Saturday, July 22, 2006 ~ Post Falls, Idaho
After nearly two weeks in the pressure cooker of volcano country, it's a relief to find myself in the gentler energy of northern Idaho.
Post Falls is just a few miles west of Coeur d'Alene. And any place with heart ("coeur") as part of its name is bound to be embracing.
I've lived among volcanoes before - on two Hawaiian islands and in Northern Arizona - and am familiar with their transformative energy.
Yet my two weeks in the Cascades was different. Perhaps because I wasn't steeped over time in the energy of a single volcano, but was moving from one to the next in rapid succession.
It began with a night spent sleeping under the stars at the 7,000-foot level of Mount Shasta and concluded yesterday afternoon, as I drove eastward, away from Mount Rainier.
In between I experienced dozens of volcanoes and volcanic remnants in California, Oregon and Washington State.
Like the earthquake energy of the California coast, the volcanoes of the Cascades are filled with the energy of upheaval. Explosive upheaval. Disruption. Displacement.
It was instructive to drive up to Mount St. Helens, for example, and see where the mountainside was blown away by the 1980 eruption and how the Toutle River was forced by volcanic debris to change its course.
It reminded me that an explosive upheaval of volcanic proportions in my own life 21 months ago blew up my status quo and forced the river of my life into new, unimaginable directions.
As well, it was somewhat disturbing yesterday to drive up to Mount Rainer, near Seattle, and sense the fiery force behind its cool, glacial exterior. In fact, each time I looked at the mountain, I clearly saw its flank collapse in an explosion of fire, rock and ash.
Whatever Mount Rainier does in the physical, its message - at least for me - is that disruption and displacement are the norm, and unexpected shifts in direction are to be expected. It confirmed a dream I had a few nights earlier, which promised "a pile of change" and suggested yet more radical evolution.
And, once more, it's a call to live as fully in the moment as I can. For there's no telling what the next moment will bring.
Photo by Mark David Gerson: Mount St. Helens, Washington
Saturday, July 22, 2006
Volcano Country
Mount Rainier as I Saw It
To learn more about this drawing, titled Fire of the Gods, or to order a copy, click here and select #93. To view all new drawings, click here.
Image (c) 2006 Mark David Gerson
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Eureka!
Wednesday, July 12, 2006 ~ Fortuna, California
As I was driving through the majestic redwoods earlier today, then thinking I would spend the night just north of here in Eureka (which, to my mind, should rightfully be spelled Eureka!), I was reminded of a piece in The Voice of the Muse: Answering the Call to Write, my book of writing inspiration and practice.
It's called "The Right Idea," and it makes the point that there's a profound difference between a good idea and the right idea, "between an idea that is anyone’s for the taking and one that is uniquely yours, one that’s right for you, right now."
There are many good ideas out in the ethers...infinitely many. But there's only one in this moment that sparks a cry of Eureka!, that either ignites your passion or is sparked by it.
The idea I had last month of staying in the Denver area was a good idea, one I could justify on many grounds. But it wasn't a Eureka! idea.
A Eureka! moment requires no explanation, no justification. It just is, often defying all logic, common sense and conventional wisdom.
The fact is, we're moving out of the energy of explanation, justification and conventional logic and into the energy of Eureka!
We're moving away from figuring things out and into the energy of allowance.
We're moving out of the energy of settling and into the energy of passion. Increasingly, we're uncovering passions previously hidden or repressed, passions our still-limited minds would prefer to shut down or flee from.
Yet these are the passions fueled by our divine nature, the same passions that allow more of that divine nature to reside more fully within us and live more fully as us.
These are the passions that cry Eureka! from the deepest place of our knowingness and beingness.
These are the passions that, for reasons I may never fully understand, have kept me on the road and brought me to Fortuna and the gates of Eureka.
I'd like to think that being so close to Eureka, California, will spark some new Eureka! moments for me. Whether it does or not, it has already pressed me to remember the magic of Eureka! and to not settle for anything less.
Photo by Mark David Gerson: Muir Woods National Monument, near San Francisco
Bella Fortuna
Wednesday, July 12, 2006 ~ Fortuna, California
The real reason I'm writing this right now is that I can't resist the opportunity to use the place line Fortuna.
Spending the night in a place called Fortuna, as I'm doing, reminds me of all the good fortune that travels with me -- despite the fears and emotional stresses of this physical and spiritual journey.
While I'm not always taken care of in ways I would humanly choose -- in ways that are comfortable -- I am always provided for. And while there are moments when my burden feels extraordinarily taxing, I know it is no heavier than yours...and much lighter than that borne by many.
In this moment, as dusk bathes nearby hills in golden light, I am grateful -- for this day, for this journey and for you.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Dancing with the Infinite
Wednesday, July 5, 2006 ~ Sedona, Arizona
As I lie in bed this morning thinking about my life in these times, the image that comes to me is of a deck of cards tossed in the air. It's a slow-motion vision of cards lazily somersaulting over each other, not yet ready to fall to earth.
