Lee Holden Archives - meagan burns

May 21, 2015May 22, 2015

Why I do the New Energy in 15

For the past 40 weeks, I’ve been posting a 15-second video to Instagram, sharing insight on what I’ve learned about energy. “Energy?” you say?! “Energy!!” I say! “Energy Balls!” I say even louder!! The road has been fascinating and it will be a lifetime of learning — tip of the iceberg, as they say. Some weeks are better than others and I find I am getting better at just rolling with it. I’m truly dedicated to this, so I decided early on to commit to doing #NewEnergyin15 for one year… but why?

Because there’s so much to learn, so much to know and so much to try. So much to heal. I don’t need to post the videos on the social networks, but why not? It’s fun and helps keep me focused on this, my purpose. Learning about video on the iPhone and all the cool apps available, are an added bonus. Doing energy work in public places has all kinds of perks, mainly meeting new people and getting over my fears. Sharing these videos with you is *your* bonus 😉 The more I learn, the more there is to discover, and so it goes. The videos will go deeper in the future.

Two years ago I awoke to the gift of feeling something different around me, in fact everything had shifted in my life after my mom passed away. I’ve felt compelled to know more about this strange new sensation because my vibration had unknowingly been raised and it literally felt like I was having a heart attack. It was scary. Kundalini rising, wooooosh. It took a few weeks to feel right in my skin, but when I did, holy moley what is all this??! So began the clean up of my life and it continues today.

What’s that? Was that an eye roll? Energy is a bunch of hooey, you say? Faeries Riding Unicorns, Sprinkling Pixie Dust on Glittery Rainbows All Over the Place? Believe me, I have heard it all — mostly because I’ve thought it myself; at least I did years ago, before I could see and feel the things I can see and feel today. I spent years trying to understand and fix myself through self-help books, therapists, groups, workshops, ETC., mostly to no avail because I was a bit dead in the heart. My mission was, “I’ve got to fix this thing that’s wrong with me; WHAT is this thing that’s wrong with me!?” ‘Round and around the treadmill I ran for years and years. It was exhausting and frustrating, and eventually I gave up and went back to my old bad habits. My eyes would roll as I walked away from “energy” people. Weirdos.

Millions of self-help books.
They know the treadmill.

Then.
As my mom neared her final day, she said to me, “I wish I had been nicer to you Meag. I was wrong about you. I’m really sorry.”

*boom*
I fall down, everything’s different. Closed my eyes…
The power of love. The power of forgiveness.
Millions of useless self-help books.

My mom’s death (and perhaps the other heart-breaking deaths I’ve been privy to) completely cracked me open in a way I was not expecting. I now feel a responsibility to understand what’s happening around me and to gain a grasp of it– not a control of it. All those years of annoyance at my mom have been replaced with gratitude for the priceless gift she has given me. There are things to do, but I no longer feel there is something wrong with me. I am excited if I am anything, for Pete’s Sake.

I read about energy. I study energy. I love energy! I practice intuition. I sleep better than I have ever slept in my life. I dance, I qigong, I t’ai chi, I make art— which has improved tremendously since I started playing with energy. I’ve walked through many of my fears and doubts and have witnessed some incredible shifts. I moved to Texas. I am meeting a new tribe; we speak the same language, yet there are plenty more words to learn. How cool is that? But in all honesty, my energy game is way off these days.

This road is not always easy; but it is necessary. There has been heartache and loss, there too has been ghastly name calling; I have been called weird. Alas… I no longer blink at weird; my mom thought I was weird, she then regretted it. I am weird. No biggie.

I’ve set my sights in a new direction because the past few months have been brutal at home and my Spirit has effectively left the building. This affects my everything; I am not learning as quickly nor effortlessly as I had in the past. My energy is stuck, wowza how ironic — and dammit this hurts. Luckily I have found a support system and am leaning on them; I am confident I will bounce back but my biggest fear is that my heart shut down again. Oh please not that. I hold my heart near and dear, literally, figuratively and metaphorically, and will continue to protect it fiercely.

Three steps forward, two steps back.
Expanse, Constrict.
Energy Balls.

Thank you for checking out my new website; Larkabouts is now forever larking about here and there. This site will house my art and energy endeavors, with more categories to come. My heart thanks you for following along — and reading — this far. Stay tuned for a few more weeks of #NewEnergyin15 and then… on to deeper things.

