I was asked to share some of my thoughts about energy work, and I'm not exactly sure what to say today. It has been a trying week. My propane stove tried to expand beyond its normal boundaries this week, and that really shook me to my core. I spent a lot of time going within and dealing with the issues that it triggered….and I guess this has a lot to do with energy work. It happens on so many levels in so many different forms. It isn't just about laying on of hands during a session….sometimes an energetic healing comes when your propane stove nearly blows up on you.

I began doing energy work as a child until, lets just say, it was shut down for me by others. That's okay…that was their issue, and from their issue I learned a lot about fighting for what you care about and are passionate about. Maybe it wouldn't have been so clear to me if it wouldn't have been for others trying to limit me.

I took Reiki One after I witnessed what it did for my dog Chester who had been sick for an entire year. In one treatment, he was healed completely. I was told he would live for maybe five years, and he lived until he was fifteen. He was my dearest friend, teacher and supporter through some difficult times.

I took Reiki Two in Telluride, and luckily for me, my Reiki Master ditched us all after the class. She refused to answer any of our questions after the class, and I had a few. Instead of learning from her, I learned from the energy. I didn't have a computer then or an internet connection, so there was nobody I could ask. Also, I camped for the first year I lived in Telluride. We didn't even have a phone back then let alone plumbing or electricity. Those were good days.

So, I spent time working on my animals, trees, the river, the Earth and a few friends with the energy….and I would always focus on the symbols, draw them, say their name and allow the energy to flow…it worked! It was great! But, as I moved further and further into my relationship with it, as I began to trust it and love it and accept it, the energy changed for me. During treatments, it didn't want me to draw the symbols…I was in this tug of war between what I was taught to do, what I thought that I needed to do in order to make it all work and what the Divine Energy some call Reiki wanted me to do…what it wanted me to learn to do, which was simply to be present with it…to be in the moment with it and not limit what we could do together. The more and more I let go, the more and more spontaneous and amazing the sessions became.

I learned that symbols are a great thing to help still your mind. Our constant chatter gets in the way of the energy from flowing through us…it puts up stumbling blocks and slows it down. It still gets through, but at a trickle compared to a waterfall. The symbols give our minds something to focus on, so we can get out of the way of the energy. However, our intention is all that is needed. Our intention opens up the doors of our Soul, so we can become Hollow Bones for the energy to flow through us to others. Yes, we may always be attuned, but that does not mean that a waterfall of energy flows through us. It is up to us to maintain that channel, to keep it as clear as possible, not only for our benefit, but for the benefit of others.

One day though you may find that you no longer need to work with the symbols in the traditional way, and that is okay. It is okay! You may find that you will work with the symbols in completely different ways or new symbols altogether! Also, you may not even work with the symbols….many times I simply meditate with the energy, and let it guide me as to where to place my hands, what to ask my clients to do in conjunction with me. Maybe will tone to a certain vowel sound as I work upon an area for instance.

I believe that Takata told the story she did of Reiki to help convince Westerners of its effectiveness….she understood our doubting minds and the ways of getting around them. Usui was not a Christian…he was a Buddhist Monk who developed a relationship with this energy through meditation. The Vipassana and Tonglen meditations in my previous blogs are perfect for helping you clear out your channel and increase the steady waterfall of energetic healing for others. I actually have a copy of Usui's original manual, which can never be sold. It is meant to be distributed freely.

I'm hoping that this link works:

http://www.reenchantedearth.com/usuimanual.pdf

The energy can do anything….but if our mental constructs limit ourselves, the channel, then the energy will be limited. That is the difference between a trickle and a waterfall. Remember that the energy is alive. It is waiting for us to interact with it, get creative with it, listen to it, move with it, sing with it….Energy works through so many methods! Laying on of hands is only one way. Let the symbols be a guide for you, but don't let them become your crutch. Let them work through you in whatever unique ways they wish to. There are many, MANY ways to work with them as well….such as have a client lay down on the earth, and with crystals create the symbol around them. I do a connect the dots type of thing with my crystals. I create the main points of the symbol after infusing the Earth and the crystals with the energy, and then I have the person lay down within it. After they are comfortable, I draw the symbol over them connecting all of the crystals together….I let them lay there for an hour if not more…usually, they know when it is over…

Anyway, here are a few of my thoughts. I hope this helps.

