Closing a Door...

Today I continue wrapping things up at Sound Body Center. Henry decided after a slow summer it was too much for him to try to keep it open so this is the last weekend. Last event was Wednesday when I did a private Healing Sound Journey for a group and went from there to St. Pete College as a guest speaker with a bunch of Tibetan bowls and a few other instruments.

It has been amazing being here for the past month and seeing how many lives have been affected, touched, changed, by the center. I have actually been busier this month and made more money than any one month in the past 7 years which is interesting.  Last February I let people know I wouldn't be around as much and set up a bunch of events in light of that and no one showed up! That was actually when I first made the decision to close the center thinking it was apparently played out for whatever reason.

I have spent a lot of time in the space in the last 3 weeks realizing what an amazing gift it was both to myself and to so many others.  For me, to be able to spend my days in there- to be able to go from room to room with clients or just by myself and be able to lay down on a sound table, to be able to sit in another room and play crystal bowls, to walk into the next room and play my tamboura (thank you, Fred Johnson, Cathy and Barry), or sit and play Tibetan bowls for two hours- what an incredible blessing.

A few days ago I walked around and took pictures of everything that other people had donated to help create the beautiful space that it has been.

I love you
I thank you
I respect you

Hearing and Being... in the Here and Now

Blissful Listening Man by Rosie

It's early... a cool morning after a torrential downpour yesterday and intermittent rain throughout the night last night. The rain has cleared out and the air is beautiful. All the windows and doors are open in my cabin.  I still hear moisture dripping from the trees, the sound of cars in the distance and the steady sound of crickets. There is a crow far away and other birds whose songs I have heard all my life but whose names I don't know.

Ten years ago I started writing a book on sound healing. I had gotten a good start on it but when I opened the center in 2005 I put it up on the shelf above my desk in my office, and there it sat. Everyday I would see the binder of the folder it was in and look forward to the day I could get back to it. Occasionally I would take it down and look through it and see if what I had begun was still relevant.  Seven years went by. All the while I was running the sound healing center, hosting events, giving sessions, teaching workshops and having other sound healers come in and teach as well.  Lots of people passed through the center for lots of different events, teaching and learning. I, however, was the one constant there! And because of that I gained a tremendous amount of experience and information and knew that when it was over I would have much more to write about- and I do. 

Yesterday I got my manuscript out again and started working on it which has brought me back to thinking non-stop about sound. I awoke this morning still thinking about it and observing the sounds around me.  I lay in bed in the quiet, my mind wandering.  Then came the birds. There was a crow close by and a seagull. I noted the different quality of sound in each of them.  I also noticed how every time one of them called out it would snap me into the present.  Sound has that ability- it brought to mind the mynah in Aldous Huxley's book Island. "Here and now, boys. Here and now." Only it doesn't need to be said because that is actually what certain sounds do- bring us back to the here and now. Some sounds take us out of the body. Some bring us back.

As I lay there not fully awake I would begin drifting off again at times and on some level became aware that I was in a semi-altered state.  [Right now off in the distance the National Anthem just started playing- a game at a school starting somewhere? It's exactly 8 a.m.] At one point it felt as if I was in a moving vehicle, a train perhaps? And my body was being carried along at an almost unnervingly high speed and then the sound of the crow would slice through my awareness and I was fully present, here and now.  I contemplated the movement and measurement of time and the development of devices for measuring time and how the use of clocks and the actual ticking away of the seconds has brought about, or reinforced, the need for control- and the illusion that we actually might have some control over time, over the events in our lives. And an obsession around it, maybe something like a collective neurosis, that has allowed a deep-seated fear of the future to surface. It is a fascinating thing to think about... how much energy is wasted worrying about not making deadlines, being late for appointments, being upset with other people for being late. For most of us our daily lives are ruled by the clock and the weeks and months that stretch before us neatly marked on a calendar. It is a frightening prospect. So many plans, so many disappointments, so many opportunities to let ourselves and others down.

