nature

Dancing the Dream 

| Sheree

Dancing the Dream – the seven sacred paths of human transformation, by Jamie Sams

This is the new book I’m reading at the the moment. And I’m trying to take my time, to savour it and let the lessons sink in. But it’s not going that way. Every page that I’m reading, I’m nodding my head in recognition of the wisdom, of the truths that are being mentioned in terms of the energy that connects us all together. Our thoughts, feelings, judgements, our internal landscapes create our outside worlds. If these are full of negativity, this is the energy we are putting out into the world. And what goes around comes around. We are all connected. We are all one.

I made a promise to myself while reading this book to not write any notes. To just absorb the initiations. I intend to go back and reread the book after this first reading and actively work with the lessons. So this post is me marking this promise and making sure I follow through on it. Thank you.

Sundays 

| Sheree

wildsoulwoman says: Some Sunday’s are made for just chillin’ with the peeps. Can’t believe the summer holidays are almost over and then back to work. Trying to stay in each moment and squeeze out every last ounce of pleasure and joy. Back in the sea with Miss Ella yesterday and she said how grateful she was for her family. She’s 6 and has so much to teach me. I’m paying attention 🙂

From the WSW vault: Trust

| Sheree

October 2015:

“Fuck. It was bound to come up. Trust. I have issues with trust. Ever since I found out my dad was dying only when he was actually dead, I’ve had trouble with trust. My mum and dad thought it best not to tell us kids that our dad was dying. To protect us. So when I found out it was already too late. He was dead and I felt betrayed.

I do not give my trust lightly. You betray my trust and you’re gone out of my life. Simple as that. But it isn’t that simple. Trust is about feeling safe and putting yourself out there with someone else. It’s about being vulnerable, wanting to protect oneself at the same time as taking a risk, moving out of oneself. It’s leaning in and out at the same time.

I’ve always been able to say I can trust myself. Until now. Now I’m not too sure about myself. If my actions are carried out for the right reasons, with the right intentions?

I’m at the edge of an abyss. At the edge of my existence as I have known it. And I now I have to take the leap into the new but can I trust myself in the fall?

I know it’s about love. Love of myself. There has to be the space to allow myself to fall. To know in the fall that I can still breathe, still live and will find my footing again. It’s about accepting that I am not in control and probably never was or will be. It is about trusting in the unknown. Trusting that I will be alright, that everything will be all right. I just have to trust the process. I just have to trust in me.”

Breathe ( and make time for yourself)

| Sheree

I picked up this new magazine by chance. Not sure what I was looking for. Maybe I was looking to ‘breathe’, to gain some space in my day, in my life.

I’ve sworn off all those glossy women’s magazines, those that carry the images of perfection; white skinny beautiful women. The money I must have spent on them, trying to fit the ideal, and knowing fine well that I’d never would. But that didn’t stop me buying into the construction.

It didn’t seem to bother me that I never saw women in there that looked like me. Or did it?
As I also went through a phase of buying Pride Magazine, Oprah, Ebony to see black women in magazines.
But they still didn’t look like me, as they were still skinny, well styled and looked like they had their lives all together, nice and sweet.

I suppose when I buy magazines now, like this one, I am still trying to find myself, to better myself, but from the inside out.

I am working on my soul, my spirit, my true self when I pick up a magazine like Breathe because I am looking to take care of myself by taking the time to slow down, to try yoga ( again), to start back up with my gratitude journal etc. Magazines like this make me think, make me assess what I am doing in terms of self-care, self-love and how am I working within this world to make it a better place?

I would highly recommend this magazine if you are looking to make time for yourself, for your true self.

Lunar Wisdom

| Sheree

Hypnotised by the moon … I found the more I dwelt with her, the more I became conscious of her tides, and all my life began to move with them. – Dion Fortune

It was a full moon last night. A beautiful sight in a clear dark sky.
I’ve taken to paying more attention to the moon’s rhythms recently. Starting to believe in Her wisdom as well as becoming connected to her as a woman.

For example, the phrases of the moon are matched each month by a woman’s bodily functions. Just as the moon is full, my womb waxes full and then wanes, empties with each menstrual bleed, just as the moon wanes to nothing, to the dark moon, when She is no longer visible.

Before, I never really knew anything about a woman’s natural connection to the moon. There’s energy and power to be enjoyed if we as woman chose to use Her light as a indicator of when to be in action and when to be still. When to gather and when to release. Once we align ourselves with Her natural energy and movements, things could start to flow much more easily within our individual lives.