This week’s video is a reminder about why I do this work — I really do love it, even as I struggle through it right now. I am not, nor will I ever give up; I am Grasshopper 4Evah!

Thank you xx

—> My #NewEnergyin15 YouTube Channel is here <—

Follow along on Instagram
………. Twitter toooooooooo!

May 8, 2015May 8, 2015

New Energy in 15, 7 Precious Gestures on Lady Bird

In Qi Gong, there’s a practice called “7 Precious Gestures” and while there is no perfecting them, I hope they will be a part of my daily routine for the rest of my days. The slower, the better, the bigger the burn — the bigger the test on my patience. Even though it’s done very s-l-o-w-l-y, these 7 gestures totally fire up my life force energy and that’s what I’m here for.

April 13, 2015May 8, 2015

New Energy in 15, twirling at the museum

I have overcome my fear of doing qigong in public (mostly), and at this groovy Austin museum on a rainy January day, I pull out a Heaven & Earth followed up with a Knocking on the Door of Life. Good Day Austin!

April 13, 2015May 8, 2015

New Energy in 15, Slapping the Qi Gong Monkey

This is a great technique to wake up the body in the morning or prepare for sleep in the evening; better known as Knocking On The Door of Life. I spend much of my qigong & t’ai chi time spinning my spine for good health.

October 15, 2014May 9, 2015

What is Nia Dance?

Sometimes I burst out in tears when I think about my mom, and I’m occasionally surprised at how close I feel to the sadness, but I don’t question it, as grief is what it is. This usually happens when I am doing the dishes or sweeping the floor or some other mundane task, but not always; sometimes it happens when I am out in public and I find creative ways to work the tears into whatever it is I am doing. I get a pang in my heart and find the most comforting thing to do is to put my forearm over my eyes and let it all hang out, even if in silence. It is usually short-lived, but bellows from deep down.

Last night I threw a ribeye on the hot iron skillet and it hit me just as the sizzle splashed up; the sorrow of my mother’s death. The sorrow of her unlived life; dreams never seen, love never felt. It is not that I wish she were here, because we did not spend much time together and when we did it was strained — or something. I cry for her sadness and how our entire lives together were summarized in those few short days or minutes before she could not speak anymore. I cry for not having a daughter; who will hold my hand when I die? But still, my mom and I made our peace. She loved me. She was sorry. I was sorry. I loved her.

I often see it as my mother slipping into a black, fiery hole, on a board that is angled at a fairly steep 45-degree angle, leading into the black, murky hole. It is a big hole and I am kneeling on one knee on the edge, with my arm extended towards her, leaning farther in as I am physically begging her to grab my hand. There are angels standing along the edge of the hole, probably about ten of them — I just counted them for the first time in my mind, because I have not paid much attention to them. My mom is slipping feet first into this hole and she is looking back up at me, reaching towards me and trying to say something to me as if its the first time she is speaking to me and obviously, it is the last time. Always in this scene, I am reaching towards her with my right arm as I have my left forearm over my eyes, as I hang my head low in deep sorrow. She is leaving me for the final time. The sadness goes deep.

“Don’t be scared, Mom”, as she slips in deeper.
What do I know? Nothing. It’s hard to know what to say when someone is dying.
I miss her. I think she’s okay. What do I know?

When I am hit with this moving picture show in my mind, and once I compose myself, I think about how much my life has changed since my mom’s death. In many ways, maybe I too was sliding into a big black hole, because I certainly didn’t feel all that alive 18 months ago. I was trapped in my own fears, imprisoned by my own thoughts and completely out of touch with my heart. I had accepted that I was getting old and that there would be no more real moments of joy nor carefree silliness in life; only perhaps drunken silliness, and this is not really all that silly, except that it is pretty silly.

