is anyone out there?

Just wonder if anyone is reading this or if i'm writing to myself? 

Developments

Faery workshop this weekend was intense and beautiful and powerful.  Hard to know how to put into words exactly, but the effects were remarkable...improved my boundaries, sense of self, and powers of manifestation...

Started coaching, and made a fun collage with the things I want to bring into and have in my life.

Funny thing, is made the collage on Friday night sitting at a coffee house in Montpelier, VT, listening to live music.  Felt so good to be OUT and around people, doing soemthing!  Driving home sunday night after the Faery work, I just knew that music had to become a much bigger part of my life.  Soemthing I've been squelching for 15 years....and I happened to include a banjo on my collage.

So now it turns out I'm about to become the owner of a banjo, for a price that can't be beat!  Now I gotta make time for daily practice.  No excuses.

I can't really afford to be buying a banjo willy nilly, but neither can I afford to not have the life I want. I want to make music, and I want to be multi instrumented.  Going to TRY to keep up with guitar as well.  and my drums.  and sing, and write songs again.songs about trees, songs about wildness, songs about lost love....I've wanted to take up the banjo for a long time.  Banjo is sexy.  Maybe then I should be a dready head banjo pickin girl.

We looked at a house today, well an apt in a house, and boy have we been spoiled where we live now.  I'm trying not to panic about where we will move and how we will afford it, but this place we saw was kind of awful....
hoping for something much better to come along soon!  Still waiting for spring to arrive.
In the meantime.....
http://www.myspace.com/risingappalachia/music/songs/nikola-74412981

Till my dying day...

Laying in your arms

upon the bosom of the Earth, Mother

she cradled our bodies

locked in passionate embrace

She blew a cool breeze to stoke the fire

and made songs in the trees that whispered your name to me.

There in my heart you stayed

as I crawled within your loving space

the walls crumbled at our feet

we broke down the windows and the doors

till we fell into each other, complete.

Laying in Gaia's embrace.

-November 2005

It happens now and again....this love comes back to the front of my mind, my heart.  It never leaves really, but I put it aside at times.  Going on 6 yrs this love.  We were together once- I was too young, he was overwhelmed with lifes troubles.  We parted ways and I was devastated.  I tried to be angry, I tried hate.  But still inside I loved.

He came back into my life for a brief while, a beautiful manifestation of all the good I had seen in him all those years ago, and I became ablaze with this love reawakened,  but he told me again, it was not to be.  I told him it didn't matter, that I would love him always...I'd take my love to the grave.

The more time that passes I realize it is true.  I'll never stop loving this man.  Even though I know there is not much chance of there ever being "Us" in this life.  I know I'm a fool.  My heart doesn't care.  And every now again he visits my dreams, we reach out and touch each other through letters and phone calls for a few brief moments.  And my love burns still.  I know that I won't have what I crave, but if I could just hold him again, look into his eyes...what would I do for such a moment? 

images of our brief time shared together haunt my memories, and fill me with a longing ache for what might have, could have, should have been.  The song he sang to me late one night in a cabin in the woods, the kisses exchanged beneath a giant eucalyptus.  The mountaintop where we lay in each others arms listening to whispering songs in the pines.  The secret night we slept in each others arms, but did nothing more.

But life moves on, and carries us to places unknown- far from each other, far from the places we could have built together.  I love another, deeply and fully, and know that love is not limited.  the heart is big enough to love infinitely.  But the ache of longing runs deep.

He tells me I am one of the most important things that ever happened to him.  He was the first man to see and love "me".  The wild, dirty, earthy goddess I was becoming, even then.  We were lights to each other in dark times in our lives, with broken hearts we held each other for a while in this life.  I wish that could be enough.  But I'll take this unfulfilled love with me til my dying day.  I love you my Banjo Man.

the blackest crow

The Blackest Crow
(original lyrics)

