I found a new cluster of trees to talk with.  There is a swamp near my new job, and within minutes I am on a old trail into a cluster of birches.  They are mostly young, some fallen, now exhausted from fighting each other and the web marshy soil.  Alders and pines sprinkle into the tiny forest and I walk and we talk.

They remind me about being eager to live.  The sprout and gaggle, white and earnest. I tell them they look like tall zebras, and they laugh.  “What’s a zebra!?”

We enjoy our conversations.  They are not used to someone talking with them and have much chatter about the ducks and the lovely mess the bushes create.  They remind me about how spring will wash the walk with green cover, and we will be in even deeper privacy singing songs to the Goddess of the Glen.

Perhaps my hands can meditate today, because my mind is twisted around my old cat that has disappeared.  My hands will rest one inside the other like a small bowl to hold the peace of here and now.  They will operate a horrendous vacuum cleaner as I volunteer my time for those who serve the children.  They will hold the steering wheel in service as I drive here and there, now and then for tasks that can be done.

I will wak down my street talking to neighbors, and my hands will be by my side tingling with the intrinsic awareness that all is indeed well.  Whether hidden in a neighbor’s house cozy and fed or curled up in a pile of autumn leaves sleeping into eternity, my cat is indeed well.  And my hands reach up to touch my Best Friend wrapping her arms around my shoulders, whispering the sweet nothings of eternal life in my ear.

Part of me believes that indeed I do create my own reality.  That we are life artists.  With deep emotions and persistent thoughts, the path ahead of us is created.  Look around you–everything you see started with an idea inside someone’s head.  Even you and me began with a glimmer in someone’s eye.

But there is another part of me that believes that there is a path for me that is the Will of Heaven.  Or perhaps I sat down with my Divine Lover and we laughed at the game plan we set out for this life.

This day is a yang day–I am proactive with choices: meetings, scooting, specific shopping and then home time.  At the same time (ha!), I am formulating (is this outpicturing?) the jacket that I want to buy.  I see it in my mind’s eye–I’m using the power of yin.

The Tao is bigger than God.  Together She and I get on the rocko-plane in the festival of human-spirit, yin-yang play and squeal and scream in delight.

Dry yellow grass, brittle brown twisted leaves prematurely littering the lawns.  Young trees choking into autumn.  Shrinking season of summer.  But still hot.

I can get cranky when my hair frizzes and the grass crinkles beneath my feet.  I don’t want to go outside.  The sun hurts my skin. 

If I don’t tune up each morning, I will play a discordant song.  In this brief moment, before the blue angels scream their thunderous flight across the sky in blazing power, I claim a clear path.  I declare that no matter a dry meadow, fire-threatened forest or barren sand in front of me, I am sweet, soft, nourished and ready to make a slender song to the Divine hidden in the silent birds.

We talked about the Tao last night.  What does it mean to do–not do?  Action—non-action?  The Master does nothing and everything gets done.  All is always done, actually.  Sometimes I think we are truly just on a wheel and the whole point is to enjoy the ride rather than figure out where we think we are going.

Today I am sitting deeply in the now of a visit from my daughter.  The everlasting here of my child.  To counteract the despair of the fleeting moment and be rooted so firmly in the now and here of the Presence in her eyes.

Flowing with the going, being in the now.

If I’m feeling entitled, a frustrated victim, or a suffering martyr, I’m vacillating back and forth as if in a debating society.  The two sides of my brain keep arguing and arguing: “But it should be this way–the right way!”  “But you are not entitled to that right, as you are hopelessly wrong.”  “I have needs!”  “But no one is required to fulfill those needs.”  And back and forth endlessly sniping at each other.

I don’t feel bewildered, but as the original word meant, I do feel like I’m suddenly lost in the wild.  Standing at what seems to be a dead end in the path, thick twisted vines and solid thick branches in my face, with only a pair of tiny bird-engraved embroidery scissors in my hand for a tool.

