What's in the gallery?
We dissolve stuck and rewrite patterns. We apply radical playfulness to life (when we feel like it!), embarking on internal adventures (credo of Safety First). We have a fake band called Solved By Cake. We build invisible sanctuaries, invent words and worlds, breathe awe and wonder.
We are not impressed by monsters. Except when we are. We explore the connections between internal territories and surrounding environment to learn what marvelously supportive delicious space feels like, and how to take exquisite care of ourselves. We transform things.* We glow wild.**
* For example: Desire, fear, worry, pain-and-trauma, boundaries, that problematic word which rhymes with flaweductivity.
** Fair warning: Self-fluency has been known to lead to extremely subversive behavior, including treasuring yourself unconditionally, unapologetically taking up space, experiencing outrageously improbable levels of self-acceptance, and general rejoicing in aliveness.
What's in the gallery?
We dissolve stuck and rewrite patterns. We apply radical playfulness to life (when we feel like it!), embarking on internal adventures (credo of Safety First). We have a fake band called Solved By Cake. We build invisible sanctuaries, invent words and worlds, breathe awe and wonder.
We are not impressed by monsters. Except when we are. We explore the connections between internal territories and surrounding environment to learn what marvelously supportive delicious space feels like, and how to take exquisite care of ourselves. We transform things.* We glow wild.**
* For example: Desire, fear, worry, pain-and-trauma, boundaries, that problematic word which rhymes with flaweductivity.
** Fair warning: Self-fluency has been known to lead to extremely subversive behavior, including treasuring yourself unconditionally, unapologetically taking up space, experiencing outrageously improbable levels of self-acceptance, and general rejoicing in aliveness.
Very Personal Ads #122: if you know what I mean…
Personal ads. They’re … personal! Very.
Each week I write these VPAs to practice asking for what I want. And to get clarity on what that really is, even when asking feels conflicted.
I always get useful information about my relationship with various aspects of the ask. Join in if you like!
Hey there! Sunday! It’s you! Oh, Sunday. How have you been all week?
I had adventures. And it’s really good to be back here at the Gwishery!
Yes, the place where I secretly and not-so-secretly deposit my gwishes.
Let’s do this. And you can play too if you want.
Thing 1: A stage-like thing and a perfect simple solution.
Here’s what I want:
So I’m teaching this workshop in Boulder on Thursday and there will be 26 people.
But we decided not to rent a stage because it was too complicated to arrange delivery with the location, for a variety of reasons.
And it is not impossible to teach Shiva Nata while not being taller than everyone so they can see easily, but it’s a challenge.
So I would really like a small, portable, DIY stage-like thing to magically reveal itself.
Ways this could work:
No idea! Let’s see.
Hmmm… maybe one of my people in Boulder or Denver has access to a bunch of milk crates and a large board?
Maybe someone works somewhere where there are portable risers and could help arrange for transport?
Maybe one of my roller derby connections has access to something. Like a tiny section of bleachers… ?? Or something else?
Maybe I just go get outrageously high platform shoes and we don’t do any high-impact jumping around.
Maybe I have the just right idea. In fact, most likely: Maybe Shiva Nata gives me the idea or the solution, since that’s one of the things that it does best.
Do you guys have ideas?
I’m receptive to a variety crazy goofball suggestions. Not things along the lines of “just deal with it”, though. That’s not what I want.
My commitment.
To have fun. To have so much fun.
I’ve already planned the class and today I’m having my imaginary Traveling Companion pack my valise.
So now I am just asking the ask and WISHING it. From a secret hidden room that is filled with trust, calm, strength and endless playful possibilities.
Thing 2: Recovery. Easy Transitions. Consolidation. Revue.
Here’s what I want:
I just finished pulling off mad feats of brilliance, grace and athleticism at THE OLYMPICS (shhhhh, that’s my proxy for teaching eight days of Crossing the Line).
But on Wednesday, I’m flying to Denver.
And there are all sorts of things that need to happen for that. Not to mention all sorts of recovery practices, exit rituals and a sparkly spangly dancing-mouse Revue of what was.
Ways this could work:
I have created an Anthology of Exit. It’s at the Playground. And maybe I can play with that.
Also I need a new word for consolidation because it’s stressing me out.
Magical synthesis? Can I relate it to the fractal flowers? Because that would be awesome.
Basically I don’t know how any of this will work.
But I know what I need:
Spaciousness. Curiosity. Investigation.
