sunday magic

Tonight I stumbled across an old story I wrote in India, I had one of those days, filled of light, dancing and happiness, it ended with a burst of confusion and communication breakdowns.
Then this story came to me to help shift me out of the funk.

It's interesting the way you can connect with others on this level, mind, body, soul, but somehow the ego, the words not being said, the assumptions made, can cause these disconnects.
They always shake me a bit, I mean, it feels great to be in tune, so when i'm not - of course frustration comes in.
 but every moment, every challenge is that opportunity to grow, so its the acceptance of the confusion, of the imperfection, of the inability to completely understand all of it, all at once, is definitely a lesson I'm learning.
To shake it out - and breeatthhhe.

Here's the story I found that lightened my perspective;


You fell asleep at the bottom of the ocean.
The fish sang to you and long strips of seaweed whistled tunes and played themselves the way someone might play a violin.

When you woke you found a clam, you crawled inside and found yourself in a vast valley.

The valley was sunlight and you wondered how you could find light in such unexpected places.
You walked down and found a door, it was old and wooden and covered with this beautiful green moss. When you put your fingers into it it was like touching foamy silk.
You leaned up against the door and just sat there hugging it.

When you opened your eyes you were on top of a mountain, the ground beneath you the same consistency as that silk, but felt like a giant nest. 

Down near your legs a wolf had nestled its head into your lap.

You sat there, stroking its head and said;

"this is life, things can change in the blink of an eye."

He looked at you and in his eyes you saw the eyes of every person you have ever loved, every person you have ever been with and let the inevitability of time split you apart, only to rejoin in new forms...

I found this in a letter in an old journal.
For someone named Ishaque;
Thanking them for their support, for their believing in dreams and wishes.
They had donated $ to my project I began in India.
I had never met them, nor had any idea who they are.
Just a soul, inspired to help a stranger.
I was astounded.

I've been thinking a lot about a quote my friend Will said to me recently;
"belief clings, faith lets go."

when you have faith, you don't need to cling to anything.
something to ponder.

Ben and I went to the Hare Krishna temple tonight.
I had dreamt about it recently so I thought it was time


I love watching people sing and dance, and enjoy themselves and others in this way.
Music carries a frequency, and when others tap into that frequency together, a sort of inspiration comes.
It's like a presence, a rythmn, a vibration that everyone is on together.

Another thing I found that a friend had written to me that I wanted to share..
Here goes:

" So I read this nice passage in this book Andy got me called Generation Hex.
All about what magic means in this time.

' Magic is living tapestry, a living history, and it falls to each generation to renew it. 
Ultimately magic is a kind of life that you live. Magicians are artists who use their lives, their culture, and the fabric of reality itself as their implements. That's where it ends up. It starts slow but the learning curve's as steep as it gets.
It means defining your life exactly how you want, turning it into gold. Learning about hidden things. Making things happen that shouldn't happen.
Setting up residence in the impossible.
Talking directly to the universe and finding out that it talks back, that it loves you.
That it will make your dreams real because it put them there for you to find in the first place, that if your  heart is pure it will show you incredible things.
Finding out that there have been people as nutty and blissed as you for as long as the human species has existed and looking to these ancestors for a bit of guidance and validation. Getting your motivation to the best and only party that has ever existed. The unveiling of another scene, our passport into the halmenon, the pure mentation of the All.
A chittering clacking dance of lust underneath a black sun with witches at night. Breathing lightening....
Speaking upside down language to God, It's a vibration in your heart. In your longing. And all alone in the chamber of sex and stars you realize where the story's going.
It's a life worth living all right' "
Jason Lau

I keep pieces of people and places and things on my wall that inspire me and this is one of them!

Thank you Taryn, Goddess sista- here's her site where she has amazing things she makes with her magician hands;
http://www.etsy.com/shop/LooseGoods?page=3

and an old painting she made me.

good night.

shine bright.

maybe more dreams of the sea for me?

Exercise for the Soul and Spirit November

Last nigth I took a martial arts class, my sister had begun taking a karate class with a Sensei in Santa Barbara and she told me, "once you eliminate fear in your body, you eliminate it in all aspects of your life>."

I'm really not about fighting, but defense is a whole different form of arts. I learned how to do a sommer-sault in case I fall off a bike or lose my footing, how to get myself out of a tight grip and basically how to do a dance with a wooden sword. I giggled through most of the exercises and all my partners would always sort of laugh in wonderment or curiosity. I couldn't help but laugh, each new experience made me giggle, learning new things that fathom me arise this emotion in me.

It's like a little kid seeing something for the first time, that curious smile and giggle at each new encounter with it.

Then I saw a movie that was incredibly disturbing, and I asked Ben, is it normal for people to feel sad for reasons they can't understand?

He said, "of course- and of course you're going to feel sad, we we're just emotionally raped by this movie! don't confuse your feelings and emotions for who you are."

I put this stone pyramid on my third eye, it was so cooling and sucked so much of the draining energy out of me, soon I fell into a deep sleep, knowing in a blink it'd be morning.