I clutched my heart a lot after my mom’s death; I thought I was having a heart attack. I couldn’t breathe and I was terrified. I reached for the walls when I walked in case I fell down. I was so afraid I was dying. Nooooooo, please not like this. I found a doctor, made an appointment. Then fell asleep for two weeks.

bike — My first trip after crumbling was to Lake Tahoe

After I changed everything in my life, I actually started to have real fun again. My spirit came back after I left Chicago and moved to my mom’s empty place in Woodstock, where I began to pursue the things that mattered most to me. People fell out of my life, good ones and bad, as did a number of jobs — money too; oh the money went tumbling out. I started taking long walks around Lake Geneva, because I simply had to move about outside, as well as doing lots of yoga. I quit drinking and drank kale juice every morning and soon felt amazingly strong and ready for new adventures. I was breaking free of the shackles of my life, which in hindsight felt a lot like walking through a long dark hallway while being striped of every thread I wore. It was beautiful and terrifying time, and the fears of the future were loud, but my faith grew louder each day as I awoke to a new ability to see and feel…. energy. Twirling Figure 8’s are what I see, everywhere. They make me hopeful.

I am certain I will spend the rest of my life learning about energy, even though I hear those sarcastic Irish voices in my head that say, “you do WHAT Meag??! You see Figure 8’s???? Should you be driving? Are you in the paint again Meag???” I boot those needling leprechauns aside and forge ahead — they cannot stop me now because they are all dead and I am alive and roam the earth with my trusty energy balls.

I initially thought I would be an energy healer in my next career, but as I dig deeper, I am not so sure. To work with people’s energy is to associate with them on such an intimate level, which presents all sorts of ethical issues that I’m not interested in, quite frankly. I have always been a bit of a loner, so I looked to other ways of working it. Which is why I am super-glad I have jumped into the arena by returning to my first love, DANCING.

I am now a Nia Technique teacher, although for years I studied and taught Gabrielle Roth’s 5 Rhythm’s. I loved my time in the 5 Rhythms but my life fits so much better with Nia now. However, no one is coming to my classes just yet, but gosh it’s great practice! I suspect this dance may be a bit too progressive for Dripping Springs. Change is in the air here and people are moving here in droves, but the majority of people here are young, church-going families, who I suspect are not looking to take a dance class that combines the best of modern dance, martial arts and the healing arts. I keep my heart and my eyes open for new horizons, as usual, as I look outside of Texas.

acrobatics — When I taught dance in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico

What is Nia dance, you ask? When founders Debbie and Carlos Rosas created NIA in the early 80’s as an alternative to the high-impact aerobics craze, they called it “non-impact aerobics”. Over time they determined the acronym was negative, so research took them in a new direction. It was then renamed “Neuromuscular Integrated Action”, but how lame is that? About 15 years ago, a truth revealed itself: in Swahili, Nia means ‘purpose;’ in Hebrew, it means ‘to create subtle movements.’ Ah, the metaphysical truth.

In Nia, we use nine classic movement forms: three from the martial arts (t’ai chi, aikido, tae kwon do), three from the dance arts (jazz, modern, Duncan), and three from the healing arts (yoga, Alexander Technique, Feldenkrais). There are also 52 fundamental steps and patterns. When the custom choreographed music starts up, I move the moves by adding my own personality and style of dance, so that it becomes my dance — and I encourage you to discover your dance. This is why I really love Nia, it honors the skill level and development of the individual spirit with these age-old practices. There is no wrong way to do Nia, unless you are hurting yourself; you move in your body’s way. I learn something new each time I dance the dance and I anticipate future learning pangs.

I incorporate tools to improve my body’s energy during my class that I have learned over the past several months, and I also share them on Instagram, called #newenergyin15 . I’ve learned these tips from Lee Holden, Sonia Choquette, Lydia Wong, Donna Eden at Eden Energy Medicine ( I LOVE Donna’s energy!) and from my own inspiration, so it really is becoming my style and maybe someday I will have students!

When the tears for my mom appear, I let them hang out, because they keep me grateful and in tune with why I pursue the things I pursue. My mom’s dreams were cut short many years ago while she sat around waiting to die and then she fought like hell in the final hours. I’m attempting to mow down my regrets before they have a chance to fester; having sat with three people as they laid dying revealed some crushing views on life and I am thanking my stars above that I have an opportunity to turn my life around. Once again. 😀

My mission statement: “I want the rest of my life to be the best of my life.”
My quest to understand energy has only just begun, so do you care to dance with me?

September 30, 2014May 9, 2015

What’s an Energy Healer?

“An energy healer is someone who can assist in moving your energy in an attempt for better mental, emotional and physical health.”

