked my face. I smiled on the outside, retrieved my camera, snapped a photo with my husband, then watched as the open hills of South Dakota moved like sound waves through my heart, everything singing loss. I might never come back for my destiny, I thought. Jesus Christ, I might never know.

~~~

Some people are doorways into new depths of our selves. My body pulled into his like a magnet, like it had been dead and suddenly shocked awake again. Once we feel, we cannot un-feel.

~~~

Almost a year later, I still could not undo my longing. I want for us to come clean, I wrote my husband with every ounce of courage in me; to honor each other out the door.

~~~

We ran into each other on a random side-street in the city at 2am on a Tuesday a month after we split. When I didn’t know how I was getting home, he offered me to stay at his. We hardly cuddled in that tiny twin bed. He tried, but I couldn't kiss him. I couldn't bear to take off my clothes. I couldn't offer my body, not my heart, not my hands. All I could do was sob. And so I did. And he did, too. We sobbed together until we forgot why we were sobbing. Until we fell asleep like motherless babies in a new world neither of us knew. 

~~~

My best friend curled into my bed after her brother's wedding. We spooned. The gas that had been grumbling in my stomach for a month was slowly disappearing. I slept without worry or stress. I woke up with tears in my throat. Drove her home where her family was waiting. 

Do you ever miss him? her parents asked of my ex. 

Sometimes. We're not talking right now. I just need the space. 

I got back in my car. Soko played in the background. Four years and I still haven't gotten over you, she sings. The whole ride home, grief flooded my face. I landed on the couch, asked my mother to read to me.

~~~

He called from South Dakota one year after my ex and I loaded that van with our bikes. My ex was back on the Rez and ran into him, told him out of the goodness in his heart that we broke up and I’d love to hear from him. Then gave him my number so he could call.

I’m building my house, he left on my voice-machine. You can come out if you’d like. I’d love to see ya. Three hours later I was in a rental car. Two and a half days later, he was holding me at the top of his dusty driveway, a whole universe of unfinished business flooding our bodies.

I heard every message God wanted him to deliver me. We sang every song that was stuck in my throat of doubt.

~~~

A cat nudges me now in the mornings, purrs like a reminder that love comes in many forms. I sit alone after a year of dating around, doing my best at not hurrying for others arms or eyes. I sit alone now in a whole new body, cell after cell transforming from stuck to free. I do my best at getting out of the way, at letting myself float in the unknown until something real jumps out for touching.

~~~

Some truth about love is really wanting to break through you, Jenny tells me on the phone today, one year exactly after my ex and I split.

It’s true, I say knowingly, tears cracking my voice. I have to keep going like this--risking everything for my truth, not knowing what will happen. I have to stay willing to speak everything in my heart, then watch things break or be born again.

Yes, she whispered with power. It's revolutionary work.

It is. But what else is there? I'm here for the very best quality love. I can't pretend I'm wired any other way.

Not pretending is the beginning, she said.

Yes, I nodded quietly, knowing that beginnings are only born when we brave our honest endings, and no ending is done without courage. 

~~~

A year ago this short was filmed by my incredible friends Jen and Corinna via Hopeful World Productions. Brian and I so tenderly agreed to let them capture the very end of our relationship on reel. I am so thankful to have it, to hear Jen's wisdom, to see all the love matched with all the loss, to know that truly, our goodbyes are the beginnings to the new life that is waiting for us. Today, I hope you give this film a watch. And may you know, especially if you are amidst grand change, that there is reason to be hopeful, to have faith, to trust, that a deeper truer you is ripening. And that we are truly, truly together in the tenderness of our beautiful endless cycles. 

All my love,

Rachael

Everything Changes from Hopeful World on Vimeo.

When you're thinking yourself stuck: feel.

My sweet cat-housemate, Tunafish, who was weeping from the balcony, thinking herself stuck, forgetting completely about the easier way down and out through the house.

Sometimes, I just need to be held. I mean, really really held. Do you know the feeling? It’s actually a hard one for me to know, pinpoint, because usually the Lion of Logic takes over before I get the chance to feel it. Welp, that’s just not possible right now, so don’t waste your time dwelling on it. Move on, darling. Go do something, or take a nap.

But today, I texted the person I’ve been dating who’s in a faraway state and meekly asked, “Can you talk? I need to break a pattern.”

It was actually a few patterns: always being the helper (not the helped), always having a solution (rather than just a feeling), and when neither of those normal roles are possible, simply shutting down. 

When we got on the phone the talking was more like snot-cry-yodeling, which is my real expression when I’m feeling vulnerable and honest. Through small weeps, I confessed how hard it is for me to soften into my feelings when I can’t fix them. When I don’t really like them. When they’re not what I want. “I’ve got this pattern of just toughening up,” I told her, “turning on my in-it-alone mode that I’ve gotten so used to, and moving on. But I don’t really want to do that any more, you know? I want to lean in…”

And then she said something really wonderful that I wanted to share with you here, in case you’re also having a feeling that has no rational solution at the time.