And also…. tea, notebooks, scribbling, doing old Turkish lady yoga and secret agent marathon-training sessions (that aren’t actually marathon-training sessions at all, because that’s code too, ahahahaaaaa!).
My commitment.
There has to be a way to make this fun, creative, safe, permission-filled, light-hearted and ridiculous.
And I’m going to find it.
Because if anyone can find it, that person would be me. It’s what I do. And if you think about it, this whole project is a sort of strategic conceptual blanket fort.
Whoah. Strategic Conceptual Blanket Forts. Is it just one guy?
Thing 3: The Page That Shall Not Be Mentioned Except By Proxy.
Here’s what I want:
On Friday, roller derby Championships begin. The Continental Divide & Conquer!
We’ll have a full page ad for Shiva Nata in the giant program.
It will be directing people to a page on the website.
That page does not really exist yet. Yes. Hilarious!
Because who doesn’t love doing something risky, expensive and possibly stupid? At the last minute? I live for that stuff.
I wish this were not true. Okay. It’s kind of not true. Oh god. At this point I’m just kind of muttering stuff under my breath awkwardly!
So this has to work, people. How is it going to work?
Ways this could work:
We’re going to have to proxy it, of course.
And I need a daring plan.
It will involve secret agent code words and a hot water bottle that has a bear on it.
I will have to use all my superpowers and my best costumes. And I will need help.
My commitment.
To do my secret marathon-training mini-sessions (wink, wink) so that I can be focused and ready.
To pretend I’m at Rally (Rally!).
To do some Shiva Nata on it, make it hard, and have realizations about what to do next.
To trust and trust and trust some more.
Thing 4: Recommendations for speakers!
Here’s what I want:
Not the kind of speakers who stand behind a podium.
The kind that play music and make a room sound beautiful.
I had another shivanautical realization this week. I have these portable speakers that go with my ipod because I am still in the identity of Traveling Yoga Teacher Who Wanders The World.
But now I’m the director of a center where I also run a yoga studio. This is different. We need an actual sound system.
It doesn’t need to be crazy fancy, because the Playground has magical acoustics and an enormously high coved ceiling, and everything sounds terrific there.
It needs to be relatively affordable (not something my high-end-audiophile ex-husband would recommend) but also sound good and be relatively easy to install.
Ways this could work:
I can ask you guys for ideas and recommendations.
I can bring it to my Kitchen Table and ask there.
Or ask the Frolicsome Bar? Or the twitter pub?
My commitment.
To keep investigating this. To find out where the stuck lives and ask it loving questions.
Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.
Just to update you on what’s happened since last time.
I wanted to find the shortcuts and I found all the shortcuts. This is incredible.
Note to me-who-forgets: The shortcuts include a) proxies, b) fifteen mini newts!, c) mini “marathon-training sessions” wink-wink, d) choosing the door by choosing the world you want to be in and doing something that represents that world, e) write it down.
I asked for documentation, and created the best Anthology ever. Yes!
Then I wanted good recovery time, and am still working on that. But some things that helped: hiding with Briana, immersing myself in the hidden hotel, writing notes to myself, using the Anthology of Exit.
Also: thai massage.
The ask for a Partner In Crime resulted in all sorts of marvelous and unexpected results, including a fantastic idea I had that will most certainly lead to shenanigans. Of the good kind.
I also wanted Rally sign-ups for the January Rally (Rally!), and we that happened. I believe there are now two spots left? And a scholarship ship?
And next steps on the Convening of the Enthusiastic, which is moving full speed ahead. Wow. Best VPAs ever. I can’t believe so much of this actually happened so quickly.
Play-filled comment zen. Here’s what I’d love today.
- Wanted: Your own personal ads, small or large. Updates on past ones if you like.
- You can also do these on your own or in your head. You can always call silent retreat!
- Leave your gwishes! Throw things in the pot!
- Things we try to keep away from: the word “manifest”, telling people how they should be asking for things, unsolicited advice.
- VPA amnesty applies, of course. Leave yours any time between now and next Sunday (or whenever, really) — it’s all fine by us!
xox
Friday Chicken #170: Chicken takes the gold!
In which I cover the good stuff and the hard stuff in my week, trying for the non-preachy, non-annoying side of ritual and self-reflection.
And you get to join in if you feel like it.
You guys! I am doing a different thing for this week’s Chicken, and that thing is proxying.
