shedding some skin

I'm sitting here trying to put words to how i feel. to my reflection on the day,  there are so many thoughts...and yet none sufficient enough, none necessary. All I can feel is an expanding and an opening of my heart. These past 5-6 days have been tough, there have been ups and downs and many nights i go to bed feeling great, but its the moving through that's been.....uncomfortable.

I had a lot of great conversations today, and now that i think of it....not one of them did i carry any expectation on it. It wasn't that i didn't care, it was that i didn't expect the other person to be a certain way, and in doing so i opened myself up to wonder, to wonder about this other person, and ask them questions, to get to wonder at their lives even more. I also spent a lot of time silently appreciating the people around me. Noticing their beauty, them as soul AND body. I let go of self expectations and judgments as well....because the only way to truly have no expectations of others is to let yourself off the hook too.

And it was miraculous, i flowed from task to task, really enjoying what i was doing in the moment, and just resting. Today was work weekend at the guild, where people come and do grounds and garden work in exchange for room and delicious meals. I got to meet some of the long time guilders and some newbies. Then after dinner we had a 'history of plain' presentation here (Plain is the town the guild is in). I was struck by the diversity of crowd the guild draws. From outside of the immediate area the guild draws many artists who are wild and eccentric by nature, many who like to explore new thoughts and concepts, and generally fit the 'hippy' vibe this place has. The group that was here for the presentation were all people mostly from the area. All people who have grown up here, or moved here, hard working people who embody the energy of highly structured conservative christian logging town it was built on.
These are such a gap...and a tension between these two groups....now there ARE artists in this area who LOVE the guild and that there is a place like this that exists, but my feeling with the rest of them is that they don't quite get it, are not QUITE comfortable with thinking openly and differently.

To me, the guild embodies acceptance, acceptance without judgment, or rules or structures to abide by...just open armed acceptance. Even if they don't believe what you believe, they will at least listen to you....really listen to you. And try to wrap their minds around..or let them go.

Talking with one of the guildies tonight, she was telling me that other than her husband, I'm the only one who she can talk to about different spiritual stuff....and i came upon something that i forget.

I get so caught up in trying to be something, be important, be included, that i spread my ideas out like a spray hoping to catch someone in it and they will reflect back and validate my experience....but what I've been projecting is insecurity....so what i get a lot of times is either :
 #1-validating someones insecurity...so they buy into what I'm saying, and then i fall in to judging the weakness of the other person
#2- the other person can't hear what i have to say, and won't listen so they shut off and down, saying something to invalidate my knowledge and experience making me feel insecure and invalidated......because I'm operating from a sense of insecurity, not wanting to share

and  I've been getting just that....a reflection of who i am, a closed individual, who is insecure in who she is, either reaching out for validation or shutting off what i think doesn't fit with me without even looking at it..

and i realized...a lot of my beliefs about life, and spirit, and love...are different from that of a lot of people...from the majority of the society (it seems). And its not necessary for me to push it on them. some people JUST AREN'T THERE yet...or never...and IT IS OK! it doesn't mean I am less, it doesn't mean THEY don't appreciate me and care for me...it just means they haven't gotten to a place where they can see that.....if they ever will.

I also realized that i influence and change other people so much more when i am just being myself and being true to my beliefs....it is LIVING my truths which will influence others, not what i SAY.

and communicating IS important, but instead of communicating about mental distractions, to release the fear and say what is REALLY at the heart of the matter, what am i feeling inside, the part of me that is vulnerable and sad and open and joyful....my insecurities, the part that i used to feel was necessary to hide 'because i had to be strong' thinking i had to live up to some mythological guidelines in my head...which ultimately left me feeling more disconnected and outcast.

This is part of the reason that I write this. I am human, i have common experiences, and even if its sometimes scary for me, i know that every negative thought I've had about myself, there's someone else out there who's had that very same negative thought.....i used to try to pride myself in being different...no one understands me, I'm different. i dye my hair funky colors and wear strange clothing, I'm different, I'm cooler than everyone else, I'm an artist, I'm different, there's no way you could understand or be at the same level as me.......this as well left me feeling disconnected from people, and outcast. i was basing my self perception on judging other people (mentally mostly, because there was a part of me that knew it was rude and mean to speak it out loud).

now i realize that the judgment i feel is really my judgment of myself reflected back at me through another person.

So....today i was ultra aware of my reactions and thoughts, and i had many people come in and take care of me, take over some duties, set me free, love me. because every time i had a judging thought, i would stop myself and find the good, the beautiful, the divine in another person.


in the tzolkin calender i follow we are in the midst of the red dragon wavespell...for 13 days (the wave) we travel through this energy looking at different aspects. Dragon is rebirth, renewal, being, and it has been a very uncomfortable time for me. the only thing that has gotten me through it is remembering that this is a time of shifting, of upgrading vibrations of living, of loving, of shedding my old skin. Today was red overtone snake....for the past 5 days I've been itching and scratching and loosening my old dead skin and today I've started to make the move out of it. it is a slow process which is uncomfortable, my skin is tender and vulnerable, so that even the slightest breeze can be a shock. So I'm sitting with it, and giving myself permission to sit with it. stay with the feeling and feel THROUGH the pain. knowing that if i look at it, its not REALLY that big...in fact it gets smaller....as long as i look at it and release any mental chatter that tries to come up. just focusing and totally enveloping myself in the feeling.