THE KINDNESS OF PRESENCE
Healing and Awakening in the Body

A Dream from May 24, 2020
I am visiting an enormous, infinite exhibition of dreams. A woman therapist who serves as the curator of the exhibit is showing me around. She looks like someone famous whom I have seen before but can’t quite place. The exhibit is often used as research. The woman is letting me look through the dreams to research a question that I have about them.

This is a dream that I had on March 10, 2020, a few days before Covid-19 shut things down in my area. This powerful dream turned out to be a sequel to Wandering in the Spiritual Bardo. I only realized the two dreams went together, because The Dream Exhibit suggested that I look for bookend dreams.

Conversations on Ways We Imprison and Free Ourselves
Whether we are aware of it or not, most of us live imprisoned and limited lives. Our incarnation here on earth may be likened to a kind of confinement into the challenging circumstances we face. The limitations of living in a human body (which may have various illnesses and disabilities, and eventually dies!) offers valuable lessons.

A simple daily practice of listening to my body and simply being present for it, has transformed my life more than anything else that I have done. This practice has been so vital that I feel motivated to dialogue with others about it. I established this page as a place to compile dialogue with those who have similar practices or desire to explore this terrain more.

Release is simply the body's way of relinquishing tension or trauma, and thus shifting to a more relaxed state of being. Some people (such as Somatic Experiencing practitioners) use the word discharge instead of release. I use the two terms interchangeably, but prefer the word release.

This barn belongs to one of my closest neighbors and is part of their 600 acre dairy farm. I fell in love with them and their farm and land. The picture captures some metaphoric and literal essence of where I am at right now.
My husband and I bought a house in a beautiful location 1.5 hours north and west of where we used to live. Details about our home came to me in dreams before we had even been to the area. Though it was love at first sight with the land surrounding us,

In Art, Spirituality, Awakening and Life
I have lived my life from a feeling of equality with all beings and want to resurrect and make popular old-fashioned values like humility and respect. In March of 2021, I wrote about the value of promoting humble and vulnerable art. A year later I felt moved to expand what I'd written to include the realm of spiritual awakening. Through spiritual writing and teaching, I advocate for equality and integrity

Healing Embodied Powerlessness and Despair
Though I’d done enough inner work that I now felt inwardly safe and supported, my physical body still held a posture of discouragement and despair. So I ventured into exploring bodily spaces where difficult emotions were still firmly entrenched. It was not easy. I felt crazy for choosing to wander into dark issues

Sometimes art pieces emerge from the subconscious that act upon us in unexpected ways. An image may offer a blueprint or energetic pathway for healing trauma that has been stored in our body. Rachael and I offer our experiences with two pieces of somatic art, which reveal the importance of creative expression and a healing bodily response.

Explorations into Unseen Dimensions of Life and Self
We all live multidimensional lives, whether we are consciously aware of it or not. Everyone has untapped potential and access to subtle realms of existence. However, many have a tendency to elevate and glorify these dimensions, or conversely ridicule and judge that which falls outside of a culturally agreed upon reality.

I did not make this drawing, though I wish that I had. It was made by my good friend Heather Quaine. The truth is that Heather and I only recently met. I left glowing comments about some of her art pieces, and then asked for permission to write about her work. She then made a short video telling me about her life,

We each live a life of wholeness. Everyone receives input from their unconscious when they sleep. We cannot survive without it. Some of us, however, intentionally develop an ongoing rapport with subconscious material, while others live their entire lives without consciously drawing upon these unseen connections.

Diversity and the Freedom of Being Fully Seen
My life has been lived between the tension of wanting to be myself, while trying to fit in with others. Perhaps you also negotiate this delicate balance. As biological mammals, a degree of conforming to family and culture is crucial for survival. Ideally, one is raised to have both — authenticity and belonging.

In February of 2021, I was eager to bring my Drawing into Trauma series to completion. After two plus years and 111 images, I was weary of mucking around in the angst of healing. I longed for an expansion of creativity in new directions. So I felt relieved, when this particular piece birthed forth rapidly, in a frenzy of motion that left little room for thinking.

When making the Drawing into Trauma Series of 111 images, I did not reject any work or toss out mistakes. Healing entailed being with the neglected, abandoned parts of myself, so accepting uncomfortable pieces, facilitated inner reconciliation. However, when I was young, I regularly destroyed artwork.

This art piece that I made on March 5, 2021, references insects, which have positive associations for me. I feel especially fond of spiders. As a child, I would rescue spiders from others who wanted to kill them out of fear. Since many people associate insects with dark energy, they offer a bridge for integrating shadow elements of self.

Number 39 in my series on healing trauma. This drawing was made in early March of 2020, a week before the pandemic shut everything down in my area. (Art which comes from the subconscious, tends to be just a bit ahead of my lived experience, while significant dreams take many months to play out.) This image exposes the body as a landscape, revealing the inner healing time that the Covid-19 quarantine engendered.

This is the second piece in a series of images that delve into The Art of the Unknown. My art arises unplanned from subconscious scribbling. After two plus years of drawing into trauma, a transformation has occurred. I am no longer drawing wounds.

Most of my art arises from a state of emotional intensity of one kind or another. We might as well make good use of our distressed energy! The art making process transmutes turbulent emotions into something healing. A drawing might begin with anger, but very few end up looking and feeling that way.