Its grey here, but patches of white grey lay everywhere. An old friend just called, and that comfort of a voice I've known for so long soothed me, but also left me with this feeling of - i want more!

I've been flipping through an old note book, full of notes, insights, quotes and wishes.

An old teacher told me, "nothing is finite, it seems like things have a weight, but everything is changing. Have faith in every step you make, don't be too responsible, make irresponsible choices too, follow your nose." She had then told me the story of taking out a $20,000 dollar loan in her twenties to make a film, soon after she was rewarded a grant to cover and make up for what she had done, she had no idea she was going to get that grant, but she trusted and took the risk to go after what she wanted.

 Whatever that path may be, if intuition is telling you to do something, sometimes logic has to be disregarded.

Yesterday I had a chart reading, astrology is so interesting. Being born under the stars, your situations in life, your challenges, choices and so forth.

Life is a constant flux, and its all about the flow of it. My friend Cofield, who read for me, told me "dont put yourself in a box, let yourself have your experiences."

Once we start boxing ourselves to what we are or should be, false barriers come up, that seem to prevent growth. The only way to really learn anything, is to experience it.-SO theory i get it- experience- im trying! I am human after all. :)

Last week I took a two hour soul dance class- called "Spirit Rythmns".

Basically a group of a ton of people turning around in circles and circles, singing, dancing and moving their bodies in the way spirit inspires them to.

This man showed up an hour into class named Carlos.

He was in an electronic wheelchair, with hardly an arm movement and absolutely no leg movement.

He smiled and smiled and spun in circles with everyone.

Ben told him at the end he had such grace, and he did, I was just astounded at his courage and general state of happiness.

BTW Dance class is amazing- (find it, do it, go for it).

http://www.5rhythms-la.com/

A beautiful friend of mine completely moved me this week after I hadn't talked to her in mths. I had tried to reach her but she told me she had been healing, or accepting what had happened to her and hadn't been able to talk to anyone yet.

She had fallen three stories down from an apartment building and ended up in the hospital. She told me the story of all the pain, of the surgeries, of how they had to move her organs around and about the infections they caused.

Then she laughed, made jokes, told me about how during the past hospital stay a boy came in and she taught him how to draw for hours. How inspired she was, how this situation has already changed her outlook in so many things. She told me about the nature haven at her mom's in Wisconsin where she's healing, her desire to possibly go back to school, her courage with her state, her acceptance of being in this wheelchair. Her message in life, how she just wants to remind people, that "hey if your cell phone breaks- its going to be ok."

I felt so inspired after talking to her, a serious perspective shift.

"a day for laughing...excercise for the soul, for the spirit. " drawing and interview- Alex Parkin.

enjoy :)

many of these are stills from my new animation work!

coming sooooooooon.

i love you.

x

the beginning of october

the 6th of October.

I keep seeing 10:10 each time i look at a clock.
Someone told me recently that 10:10 signify's new beginnings.
here's to new beginnings!


a few nights ago i had a manifestation drawing and dinner here with an amazing circle of people.
I explained how over the past year each time I wanted to see something happen I drew it out first as a visual for myself.
One of my beautiful muse friends, Amy Jenkins, taught me this before I moved to India.
I remember she asked me, "what do you want?"
-"Money"
-"Why? Get Specific."
-"So I can take care of myself, and go to India to make a film and share beauty and magic with others and share my life.."
She said, "Ok- draw it."

We were at a diner, on a napkin I drew myself sitting on a elephant with a camera filming, with bags of "funds- $" on either side of me to do it.
 A few months later and this would be the reality.

India ended and after I returned I started to long for a place to call my own.

So again, I drew it.

If you saw my home now, you'd see it looks a lot like this, with the mountains in the window, tea cups on a tables, tarot on shelves, and magic littered around. :)

I've drawn out my most recent set of wishes and intentions, this includes the winter solstice in Mexico, Screenings in New York, SF and LA, finishing two major projects and nurturing and growing in a relationship by staying present and trusting.

In the circle everyone drew out their wishes, and Ben led verbal sharing of intentions and blessings for the group. Everyone really opened up and became so vulnerable, we're all just humans, and being able to express what you need and want is so important. Faith, being the main driving force behind anything.
I went to a workshop/circle in long beach recently and the doctor in the group said-
"Every time you doubt yourself it disempowers you"

i found a few other things from one of my wish books that stuck out to me.

it is the beginning of october.

what will you visualize for yourself from here on out?

all my lovin.

there is a record playing in my room.

Its "Dusk at New Hope, Pennsylvania" off an album called Environments.
It's just crickets and the symphony of dusk, the tune of nature.
This song is playing over it and there are certain chords that just play everything in my heart:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1OvKhEkTzU

I watched a film called "La Belle Vert" tonight.

I watched this woman go from living in nature with a huge community to the city of Paris.