What if that was a directive: be in the wild.  Maybe we volunteered for this crazy journey just as in a game, to be in a spot where we have no answers.  The past is no longer a precedent that helps with the future.  The landscape has completely changed and I didn’t get the guidebook for this geography.  Time for the heart and brain to work together for wisdom.

Perhaps today I will let the brain rest from frantic rationalizations on either side and let the heart feel its way along the path.  The shadow of doubt is truly The Serene One reaching out for me.  No matter what is on the path, holding Her tender and constant hand soothes my heart, body and mind.

I do love.  I see only love.  I feel only love.  I am only love.

That’s my chant today.  Because I started out not feeling that way.  Life just happens you know and on the path, minding my own business (for a change!), and all of a sudden I’m in a twisted turnaround and I feel down.  Depressed, discontent, despair, discouraged–dissed in every way.  Nothing really happened, just a turn of the corner and feelings come up that pull me down.

Grateful for my sangha, my group of fellow travelers, the herd I move with.  I listened and spoke this morning about these feelings.  And the circulation of good began to show itself.  We spoke about putting on those rose-colored glasses of love and seeing through the discouraging lies.

What if everything we saw was love?  Those fighting somehow have a love/passion for the righteousness they stand for.  Those trying to shock us into their way of being “good” are perhaps trying to shock us in to love.  The scowl on the grocery clerk (rare it seems to me) or the scorn on the shopper are those stuck in the frustration of not seeing the love soup around them.

Today I see only love, I feel only love, I speak only love, I hear only love.  It may be just a chant in my head.  It may be a fantasy.  But it soothes the trepidation in my chest.  It settles my shoulders and reminds me to look further than the illusion of “no good” to the truth of goodness, kindness and peace.

Be in the womb bubble.  Surrounded with liquid love in a safe window on the world.  Watch the frustration, irritation, negative stories, heart-stretching impossibilities–from the cozy warm belly of the cosmic Elephant.  Her skin is miles thick, but completely permeable with choice.  The rolling lullabye of Her walk rocks me to a soft sleep, an easy allowance of the worlds prickly points.

Pulling up the comforting covers of Her Love, I am.

Words have vibrations.  Good words or words that feel good to you, have good vibrations for you body-mind.  If you chant them over and over again, the vibrations turn that “pain body” into a resilient flowing humming energy that bends into acceptance.  At least that’s what happens to me.

But you have to prove it to yourself by finding a word or phrase that feels good throughout your body when you say it over and over again.  Here’s what works for me:

I’m safe.  I’m safe.  I’m safe.  I’m safe.  I’m safe.  I’m safe.  I’m safe.  I’m safe.  I’m safe. 
I need to say it until my body reluctantly starts to perhaps maybe begin to believe it.  I find that at the core of all my fears and anxieties is the fear that I am unsafe or unappreciated.  And another one that works is:

I love you.  I love you.  I love you.  I love you.  I love you.  I love you.  I love you.  I love you.
This is said TO me, from my Highest Self.  And TO my Highest Self from the little me.

Here’s a couple more that always cheer me up:  FREE, I’m free.  I’m free.  Happy birthday to me! (said ANYday I want) and I’m going on VACATION!!

I put my glasses on and the pink coral hibiscus flowers jump out at me from the wall of tall bushes in the alley.  I see the gentle breeze and steady sunshine now, here in Angel City.

I cling to the ancient chant: I am filled with loving kindness.  I am well.  Reaching roots deep to stay in this crystal moment, stretching into this precious fragile now.

The path is firm and steady, but the view is dizzying.  On one side is the warmth of grown children, in rich relationships, exciting young careers.  On the other side of this still solid walkway yawns a fierce screaming dropoff to a dry scrub canyon of immanent father death, sibling sobs, and impending decisions, honoring the end of a long life, the last parent standing.  (ok, well, he can’t stand any more.)

Back to here and now.  This is the Presence of Grace: a white table, a bright quiet morning, a room filled with photographs of friends and family.  This is my here and now.  I claim the here and now every second of this day.

Divine heart-fullness.  Dancing defies time, here and twirl, now and swirl.