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.
What Do I Want To Echo
Echoing
We are in the month of Echoing, and I feel
tingly excitement and an almost overwhelming vastness of possibility
somewhere between thrill (I want to dance!)
and apprehension (I want to hide!)
an entire colony of butterflies inside me
oh wow this big newness this intensity of feeling
And so here is a grounding stone to skip
something to reverberate…
What do I want to echo?
What do I want to echo?
Clarity. Resonance. Spark. Presence: I am here.
Presence like grounded awe and grace, like a glowing ray of light and this breath now.
And presence like panther presence. Something striking and powerful and vitally alive.
Answers and questions.
What else about echo?
Echo like clap back. Echo as community.
This is related to my wishes about companionship and about legacy. I want people to play with in self-fluency, as equals, I don’t want to be the teacher or the guru or the one in the front of the room.
And I want the fullness of my [body of work] to be documented, to exist in one place, in a clear form. That way people can throw themselves into study and play without needing me at all, they can go as deep as they like, to take as much or as little as they want in a given moment.
What else do I know about this?
Mmmmm. I kind of like how this particular flavor of wish as stated above doesn’t answer my biggest (current) question.
Ha, current questions. That is a lovely double meaning. Questions that are of this moment right now, and questions that have spark, a powerful charge, and questions of funding and currency.
Let’s investigate this BCQ (Biggest Current Question), and invoke all the superpowers of current and flow.
Noticing…
My intention in writing this wish was to reveal some clarity on my biggest question (BCQ!), but it turns out that my wise wish knows how to sidestep that question with elegance and grace….
So here’s to all the superpowers of the Graceful Sidestep, which is itself an important principle in the practice of self-fluency and very interior design.
My BCQ —biggest! current! question! — until very recently at least, was this, or at least I thought it was:
Should I stay or should I go? After nearly twelve years of this business and the past four impossibly hard years, what happens next?
This might be a monster question but it’s still a question: let’s say I devote the next year as planned to Last Experiments in discovering if it is possible to make this business a sustainable enterprise, and it doesn’t work, what then?
Or would it make more sense to go get a job-job for a while in something I happen to be very good at — for example, copywriting, editing, marketing for anyone who is not me — and find out what it’s like to not be on the edge?
If I go into logic-mind…
Alright, the latter is definitely not 120% yes. I know this from experience: when I give up on a true yes and take a long meandering side path that might point me in that direction eventually, I end up just losing sight of my spark.
And once my actual yes is out of sight, I invariably compromise on a medium-yes. Or I get sucked into the day-to- day bullshit of the rigged game and forget to check in with my new true yes of the present moment.
On the other hand, as we were forced to get very clear on last week, it is also not my yes to keep the business afloat at my own expense, which at this point isn’t something I can do anymore even if I wanted to.
But/and: Logic-mind isn’t where the answer to this lives. Logic-mind is just where I grind wheels and get lost in pros-and-cons of on the one hand and on the other hand. This is just fiddling details, and they aren’t even necessarily grounded in true yes.
The actual answers (or, better: the clues) live in truth-mind, that is: turning inward, getting quiet, immersing in body-heart-mind knowing. Truth-mind offers me something else entirely.
What does truth say? What does wise, loving, patient Incoming Me say?
(1) It isn’t about staying or going at all.
It doesn’t matter what you do, Havi Bell, because either way, your yes is to catalogue and preserve your legacy. Your legacy is what you want to echo. It is your bell. It is the work of your life and it is time to let it come into form.
So whether you stay and devote yourself to the well-being of the gallery or you seek external support in the form of [salary], or any other option, this is your beacon. Resonate.
(2) It’s time to allow what you live to be downloaded into form.
When this legacy is in place, you can absolutely stay and play if that is your yes, which it may well be. We still feel sparks there. We still have great love for community and play.
Or maybe you will then wish to pursue a new yes calling to you, but either way, your body of work is asking to be preserved in form, this is your devotion, your desire, your unique contribution to the universal sea of shared wisdom.
Legacy is what lives beyond. Putting your focus here solves all questions of doors of entry versus doors of exit. This is what you wish to echo. So let it echo through you.
(3) You have spent the past two years learning about freedom.
Freedom as spiritual quality and the freedom in letting go of [oh pretty much everything]. Creative freedom and more freedom in your days, the treasure of freedom in relationships. Even freedom in dance, a very specific kind of freedom that comes from form, technique, discipline, intention and big wild presence.
Now the time has come to learn about a new freedom.
You need to not only learn about but prioritize financial freedom — or, really, for right now just some form of financial afloat-ness to get you through the period of Preserving Legacy aka allowing it to come into form.
Because that’s the only way you can document the collection of what you know, not just as blog posts of concepts and ideas here and there, but the body of work.
You can’t do this the way you are living now where your resources of attention go to where you will be staying when and for how long, and living on miracles.
