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.
Wish 296: and we’re off!
Personal ads. They’re … personal! Very.
♡
I have three wishes this week.
Three wishes, and I suspect they are all related, except I don’t exactly know how yet.
Fairy godmother blessings.
Before my birthday, I asked the Secret S-Word Society to glow fairy-godmother wishes for me and for my incoming year. I liked how that felt, that desire.
It is a wish about knowing that I am held in a circle of pure qualities: joy, love, adoration, presence, and grace. And not needing anything more than the reminder that these qualities are available to me at all times.
It is a way of preparing for the voyage.
And then I was offline on my birthday, and when I came back to visit this world of links-and-pixels, there were so many wishes and blessings for me.
These are the qualities.
Here are the qualities and delights people wished for me, on the Book of Face, and on the Switch/Swoop:
Enjoyment. Health. Vitality. Adoration. All wishes come true.
Light. Laughter. Dance. Peace. Companionship. Stillness. Merriment. Joy.
Relaxation. Love. People who make you smile. Gwishes come true, today and all days.
Serenity. Sweetness. Calm. Wisdom. Beauty. The language of bridges.
Ease. Discovery. Possibility. Celebration. Recharging. Renewal. Refreshment. Secret delights.
Magic. Victuals. Vivacity. Bells. Invitations. Bubblicious Bubble Bubbles.
Panache. Happiness. A million glittering sparklepoints. All things wonderful.
And Bill Weasley, handsomely scruffy curse-breaking specialist. Amen to that.
I want to really feel the power of this. The power of these wishes.
Landing.
Rachel Naomi Remen describes blessings as airplanes waiting to land. As if there is this moment when you say YES, and then all the good wishes that have been hovering in your orbit, waiting to be received, can finally come in.
My wish is about saying a clear, warm, welcoming YES to these fairy godparent blessings, and for the just-right filter that takes in only the qualities, the beautiful essence, without any energy or stuff that might be attached to any of the wishes.
My wish is about being a bell of appreciation and gratitude, humming love, really allowing myself to receive all this beautiful goodness, and knowing how fortunate I am to have such loving people in my life, and to live in a time when we can share this love, instantaneously, in the form of words, from all over the world, it is amazing.
My second wish.
I am embarking this week on a six month voyage of discovery, in the form of a road trip in a small camper, with a boy I like and a lot of notebooks.
Well, I plan to be discovering for much longer than that, but the first half of my Shmita year will be on the road, or at least that is the plan right now.
My wish is for ease and delight on this trip, and for this embarking. To receive all the qualities and birthday wishes, and let them be the companions for voyaging. I wish for a peaceful and well-provisioned exit/entry. And to feel Wildly Confident while finishing up the last-minute packing.
And a big part of this wish has to do with planning, and the relationship between Joyful Spontaneity and Beautifully Prepared. The former is (for me) about FREEDOM, and the latter about SAFETY and feeling anchored.
Which leads me to the third wish, which is for an app, but really for a peaceful heart, because all wishes about things/solutions are never about that but always about the desire for safety, love, and peaceful kingdoms.
The third wish.
I am somewhat overwhelmed with keeping track of what we know about our voyage on the road.
New intel keeps coming in. My lover has racing days and track days and a canyoneering adventure with a friend. There are dance conventions we want to hit. I have my witchy retreats and my pole dancing classes (that’s a proxy, though I would also be down for actual pole dancing classes).
Anyway, there are a lot of constantly updating variables. I want to be able to see all the information, in one place, and to share this with my traveling companion so that we can both update. And something that is easy to use on a phone.
My ideal solution would be an app that has a calendar function or can sync with google calendar.
I have also looked at things like Trello and Wunderlist, except the language of these things tends to be so…I want to say it sounds like it comes from boy brain, which isn’t really nice, but what I mean is TASKS and To-Do Items, and these incredibly boring and stressful-sounding things are then ASSIGNED to people, with DEADLINES. Yuck.
It is all super depressing, since what I want, both in my life in general, and specifically for sabbatical mode aka clear head aka Rosh Tzalul, is not having any of those things.
Speaking of clarity, let me be very clear.
To be honest, I don’t even want to live in the same world where those things exist.
That whole make-it-happen get-things-done ass-in-chair mentality is the opposite of what I am interested in.
I want to let projects and desires be revealed, not to make them happen. To explore, not to dictate. To be wonderfully surprised by everything I discover while following trails, not bulldozing my way from predetermined Point A to predetermined Point B.
So I realize it may be hard to find something that on the one hand falls into the category of “project management” but is also not so finger-wagging about Doing Things.
If that is possible, I would like it.
If not, then I will take an app my traveling companion and I can use to plot our course, and share details about what we might want to be doing when.
Tell me if you have ideas! Recommendations and suggestions are welcome.
What do I know about what I want?
These wishes are all about trust, joy, delight, and order.
They are about taking active steps (sovereignty!) to make sure I am taken care of, and that my kingdom is taken care of, while at the same time knowing that no matter what happens, All Is Well and I will be okay.
Now.
I am at Svevo’s. Svevo is my uncle, and the most sovereign person I know.
He takes three naps before lunch.
He does what he wants when he wants, does not care at all what anyone else thinks about that, and manages to be kind, gentle and loving without going into caretaking mode. He never tries to change anyone. Animals and small children follow him around.