I will still chicken my week. But!
Whenever I refer to having just been in the Olympics (!) and then winning all those medals and oh wow best Olympics ever (!), I am secretly talking about something else.
Yes?
So. I just finished teaching Crossing the Line (the password for this: haulaway), and it was a long and amazing eight day voyage that was secretly years and years in far-away lands. So that is the hard and good of this week.
And for our purposes it was the OLYMPICS. And they have just ended, and I am an exhausted, happy, proud, deliriously overjoyed athlete who is recovering because dude, the Olympics.
The hard stuff
OHMYGOD THE OLYMPICS ARE INTENSE.
Wow.
I feel really energized but also really drained. Not negative-drained but still like it is time to just fill fill fill fill.
Also I kind of can’t move.
Cold packs! Or hot packs! Or whatever my trainer knows is best, please.
OHMYGOD THE OLYMPICS ARE OVER.
This is disorienting!
Especially when they are both the ending and the beginning. The culmination of everything you have been caring about in your life, and also the door into the next layer/level/thing of your athletic identity.
It was almost like our athletic training center (yes, this one) suddenly revealed that it had come into being for the purpose of this experience and these Olympics, and that was a crazy thing to discover.
So I am excited about the rest of my athletic career as well as my eventual retirement and transition into a new aspect of this, but I am also dealing with encountering the various and unexpected forms of Oh Everything Is Different Now.
Recovery is challenging…
Like when you just want to get back to your regular training practices but you can’t because now is the time for sports therapy and stuff like that.
Also you are toast. Toast, I say!
Because you were functioning at the PEAK of your peak of peak performance and you were on a mission, and you were fully there.
Nostalgia?
Sad about missing all the incredible and dedicated athletes who I got to spend so much time with and who shared this experience.
My entire body hurts.
Both in an awesome way and also in the way that requires deep attention and immersion in warm water.
Exhausted and dead tired and just wanting someone to deposit me in a bath.
I am flying to Denver on Wednesday for another athletic event.
Ha! I actually am.
And this is wonderful and weird. I need this next week to magically be three weeks so that I can enjoy the confetti parades and still get taken care of and also prepare for the body feats that will happen there.
The good stuff
WOW THE OLYMPICS!
There is no good way to explain how overjoyed and delighted with being alive I am right now.
Or how important and spectacular and meaningful this experience was for me and for my team and my country and my sport and the world.
WOW WE WON THESE CRAZY-AWESOME MEDALS LOOK!
Everything that needed to happen happened in exactly the right way.
My secret hopes, dreams, wishes and desires for this experience all came true.
We reached records that we didn’t know could be reached, and stayed loose, flexible, graceful and strong.
We were unshakeable. There was no shaking.
FLOW-STATE OF HAPPY!
And so much fun.
Really the whole experience was so incredibly great that I can hardly stand it.
Usually the first few days of an athletic event are all about focus and getting into it before it gets good, but this entire experience was brilliant, sparkly, exciting and exactly-what-it-needed-to-be for the full duration of being in it.
I knew I would love it but I had no idea how much. So much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If I had to make a list of accomplishments in my life that I am most proud of and joyful over, this now catapults way to the top.
Being an athlete doing the thing that you have trained for forever is so right.
You can feel all the years of working up to knowing what you know and being to execute things in particular ways.
Every cell and every moment saying: we have brought you here.
I am very much not a “life purpose” sort of person, as you guys know. I believe that what I will do will always change, and that this is a vital part of being me.
But this week felt aligned. This is exactly what I was supposed to be doing this week, in this way, at this time, in this setting, with these people. And it worked in the deepest way possible.
Now I have all these ideas about possibilities!
Like all the rest of the things that can be achieved in this particular athletic field.
And the as-yet-impossible maneuvers and skillful movements that are now in the realm of maybe-someday.
Everything feels right.
It just does.
Look at all this confetti!
Who doesn’t like confetti?
I am filled with excitement, gratitude, anticipation, gleeful rejoicing.
And most of all: LOVE.
These are very nice things to be filled with.
Especially after I hurt my leg at the last Olympics, so I had been feeling a little anxious about that.
But being at these Olympics helped me remember how beautiful and powerful the last ones were, even with the hurt leg. And that was a healing for me-from-then too.
So yeah. Basically this is me blinking in the light, trying to assimilate the impossibly beautiful thing that I have experienced, and finding out what happens next.