It is time to prioritize stability. You need a better foundation for your work of echoing. Ask for it and expect it.
I sit with this and skip some stone questions…
Me: Okay, interesting. So essentially, we just need something to pay the bills and hold down the fort while I document [Legacy]. That something can be the Friends of Museum option, when we let that into the world. Or a new foundation. Or possibly that something is a new solution I haven’t met yet.
And then this legacy either allows for a new way to have a business, a way for the Gallery to be self-sustaining, or it lets me to find some new way to support myself while still knowing that the library of my work lives on.
That is useful to know. It still doesn’t alleviate my monster-fears of What If It Doesn’t Work. It is a start though.
Wisest me: I honestly don’t think it matters. There isn’t a time limit.
Me: How can you say there isn’t a time limit when we are out of funds? Even with being vulnerable and asking, and this amazing outpouring of love and support, it’s still only enough to make it a few more months. There clearly is a limit but you say there isn’t.
Wisest me: There isn’t.
Me: I don’t get it.
Wisest me: Everything you are going through is legitimate, my bell love, all the apprehension, pain, fear, excitement, passion, all of it. It all makes sense and it is all temporary and it is all just right.
And you are quite correct that yes, on the physical plane of course there are limits, even the most basic one: one day we will cease to exist in this body form. The time will come for the long nap. And, at the same time, that’s not the only plane.
There is also another truth, a truth that says there is time, there is plenty of [everything you need], there are beautiful surprise solutions emerging in every instant, and there is treasure and power and grace in this breath now, yes, in this moment of not knowing.
Wisest-me in a moment of channeling truth.
Receive the treasure of this moment of recognizing something true:
In order for you to do your work in this world, you need resources. This is a vital piece of truth that you’ve been neglecting in your passionate dedication to your work: you need to be supported, it is vital for you to have what you need in order to create, because what is creating if not being a clear channel.
When you recognize this, when you decide that it matters to have your day to day needs met in order to do your best work, this is also part of your legacy. More important than you know even.
Decide that it is important that you get paid, in one form or another. Prioritize that before all else, and focus on this now, because this is about harmony, truth-love, congruence, right relationship, and taking care of yourself. These are the important things of life.
You curate one of the most magical galleries on the planet, and doing this requires that you are able to access your state of creative genius, your wisest knowing. And if the gallery owner is constantly dealing with stuff like keeping the heat on in the winter, she cannot do her big creative magic.
If you are going to model what you teach, if you want to be a beacon of self-fluency, you need to prioritize your own well-being, you need to be done with letting the edge be your normal.
Back and forth.
Me: But that’s not why I want to document my legacy.
Wisest-me: Of course not. That is what will allow you to let your legacy take the form it wants to take.
Me: Okay, but I don’t even know how to do this.
Wisest-me: You don’t have to know yet. That’s not the point of wishing, babe. The point of wishing is to reveal your yes, let it be named with love, while creating the safest possible environment in which to want what you want.
Me: I really want a solution though. I feel impatient.
Wisest-me: I get that. It will be here. For now, commit to the wish and the wishing. This is a wish about Legacy, and making sure you have the resources to document your legacy is part of the beautiful glow-spark of the wish!
What else do I find inside my wish?
Hopefulness.
Receptivity.
Spark.
Excitement.
An overflowing thank you heart for the magnificence of all of it: everything that has come through me so far, all the incredible people who are here to play and celebrate with me. I cannot thank you enough, everyone who has given something to the cause. I have been crying all weekend with amazement about how many people care.
Looking forward to Six Month (Virtual) Rally/Retreat, even if monsters are doubtful about whether this can buy enough time for the mission of Legacy. I am excited about everything I am currently writing, the gallery, positive change.
I want to trust that clarity is enough, and that whatever emerges from this wish will be so beautiful, so right, and, like every other wish I have wished here in all these years of wishing, it will point me with love to the next step.
Anything else about my wish?
It feels almost unbearably vulnerable
(which, hey, that’s how wishes work sometimes)
to share about this at all
I don’t know what else I want to make safety around it
or what I want to do with this wish.
Other than wish it and
release it into the world.
382 weeks.
That is how long I have been writing weekly wishes here.
They have all come true in some form,
because they are true,
because they launch me towards my truth,
and because I do not ask for candyland bullshit,
my ask is always about process and discovery,
learning about my relationship with the essence of what I want,
calling in the qualities that will help me embody it.
One day, maybe as part of the work of legacy,
I will revisit all the past wishes and
see just how much love-joy-magic-power they have glowed into the world.