I've had that image before. And the sense that has always accompanied it is that everything is in limbo, that I'm waiting for the cards to fall into whatever the new pattern of my life will be.
This morning, though, my interpretation is different. Disconcertingly different.
What if, I ask myself, this somersaulting limbo is the new pattern? What if the cards don't fall to earth because they're dancing in a different vibration...and I'm being asked to dance with them?
In the past, I would wait patiently for the new pattern, even as I tried to figure out what it would look like, where the dominant focus would be.
Would it be these writings? My fiction? My screen writing?
Would it be my groups, sessions and teleconference? And would that focus be trained on singing/sound healing or spoken inspiration?
This morning, in an Aha! that I'm still integrating, I realize that my old response is no longer appropriate.
First, it denies the present moment in favor of some indeterminate future one.
Second, it assumes that anything will ever be fixed again, even for a moment.
Third, it denies the increasing multidimensionality of my nature.
The truth is that any attempt to figure things out repudiates the present moment and the call to surrender fully to it. The truth is that nothing will ever be fixed again, at least not in the old ways I remember. The truth is that all forward motion points to fluidity and surrender.
The truth is that destination -- any destination -- is not the point.
Where I'll drop anchor, what my work will look like, whether my books are ever published or screenplays are ever filmed is immaterial...even as the less-evolved parts of me protest.
As all great spiritual teachers repeatedly remind us, only the journey matters...be it my interstate highway journey, my writing journey or the journey of Radical Evolution I wrote about in this week's newsletter (and will be working with in next week's teleconference).
I'm feeling that focus on the journey more and more fully in recent times, and it's not always comfortable. Parts of me gaze longingly and naively back to a sense of stability, control and destiny that is more illusory than ever.
More and more of me realizes that those cards aren't coming down...perhaps ever. Even if they do, some day, all that can matter is this moment, when they continue to dance in ever-shifting patterns and beckon me to join in.
Truly, I have no choice but to answer the call and dance with them.
What's It All About, Alfie? II
Thursday, June 29, 2006 ~ Santa Fe, New Mexico
I'm back in Santa Fe after 12 days or so in the Denver area, wondering once more what Alfie -- or anyone -- can tell me about my life in these strange and unsettling times.
When I arrived in the Denver not long after the 18-month anniversary of my highway odyssey, I made an executive decision: I'm done with being a full-time roadie and choose to park myself here...certainly for the summer, perhaps indefinitely.
Before I go on, let me tell you that the executive who made that decision has been demoted and is now on probation!
The short version of the story is that nothing supported me staying -- hotels were booked up with sporting tournaments, furnished rentals were not readily (or affordably) available and even the housesitting gig I manifested didn't work out.
So I left...frustrated, confused and with many questions.
Some answers arrived this evening when I called on a technique I teach others and use when working with others but have fallen out of the habit of practicing myself: using writing to connect with my highest wisdom.
1) Why, I asked, am I still on the road....and not only on the road but seemingly condemned to travel the same roads over and over?
2) If we're in the energy of choice, why can't I choose to stop my full-time traveling and stay in the Denver area?
What formed on the page were some surprising answers.
1) You are not only laying, clearing, reactivating and aligning earth grids in your travels. You are, more importantly at this time, also dropping light codes into the framework of the major roads you drive, providing activations and initiations to all who travel upon them. Why the same roads? You have a particular territory and each time you pass along the same road, you are upping the frequency of the installed codes. In so doing, you are touching many thousands of people each day. Many commuters, taxi drivers and truckers are doing the same Johnny Appleseed-type work, whether or not they realize it.
2) First, there are degrees and vibrations of choice, and of choosers. The "choice for Denver" might have been an advanced choice for some. It was not for you. You have evolved beyond that degree of choice. Your only choice now is to surrender to the mystery of the Radical Evolution now moving through you. Your only choice is to remain as connected as you can in each moment with the divine essence of your beingness...the greater self...the infinite intelligence...the God that you are.
The bottom line? For me it always comes back to surrender...to the mystery, to the divine imperative, to the moment. And from that place of surrender, trusting that all is well.
For the still-human parts of me, that level of surrender remains something of a struggle some days. Yet all I can do is move forward in the not-always-comfortable (or comforting) certainty that each moment is propelling me into a place of greater divinity.
Meantime, even as I continue to travel, present teleconferences (including one on July 11), offer private sessions and redesign my web site, I'm creating space and time for writing. I'm working on a screenplay of The MoonQuest and simultaneoulsy revising the novel, while committed to the trilogy of which The MoonQuest is the first installment.
Those still-human parts of me can't always see how all that can be accomplished, particularly while still on the road. That's where surrender and the higher vibration of choice come in.
In this moment, I choose to honor all aspects of my passion and leave the means, timing and resources to my divine self. I surrender to the mystery.
And so it is.
