Just around New Years, 6 years ago, I made a last minute decision to travel to India...𝗦𝗢𝗟𝗢. I'd just come out of more than a solid year in the Peruvian jungle. I'd ended a traditional dieta with an Amazonian tree from 𝘭𝘢 𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘷𝘢 𝘢𝘭𝘵𝘢 - called bechuja  - just barely a few weeks earlier. As with most dietas, my time with bechuja was life-changing in all dimensions.

The extremely sensitive being that I am, in this dieta, I finally felt the truth of my own essence and my own energy field. Bechuja brought a powerful protection, and taught me how to filter out the rest of the world. Something I don't know if I ever had known how to do before. I remember sitting in the middle of the last ayahuasca ceremony of the dieta, around the flame of a candle and had the profound realization that I felt absolutely no-one else's energy, though many sat around me. The new 𝗙𝗥𝗘𝗘𝗗𝗢𝗠 I felt had me in tears. What I was feeling - was literally JUST ME, and it was beautiful. Bechuja was gifting me with a pathway to hold my own boundary and protection. I could finally be me in a world of infinite energies. A precious precious gift of not processing any and everything around me.

In this dieta, India came to me in her mysterious way through the channel of the plants. I'd always wanted to go to India, but the Peruvian jungle kept pulling me back. In one ceremony during this dieta, a being blasted through on a horse, with a sword, shedding light and slashing through a prior experience of jungle brujeria. I asked who this being on the horse was, and I heard "Ishvara." I knew almost nothing of Hinduism, but later came to understand that in the most basic explanation - Ishvara is God, Supreme Ruler, Lord Shiva.

After I'd had enough of the mayhem, and had felt complete at the temple, I moved on to Maheshwar. Only to discover that the one solo woman traveler I'd seen in the streets of Omkareshwar, was thankfully staying in the hotel room next to mine. A discreet, sharp Italian girl, who was also traveling solo through India, following in her dead fathers footsteps from his journey decades ago. We were immediate friends.

In Maheshwar, there was a buzz too, but it's energy was more peaceful with a mix of something mystical that I couldn't quite name. On the Narmada River, they were just beginning the Sacred River Festival in the gorgeous old Ahilya Fort. Filled with traditional music (the sitar alone was enough to satisfy my soul) and dance, decorated with flowers and oil lamps. It was a side of India that I had not yet seen. One that told of an ancient rich culture still alive deep within Mother India. And it seemed somehow to magically appear just in time for my birthday. Ahilya was the home of Ahilyabai, a QUEEN - a rarity - who was respected as she took good care of her realm centuries ago. Later I learned she was the one who  rebuilt one of the most famous Shiva temples - Kashi Visgwanath - in Varanasi. I intuitively followed the trail and arrived there a few weeks later, during Shivaratri, where 100,000 pilgrims gathered (which is another story for another time.)

༄Tʜᴇ Mᴇᴅɪᴄɪɴᴇ ᴏғ Sᴏʟɪᴛᴜᴅᴇ (ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴍʏ ғᴜʀʀʏ sɪᴅᴇ-ᴋɪᴄᴋ) ༄

With so much isolation, loneliness, and grief, it's a seemingly unusual path, to rest in deep solitude. In the current state of affairs, the busyness and noisiness is distracting. Busyness is always distracting, but these times have a different tone. There's a way where it sneaks in as a false answer to our ever increasing discomfort. The cost of getting caught in it, is it amplifies what's below the surface.

I spent the last week for the Winter Solstice in Southern New Mexico, hiking, exploring, communing with the land...ᴀʟᴏɴᴇ (with my furry side-kick of course). I needed to cultivate a deep sense of solitude - away from the computer, the "to-do", the "keeping on top of everything." A place where the truth and heart can be rediscovered in a new way.

This is not something new to me - solitude is a path that I know. It's a commitment, and at times it's very hard to do. But to be honest, options are seemingly limited at the moment. I knew I had to do something. These 2 years have worn on most of us in profound ways. I needed to take time at the close of this year to see more clearly what's happening inside. Shedding layers that were ready to go. In ceremony and prayer, I let old emotions and long-forgotten memories release back into the Earth. I rested in quiet and in stillness, ending subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) internal struggle and conflict.

I welcomed my dear old wise friends - the Earth, the winter Sun, the Moon, the long starry nights, and some precious plant teachers. I brought them inside to help me clear out what is not needed, and make more room for the truth. It's an experience of pure beauty and love, to rest in solitude in this way. Never truly alone, always connected to the infinite flow of life's wisdom, teachings and mystery.

Returning back to "the world," I notice again many emotions - the tangible loneliness, grief, heartache, fear, desperation - they are still very much pulsing within us humans. Grateful for the moments of true relief and release- through laughter, joy, and connection - these are also much needed medicines. Medicines of being in it together. Here, too, we can rest for a moment, let go, and refind our truth that's just beyond the surface. Whether in solitude, or in true connection, it's the moments of that truth that are pulling us through it all. In the grand scheme of things - it's all rather incredibly beautiful. Let's keep going.

🔥 ℙ𝕙𝕠𝕖𝕟𝕚𝕩 ℝ𝕚𝕤𝕚𝕟𝕘 🔥

For the last few weeks, I've been struggling with strange symptoms - my energy has been fluctuating, I have a painful rash, my skin itches everywhere, I have abdominal cramps, I've lost my appetite, and I am losing weight. I woke up in the middle of the night a few times having a hard time breathing, heart fluttering, seriously considering that maybe I needed to go to the ER. Finally I made it to urgent care, where they think perhaps it's parasites. Through it all, I know I'm fine, and feel much better coming to some understanding of what's happening on a physical level. I'm used to dealing with the emotional and spiritual healing, and to bring it into the physical, takes a greater reserve of self-care.

I know many people right now are struggling with seemingly mysterious and unknown physical symptoms. Many of us are being forced to pay attention to caring for our bodies. It's not easy - it takes an immense amount of energy, patience, kindness and finding the right support of doctors, healers, naturopaths - those we can trust. My heart goes out to those who struggle with chronic illnesses, who still show up in this world somehow. And many blessing for those who've had to walk through the fire with the virus. When your body needs this level of healing, the depths of the transformation requires every ounce of awareness and life force.

This last week, I've been journeying and guiding others in a journey with wild reishi. Reishi, know as the "mushroom of immortality," along with the physical intensity I've been experiencing has been a potent teacher on life and death. It seems that many have also been leaving this plane of existence lately - not just from the virus, but other causes. Sending blessings and prayers for their transition and those they've left behind as they leave this human reality. Reishi has been guiding me to feel more deeply into the immortality of life, myself, of the grander universe. Facing mortality and integrating the duality that we are not this body and yet we are. At the same time, reishi is bringing me more into my embodiment - into my physical human body, my incarnation, and this Earth. It's opening and clearing the channel between heaven and Earth - as something I can rest into, trust and allow the transformation to take it's course.

A few nights ago, I was extremely uncomfortable with all my symptoms - I wasn't able to lie still (much less sleep) - the rising phoenix appeared. It was me, around me, and everywhere representing a greater collective of humanity, whether still in this human form or not. All being reborn. Like reishi, the phoenix rising is a symbol of immortality. Having walked through the fire and burned to death, it rises from the ashes of suffering, reclaiming a new magnificence - miraculously emerging with such beauty, grace and strength. They say that the medicine of the phoenix is so powerful that it's tears heal everything that they touch. It's ashes bring the dead to life.

This is us. We are being reborn right now, in many and all ways. With immense strength and courage to bring forth something new, we burn the past into ashes.

🔥🔥🔥