Thank you, everyone who glows wishes with me, and thank you for the way we celebrate our wishes together, welcoming them and each other, it is a beautiful thing, and I am glad for it.
invitation: come play with me…
you are invited to share this post and to share many !!!!!! about what is here,
or share appreciation or anything sparked for you while reading
deposit wishes, gwishes, superpowers, qualities, ingredients, intel, possibly in code
safe space for creative exploration asks us to let go of care-taking and advice-giving
wishes are never late because whenever you wish is the right time for wishing
we remember that people vary and my wishes don’t have to be yours, each process is unique, and this is a good thing
here’s how we meet each other’s wishes: with great kindness and appreciation and awe, whispering (and sometimes shouting) oh, wow what beautiful wishes
♡
the week of waves of wonder
This is week 432 of this ritual, and so we chicken.
What’s been working? What do I want to play with….
Each day before I start work, I ask a question and direct it at three aspects of myself that I don’t know that well yet. Sometimes it is as simple as “tell me what you think I should know”.
It is very grounding, often surprising, and I find that I am more focused.
Breathing for the hard, challenging and mysterious.
- Mouse in motorhome. Just one guy. Actually it is two mice. They are unbelievably cute and I want them to leave. Breathing for peaceful exits.
- Working way too many hours, too much sitting/concentrating, not enough air and stars. Breathing for this.
- Website was down for just about twenty four hours. Nothing but bad news (and expensive news) while trying to get it back up. Breathing.
- After working ass off on The New Plan for the past few weeks, realizing that we can’t actually make it happen without immediate help to get through crisis. Breathing for clarity and trust-love.
- Having to ask for help, my least favorite thing in the entire world. Breathing comfort and reassurance.
- Catching myself doing so much pre-emptive placating, reassuring and hand-holding, having to remind myself to cut that out because that all falls into the category of caretaking and WUSIT (What Unsovereign Shit Is This). Remembering that I no longer work for Tantrum Prevention Incorporated, but bracing for that anyway, lots of stuff from then. Breathing the reminder that Now Is Not Then, and we are fierce powerful panthers, amen.
- My big wish-desire still scares me way too much. Breathing trust and patience.
- Ugh do not want to get the kind of jobs that I need to get, even though I would be very good at them. Breathing for surprise perfect solutions that are so beautiful I clap my hands in delight.
- Inhale, exhale. May all misunderstandings and distortions, internal and external, dissolve in love if not in laughter. May peacefulness prevail. Trust-more love-more release-more receive-more. Goodbye (and thank you), mysteries and hard moments of this week.
Breathing for the good, reassuring, and magical!
- Back in the wilderness under the stars, it is so gorgeous here. Breathing thank you.
- Not only am I sleeping again, but also no longer having regular nightmares. Breathing thankfulness.
- Misunderstanding from last week sorted with ease and grace, happy to have friend back in my life. Breath of appreciation.
- Playfulness and joy and silliness and gleeful giddy wonder and grand adventures and big ideas and fun collaborations and so much play. Breathing happiness.
- Getting so much done. Breathing for magic.
- I was brave and asked for help, and am overwhelmed by the outpouring of love from people all over the world. Breathing gratitude for this reminder that I am not alone and this work is so deeply loved, thank you.
- Discovered a path from the pain of I Can’t Fix This to the amazing (and surprisingly blissful) superpower of I Am Completely Peaceful And Can Let The Audience Decide. Amazing. Breathing steadiness and grace.
- I like being in one place — for now! I like being here — for now! I like the sun and the long meandering dirt road walks and the dusting of snow on the mountains and the cafe where I work! And watching So You Think You Can Dance and crying because the routines are so incredible. Breathing and smiling.
- Cubs won the world series!!!!! Who ever thought that would happen in our lifetime? Take that, curses and hexes and long runs of bad luck. Breathing so much delight.
- Big dreamy ideas and wishes, getting to know them, getting to know the me who believes they are possible. Breathing joy.
- Thankfulness. Treasure in the form of sleeping in, Agent Sloan offering to go on a secret mission for me, old friends returning, all the best clues, enchiladas with the cowboy, starting a dance crew in my mind. Nothing is wrong, even when I want to believe it is. Now is not then. All Timing Is Right Timing. Thank you for this grand adventure. A full breath of deep appreciation in my thank-you heart.
Superpowers.
Last week I asked for the power of Effortlessly Grounded in Panther Powers as well as People Rejoice With Me, and all the powers of the beautiful wind-blowing spirit emoji blessing my trajectory and my sails with love. Totally happened.
Now I am asking for surprise perfect solutions that are so beautiful I clap my hands in delight. I want lots of these! I want to be able to see them and recognize them! I want to rejoice in them! I want to explore new doors with curiosity and delight, and all the best companions.
May it be so.
How was your week?
Come play in the comments. Share something from your week, take a breath, or just say hi! No rules, my format doesn’t have to be yours, we’ve been doing this every week for years now and there still isn’t a right way.
Everyone belongs. We let people have their own experience. We’re supportive and welcoming. We lovingly refrain from giving advice.
