SingingStones:Retreat- Listen-Vision-Focus-Create

Living Words Living Movement

Words Have Power....
They write your mind alive. They Transform your feelings. They heal your body.

... some writing words for today...

....PEACE....SORROW....HOPE....

Write from your heart feelings,
Write without concern about all the stuff you were taught in English class

Then make connections with other thoughts and feelings.
It's easy! It all starts with one word.

Then write a poem, a story, or a letter with it.
Or Try This!!

Make a collage with visual images and words.
Don't know How! Just tear pictures and words.
whatever grabs you, from magazines, cards, glue to heavy paper or poster board.
Arrange while listening to music.
Experiment and have fun. Theres no right way to do this!!

It is a sure way to assist you to find your "own silent voice'

So make your "sacred space" today, know you are safe here.
You do not need to guard your words or hide your writing.
No one is going to invade your soul with their fears or their judgements

OOOOOOO

THE 'WONDER WORKING POWER' OF OUR THOUGHTS

The Body, Mind and Spirit are so closely interconnected that not a single word or thought can come into existence without being reflected in the personality, health and behavior of the individual.
We have thousands of thoughts throughout the day. They are like seeds and the ones we focus on are the ones which grow and flourish. Working with Postive Affirmations and allowing them to work for us creates energy that is Life Giving for ourselves, for all others. Even the Plants Grow and Flourish. It becomes a whole different garden.
But we need to watch out for the weeds!!!

OOOOOOO

The beliefs that have led you to where you are, are not the same that will lead you to where you want to go.
....Albert Einstein

I AM- I NEED- I WANT - I CAN - I WILL- I FEEL -I BELIEVE- ARE AFFIRMATIONS OF OUR STRENGTH AND INNER TRUTH.

They express a language and spirit of HOPE.

OOOOOOO

 

JOURNALING

Spiritual Formation

 There is an Awakening need for Spiritual Formation that is connected to the reality of life experience, that goes beyond ritualistic practice of religion. Spiritual formation can become an inner experience of the presence of Divine spirit that is an adventure of the recovery of our soul and spirit and a discovery of new and higher dimensions of 'the Holy Something'.

 

It is a search, a hunger, a journey, a quest, a pilgrimage and exploration that is growth into wholeness. It is a Way of Being rather than information, facts, techniques, creeds or dogma.

 

Journaling allows us to connect with deeper insights, emotions and understanding; the inner patterns of connection that live deep within our conscious awareness. Journaling a traumatic issue for four days will release the blocked emotional energy in a profound way.

 

...all of us are pilgrims-pioneers-scouts on the inner journey
...all of us come as students with a beginners mind
...none of us will ever really arrive.

 

1.Preparation: Center oneself in silence and sacred space.Be prepared to stretch and grow

2.Listen for what your body and mind is attempting to speak to you

5.Respond with your heart and spirit. Write whatever comes without censorship or judgements.

6. Be prepared for nothing or for everything.

-.When done on a regular basis, you will discover a pattern that connects and reorganizes your living.

OOOOOOO

TAKE A WALK OF THE HEART......THEN JOURNAL

The Ceremony of Walk Of the Heart comes from many Spiritual Traditions.  • The “Walk of the Heart” may be a day, an hour or even a few minutes. It is a journey of body, mind and Spirit making connection with the earth. The Walk of the Heart Ceremony is also a mirror. Through it, signs and symbols of your inward journey  will be reflected. • During the walk, certain spirits or powers of nature, which typify the nature of your own strengths, gifts or "medicine power," are attracted by, and reveal themselves to you. With your help, they weave a symbolic story which indicates future life direction,your inherent gifts, strengths and dreams. In other words, they reveal “the art of the heart’ that is your life • Begin and end your “heart walk” with ceremony. Create one of your own that affirms the sacrednes of earth and life. • Mindfully watch for items that are symbols of meaning and importance to you, that in some way relate to your inner gifts. You may find several items that are expressions of your gifts. Or you may find only one.. Ask permission of the elements and leave some kind of offering. Native Americans leave offerings of tobacco or corn meal or food. • Pay special attention to loved ones and friends who call strongly to you as you walk or to your fantasies, animals, birds, the winds, the images of the clouds, the textures of trees, stones etc.. Some who call to you are your "spirit guides," teachers, heroes, and helpers, who will watch as you grow and help to strengthen the circle of your purpose. • Like the vision quest, or the medicine walk ‘the walk of the heart” is an exercise of balance and attunement. It is not a challenging of the elements or heights, nor is it an endurance contest. The heart walker maintains connection with the beauty of life and the reality of death as both are reflected by the world of nature. • A medicine walk can be used in many ways: as a preparation for a vision quest; to answer a persistent question, either chronic or acute; or as an open-ended journey of self-discovery as one prepares to journal or address a particular project of whatever nature. As with any meaningful human endeavor, results are commensurate with effort and intention: the effort of preparation,the effort of focused attention; the effort of honest self-examination and interpretation. • A ‘Heart walk’ is s a way to your own truth, the artist within and to validate your own experience alone, in nature. Upon deciding to undertake  thewalk, it may be helpful to inform a person you trust of your intent,.. Clarify with them the life issues you wish to concentrate on, or you may just want to be open to the surprises of ‘discovery’ of what lies with your heart. • The cloth of our lives may be finely woven or patchwork. It helps us little to compare our garments to those of others. Our task is to accept our past, our path, and our purpose, to take on the fabric of our lives and wear it. To live the “art of our heart’ as a gift to the universe.