I’ve often asked myself what IS an energy healer and then mumble, “it’s not real”, even though I am surrounded by the study, practice and fascination of all things energy. Here is my laundry list of current energetic practices:

– Attuned in reiki — I now have hot hands!
– Student of Lee Holden‘s qi gong
– Student of Lydia Wong‘s Meridian Dance Massage (I LOVE her Mambo T’ai chi classes!)
– Student of Sonia Choquette‘s Six Sensory studies
– Student of Tarot and various other oracle cards
– Officially a NIA technique white belt dance teacher (!!)
– Each morning starts with one hour of sun salutation meditations that include the energy medicine practices of Donna Eden (and oooooh I can’t wait to take her classes!)

I also love to read about angels, intuition, psychics, faeries, meditation, mediums and have discovered one common thread in all these modalities… it’s all ENERGY. Fascinating, beating, twirling, moving, pulsating energy; I can feel it, I can change it — I have totally improved it, and I am enamored by it. Ironically, energy healing can freak some people out.

I totally get this, I have long had my doubts about energy so much so that I totally forgot about it for years and paid no attention to it whatsoever. I remember thinking it was a deceptive way of saying, “I make stuff up” or “I like to day dream and ride white unicorns over sparkly rainbows”. Even though I have always come back to the healing arts, I have been and remain somewhat skeptical about what it actually means. My Irish sarcasm runs deep to this day.

These days, however, I am more curious than anything and am ready to dive into this.

My mom’s deathbed apology totally changed everything for me, and once I emerged from the hellacious panic attack I was trapped in, I began to experience life in a very, different manner. Life suddenly seemed quiet and crisp. I felt as though I had no choice, I simply HAD to clean up my life on every level and even now, I pay dearly if I eat junk food or I feel the foggy after-effect of one glass of wine for three or more days, so I don’t drink. I feel people in a visceral way that is new to me. I hear their stories in my nose. When I am out in public these days, it is a very different experience. I am affected by sounds, lights, crowds, smells and cellphones (hello!). It’s why I prefer to be in the country now.

This is not religious experience, because I am not aligned with any one religion, although I do fall back on some of my Catholic tendencies. I believe most religions are dangerous and encourage punishing thinking, so I don’t go there. I am also quick to not describe this as a spiritual experience either, because once I label myself as spiritual, it raises an eyebrow, an eyebrow that loves to scrutinize our humanness.

I’m not into labels. I like energy. I am flawed and have bad days. I suffer rejection, but not as years gone by; I get over things pretty quickly. Including when I sometimes wonder if I am a delusional or perhaps the butt of jokes, but then I say, “who cares?”. I love where I’m finding myself these days, with its imperfections and all, and I feel totally grateful to have this opportunity to wake up. It’s what I have wanted for years.

I have also experienced some amazing insight on people in my immediate and not-so-immediate circles; I feel my nose get tapped and then I’m flooded with thoughts. It is energy in motion and I can read it somehow. I have been told I am an Energy Healer. I have been told I am an Intuitive. I continue to search for understanding.

Naturally the internet has a boatload to say about the subject, after I made my way through the ads for several local area energy healers, and if it is one thing, energy healing is vague. Rife with scam artists and bally-hoo-magical thinkers, so says Wikipedia. “Physicists and skeptics roundly criticize these explanations as pseudophysics — a branch of pseudoscience which explains magical thinking by using irrelevant jargon from modern physics to exploit scientific illiteracy and to impress the unsophisticated.”