And of course it’s always okay to comment under a made-up name, whether for play and delight, or in the interest of Safety First.
Wishing you a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day, a restful weekend and a happy week to come.
It’s fine if it’s not Friday anymore. There’s complete chicken amnesty — jump in whenever you like. Blowing kisses to the Beloved Lurkers too!
Moment of truth. Let’s ring the bells.
Hey we have a gorgeous new website!
Are we doing this? Moment of truth. And bells.
This week’s wish began as a wish about Legacy and became a wish of What Do I Want To Echo. But then something happened and I had to scrap it, and now it is a wish about the next few days and ringing truth-bells.
Interestingly, this is the month of Echoing with the superpower of — get this — being a bell, and here is my chance to practice.
Right on time.
What do I know about moment of truth and ringing this bell?
Do you want the short version or the long version? I don’t know which one I want to write.
To be honest, I think I’d prefer to not need to share any of this, but here we are.
Wisest quiet me says: Speak truth and be heard, be a bell, trust that it is the time to ring all the bells and let them echo.
The truth bell version.
(0) But first, we breathe!
Breathing here for the vulnerability of it all. Breathing receptivity, ease, intention, honesty, clarity, surrender, opening, presence. I am here. And: I am here for this.
Breathing for meeting this moment. Breathing for trusting life.
(1) In six days, we are out of options.
In six days, on November 8, we have to make our yearly payment of $1300 for our shopping cart/list system, and we don’t have it. We don’t have anything, actually.
So either we bring in (or otherwise come up with) that sum right now, or the lights go out in the gallery. For a while or for longer than a while or I don’t know.
(2) It’s not just that.
Yesterday the gorgeous new website (which I also have not paid for yet because my incredible designer is the biggest fan of my work and trusts that I am the right horse to bet on) was down for an entire day because our old tired server can’t keep up, and hey, now we need to pay twice as much for hosting.
To be even more painfully truthful, I haven’t paid him in over a year, and it’s been a few years now since I regularly paid myself enough to live on. Most of the people who help out in the business volunteer their time, just like I volunteer mine, because they love this work, and me, and they believe in the mission. They trust (as I do) that we will all be compensated in good time.
That is really beautiful — I am endlessly grateful, and this trust is treasure, and also it sucks. It isn’t okay.
That isn’t what I want to model in the world. What I want to model in the world is something glowing and beautiful and sustainable. Right now we work hard and make beautiful, amazing, vitally important things, but that isn’t enough.
I honestly don’t know if sustainable exists but I want to find out. I want to be able to find out. If we figure out a way to keep the lights on in the gallery for 2017, that will be my project.
(3) I genuinely want to find out what sustainable looks like.
Sustainable to me means:
+ Havi doesn’t get burnt out/isn’t perpetuating a state of burnout
+ generating enough income to live on* and to easily cover the costs of running a business
+ I am able to pay everyone in my business, including me, for their time and hard work
+ the business does not rely on personal debt, no more floating the operation from my own now-depleted resources
+ a business that is peaceful, good for the world, a source of sustenance and joy
+ powered by integrity and love-more-trust-more
+ everyone who finds us breathes a little deeper, we all take better care of ourselves
+ something I feel comfortable modeling (not something I would talk someone else out of trying)
(Glowing Reassurances)
Whatever happens in the next six days, whether the lights in the gallery stay on or have to shut off, whichever way the miracles go (because as far as Wisest-Me is concerned, it’s all miracles in all directions), I will deliver everything I have promised to everyone who has already paid for things this year.
There are two more YEARbooks in progress, nearly completed. The Path of Color aka the monster coloring course is all planned and we’ll send dates soon to everyone who signed up. The Six Month Online Rally/Retreat will still be happening.
So let’s breathe for that. Nothing to worry about. There never is.
All is and and will be well, however it turns out.
What is interesting about vulnerability?
Whether lights stay on or lights go off, I’m not the one who can determine that, and I cannot even tell you how deeply disconcerting this feels.
For the first time in the past twelve years of doing this, that decision is not up to me because I don’t have the resources to decide.
I’ve spent the past few months exploring all possible variations of the ultimate big question, a la The Clash — should I stay or should I go?! —and yet, here we are in this moment of deciding, and it turns out it’s not me who decides.
Either the funds will show up or they won’t.
I guess in that sense, my decision is a yes. I want to stay, but only if it is possible. And that part isn’t in my hands.
Can I find peacefulness in not having a say? What would that be like?
Mmmmmm, it’s a bit like the show So You Think You Can Dance, when the audience votes for which dancers get to stay on the show.
It’s a funny situation, really. They’re all phenomenally talented dancers at the peak of their ability. Some have to go. And the judges (the ones with the magic vision who can see the nuances of technique) don’t get to weigh in until the audience has spoken first about what they feel, what they love.
I can experience this lack of control as terrifying, but I can also let this be a relief.