Words & Music:
Traditional American

As time draws near, my dearest dear, when you and I must part,
What little you know of the grace and awe of my poor aching heart.
Each night I suffer for your sake, you're the one I love so dear;
I wish that I was going with you, or you were staying here.
I wish my breast was made of glass wherein you might behold
Oh there your name I's wrote, my dear, in letters made of gold.
Oh there your name I's wrote, my dear, believe me what I say,
You are the one I love the best until my dying day.
The crow that is so black, my love, will surely turn to white
If ever I prove false to you, bright day return to night.
Bright day return to night, my love, the elements will mourn.
If ever I prove false to you, the seas will rage and burn.
And when you're on some distant shore, think of your absent friend,
And when the wind blows high and clear, a line to me, pray send.
And when the wind blows high and clear, pray send a note to me,
That I might know by your handwrite how time has gone with thee.

More snow...

Just when I thought spring really was here....its snowing again.  8 inches snowing.
Please please stop snowing!!

The good news is I had my first coaching call this morning, which was moving, and enlightening.  Seems like I'm spending most of my time not doing anything at all related to what I want... I have a long way to go to where I want to be I guess.  But I'm glad I'm not trying to figure it out all on my own anymore.
I have a set of tools to use to ground and connect.  And someone who's rooting for me, and helping me figure out a plan.

And bonus is I can't fail!  Unless I do nothing.   This weeks assignment is a vision board, or something akin to that.  We've made a bulls eye view of what I want in my life, and my project is to turn it into a visual representation.  I'm thinking a photo collage.  But most photos I have access to are online.  which means more computer work.  :(
So, maybe there is another way to do this that would be more fun. I loved cutting and pasting magazine pictures in my younger days, but don't have access to a lot of magazines atm.

Medicine making season has begun.  I made the first harvest of birch twigs this spring- some to share with others, and some turned into medicine.   I have the CSA products almost ready to go (waiting on some items that weren't shipped in my bottle order to arrive!).  A dear student and friend sent me some amazing fresh desert herbs in the mail this week, including fresh white sage (salvia apiana) and creosote bush (larrea tridentata)  Both of which made their way into various forms of medicine- oils, tinctures and more.

I spent most of the weekend off, sadly because I had a bout of food poisoning that kept me in bed or on the toilet all day saturday, and spent sunday mostly recovering, but was able to go outside for a walk in the sunshine and melting snow.  Only thing i figure was the homemade mayo, since sean didn't eat that, and I did.  I guess it was too old??

But good old chamomile is helping a lot with the recovery.  And I'm eating normally, so I'm not too worried.
This weekend  is a long awaited class happening in VT with Orion Foxwood on the Faery Teachings and Tree of Enchantment.  I read his books this past summer, and they deeply spoke to me, and i've been looking forward to beginning to study with him in person for months! 

All in all, things looking UP, except for this silly snow.  Its that winter heaving, labor, birth...freeze thaw freeze thaw...but the birches have buds, and the populus tree buds are sticky. 

It's official

I've gone from zero to 60 in 3 seconds flat. No...not really.
 But i have gone from being in the blackest hole of depression ever in my short years, to raising money doing something I love, and signing on with a Life Coach, to help me figure out what I really want and how I can make it happen in about 3 weeks.  give or take.

I made my first payment to In Arms Coaching today, and got my welcome materials and have a coaching call scheduled almost every week of the upcoming 12 months!  I hope I can keep up!!

I'm just so tired of EVERYTHING feeling like a chore, of being broke, being lonely, working all the time, stressing out all the time, and really, not enjoying my life like I thought I would once I was an herbalist.

Funny all those 10 years ago, seeing myself in the future as an herbalist, seeing the kind of life I'd like to live...and here I am, but somehow it isn't what I thought. Or it isn't enough.  Or...something isn't right.

I keep running into issues, thoughts, ideas, roadblocks, mental mind games etc that I should make a list of to work on with my coach.  But even just having her around, and the few tools I've received already, has really gotten me to THINK about this stuff, and why I feel bad, and what I do that feels bad, and what feels good.

And, I said at dinner tonight, "Hey, I probably have some things to learn from someone who can get me to hand over a large sum of money each month for her services."  I mean I constantly live in the land of lack.  there is never enough money for things i want, business supplies, the kind of food I want to eat, etc etc...but somehow she inspired me to find a way to come up with a bunch of money, in a hurry.  So, yes, there is something to learn here.