And I’m putting this here so that in a few months when I’m tired/cranky and can’t remember why I love the Olympics (especially given just how much insane work I put into getting to them), you can point me here and I will remember.
The fun part of the Chickening happens here.
Tabstravaganza! Or: what’s Havi been up to with all those open Firefox tabs?
Hardly anything because I wasn’t internetting, what with being at the Olympics. But:
- Obviously I love this: Can I stream it? Extra points for the domain name.
- Bonnie pointed me to this outrageous piece of joy (the first two and a half minutes are heaven).
Playing live at the meme beach house — it’s the Fake Band of the Week!
Background? Ez and I make up bands. Stu (retired Bolshevik-fearing voice-to-text software) once translated “people will hate me and be jealous” to “they’ll hang out at my Meme Beach House“. It’s just one guy.
We came up with twenty seven hundred fabulous band names at the Olympics and now I can’t remember any of them. Argh.
So. This week’s band:
There Are Two Of Everything.
They pretend to be a duo, but I know the secret. It’s all done with mirrors and recording studio magic. Because it’s actually just one guy.
Hallo Hallo! I am saying Hallo Hallo. Announcement time.
Picture me wearing that crazy hat…
- Come to the Rally (Rally!) in January! We will play and it will be magical.
- Even though the Olympics aren’t for another four years, another four years is happening in OCTOBER. And you might be there. So take a look at Crossing the Line: the 8 Day Voyage! (password: haulaway)..
- The class in Boulder next week has 24 people and we are full. But you could try getting on a waiting list just in case?
I think that’s everything. If not, I’ll add stuff to the Very Personal Ads over the weekend.
That’s it for me …
And of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments if you feel like it.
Yes? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?
And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day, a restful weekend and a happy week to come. Shabbat shalom.
p.s. It’s okay if it’s not Friday anymore. There’s complete chicken amnesty — join in whenever (or not) and it’s no big deal.
Hello, November.
Saying hello to the months is an experimental form, and always changing. This is the fifth time I’m trying this (in a row — whoah!), and each time I’ve done it differently.
I’ve read over July and August and September and October, and each one is lovely and sweet in its own way.
What about this month’s hellos? What if they parallel last month’s goodbyes? That could be interesting. I’m trying it.
Hi there, November.
Hey, November. You’re here. I wasn’t expecting you but now that you’ve arrived, I’m weirdly happy to find us together again.
Oh, November. This is me preparing for the voyage (of being with you, November) through conscious entry.
What I love about November.
This is a bit of an odd place to start because I’m pretty sure that I don’t normally love November.
But somehow asking this is reminding me that actually I do love some things about it:
- The smell of rain.
- Having the parks to myself because all the Fickle Fair Weather Frolickers aren’t there. Spaciousness and long walks, with everything so green against the grey. Beautiful.
- Hot baths. Warm towels.
- The Playground is extra snug and cozy, with its magical rugs and soft blankets.
- Shavasana. Hibernation mode. Feeling the movement into winter.
- I look good in ALL hats. It’s my superpower! November is totally a month of hats.
- The Great Ducking Out, which is the best thing in the entire world. It will be spectacularly great.
- Root vegetables. Roasted beets and potato.
- Everyone is brewing porter again.
- Brewing. It’s also a kind of door, right?
- Sitting on the window seat and writing…
Things I am planning to love about this November.
- ROLLER DERBY CHAMPIONSHIPS!!! YEAH!!!
- And I am going to be there in person, watching Rose City kick ass. And we’re sponsoring! Because Shiva Nata and roller derby are cousins. Sort of.
- The workshop I’m teaching in Boulder (which you can still sign up for because the studio is bigger than I’d originally understood it to be). Yay.
- The Ducking Out, of course. Which you can’t sign up for because it sold out months ago but you can come in November, 2012 if you’d like…
November things about which I feel ambivalent or conflicted ….
Stupid being cold! Stupid dark all the time! Dry skin!
Also November is dentist time. This always requires force fields and secret agent code words and safe rooms and preparation.
I need lots of recovery time after the unbelievably amazing thing that was Crossing the Line this past week. But it’s going to have to happen in doses rather than in one piece. Not entirely sure how that will work yet.
November is also when we (me Selma the duck, and the First Mate) meet with our accountant and various other grown-ups in the business. And while our Treasure Crew is completely great, I always get nervous about how to translate stuff we do for the World Out There where they live.