Superpower of hey, it’s up to the audience now. Nothing more to do here except ring the bell of asking, and ask. And receive whatever results from that or doesn’t as a gift.
Whatever happens next will decide for me, because there isn’t anything else I can do.
What if I can let that be a beautiful form of freedom and enjoy not being in charge?
What do I want?
I want sustainable. I honestly don’t know if that is even possible, but I want to explore.
I want harmoniousness and congruence and entirely new levels of wild trust. I want to walk through whichever door shows up, trusting that it is the just-right door.
And I want the superpowers of: Echoing. Calm. Steady and powerful in panther mode. Rays of Light. I Am Able To See The Opportunity/Treasure In This. Honesty. Clarity. No More Putting Up With Unsustainable Situations. It’s Out Of My Hands. Landing On Feet. Beautiful ease-filled solutions that make me clap my hands with delight. Wild and Witchy. Peaceful heart.
Reverberating. Grace.
The mea culpa section.
Monsters want me to list all the ways that I screwed up, to take responsibility for my part in this. So let’s name these.
(I plan to write more about this, that is, about my decisions and about circumstances, sans monsters, because I don’t actually believe in screwups, in Love Letter To A Museum Dreamer, which you can read here later if we stay open.)
- When the business was doing well, that is, prior to 2012 when it all came crashing down, I could have paid myself and put funds aside as a cushion instead of putting everything back into the business. I also could have chosen not to expand the retreat center when we had the opportunity. I took a risk because I wanted to be able to make the work more accessible and reach more people (and offer lower prices), and it bombed. We couldn’t make the larger space work, and every penny we made over the next three years went to overhead. Wrong move? Sure. However, I see how it came from my good heart, and so I glow love to past-me for wanting to do what she thought was right.
- I could have saved everyone a lot of pain by getting things in writing, so, for example, when my mentor changed his position on everything he had ever said and wanted to sue me for doing what I thought he wanted, I could have said hey let’s look at paragraph three. I wouldn’t have ended up in the awful helpless position of not being able to stand up for my students or my work, knowing anything I could possibly say in our defense would end up being used against me. I can think of about twenty other examples of Get It In Writing. Lesson learned, I hope.
- Shmita. Here I am disagreement with the monster crew. Taking sabbatical time when I did, when my body was on the verge of collapse from exhaustion and burnout, is by far the best possible thing I could have done for myself, and I do not regret it. A completely transformative experience. However, it did involve shutting down our primary income streams while I was in recovery mode, and I no longer have it in me to be in teacher mode because I no longer believe that’s the right way. I need more time to figure out an alternative, and, as mentioned, we are out of time. So there’s that. That’s on me.
What else do I want?
I want to not have to do this again.
I feel so much joy that there are people who want to help, and I also don’t like asking people to keep us afloat in an emergency. I don’t want to be at the edge.
I want a way to live (and a place to live) that doesn’t depend on having to ask for help keeping the lights on. A foundation for me so that I can do my best writing and teaching-without-teaching, and share the full body of work, without constantly dealing with how to keep the place up and running.
So, one example, if I had the funds to finish my basement, I could possibly turn it into a rental and I would consider that a sustainable solution even if not a plentiful one. External resources that mean not having to scramble, or panic about server hosting costs going up. I want that.
And I want people reading and playing here. Both because I want the work of self-fluency to reach a much broader audience, and because people often write to us and say they’d be glad to pay ten dollars a month or whatever for this space, which is so sweet but that really only becomes a viable option when we’re talking about a much larger group of playmates.
And? I want to preserve the freedom to write what I want to write, as it comes through me, trusting my instincts and trusting flow.
States of…
Vulnerability, state of. Perceived Emergency, state of. Peacefulness, state of.
And, also: Bell state. The state of being a bell. Resonance. Echoing and reverberating. Clarity. Truth love.
I am thinking about bridging between states, and what this means.
Sometimes I imagine opening a Metaphorical Travel Agency. I want to take you to all my favorite places, taking us through the qualities of these places which live in the names.
I have been through Bliss and Starlight (actual places), and now I want us to visit New Hope.
What pathways do I want to traverse in my bell state as we cross states? From emergency (perceived emergency) to emergence to new hope to starlight to bliss, and then to whatever lies beyond that starlit bliss of self-renewing hope?
These are the kinds of questions that I explore in my writing and weekly wishes, these are the questions I want to continue to visit, that for me is one piece of keeping the lights on.
Let’s apply self-fluency, like we do.
Here’s my part: Getting quiet. Turning inward. Skipping stones. Consulting my wisest selves and Incoming me. Being present. Open heart. Grace state. Bell resonance. Being as true to myself as I know how. Echoing and reverberating. Asking for help.
Here’s your part: You decide. I trust you. I love you, whatever comes of this. Vote.
We are out of time. Do the lights stay on?