She said, “It’s like the world is set up for us to be rational, and rationally speaking, it makes sense to just go do something different, stuff the feeling down, move on, because you can’t really get what you need, so why dwell? But that’s not really what your feelings need. Your feelings need to feel.”

My feelings need to feel. Our feelings need to feel. It’s so obvious, and yet, so unpracticed.

“Right,” I said… “I could’ve walked these bottled up feelings to a museum, carried them with me on my hike… but then they’re like a poison I’m lugging around with me wherever I go.”

“Yeah. Or you could just cry now and let ‘em free.”

It’s been a journey for me out here in New Mexico. I’ve worked with some seriously incredible healers who’ve helped unearth parts of me that have been locked up for far too long. I’m breaking lifelong patterns and it’s not comfortable, takes so much courage and breathing and vulnerable requests for love and care as I go through this process.

But really listening to my feelings, asking them what I can do to let them come forward, is softening me, actually making this deep process lighter. I can feel that basic, humble love that lives at the bottom. And I’m starting to trust that it’s okay, sane, wise to listen deeply and follow earnestly my wild flow of emotion.

Today, I want to know, what's that feeling for you that you think "unfixable" or "irrational"... that you stuff down and don't let yourself have? Be brave and leave it in the comments. You can leave just one word, one phrase. But doing so is the beginning to letting your inner self know that you acknowledge it, that you won't ignore it forever, that something alive in you wants all of you to be free.

I want that for you, too. For all of us. For all of us to feel freely.

All my love,

Rachael

God, What would you have me say?

This is what my new friend Jenny asks each time she sits down to write.

My palms sweat even writing that question. Who am I to speak of God? To invoke it into my writing, transparently, for you to know and see and experience?

Which really just translates to, Who am I to soften? To be more vulnerable exposing who I've grown into? To be honest about my faith, in a world where having it makes me feel like a total freak?

Which REALLY just translates to, Is admitting faith safe? Will believing in something unexplainable by "modern science's" terms, make me less lovable or approved of or legitimate to you wonderful people out there?

And then there's this image of how I really look, how I really feel, when it comes to my relationship with the greatest mystery of all: quiet, calm, glad, deeply deeply rooted.

I call Jenny Earth Angel because meeting her changed my life. She asked me the first time we got together for coffee, Do you know that you have guardian angels? 

It reminded me of the time Darrell asked me, Do you know that you have a spirit song in you? That everything is connected to the Great Spirit, that everything is spiritual?

It reminded me of the time the soulcaller looked straight through my eyes and said, Do you know that this is your work? To do what I am doing?

Each time, my response was an immediate Yes. My insides know, know, know. But my outsides are a whole other story. They scurry at the thought of being perceived as illegitimate, flukey, irrational, new age bull shit. I don't exactly know how to talk about the messy journey of faith and freedom. God. The Universe. Spirit. Because as much as I hate to admit it, I'm used to talking to convince. Because I'm scared of what not convincing might mean. I'm scared of being called Wrong, of being burned at the stake for believing in and accessing the mysterious powers of the universe. I'm both afraid of being cut off from the power of God and of accessing it. Which is really just a translation to my own power. I'm still not all that comfortable with it.

But I've been practicing on the inside (a LOT). And hiding on the outside (a bit).

Until now. Until I'm starting to realize that "my power" isn't really about "me", it's about everything. It's about being tapped into the truth that asks us to come home to Love. It's about traveling home, and helping others who long to, do the same.

And so I just want to be out of the closet. Humbly, messily, earnestly. I just want you to know that when I show up to work with you, to love you, to support or honor or challenge or praise you, I do it with my whole being in a humble devotion of faith and trust. I believe in leaning into the rich mystery of life. That within every mystery is a difficult, liberating truth. And for now, that's how I experience what I'm calling God--as the truth at the center when I let myself feel it. Sometimes it's rational, sometimes it's hardly imaginable. But somehow, it's there. It's usually full of an immense immeasurable Love. Like a heartbeat in the center of existence--the pulse that holds everything together. How? What? Why? I cannot know, exactly, but I can say thank you--for its strength, its life force, its continual presence even when I forget the magic of it.

Sometimes, I don't want to say thank you because I can hardly feel the Love. And that's okay. Faith isn't all blue skies. Life isn't all blue skies. But having faith amidst the shit is a devotion I came to when I lost everything I thought I knew, when I could barely get out of bed for over a year, so emotionally and spiritually spent. It was a way of survival, and has become an invaluable compass for me, now.

So, God, What would you have me say?

Thank you, sweet people out there, for being here, for reading. I'm over here with my light on, in case you're seeking a safe space to reveal your faith, doubts, desires, truths.

And if you're looking for a place to begin, I offer you (oh so vulnerably!) this tiny prayer, good for anytime, any day, anywhere, anyhow....

Dear God,
Are you there? What have I forgotten to trust? What truth will help lead me home? Thank you, thank you, thank you.