His house is just like him: peaceful, steady, quiet.
Everything is wood or metal or wool or woven from straw. Plastic doesn’t really have a place here. There are no curtains and you see green of trees in every direction.
I am sitting in his favorite rocking chair, eating hazelnuts from a wooden bowl, and I think, as I always do when I am here, who could possibly need more than this.
Me: Hey, slightly-wiser me, what do you have for me?
She: Isn’t it wonderful that you went through [all the things from the past few years] so that you could get here to this? Isn’t it marvelous that your big business venture/dream crashed and flailed-with-an-l, so that nothing is keeping us from committing to freedom and grand adventures.
Me: (smiles)
She: It seemed at the time like it was a disaster to receive a NO in the face of all your big goals and wishes, and yet those NOs brought you to this big YES. And now you realize that if you had those things, you’d now need to divest of them to be able to follow this yes. And if they were successful, you might have a hard time justifying letting them go. So much freedom. So much sweet, beautiful freedom. Every single NO was treasure. Not rejection, not about you, not about failure, not about anything. Just setting you up to be free in this moment to pursue this.
Clues?
A sign with an image of a BELL on it, then bells from a belltower ringing as I arrived at my uncle’s house.
And then a license plate that said YES.
The superpower of delighting in plenty
The quality for February on the 2015 Fluent Self calendar was APPRECIATE and the superpower was I See Beauty Everywhere.
Now we are in March, and the quality is RECEIVE, with the superpower of delight in plenty.
Hmm. It seems like this is so much easier for me to do when I am in a state of not-doing. So I think even though my Shmita year might means less coming in, it will be easier for me to discern and to delight. To recognize plenty and appreciate it.
Ongoing wishes.
Everything is easier than I thought, and look, miracles everywhere. Ha, this doesn’t require my input! My business is thriving happily without me. I think like a dancer. It’s so perfect it turned out like this. Past me is a GENIUS. I have what I need, and appreciate it. I am fearless and confident. I state my preferences clearly, calmly and easily, not a big deal. I am ready to come into my superpowers and receive.
Things I find helpful when working with intentions and wishes…
Adventure. Rest. Horizons. Security. Passion. Sweetness. Clarity. Presence.
Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.
So. Last week, aka bell exits / exit bells…
My wish was to become a playground. I have been conducting and writing in notebooks, and generally bringing more playground into my life. And I quit three things that were keeping me from being in bell state, and this is new and exciting, and I hope it sticks.
Attenzione! Attention, AGENTS.
If you want a Playground mug with a pack of stone skipping cards inside, I believe we have two mugs left: $30 + $12.65 shipping = $42.65
Just send a note and we’ll set it up. Not sure about international shipping but Richard might know.
Keep me company?
Consider this an open invitation to deposit wishes, gwishes, personal ads. In any size/form you like, there’s no right way. Updates on past experiments are welcome too, as is anything sparked for you.
Commenting culture: This is safe space for creative exploration. We are on permanent vacation from care-taking and advice-giving. We are here to play and throw things in the pot! With amnesty. Leave a wish any time you want.
Here’s how we meet each other’s wishes: Oh, wow. What beautiful wishes.
xox
Chicken 345: it was in the closet this whole time
It is Friday and we are here.
{a breath for Friday.}
What worked this week?
Celebrating the invisible wins.
This week wasn’t so much about what got done as it was about giving myself a hundred billion sparklepoints for not hiding.
Given all the big stuff going on for me right now — exiting the playground, my home, and my city, figuring out what I want to do and where I want to live, knee injury, my relationship with writing and dance, what if six months in a tiny camper with the boy I like ruins our beautiful sexy NARBAR (Not A Relationship / Better than A Relationship), what if I don’t have the things I need, what is my plan for money if I’m not working aaaaaaah scary, and what if I don’t get anything accomplished on sabbatical (which is hilarious, because not-accomplishing is the point) and what if I sit with the void and get no answers and come back poor and knowing nothing (even more hilarious, because look how many answers I got on the six weeks in the desert), or what if I get too many answers and they scare me (my love, you will get the just right answers in the just right timing), etc etc…
Well, given all this, I think I am doing okay.
Amazingly, I did not spend this week hiding under the covers or watching all the cop shows on Hulu (though if I did, that would be legitimate and understandable).
The monsters are of the opinion that not hiding in bed isn’t an “accomplishment”. No. I say it is. I did things this week that were not hiding when I had every reason to hide!
And I gave myself a hundred trillion sparklepoints every time I didn’t hide. Also when I did hide, because hiding is choosing safety, and this is important.
Next time I might…
Light the candles.
And all other forms of [enjoy this now instead of saving it for some later date that I deem more worthy].
Eight breaths for the hard, challenging and mysterious.
- The last day of Playground. Farewell, sweet playground, love of my life. Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye. A breath for walking out the door — the magical door — of my favorite place in the world for the very last time.
- My knee is still on and off. It likes to walk again, which is wonderful, however it finds sitting in any position to be painful. It’s pretty much only happy when I’m moving. This makes it hard to write. A breath for trust, patience, healing.
- Waiting to hear back from [person] about [situation], and feeling distress about this. A breath for remembering that we both want the same thing: to be heard, to be safe, to find a good solution.
