Seeking Authentic Voice

This little cutey has taken to teasing and taunting my dogs. Ruby and Emmy wait for the chipmunk to scamper up on the deck, fully anticipating that they will be able to catch her. Emmy on the left and Ruby on the right. In the center is Oliver, our daughter's dog - who catches chipmunks at the horse farm where he spends most of his days while she is working.... But alas, the dogs are confined behind glass, or screen, and the chipmunk seems to know it. Oh sure, she runs off whenever the dogs bark at her (which is often...oh my, so very often....) but she also comes very close, dangerously close if it were not for the sliding glass door. She comes to help herself to the pitcher of bird seed that my husband stores on the deck - a partially full, two quart pitcher...and the chipmunk just plunks herself right down inside the pitcher and eats to her heart content. Until the dogs bark. And then she's gone, faster than lightening. I know people who despise these little o...

My daughter has taught her dog, Ollie, to balance objects on his nose. She places something on his nose and tells him to "Wait!" then after a short time she says, "Take it!" and he turns his head, catching the object in his mouth. He does it really well, to our great amusement. Balance is something that I strive for in my life. Unlike this trick of Ollie's, I seek balance that is deeper - spiritual, emotional, physical - balance.

When I left St. Homeostasis a few months ago I received some good advice from a colleague, the Jungian Priest. He said, "It's a sick church, let it go." Letting go seems to be a theme in my life these days, something I blogged about in my post yesterday on the yoga DVD Gravity and Grace. A day later I find myself thinking more about this: "In letting go, by relaxing into the postures, one builds strength, stamina, and flexibility. Counter-intuitive, perhaps. But I think there is great wisdom in that principle which can be applied to life in many ways - letting go, breathing, relaxing into the posture, the situation, or whatever life throws at us - builds us up. Letting go is not the same thing as collapsing or giving up, letting go is a process of holding a very difficult posture/life experience while at the same time breathing, relaxing into it, and letting go." This process of letting go, as I describe above, is a process of working through resistance. Stiff m...