Therein lies my challenge. I believe in energy healing and the positive changes it has made in my life, but I now am ready to dig deeper.

~~~

When I was 26, I took a job as a Production Manager at a photographic and design studio in San Francisco, which kicked off my journey into healing my inner kid, or rather, my search into “how not to be in so much damn emotional pain”. I was wide-eyed and bushy-tailed, thrilled to be in San Francisco and I was about two years sober at that time. This was the perfect city for me; I had amazing adventures on my bike (huge calves and thighs!), at my job in SOMA (it was called the Multimedia Gulch back then), and enjoying my first “healthy” relationship with a pastry chef/marathon runner, who had me running with him all over the Marin County trails. It was a tremendous place for me to be and I was “tippy-toed-excited” about all that lay ahead of me.

I first lived on Russian Hill and rode my bike to work over Nob Hill to SOMA, or I took the fantastically aromatic #30 bus through North Town and Chinatown. The bus was usually serene and roomy when I boarded in the Marina, but when we pulled onto Columbus, suddenly the bus turned to a sea of people with no personal boundaries, nor indoor voices, all carrying plastic bags full of duck stew. I was happy to ride my bike up and over the hills as often as possible, and honestly there was no feeling in the world like blasting down the streets of San Francisco, even though that required pedaling up those same streets. I was a biking machine and I loved it!

It didn’t take me long to take notice of Mill Valley across the Bay, and within a few months, I was living in a log cabin on Mount Tamalpais and riding my bike to the Sausalito ferry each morning to cross the Bay. It was a glorious way to start and finish each day and I don’t know that I was ever in better shape in my life. My super beefy legs may not have ever been considered sexy, but they sure were strong as oxen and for that I have always been grateful. Even today, my legs are oh-so-hardy.

It was in Mill Valley where I started to meet “energy healers”. Whhooo-whhoooo-what? I was curious but highly skeptical, as this sounded like a bunch of hooey. The first weekend at the log cabin, my roommate had a Shaman come to the house to do a sage clearing. A what? A long-haired gentleman, dressed in all white robes strutted around the house with rattles and a lit sage wand as he traced the windows, door frames and spun in all the corners of the house. It smelled like weed. I was fascinated and a bit scared. Was this an exorciscm? Was the house haunted? Will there be goblins and ghosts?

There were no goblins nor hauntings, and since this experience, I now practice space clearing and have learned so much about it from the powerful teachings of Denise Linn. I love this woman’s energy! I am also a fan of Tess Whitehurst‘s books on the subject of space clearing, as well. Once I started looking, the information was plentiful.

I love, love, LOVE working with energy, healing energy and learning even more about energy. It is my thing. This is one of the many gifts of my mom’s passing; and her apology to me before leaving. I finally eased up and off myself and my God, the difference it has made in my life. The message has not been lost on me at all.

But the message of energy healing was a hard one to grasp. Last year, when I was fired from yet another ill-fitting job, I found myself scrambling…. “WHAT AM I GOING TO DO NOW???!” as I stayed up all night reading about healing through reiki, angels, prayers, psychics, t’ai chi, yoga, kale, crystals, breathing, vibration, praying, chakras, qi gong, breathing, walking in nature, silence, Law of Attraction, spirituality, religion and let’s not forget the FAERIES!

“Oh my, Meagan is totally OUT THERE now.” I know, isn’t it fantastic?

The results of being at odds with myself my whole life has made for a very chaotic, albeit it, exciting life. I am ready for this new chapter as I dive into the energetic world.

Until I get my unicorn, I’ll fly without him for now… xo

May 17, 2013May 17, 2013

Meditation is Hard — But Getting Softer

I have dabbled in meditation here and there over the years but it wasn’t until this past February that I found myself sitting in the local buddhist temple, which is a strikingly peaceful oasis to sit and soak in the silence. And to begin my foray back into mediation. These Buddhist Monks hail from Sri Lanka and I can’t pronounce any of their names except I have recently learned that the equivalent of “Father Sujatha” is “Bhante Sujatha” so I find it’s safest to call each of them “Bhante.”

A few months ago it was all I needed to sit in the beautiful temple to attempt to quiet my mind, which ping-ponged all over the place like a mad chicken on crack. I was all over the place so the silence did my mind and body good, and I probably tweaked and twitched as I sat there in the silence. It doesn’t matter, any and all are welcome at this temple and I totally appreciate the warm welcome they gave me.

As the weeks unraveled and I began to recover from everything that had happened over the past year, I was having more and more questions for the Monks and requiring more direction. Three nights per week they host silent mediations, followed up by a talk from Bhante Sujatha, if he is in town or one of the others. When Bhante speaks, he refers to the benefits of his mediation and how he is able to allow things to bounce off him and not bother him and is accepting of most situations in life; he is always harmonious with life. These are my words and not his; he would never say something so arrogant as this. I’m sure of it.