For some reason I thought of this moment in India, before I left when i said "Kripiya bhaiya,( please brother) what if I was your sister?"
It was at the airport when i was getting fees for overweight baggage. The fee was two hundred dollars.
He looked me in the eyes and then slowly looked down and said "I cant..." Which I knew was really "well..." a few moments later he gave me my boarding pass and forgot about the fee.
What if we all did just treat everyone as our immediate family?

I also thought of this one time I was on the bus in Chicago.
I boarded with no money and I was trying to be silent that day.
I looked in my pockets and found some gems and some colorful glints of confetti.
I handed it to the bus driver and smiled.

He looked down.
 He smiled back at me with a sort of curiosity and wonderment
He nodded and I went to the back of the bus and sat down.

In those days I used to photograph my shadow a lot, I'd document my travel to and from school, often distracted by the beautifully mundane moments of life.

I watched a cat eat a bird yesterday.

I heard the bird squealing first and my ears propped up like an animals,
Then the cat ran across my path with the bird in its mouth.
Rose was with me and her jaw dropped,  and she said
"circle of life" as she clasped her face.
We both laughed because really we didn't know what else to do.
So real.

i asked her what the human heart was.
she said it was "a rythmn, a beat, something that all things have, well all living things."
She said "they tell us it stops when we're dead but it just turns into something else."

A man at work the day before told me, "you do what you can with what you have."

He spoke for awhile and this one thing stuck out in a way where i found myself repeating it in my head,  the way one repeats a new phrase in a foreign language, "the facts aren't always sharp but the feelings are always clear."

it reminded me of dreams, of love, conversations, moments, where the details fall but the feelings are clear.
something like the desert or a sunset.
I can't always recall the details of these things but I know the way they make me feel.

the stars in California

the stars in california look like little pieces of my heart all spread around in the sky.

i wonder if anyone can see the pieces of me reflected in them as i see them, if their thoughts cross paths with mine.

this was a little drawing made before the solar eclipse.

a precursor to what was coming, release, clarification, understanding that there are two ways to look at the same thing.

two sides to everything,  maybe even more.

espirito santo is burning in my room, a long candle with a dove's wings lit up.

all these people flash before my eyes, these souls who i've connected with, on this level in such a brief lapse of time. time makes no sense and expands and grows in this way that is similar to space 

endless and immeasurable.

i just signed up for another ten day silent meditation retreat, i can hear the coyotes outside howling.

so many voices that sound familiar with my heart.

Vipassana, the name of the retreat, means to see things as they really are.

i wonder how often we are clouded by thoughts, negativity, the external world, internal struggles, and I wonder if we begin to stop seeing things in front of us.

I dreamt the other night of my eye fogging over, i couldn't see through it at all.

I was in a situation that felt wrong and until i pulled myself out of it did the fog clear away.

The next day I sat staring at the solar eclipse, later my eyes became sore and these two experiences

dream, and reality, or vice verse, seemed to correlate and cross over in such comprehensible ways.

the art of seeing.

i made a drawing titled

"in case i lose my sight

all things full circle."

after all, everything is a circle, a cycle, one experience bringing us to the next.

later i sat making lots of watercolor paintings, i decided, well if i'm going to go blind i might as well live it up and paint while i can. :)

i found a song called "everything is simple in the moonlight."

atleast things are illuminated, thats for sure.

I remember being isolated in the village in India, the moon became one of my closest friends and allies out there, this familiar source of light, regeneration and familiarity in such a foreign place.

She seemed to wink at me when things got tough or lonely.

although that feeling never lasted quite so long, as children seemed to continuously grab me by my center and squeeze this intense unconditional love into me

listen to the sound of the earth.

i've been trying to do that more.

listen to the wind, the birds, the trees, water, the night sky.

i taught a yoga class the other day in Santa Cruz and one boy who decided not to participate but

rather watch from a window told me

" i wish i had done yoga with you all, i like the way you did that back opener with your ear to the earth, adds another element."

true dat yo.

i've been streaming together videos on love.

its a topic.

its more than a topic, a topic is an under statement.

its something that fathoms, astounds and amazes me.

i find it in the most subtle situations.

a smile, a touch, a hug, a letter, a dinner, a wish, a drawing, words,

giving, receiving.

strangers, close friends, distant friends, family.

in India it was bestowed upon me all the time, in the US its the same.

its whatever you make it and where ever you attract it.

it can be overwhelming.

like swimming in the ocean.

beautiful and wonderful and intense.

what to do with all the waves this heart can feel?

i've moved back to California, which even for me was a surprise, I guess thats why it also makes sense.

time to root and ground a bit like a tree.

i see mexico in the future, on the horizon, central america, south america.

but in good time.

when i've made the connections with the souls who want to create explore, film and capture there together.

magic and intentions.

it will happen.

gratitude to all the guides in my life.

the support, help, guidance, inspiration, forgiveness and allowance.

allowing me to come in and out of your lives as i do, like a bird who perches, nests, explores and 

returns.

you're always in my heart.

rest. and growth.

its about midnight, and this about sums up my thoughts for the night.