"True Peace is not merely the absence of tension, it is the presence of justice." Martin Luther King, Jr
I arrived in Truth or Consequences late Tuesday night. Karen, the homeopath who I was to stay with, had just arriving home from a concert, where Miriam, a Peace singer had just entertained a local group for several hours. Karen welcomed me with raw hummus, raw vegan crackers and olives and tales of the beautiful music, which I had missed by a few hours. Karen decided to host a dinner the next evening for all the Divine Divas -- the spiritually inclined women in the community -- to say goodbye to Miriam and to meet with me.
Karen and her husband are raw foodists so the feast the next day was to be a fare of 100% raw food. Though I have eaten vegetarian for many years i had not really thought about food in terms of whether it was raw or not. My stay with Karen was to make me look at the world with new lenses.
The next morning Karen started calling and emailing the local women. We went down town to the local health food stores and met several women who Karen immediately invited. Everywhere we went we met women who we interested in the gathering, some who could make it and some not. In the end we had 9 women who formed the first Goddess Circle in the community, what those who came are hoping will become a monthly gathering for the spiritually minded women.
Karen and I worked all afternoon preparing the spread -- guacamole made with fresh organic avocados, tomatoes, onions and garlic; raw vegan crackers; gaspacho with tomatoes, onions, zucchini and green pepper; my mother's amazing cucumber salad, a huge raw organic salad with romaine lettuce, fresh pea sprouts; carrots, green pepper and tomatoes; a plater of sliced carrots, cauliflower, broccoli; raw goats cheese; a raw banana coconut pie with a walnut date crust; an avocado chocolate mint pudding; gingered grapes and hibiscus sun tea. It was a feast fit for a Goddess, or a Divine Diva.
Women started arriving slowly congregating in the kitchen until the crowd began to spill over into the living room. We introduced ourselves and Miriam welcomed us with several songs of Peace sung in her native language, Hebrew. Karen sang a song she had shared with Miriam the night before and Lou recited a poem. Peace was the topic of the evening. Peace, a Raw feast, Hot Springs and Divine Divas ... what more can you ask for ... a combination made in heaven!!
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Firing the Grid and Admiring the Desert
"Responsibility does not lie with the leaders of our countries or with those who have been appointed or elected to do a particular job. It lies with each of us individually. Peace, for example, starts within each one of us. When we have inner peace we can be at peace with those around us. When we feel love and kindness towards others, it not only makes others feel loved and cared for, but it helps us to develop inner happiness and peace" his holiness the Dalai Lama.
Thursday July 17 was the day to fire the grid. People from around the world were connecting energetically through prayer and meditation to our mother the Earth and sending love, peace and harmony and the energy of collective cooperation to heal the earth and to awaken our individual and collective souls as human beings on this planet at this conjuncture in time-space to our true purpose. If you were not part of the process or know nothing about firing the grid you can find out more at www.firethegrid.com.
I was a one of the millions of people around the world who fired the grid at 11:11am GMT or 4:11am Arizona time. I had originally planned to be on my way to San Antonio, Texas via Truth or Consequences, New Mexico on Monday but decided to stay to collectively fire the grid. It seemed like a good way to end my stay in Prescott.
Although I had stayed up very late packing up and cleaning up the apartment in the healing centre where I had been staying, I was up at 3:45am when Daisy came over to prepare the healing centre. The women started arriving a few minutes later. By 4:09 am there were 7 women gathered. We all sat in a circle around the deerskin rugs in front of the altar and we were ready to begin. The final two women who would join us came in just after we started the ceremony.
After a brief introduction, Daisy played the flute and and Margaret, who runs the sweat lodges at the healing centre, began drumming. That was their prayer for the earth. The rest of us were meditating and praying, sending healing energy to mother earth. Part way through the hour we listened to a CD of chants and the drum and flute prayers continued and our meditations continued. The birds were beginning to sing outside the window of the healing centre, joining in with us. Towards the end of the hour we began to name beautiful and not so beautiful places on the earth that we wanted to be healed. We all joined hands and I imagined that we were holding hands with all the people around the world that were firing the grid at the same time that we were. We did a visualization where we draw the vital energy from the sky, from source, through our bodies and sent it down into the earth to wrap three times around the core of the earth, the heart of our mother pacha mama. It was 5:11am. A few women had to leave to go to work and a few remained to discuss the prayer.
It was starting to get lighter. Margaret suggested that we go outside and drum in the sunrise. It was a great idea as it allowed us to walk on mother earth with a new sense of connection and respect, still focusing on peace, harmony and balance. We went over to the sacred ground where the sweat lodge is usually held. It is a clearing surrounded by firs and desert shrubs. The sun was just beginning to peak over the mountains in the distance. There were 4 of us. Margaret was drumming and singing a Lakota turtle song for Mother Earth. It was a powerful experience indeed.
After tea and breakfast I finished packing the car and was on my way. It was much later than I had planned to leave and I had hardly slept so I only drove for an hour heading towards Phoenix before I had to stop to have a nap. Ten minutes later, totally refreshed, I was on the road again and did not stop till I got to Picacho Peak State Park. I had seen the name when I googled Sonora desert and for some reason it caught my eye.
I pulled off the highway when I saw the sign, paid my $3 fee to enter the park and was informed by the two park rangers that it was over 104 degrees and probably not a great time of day to be hiking up to the peak. I knew it was hot but did not realize that it was quite that hot. I was told it would take over an hour to hike up to the top of the peak. I was still planning to arrive in Truth or Consequences relatively early so decided not to do the climb. Instead I drove to the furthest part of the park and hiked around that area, enjoying the incredible view of the rolling desert plains, with the train tracks in the distance and the blue, blue Arizona sky.
I was very thirsty. I opened one of the juices I was carrying in the cooler and made a cheese sandwich, eating it as I looked out over the distant horizon, wondering which of the famous cowboys I had read about when I was a child had passed through this area that was now a park. I had visions of covered wagons moving across the plains and gun slingers and cattle rustlers riding among the tall cactus. Other than myself, the plants and the warm breeze, there was no one around and no movement anywhere nearby. Off in the distance I could see the tiny cars passing by on the highway and the even tinier train halfway across the plain.