I'm really excited for our first call next monday, and I'm also really excited to listen to her free teleseminar on Boundaries for Women in april, since I KNOW my boundaries are really sucking lately.


On another note, I got a wonderful, giant box of one of my favorite plants from the desert in the mail, Larrea tridentata, or Creosote bush, from a sweet and wonderful student. It was like getting a piece of home in the mail.  I put up 1/2 gallon of oil, and still have LOTS leftover for tincturing and drying. 

Sometime soon, I'm going to harvest birch twigs.  But this weekend students are coming to the house to learn about digestion and immunity, and I'm not really prepared at all.  Tomorrow is a St Patty's Day adventure with some friends, involving Corned Beef, and Gluten free cake baking.

1 step forward, 2 steps back

Wow, I had a great weekend, making products, took Sunday off, all to myself, no computer, no work.  Had a Thai Yoga massage and a wonderful visit and conversation with a friend.  Felt all ready for the week.
 Finalized my coaching plan this morning at 9 after waking up 3 hours later than I wanted to. 
Didn't do yoga, didnt shower, didnt make a list....
didn't get anywhere focused.
I went outside to gather poplar buds.  It's time.  Its above freezing- way above freezing, for several days now, the snow melting off the roof sounds like rain.  And the sap is starting to run.  So, I decided to go out and collect.  Cause no matter what else the plants don't really wait for a convienent time to be ready to be harvested.  But somehow I've found, I can't let myself believe that going outside for a walk in the sun, and collecting medicine plants is work. 

I know it is something I need to do, to get clients medicine, and make products, but yet, its not allowed to be work.  Only thing I allow to be work is sitting on the computer writing lessons.  or something. i hate it.  I despise it. 

I guess this means I need to do less work that is on the computer and more work outside and making herbal goodies.  That would mean no teaching online.  WHich is really the only way i've ever made any money at being an herbalist. 
It is just so tedious. I constantly feel guilty, and like I haven't done enough, and that people are going to stop paying me, because I suck.    Not a good place to be. Not a good cycle.  And i'm pretty much roped into at least another 6 months that I've committed to a set of students. 

ugh...so here i am, feeling shitty that my march lessons are almost 3 weeks late, i didn't get any "work' done, and it's 3 o clock already. The house is sty.  The dishes piled high.  (Go away for one day and the dishes overtake the world. )

Things look better, then they look like a pit of despair all over again.
I have NO IDEA how I"m going to be able to get put together enough to both find a place to live, and pack all the stuff, and move it somewhere.  I should start now. Really.

But at least the sun is shining, and the snow is finally starting to melt, and Sean brought me home a pot of pretty purple tulips to bring spring inside.  and some blueberry lavender chocolate.  I have the windows open...

Chiaroscuro

How is it possible that one 24 hr period can contain so much love, and joy and blessing and gratitude, and yet also sadness, devastation, fear and negativity?
Its overwhelming. I just want some peace.

The herbal CSA idea was a total hit.  I had no idea it would be so well recieved and that so many people would want to contribute to my personal well being.  I"m deeply touched, honored and full of gratitude.  The idea was simple, really, and came to me in a random moment  this weekend.  It took me only a few days to figure out if it could work financially, and research the details I needed to make it work, but I"m flabbergasted reallyl, how many people not only wanted to get the herbal products I"m offering, but just be of support to me in this time where I'm feeling so discouraged, disheartened, lonely, afraid.  But I'm also deeply sad- that so many people care and like what I do...but yet, i Can't see it. I can't feel it. I feel unworthy, unloved, under appreciated and second rate.  Why do I have mud colored glasses on???

Its such a good idea that I hope I can incorporate it further into my life to bring in income and offer people things they want and need.  Just need to make it financially viable.and not stress myself out in the process of getting products ready.

