How will you ever find peace

unless you yield to love?

—Rabia

If you put down what you carry

in case of emergency, you will make

space for what can really help. For

clutching onto failure or success

will only make you sink.

As our last weeks in Florida go by, I find myself looking with fresh eyes at the natural world right outside our door, just like I did when we first arrived here. When you know you are moving (and who knows when you will return), everything takes on a special light, a different vibration. Habit falls away and you see every detail with delight and appreciation. A group of ten white ibises with long curved orange beaks walks slowly past our lanai. A palm warbler on the window ledge looks around curiously, bobbing its tail. A giant swallowtail butterfly, the largest in the U.S., serenely floats by and lands on a bush next to the trail where I am walking. A zebra longwing butterfly flutters in the air nearby. So many amazing creatures so close and clearly visible. None of them native to Massachusetts. These are once-in-a-lifetime moments, I say to myself; savor them.

Colette’s Spiritual Self-Care Gift Guide

First off, can we just say that if there’s ever been a holiday season when we all deserve to treat ourselves and each other… it’s 2020! 

As I’ve been looking for gifts to treat my friends, family, and — okay, I admit it — myself, I’ve been naturally pulled towards those that help us create a cocoon of self-care and nurturing (doesn’t that sound amazing?!).

So pull up a squishy chair, tuck your pajama-clad legs underneath you, grab a mug of something warm, and let’s do some self-care gift shopping! 

Colette’s Spiritual Self-Care Gift Guide

Beauty Needs No Explanation

Beauty
Doesn’t need
An explanation

It is unnecessary
To describe
What is plainly seen

Beauty requires
No proof
Or evaluation

Judging what is genuine
As good or bad
Right or wrong
More or less
Is wasted attention

One’s attention
Could be on
The Beauty
Instead

Beauty does not need
To be interpreted to be validated

Beauty
Doesn’t explain
It just is what it is

Everything in creation is beautiful.

Singing in the Face of Days

— dhikr in Islam, japam in Sanskrit, witness in English:  the repetition of a name or face of God.

In the air that lets a leaf fall slowly.

In the mud that swallows every blade.

In the bridge that creaks but will not break.

In the fence that fails.

In the secret maps that lead us nowhere.

In the questions that sprout from our mistakes.

In the suffering that makes us give more.

In those slain for no reason.

In those spared for no reason who keep naming the slain.

In how the mind stops spinning its web in light.

In how truth like rain makes tender hearts swell.

In how arms spread like wings when dropping all they carry.

In how petting the dog keeps us from leaving.

In the smoothing of a stone by a thousand waves.

In the smoothing of our ego by the slap of time.

In the drops of blood covered by snow.

In the stories of kindness finally praised.

In how we keep dying without dying.

In how we keep losing without losing.

In how we live in spite of everything. Like

hungry fish parting the water of our days.

Now That You’re Gone

In my sixty-eighth year, I saw a dancer, middle-aged, outside a café. I was at a conference in California and she was hired to dance at lunch time in the open. I sipped my coffee and watched her for a while. Most of us were busy going to what was next. Something in how she leapt and landed softened me. For she was so thoroughly herself that there was nowhere to go. And I realized that all of us were there to find what she had found.

It’s been a week since I flew home. And I’m up early, having dreamt of the dancer being herself. And before the sun comes up, I realize Mom, now that you’re gone, that this was all you ever wanted—to find a spot in the sun where you could leap out from under the turmoil of your life and be thoroughly yourself.

Wabi Sabi Quarantine

Wabi Sabi is the ancient Japanese aesthetic of seeking to discover beauty and perfection in imperfection. It seeks to find the beauty in things that are old, worn, imperfect or impermanent.

When we are in a situation beyond our control, and are finding ourselves highly annoyed or frustrated with someone’s behavior, that is the time to practice Wabi Sabi Love: this is about having a shift in perception and making up a new and empowering story about whatever you are perceiving as broken, wrong, or just not right.