This was a perfect place to continue to celebrate my connection with Mother Earth. I did a standing meditation facing the rugged mountain peak and then lay down briefly on the earth, feeling the incredible heat that had been accumulating all day on my back. It felt good to connect with the earth, to remember my connection to this powerful element that sustains us and gives us life. I thought back to the ceremony earlier in the morning when millions of people around the world joined together to send our energy, our healing energy, to nurture our mother who has nurtured us and continues to feed and clothe us. I said a prayer of thanks to the earth before I quickly got up before the heat of ground became too much. There was such a sense of peace.
Lessons learned: 1) Many hands make light work. We need to each do our part to nurture and take care of the earth. 2) Sometime you can find peace only a few steps off the beaten path, 3)Beauty is where you are.
Thursday July 17 was the day to fire the grid. People from around the world were connecting energetically through prayer and meditation to our mother the Earth and sending love, peace and harmony and the energy of collective cooperation to heal the earth and to awaken our individual and collective souls as human beings on this planet at this conjuncture in time-space to our true purpose. If you were not part of the process or know nothing about firing the grid you can find out more at www.firethegrid.com.
I was a one of the millions of people around the world who fired the grid at 11:11am GMT or 4:11am Arizona time. I had originally planned to be on my way to San Antonio, Texas via Truth or Consequences, New Mexico on Monday but decided to stay to collectively fire the grid. It seemed like a good way to end my stay in Prescott.
Although I had stayed up very late packing up and cleaning up the apartment in the healing centre where I had been staying, I was up at 3:45am when Daisy came over to prepare the healing centre. The women started arriving a few minutes later. By 4:09 am there were 7 women gathered. We all sat in a circle around the deerskin rugs in front of the altar and we were ready to begin. The final two women who would join us came in just after we started the ceremony.
After a brief introduction, Daisy played the flute and and Margaret, who runs the sweat lodges at the healing centre, began drumming. That was their prayer for the earth. The rest of us were meditating and praying, sending healing energy to mother earth. Part way through the hour we listened to a CD of chants and the drum and flute prayers continued and our meditations continued. The birds were beginning to sing outside the window of the healing centre, joining in with us. Towards the end of the hour we began to name beautiful and not so beautiful places on the earth that we wanted to be healed. We all joined hands and I imagined that we were holding hands with all the people around the world that were firing the grid at the same time that we were. We did a visualization where we draw the vital energy from the sky, from source, through our bodies and sent it down into the earth to wrap three times around the core of the earth, the heart of our mother pacha mama. It was 5:11am. A few women had to leave to go to work and a few remained to discuss the prayer.
It was starting to get lighter. Margaret suggested that we go outside and drum in the sunrise. It was a great idea as it allowed us to walk on mother earth with a new sense of connection and respect, still focusing on peace, harmony and balance. We went over to the sacred ground where the sweat lodge is usually held. It is a clearing surrounded by firs and desert shrubs. The sun was just beginning to peak over the mountains in the distance. There were 4 of us. Margaret was drumming and singing a Lakota turtle song for Mother Earth. It was a powerful experience indeed.
After tea and breakfast I finished packing the car and was on my way. It was much later than I had planned to leave and I had hardly slept so I only drove for an hour heading towards Phoenix before I had to stop to have a nap. Ten minutes later, totally refreshed, I was on the road again and did not stop till I got to Picacho Peak State Park. I had seen the name when I googled Sonora desert and for some reason it caught my eye.
I pulled off the highway when I saw the sign, paid my $3 fee to enter the park and was informed by the two park rangers that it was over 104 degrees and probably not a great time of day to be hiking up to the peak. I knew it was hot but did not realize that it was quite that hot. I was told it would take over an hour to hike up to the top of the peak. I was still planning to arrive in Truth or Consequences relatively early so decided not to do the climb. Instead I drove to the furthest part of the park and hiked around that area, enjoying the incredible view of the rolling desert plains, with the train tracks in the distance and the blue, blue Arizona sky.
I was very thirsty. I opened one of the juices I was carrying in the cooler and made a cheese sandwich, eating it as I looked out over the distant horizon, wondering which of the famous cowboys I had read about when I was a child had passed through this area that was now a park. I had visions of covered wagons moving across the plains and gun slingers and cattle rustlers riding among the tall cactus. Other than myself, the plants and the warm breeze, there was no one around and no movement anywhere nearby. Off in the distance I could see the tiny cars passing by on the highway and the even tinier train halfway across the plain.
This was a perfect place to continue to celebrate my connection with Mother Earth. I did a standing meditation facing the rugged mountain peak and then lay down briefly on the earth, feeling the incredible heat that had been accumulating all day on my back. It felt good to connect with the earth, to remember my connection to this powerful element that sustains us and gives us life. I thought back to the ceremony earlier in the morning when millions of people around the world joined together to send our energy, our healing energy, to nurture our mother who has nurtured us and continues to feed and clothe us. I said a prayer of thanks to the earth before I quickly got up before the heat of ground became too much. There was such a sense of peace.
Lessons learned: 1) Many hands make light work. We need to each do our part to nurture and take care of the earth. 2) Sometime you can find peace only a few steps off the beaten path, 3)Beauty is where you are.
Monday, July 16, 2007
Desert Rain! Oh How Sweet it is!
"Whoever Can See Through All Fear Will Always Be Safe" Tao Te Ching.
Ah!! The monsoons have arrived! I was hoping they would come before I left and today was the day. It has been raining since 2:30pm this afternoon and it is 10pm and it is still raining. Oh how sweet it is -- rain in the desert. I have never appreciated rain as much as I did today.
I was at the healing centre all morning and about 2 pm decided to go downtown to say goodbye to a few people I had met before I left and pick up a few things for my trip tomorrow. This time I took my camera, having found my battery charger the night before after it had hid itself away for the past 2 weeks. My first stop was to be the bank across from the square, but as I had my camera in hand I drove by the Aikido dojo where I have been training for the past 2 weeks to take a couple of photos before heading off to the square. There were a couple of large dark clouds hanging low in the sky and a few rumblings but there had been rumblings and the occasional dark cloud for the past week. I had been told that the monsoons were coming but truthfully did not expect to see rain before I left.