But the Book of Me has a note that this always goes better than I think it will, and that I just have to be the Pirate Queen and wear my costume (not a pirate costume — a “regular person” costume).
Though ohmygod maybe I should go in a pirate costume. That could in fact make the whole thing significantly more awesome.
What do I know about November?
One of the things we did at Crossing the Line (haulaway) last week was discovering the things we know that we didn’t know we knew.
So what are the things that I know but don’t realize I know about November?
Or: If I had an Almanac of Me, what would it tell me about my relationship with November?
I am going to ask slightly wiser me about this.
Slightly wiser me has plenty to say about November, as it turns out:
“It is important to remember that now is not then.
“Those past painful Novembers are part of experiences from then.
“They are not held in the November-ness.
“You hold them. And you don’t have to anymore. You can keep the wisdom from those hard times without holding the pain in your space.
“Dark and cold is an opportunity to burrow.
“So go deeper into the blanket forts. Use color. Use texture. Use your quarters at the Playground. Be inspired by the Refueling Station. Follow everything that is orange.
Sorge dafuer dass es dir warm, gemuetlich und behaglich ist.
“Trust water. Trust the element of water. And be in warm water as much as you can. And drink tea!”
The qualities I want to hum in November.
Yes, hum. Havi, remember what the castle told you: humming is the aural form of shining!
Safety. Shelter. Appreciation. Replenishing.
Courage. Sovereignty. Spaciousness. Sweetness. Right timing.
Elimination. Transportation. Easy transitions.
And booty bouncing, of course.
(The monster collective would like to register their opinion that saying “replenishing” is almost as embarrassing as “nurturing”, and that I shouldn’t ever admit to wanting it, but I asked them to let us try as an experiment.)
Planting November’s gwishes.
A gwish is somewhere between a goal and a wish, and I have lots of them, but I am going to whisper-plant them in my journal instead of putting them here.
If you would like to whisper with me or whisper loving wishes for my dreams, that would be good.
Come play with me! Comments in the giant collective blanket fort.
I’m putting this all into the pot with love.
If you would like to throw things into the pot and/or think about your relationship with this November, go for it. You can do it here in the comments or silently in your heart. Or wherever and however you like, obviously.
We all have our stuff. We let other people have what’s theirs and take responsibility for what’s ours. And we do this through not giving other people advice or telling them how what to do or how to feel.
Extra wishes for a safe, healthy, delight-filled November with lots of the good kind of surprises.
Postscripting!
Come hide in blanket forts with me! There are a few spaces left for the January Rally (Rally!), and I would love to hang out with you and find out about all the magical things that will happen when we’re at the Playground together.
Goodbye, October
We’ve said hello to several months this year (four so far, I think), but we haven’t yet said any goodbyes. At least not out loud.
Today seems like the right moment to revisit Hello, October and then make my farewells.
What I loved about October this year…
So many things.
Some of them October Things:
- The last of the tomatoes from the garden.
- Sun! Lots and lots of sun.
- Sukkot! The holiday of blanket forts…
- The return of the red flannel sheets.
- Crunching leaves.
- The last hurrah of the last of the roses.
- Dahlias. Ohmylord.
- Roasted sweet potato. Fresh baked pumpkin seed bread.
- Hats! Time for hats. I look great in hats.
- Borrowing the gentleman’s giant warm hoodie.
- Hot yummy fall food from the food carts.
- The first wearing of the rainboots.
- Crisp air.
- October means that Deschutes puts out the Jubelale, and all is good in the world.
And some of them things that just happened to be in October:
- My new hiding space and blanket fort just for me!
- Redecorating the Playground.
- The outrageously great people and experiences from Crossing the Line. password: haulaway
- Having Barbara Sher come teach at my Kitchen Table program.
- Three new forum boards at the KT.
- Massive depiling.
- Bathtime.
- Learning Thriller.
- Making a new friend.
- Discovering that the people who go to dance class with me have become my community.
- Finding ways for things to happen way in advance, and feeling what that’s like.
- Miraculously choosing the just-right present for someone.
- Walking through the streets holding a giant fuzzy monster and meeting all sorts of interesting people as a result.
- Buying make-up. And kind of liking it. I know!
- “I’ve got it! There are two of everything!”
What was hard about this October?
Busy busy busy busy.
Getting dark early.
Missing lots of dance class due to being sick.
Depletion.
An attack of someone else’s stuff masquerading as an attack of my stuff. Dizziness and fear that did not belong to me.