For those of us that are stressed out, frustrated or are experiencing extreme cabin fever from the quarantine, finding the beauty and perfection in the imperfection can be a challenge.

I could make a long list of all the things I don’t like about being quarantined, but now that we are in week seven, I think for me, the good things are beginning to outweigh the bad.

By digging deep into my spiritual toolkit I have been practicing things I’ve often talked about but never really had to deal with….like turning fear into love and transforming judgement into compassion. The latter being the most difficult.

As I have watched many people filling social media with wild conspiracy theories, I find myself pinging back and forth between outrage and wanting to fix them.

Finding Beauty and Inspiration in Devastation

There is no denying where we are right now.

The shit has hit the fan.

Or, you more evolved types might say “the shift has hit the fan.”

In this moment in time, where no one knows when the pandemic will end, and how and when the economy will recover, I am navigating my rollercoaster of emotions that range from sheer terror to excitement and possibility.

One of my favorite thought leaders and scientists is Bruce Lipton. He is a Stanford stem cell biologist, bestselling author of The Biology of Belief, and recipient of the 2009 Goi Peace Award, and below is a short explanation of “imaginal cells” that he wrote many years ago that is timely today. I think you will find fascinating and uplifting:

Perceiving through Pygmalion

Today I’d like to share with you a well-documented phenomenon called The Pygmalion Effect.

The name is derived from the mythical Greek character, Pygmalion, who had carved such a beautiful statue that he fell in love with it...and brought her to life.

In other words, Pygmalion’s perception of this seemingly inanimate rock as a beautiful living woman  changed its very nature into a beautiful living woman.

The effect was popularized by a study that showed that teachers’ perceptions of their students impacted their students’ innate IQ level. When the teacher perceived a particular student as an “intellectual bloomer” (even if this held no measurable validity), that student became an intellectual bloomer.

The Pygmalion Effect then can be seen as a self-fulfilling prophecy…

Love In The Time of Coronavirus

Rebecca Winn is an artist with words and her new book, new book One Hundred Daffodils; Finding Beauty, Grace, and Meaning When Things Fall Apart, proves the underestimated power of beauty to heal our deepest wounds.

Using her garden, nature, and a delightful smattering of wild creatures, she weaves her midlife catastrophe into a beautifully written story of raw vulnerability, courage, and transformation.

I was totally captivated and entranced.

Today she is guest blogging to share her thoughts on love during this time of crisis:

“We are all connected.” A phrase so common, it has become a meaningless spiritual cliche. Or has it?

Four months ago we could watch the news unfolding in China with a detachment that distance and depersonalization afforded us. Today, we are sheltering in place, surrounded by fear so palpable even the skeptics are panic buying, and the most committed introverts confess that they only want to be alone when it’s their choice.

And yet, only a few days into self-quarantine, something magical has also happened. Musicians are sharing their music for free during social media Live events. Authors whose book tours have been cancelled (including my own) are reading from their books online. People are reaching out to help one another in ways heretofore unimagined. Some property owners are telling restaurants to pay their employees instead of their rent.

Wishing for you in 2020: Serenity

My hope is that you’ll find serenity in the New Year, the calm within the storm, within yourself. 

In this world, we need that calm, centered place!

As I write, I’m looking out at the sky. Moments ago it was pouring down rain. Now there’s a break in the clouds, the light is streaming through, and it’s spectacular!

If we watch and listen, we can find that place again and again. 

HEALTH. SERENITY. GRACE.

That’s what I hope you see in the New Year. 

Nourishing thoughts!

Rebecca

How to Trust the Universe Fully

Folks often ask me how to develop trust in the Universe.

How do you not have trust and faith in life?

Look around.

We live in a crazy unique, amazing, unbelievable universe.

If you simply just observe life, observe the nature of what is, the nature of life: the sun, the sky, the moon, the animals.

There is an intelligence.

There is something that is functioning for all existence.

Every day for billions and billions of years life was existing.

Life is existing…

Enjoy my short video on How To Develop More Trust and Faith in the Universe.