But on the other hand, had a fight in the middle of the night, I slept for shit.  My undeniable issues of self worth and self esteem come to a nasty festering head reapeatedly.  This time, just looking over the proclaimed and wonderful Plant Healer magazine.  All I can see through these damn mud colored glasses is how inadequate I think of myself as an herbalist, how i can't even compare with anyone in that magazine, and how I couldn't even attempt to write something so thorough, detailed, complete, esoteric and refined.   I feel simple-minded comparatively.   I used to write, I used to LIKE to write.  Now it just feels like tedium and boredom.  I have no patience for it. so why the hell do i even care? 

I like making teas and tinctures - i should do what i LIKE.  But somehow that isn't enough for me, i can't compare or get the credit i seem to think I lack if I don't do what all the other kids do.   Am I still really just trying to fit in the way i struggled for so many years as a child?  Trying to get the right Guess Jeans to be invited to sit at the popular table?  And when I dump my  lunch tray of ketchup and fries on my lap looking like a fool, I go cower in the bathroom until the end of the day? 

Why this insatiable drive and need to fit in, be accepted, be praised?  WHY is it that the huge amount of support and compliments I got by starting this CSA project to fund my coaching with Britt doesn't even make a dent in this perceived lack?

It's also come to our attention, without any more ado, that we're probably going to have to move away from this 100 acre farm we've lived on all winter.  Now that is a mixed bag.  I was already having my doubts about it being the right place for me.  Being so far away and isolated from community and action, not having any clients.  But the owner wants 350 more dollars a month. I'd have to start a whole second CSA to fund just the rent/utilities,  and it still gets me no closer to paying off the HUGE amount of debt hanging over my head.  But I'm so sad, because there are SOO many beautiful amazing plants on this land that I was SOOOO looking forward to spending the growing season with.  And space for a garden.  Which now, who knows if that will be something I'm able to do where ever we end up....its like WHAM, take THAT!    I'll probably never swim in the river.  Or see the hawthorn bloom, or pick red clover.

Maybe it was all too good to be true anyway.  I mean what an amazing place to land, for not much money, but I'm so tired of moving.  
I just want to find a home.  Land to connect to, familiar trees, rocks, and the same place to sit every day with the world in its wild ways.  I am so HOMESICK.  Maybe for the land I used to call home in the SW.  The old oak tree who sheltered me in her shade for years.  The Giant Walnut who invited me to pass hours in his branches, and collect fruits of plenty each fall.  The long string of elders and cottonwoods that beackoned every spring, and the singing rock, and the place where I laid my aching heart on the earth under pine trees on top of the mountain,  and awoke to find millions of lady bugs at eye level. 

But really i think it is homesick for LANDEDNESS, for feeling a part of the environment.  Winter makes that difficult for me, in more ways than one, but also continually moving around doesn't make that easy either.  I need home, community, rootedness, heart and a damn good new pair of rose colored glasses...or at least some way to clean the mud off the ones that dull my vision from day to day.

i've also gotten completely sidetracked from my plan of discipline to get up, take time for me in the morning, make a list and get organized and work.  I ended up spending more time on facebook than I intended to make the CSA thing happen, and it lured me in with its tricky grasp way too easily. I got ZERO work done today.  Didn't take a moment of time for me.  Now the day is gone.  I'd almost say wasted, if it weren't for the fact of the huge success of the CSA and my excitement that I get to work with Britt /In Arms Coaching in the coming months. 

An Herbal CSA- Asking for help from my friends and community

I am writing today to ask for some support from my friends and community. As some of you may know I've been dealing with a lot of sadness, frustration, inability to work effectively and general motivational blahs. Seems like months now. All my loved ones have concurred that I need to find help to handle what is seemingly overwhelming and too big for me alone, and I've found something that I think will change my life, and the way I live it, and I'm so excited. But it isn't cheap.

I've spent some time talking with Britt at In Arms Coaching over the last few weeks and participated in her seminar Overcoming Overwhelm: 3 Tools for Women. Just the few short sessions I've had with her have been remarkably helpful in getting me out of a really deep funk and helped me to find ways to become more grounded and less overwhelmed by the daily to do list.

Anyway, I really need to continue working with her in her coaching program, and I need to come up with 300$ extra dollars a month to afford this.  So I've hatched a plan.  An herbal CSA.