When I first arrived in Prescott just about a month ago the days were very hot and the nights quite cold, much like you would expect in any desert area -- not much of a difference as in the Wirricuta desert in Mexico. It got cold enough at night that I was sleeping with a blanket and with the windows closed. Not so of late! After I returned from the Sundance I noticed a shift in the night temperatures. It was getting warmer at night because of the increasing cloud cover which didn't seem to affect the daytime temperature, which was still hot but at night it was no longer that delightful cool then quite cold, in fact if it got to delightfully cool you were lucky. It was more of a balmy almost tropical summer night.. much like it had been in Jamaica when I was growing up. In fact some nights it was so warm that I found it hard to sleep. I was told that the balmy night weather had to build up for days until finally it rained. I kept hoping for the rain.
Well, it arrived today and has it ever rained. I arrived in the plaza downtown with many heavy clouds and took photos of the square trying to capture the light. I went into a spiritual bookstore hoping to find a present for Daisy the guardian of the woman's altar and 'bumped into' two of the people I had planned to see before I left. As I left the bookstore the rain started ... Those big, fat delicious raindrops that you get in the summer and oh the smell of the wet earth. It was amazing after so many weeks of hot dry weather. I stopped at the local natural food store to stock up on some items for my trip and by that time it was pouring. The heavy sudden down pour that we always used to get in the afternoons in summer in Jamaica. Ahhh.. and me with no raincoat! There I was running into the store like I used to run in the rain between classroom in high school.
Feeling the fat warm drops on my back and head. What a delight. In the store I again 'bumped into' another one of the few people I knew in Prescott. When I got everything I needed and was at the checkout counter the young woman who was on cash was looking longingly outside as the rain poured down. I'd love to be out there she said, but I am stuck in here. Everyone in the store seemed to have a smile on their fact. Rain in the desert where there has been a 12 year drought is enough to make even the hardest hearted person smile. As I went outside with my bags of groceries there was a woman sheltering from the rain under the eves. She asked if I was from here and did I know how long it lasted. I laughed and said I wasn't from here. Just then a man came out the store so I asked him if he was from here and how long the rain lasted. He said it usually lasts 20 minutes but that he was not going to let it keep him here because you never know how long it will really last.
I followed suit and ran through the rain to the car. It felt great to get wet in the desert. As I drove back to the healing centre I noticed so many puddles that had not been there only 2 hours before and the smell of the fresh wet pines. Oh how sweet it is. It doesn't get any better than this. I was later told by a local woman who came to the altar for a ceremony that the day before she had called her grandchildren in Vermont and they had told her that they had done a rain dance for it to rain in Prescott and her grandson had sent one cloud to her. Well, what powerful kids, I said. That one cloud must have picked up several friend's on the way because when it arrived in Prescott, it rained from 2:30pm till the wee hours of the morning...
Lessons learned: 1) Rain beautiful rain. Give thanks for the element of water in all its beautiful forms. 2) Our prayers are answered, 3) Innocent children carry powerful medicine.
staywell and travel with Spirit in Beauty and Truth, Spirit Traveller.
Ah!! The monsoons have arrived! I was hoping they would come before I left and today was the day. It has been raining since 2:30pm this afternoon and it is 10pm and it is still raining. Oh how sweet it is -- rain in the desert. I have never appreciated rain as much as I did today.
I was at the healing centre all morning and about 2 pm decided to go downtown to say goodbye to a few people I had met before I left and pick up a few things for my trip tomorrow. This time I took my camera, having found my battery charger the night before after it had hid itself away for the past 2 weeks. My first stop was to be the bank across from the square, but as I had my camera in hand I drove by the Aikido dojo where I have been training for the past 2 weeks to take a couple of photos before heading off to the square. There were a couple of large dark clouds hanging low in the sky and a few rumblings but there had been rumblings and the occasional dark cloud for the past week. I had been told that the monsoons were coming but truthfully did not expect to see rain before I left.
When I first arrived in Prescott just about a month ago the days were very hot and the nights quite cold, much like you would expect in any desert area -- not much of a difference as in the Wirricuta desert in Mexico. It got cold enough at night that I was sleeping with a blanket and with the windows closed. Not so of late! After I returned from the Sundance I noticed a shift in the night temperatures. It was getting warmer at night because of the increasing cloud cover which didn't seem to affect the daytime temperature, which was still hot but at night it was no longer that delightful cool then quite cold, in fact if it got to delightfully cool you were lucky. It was more of a balmy almost tropical summer night.. much like it had been in Jamaica when I was growing up. In fact some nights it was so warm that I found it hard to sleep. I was told that the balmy night weather had to build up for days until finally it rained. I kept hoping for the rain.
Well, it arrived today and has it ever rained. I arrived in the plaza downtown with many heavy clouds and took photos of the square trying to capture the light. I went into a spiritual bookstore hoping to find a present for Daisy the guardian of the woman's altar and 'bumped into' two of the people I had planned to see before I left. As I left the bookstore the rain started ... Those big, fat delicious raindrops that you get in the summer and oh the smell of the wet earth. It was amazing after so many weeks of hot dry weather. I stopped at the local natural food store to stock up on some items for my trip and by that time it was pouring. The heavy sudden down pour that we always used to get in the afternoons in summer in Jamaica. Ahhh.. and me with no raincoat! There I was running into the store like I used to run in the rain between classroom in high school.
Feeling the fat warm drops on my back and head. What a delight. In the store I again 'bumped into' another one of the few people I knew in Prescott. When I got everything I needed and was at the checkout counter the young woman who was on cash was looking longingly outside as the rain poured down. I'd love to be out there she said, but I am stuck in here. Everyone in the store seemed to have a smile on their fact. Rain in the desert where there has been a 12 year drought is enough to make even the hardest hearted person smile. As I went outside with my bags of groceries there was a woman sheltering from the rain under the eves. She asked if I was from here and did I know how long it lasted. I laughed and said I wasn't from here. Just then a man came out the store so I asked him if he was from here and how long the rain lasted. He said it usually lasts 20 minutes but that he was not going to let it keep him here because you never know how long it will really last.