My questions during class hover around, “so in order to get to this place of acceptance, can you suggest maybe five or six ways to achieve this through mediation?” No, just continue to practice and you will see. “But my thoughts stampede out to the wildest situations, usually sexual in nature or something along those lines, but it is never still, always racing.” Just keep coming here and you will see.

This worked for a few weeks but I knew that I was in need of some direction, because I really want to reign in my thoughts and quiet the mind. I’ve had glimpses of this in the recent past and know it’s possible, so my desire led me to search for more. It led me to google things!

Another benefit of the exploration years in San Francisco is that I used to take T’ai Chi lessons in the park in the early mornings and I remembered how calming it was for me. I googled t’ai chi and soon stumbled upon Qi Gong, another Asian healing art I studied briefly a long time ago and was drawn to it because it’s referred to as the Mother of T’ai Chi.

It didn’t take long for me to have an A HA moment and realize this is where I wanted to spend my time. I googled deeper into Qi Gong and discovered Lee Holden. He has a few free youtubes and I was hooked with 7 Minutes of Magic that was filmed in Sand Harbor Beach in Lake Tahoe, as well as taking a class at the Temple. I knew I was starting to wake up because for the first time in a very long time, I was ready to go some where. I went to South Lake Tahoe. I climbed a mountain. I did Qi Gong. T’ai Chi. Yoga. Mountain Biking. Hot springs. Ate organic salads. Had a blast!

Of course I made a Vine too (I am @meagburnt on Vine)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OvA9Hg9u8w&feature=em-upload_owner

Since returning home I signed up for Lee’s online classes because his world head quarters are in Santa Cruz, California. Or perhaps it’s his studio! I am going to give myself 30-days to stick with it — and if I do, I will pursue taking more IRL classes. So far, the lessons have been wonderful and my QI is starting to wake up!

No seriously, this is serious. I am enjoying every minute of this. After this morning’s meditation I felt the qi rising in my cheeks and shins like I had never felt them before in my life. Who’s body is this? It’s mine! xo

Here’s Henry the day I came home from Lake Tahoe, he was soooooooo excited to see me, he went airborne! His qi is incredible too …

May 16, 2013

Going Green, Take Two

I've been waving to the sunsets for decades now; here's me in Big Sur in 1998 — I’ve been waving to the sunset for decades now; here’s me in Big Sur in 1998

When I think back to the last half of 2012, it occurs to me that I was in a rather suspended mode and did not make many waves as I waited for yet another holiday season to roll on by. I knew something was up with my mom, but I was not allowed to get too close, so I numbed it out of my mind. I remember walking out of my office and I could feel my feet walking down the sidewalk, but it felt like my head was staying in the same place. I was trapped in a tunnel. It’s all rather surreal when I think back, because it was literally right after the holidays ended that my mom went south, after her youngest brother went into the hospital and was told he had about a week to live. Tom did not make it past three days and the night of his funeral was when I first had to bring my mom to the Emergency Room. They told me they couldn’t keep Mom, they said excruciating pain was not enough of a reason to admit someone. WHAT?

It was a snowy Friday January evening; I took the bus home across the Loop and arrived at my West Loop neighborhood in record time. I didn’t want to go upstairs just yet; I don’t even know why because I never usually hesitated. I walked through the alley behind Girl & The Goat because I didn’t feel like looking at all the beautiful people on Randolph going to dinner. I smoked a cigarette in the alley and it tasted God awful, I couldn’t even finish it but I held it and looked at it in the falling snow. I hated that thing. I flicked it at the dumpster and made my way home.

Twenty minutes later the call came in that Mom was really sick and I needed to head out there. Ninety minutes later I was there with mom.

I took a leave of absence from my job. A job I knew I was not right for, but so many of us know that we are not right for a job and do it anyways because it’s 2013, and dammit we should be grateful that we have a job at all, so fake it ’til you make it. All bets were off when my mom got sick, I knew the gig was up. I will make amends for this when the time is right.

Now it’s the middle of May and I have radically changed almost everything about my life. My current reading and doing list:

Crazy, Sexy Diet by Kris Carr
(Eat your veggies, ignite your spark and live like you mean it!)

The Rainforest by Victor W. Hwang and Greg Horowitt
(The secret to building the next Silicon Valley)

Soak Your Nuts
(Karyn’s Conscious Comfort Foods and Recipes for Everyday Life)

Astrology for Beginners (just because!)

The Holy Bible (I pick it up, give it a side-eye, then toss it aside)