This is the painting that I was doing of a wolf. However, when I was done, I came out of my trance and saw that it was really my dog Chester. Everyone used to call him “Little Wolf”. It makes me cry in a good way.

Hi Everyone,

 

I just listed four of my older paintings on Ebay. I am hoping to sell them to help raise money for a few charitable groups such as Wildlife Rescue group in Maryland, Re-Member, which is a group on the Pine Ridge Reservation and Community Nutrition Resources, which benefits Native Americans in Arizona. If you could let any of your friends know about the auctions, I would be grateful. The reserves are very low, and they all started today. Thanks for your help.

 

Istazi

 

 

 

 

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=019&sspagename=STRK%3AMESE%3AIT&viewitem=&item=290094628326&rd=1&rd=1

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=019&sspagename=STRK%3AMESE%3AIT&viewitem=&item=290094635028&rd=1&rd=1

 

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This has been an interesting week for me. The weather hear has been amazing, and all I have wanted to do is be outside. My plants are coming up...hollyhocks, columbines, sage, oriental poppies, alyssum, pansies, and so much more. My Feverfew and Valerian are also coming back as my lilac begins to sport some buds. It is a great time of year...one that always makes me feel restless. My mom on the rez always says that I am a bear...I hibernate quite a bit. I need to have a lot of time alone, but when I am ready to burst out, I am ready to roam. All I want to do is drain my primary a bit, get on my Harley and go on some trips.

However, I also feel like I want to hold myself back and people in my life want to hold myself back. I am an artist and I do ceremony, and I happen to live in a community that accepts me, loves me even, but doesn't know what to make of me. I would love to open a gallery, but that is something that doesn't work here, at least not yet. Maybe in ten years or so. It is a small town, with a small main street. I think 800 people live in the town and close to 2,500 on the mesa. However, I think that number is a bit high. A lot of the people work in the ski resort 35 miles up the road or they are ranchers. I am grateful for the ranchers, because they preserve so much open space here on this amazing mesa.

However, I often feel alone here. I don't feel like there are many people that I can talk to, share my work with, or share my ceremony with. Sometimes I feel lonely, resentful and just plain lost. Other times I feel my deep connection to the land and the Spirit that lives within this land...to the Ancestors that once roamed here. The Anasazi pueblos are not too far from my home, and I then think, "How can I leave here?"

As I struggle with these paradoxes, I find that a thorn within the side of all of this is what people think that I should do. They think I should paint happy, I should paint flowers, I should paint more realistically, I should pain cleaner...I should be more polished in my work.....I should, I should, and I should! That is a word that may as well be a noose around my neck. I suffocate, and I can't create. I begin to doubt myself and my vision...my talent. Do I have any? Am I just fooling myself? Is my boyfriend believing in me for no reason at all?
Everytime I listen to their should's out of my own fears and insecurities, that noose cinches up just a bit more.

I don't want to paint flowers or nice faces or paint in a more in a more polished way. Isn't that why we love Van Gogh and Monet so much? It was raw emotion and expresson on their canvases. In their day it was considered to be very unpolished. I want to paint the way Spirit guides me too whether it makes people uncomfortable or not. I am not painting to make money, I never have, and I have only been showing my work for two years. I do want to show it. I do want to share it, because I am being given these images...visions, dreams, whatever label is out there I guess. I don't come up with them on my own. However, I don't think I need to sell out in order to share my work.

Yesterday we went out to watch the sunset over the mountains in Utah, and it was so amazing. Purples and orange and yellows shooting upward from the horizon while the mountains were dancing within blues and reds and purples. My breathing slowed, and then I saw the image I am working on for my next painting. It is a reminder that just because the Ancestors aren't physically walking the earth, they are still here. The Ceremony is still within the land, and it is waiting for us to remember it, to bring our own contributions to it....