- Ahahahahahaha how do you pack for half a year on the road when you don’t really know where you’ll be going or what you’ll be doing but you definitely won’t be places where you can acquire certain things should you need them. A breath for trust, trust, trust, trust and more trust, and for the superpower of I Am A Grand Adventuress who does things In A Grand Fashion.
- Monsters criticizing me from all sides in a gigantic Monster Wedding. The groom’s side, which is all about How Come You’re Not Resting You’re Supposed To Be On Sabbatical Look At You Doing Stupid Work Crap All The Time, and then the bride’s family which is more like No You Need To Focus And Get Shit Done You Are Leaving For SIX MONTHS In A Couple Of Days And You Aren’t Even Packed And You Have No Plan And This Is A Disaster. Gigantic monster wedding! A breath for how stressful (and confusing) this is.
- Old patterns and habits, and the need to push for pellets when I know that pellet-pushing does not bring me joy. A breath for me.
- Bureaucratic nightmare with healthcare provider sucked up six hours of this week. I’m paying double, because of a mistake that is not mine, and they won’t refund, and I’ve spent way too much time sorting it out, and they are gaslighting me so hard, saying they have no record of letters they sent me, but claiming to have sent a letter that said the opposite. A breath for safe passage, and for trying new things in the video game.
- Inhale, exhale. May all misunderstandings and distortions, internal and external, dissolve in love if not in laughter. Goodbye (and thank you), mysteries and hard moments of this week. May I choose to trust-more love-more release-more receive-more.
Eight breaths of good, reassuring, delight-filled.
- Spent the weekend with my lover after our eight days apart, and it was full of sweetness. And now we will get to have this sweetness every day on the road. A breath for smiling like dopes.
- My knee feels really good when I’m walking, no more twinges. Stairs are better. I can bounce and even jump (gingerly). As long as I don’t sit for very long, it’s good. This is big improvement. A breath of love for my body.
- The beautiful boy cleared out the Playground for me. A breath of deep appreciation and gratitude, full heart of joy.
- Amazingly, I did not fall apart this week. Not even sure how that happened given all that was going on. A breath for miracles.
- The Switch aka the Swoop aka the Secret Sword Society. A breath for how wonderful it is.
- Leaving for Operation True Yes aka Operation Rosh Tzalul (clear head) aka six months on the road. It is happening! We were supposed to leave yesterday for Eugene but there was a situation, so now this happens today. Going to spend my birthday tomorrow with the beautiful boy and with Svevo, my favorite uncle (favorite everything), and with some of my favorite trees. Then we will be back in Portland for a few days to take care of some last missions, and then we are on the road. So we get a long slow sexy entry into Shmita, which is exactly what I needed. A breath for this grand adventure.
- Each week in the Wishes aka Very Personal Ads, I plant a wish called Past Me Is A Genius. This helps me recognize the treasure in past experience, and remember that even the decisions I doubt and second-guess were right, because they gave me intel about what I don’t want. This week the shower curtain liner ripped, and I remembered how it took forever to research an eco-friendly, PVC-free, not plasticky-smelling, inexpensive solution, but couldn’t remember how I solved this. Guess what? Turns out past me bought a replacement, a spare, and I forgot about it. It was hiding in the linen closet, and tumbled out while I was packing towels for the trip. A breath for remembering that I am provided for, and sometimes it is even me doing the providing.
- Thankfulness. So much is good. Amye took me on an op! Danielle and I got Regrounded. Someone knocked at the door at night and I didn’t fall apart this time. I used ten pound weights, and my arms said okay for three minutes! Warm, friendly, helpful people have been assisting me in the healthcare op. The cherry blossoms and daffodils and even early magnolia blossoms: so pretty. Emptying out. Everything is okay. Nothing is wrong. Now is not then. All Timing Is Right Timing. A full breath of deep appreciation in my thank-you heart.
Wham booms, wisdom, superpowers, salve and FBOTW!
Operations completed. Wham boom!
I somehow did all the things, without falling apart. The provisions have been acquired. The dates have been set. The Provisioning Map (packing list). And we are off! And by off, I mean, leaving town, but I also mean time off, and I also mean turning off. Except, and this is the funny part, we are leaving and then coming back and then leaving again, so we aren’t so much off as we are testing out what off feels like. Thank you fractal flowers. Wham Boom.
Revisiting some wise words from past-me.
There are two kinds of asking why…
Superpowers I had this week…
I had the superpower of knowing that something sad can also be joyful and, more important, it can be right.
I also had a small taste of Want What You Have! And I had the superpowers of Jade Colored Toenails, the superpower of finding good clues, and the superpower of knowing when my housemate wants a hug.
Powers I want.
The power of releasing the need to have things be Just So, and Seeing Beauty In The Messiness.
And I want the superpower of Delighting In Commercial Breaks. Like, yay I can take eight breaths now. Or yay, I can notice if there were any glitches or reactions for me. Or yay, perfect time for a compass. And commercial breaks can be any form of waiting, like waiting for a bus or waiting in line, or whatever it is, the places and spaces where I try to fill time instead of being with time.
The Salve of Delighting In Waiting.
This salve sweetens everything. It turns an unexpected time out into a time in.
When I wear this salve, I remember to look for clues, to look up, to savor the red lights instead of wishing they were green.
