Hello friends,

On this day of the Full Moon, I want to share with you what a group of us did on the New Moon of the month, two weeks ago.

I, and a friend of mine, Elena Kfoury, led an online memorial service for four women who had been repeat students of Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes Reyes (affectionately known as “Dr. E”), and who have gone before us into the mystery of death. I had the privilege to have known all four of the women, and to carry beautiful memories of how they made the world such a better place by their presence.

As many of you know, Dr. E has been my most important wisdom teacher. She is the author of the classic Women Who Run With the Wolves and Untie the Strong Woman, as well as more than 30 audio works through the publishing company Sounds True. In 2011 I came across one tiny ad on the Sounds True website for a 5 day intensive training with her called The Mysterium — all about the psyche and spirit, and how we can live lives of depth and integrity.

Clarissa Pinkola Estés Réyes, Ph.D., is an internationally recognized scholar, award-winning poet, Diplomate Senior Jungian psychoanalyst, and cantadora--keeper of the old stories in the Latina tradition. She is the author of many books and audio recordings on the journey of the soul. Her work has been published in more than 40 languages, and her first book, Women Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of The Wild Woman Archetype, was on the New York Times’ best-seller list for 145 weeks, as well as other best-seller lists including USA Today, Publishers Weekly, and Library Journal.

In the 1960s, Dr. Estés Réyes began her work as a post-trauma specialist at hospitals, caring for severely injured children and “shell-shocked” war veterans and their families. She ministers in the fields of childbearing loss and with surviving families of murder victims, as well as critical incident work and PTSD. She served at disaster sites, first developing post-trauma recovery protocol for earthquake survivors in Armenia. That protocol is now used as one of the top three protocols to teach survivors to do post-trauma work onsite within a few hours. After the 1999 Columbine High School massacre, she worked with the students and community from 1999-2003. Currently, she works with 9/11 survivor families on both the East and West coasts.

Dr. Estés Réyes shares her insights on politics, spirituality and culture, as well as tools for healing in these troubled times, as the managing editor and columnist at the newsblog The Moderate Voice and as a columnist at The National Catholic Reporter online. She continues to publish new works (see below for a complete list) even as the relevance and popularity of her early works continues to expand. Women Who Run With the Wolves was featured in 2017 by actor and UN Goodwill Ambassador for Women, Emma Watson, on her feminist book club, “Our Shared Shelf,” garnering millions of hits on social media from a new generation of “las lobas.”

Dr. Estés Réyes’ work investigates creativity, anger, self-care, childhood wounds, mother-daughter relationships, being “at home” in a challenging world, and much more. She uses the power of metaphor and the art of storytelling to guide listeners through unfamiliar doors of perception and observation: we return with more of ourselves.

Well, even my spouse took one look at the ad’s description of the training (not the description of Dr. E’s work above) and said “you’ve GOT to go!” It felt like a once in a lifetime opportunity. If I had written a paragraph describing the most ideal learning experience for me at that point in my life, it would have been almost a word-for-word copy of the ACTUAL training description!

I went, and on the last day of that training, Dr. E revealed her hope for the future, that she would continue the intensive trainings, including a five year series called The Mysterium. The series would be primarily on the work of Carl Jung and how his work can be practically helpful for all those who both work with other persons in healing and depth, as well as for our own increase in depth, self-examination, and spiritual growth.

So I came home from my “once in a lifetime” training to tell dear Andrew, “well, hon, it’s not just a one-year wonder — it’s planned to have four more years!” To make a long story short, our finances at the time could not easily absorb that kind of expenditure, especially every year. Yet we made it work, and I am honored to say that almost 16 years later I’ve attended 20 or 21 of the various summer trainings that Dr. E went on to offer. And yes, they have been completely worth it.

Each training is limited to about 110 people, the maximum number that the venue, Sunrise Ranch near Denver, Colorado, can hold. Most of the learners are women, yet there have been a handful of men at each training. Although each training is separate, many participants have tended to come back year after year. I’ve made some very dear friends there, and on my darkest days, I’m encouraged by remembering that this group of people are each in their communities around the world doing their work and making the world a kinder, more just, and loving place.

Dr. E often refers to all of her learners and colleagues as the Tribe of the Sacred Heart, and those of us who have been to her trainings carry that description with love.

Over the years we’ve witnessed four women who have passed on. Georgia Kukowski, a wild woman in her 30’s, died far too soon from cancer, leaving two teen children. Toni McCormick, a beloved therapist, also lived with cancer until too weak to continue to live. Laurie Waitz struggled with a long illness after a long life of struggle, healing, and contribution. And this past year, Piper Warwick, another therapist too young to leave this world, passed on from a blood-clot.

