Breath

This MS pain is great I’m not complaining I’m just explaining. So great it can stop me in my tracks. At first I Bear Down grit my teeth and soldier my way through,  next I take it as a road sign to think about G-d to pray, to chant to/about the Shekkina.

Shiviti Shekkina l’negdi Tamid (I place the nurturing presence of G-d before me always!

Then I try to move it move it, move my arm, move my shoulder around, alleviate the pain. I try medical marijuana to dull the pain. I cry out to G-d in the heights of those moments- but weather the storm. Now the pain has moved from my shoulder and as I expressed in last post it’s also in my jaw and also on the right side of my heart chakra, and it seems to be traveling down my right arm…

And incredibly, the tool I’ve/we’ve been taught for many years: breathing deeply, taking deep breaths- in through the nose,  is what alleviates the pain and directly! Awesome that an action running through the body is what can sooth the symptoms from an auto immune disease. The body can heal as well as defy itself!

Reminding me that the healing remedy often time grows alongside the plant that causes discomfort. Next to poison ivy grows jewel weed! And plaintain in the clover fields alleviates the bees stings who are attracted to the clover flowers.

Yes, this is an intelligent universe!

The olfactory sense is what connects us straight to the soul, so the Jewish sages teach. And just as G-d formed the body out of clay, and breathed in through the nostrils the holy breath of life! The breath of G-d, our healing lives here-in!

Now we find ourselves in the Days of Awe, between the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashana, and the day of atonement, Yom Kippor. This is the time for T’shuvah, T’fillah, and Tzedaka. Returning- to your soul, to your path, to yourself, to G-d. Prayer- crying out to the divine, and coming to reconciliation with others on the earth, and the earth herself. And charity- giving with a full heart.

We had an opportunity to cast our past year’s transgressions into flowing water to have it’s own mikvah of purification. Into the mayim chayim, the living waters during the Tashlique service.

When the prophet Isaiah instructs the people to atone for their sins, he says, seek G-d when G-d is close! And G-d is especially close on these 10 Days of Awe. So, my petition is thus, just as Moses cried out to G-d to heal his sister Miriam when she was struck ill, I too cry out for healing- for myself, for my loved ones, and for all who seek healing. Most of all, healing for the Earth, herself!

Ana Elna R’fanala~ R’fuah sh’layma!! (Body, soul, and spirit!)

L’Shanah Tova!

 

Breath

Sitting on the earth in a circle of musicians

Mountains of colored clay crumble into sand

I am holding and playing my clay ocarina

And the melody is mournful and familiar

Woman of clay and earth, creased and crumbling

A willing compnion until the end of days

Another is remarking that my clay ocarina must feel honored

It’s been sitting on the altar all these years

by, Yiskah Koock

Walk the walk

Unsteady

Been a tough weekend for mobility, but inspiriting!! Bernie Sanders stumped for Zephyr Teachout (running for the 19th congressional district.) At a local park in my town. I stood on the grass on this lovely late summer day,in the strong sun. After these 2 motivating progressive activist’s speeches, I realized walking would be a struggle, and it was, every step. My groovy leg brace, and olive wood walking stick, are little help in the face of body fatigue!

A day later, I sat on the grass again, in the strong sun, to watch my little boy’s first soccer game. Coaching myself: legs, engage, muscles, hold the body up, walk forward, take another step. “I think I can, I think I can…”

The question of “what is my life’s walk,” Comes to mind. Or more importantly, “how can I be of service in the world?” or as Jewish sages call it, Tikkun, or repair of the world. In the wise words of, Howard Thurman,

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

Answer: do what you love! So I am facilitating a dream group at the Center for Symbolic Studies, a new venue for me to host at, but I’ve been coming to the dream group at CSS, under the masterful tutelage of Stephen and Robin Larsen for 19 years! (Since I moved to the Mid-Hudson Valley.) Substitute facilitating when so honored.

Steve certified me to be a dream group facilitator 6 years in, of a direct lineage of teacher to student to Carl G. Jung, whose picture adorns his office, I have also had the great, good fortune of learning with, and being certified by master teacher and minister, Jeremy Taylor, of MIPD, and dream shaman, “the maestro”, Robert Moss.

And a further report on these symptoms caused by MS, the pain level in my right shoulder is high! wow- an electric pulse coursing through me, my right side of my jaw has joined the fray- maybe the Medical Marijuana takes the edge off? (see previous blog post: Medical Marijuana Today, I went for my first session of Qi Gong with a phenomenal woman, Helen B., who is offering this ancient knowledge as her service in the world

A little later in the season with the changing leaves in this pic.

. Though my body is limited in the motions it can make to gather the energy, let this serve as a baseline from which to only improve, and may this martial art bring renewal in mind, body, breath!.

Here is the event invite for the next dream-sharing circle I’m hosting: https://www.facebook.com/events/210249016059245/
If you find yourself in New Paltz, (which I highly recommend), Come do dream work with us!