All of a sudden what first appeared to be an impasse or an imposition turns into a secret gift: time for me to notice the cool breath entering my nostrils and the way it exits warmer, to touch in, to feel my feet on the ground, to let go of things that need letting go, to touch my skin and say “hi, I have missed you, but I am here now”.
It isn’t so much waiting as it is readying myself, making tiny adjustments, choosing away from tightness and towards joy. And then I don’t mind waiting, because I remember that All Timing Is Right Timing. And as I soften, so do the things that were causing the wait.
This salve has a marvelous spreading effect. When you wear it, everyone around you benefits from it too!
Playing live at the meme beach house — the Fake Band of the Week!
This week’s band is called Digital Dust-Up, they play twangy cowboy versions of bollywood songs and, as it turns out, they’re actually just one guy.
Attenzione! Attention, AGENTS.
I am recommending the Emergency Get Calm, Quiet And Steady techniques, aka the thing that keeps me from falling apart.
They help, a lot. Not just with calming down in the moment but with building the kind of habits that allow you to change your relationship with whatever is scary or uncomfortable.
The page is many years old and needs rewriting! Copywriting aside, this is still one of the best things I have ever made, by a lot. I have two boxes in my office filled with thank you notes, and most of them are for this.
Come play if you like…
Join me in the comments. Some of us share hard and good, some of us say hi, or maybe we’re feeling quiet. My ritual doesn’t have to be your ritual. Whatever works for you. We’ve been doing this every week for years now and there still isn’t a right way. Feel free to leave pebbles (or petals!), hearts, warmth, sweetness. Those always work.
Everyone belongs. We let people have their own experience. We’re supportive and welcoming. We don’t give advice.
Wishing you a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day, a restful weekend and a happy week to come.
p.s. It’s fine if it’s not Friday anymore. There’s complete chicken amnesty — join in whenever you like. Blowing kisses to the Beloved Lurkers too!
Vroom Vroom You’re There
Vroom Vroom You’re There
The Ann Arbor Transit Authority, now the Ann Arbor Area Transit Authority, the AAATA, also known, sort of, as The Ride, has tried out some awkward and unfortunate slogans over the years, if my high school memory serves.
I believe Vroom Vroom You’re There was short-lived.
Certainly it was embarrassing. High-school-me is probably still rolling her eyes.
The phrase lives on in my head though, as I think it whenever I work on a project.
Vroom! Vroom! I’m there.
Vulnerability.
I am making peace, slowly, with vulnerability and its powers.
Vulnerability is a door to many beautiful things.
Or as I realized several years ago while naked hot-tubbing with a bunch of strangers in broad daylight a few blocks from my office, because Portland is Portland, you can’t get more naked once you’re naked.
There is a strength in being unhidden.
There is a steadiness in being the person who puts cards on the table.
Visibility.
See also: Vulnerability.
This is also related to the question what needs to be illuminated.
And the principle of Safety First, which is at the very core of the practice of self-fluency.
Verb.
Over the past four years, I [verb]-ed FIFTY ONE Rallies, and never found a verb for it.
I have no interest in being a guru, a leader, in charge, at the front.
I want to be a secret teacher who leads through modeling curiosity and self-inquiry. Using my own practice to reveal some of the concepts, tools and doors that I use to turn inward and get my answers, so other people can turn inward and find theirs.
I don’t want people to think their results are because of me.
I want to create environments and cultures that are so full of safety and sovereignty, magic and play, that people can do their own self-investigation, their own rewriting of patterns.
And instead of thinking this is all because “well, Havi is amazing”, they can see what is actually happening, and be awed by their own playful wisdom.
The magic of Rally, as far as I was concerned is that Rally was the teacher, not me.
Rally verbs itself. Vroom vroom. You’re there.
Voyage.
I like the word voyage more than path.
Voyages are adventures, voyages can change, voyages take you places and when you are done, you are somehow more you than you were before.
How we prepare for the voyage and enter it — enter as you wish to be in it — changes how you experience it.
The other day Kat invoked the superpower of Vivid Voyaging. I can’t wait to find out what that’s like.
Also I wrote this post a while ago, and whenever I have a mostly-written post that I don’t want to send out into the world, there is always a reason. It invariably turns out I needed to wait for a new piece of intel for my words to be ready to be shared.
As soon as I saw the words vivid and voyaging together, I knew it was the right time to reconnect with V.
I am embarking on my own voyage this week, the biggest one: Shmita, and many (six?) months of road trip with the boy, asking questions and giving them to the desert and the mountains and the stars. It’s my time to go be with the void.
And vivid, yes, vivid. That is how I want to voyage.
Vibration.
There are a surprising number of lovely and magical qualities that begin with V, and they vibrate:
Vastness.
Veracity and Voice.
Vibrancy and Vibration.
Visibility and Vision.
Vitality and Vivacity.
Voluptuousness.
Victory.
Veritas.
More V words…
Vigilance. Ventriloquist. Vent. Vapor.
Vector. Velocity. View.
Viable. Vixen. Victuals. Venerate.
Voluminous. Velvet.
Vacation.
I wish I could find my Rally notebook from Rally V, from the year of alphabet rallies, because I think there are many more I’ve forgotten.
The notebook might have fallen into the vortex.
