Today, I usually post three truths and one wish. However, I’ve been so busy, I didn’t post last week and feel this week slipping away too. So instead, I’m going to share the last three posts I’ve made to Instagram for April Love 2017, which all happen to be true, and make a wish.
1. Wooden: Some people might consider my practice, my routine wooden, stiff, boring, but for me it’s space, mercy, rest, grace, a soft place to land.
2. Noon. Simply “the view from here” at noon on Tuesday.
3. (One of my) Favorite quote(s): the last three lines of Yusef Komunyakaa’s poem “Anodyne” – – “because I know I was born to wear out at least one hundred angels.” I have the last half of the poem printed out, sitting next to my work desk at CSU, a reminder of so many things – of impermanence, to love myself (“this sac of dung & joy”), that poetry is magic and medicine, that while I may not love my job every moment, it enables me to meet and work with amazing artists and humans like Yusef Komunyakaa.
One wish: May we see what’s really happening, notice and meet reality with an open heart, experience the joy of a small thing, find a soft place to rest when we need it, know comfort, happily get up when it’s time to move again, and never ever ever give up.
12. AKR Yellow Umbrella Foundation, “a non-profit organization providing funding for ovarian cancer research as well as child literacy, causes important to Amy Krouse Rosenthal.”
I don’t know that America has ever seen a political party so divested of care. Since Trump took office, Republicans have proposed legislation to destroy unions, the healthcare system, the education system and the Environmental Protection Agency; to defund the reproductive health charity Planned Parenthood and restrict abortion; to stifle public protest and decimate arts funding; to increase the risk of violence against trans people and roll back anti-discrimination laws; and to funnel more and more wealth from the poorest to the richest. Every executive order and piece of GOP legislation is destructive, aimed at dismantling something else, never creating anything new, never in the service of improving the care of the nation.
22. Wisdom from bpdgorl on tumblr, “being emotionally abused has made me incredibly defensive towards being told what to do, but at the same time has made it hard for me to do things without someone telling me that it’s ok to do out if fear of doing something wrong and getting in trouble.” Word.
23. Storybowl How-To Kit from Andrea Scher at Superhero Life. I’ve done this practice with Andrea before (so powerful and fun), purchased a kit to host one of my own.
31. Episode 76: Thriving Out Loud. From Edit Your Life, “A podcast to help you edit the unnecessary from your life so you have more room to enjoy the awesome.” A great interview with Karen Walrond.
Open Space Practice, (AKA: A Thousand Shades of Gray) 