I followed suit and ran through the rain to the car. It felt great to get wet in the desert. As I drove back to the healing centre I noticed so many puddles that had not been there only 2 hours before and the smell of the fresh wet pines. Oh how sweet it is. It doesn't get any better than this. I was later told by a local woman who came to the altar for a ceremony that the day before she had called her grandchildren in Vermont and they had told her that they had done a rain dance for it to rain in Prescott and her grandson had sent one cloud to her. Well, what powerful kids, I said. That one cloud must have picked up several friend's on the way because when it arrived in Prescott, it rained from 2:30pm till the wee hours of the morning...
Lessons learned: 1) Rain beautiful rain. Give thanks for the element of water in all its beautiful forms. 2) Our prayers are answered, 3) Innocent children carry powerful medicine.
staywell and travel with Spirit in Beauty and Truth, Spirit Traveller.
Saturday, July 14, 2007
Traeger, Ecological Acupuncturist
Traeger Stertzbach, Ecological Acupuncturist.
I met Traeger at my first Aikido class in Prescott. He is a student of Sensei Bob Ward, who I had met at the sundance and who graciously allowed me to train in his dojo while I was in Prescott. When I found out that Traeger also does acupuncture I thought he might be a great subject for my blog, so I went to visit his practice which is located in the space owned by the Shanti Wellness Project, a not for profit Organization which provided low cost Wholistic Health care for Women in Yavapai county. More about Shanti in another post.
Traeger graduated last year from the 4 year program at the Oregon College of Oriental medicine. After finishing an undergraduate degree in natural history and ecology, he went to Portland planning to go to Naturopathic College but after talking with senior students at both colleges decided to go into Oriental medicine. At the time it seemed like a huge shift. But what he asked himself was whether he wanted to continue to operate in a Western scientific framework or if it was time to step outside of the box. The answer was Oriental Medicine.
“I graduated with an undergraduate degree in natural history and ecology from Prescott College in 1999. The same year that Shanti was finishing up her project. I graduated from Chinese Medicine school last September. When I came back to Prescott I was looking at partnering up with a chiropractor, or something like that. I was hoping to find someone to work with or learn from. I called everyone I knew and no one seemed to need a partner. The truth is in Arizona, if you partner with a chiropractor who is billing for your services it’s a bit tricky since acupuncturists are not allowed to bill for our services. I realized that I needed to just go for it and open my own practice. I found out that the Shanti Wellness Project was looking for practitioners through two friends who are acupuncturists. They work out of room 1 on Monday’s, Fridays and Saturdays. I called Sherry and arranged to see the space. When I came I felt that the energy here was great, so I put some paint on the walls and a rug on the floor and here I am.”
“The mission of the Shanti is something that I fully connect to and I have several related projects on the go. Jason and Laura, the two other acupuncturists, and I are discussing the possibility of a community based acupuncture clinic similar to the working class acupuncture project that they have in Portland, Oregon. You can think of it as a type of group acupuncture or network chiropractic. The practitioner sees each client individually to take the pulse and check the tongue and find out their chief complaint but instead of having one room, one client all the treatment is done in a room with several clients. The practitioner puts the needles in and goes on to the next person.. This allows the practitioner to charge $20-$35 per session making it feasible for people who do not have a lot of money to come in once or twice a week.” That way of practicing is much more similar to the way they treat patients in China.
I asked him if he saw OM as more of a spiritual path. His response was that he does but that this path is also helping him to be more grounded to the physical realm as his tendency is to think a lot and this is a very physical and very practical form of medicine. He uses a lot of shiatsu in his treatments. For him it is very important to be fully present with the patient and the real time changes that are going on during the treatment. “It is possible to get off into your head, but the hands-on work requires you to really pay attention.” he says. Traeger is a minimalist when it comes to point selection. His training is much like mine – use as few needles as possible. He explains this drawing on the imagery used in a lecture he once attended – the pond effect he calls it – the difference between the ripple effect after throwing one or two stones into a pond and throwing many stones into the same pond. He sees oriental medicine as a medicine that more in tune with the ecology of the human body than the reductionist approach of allopathic medicine.
Although he is a fairly new practitioner, he is drawn to meridian style acupuncture where he sees the channel as a whole. He loves to have 5 element acupuncture done to him, but on his patients he focuses on the entire meridian, or energy channel.
I asked Traeger to explain why he sees acupuncture as more like ecology, than reductionism. He takes me back to my undergrad ecology days, reminding me that the root of ecology is eco’ logos – the study of the family home, and that it focuses on looking at the organism in relation to the environment they are in and the greater system that surrounds them. He says that in oriental medicine we have to take into consideration the organism, their environment and factors in their day to day – that is ecology. In fact, oriental medicine stems from a real close observation of nature. He talks about the time when he was walking near a shipyard and noticed the variations in the river channels he immediately thought back to the he-sea points and the shu-transport points on the energy channels he had studied and realized that this was how the analogies were made, by observing these relationships in nature.
Traeger adds “After I finished my undergrad I left Prescott wondering how am I going to affect change in this environmental crisis? I am not an activist nor am I a policymaker. This seemed like a way to affect change at an individual and a community level. Not only can we use specific acupuncture points to affect the ecology of an individual but that individual is him or herself an acupuncture point in their community.”
One of the projects that Traeger is working on really integrates his ecology background with his love of oriental medicine. That is the herbothecary and teahouse he is working on creating with Margaret, the owner of Magpie, a local food coop and health food store. They plan to sell bulk teas and to serve teas in a traditional way.
“In relationship to my clients, I see myself as a guide or a listener. I really see them as the teachers. Everyone is just an incredible resource. I am getting a lot of difficult cases and they are teaching me how to practice this medicine. I feel fortunate that I have been able to help some of them make changes in their lives. I love to come to work to help people make changes in their lives.”