Oh! Speaking of the vortex, as one does…
Would you like to use the vortex stone?
At the Playground we had a vortex stone, of course.
It started out as kind of an inside joke, because we used to have a gigantic blanket fort called Blanket Fort George. Because its name was George.
But also because of this Fort George, and the brewery there makes a beer called Vortex, and it was in that brewery drinking that beer that I had a series of Very Life-Changing Epiphanies.
Anyway, the vortex stone is a very special piece of Playground memorabilia. It symbolizes adventure, the unknown, voyaging, sitting with the stillness of the void and receiving beautiful and unexpected answers that startle you and make you laugh.
The way you use the vortex stone is by holding it in your hand (or imagine holding it in your hand), and saying I am here.
I gave the stone to Lucky Lola, who spent the last beautiful day of Playground with me.
The vortex is the beautiful void that we avoid. Or maybe it’s the door into that. The door that opens when Shiva dances the dance of destruction and deconstruction, so that the new spaces can be revealed.
You sit with the vortex (vortices!), and then vroom vroom you’re there.
Vs
The V is also…vaginal, speaking of the magic of the vortex, and of things that are diamonds and treasure and vestibules and doors and full of sweetness.
Mmmm. VESTIBULE. What a delicious word. A vestibule is both practical and magical. And sexy.
And it can be a place out in the world in a building (external space), or in the body (internal space), and I am very interested in the relationship between internal and external space, and changing one to change the other. That is the essence of what I do. That is my work as a bell, and as a Havi.
And, get this, it is also: “a chamber or channel communicating with or opening into another, in particular”. Uh huh. Is it getting hot in here?
Vestibules also make me think of Chandler Bing, and I’ve had a gigantic crush on him forever.
So it is all about vestibules, and this is how I shall refer to my downstairs bodyparts (thank you, Secret Agent Purple, for that perfect phrase) forever forth.
Vestibule. Yes yes yes yes yes. Mmmmm.
V is other things as well.
V is also 5!
V is also half of a diamond. If you put an upside-down V on top of a right-side-up V, you get a diamond! See? Treasure.
V is fingers saying VICTORY.
V is fingers saying PEACE.
V is also half of a W, if you put two Vs side by side.
V is the bottom half of a heart shape.
V is also the shape of the formation that birds fly in, it allows them to take turns resting. Strongest most capable me to the front of the V while the other parts of me rest!
Rest is the key to getting places.
May it be so! And come play with me.
This has been a meditation on words that begin with V.
If you want to whisper words or sound effects that start with V, go for it.
You are invited to be a dork about words with me! You can also throw more V words into the pot, or peek over here for more V words. Like vacuefy, veilleuse, ventripotent, and volitorial.
And of course, if you want to share in any of the qualities and magical words I named here, help yourself.
They work like the salves in the Friday Chicken: there is enough and there is always more.
Whispering loving spells that begin with V, for myself, and for anyone who wants…
Wish 295: bell exits / exit bells
Personal ads. They’re … personal! Very.
♡
Exits.
The day before yesterday, Saturday, February 28 aka the day of leap, this was the last day of Playground.
The Playground is the center I opened in Portland five years ago. Five-years-minus-two-months. It is the thing I am most proud of having brought into this world, and the place where I feel the most joyful, safe, creative, held, loved.
And now it is gone.
I am in Portland for four more days but will not visit. In fact, I plan to avoid the street altogether, except for a mission with the ninja, and stopping by Back To Eden bakery to acquire delicious savory baked goods sans gluten to take on the road.
All timing is right timing, and this timing is especially right timing.
Saturday was the right day for the last day because:
- Erev Shmita, or Shmita Eve.The evening before the first day of my year of fallow fields.
- Goodbye playground and hello Secret S-word Society aka the Swoop aka the Switch is the perfect, well, switch. An ending into a beginning.
- The Playground told me this was the day and the time, and how to exit.
- The beautiful boy took the last furnishings and rugs and lamps out of the Playground and onto his truck, and I don’t want to see the space completely bare. I want to remember it in my last moments there, my last conducting/shavasana on my favorite red rug by my favorite lamp.
- Reasons that I don’t know yet and possibly may never know, because this is a secret op and I only have clearance for so much intel. Need to know basis. That’s how this works. All I need to know is that I am being led, and my only job in life is to follow what is indicated and trust that all is well. Literally right now that is my only job. And even when I go back to other jobs, that is the only important job. Knowing this is one of the many gifts of the Playground.
Gifts.
I was in shavasana, on the red rug where I have spent so many hours in yoga, in naps, in soaring bliss and in deep peaceful quiet. And I was crying a little, overwhelmed by the ending, and by how much the playground loves me, and what will I do without being able to be there.
I reminded myself of what we always say on the last day of retreat: once you have played at the playground, it lives in you forever. A blueprint in every cell. You can’t lose this.
I cried and listened to the playground, and the playground said:
I brought you the [situation that forced you out], this is my gift to you even if it may not look like one. Think of it as the most loving way I could bump you out of the nest and get you to fully commit to the road. I knew you didn’t want to leave me, so I invited a situation that would make you want to leave.
And then I felt full of peacefulness, and in that moment the boy sat down next to me and took my hand in his very gently, and his hand was so warm, and I could feel his heart full of sweetness, the way he just holds peace and calm for me, and the playground said:
I brought you this too. I brought you this boy, and I have brought you every wish you have ever made here in these five years of wishing. If any haven’t arrived yet, they’re on the way.