It’s been a few years now since the museum business adequately covered all expenses, and we muddled through okay, but now we are past the point where that’s an option, so here we are, moment of truth.
Is it scary to let the audience decide? Of course. But it’s also okay. I’m not worried either way. This entire experience has been full of magic for me. Do I hope for more? Of course. But mainly I am trusting that whatever comes next will be just right.
Here’s how you vote. You can give us money and get stuff in return, or you can give us money as a thank you for everything that has been and is and may be, and expect nothing in return. Either of those work for us!
First option: If we raise enough funds to keep this going, here’s what will happen: I’ll spend 2017 figuring out if/how sustainable business works. Those of you who join the six month rally at the Secret Door Society will get to watch that process and maybe think through things with me if you want. I will keep exploring wishes here.
Second option: Not enough funds. In that case, I will get another job or three, and it will look like this: yes to the six month rally at secret door society for Friends of the Museum, yes to what I have already promised, no to the blog, no to everything else, because there won’t be time to do any of it.
Third option: Should we make more than enough funds to solve this, then I can do this full time. The blog will stay. I will write posts about all the stuff I want to write about. Exciting things will be happening. Big wild exploration.
Here’s the situation. November 8 is when we have to either pull the plug or go forward (again, either way we will deliver everything we’ve promised plus the Secret Door Society), but it takes a few days for funds to actually arrive in our account. So if your vote is for yes let’s stay open, then help us out now if you can.
WHERE TO GO & WHAT TO DO
If you want to join the Friends of the Museum, go here.
If you want to either buy past products or toss some money our way as a thank you for nearly twelve years and seventeen hundred posts and thirty four thousand comments and to keep this beautiful space going, you can do that on the foundation page.
Bells, wishes, doors.
Calling on all the superpowers of (perceived) crisis into door, the superpower of beautiful solutions, the superpower of welcoming the moment that is a door.
Agreeing to let perceived crisis slide into that category of good things that are not immediately recognizable as good things at the time. Which is probably most things.
And we are not in any way required to recognize them as good things, that is not necessary, because forcing ourselves to find the good inside of a moment of hard is not compassionate. Compassion is letting the hard thing be hard. Once we’ve done that, the good will reveal itself in right timing anyway.
I trust this and I trust us, and I am ready for whatever happens or does not happen. That is how echoing works.
last week’s wishes
last-week-me wished a wish called say what you want to say, and much to my surprise I am saying things I did not want to say, but it is the time to say them, and so in that sense, it was a very powerful wish indeed.
invitation: come play with me…
you are invited to share this post and to share many !!!!!! about what is here, or share appreciation or anything sparked for you while reading
deposit wishes, gwishes, superpowers, qualities, ingredients, intel, possibly in code
safe space for creative exploration asks us to let go of care-taking and advice-giving
wishes are never late because whenever you wish is the right time for wishing
we remember that people vary and my wishes don’t have to be yours, each process is unique, and this is a good thing
here’s how we meet each other’s wishes: with great kindness and appreciation and awe, whispering (and sometimes shouting) oh, wow what beautiful wishes
♡
the week of wind blessing sails
This is week 431 of this ritual, and so we chicken.
What’s been working? What do I want to play with….
I had a giant project that couldn’t possibly done in time (it needed two weeks and I had two days), so I imagined that there is a version of me who could handle this.
Specifically, the me who is really good at letting rough things be rough.
Yes, my mind went to some lovely dirty places there too. But what I actually mean is this: I assumed there is a version of me who is so completely grounded in Trust Love that she can let a rough draft be enough, trusting there will be time to polish later. Then I let her tell me what to do.
We got two weeks of work done in two days and yes, it was rough, and also so good.
Breathing for the hard, challenging and mysterious.
- Learned something I didn’t want to know. Breathing for comfort.
- Big miscommunication with someone I don’t know very well that resulted in inadvertent and very unnecessary hurt feelings, as well as all kinds of conclusion-jumping. Breathing for clarity, trust-love and sovereign communication, as well as for everything resolving itself under the surface.
- Learned about a big wish-desire, and it scares me so much that I can’t even think about it. Breathing patience. Breathing trust in proxy magic.
- The Everything Is Hopeless Why Even Bother monsters were still around, not just about the big wish but about everything. Breathing for comfort and Safety First.
- I am ready to be out of the Tantrum Prevention business, and I suspect this means taking more action on my part than just stating that I’m done. Also really ready for an actual vacation, the kind that doesn’t involve spending most of the day troubleshooting. Breathing for this.
- So. Much. Rigged. Game. Cultural. Bullshit. Breathing for this.
- Creepy dudes being creepy. Breathing badass panther prowess and DNFW.