I met Traeger at my first Aikido class in Prescott. He is a student of Sensei Bob Ward, who I had met at the sundance and who graciously allowed me to train in his dojo while I was in Prescott. When I found out that Traeger also does acupuncture I thought he might be a great subject for my blog, so I went to visit his practice which is located in the space owned by the Shanti Wellness Project, a not for profit Organization which provided low cost Wholistic Health care for Women in Yavapai county. More about Shanti in another post.
Traeger graduated last year from the 4 year program at the Oregon College of Oriental medicine. After finishing an undergraduate degree in natural history and ecology, he went to Portland planning to go to Naturopathic College but after talking with senior students at both colleges decided to go into Oriental medicine. At the time it seemed like a huge shift. But what he asked himself was whether he wanted to continue to operate in a Western scientific framework or if it was time to step outside of the box. The answer was Oriental Medicine.
“I graduated with an undergraduate degree in natural history and ecology from Prescott College in 1999. The same year that Shanti was finishing up her project. I graduated from Chinese Medicine school last September. When I came back to Prescott I was looking at partnering up with a chiropractor, or something like that. I was hoping to find someone to work with or learn from. I called everyone I knew and no one seemed to need a partner. The truth is in Arizona, if you partner with a chiropractor who is billing for your services it’s a bit tricky since acupuncturists are not allowed to bill for our services. I realized that I needed to just go for it and open my own practice. I found out that the Shanti Wellness Project was looking for practitioners through two friends who are acupuncturists. They work out of room 1 on Monday’s, Fridays and Saturdays. I called Sherry and arranged to see the space. When I came I felt that the energy here was great, so I put some paint on the walls and a rug on the floor and here I am.”
“The mission of the Shanti is something that I fully connect to and I have several related projects on the go. Jason and Laura, the two other acupuncturists, and I are discussing the possibility of a community based acupuncture clinic similar to the working class acupuncture project that they have in Portland, Oregon. You can think of it as a type of group acupuncture or network chiropractic. The practitioner sees each client individually to take the pulse and check the tongue and find out their chief complaint but instead of having one room, one client all the treatment is done in a room with several clients. The practitioner puts the needles in and goes on to the next person.. This allows the practitioner to charge $20-$35 per session making it feasible for people who do not have a lot of money to come in once or twice a week.” That way of practicing is much more similar to the way they treat patients in China.
I asked him if he saw OM as more of a spiritual path. His response was that he does but that this path is also helping him to be more grounded to the physical realm as his tendency is to think a lot and this is a very physical and very practical form of medicine. He uses a lot of shiatsu in his treatments. For him it is very important to be fully present with the patient and the real time changes that are going on during the treatment. “It is possible to get off into your head, but the hands-on work requires you to really pay attention.” he says. Traeger is a minimalist when it comes to point selection. His training is much like mine – use as few needles as possible. He explains this drawing on the imagery used in a lecture he once attended – the pond effect he calls it – the difference between the ripple effect after throwing one or two stones into a pond and throwing many stones into the same pond. He sees oriental medicine as a medicine that more in tune with the ecology of the human body than the reductionist approach of allopathic medicine.
Although he is a fairly new practitioner, he is drawn to meridian style acupuncture where he sees the channel as a whole. He loves to have 5 element acupuncture done to him, but on his patients he focuses on the entire meridian, or energy channel.
I asked Traeger to explain why he sees acupuncture as more like ecology, than reductionism. He takes me back to my undergrad ecology days, reminding me that the root of ecology is eco’ logos – the study of the family home, and that it focuses on looking at the organism in relation to the environment they are in and the greater system that surrounds them. He says that in oriental medicine we have to take into consideration the organism, their environment and factors in their day to day – that is ecology. In fact, oriental medicine stems from a real close observation of nature. He talks about the time when he was walking near a shipyard and noticed the variations in the river channels he immediately thought back to the he-sea points and the shu-transport points on the energy channels he had studied and realized that this was how the analogies were made, by observing these relationships in nature.
Traeger adds “After I finished my undergrad I left Prescott wondering how am I going to affect change in this environmental crisis? I am not an activist nor am I a policymaker. This seemed like a way to affect change at an individual and a community level. Not only can we use specific acupuncture points to affect the ecology of an individual but that individual is him or herself an acupuncture point in their community.”
One of the projects that Traeger is working on really integrates his ecology background with his love of oriental medicine. That is the herbothecary and teahouse he is working on creating with Margaret, the owner of Magpie, a local food coop and health food store. They plan to sell bulk teas and to serve teas in a traditional way.
“In relationship to my clients, I see myself as a guide or a listener. I really see them as the teachers. Everyone is just an incredible resource. I am getting a lot of difficult cases and they are teaching me how to practice this medicine. I feel fortunate that I have been able to help some of them make changes in their lives. I love to come to work to help people make changes in their lives.”
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Healing Myself at The Women's Altar
"Power is not given lightly but awarded to those who are willing to carry responsibility in a balanced manner" Jamie Sams and David Carson
I've been staying at the Morning Blessing Way Healing Center since Sundance ended. Daisy had invited me to come back and stay for a while. The invitation was in fact an invitation from the Grand Will, there were things I still needed to learn and much I still needed to do at the healing centre. Masauke was heading back to San Antonio with Linda after the Sundance to do some carpentry work and transform her house. Linda, who had driven from Texas to the Sundance, wanted to spend some time with Masauke and to enjoy a slow drive from Arizona to Texas, connecting with friends and relatives along the way. Spirit was again coordinating our agendas -- I would drive her car back to the women's altar allowing her to head back to Texas with Masauke and me to have a vehicle to get me back to Texas after my stay. The Great Mystery works in amazing ways if we are truly open to the workings of Spirit.