What about the dancing Revue?
I dislike reviews because they’re super stressful (for me!), and so we have a dancing spangly Revue instead.
And, for the record, I’m totally picturing kooky 1930s cartoon mice doing some sort of vaguely obscene chorus line.
The Revue always has two questions:
1) What worked? 2) What might I want to try in the future?
What worked this October?
My new quarters at the Playground. Having a place just for me. Taking iron. Going for walks. Getting a new coat.
The amazing Board of Surprisers convening, and doing Show & Tell.
Practicing wanting what I want.
Getting ridiculous amounts of things done before the Crossing.
What might I want to try in the future?
More entry. More exit. More time and spaciousness. More vitamin C.
More setting things up in advance for slightly future me.
Looking back at Hello, October.
What do I notice?
I wanted to practice Wanting the Wanting, and that was a big part of this month.
There was a gwish about rituals and 16-16. Both of these were useful. And challenging.
There was something that needed the perfect name, and that name came to me.
I wanted Plum Duff magic, and that was a fascinating experiment.
Then I wanted blanket forts everywhere and a month full of Elongated Entrances and Exits, and both of those things came true in just the right way. You know what? I’m actually feeling kind of surprised and pleased right now with my gwishing and with the unexpected results. Huh. Cool!
Goodbye, October.
I am appreciating the good.
I am learning from the hard.
Thank you for this month. And for zombie Thriller.
Fair Winds, October! I will see you in one year when you are new and I am new and we are both new versions of ourselves.
Play with me! Comment zen in the giant collective blanket fort.
I’m putting this all into the pot with love.
If you would like to leave some noticings about this October or your relationship with October, that would be lovely. Here in the comments or quietly just for you.
As always: we all have stuff. So we take responsibility for our stuff and let other people have their stuff. We practice this by not giving other people advice or telling them what to do or how to feel.
Kisses to the commenter mice, the Beloved Lurkers and everyone who reads.
Postscripting! I actually remembered to send out an announcement to my very occasional Havi’s Announcing a Thing list last week. So if you’re not on that, you might want to be. Sign-up is on the events page.
Very Personal Ads #121: clarity vhooosh?
Personal ads. They’re … personal! Very.
Each week I write these VPAs to practice asking for what I want. And to get clarity on what that really is, even when asking feels conflicted.
I always get useful information about my relationship with various aspects of the ask. Join in if you like!
My brain is all turned around from being a zombie (slightly noisy link!) and teaching and all of it.
So these might be very incoherent personal ads. But we’re doing it!
As always, you can VPA all week, if you like.
Thing 1: Where else am I taking the long way when the long way is unnecessary?
Here’s what I want:
This past week at Crossing the Line (password: haulaway) I have discovered countless things that I am completely tripping over.
And each time it’s a case of doing something in a hard, complicated way when the easy and fun way is right in front of me.
We’ve been doing lots of Shiva Nata, and all of the epiphanies are yelling HEY LOOK THERE’S A SIMPLER WAY OVER HERE!!!
So. If I’m making things unnecessarily convoluted in this one area of my life (teaching), where am I doing it in the rest of my life? That’s what I’d like to find out.
Ways this could work:
Journaling. Stone skipping. More shivanauttery.
Throw it into the pot. Talk it over with clever and compassionate friends. Take it to the treasure map. What would one of the beacons do?
My commitment.
To not take myself too seriously.
To be receptive to many possible things-that-are-true.
To use the crayons.
Thing 2: Documentation. (Meta!)
Here’s what I want:
While I teach, I also take notes on the teaching.
Basic stuff like conscious entry and the dancing Revue.
But also noticings, ways I can adapt the various Capers that we play with, ideas for future Capers, ways that I have changed the sequencing or the material to fit the specific needs of a specific group.
So I end up with the meta-tour of the program. And then all those notes tend to just go live in a messy pile of iguanas and doom until I decide what to do with it.
I want a more formal way of documenting this stuff so that I can easily access it.
If I want to. I don’t have to. But it’s there for me if I decide I want to revisit it.
Ways this could work:
An Anthology! Or a section in an anthology.
(Anthology is my metaphor-mouse-word for “binder” because binders remind me of school and then I don’t want to use them.)
I already have my Anthology of Crossing the Line (The Ship!) and its companion, the Anthology of Crossing the Line (The Sea!).