Modern Qi Gong by Lee Holden
(a 27-part online series to learn & live the basics of Qi Gong — wonderful to learn how to breathe from my toes and awaken the Qi)

Mother Daughter Wisedom by Dr. Christine Northup
(also attending the Doctor’s 4-part workshop on Lightening the Motherload, which has been super super helpful and freeing)

I’ve changed my eating, drinking, breathing, address, job and spare time since my mom passed away. I go to yoga, I meditate with Buddhist Monks, I hike the hills (mounds?) of McHenry and Walworth Counties and every day I learn something new about where our food comes from and how screwed up the American food system is today and I am trying to discover a healthier ways through this. I teach social media at a creativity incubator and also am doing in-store demonstrations for a smart phone company (I made this connection while at a funeral, so always remember to keep your options open).

I was Meagan the Vegan many years ago when I lived in San Francisco; however things were so very different back, but then again not really. The cool thing to do was to jump on the “John Robbins, “Diet for a New America” bandwagon; I did it and I loved it, but I think I took everything too far as I was known to do. This was when I first learned how wrong the American diet was (is!), how proper food combining was necessary to thrive, all about food allergies and how poisonous Baskin & Robbins ice cream is to a body. I soon became convinced I was addicted and allergic to everything under the sun. I attended 12-step meetings, saw several therapists, tried different religions, worked with shamans in the forest, went to women’s drumming circles, had soul retrievals, studied expressive creative dance, did ecstasy naked on the beaches of Big Sur with hippies, rode my bike all over Northern California (mostly because I didn’t have a car for the first two years) — honestly it was an incredible time in my life and I will never forget the San Francisco years. I worked in SOMA’s South Park neighborhood (the exact park where Twitter and Instagram were born!) as a 35mm slide designer and then I tripped the holistic light fantastic at night and on weekends. I lived in Mill Valley with my pastry chef boyfriend and rode my bike to the Sausalito ferry to ride across the bay each day, right on past Alcatraz Island — could there be a more beautiful start the morning? No! It was cold of course, but absolutely gorgeous.

So here I am going green again twenty years later and I am basically re-learning everything — which is the cool part because I always love a challenge, and naturally it’s all different. My mother is dead now.

I don’t say that flippantly. Losing my mother was such an incredible kick in the guts, I was so not prepared. Even though I thought I was and had been preparing myself for the past two years. The lessons have been hige; my mom’s death is teaching me so much about myself and about life. I am extremely grateful for this bittersweet message that has changed my life.

I am not saying that it isn’t difficult for sons, but the mother-daughter connection is such a powerful connection, even if the two were not friends. My mom and I were occasionally friends, but mostly not. I’ve been amazed at some of the stories I’ve learned in the past few months; both heart -breaking and inspiring. Never in a million years would I have thought it would be me to have a complete meltdown after my mom died, in fact I would have wagered big money that I would NOT be the one to lose it. No Siree Bub, not me.

I did lose it. But I quickly crawled up to gasp for air and asked for help in turning my life around. I was in bad shape. Not on the outside necessarily, but my insides were all topsy-turvy. I was empty and then shattered. My mom apologized for being so mean to me for so many years. She apologized. I laughed at her when she said it, but it was a nervous laughter because I did not know how to respond. Then I saw the look in her eye. She looked away and stared out to nowhere with an empty sadness in her eye. I knew she meant it. I knew right then that she was going to die soon.

I was fired twice in 2012 from two shitty jobs, and these back-to-back firings were very challenging to recover from their blows. I didn’t get fired for lack of trying, that’s for sure. I took this last job out of desperation — even my co-worker mentioned that I seemed “very hungry” when I first started working with the group. It’s true, I was literally hungry and scared because I had to sell my truck, my jewelry and anything else of value to stay afloat. It was very scary and I avoided calling my mom for several months because I did not want her to worry.

My Monk buddies tell me there is no such thing as being “balanced”, there is only “balancing” – I agree! I will continue to attempt to balance things through thick and thin, but I realize there will be challenges and setbacks, along with the successes, and perhaps those setbacks may require a strawberry sundae. It’s starting to sound less and less appealing but perhaps some rainy day may call for a cheeseburger to make things feel alright.

I couldn’t be more inspired than I am right now to live a right life. I don’t expect perfection, in fact I don’t want perfection — I want the real deal. I intend to remain soft, spongey and teachable as I enter the autumn of my life. I want this to be the best time of my life and live well for both myself and my Spirit Sister; my mom Juls.