So I’m finding out through my recent readings, and I look forward to learning more about lunar wisdom, lunar phases as well as lunar rituals and becoming more in touch with my own natural rhythms.

Love Yourself Friday 

| Sheree

love youseslf

Yes I know today isn’t Friday. But I want to share with you something that happened to me a few months ago which I am proud of.

I had the pleasure of being interviewed by Phoenix Rising Collective, for their Love Yourself First Friday.
The aim of this special feature is to shed light on various ways we as women are practicing self-care, making it a priority in our lives.

After a couple of years of being in the doldrums and not being able to look myself in the eyes in the mirror, I feel I’ve come a long way to the point of actively practicing self-love. Maybe going through situations and experiences that others might recognise and gain insight from by sharing this way.

The question that struck home the most was; Is there an obstacle or challenge that you’ve overcome that lead you to a deeper love for who you are? In answer to this question, for the first time, I revealed my dirty secret. And it felt good to finally speak out about it.

Here is my answer and read the rest of the interview here.

“What would happen if one woman told the truth about her life? The world would spin open.” -Muriel Rukeyer

There comes a time in everybody’s life when the unspeakable happens. To say it hasn’t happened or won’t happen to you is a lie. You’re kidding yourself. Believe me.

In May 2015, the unspeakable happened to me. There was a public shaming. My whole world fell apart the day I was accused of being a plagiarist on Facebook by a ‘so-called’ friend and fellow poet. He wrote that he’d found whole scale “borrowings” from other writers’ words, phrases, and structures within my latest collection of poetry. He said that he was just doing his duty for the poetry community by bringing it to everyone’s attention. What followed was what I chose to call a public lynching of me as a writer, poet and person. This was the unspeakable that happened to me. But funny enough, I am speaking about it here, as well as writing a creative non-fiction book about this whole experience. Everything I knew, all I was, how I thought myself to be was taken from me in that public posting. I issued an apology regarding my unintentional mistakes and withdrew from the public realm. At one point, death looked a very promising course of action, but I had my family and some supportive friends who helped me.

Within the Chakra system there is a heart center called Anahata Chakra. In Sanskrit, Anahata means “Unstruck.” For me this speaks to the resilient nature of the human heart. I believe, wholeheartedly, that there is a place within my heart that is absolutely unbreakable. Thank you Chris Maddox for this wisdom.

This experience did break my heart, stopped me from loving, and shut me down and out. However, there was a minute part that kept pulsing, kept the light on for me. Maybe it was my belief in self, my self-love that got me through each day.

Each day has not been wasted. I have taken this experience as a wake-up call, a wake-up to explore and claim my authenticity. Afterwards, I had nothing. I couldn’t even look myself in the face at one point. But writing my book and starting to take photographs of myself have supported me in my climb up. I can’t say climb ‘back’, because who or what I am becoming, I do not know. I have never met this woman. I do know that love and self-love, first and foremost, are at the center of this journey.

Out in the sun

| Sheree

I got up at about 5.00 am. Ella was calling. I ‘d had a rough night’s sleep. Couldn’t get off. Too many things, ‘worries’, running around my head. So up and down tending to Ella, was annoying just something else to add to my disturbed sleep. This went on until 5.38. I’m thinking this was a sign that I should be up and out in the world. So I put Ella into our bed and got dressed and out the door before I could think about how tired I was.

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It was a lovely morning. The sun was up but still playing with colours as it graced the sea and rocks. I walked with a brisk pace, with purpose as it felt right to be up now and out, getting some exercise, starting my day with good intentions towards myself. I was out for 50 minutes. I got back and practiced yoga for 15 minutes. Then created a green smoothie for breakfast and settled down in my space to write my morning pages.

Before I knew it 2 hours had passed. This is an indication of how much time I need at the start of every day to come home to myself before I’m ready to start the rest of my day with others and responsibilities. I am being honest with myself here, and if I want to see out the rest of my day in a balanced, happier and truer way, I need to make sure that more times than not this is how I start my day, even if it means getting up at 5.30. It’s not a luxury but a necessity.

‘ The quality of light by which we scrutinize our lives has direct bearing upon the product which we live, and upon the changes which we hope to bring about through those lives. It is within this light that we form those ideas by which we pursue our magic and make it realized.’ Taken from Audre Lorde, ‘Poetry Is Not A Luxury.’

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