CULTIVATE POSITIVE THOUGHTS . . .

 Salmon River Inn, Karen Day shared this place with many of us over
the years for her"Burning Woman" birthday weekend in the fall. 
Lovely being with a 25+ women of all ages, themed for full throttle adventure.

PEACE BOUND
Looking up sky gifting blue
Bikini Farms 
4 Acres....
Grow!
My kid; a genius
Artful earthfull living
Overalls on, hands dirty.
What's not to L O V E ?
A welcoming hug always here for you.


In this economy one has to look around and re invent themselves.  Were all connected, earth and mankind a very John Muir mindset.
Everyone is feeling the crunch and we have to work with others and try to elevate our possibilities by nurturing what we do best.
Look around and make a daily plan to do five good things that reflect who you want to be.
Example:
1. Love someone...reach out and just hold someones hand in the simplest form unconditionally
2. Love your self and others with a divine light.....yes look up and give thanks to your Gods if they are good and not killing that is the point.
3. Pay attention to your partner, family, kids, animals, take time to be present and hear what they say with their hearts and eyes. Being present doesn't mean shutting them down because your not hearing what YOU want to hear.  Listen, acceptance and non attachment will help.
4. Cry if you have to and be human, that's right open that heart Chakra and let it out.
5. Act in truth of your heart felt feelings.  Be true and clear up all things messy.
6. On a lighter level....if you make art you can teach do workshops, cooking and welding and walking dogs...all great skills, comfort others...we are all vital souls full of possibility.  Make a step towards your community, volunteering work may not pay the bills but you are karmic-ally helping and who knows maybe you will meet an amazing person that will be a conduit and key to the next best thing happening in your life.  Easier to say I know but never give up hope and always let go of what isn't working.  I can only photograph a human so many ways with the same chair...maybe more than most but sometimes you gotta change.  Evolve with faith and believe it will be better.  It will.
If your happy your work will feel better and so will you, find some light in your lives and reflect it.  
If you are jobless, be kind to yourself and know that you have much worth and that the world is a crazy place right now. Lean on friends ask for help, as they care for you if you let them into your deeper soul. ASK!
Make a plan.  List the things you do best and make one of those things bankable for your world.
Don' t give up....just reach out and ask ...keep asking and believe in your ability to do good works and be an asset in someone s life.
Especially yours.  Look up and know that the the Universe will provide.  Your good people and just don't be beaten down by whatever is lacking in your life....We so want to control our lives and others when in fact...sometimes...the chapters change and the book is over.  

I have had a few long rides with major magazines...than one day I crossed the bridge of no return...spoke up and well...I burned a bridge or two.
Regrets but....more fish in the sea with more flavor and you have to believe in your talents and if they aren't working for you ....change....let go of the old and just let it be.   Forge a new path and fill it with what you love.  Make art, make food, make love with a happy joyful heart.  
Good luck with it all.
INVENTORY:
Take a little inventory about who you are now.
Have you vacated your heart for some company or a position that props you up for a star/brownie points?
Possibly living your life for another person harboring resentment's! Rolls are always in a state of flux in relationships.
Are you job less and feeling less than more "the world is done with me".  No the world is not done with you.
End of day whose got your back? Whose back to you have?
Stuck, dam place to be....change is hard and even harder for older people...lighten up and loosen up everything is impermanence...a difficult concept for Westerners.   Let go let it be and move toward learning about what isn't working and grow. It's okay to change your life anytime.
Don't you want to be happier?  Are you happy?  If so than lucky you.  Namaste your a great reflection and example to others around you.

"You are like a candle. Imagine you are sending light out all around you. All your words, thoughts and actions are going in many directions. If you say something kind, your kind words go in many directions, and you yourself go with them. We are ...transforming and continuing in a different form at every moment."

Thich Nhat Hanh

 Don' t give up, most likely you all have some special talents to share with others....Even when you've surfed the tops of waves sometimes you get tossed off and you have to find a new wave or a better location to be who you are....we get older and recycled and well its all about cycles in life and creating new possibilities...and maybe the Universe is trying to say....IT S TIME TO CHANGE...move on and start a new fire. 

 

Brie, June 1968, Brie, France. Photo by Henri Cartier-Bresson

THE MINDS EYE deserves a rest and some kind consideration....sit breath....ponder....energize and yes REST.
 Today my friend Eric Swanson shared some thoughts from his Rimpoche
If you make time for sitting and letting your mind be still as the thoughts arise and flow as they 
"traverse all the paths and levels and in this very lifetime to attain full and complete enlightenment is definitely unlikely for most of us. 
But that isn't a bad thing.  Since time immemorial up until now we have been wandering in and out of one state after another.  
You don't have to achieve enlightenment right now, but if you direct yourself towards that goal, that is the direction you are moving.
Slowly engaging in all the different ways for taming the mind/meditation and they will all gradually ripen in you. "  Pema Chodron says to say the word "THINKING" when those thoughts are basically cluttering your mind.   It works especially when its a runaway train.  I place my hands on my head, feet flat on the floor and ground myself.   Thoughts are concepts that can cause panic, anxiety and grief, or when your joyful, the complete opposite, a vibrant feeling, calm and your soul can reside in a kinder place.  The human mind can be complicated, the body sometimes rules us with its chemistry to cradle or rock our worlds.  Go with it whatever it is and know its part of you being true to whatever your feeling.  Acknowledge it and move your energy toward health and wellness.  If it pains you...work through it...don't sweep it away...it will drift back...go through it....the other side is more evolved....be gentle with yourselves if you have had little experience dealing with deep past painful places that scare you.  Pema has books about such things.  THE PLACES THAT SCARE YOU and many other invaluable books.  

 Sitting and feeling is better than medicating and padding the soul with booze, most assuredly a depressant that doesn't allow one to sleep long nights, smoke and pills...it all has some sort of shifting on a mind for sure...but be it pure or polluted....to be awakened and open for a present sense is ultimate.
Spirituality is by far a path for calming an over energetic and stirred mind.   We are all human and if we acknowledge our feelings verbally we can face our fears and over come what may feel like a dark devastation.   In the wheel of life and living we feel it all if were alive....too alive sometimes but be not ignorant as growth can create and cultivate new ways of seeing feeling and being.  Its not an easy path but its each souls journey to get the lessons and be more awake.  Zombie I am not.  I encourage those of you who struggle to simplify and those who hide in work to wake up and make friends with your soul self, creatives hang in there in this rotten economy....don't give up....reach out help and ask for help.  Pray.
The past is gone.  Now is where its at.

"Let everything happen to you, beauty and terror, no feeling is final."

Rainer Maria Rilke (1875 - 1926)

“A warrior chooses a path with heart, any path with heart, and follows it; and then he rejoices and laughs. He knows because he sees that his life will be over altogether too soon. He sees that nothing is more important than anything else.”

Carlos Castaneda (1931 -)

Authors I recommend: Pema Chodron - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pema_Ch%C3%B6dr%C3%B6n
Eckhart Tolle - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eckhart_Tolle
Wayne Dryer - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayne_Dyer
Charlotte Kasl - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlotte_Kasl
Ondrea/Stephen Levine - Embracing The Beloved
Thich Nhat Hanh - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thich_Nhat_Hanh