May 9, 2013May 10, 2013

Spring has grown legs, finally!

May has finally warmed things up in the Midwest after a never-ending winter, and now the buds, blossoms and green fields are singing everywhere — I have even spotted a real live elbow or two (a sure sign of spring) while out and about. I am on Month Two Point Five of my “time out” from the city and I continue to make good on the promise to myself that I would not get bored. Outside of work and school, I intend to find new people, places and things and interesting things to do. People live here for a reason, right?

I’ll be honest; Northern Illinois bores me to absolute tears. I know I am not long for this area because I am here for a reason and I am dedicated to discovering things that I had not known while growing up, nor back for ocassional visits. I’ve officially made peace with Woodstock, but c’mon you all drive me crazy Illinois.

When I go to grocery stores and ask if they have organic vegetables, they look at me as if I am the Creature from the Black Lagoon. A produce guy said to me, “I’ve been eating these pesticides my whole life and nothing has happened to me!” I laughed, said “me too!” and sashayed away. We’ve all been eating them but now it’s time to stop, Bubs! I don’t expect it to be Organic Town USA here, but I do enjoy the conversations it can encourage. Northern Illinois has a huge resistance to it.

I have never understood McHenry County and probably never will. I went to the local community college because I heard they had a map of all the county trails but when I pulled into the main parking lot, I almost fell out of my car. Literally. They had created a mock-cemetery in the front yard of all the babies aborted. There were vicious signs everywhere. I was aghast. At the community college. eeee-gads. I’ve often commented that it feels more like Texas here than Texas.

There is something about this county that just does not want to be budged.
So be it, I am only a visitor.

My temporary explorations must carry on! The curious mind has pushed me across the border to Wisconsin, once again. My ex-sister-in-law Wendy and her family live in Linn Township and we have long considered each other as family, even though technically we are no longer. Wendy’s oldest son, Jackson, now five, has autism and recently they added Inka, the German autism service dog, to their rowsy family. Inka was trained in Germany and continues her training locally yet has a fairly substantial bill to support her services. Wendy and her neighbors are really good about creating events to support each other and a few weeks ago they hosted a partial-walk around Lake Geneva to raise funds to defer some of Inka’s training costs. The walk ended at Foley’s Bar & Grill where they offered a special Reuben sandwich for the day and sponsored a meat raffle. yes a meat raffle, say what?! Tables & tables of meat were raffled off, I’ve never seen anything like it. I won a huge a Wisconsin salami.

So this was not only a great event to be involved in, it totally sparked my memory that there is a 20-something-mile path that goes all the way around the lake and it’s open to the public. Over the past two weeks, I have hit this trail and it is SPECTACULAR.

As you make your way around the lake, homes that are not visible from anywhere but the lakefront are visible, as are their gorgeous landscapes and lake-faring accouterments. No two homes are the same and the path is varied and semi-rugged, by going through golf courses, flat beaches, endless green lawns and beautiful lakefront patios and so on. I recommend remaining very respectful because you are very close to people’s homes, but there certainly are areas you can sit back and take in the views. I sat at William Wrigley’s boat slip to take in the sunset — very serene indeed.

More information in case you want to plan this thing out a bit more than me:
http://www.makeitbetter.net/entertainment/outings-a-travel/1506-hiking-through-historythe-geneva-lake-walking-path

Naturally I made a Vine:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAF66cbAU_c&feature=youtu.be

I look forward to learning more about Lake Geneva this summer, especially because this is FREE! Things just taste better when they are free, yahvoh!

I am completely grateful my health has returned (WHEW!) and my legs are strong once again and ready to hike, hike hike. Ever since I read Cheryl Strayed’s “WILD” when I was in Lake Tahoe a few weeks ago, I am feeling compelled to plan a super-big hike, but not entirely the same as Cheryl Strayed’s hike of the Pacific Crest Trail.

I back-packed through Northern Arizona several years ago and hiking with a monster-backpack is very hard work — I felt very tall and my legs were never stronger. It’s hot and dirty, dusty and smelly but I absolutely loved the experience — even though a mountain lion growled at me and I thought I was going to die right there. I didn’t.

That was an experience a woman should experience in her twenties, and that’s about when I had mine. Except I think I was 32. I am looking to do something different now and will continue to research and plan.

My legs are ready to climb things again, this much I know. A treadmill will not cut it.

Next up, mom’s ashes are going for a swim.
Thank you for reading my words, I do appreciate it. xo