A few years ago it hit me as I was driving over the Skyway Bridge (I remember the moment vividly) worrying about arriving a few minutes late for an appointment, that if we didn't have this obsession about being bound to the ticking of the clock, if we set our appointments and meetings by the movement of the sun and the moon and the stars we might be far more relaxed and less anxious. I thought, if I were to meet that person when the sun came up over a particular tree 5 minutes wouldn't matter at all.  And they wouldn't wonder where I was unless it rose high above the tree and I still hadn't shown up- and then maybe they would begin to wonder if I had fallen off my horse or been attacked by a wild animal in the woods.

How healthy is it to plan for the future? Is it an exercise in self-discipline or an exercise in futility? Or is it both- a gift and a curse? And where am I going with all this? A fast-moving train of thought!  Part of the gift is that when our fears come to the surface we have to look at them and try to understand where they are really coming from. What are we really afraid of?

A Course in Miracles has some beautiful passages on the purpose and passing of time, how we perceive it and how we choose to use it- essentially on behalf of the ego or on behalf of the Holy Spirit.
The following are excerpts from Workbook Lesson 135- "If I defend myself I am attacked."

    "A healed mind does not plan. It carries out the plans that it receives through listening to Wisdom that is not its own..."
    "A healed mind is relieved of the belief that it must plan, although it cannot know the outcome which is best, the means by which it is achieved, nor how to recognize the problem that the plan is made to solve..."
    "The mind engaged in planning for itself is occupied in setting up control of future happenings. It does not think it will be provided for, unless it makes its own provisions. Time becomes a future emphasis, to be controlled by learning and experience obtained from past events and previous beliefs. It overlooks the present, for it rest on the idea the past has taught enough to let the mind direct its future course.
    "The mind that plans is thus refusing to allow for change. What it has learned before becomes the basis for its future goals. Its past experience directs its choice of what will happen. And it does not see that here and now is everything it needs to guarantee a future quite unlike the past, without a continuity of old ideas and sick beliefs. Anticipation plays no part at all, for present confidence directs the way.
    "Defenses are plans you undertake to make against the truth...
    "What could you not accept, if you but knew that everything that happens, all events, past, present, and to come, are gently planned by One Whose only purpose is your good?"

And Lesson 194- "I place the future in the Hands of God."
 
    "God holds your future as He holds your past and present. They are one to Him, and so they should be one to you. Yet in this world, the temporal progression still seems real. And so you are not asked to understand the lack of sequence really found in time. You are but asked to let the future go, and place it in God's Hands. And you will see by your experience that you have the past and present in His Hands as well, because the past will punish you no more, and future dread will now be meaningless.
    "Release the future. For the past is gone, and what is present, freed from its bequest of grief and misery, of pain and loss, becomes the instant in which time escapes the bondage of illusions where it runs its pitiless, inevitable course.  Then is each instant which was slave to time transformed into a holy instant, when the light that was kept hidden in God's Son is freed to bless the world.  Now is he free, and all his glory shines upon a world made free with him, to share his holiness."

Ainsi soit-il.
 
    So be it.
     
        Amen.

Midnight Meditation

I am sitting in my cabin, in my bed, listening to the outdoor sounds-  mostly the steady sound of insects. More than one kind I would say.  Occasionally an airplane... cars off in the distance.  And very quietly behind it all the steady sound of the ocean. I close my eyes and the sounds are hypnotic, grabbing my awareness.  This will be my midnight meditation tonight and perhaps my lullaby. I feel the sounds move through my body if I am very quiet. The clicking on my keyboard pulls me out of the kinesthetic experience of the  sound. I stop and close my eyes again and feel myself drifting into the rhythm of the repetitive choruses of the crickets and other insects. I can hear at least three different groups of them, each with a different frequency and rate at which they repeat their song.  I think of Jim Wilson and his beautiful recording of God's Cricket Chorus, a recording of crickets slowed down to match the lifespan of a human. Their sound is transformed to what could easily be a choir of angels singing celestial harmonies.