- Tired of being on the edge, tired of the ongoing museum situation/crisis, tired of options getting narrower and narrower at every turn. I’ve been without a home base for 183 days now, which is mostly a super fun adventure, but I am so ready to have the option of sanctuary and foundation and a place to land when I want it. I genuinely don’t mind not having a place like that right now because it isn’t my yes, but I mind a lot not having the resources to make that an easy choice if it happens to feel right. Having the OPTION is my yes, and right now I don’t. Breathing for solutions and ease and the superpower of Surprise Good News.
- Working a million hours a day instead of going for beautiful walks and stretching and napping. Missing dance and movement and training. Breathing for my body.
- Inhale, exhale. May all misunderstandings and distortions, internal and external, dissolve in love if not in laughter. May peacefulness prevail. Trust-more love-more release-more receive-more. Goodbye (and thank you), mysteries and hard moments of this week.
Breathing for the good, reassuring, and magical!
- I AM SLEEPING AGAIN! ALL NIGHT LONG! Apparently the answer was as easy as Get Out Of Los Angeles because as soon I landed back in the motorhome, I was sleeping ten hours a night instead of three. I have no idea why I would sleep better in a noisy supermarket parking lot or some random truck stop than in my friend’s beautiful peaceful apartment on the edge of a hill with pretty trees, but for whatever reason, my body remembered how to sleep, and I am so happy about this. Breathing thankfulness.
- When new friend was upset with me and jumping to conclusions and saying hurtful things, I did not make shit about me, I did not take it personally, I one hundred percent understood how misunderstandings worked. And I was able to respond with love and presence, grace and ease, and friend was able to back up and do the same. Breathing thank you for self-fluency and the past twelve years of training.
- Sweetness and joy and love and levels of connection that are pure magic. Breathing thank you.
- Hey did I mention that I got two weeks of work done in two days, thanks to Incoming Me being the world’s biggest badass and telling me exactly what to do and how to do it? Breathing for Rally magic.
- Oh, and finally (like, after many, many, many months of agonizing over this) figured out what I want to do about the museum and what I want in its place, and how I want that to work and what I want to look like, and set it all into motion. Breathing joy and gratitude and sparks of love for this.
- Pretty scenery in Arizona and Nevada, and now I am in Bishop, California, where it is no longer too hot, and where the leaves are pretty colors and I can wear layers again, and there is a dusting of snow on the mountains. Breathing for this is where I want to be.
- The Cowboy and I generally want very different things and then a few of the same things, but right now we have remarkably similar visions in some ways. Breathing and smiling.
- Had so much fun spending two days on the road dreaming up ideas and excitement for someday wishes, and inventing fun, creative and playful names for all of it. Breathing joy.
- Thankfulness. Treasure in the form of clues everywhere, loving friends, surprise nachos, walking to the movie theater with my favorite human, having the exact right thing to wear. Nothing is wrong, even when I want to believe it is. Now is not then. All Timing Is Right Timing. Thank you for this grand adventure. A full breath of deep appreciation in my thank-you heart.
Superpowers.
Last week I was stranded at LAX all day and asked for extreme levels of believing that something that looks like bad news (missing my flight?) is actually What Unexpected Good Fortune.
This was a marvelous superpower to ask for! First of all, it did turn out to be good fortune because the cowboy wouldn’t have been able to pick me in Phoenix because of massive delays due to a road accident involving a twenty car pile-up.
I think I had an easier time this week finding the good and not assuming [Doom], even when challenges arose, as they do. So I am glad to have met this superpower.
This week I am asking for the power of Effortlessly Grounded in Panther Powers as well as People Rejoice With Me, and all the powers of the beautiful wind-blowing spirit emoji blessing my trajectory and my sails with love. May it be so.
How was your week?
Come play in the comments. Share something from your week, take a breath, or just say hi! No rules, my format doesn’t have to be yours, we’ve been doing this every week for years now and there still isn’t a right way.
Everyone belongs. We let people have their own experience. We’re supportive and welcoming. We lovingly refrain from giving advice.
And of course it’s always okay to comment under a made-up name, whether for play and delight, or in the interest of Safety First.
Wishing you a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day, a restful weekend and a happy week to come.
It’s fine if it’s not Friday anymore. There’s complete chicken amnesty — jump in whenever you like. Blowing kisses to the Beloved Lurkers too!
say what you want to say
the point isn’t getting my wish (though cool things have emerged from wishing), it’s learning about my relationship with wanting, accessing the qualities…
wanting can be hard, it is easy to feel conflicted about it, and the reasons for that make this a surprisingly subversive practice…
this is the 380th week of wishing, come play!
Say what you want to say…
That is the song playing right now.
Say what you wanna say /
And let the words fall out /
Honestly I wanna see you be brave
Honestly I want to see myself be brave.
Say what you want to say and say what you want.
This is how the song goes in my mind.
What do I want?
I have been less than honest with myself lately, maybe always, both about yeses and about lots of things.