I'm looking for 12-15 generous and committed souls, friends, customers and family members who would be willing to donate $25 dollars a month, for 12 months.  In return for your huge generosity and love, I would send you a full sized herbal product or two each month.  This will include tinctures, elixirs, vinegars, syrups,  teas, salves, creams or anything else special and seasonal that I dream up for you.

Some of the products could include:
NettleBerry Vinegar
Birch elixir
St Johns Wort Oil
Elderberry Syrup
Pine sap salve
Dream tea
Faery Nectar Tea
Herbal Chai
Elderflower Elixir
Herbal Healing Salve
St John's Wort Tincture
Calendula Cream
and much more!

The price of the donation, which is a subscription through paypal, includes the product, and shipping, plus enough extra for me to pay my monthly coaching payment.

I hope to start coaching right away, and am ready to send you your first product at the end of March!

If you would be willing to support me in making Life Coaching from In Arms Coaching a reality, and getting super high quality  handcrafted, wildcrafted and effective herbal medicines and products in return, please let me know right away, or you can subscribe immediately by using the paypal button below.

This subscription will be automatically paid each month via paypal. If you want to make other arrangements please e mail me at shamana.flora@gmail.com.

Thank you so much for helping me to make coaching with Britt a reality, so that I can better help myself create the life I want, that brings me happiness, fulfillment, and even better herbal offerings to all of you.

Darcey Blue

Song of the Travelling Daughter

Please ignore the silly anime cartoon.  It's the song I'm after.  This is what I want my life to sound like.



World sits outside the door
Men wai you ge shijie

A voice in your heart is calling
Xinzhong you ge shengyin

The ends of the world await
Sifang jiu deng ni lai

Traveling daughter
Younu

Feel the sunshine on your face
Lianshang gandao taiyang

Starlight guides your feet
Jiaobu suizhao xingguang

Earth and Sky will carry you
Tiandi zai ni zouyou

Journey after journey
Zoule yi shan you yi shan

One mountain to the next
Zhe shan guole ne shan lai

Voice in your heart is calling
Xinzhong you ge shengyin

High hopes

I did have such high hopes for a productive weekend, but it doesn't seem to be going that way.  Earlier this week I got a little notebook and decorated it with birch bark.  This is my list notebook.  it sounds OCD
but i think if i can lay out exactly what I need/want to do, what my priorities are each day, and cross things off, I will feel more productive, accomplished and organized, and less overwhelmed and like I havne't gotten anything accomplished.  So far it seems to work. 
Except when I don't cross anything off the days list. Lke yesterday. I went outside because it was sunny- and the rest of this weekend is gloomy and raining.  But not snowing (at least not yet).  So I spent several hours snow shoeing with Trill, taking pictures, checking out plants that are mostly still fast asleep in the cold of winter.  When I cam back in, I couldn't focus, I couldn't get started on anything. 
I skipped dinner, and then went to bed at about 8:30. 
This morning I didn't get out of bed till 11:30.  This is unheard of.  I'm always the early riser....
I had some soup for breakfast, chicken, leek and pumpkin soup that was in the freezer.  Had some coffee, and havne't done my yoga or showered.  I've been fucking around on the computer all morning, and working on responding to students.

Not all together unworthy, but thats not that pattern I want in my day. I want morning ritual, grounding time ( as Britt mentioned in her Overcoming Overwhelm Teleconference.  (She's offering another on Boundaries for Women.   Check it out!)  Time to deliniate ME time and work time.  This muddled mess of breakfast and working at the same time, and wasting time on the computer (still a problem even without Facebook-which i slightly cheated on yesterday, much to my dismay.  it sucked me right in!), is not what I want for my day. 
As soon as I'm done writing this I'm going to start on one thing on my list, probably salve making.  I need to get some new things on my Etsy and Poppyswap shops too. 


I'm still trying to think of ways to finance coaching with Britt, and hitting some road blocks.  We've talked a little about moving from this area of Maine to somewhere a little easier to find community, students, clients- so i"m not sure about trying to find a job in town if we're just goign to leave.  But i can't drag my feet forever....