I have fulfilled your wishes, all of them, sometimes in forms that seem different than what were imagining, because that was right. And now I am coming with you, so we will still be together. Talk to me whenever you want.
All the superpowers of the playground are yours. Happy Shmita. I love you and am with you always.
I have two stones next to me.
Hand-painted by Richard. One stone was a gift for me when I became a bell, the other was made for a voyage that went somewhere unexpected.
One says exit and one says bell.
These are my clues and my companions right now.
I am the bell of exiting. This is the bell of exit, this is the exit bell.
Exit with bells. Exit the bell. Exit as a bell. Ring the bell of exits.
Right now my secret agent name is Bell West. Bell is for resonance, and also Bell is my middle name, and bell as a verb. And west because West in the compass is GLOW, which is the visual form of resonating. And west in my new compass is CLARITY, and I want to be a bell of clarity.
And west is the western united states which is where I will be on Shmita: Utah, Nevada, California, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming and South Dakota. This is the territory of Operation True Yes aka Rosh Tzalul.
And there is more intel I haven’t received yet about why Bell and West and Exit…
I am Bell West, the Exit Bell and the Bell of Exits.
The last thing.
The last thing I did at the Playground before exiting, was to ring the bell that hangs from the magical elevator shaft, and then I took the bell with me.
Actually that was the third-to-last thing.
As I approached the door for the last time, I paused to remove the sign that says exit as you wish to continue, and tucked it into my bag. As I was doing this, I suddenly noticed that the wallpaper covering the inside of the door glass is POMEGRANATES with beautiful CROWNS.
How is it possible that for [five years minus two months] I have looked at pomegranates every day, multiple times a day, and only this year recognized that this is the symbol for everything I want in my life and business, and only now realized that past-me planted this clue for me to find.
I have always just thought it was a pretty pattern and never really looked at it. I laughed, as I have so many times at the Playground, in so many startling and hilarious moments of realization.
Agent Annabelle, who has rallied at Rally many, many times says, “Geniuses like to leave fun clues for themselves to discover later. For the fun!” This makes me laugh too.
So many gifts, so many clues.
One of the first things that went into the Playground was a full size tree decal on the wall. When I peeled off all the leaves on Saturday, I discovered that if you change their orientation, they are diamonds. This whole time I thought the tree was to remind me about grounding, but it was also to remind me about treasure.
And when I took the last piece of the playground — a giant bulletin board, a piece of paper I have never seen before slipped from the back of it and onto the floor.
A white piece of paper with a watercolor painting of a flower and the words Thank You.
What is my wish? What do I want?
My new mysterious project for Shmita is to become a playground.
To learn the quiet art of becoming a playground.
To carry the essence of playground with me so that everywhere I go I am grounded and playful and charged up with magic and fully aware of how deeply loved I am. Just like when I am conducting on the floor of the playground, held in love.
And I want to learn how to work without working (oh right, that’s what play is, that’s why I made a playground), and how to do without overdoing, or really, how to do without doing.
And also to release resentment/frustration about the [monsternumber] of things that need attention before I climb into the boy’s truck and set off on the road for this adventure.
What do I know about becoming/being a playground?
- I skip stones!
- I rest before I need rest
- there is always tea and snacks
- rich sumptuous colors and textures, sexy deep reds and oranges
- I play with identity and invite in new aspects of me just like at rally
- I delight in being barefoot or wearing the comfiest socks
- spirals spirals spirals
- I walk around and blow bubbles and receive clues (sometimes I walk backwards)
- conducting and clearing out (whoosh, to the elevator shaft!)
- clear firm glowing boundaries
- only inviting in things that are beautiful
- humming and glowing and filling up on love
- bells
What do I know about what I want?
If I believe/remember that it is already done, I can just be it.
And if I forget how to believe/remember, I can pretend that it has already happened and then I can reverse-engineer and figure out how I might have gotten there.
Now.
Something we always say at Rally is “change your place change your luck”, which is kind of like going widdershins.
And today I was deep in Nothing Is Working, and overwhelmed because my house is full of Playground things, and so I am hiding out in the guest room, and it is so peaceful there, and everything is better now.
Me: Hey, slightly-wiser me, what do you have for me?
She: Let’s have an RGW (Replenishing Glass of Water)
Me: (drinks)
She: Look at all the aliveness around you. Just from where you are sitting you can see three plants, two flowers, trees outside. There is so much life in this life. All the things you are worried about are distractions and maya (illusion). Choose to be part of this flourishing of life. Plants and flowers are not caught up in doing. Choose things that remind you about breath and pleasure.
Clues?
Agent Anna saw a sign that says “ATTENTION! Bell will ring without warning.”
She sent me a picture. I love this so much. I am also a bell who will ring without warning.
The superpower of delighting in plenty
The quality for February on the 2015 Fluent Self calendar was APPRECIATE and the superpower was I See Beauty Everywhere.
Now we are in March, and the quality is RECEIVE, with the superpower of delight in plenty.
They go together so seamlessly for me. This past week I was really starting to feel Appreciation kicking in, and something opened in my heart from all those thank-yous, and now I am ready to fill up on Receiving.