Before I had left for the Sundance, Daisy and I had done our first work together at the altar facilitating an energetic shift for a man who had a very difficult childhood and was still carrying the energetic resonances of his early childhood experiences. It had been a beautiful experience working together at the altar as we work in very different but complimentary ways. Daisy, using the flute and drum as she connects to the Great Spirit in prayer, and I doing energy work and featherwork, clearing away resonances from his energy field. He had wanted to come back for a deeper session but I had been leaving for the sundance so Daisy invited me back.
There have not been a lot of people coming to the altar since I have been here other than him. Those who come are those who should be there. When Daisy and I worked together again Daisy rebirthing this man and I helped to connect him to his mother's love and his father's strength, neither of which he had experience before even though he is now in his late 50s. It was a powerful experience for each of us - him because he was able to feel those powerful emotions and for me because it allowed me to trust my inner knowing that I would know which of the healing tools, the medicines, I carry would be appropriate and when to use them.
Daisy and I have since worked together to do an energy clearing and to introduce a visiting woman to the energy of the woman's altar. Most of the time that I have been here Daisy has been working on finishing her book. I have had the opportunity to read and review the book which tells a truly powerful story about the healing of her son and her spiritual journey. As well, I have had time to experience a new martial art - Aikido at the local Aikido dojo, to write and to visit several local organizations and individuals some of whom I had met last year when I had visited after the sundance and many of whom serendipity or the Spirit has newly presented.
Mostly what I have been doing while I have been here though is healing myself! Listening to the voice of Spirit, listening to my inner knowing and truly learning to follow that. I have been sleeping in the apartment built by Masauke ajoining the healing centre which serves as a retreat for those visiting. The center surrounded by trees and a dry wash/river bed divides it from Daisy's house and the area where the Blessing Way sweatlodge is conducted at times of the year when there is no fire ban [There has not bee a sweat since I have been here because of the fire hazard, but I am told that the monsoons are coming and hope to experience them before I leave in a few days.
Every day I have been spending time at the women's altar, meditating and praying. A few nights when I could not sleep I would go quietly into the healing centre and lie on the deerskins in front of the altar, falling asleep to beautiful dreams of a very old medicine man and medicine woman working on me as I sleep, massaging my spirit and soothing my mind, removing that which no longer serves me from my mind, body and spirit. I have been re-connecting with the exercise and meditation routine I used to follow and figuring out what is right for me at this time. I have been following a simple but very well balanced diet and getting as much rest as my body has demanded. I have been doing my headstands and my tai chi and martial arts routine regularly. It has truly been a gift to have this time at this beautiful healing centre to focus on healing myself. What a blessing indeed!
Thanks You Daisy! Thank You Linda! and Thank You Masauke! for all you have shared and for all you have taught me about listening to myself and healing myself, and most of all thank you to the Great Spirit, for working through Masauke, Linda and Daisy.
Lessons: 1) Always listen to your body and your inner knowings, 2) Know when you need a rest and take it! 3) Be true to your self and your path. Do what is right for you!
staywell and travel with Spirit in Beauty and Truth, Spirit Traveller
I've been staying at the Morning Blessing Way Healing Center since Sundance ended. Daisy had invited me to come back and stay for a while. The invitation was in fact an invitation from the Grand Will, there were things I still needed to learn and much I still needed to do at the healing centre. Masauke was heading back to San Antonio with Linda after the Sundance to do some carpentry work and transform her house. Linda, who had driven from Texas to the Sundance, wanted to spend some time with Masauke and to enjoy a slow drive from Arizona to Texas, connecting with friends and relatives along the way. Spirit was again coordinating our agendas -- I would drive her car back to the women's altar allowing her to head back to Texas with Masauke and me to have a vehicle to get me back to Texas after my stay. The Great Mystery works in amazing ways if we are truly open to the workings of Spirit.
Before I had left for the Sundance, Daisy and I had done our first work together at the altar facilitating an energetic shift for a man who had a very difficult childhood and was still carrying the energetic resonances of his early childhood experiences. It had been a beautiful experience working together at the altar as we work in very different but complimentary ways. Daisy, using the flute and drum as she connects to the Great Spirit in prayer, and I doing energy work and featherwork, clearing away resonances from his energy field. He had wanted to come back for a deeper session but I had been leaving for the sundance so Daisy invited me back.
There have not been a lot of people coming to the altar since I have been here other than him. Those who come are those who should be there. When Daisy and I worked together again Daisy rebirthing this man and I helped to connect him to his mother's love and his father's strength, neither of which he had experience before even though he is now in his late 50s. It was a powerful experience for each of us - him because he was able to feel those powerful emotions and for me because it allowed me to trust my inner knowing that I would know which of the healing tools, the medicines, I carry would be appropriate and when to use them.
Daisy and I have since worked together to do an energy clearing and to introduce a visiting woman to the energy of the woman's altar. Most of the time that I have been here Daisy has been working on finishing her book. I have had the opportunity to read and review the book which tells a truly powerful story about the healing of her son and her spiritual journey. As well, I have had time to experience a new martial art - Aikido at the local Aikido dojo, to write and to visit several local organizations and individuals some of whom I had met last year when I had visited after the sundance and many of whom serendipity or the Spirit has newly presented.
Mostly what I have been doing while I have been here though is healing myself! Listening to the voice of Spirit, listening to my inner knowing and truly learning to follow that. I have been sleeping in the apartment built by Masauke ajoining the healing centre which serves as a retreat for those visiting. The center surrounded by trees and a dry wash/river bed divides it from Daisy's house and the area where the Blessing Way sweatlodge is conducted at times of the year when there is no fire ban [There has not bee a sweat since I have been here because of the fire hazard, but I am told that the monsoons are coming and hope to experience them before I leave in a few days.
Every day I have been spending time at the women's altar, meditating and praying. A few nights when I could not sleep I would go quietly into the healing centre and lie on the deerskins in front of the altar, falling asleep to beautiful dreams of a very old medicine man and medicine woman working on me as I sleep, massaging my spirit and soothing my mind, removing that which no longer serves me from my mind, body and spirit. I have been re-connecting with the exercise and meditation routine I used to follow and figuring out what is right for me at this time. I have been following a simple but very well balanced diet and getting as much rest as my body has demanded. I have been doing my headstands and my tai chi and martial arts routine regularly. It has truly been a gift to have this time at this beautiful healing centre to focus on healing myself. What a blessing indeed!