I wish I could make my Etsy and Poppyswap shops suddenly immensely profitable.  To do that, I'd need more product, for that I need money.  I'm still so upset about the immense credit card debt i'm in.  If i wasn't so far in I'd be able to splurge a little to finance something, but as it is...I can't justify it.  I'm in so deep.  I dont think i'm ever getting out of debt.  Would it be so bad to die in debt. 
Throwing away 400-500 dollars a month on debt.  Some of it worthy, some of it not.  Fuck.  Its depressing. 

Snow Bound

Winter sleep

Coaching conundrum

Over the past week I've been talking with Britt at In Arms Coaching and everything about it sounds great, and like something that might really help me get straight with myself, and what I want, and give me the boost I need to get out of the funk.

Problem is...money.  It isn't cheap. At all.  Payment plans would be about 280$-$360 a month.  For a year or more. 
So, I'm asking for help...do you have ideas for me? New classes to offer? Job leads? Thoughts that are creative for ways to make a few more bucks?  I mean, I can't cut into my current income at all, because I"m just barely covering the nut.  
So I must find new income.  Any and all ideas are welcome.  Donations as well, but considering I need 12 months of payments, I need something reliable as well.

 

the wrong foot

today feels like it is just starting off all wrong.
I'm grumpy, sad, lethargic.
forced myself to do yoga. wrote in my journal- realized my whole day has to be rearranged for a client- a pro bono client.

I'm beginning to think I will never ever be able to log into my shamana gmail account again. it has been disabled for 4 days now. I'm loosing work. I dont know what to do, repeated e mails to the service e mail result in nothing.  Their gmail status site says we are wroking to restore access to the remaining .000001 of accounts  ( i guess that means MINE), but nothing happens. 

SUpposed to go away this weekend, but the cost of gas, the strangers, the effort.  All too much.   Maybe I'll just stay in bed all weekend.   Or maybe I'll put on the snow shoes and attempt to go outside.  When it isn't 30 below zero.

Yuck. 

Waiting for tree whispers

Maybe

Connection and disappointment

Well I had a lovely, if all too short visit from a friend last night whom I hadnt' seen since September or October, we stayed up too late, laughing, eating, talking.  <3
So grateful for the connection, to know I'm not really alone. To know someone is thinking of me and wishing me well and cares and loves me.  Thank you for that. 

Also had my free session with In Arms Coaching, which was moving, and powerful, definatley some immediately useful insights about what I'm wanting and not wanting.  Sadly tho, I'm 99.9% sure I can't come anywhere near affording the full program. I'm extra dissapointed about it, because it feels like something that could be really helpful to me, but unless I suddenly become a banker or win the lottery,  I don't think I can devote almost half my income to having a life coach.  I mean- eating is pretty high on my priority list.  I'm struggling to make ends meet at all as it is, and I dont see any immediate ways to suddenly have a large cash flow...and if i did, shouldn't some portion of it go towards paying off the interminable ball and chain of debt hanging over my head.  I mean I'm all anxious and waiting for the banking system to collapse and be free of those obligations, but for now, debt is literally the ball and chain that weighs me down year after year.  Two unexpected significant expenses that I cant afford, put on credit, have set me back about two years of payments.   I finally saw progress, and then it evaporated before my eyes in a few short months. 

Screwed is how i feel about that.  An you know, if collapse came today, I probably don't have enough survival skills to really be able to hack it in the world.  I dont own a gun, I don't know how to hunt, I have no garden or stored food, nor a supportive community willing to trade food for skills I do have. 

So, I'd go the way of the dodo in a hurry most likely.   But I got up early today, had a nice visit with my friend, and will force myself to do some yoga, and take a shower.
I decided that I need to give myself more structure, routine and discpline and something simple like taking a shower every day ( which is not something i generall buy into), not even really needing to wash my hair or use soap, but just a daily emotional/spiritual cleansing ritual to separate the work day from the morning might be helpful.  Not being so damn lazy. Get out of my pajamas.  Do something.