Baby Chipmunk

I’m now obsessed with needle felting itty-bitty baby chipmunks!

New Felted Chipmunk

You can adopt him on my Etsy!

I’m always overjoyed when I notice a bit of improvement in my craft. I think this little guy has some charm 🙂

That Moment When…

You’re all ready to go to bed, but suddenly there’s a raccoon stuck under the rain-proofing plastic under the balcony, and it’s right above your head.

Meditation thought

The more you are a self, the less you are the infinite.

Yanantin of Fear and Warriorship

In believing in complementary duality in all things, I believe we are constructed of two extremes: the fear self and the warrior self. These two give birth to the instance of yourself right now, just as the Everything and the Nothing conspired to create this world of Something.

The key of all yanantin is balance, and in this case it is the balance between fearsome and fearless states. It is not that the fearless warrior is who you should strive to be! It is not that we need to remove and deny all fear. The dichotomy is not good vs. bad here. Everything has its place: fear can keep you alive, or at least keep you from doing senseless things. Complete fearlessness on the other hand can lead to a lack of real love, for what is love without a fear of losing it? (What is having anything without a fear of loss?) That is yanantin, the acceptances of opposites as necessary points on a spectrum between which we seek the wisdom of balance.

 

My Mesa (non-traditional)

My mesa (based on Andean travelling altars) is a sacred pouch containing various power objects. Most of them are stones, and I’ve come to meet the spirits of each and discover their gifts. Each stone can be used for diagnosing or outright healing. For instance, the egg-shape at the back/top is opalized glass (pretty sure it’s not real opal), and it helps draw the refined light energy of the universe down to me. Meanwhile the fossilized shell in the first/bottom row is like a fine-toothed energy comb for sifting through the human complications and “sorting myself out.” The white smooth stone with the little swirl is a tremendously powerful yet gentle stone for drawing heavy energy out of me. Meanwhile the bloodstone is good for healing physical ailments. All these correspondences are original to the particular spirit of the stone, and I spent time holding each in my hands to ascertain them.

When working with sacred objects, remember that they have spirits too, and it’s this spirit of the object that you really want to work with.

Little thought

The key to deep sacredness is that it comes naturally and does not feel at all extraordinary.

Leather Medicine Pouch Necklace

See it on Etsy!

Yanantin: Sami and Hucha

My most basic knowledge of the cosmos, the entirety of the infinite being-ness, is that it is a neutral force.  It is neither wholly good nor wholly bad, as these concepts themselves are abstractions from the yin-yang relationship unity. They are complementary opposites that do not exist apart from each other. This is the Andean teaching of yanantin.

To be at peace with the idea that the infinite cosmic force is ultimately neutral is to let go of our desire to be saved without effort. We move from a place of asking for blessings to asking for balance, which is the wiser and fuller gift. As spirit-workers, we face a reality of existing in-between the everything and the nothing, the physical and the spiritual, the perfect and the imperfect. It is a complexity and a simplicity all at once. It forces the mind to never lie still, but to balance with constant intention and yogic discipline.

The Andeans see energy as being either sami or hucha. Sami is refined, light, and easy. It is ever-flowing from the cosmos and Pachamama (our mother earth). Hucha is heavy and disordered. Humans create hucha, primarily by being highly instanced selves, pieces of consciousness that are not properly merged into the wholeness of existence. The more you are a self, the less you are the infinite. However hucha is not bad or evil – it is a gift you can feed to Pachamama, who digests our human-life drama and offers sami in return.

Each of us is infinitely meaningful and infinitely meaningless.  We are self and other, we are momentary and eternal. To understand this is not always easy, but it puts all overly-complicated questions to rest. Why is there something rather than nothing? Because there is Everything and Nothing, where the potential of nothingness gives way to the dreaming of Everything into existence. Everything happens. This is sami: everything happens. The “somethingness” of human life is an instance of the everything, and this is hucha.

You can teach yourself to let go of hucha, pushing it down to Pachamama, and draw sami energy into the crown of your head. It feels wonderful and helps you gently fall into perfect balance with your environment.

So Tired. So Happy.

Another Algonquin trip — lots of new experiences, including a wonderful moment with a pine marten.