Thanks You Daisy! Thank You Linda! and Thank You Masauke! for all you have shared and for all you have taught me about listening to myself and healing myself, and most of all thank you to the Great Spirit, for working through Masauke, Linda and Daisy.
Lessons: 1) Always listen to your body and your inner knowings, 2) Know when you need a rest and take it! 3) Be true to your self and your path. Do what is right for you!
staywell and travel with Spirit in Beauty and Truth, Spirit Traveller
Monday, July 9, 2007
Blessings
Blessings to everyone reading this blog:
May your path continue to be illuminated.
May you find peace and joy scattered like rose petals at your feet on your journeys.
May you dance with innocence and enchantment.
May truth fall like raindrops and refreshen the ground you walk on.
May love encircle your heart and send it's root into your soul to nourish nourish nourish you and keep you strong.
May Faith, Joy and Hope be your constant companions.
May blossoms of beauty scatter in front of you like tiny seeds blowing in the wind, and may all the desires of your heart become whispers that echo in the canyons of possibilities, manifest in the realm of dreams and take root in the lands of opportunity.
May ALL that is good, true, beautiful, magical and harmonious be your now and always and may you find those you truly love and continue to walk together with love in your heart, beauty in your soul and joy in your steps and the deep and true knowledge that you are always connected through time and space to the ends of infinity and eternity and back.
May you bathe in fountains of love and swim in rivers of abundant blessings.
May you know that you are a precious and true manifestation of the Divine and that you are always truly, truly blessed and that you are also a true blessing to Gaia/Pacha Mama, our home and earth mother.
This is my blessing to you ...
StayWell and Travel with Spirit, in Beauty and Truth, Spirit Traveller
May your path continue to be illuminated.
May you find peace and joy scattered like rose petals at your feet on your journeys.
May you dance with innocence and enchantment.
May truth fall like raindrops and refreshen the ground you walk on.
May love encircle your heart and send it's root into your soul to nourish nourish nourish you and keep you strong.
May Faith, Joy and Hope be your constant companions.
May blossoms of beauty scatter in front of you like tiny seeds blowing in the wind, and may all the desires of your heart become whispers that echo in the canyons of possibilities, manifest in the realm of dreams and take root in the lands of opportunity.
May ALL that is good, true, beautiful, magical and harmonious be your now and always and may you find those you truly love and continue to walk together with love in your heart, beauty in your soul and joy in your steps and the deep and true knowledge that you are always connected through time and space to the ends of infinity and eternity and back.
May you bathe in fountains of love and swim in rivers of abundant blessings.
May you know that you are a precious and true manifestation of the Divine and that you are always truly, truly blessed and that you are also a true blessing to Gaia/Pacha Mama, our home and earth mother.
This is my blessing to you ...
StayWell and Travel with Spirit, in Beauty and Truth, Spirit Traveller
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Hanging Out with HyoChul
"Unlike goddesses associated with fertility, Tara is approached primarily as a protector and preserver of life. In the sky above, a dragon emerges from the clouds clutching a wish-fulfilling gem. In the Buddhist tradition, the pearl without price symbolizes the wisdom of selflessness, of great compassion - "the one force benefiting both self and others." Celestial Gallery. Romeo Shrestha.
Hyochul is a very special 14 year old boy who lives in Prescott, Arizona. He has lived here for 11 years and before that lived in Idaho. Hyochul loves to draw, ride his bike and rollerblade. Hyochul tells me he had leukemia for 3 years and says that he was dealing with the medical stuff for a long time. His mother clarifies that it was the rejection to the bone marrow transplant and the after effects of the transplant that lasted 6 and a half years. Thirty percent of kids who have the transplant die during the transplant and another 30% die in the first year. HyoChul is one of a very small percentage of kids who have survived a specific type of childhood leukemia, and his mother Daisy feels that he is a precious gift who came into her life to reinforce her faith in the Great Spirit and that through his sacrifice and her sacrifice to keep him alive, she found the strength she needed to become the guardian of the women's altar.
His mother, who has studied with many great teachers including Swami Hiraharinanda Giri, the last living disciple of Sri YuctaSwa and Yoginanda's fellow disciple, with Luke Chan the first Master of ChiLiel Chi Gong in the West and with Masauke, says that HyoChul is her greatest teacher. She tells of the time when they had found out how serious HyoChul's leukemia was. He had 0.02% chance of living because he had a very specific translocation and did not go into remission. She and her husband had to decide whether or not to go the route of a transplant and she had 4 people pray and send chi when they were making the decision about whether he would have the transplant that had as much chance of killing him as saving him.
Many say that HyoChul is still alive now because of Daisy's faith, she never ever gave up, and also because of the energy and chi and prayers sent by the thousands of people around the world who were part of Daisy's chi gung network. Hyochul's story touched the heart of a Navajo medicine man who gathered 21 native men who had never met HyoChul and did a sweatlodge for his healing. The Bodinath temple in Katmandu did a ceremony for his healing. Daisy even went to the local Tibet store and asked them to take a picture of HyoChul to Garchen Rimpoche and he too gave a blessing. "China and Tibet were completely united in that little child at 7 years old" she says.
After several attempts during the 6.5 years to reduce the anti-rejection meds that kept HyoChul's transplanted immune system from rejecting the rest of his body, he finally came of the meds last year just before he want to the Sundance. Daisy firmly believes that it was the days of drumming at the Sundance that kept HyoChul's body from needing to go back on the meds. When asked about his experience at the sundance last year, HyoChul said that it was nothing special, just another religious thing, but that he had met some people that he really liked at the Sundance.
Hyochul's first love is his art. He says that the love of art has always been in his family and that even when he was very little he can always remember scribbling and drawing, He's just gotten better as he got older. He feels that he is good at art because he practices every day not so much because he was born being really good.