Singing Ringing Tree

The latest most exciting discovery in my world of sound exploration, unusual instruments, sound sculptures, etc.  This video is also brilliantly shot and beautiful. Enjoy!

Tuning Mom

Well, again Mom has had profound results from the tuning forks and I realize I need to be writing about this and keeping track because the results are so dramatic and consistent.

For those who have not read my posts from early last year my mother is 90 years. She is very "with it" mentally, but she does have pretty bad arthritis. Typically a lot of pain in her neck, her hips and her hands. Her mobility is thus somewhat compromised- she uses a walker and after a lifetime of needlework and gardening her fingers have become very stiff and she has lost a lot of the sensitivity that she had in her fingers so it is hard for her to pick things up and to do things that require manual dexterity. 

I began giving her treatments with tuning forks a couple of years ago and she responded really well to them so we have been working with them more and more.  The results are very fast.  

Last week I used the Otto 128 (cycles per second) on her hands- the wrists, joints, and fingertips. She told me the next day that her hands felt much better and she called me three days after that to say that she couldn't get over how much better her hands still were after the treatment.

Today I came to visit and tonight after dinner we were sitting at the table and she complained about a lot of pain in her right hip and butt cheek. I decided to work on her right where she was- sitting in her chair.  I used the Otto 64 on the points that I could get to- no specific protocol, just basically where it hurt and where I could get to with her sitting in the chair. Then I switched to the Otto 128 and did the same thing but also used it on the outside of the right thigh, basically following the gall bladder meridian. I got to one spot and she said all of a sudden her butt was hurting again- I told her I thought it was referred pain and that I also felt that something was clearing and wanting to stay with it a couple more minutes. 

Then I told her that I would work on her some more when she went to bed so that I could work on her with her lying on her side. She decided to go up shortly after that. I told her to let me know when she was ready to get in bed and I would come up. She called down the stairs about ten minutes later and said that the pain in her hip was completely gone! She was astounded- as was I and my sister Miranda who is also here for a visit. I used the otto 128 on her hands after she got in bed but she had no other complaints. Can't wait to see how she's feeling in the morning!

Getting in Tune

Thinking about the tuning fork workshop I took last weekend which led me to this great old song by The  Who...

We come into the world in tune- at least for a little while- then it seems like we spend our lives trying to get back in tune. So interesting... I feel like I am more in tune with myself now than I have been in many many years- really trying to listen and follow the guidance I get- which comes mostly as feeling and impulses from within. Is this situation comfortable? Is that where I want to be? On so many levels from eating the right food to being with the right people to how I choose to move through my day. And refining the levels of discernment- which voice am I listening to? Is it a real gut feeling that is assisting me in making a particular choice or is it my ego looking for a little comfort or instant gratification?

Getting in tune.  I have been away from my home for 17 years.  Florida was never my home. It was just where I lived. I have had shoes that felt more like home to me than Florida ever did!

Life Changes

Well, again... a pause between my writings. Every day I think of it and wonder when I will find the time! Today I decided to simply hibernate and work on my writing- which included a bunch of handwritten cards while I had my coffee this morning. I moved up to Middletown, RI a few weeks ago- just outside of Newport a half mile walk from the beach. Living in a tiny little cabin in a thicket of honeysuckle and wild roses for the summer. It's so beautiful.  In the winter I'll move in to the big house on the same property. All I hear is the wind blowing through the shrubs and trees, birds of all kinds, squirrels jumping from branch to branch, the occasional insect and a few cars or motorcycles way off in the distance very occasionally.  Sometimes there is a chorus of neighborhood dogs or music off in the distance.  Right now a plane going overhead. Earlier today I heard a bird that kept sounding like it was saying "You 'n me, you 'n me..." over and over. A butterfly flew in and visited me in my kitchen this morning and then flew out. A couple of days ago I had to help one out.