But while painting today I found myself crying. I found myself wanting to give everything up, because I am so tired of everyone telling me what I should do in order to be a success. Who asked them? I like my idea of having my own traveling gallery that goes to shows around the state and into a couple of other states. I like the idea of showing my work and talking about it with others, and maybe inspiring someone to create something from their own visions. I like the idea of getting people back in touch with their own imagination. Can't that be considered success in this world? I am a success just in the fact that I walk up to my studio everyday and face all of the feelings that come up each time I life up a brush or a pastel. Sometimes I have to do what Picasso did to get myself up there...I tell myself I am just going to go up there to straighten things out when I feel that dread in my stomach about what may come. I get myself up there to straighten up, but then I look at the painting or a blank sheet of paper, and I can't walk away. Can't that be success?

Sometimes I feel selfish, because I am not able to bring in as much money as I would like to. I feel the pressure to sell or what not...sometimes I feel selfish simply because it is an old recording...or because of the comments others make...sometimes it is because of all those darn shoulds. They need to be thrown out the window and replaced with could. I could paint more nicely, but I choose not to. I could paint flowers, but I choose to paint whatever it is Spirit wants me to pain. I can do anything I want....the noose is still there, because of that chorus of people in the background....trying to label me into something that makes them comfortable and able to accept me....but I can take this noose off.

This painting goes back to the Magdalenian era and the Goddess. I had a huge experience a few weeks ago that I will someday write about, and this painting is something that came from this...It is about reclaiming our womanhood...by accepting it.  That is all I will say right now.

The Oasis is this great bar and restaurant down in Austin, Texas. It is on Lake Travis, and has over 16 decks or something. It has amazing views of the sunset. Each night when the sun actually sets, everyone stands up and applauds! I love that!  I was in shock the first time I went there. If you are ever in Austin, I highly recommend that you go out there. It is in the hill country outside of the city, although the city seems to be encroaching upon it, and it is a beautiful place to go and enjoy your friends and the sunsets.

Tonight, when the sun sets upon the horizon, go out and applaud to celebrate Spring and the long Journey that the Earth and the Sun have made together out of gratitude that they haven't given up on us.

Today at 6:07pm mountain time the Vernal Equinox takes place! I am so excited. This is a day of celebration, and this is a day that has been forgotten in our society replaced by other Holidays. I began bringing these celebrations back into my life several years ago, and I thought I would share a bit about what I do....

First of all, you have to have a feast! It is a very necessary thing. I make something that includes meat, bread, fruit and vegetables. Two of the dishes are sacred in my family and tradition, corn and wojapi. Corn is present during every sacred meal I cook. I grow it in my garden every year, I pray to it, talk to it, drum to it, ask Tonanzin to bless it, and listen to Corn Woman's words regarding prayers. I love to serve it in many ways. Spoon bread is always great, but very fattening...but it includes corn, green chiles and cheddar cheese. It is so moist, that you must spoon it out of the pan.

Wojapi is a Lakota dish that my family taught me to cook. Simply, it is berry soup. It is always served with fried bread, but I don't eat that as much anymore. Too fattening and bad for the heart...so I serve it with a multi-grain bread. What you do is get fresh, frozen or canned berries...we usually use blackberries or blueberries. Put them in a pot with water, the amount depends upon how much berries you put in there, and mix in some corn starch or flour to thicken it up. Put it on simmer until it slowly cooks down into a soup. You can put sugar in it, but I don't. I like the natural flavor of the berries with a bit of cinnamon in it. This is better than cake for me.

I am making shrimp enchiladas cooked in organic Chimayo Chile tonight with corn, a salad and wojapi. It will be a wonderful meal, and I hope wherever you guys are, you will have a great meal. I will take a pinch of everything that is served, and put it out on a plate with some tobacco and cornmeal as an offering to the Ancestral Spirits and my Medicine in thanksgiving for their presence in my life.

Spring is such an amazing time. We all come out of hibernation, and new growth is ready to sprout literally and figuratively. Maybe you made some New Year's Resolutions...gathered up your seeds for what you wanted to create. Well, now is the time to plant them, water them and begin amending the soil, so that they can grow. It is a time of life and death. In order for new life to sprout through the fertile soils of our Souls, we have to let things go...or transform them into something that is functional rather than dysfuctional...but no matter what you do, you will be letting go of the old...letting it fall away so that it can one day become fertile soil for new life and something new can grow into your life.