Ongoing wishes.
Everything is easier than I thought, and look, miracles everywhere. Ha, this doesn’t require my input! My business is thriving happily without me. I think like a dancer. It’s so perfect it turned out like this. Past me is a GENIUS. I have what I need, and appreciate it. I am fearless and confident. I state my preferences clearly, calmly and easily, not a big deal. I am ready to come into my superpowers and receive.
Things I find helpful when working with intentions and wishes…
Adventure. Rest. Horizons. Security. Passion. Sweetness. Clarity. Presence.
Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.
So. Last week, aka follow me through the rubble…
What a big upheaval of a week, and what a perfect wish. The shitstorm resolved itself (or maybe it didn’t and I just don’t care?), I took the exit sign and said thank you, and I no longer think the wallet is ugly. Also I now see why the thing that looked like destruction is actually treasure.
Attenzione! Attention, AGENTS.
If you want a handmade buttmonster from the Playground, we have a few left: $22 + $5.95 shipping = $27.95
If you want a Playground mug and a pack of stone skipping cards: $30 + $12.65 shipping = $42.65
Just send a note and we’ll set it up. Not sure about international shipping but Richard might know.
Keep me company?
Consider this an open invitation to deposit wishes, gwishes, personal ads. In any size/form you like, there’s no right way. Updates on past experiments are welcome too, as is anything sparked for you.
Commenting culture: This is safe space for creative exploration. We are on permanent vacation from care-taking and advice-giving. We are here to play and throw things in the pot! With amnesty. Leave a wish any time you want.
Here’s how we meet each other’s wishes: Oh, wow. What beautiful wishes.
xox
Chicken 344: And Smash
It is Friday Saturday and we are here.
{a breath for the Chicken showing up when it’s ready.}
What worked this week?
Giving up!
Thursday night at around midnight I was still working. And very annoyed. Not only about the latest frustrating challenge keeping me up, but also about all the other similar midnights I’ve been through.
My business will be ten years old on Saturday.
That’s ten years of saying “okay, this is the last time it will be like this, just one last push and then we’re done”. I did not like this thought.
This was a rough week for me, in a lot of ways, and I was imagining sitting down to write the chicken and instead just saying: YOU KNOW WHAT NOTHING WORKED THIS WEEK BECAUSE EVERYTHING IS STUPID AND AWFUL THE END.
Band of the week: Ugh. Salve: Screw Everything. Superpower: Giving Up.
So I was sitting there thinking, “I give up, I give up, I give up, I can’t do this anymore.”
But then this switch happened and I suddenly felt so joyful about this! Like, HEY WAIT A MINUTE! I COULD JUST GIVE UP! OHMYGOD! I GET TO GIVE UP!
And suddenly that felt amazing. I mean, that’s the essence of Shmita. Giving up on things that are not working is releasing, which is what I want to be doing anyway.
Next time I might…
Give up sooner.
And surround myself with people who support this. Yeah! Give up!
Eight breaths for the hard, challenging and mysterious.
- My knee isn’t healed enough to dance, and I’m missing Rose City Swing, a dance convention taking place this weekend in Portland, something I’ve been looking forward to for the past year. This is the worst. I mean, I know that this is not my bus, because if it were my bus I’d be on it. And I know that it is good for me right now to be away from the competitive, comparison-heavy mentality of the dance world. It’s just hard for me to trust this right now. So. A breath for trust, patience, healing.
- The nightmares are back. A breath for rewriting, and for restful sleep.
- Consulting with lawyers about the distressing thing in my work space. A breath for remembering that sometimes the right door is an exit.
- Working on projects and waiting for other people to get back to me with critical intel. The ball is in all the courts but mine. A breath for trusting in right timing, and for the sovereign superpower of calmly and warmly requesting updates.
- Somehow we didn’t save vital posts from last year’s Floop (my online community) when everything got erased during Dry Dock. And the backup disappeared. And the 2013 backup is the an old version and anyway we couldn’t re-install, and the Secret Sword Society is embarking this weekend and suddenly we din’t have any of the orientation material. We uploaded it somewhere else but that still meant sorting through THIRTY THOUSAND POSTS. After about a million hours, we finally found the search terms that worked, but it’s still the old material without my rewrites, ugh. Speaking of millions of hours, my entire week was like that. For example, I thought a project would take two hours so I allotted three, plus an additional two hours to get in the right headspace for doing it. Nope, it took NINE HOURS. This whole week was just one long frustrating experience of everything being infinitely more complicated than I wanted it to be, and re-doing the work I’d already done. A breath for this.
- I didn’t get to see my lover this week at all, partly because he was sick and mostly because we are both working our asses off so that we can hit the road for Operation True Yes. Except what is the point of being in the same city with the person you want to be near if you never see them, and what is the point of working towards LATER if you can’t be together now, and anyway, I don’t believe in later. A breath for me.
- So many endings. A breath for saying goodbye with love, and for new eyes so I can find the treasure and enjoy the beautiful beginnings taking form.
- Inhale, exhale. May all misunderstandings and distortions, internal and external, dissolve in love if not in laughter. Goodbye (and thank you), mysteries and hard moments of this week. May I choose to trust-more love-more release-more receive-more.
Eight breaths of good, reassuring, delight-filled.
