On Lightness and Grace

"Slow down everyone you're moving too fast, frames can't catch you when you're moving like that." ~Jack Johnson

With each passing moment, I sink deeper into the slow life here in the south of Laos. So slow that everything suspends in time, like a photograph, like a never ending ellipsis....

Life is still, but water flows through everything. The Mekong and the waterfalls. Etheric and dreamy, an effortless magic.

The bold swim under the waterfall letting its power crash over them. Small children splash about the shallow shoreline. I lie on the floating platform at the edge of the small lagoon, and the sound and vibrations from the waterfall move through me. I buzz and tingle. Nothing feels real anymore.

From the road, frames rush past. I cross bridges and when there aren't bridges, my bike and I float across the Mekong by raft.

With each breath, I float out of time and space, and with each exhale, I ground back down. But back into a slightly altered reality.

In Savannakhet I stand face to face with powers that could change the course of everything. Being denied a visa is not part of my plan. I breath through the initial denial and connect with my own source of power. Through calm words, I get out of my own way and allow space for the miracle to come through. When I pick up my visa the next day, the sensation of lightness lifts me out of time once again.

I float on to Si Phan Don, the 4000 islands in the Mekong that separate Laos from Cambodia. Dirt roads, aged river huts, rickety bicycles bumble by--as though I've stepped back in time 30 years. Not much changes here. The islands float above the rest of the world where they can't be touched.  Don Det, at the river's edge, I sink my toes into the sand. From a distant cafe, music drifts through the palms and out over the river. You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.

My last few days in Laos an anticipation bubbles up from the pit of my stomach. Obtaining a visa is one thing. Actually crossing the border is quite another. Again, at the mercy of the person who stands between me and the place I've called home for so long.

We cross the border late in the day. The thud of the stamp, the smile of the officer, my hands uncontrollably shaking. I walked out of the building and into Thailand. I nearly burst into tears of happiness. Stepping out of one reality and into another. The lightness, the relief, the faith, and the grace.

There will be moments when all you practice and believe will be put to the test. And when the moment of grace comes and the miracle has transpired, you will know why you walk the path you do.

Tell me about moments of grace you have experienced. What did it illuminate for you? 

Wisdom From the Trenches of 2018

"Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right." ~Grateful Dead

January: Loss. An extraordinary, but complicated friendship ended. Our soul contract had ended years prior, and maybe I should have seen it coming--we've done this for lifetimes. I sent out a prayer of gratitude and burned the last of the damiana. I also lost my bank card and a bit of my sanity. But such is life.

February: Excess. Between two jobs, teaching yoga, tarot classes, writing workshops, and coven gatherings, when do I have time to just be? I will tell you: In the moment. Just be present. Be the eye of your own hurricane.

March: Release. What would happen to my life in Chiang Mai if I quit the job I moved here for? All I know for sure is when a void is created be mindful of what goes into all that empty space.

April: Connect. I landed on Bali with Meno's question lingering in the back of my mind: How will you go about finding that thing the nature of which is totally unknown to you? Through the alchemy and magic of human connection.

May: Allow. What would it be like to move out of the city and into a rustic little hut in the jungle? Step carefully. Ease into this new life and let the ever morphing nature of Chiang Mai fill in all around.

June: Stillness. I've nothing to do most days except sink into the still quietness of this jungle life. This is where intuition strengthens and the journey to other worlds begin.

July: Expansion. In what new ways can I move out of my comfort zone? My soul knows better than I do so I head to Vietnam. Challenging and eye-opening and at times shocking, I adapt and I learn to navigate through this strange new energy.

August: Discover. Epic rides along the coast and through the jungle--the freedom of the open road sparks inspiration and ancient memories. I didn't just discover hidden layers of Vietnam, but a story tucked deep inside of me that began to inch its way out.

September: Integrate. Detox, meditate, integrate, repeat.

October: Alignment. My third birthday on this magic island in the Gulf of Thailand. I'm lured back here each year to reevaluate and realign, to walk the labyrinth and ask more questions. Hammock naps hold the answers to everything.

November: Discipline. Thirty days and 52000 words later I have a very rough draft of a new novel. Discipline is not just mindset. It's also structure and a solid, supportive community of friends who are on the journey too.

December: Healing. Sometimes it takes extreme circumstances to bring me back to point zero. Some times it takes going off grid into the heart of Laos and falling off a motorbike to get me there. Lots of rest and recovery. It took three weeks for my body to fully come out of shock--and to finally heal.

I slid into 2019 with ease. I was asleep well before midnight and woke up to a new year. A calm blanket of peace washes over me as I move slow through this first week of January. It is going to be an amazing year of curiosity and creation and, of course, magic.

I dare you to tap into your unlimited potential and work it to your advantage this year. What will you create? What magic will you cultivate? 

The Wild, Wild East

"In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order." ~Carl Jung

As within, so without.

Somewhere in the northern mountains of Laos between Vang Vieng and Luang Prabang I'm lying on the ground staring up at every woman in the small Hmong village. They all stare and smile and giggle at me like I'm some strange novelty fallen from the sky. Oddly comforting given my position there on the ground, far from anything familiar. Feet from me Hmong rebels walk up and down Route 13, machine guns slung over their shoulders, hard eyes staring down every passerby. I'm hours away from anywhere resembling civilization as I know it. This is the wild, wild east after all--remote and untethered and timeless.

Landlocked and full of dense jungle and rivers and waterfalls, there is an unsettling energy about Laos that is hard to pin down. For two weeks, I moved slow through the breathtakingly, surreal landscape, breathing in the vast, open wild. It was as though I'd fallen off the edge of the earth into the far reaches of this wild east. Hmong in Laos, I discovered, means Free, and it is this raw freedom that feels so unbounded and otherworldly.

I fall in love with stories about the unknown--my imagination moving across adventures in distant landscapes, places I've never been--from the stories of Indiana Jones and Firefly, to the ones of Kira Salak and Lawrence Blair. I'm suddenly transported to the here and now, terra incognita, land unknown, on the ground, staring up at the bluest sky. Days ago I'd been staring up at the same sky with the warmth of sun on my skin and the frigid water of the Nam Song around my dangling feet as my inner tube lazily floated down river. Life is but a dream.  

Few roads cut through northern Laos. To experience it you need to walk or take a boat or simply teleport about. This wilderness is protected by nothing but rebels with guns and un-exploded bombs scattered over the country. To wander into the thickness of it, could mean never returning--literal or otherwise. The greenery closing up tight from behind with each step forward, with each step inward. Here be dragons. 

To travel to other realms and worlds, you only need to walk through the opaque clutter of your own thoughts, navigate landmines, and sit in the still, dark, ether until you arrive. Listen, learn, integrate. This is the final frontier. Terra incognita. Here be dragons. 

I crash to Earth and lift myself. I move on. I move slow. On the mend in more ways than one. I will continue to explore this mysterious world--the one inside of me and the one outside of me--and share my stories. The entire Universe is inside each of us--and outside of us. As within, so without.

Inching my way back to the familiar on a two day slow boat up the Mekong River. Misty karst covered hillsides, scattering of villages along the banks, vast silence, wild magic.  Life is but a dream.

As we roll over into 2019, think about how your outer world is reflecting your inner world--and vice versa. Are they in harmony? What do you think would happen to your outer world the further and deeper you explored your inner one? Become explorers of the unknown. Experiment with this and see what begins to shift.

This will be my last post of 2018! I'm looking forward to new adventures in 2019 as I continue to follow this curious path. What visions do you have for 2019?