Today I decided to start making my soap for the upcoming season of show's and farmer's markets that I have been in for the past two years. My prayer as I created my soaps is that they will be a way for me to meet new people, share, talk, and bring something good to someone...maybe they will become reenchanted with the earth as they use my soaps. That is my prayer at least.

I am also going out to the studio to work on a painting with the prayer that this too will be a way for me to walk across a bridge and talk with people in ways that I normally don't...Art is a great way to knock down barriers, so you can get to the heart of the matter.

What I want to let go of so the above can transpire is this....Being in shows and farmer's markets...it's amazing how vulnerable I feel when I go to them. I am a shy person. Yes, Leo's can be introverted...I am one of them, and it is hard for me to start up conversations with people that I don't know. Each time I do a show, I am stepping way out of the box for me.  Last year I started showing my artwork for the first time, and that was such a huge risk for me. I think with the idea of the shows coming up, I am feeling vulnerable. Yesterday, I wrote a blog about the natural struggles I think everyone goes through. We are all struggling with our shoulds and our passions... I grew up in a very public life, and there were two versions of everything....genius and bad. Yesterday, I think as I faced another season, another time to be vulnerable with people I didn't know, a lot of fearful emotions came up. The great thing was I kept telling myself that they were just emotions, and that they did not identify me. Sometimes you just have to walk through it...go through all of the feelings, so you can let them go and move on...and that is what happened for me...and that is part of my Spring seed....to just let any former definitions about my work, go...just let it all go, so something new can come in. When I woke up today, I felt free and recharged. During my dreams I had made another choice...but I couldn't have gotten there if I wouldn't have faced all of my doubts and feelings, so I could once and for all be honest with myself. I accepted them rather than trying to avoid them, and that wasn't an easy pill to swallow. We spend so much time avoiding things that we are rarely honest with ourselves about what is really going on...so in order to strengthen my connection with the Earth, I needed to be honest with myself, I needed to share my doubts and fears, so I could make another choice and plant that seed on this day.

Somethings you can do during the Equinox...During the evenings, and I will do this until it is time for the plants to go dormant, I will take my drum outside and lightly drum it with my fingers....it is an ancient thing...to go out and drum to your plants...it helps them grow, it helps you develop a relationship with them...and it unifies you with the heartbeat of all. If you don't have a drum, clack two sticks or bones or utensils together. It really doesn't matter. The intention is what mattes.

Also, this is a great time to go betwixt and between Spring and Winter. If you don't know how to journey, use your imagination...focus upon your breath, relax your body, and then imagine yourself walking along a path...on one side is spring and on the other is winter. Explore that area...what comes up for you? Ask them to teach you about this space...are there any Spirit Helpers there to speak with? If so, make an offering and ask them to teach you about this Space. It is truly magical.

This is a painting of Dewey Beard. He was the last known surviver of the Battle of the Little Bighorn and Wounded Knee. He is my adopted mother's Grandfather on Pine Ridge. I was told many of the stories he told them. I won't repeat them here, because they are so sacred. However, I do remember Unci talking about how when he went to Congress to talk about Wounded Knee they basically didn't believe his story of what happened and said so. They sent him off to get x-rayed and lo and behold there were the bullets still in his body. He lost his family...his child and wife and mother among many others at Wounded Knee. While painting this, I asked him how he could go on? How could he have another family? Didn't it hurt? How hard was it to have white friends after all of this? The answer came to me in a dream the following night, "Sometimes Sasala, you just have to let things go. Just let them go."

So as Spring approaches with the Rocky Mountain winds, it is time to just let things go...

This is so beautiful that I needed to share it with everyone. It made me cry, and the next time I am in a city, I'm going to do this! I saw this on a friend's blog, and I had to share it with others. My love and hugs goes out to all of you.

Istazi

I thought this was an interesting article and poses a lot of questions. I think it is great that people are getting creative as to how to stop the illegal logging in the rainforest...but some think that this will "corrupt" the tribes. Personally, I think this helps the tribes reclaim their power and creates a peaceful way for them to take care of their land and their people...this is also a great way to protect the environment....What do you think?

Read the article at:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6509973.stm