- My knee is doing better this week. Actually my knee no longer hurts at all, just parts of my lower leg, on and off, depending on many things but mostly my mood. It’s still not predictable enough to test it out on the dance floor, but I am walking with ease, and stairs don’t bother me anymore. A breath of love for my body for being so clear about what it needs.
- Long talks with my lover (by text because we haven’t seen each other in eight stupid days) about what we want to be doing with our lives. A breath for insight, sweetness, seeing new paths forming.
- Spend most of this week at the Playground, soaking up its love and magic, resting in the hammock, looking at the ceiling, listening. A breath for being loved, because I have never felt more loved than when I am there letting it love me.
- So much joy and appreciating for things in my life that are beautiful. Usually when I’m going through a rough time, I can’t see any of this, but right now even in the hard, I am enjoying so much. The sensation of my feet on the ground, my marvelously comfortable shoes, the miracle of taking a bath, the wonderful thing that is moisturizer, the taste of this tea. A breath for the superpower of enjoying what is.
- While I was panicking about [Situation], my wonderful friend Alon gave me some of the best counsel I’ve ever received on the topic of NO, LISTEN, THIS IS ALL GOOD. Which is also what the Playground told me: “There is no bad news here, there is only being Redirected towards something more congruent.” A breath for remembering this, and for finding the treasure.
- In five days I am leaving for Operation True Yes aka Operation Rosh Tzalul (clear head) aka six months in a camper with a boy, being places that are not Portland, and uncovering, I hope, what I want to do next and where I want to live, and what this all might look like. A breath for a grand adventure.
- The thing that looked like the biggest obstacle might in fact be the most beautiful exit. A breath for saying SWITCH, and having everything switch.
- Thankfulness. So much is good. Lira is in town! My suitcase arrived! I have new glasses for the first time in nine years. The cherry blossoms are going crazy and it smells like spring. Emptying out. Everything is okay. Nothing is wrong. Now is not then. All Timing Is Right Timing. A full breath of deep appreciation in my thank-you heart.
Wham booms, wisdom, superpowers, salve and FBOTW!
Operations completed. Wham boom!
Good grief this week. I did more ops than I can even remember. Got the Secret Sword Society ready, on schedule! Emptied out even more of the Playground. Wrote a very hard letter. Met with the attorney. The Munich op is taken care of. Got the necessary provisions for Operation True Yes. It’s happening! Thank you fractal flowers. Wham Boom.
Revisiting some wise words from past-me.
There are two kinds of asking why…
Superpowers I had this week…
I had the superpower of Knowing That I Am Okay.
Powers I want.
I will take the power of Completely Trusting The Adventure, along with Paying Attention To What I Want And Need, and also Delighting In Surprise Exits.
The Salve of Screw Everything: Giving Up!
Normally I think of this in terms of Letting Go, or Releasing, but Screw Everything Giving Up is about reaching the point where you realize you just don’t want to do something anymore.
It is a combination of the sweet softening of Surrender, with the bold, clear, firm deep body knowing of saying Not Going To Do This, Dammit.
This salve has a cooling, calming effect. It establishes boundaries. When this salve touches my skin, I can feel not only my internal space change, but how my immediate external space changes as well. It becomes more defined. The space around me sparkles.
It is a joyful giving up, because I realize that I don’t have to do [it] anymore. The [it] that I don’t have to do might be a pattern, or a way of thinking. A behavior, an approach, a belief, a chore, a way of doing or a way of being. Whatever it is, I don’t have to do it, and I don’t have to do it that way.
This is a salve of options because when I decide to give up, new doors open for me.
Or maybe they were already there but I couldn’t see them because I was still trying to hammer at [it] instead of giving up.
When I wear this salve, I breathe more peacefully, and suddenly I am smiling and I don’t quite know why. This salve is comforting like chamomile, but it also has a zing of possibility to it. I never knew giving up could be so much fun, but it’s kind of celebratory, who knew.
Playing live at the meme beach house — the Fake Band of the Week!
This week’s band is from Amye and it’s called Husband And Smash, their latest album is Do You Take This Smash, and it is a very loud band with a gigantic drum set that plays in a completely not-soundproofed room, and yes, it is just one guy.
Attenzione! Attention, AGENTS.
I am recommending the Emergency Get Calm, Quiet And Steady techniques, aka the thing that keeps me from falling apart.
They help, a lot. Not just with calming down in the moment but with building the kind of habits that allow you to change your relationship with whatever is scary or uncomfortable.
The page is many years old and needs rewriting! Copywriting aside, this is still one of the best things I have ever made, by a lot. I have two boxes in my office filled with thank you notes, and most of them are for this.
Come play if you like…
Join me in the comments. Some of us share hard and good, some of us say hi, or maybe we’re feeling quiet. My ritual doesn’t have to be your ritual. Whatever works for you. We’ve been doing this every week for years now and there still isn’t a right way. Feel free to leave pebbles (or petals!), hearts, warmth, sweetness. Those always work.
Everyone belongs. We let people have their own experience. We’re supportive and welcoming. We don’t give advice.
Wishing you a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day, a restful weekend and a happy week to come.
p.s. It’s fine if it’s not Friday anymore. There’s complete chicken amnesty — join in whenever you like. Blowing kisses to the Beloved Lurkers too!