Initiate.

I have been tending my own garden in a slightly different way, as of late. With Surrender has come a knowing calm. A Quiet that I am quite enjoying. A release of most of the anxiety that I experience daily. I am learning how to breathe anew, in different rhythms, body wide, and the pulse of that breath is rippling out touching those around me.
 I feel as though I am being breathed, the universe is breathing me, I am the rhythm, the pulse, the breath, the heartbeat. I'm both experiencing it, and also witnessing.

I have shed my "comfort zone" which really translates to, I am shedding the story lines that double as limitations. No more limits.

With the approach of Burningman I've been searching thrift stores, acquiring clothes that will be beautiful, playful, sexy, fun, comfortable, and practical for the heat, the dust, the atmosphere. Beautiful things that are nothing like what I normally wear. A fantasy life, of sorts. And yet, not the tribal fairy wear I love so much. Mostly because I wear those in my normal life, and I don't want to risk them on the playa. Some will go, but the majority will stay safe at home. If I had my way I'd be going flush with everything elvenleather- miniskirts, haltertops, bikini's, hats, respirators, goggles, and big feather earrings, but in the meantime, I've discovered an obsession with booty shorts, belly baring tops, bathing suits, and pirate boots with cowgirl hats. Yeah, all in the same outfit. It rocks. And White. Suddenly I cannot get enough white in my wardrobe. My whole life, white has been a color I avoid. I'm too messy, it gets stained and ruined, and dirty. It just totally doesn't work. And yet, I'm finding a white goddess rocker edge tunic creeped in, and then today, a white shirt that I am positive was made for me, off the shoulder, a style I also "do not do" that says: Breathe Deeply, Love Madly, Live Fully In huge letters down the front. Finally, a pair of tiny white denim shorts, an item that would normally be an emphatic no way, and I simply could not do without them. Had to have them. Had to wear them for the rest of the day, with the shirt, and the knee high pirate boots.

It's all very silly, yes, and yet, it's sooo not. Because it is indicative of a huge inner shift. An initiation, wiping clean the slate and starting anew. White. New beginnings. The initiate.

I am experiencing comfort, confidence, love, beauty, and appreciation in and for, my body. I am owning my own beauty, divinity, connectivity more each day. Because as a part of this surrender, I found the next level of connection with the universe, the divine, that we are completely one and the same, and there is no separation. So, by poisoning my divine vessel, by disrespecting this body, I am disrespecting Spirit, Divine, the Universe. If I am  truly  the Love, embodied, then that starts at home, with my own body, heart, soul, with complete love, appreciation, and worship of my own divinity, the entry portal to the Divine.

This is the Big Work. Quite possibly the biggest work, in some ways. At least for me. Overcoming a lifetime of conditioning, and a society full of messages to the contrary, and indeed, a society that frowns on strong, confident women who love themselves and take full ownership and enjoyment from their own bodies, and sexuality.  It's fucking true. We are sluts shamed, and subject to ugly witch hunts. disempowered, locked away, killed. So it's scary. I won't gloss over that. It's actually a little terrifying. And there's that little voice still, the one that says I will be shamed, I will be in danger, the one that tries to shush This One, the One who is emerging. And I am learning to quiet that voice... it's become back ground noise, rather than the foreground.

I watched a woman teach my daughter how to do push ups the other day. She wanted Mari to do "the girl push ups" first, from the knees, because, "no, that's the boy push up, I haven't taught you that one yet" Mari wanted nothing to do with the knee push up. And I said to this woman, you know, I'm really uncomfortable with you designating one as boy and one as girl, they are just fucking pushups, you really don't need to segregate that. She agreed with me, and proceeded to resegregate them, that the boy push up was the strong one. *HOLY FUCKING SHITBALLS, WOMAN, ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS?!!*   I face palmed and stepped away before I just tore her a new one, as she was clearly drunk or impaired and nothing I had to say was going to get through. And later, had a discussion with Mari that there are no fucking limitations, there are no "Boy" whatever the fuck it is that she is limited from due to being a woman. She can do it all, anything she wants, and then some. That being a woman is a gift of the highest order, and anyone who tries to limit her or place limitations on her abilities due to her status as woman should 1. be completely disregarded, and 2, should come talk to her mama. Like, right now, and we'll just get crystal fucking clear on that one.

I owe it to my daughter, to my mother, my ancestral lineage, to every woman alive, and most of all, to myself, to Love myself completely. To take full ownership, joy, pride, and exquisite care of my self, my body, my sensuality, my sexuality, my Woman ness. To be a beacon of light, and love, in the centuries of darkness. To step into my power as Woman, as a fully sexual being, as a being of beauty, and a Divine conduit. And so it is. I invite you to join me. I love you.