 

..from Spirituality & Health Issue: September/October 2004 The Soul/Body Connection


Sweating Your Prayers: The Spiritual Practice of Ecstatic Dance with Gabrielle Roth
....Jennifer Derryberry

When Gabrielle Roth wants to get closer to God, she dances. She sinks to her knees, floats to her feet, twirls, steps with a slide and a pop, bounce, twist, slink, shimmy, swish. Her favorite music blaring, she drowns out the clamor of inner voices and disappears into the moment.

Roth’s God is ecstatic dance, she says, and she has been moving — and teaching others to move — for 35 years. Three videos, a dozen-plus albums, three books, and some 200 teacher trainees later, she calls this energetic pursuit of ecstasy a philosophy, a perspective, and a practice. As a philosophy, ecstatic dance declares that energy is motion and motion is energy. From a dance perspective, she sees life as movement through changes. And as a spiritual practice, ecstatic dance is a way to literally sweat your prayers.

Roth’s brand of ecstatic dance is rooted in five rhythms that she calls flowing, staccato, chaos, lyrical, and stillness. The instructions are simple: Dance who you are. People of all body types and physical capabilities find their own idiosyncratic ways of moving. Just crank up the music, open your mind, and follow these rhythms in whatever way your soul directs.

Begin with the flowing rhythm. Practice being fluid, becoming a continuum of movement. In flowing, you can discover what’s going on inside. For instance, you might discover that you’re feeling inert today.

Then move into the staccato rhythm. Feel focused and your movement will be focused. If you’re feeling inert, take that into the dance. Trust that inertia is the state of your being for now and allow it, move with it. Find out whether it’s a heavy inertia or a rigid inertia. Define it in your dance.

Fly into chaos. Let go of all control. If you are inert, dissolve the inertia by breathing and moving into it. Let the inertia, or whatever you’re feeling at this moment, carry you deeper into chaos.

Now let your body become lyrical. Be funky — your original, most outrageous self. Become like a big rag doll, and disappear into the dance.

End in stillness. Be formless, identifying with the river of energy that flows through the body, rather than identifying with the body itself. In stillness, detach from the previous state and begin to feel how you are now. Whatever that is, be true to its dance energy as your body rests in stillness.

Each rhythm is an energy field in which we can explore the question, “What does it mean to be a human being, a human in motion, our fluid ever-changing, impermanent self?” For Roth, the dance is always moving toward ecstasy, an egoless, timeless state of being. “You don’t get there every day, by the way,” she says, “but that’s the goal. It’s like a cleansing; it burns karma. Just let go of everything for a few minutes, and be free. It feels exquisite.”

Roth whimsically defines herself as “a verb” and “an ongoing teenager.” But beyond that, she is a modern-day shaman of sorts — an artist and healer who believes that ecstatic dance is a contemporary shamanic practice that transforms cultural and personal neurosis into creativity. Roth was a religious child who loved church, rituals, and hanging out with God. Jesus was her hero, but she was averse to dogma. “The dance freed me from the dogma,” Roth says, and now God, the dance, “is that force that keeps everything moving and changing. In the trance of the dance, I get as close to that experience as I possibly can.”

Ecstatic dancing is not an isolated, self-indulgent pursuit. In her classes, Roth directs gyrating students into relationship dances. Even if you practice alone in your living room, you will discover that your dance informs your living. The awareness and aliveness that bubble up in your body during the dance enliven everything from the trip to the grocery store to time with the kids to the drive down the freeway.

“I brought all my sufferings, starting with my teenage sorrows, to the dance,” says Roth. “I learned early on that my body was the enemy. I was ashamed of so much and had so much fear. Through the dance, I began to put myself back together. By denouncing my body I had lost my soul, and my dance was a soul retrieval. For me, the soul was my body, heart, and mind being unified. Taking on my skinny little body was like taking on the whole Western civilization. We were all suffering from this divorce of spirit and flesh, from this Western dismemberment. I quickly realized I was not alone: Everyone else was walking around the same way. Every single dance moved me closer to God — to that which is bigger, badder, and better than any self could be — toward the great big mystery.”

The movement from birth to death is a dance, says Roth, to be done in grace. We are all meant to move, whether to our favorite tunes on the radio, or the tunes on Roth’s CD Tribe, set to the beat of the five rhythms. “You can put on music really loud, music that you love,” she says, “and blare out the little voices in the head and dance until you drop.”

Keeping ourselves fluid, alive, and aware is a glorious lifelong mission, says Roth. We ought to do more than passively notice the background music. We ought to get up and dance.