It is so wonderful being here.  Work is flowing much more easily for me which is wonderful and I have had so many amazing sound experiences already this year.  I have been able to attend 3 workshops already which had been few and far between for me since I opened the center. The first was the weekend with Shyamji in the Netherlands which I want to write about today. Next was the Temple of Sound weekend with Bhagavan Das and Yogi Amrit Desai in Salt Springs, FL and then last weekend a phenomenal workshop on working with tuning forks with John Beaulieu. And I still have kirtan camp to look forward to!

So... Shyamji... oh, my life changes every time I see him, hear him, experience his beautiful sweet voice and sacred songs and mantras. The first time I experienced Shyamji (Sri Shyam Bhatnagar) was back in 1990. My stepmother Lore, a yoga teacher, took me to a deep meditation workshop with him in New York City. I was a year in recovery for substance abuse, rebuilding my spiritual foundation. We went to New York for the day. It was a Sunday. It was a beautiful day and the sounds he created were new to me. He played his tamboura and chanted seed sounds and mantras and we would repeat after him the sounds he made. We got home that evening and the next morning when I was driving my boys to school I realized I was in a totally altered state. I could function perfectly well but it was as if there were no resistance to the world around me. I was moving through it with ease- almost as if I were in still point and the world was just moving around me. I told Lore when I saw her that morning for yoga class that I felt as if I were an "open window".

On the drive to NY we had talked about A Course in Miracles which my sponsor in NA/AA had told me about.  I was really interested in it and had been wanting copy for a couple of months but didn't have the money to purchase a copy. Lore told me she thought she had a copy but she had so many boxes of books she didn't know where it was.  After yoga class that morning I mentioned the book again.  I had never seen it and didn't know what it looked like- had only heard about it through my sponsor. There were about 4 boxes of books in the room right near us. I looked down and saw a book with the binding facing away from me. I reached in and pulled it out and it was A Course in Miracles! I pulled out one volume after another- all 3 without seeing the cover or the title on any of them.  Lore said laughed and said, "Well, I guess you are supposed to have them." Apparently I was.  It changed my life- and I did have the awareness that for whatever reason I needed to see Shyamji first before I actually got the books. It also turned out to be the beginning of my journey on the path to working with sound as a healing modality- little did I know.

I have had the opportunity to be with Shyamji several times since then- all of them when I was in the process of transformation and healing on very deep levels. This last time in the Netherlands was certainly no different. The trip to the Netherlands in itself was huge for me.  I was going to a country I had wanted to go to all my life and I had actually never been overseas.  The trip had already been so powerful for me. I was finding parts of myself that had been buried so deep- reconnecting with wonder and fascination from my childhood- really happy and joyful parts of my childhood that I didn't even know existed. The workshop with Shyamji was my last weekend in the Netherlands- I was leaving the following Thursday.

Looking down the path at the Spiritual Center, Schoorl, Nederlands

I took a train to Alkmaar and met a woman there who I had met years earlier in Arizona who had been living in the Netherlands for years. She lived in Alkmaar and was a Watsu practitioner and acupuncturist. There was to be a concert Friday night followed by a two-day workshop at a spiritual center in Schoorl. Basia, my friend, and I went to the concert together and he told us that evening that the purpose of his concert and the entire weekend would be to remember what it was like to be one with our mother when we were in the womb, before most likely before the third trimester and any trauma or separation occurred. The next day, seemingly out of the blue, I had an experience of remembering what it was like to be totally and unconditionally loved and loving- not with my mother but with a man I had had relationship with many years earlier. It was not the form that was important though- it was the content- the remembrance of love.

Two days later when I was back at my friends Paul and Jane's in Soesterberg I told Jane how I wanted to rent something in Rhode Island for the summer but hadn't been able to find anything affordable. And hour later I got an email about a place for rent.  I hadn't really told anyone yet that I was seriously looking.  Here I am. This is the place.  This is me.