The first is the structures and forms that hold the teaching — timetables, plans, components of each day, entry and exit for each component.
The second is all the deliciously sneaky content (mmmmm, content!) that I might plug into the various components. Capers! Adventures! Concepts!
So maybe there’s a place for a section for 2011 Notes.
Or maybe a 2011 anthology that is just for documentation and assessment? I don’t know yet.
My commitment.
To experiment and play.
To connect to the qualities of safety, exploration, permission, discovery, form, preparation and flow.
To use the crayons some more.
Thing 3: Best recovery time ever? Let us investigate what this means!
Here’s what I want:
To give myself real recovery time from teaching this incredibly intense madcap eight days of adventuring.
And to really truly enjoy the recovering so that I’m not just collapsed in a heap.
What I don’t know is the how/where/what…
Ways this could work:
I could ask Slightly Future Me what she would do.
If for some reason I was retiring and leaving my business to the most wonderful and amazing person in the world, and I had unlimited resources to design the Ideal Recovery Situation for this person… what would the elements be?
I’m noticing a trouble spot! It’s the word VACATION. Recovery time is not a freaking vacation. It’s recovery. I need to distinguish between those and find out what that means.
Will do some more research on this. But maybe run away to my uncle Svevo in the woods?
My commitment.
To find out what I need to find out.
To be patient. It’s a process.
Thing 4: A partner in crime!
Here’s what I want:
Someone who is both a friend and an adviser to giggle and strategize with me about my big, crazy plans and dreams.
Not to coach and not to consult and not to advise.
Just to drink tea with and draw with colored pencils and go OHMYGOD THAT WOULD BE SO GREAT!
To playfully plan, to sit with me while I talk to metaphor mouse, to rejoice over small things.
Ways this could work:
I have the best idea for who this could be! And I am whispering it to the trees.
My commitment.
To find out what happens in my life when this is part of it.
And what the symbolic elements are.
Thing 5: The rest of the Rallygators for January.
Here’s what I want:
The January Rally (Rally!) is going to be the most fun, hilarious, brilliant, amazing thing ever.
That’s because I have lots of new plans and the Playground has lots of new toys.
There’s room for six more people and I would like those six people to raise their hands.
Ways this could work:
The Crossing mice each get two bonus Rallies. Maybe some of them will decide they can’t bear to be away from the Playground any longer and will say JANUARY.
The people who are considering it will just know if it’s the right timing or not.
And it could just happen.
My commitment.
To figure out what my next steps are. To talk to Carolyn about this. To find out what I’m wrong about.
Thing 6: Next steps on the Enthusiastic
Here’s what I want:
The Convening of the Enthusiastic is happening in December and I haven’t sent out the invitations!
Not even sure when I’ll be able to do this…
Ways this could work:
Talk to Briana and Cairene.
Have a snack-sized Drunk Pirate Council (Drunkette! Councilette!).
Get the initial design for the invitations. Or meditate on the copy?
My commitment.
To be enthused because the Enthusiastic is the opposite of the Bored/Board.
Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.
Just to update you on what’s happened since last time.
I wanted eighteen people for the Shiva Nata workshop in Boulder. And we have them! Though then the studio told me we can fit some more people in, so you might still be able to sign up for that in the next day or two.
Then I asked about advance planning, and I’m actually feeling pretty good about that. We have three people for next year’s Crossing the Line in October, and some scholarship applications. I will do some more with this. It feels new and weird and good so far.
I also wanted blog posts and that was kind of iffy. That is, posts happened, but I am feeling conflicted about HOW they are happening. So I need to investigate that. But yay for the posts that were here.
Next I wanted KT-ers for the Kitchen Table Rally in April, and that’s all taken care of.
And I wanted to nail Thriller and learn the Shim Sham! So yes. I can now do Thriller at full speed and without cues, without watching anyone. Even taught it to several of the Crossing the Line mice. Plus I found a Shim Sham class and signed myself up. Developments! They are happening. Thank you, VPAs.
Play-filled comment zen. Here’s what I’d love today.
- Wanted: Your own personal ads, small or large. Updates on past ones if you like.
- You can also do these on your own or in your head. You can always call silent retreat!
- Leave your gwishes! Throw things in the pot!
- Things we try to keep away from: the word “manifest”, telling people how they should be asking for things, unsolicited advice.
- VPA amnesty applies, of course. Leave yours any time between now and next Sunday (or whenever, really) — it’s all fine by us!
xox