The thing he loves best about living in Prescott is his friends. He loves hanging out with his friends and even more hanging out with his 4 older brothers and 1 older sister. Most of the time he is not very excited by Prescott though because he says that there is nothing to do in Prescott.
He is working on drawing a comic book which he started a few years ago and which features an evil inventor who created a character named after Hyochul who must escape from the clutches of his evil creator. The story sounds really interesting though I haven't seen Hyochuls' drawings yet. We spent some time this afternoon hanging out at the ice cream parlour in front of the downtown square eating sorbet while HyoChul filled me in on the plot of comic book.
Hyochul has been home schooled for most of his life and has had 1 year of regular school. Although he thought that the 'regular' school is more social and that you meet a lot of people, he did not like going to school because many of the kid were jerks to use his words.. They talked about people behind their backs and to their faces and he really did not like that.
He also plans to create designs that he wants to put on t-shirts and sell. He is already a bit of a business man as he negotiated a deal with Masauke to buy some of his Huichol t-shirts at cost and he sells them to visitors to the healing centre.
HyoChul has tried Aikido but found that sitting in ceza [sitting on your knees] was very hard on his legs that he says are not as flexible as many other peoples. I taught him some of the basic karate stances, kicks and punches and he seemed to really connect with karate so I plan to take him to one of the local karate schools later this week to see if he connects with that art in a way that will help him find the pearl without price in himself.
It has been a wonderful experience meeting this special kid who is struggling to find himself and his gift to the world and who despite everything he's been through, does not feel that he is any different from any other 14 year old.
Lessons learned: 1) Life is Precious, 2) Never make assumptions about who people are or what they have gone through, 3) Prayer is powerful! Faith even more so.
Staywell and Travel with Spirit in Beauty and Truth, Spirit Traveller.
Hyochul is a very special 14 year old boy who lives in Prescott, Arizona. He has lived here for 11 years and before that lived in Idaho. Hyochul loves to draw, ride his bike and rollerblade. Hyochul tells me he had leukemia for 3 years and says that he was dealing with the medical stuff for a long time. His mother clarifies that it was the rejection to the bone marrow transplant and the after effects of the transplant that lasted 6 and a half years. Thirty percent of kids who have the transplant die during the transplant and another 30% die in the first year. HyoChul is one of a very small percentage of kids who have survived a specific type of childhood leukemia, and his mother Daisy feels that he is a precious gift who came into her life to reinforce her faith in the Great Spirit and that through his sacrifice and her sacrifice to keep him alive, she found the strength she needed to become the guardian of the women's altar.
His mother, who has studied with many great teachers including Swami Hiraharinanda Giri, the last living disciple of Sri YuctaSwa and Yoginanda's fellow disciple, with Luke Chan the first Master of ChiLiel Chi Gong in the West and with Masauke, says that HyoChul is her greatest teacher. She tells of the time when they had found out how serious HyoChul's leukemia was. He had 0.02% chance of living because he had a very specific translocation and did not go into remission. She and her husband had to decide whether or not to go the route of a transplant and she had 4 people pray and send chi when they were making the decision about whether he would have the transplant that had as much chance of killing him as saving him.
Many say that HyoChul is still alive now because of Daisy's faith, she never ever gave up, and also because of the energy and chi and prayers sent by the thousands of people around the world who were part of Daisy's chi gung network. Hyochul's story touched the heart of a Navajo medicine man who gathered 21 native men who had never met HyoChul and did a sweatlodge for his healing. The Bodinath temple in Katmandu did a ceremony for his healing. Daisy even went to the local Tibet store and asked them to take a picture of HyoChul to Garchen Rimpoche and he too gave a blessing. "China and Tibet were completely united in that little child at 7 years old" she says.
After several attempts during the 6.5 years to reduce the anti-rejection meds that kept HyoChul's transplanted immune system from rejecting the rest of his body, he finally came of the meds last year just before he want to the Sundance. Daisy firmly believes that it was the days of drumming at the Sundance that kept HyoChul's body from needing to go back on the meds. When asked about his experience at the sundance last year, HyoChul said that it was nothing special, just another religious thing, but that he had met some people that he really liked at the Sundance.
Hyochul's first love is his art. He says that the love of art has always been in his family and that even when he was very little he can always remember scribbling and drawing, He's just gotten better as he got older. He feels that he is good at art because he practices every day not so much because he was born being really good.
The thing he loves best about living in Prescott is his friends. He loves hanging out with his friends and even more hanging out with his 4 older brothers and 1 older sister. Most of the time he is not very excited by Prescott though because he says that there is nothing to do in Prescott.
He is working on drawing a comic book which he started a few years ago and which features an evil inventor who created a character named after Hyochul who must escape from the clutches of his evil creator. The story sounds really interesting though I haven't seen Hyochuls' drawings yet. We spent some time this afternoon hanging out at the ice cream parlour in front of the downtown square eating sorbet while HyoChul filled me in on the plot of comic book.
Hyochul has been home schooled for most of his life and has had 1 year of regular school. Although he thought that the 'regular' school is more social and that you meet a lot of people, he did not like going to school because many of the kid were jerks to use his words.. They talked about people behind their backs and to their faces and he really did not like that.
He also plans to create designs that he wants to put on t-shirts and sell. He is already a bit of a business man as he negotiated a deal with Masauke to buy some of his Huichol t-shirts at cost and he sells them to visitors to the healing centre.
HyoChul has tried Aikido but found that sitting in ceza [sitting on your knees] was very hard on his legs that he says are not as flexible as many other peoples. I taught him some of the basic karate stances, kicks and punches and he seemed to really connect with karate so I plan to take him to one of the local karate schools later this week to see if he connects with that art in a way that will help him find the pearl without price in himself.
It has been a wonderful experience meeting this special kid who is struggling to find himself and his gift to the world and who despite everything he's been through, does not feel that he is any different from any other 14 year old.
Lessons learned: 1) Life is Precious, 2) Never make assumptions about who people are or what they have gone through, 3) Prayer is powerful! Faith even more so.
Staywell and Travel with Spirit in Beauty and Truth, Spirit Traveller.
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