Dancing alone in my studio this morning to the delicious melodies of my favourite music playlist, how good it felt to move. When I dance, I not only move my physical being, I move to the inner rhythms of emotions, sensations, pieces of information gathered in recent...
Painting by Christie Oades It was a day full of delicious creative, collaborative meetings. The first with my writing sisters, with whom I am co-authoring a book called Women Writing Alone Together. We have been meeting like this for over 5 years, writing and reading...
3rd Annual Art Exhibit by students and alumni of Loving Inquiry. Showing the creative process of ten Island women: Adele Storm, Linda Underwood, Selena Barwin, Norma Hoeppner, Helen Hinchliff, Sam Barlow, Charlene Wolff, Jane Mackenzie, Premilla Pillay and Dr. Ahava...
Welcome to Strong On the Inside, a project funded by the BC Arts Council through the ArtStarts in Schools program, SD 64, and Opus Art Supplies, Victoria. Aertist-facilitators Ahava Shira and Sam Barlow meet with a group of students weekly at the high school. During...
She is young and very ancient. She lives on the border between naiveté and wonder. She craves blessings, being, becomings. She is internal, eternal. She lets her curiosity flow. Her non-judgement is a vista of peace. She listens to the knowing within her unknowing....
Love is Like This is 20 tracks of poetry from the heart. Here’s the video poem for track 18 – Clouds & Mozart. Love is Like This evokes the dance of relationship. From the intimacy of first crush to sweet and sour memories of kisses, the joy of conjugal seduction...
Poetry has been a tool for me to slow down, reflect on my experience, recognize and honour the fears and discover new ways of being with myself and others. It has helped me to develop trust in my creative process. Space One arm twisted behind my back stopping...
Today is a child full of wonder a radiating light Today reaches out to you asks for your hand a kiss on its forehead clings to the hem of your heart and expects you will be there over and over despite the hours you already played read, danced in the garden Today...
I give births. I enjoy giving births. Helene Cixous Everything is alive now. Spring brings permission to begin, again. A fresh perspective, as if we could be virgin, (re)newed. This past weekend saw me fulfill a dream, long ago hatched. A dream begun inwhen I...
Act 1. first sounds first words: pick a direction, any direction you could have any man you want you have to struggle why can’t you just choose one thing and stick with it Act 2. I need a drink a job a bag of chips a lover a second to breathe to think my own...
Dance the dance of a fool Become what you become without a thought of what you could have been Be the fool, dancing your body the present unfolding before your eyes a moving picture of a paradise your body the paint as you explore your many colours on canvas ...
It is up to the writer to recognize everything that happens to her as gift, to love each thing that comes under the eye’s contemplation, inner and outer. Jane Hirshfield I choose an angel card out of a beautiful tan basket, brought home over 20 years ago after a...
As I sit in my studio and write, the apples fall. I listen to each soft thud as one-by-one, they land on the ground. Over and over this staccato symphony of release. On my deck, and around the tree, hundreds of shiny marbles, a field of plenty. In the loft I cook...
Whichever way we look into the nature of inquiry, we find that it has to be open. When you inquire into something, you are opening it up, you are revealing it. So the very nature of inquiry is a process of opening up; and what you open up are boundaries, limits,...
Last week I received this exquisite handmade journal in the mail. I was on my way into the garden to do some weeding when my farm-mate brought it over to my studio. I had to take off my purple gloves to undo the white paper packaging it had been mailed in. The...
Remembering why I came here, why I dream Sea moves constantly clouds shift light enters through rifts what appears still shivers, sways Remembering how I love myself such simple joy this eddying with language why horizons of possibility how words release restructure...
life with its unnecessary (unceasing) expectations find a spot to rest write whatever comes from presence, memory hold gently as if the soul has already leapt trying not to fail falling any way not so fast and all over labyrinthine tree language mosaic...
As we gear up toward beginning our journey together, I wanted to share an event that happened last week. Last Monday I gave a talk to a group of retired women called the High Nooners, who meet twice a month on Salt Spring to share lunch, conversation, and to listen...
I wrote this about a week ago, and felt afraid to share it, so vulnerable and honest. But then a friend sent me an email with such beauty and honesty, and it sparked an idea that I wrote about yesterday, which I will send out in my blog tomorrow. And my dharma teacher...
My farm-mate and I went to the market to sell our garden’s bounty potatoes, raspberries, Rainier cherries and two kinds of pesto garlic scape & kale almond both our own recipes One woman said it was the best pesto she’s ever had!! We’re there most Tuesdays in the...
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