All my deepest love,
Rachael

PS--I feel the need to say that I was raised Jewish, but in a much more cultural than religious setting. I was never taught prayer, never talked to of "spirit" or "God", so for me, I don't carry much religious baggage with the word God (except that it couldn't possibly be valuable if I was never really introduced to it--which... ha! is definitely some baggage!). It's all sort of a wobbly invention for me, combined with general socializations. I say this mostly to be sensitive to all the ways different people relate to God, religion, spirituality. That what I'm really talking about is faith and trust... having a practice of finding your way home to the truths that sets you free.

I'm going to Circus Camp... Really. In a Very Destined Way.

I can't even believe I'm writing right now. In 48 hours I'll be on an airplane to Santa Fe, and the hours of things that have to happen before then are a bit unmentionable. But this always happens with me: I become a total zen monk when I'm on the right path. Zero goals. Only faith. And wild, incomputable accomplishments.

Okay. So anyway. I wanted to tell you the story of how this happened, because it's awesome. And it could happen for you, too, potentially. (Stop it--I'm serious). Okay.. here it is:

I was feeling stuck in a rut. Am I really going to keep going back and forth through this same routine over and over... forever? Then I went to Portland to celebrate my best friend's birthday. Maybe it was the five days of slightly altering baked goods, or the mystical spirit of the Oregon Coast, but either way, something was bursting within me... a physical energy... I really wanted to PLAY.

Well, I did enough cartwheels on the beach to find out that cartwheels on the beach wouldn't cut it. There was this voice... this strange, delightful, nagging, insatiable voice... that kept whispering to me, You want to go to circus camp! 

On my last morning in Portland, I was telling Jodi about my friend who'd gone to lots of AA meetings. Mood follows action, she had told me. Mood follows action, we kept telling ourselves, like a pump up jam for some nameless game waiting just around the bend.

Rach... When are you going to just do it? she asked, sunlight pouring through the car windshield. I've heard you talking about doing something along these lines for a year. I think it's time.

Shit, really? I said, a bit clueless of how obvious I'd made my desire.

Yes, she said sternly. Really.

Jodi's not usually one to offer up a stern stare. She was right and she knew it. And I knew it, too.

My reaction was a mix between fuuuuuckkkkk and yes yes yes yes yes yes YESSSS!!!

But like any normal, scared/excited human, I took the conversation in stride and went on my way. At the airport, I was looking up information for this uuber expensive leadership training I'd been thinking about doing through my coaching school. My whole body felt anxious. I even called my mom crying, confessing that I felt like a total bum because I'm not "getting anywhere" with my life and "I don't even really want to do this damn leadership program anyway!" but "I feel like I have to be successful or something" and "I'm only 26... do I really have to be SO grown UP?!" and "Is it a sin to give myself the gift of fun!?" (Our complaints are actually really powerfully illuminating, if we let them be).

And then my friend Maya showed up [nothing's random] randomly at the exact runway where I was waiting in flowing black drab like a witch meant to deliver my destiny.

I spilled all my blubbering beans. And then she asked simply, Well, what do you really want to do? 

I just want to go to circus camp! I wailed. 

Have you Googled it?

...No... 

Look it up right now. 

So I did. I Googled "Adult Circus Camp" and the first thing to appear was WiseFool New Mexico. We read about their BUST program together and knew it was perfect for me. Empowerment through the circus arts. All women. 6 weeks. Inexpensive. Wild delight.

But... Am I really allowed to go do this thing... just... for fun?? 

Why the hell not? Maya asked. I was silent. Okay, how would you feel if you went to the leadership training and not the circus camp? 

Resentful that we're not doing cartwheels, I replied. And like a fake.

Yeah. Go join the circus, Rach. You've got your whole life to grow up. Or not. You gotta make yourself happy.

It was decided. I called my boss for my tutoring job from the airport to ask if I could leave a month early. She said yes.

Then... at my layover in Minneapolis I got a $500 flight voucher for being a flexible traveler. Flight to and from NM... covered!

THEN... I was calling around on Craigslist for a place to live. One woman gave me another random woman's number. That "random woman" is renting me her condo for $100/week when it's usually $1200/month. And I can use her "extra scooter"... for free.

And with zero publicity for my coaching business, within a week of deciding to go to circus camp, 3 new clients came to me through word-of-mouth.

The how followed my yes. 

It's like that Goethe quote...

That the moment one definitely commits oneself then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never have otherwise occurred. A whole stream of events issue from the decision, raising in one’s favour all manner of unforeseen incidents, and meetings and material assistance which no man could have dreamed would come his way. Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.

And it all started with this crazy nagging voice that somehow, I couldn't ignore. (Or had stalled on for almost a year, until finally, I could feel the cosmic force saying, NOW).

Here I go, people. I couldn't be happier, more excited, more ass-wiggling-ready. I wish for myself raw raucous play. New friends. New edges.

And for you, I wish that a mystical whisper enters your mind. One you simply cannot ignore. One that you follow, that makes your jaw drop with serendipitous delight. Good luck. Let me know when it happens.

PS--Did I mention I'll be doing trapeze, aerial silks, stilt walking and acrobatics... none of which I've ever tried before. Ever. Here goes noooothin'! ;)
PPS--My coaching doors are still open while I'm in the land of enchantment. Come knocking if you feel called, loves. Mwah!

And if you're curious... look!