I have been upset with other people for not sharing with me what they want or how they feel but I have also been keeping my cards close to my heart, and then sometimes even forgetting to look to see what my cards are to begin with, it’s been so long since I looked at them….
What do I want?
Beautiful Clarity. Wild Clarity. Trust in my clarity.
Quiet. Freedom. Quiet Freedom. Out under the stars. Deep healing sleep.
But mainly I want to keep being present with my cards, checking in with my current yes.
Am I following the path of now-yes, or am I taking long, winding, not-particularly-fun detours related to yeses that past-me set into motion, and somehow I got distracted by life and neglected to alter my course. Ah, of course, this is about intention and trajectory.
What do I want?
I want to be someone who sets clear, loving, sweet expectations with everyone in my life. I want to say hey let’s put cards on the table, let’s be warm and honest and vulnerable about true yes in this moment.
I want to release expectations and assumptions. Conclusion jumping is the most dangerous sport in the world, and I feel upset when people I love partake in it, but to be fair to them — and to myself, I need to permanently quit too.
What do I want?
A new way.
Do I know what I mean by this?
Yes: A new way (or possibly many new ways) of communicating what I want, of being beautifully clear.
Is there anything else I mean by this?
Yes: More time communing with the yeses, finding out more about what is true yes, what is 120% yes, what thrills me and calls my name.
Is there anything else I mean by this?
Yes. But I don’t know how to describe it yet.
A new way of everything, maybe. I will know more about this later. For now, this is more like a clue about clues to come.
What do I want?
A new metaphor.
What do I want?
Less is more.
Well, sometimes less is more. Other times less is clarity. Other times less is just right. Either way, I want to practice Do Less and Choose Ease. I want to remove distractions.
What do I want?
To keep asking this question until I know.
What do I want?
To be out in quiet peaceful places, writing, in happy connection with fun playful people, creating. Trusting the process of life and taking joy in being alive.
What do I want?
Some goals in the form of secret missions.
And to go wild with proxy missions, following all the rabbit holes.
For example, yesterday I was imagining what it would be like to run a retreat center in Bliss, Idaho, because who doesn’t want to come hang out in a state of bliss?
Clues about what I want…
- Phoenix rising from the ashes. Aka sometimes letting it all burn to the ground is a good thing.
- I had a dream that Vanna White came to visit me and she told me I was beautiful. Best dream ever.
- Lady K of the Jewels said something about how in order to achieve [Thing X] that I strive for, first you have to become a walking fuck-you to the rigged game. I used to be that, and then I forgot how. Time to remember.
- All week long I have been asking people how they feel, meaning: emotions, when to me it is very obvious that this is the context, and they have been responding with answers about their physical environment or how tired they are, and it is time to ask a different question, or to ask the same question in a new way.
Superpowers
I watched all the Cubs vs Dodgers games in Los Angeles, surrounded by Dodgers fans.
As you might imagine, I am always happy to watch the Dodgers suffer humiliating loss, in addition to being thrilled to see the Cubs finally make it to the World Series. And so I was completely charmed and surprised when the series ended and the bar full of Dodgers fans applauded the Cubs for winning. Their team lost and they applauded. I’ve never seen anything like that before. It was beautiful.
Here’s to the superpower of applauding the outcome, even when it isn’t what you want.
I also want the superpower of entirely new levels of DNGAF, and the related power of Saying What I Want Even If It Scares Me, and the related power of treating myself like I am a wild wonderful genius worthy of being cherished, may it be so.
Anything else?
Yes. Maybe this is a clue too. Or maybe it is more like a theme.
I own two lipsticks. One I lost almost immediately after acquiring it, as if being instructed to go with deep bold red and not screw around with being sweet and pink, because now is not the time for that.
After I made peace with bold red intensity, my friend found my other lip color under her couch. Time to make peace with the bold intense things and then trust.
Or to trust, and then be bold and intense. Something like that. Maybe that is another form of say what you want to say.
Centered
This is the month of Centering, with the superpower of Delicious Space, and I am returning to what centers me by asking what I want.
And actually you might say that being curious about what I want and need, as a life practice, is a form of making room for delicious space.
last week’s wishes
last-week-me wished a very long wish called new breath / new air to breathe, and now I am out of Los Angeles and out of a ridiculous misunderstanding and out of all kinds of things, and this is good.
invitation: come play with me…
you are invited to share this post and to share many !!!!!! about what is here,
or share appreciation or anything sparked for you while reading
deposit wishes, gwishes, superpowers, qualities, ingredients, intel, possibly in code
safe space for creative exploration asks us to let go of care-taking and advice-giving
wishes are never late because whenever you wish is the right time for wishing
we remember that people vary and my wishes don’t have to be yours, each process is unique, and this is a good thing
here’s how we meet each other’s wishes: with great kindness and appreciation and awe, whispering (and sometimes shouting) oh, wow what beautiful wishes
♡