My friend Elena had made a deep connection with Piper. Elena contacted me saying that she wanted to host an online memorial for Piper, and I immediately remembered the other women I’ve known from the trainings who have passed on. We chose the New Moon in August to hold an online remembrance.

We extended the invitation to all the learners that we could contact. So many expressed their love and wish to honor the women, even though many could not actually join us at the zoom meeting. The bulk of the memorial was an opportunity to share our remembrances of Piper, Laurie, Toni, and Georgia, and those who came shared so many wonderful stories. Elena hosted our time, and since I was one who had actually known all four of the women in real life, I prefaced our sharing time with a short address and poem I have written for the occasion. Here is what I said, including the poem “Entangled, or Little Acorn Hope”:

Wed., August 12, 2026 online

Hello friends,

Perhaps not all of you know me. I’m Cat Charissage and I’ve come to either 20 or 21 of Dr. E’s trainings since her first one of the Mysterium back in 2011.

Here, on this New Moon of August, we are gathering in a new way to remember and to express our gratitude to 4 learners of Dr. E who have walked on into the beyond. Each of them has been to several or many trainings here. There may be others who I’m not aware of and if so, I regret not knowing your names. There will certainly be more as we all move through and complete our lives.

When Elena contacted me with the news that Piper had died and that she’d like to have a memorial for her with our Tribe of the Sacred Heart, I realized that I knew of three other women who also have left us. Several of us have spoken of them over the years, missing their bright lights while also appreciating how wonderful it has been to know them, and to know each other. Two have died after long lives of creation and service, yet two have passed while still in the prime of life, leaving their communities bereft.

We, Elena and I, decided that it would be appropriate to acknowledge that not only is it that we each come as individuals to learn from Dr. E., but that as we share in dyads, share our tears and our insights, dance like wild women and wild men, and sob on the last morning while swaying to the song “I Need You to Survive”, that we, Dr. E.’s learners, have created an important community. Our Tribe of the Sacred Heart learners is a loose community, a body of wildness, devotion, and love. Some have joined once, others for year after year. And we have supported each other through births, graduations, surgeries, illnesses, transitions, and now, death. I know that I would not be who I am now without Dr. E., and without my interactions with you. In this body I have been seen for my true self and it has created my even more authentic self. I hope that many of you have had this experience, as well. This Tribe of the Sacred Heart, we learners, are a treasure for each other, and dare I say, for the world.

For some years now we have had Elders, those of us who have come over and over and grown older with each other. And now we have Elders in the afterlife: Piper, Laurie, Toni, and Georgia, Allies and Guides whom we can call upon for support and wisdom. It is good to acknowledge that together and claim their continued presence with us.

I will close now with my poem, “Entangled,” or “Little Acorn Hope,” which expresses my experience with all of you who have been learners with Dr. E. So many of us have so much to deal with, and when I put that in the context of this world that seems to be such a trauma producing machine, despair tries to move in with me.

Knowing though, that each of you, hundreds whom I’ve met in the past 15 years, are each in your own city, town, and community bringing your light and love out to those around you, it reminds me that there are many of us in this world who are lovers and healers. It strengthens me, and I can go on. Let it strengthen you, too, with our allies in the beyond, Piper, Laurie, Toni, and Georgia.

“Entangled,” or, “Little Acorn Hope”

Dedicated to those of us who follow the Sacred Heart with our own sacred hearts:

The world is not as it should be.

There is much to fear.

There is even more to mourn.

With the wailing often comes despair and burning anger,

yet enough has been ruined already.

A different world IS possible

and we are choosing from an ocean of tears

to reach for what hope there may be.

We may find only a tiny acorn,

A not-guaranteed promise of an oak.

So, deep breath:

over and over again let us imagine what an acorn

planted in hope can look like.

Mighty oak, strong, shelter for many living beings,

a home to protect many.

An oak in a forest nurtured by all of us

with the hope that we struggle for within us.

We need a revolution,

but maybe all we have right now are acorns.

Yet, we, you, are the promise.

You, we, are the hope, and we need each of us.

I would not be who I am today without you.

You, me, we are the ones we’ve been waiting for.

A different world is possible.

We are creating it within us, and then around us.

We don’t have to know all the details.

We need only do what is in our reach, now,

to create and to love.

A different world is possible.

Entangled together,

little acorn hope,

we plant it now.

Hello my dear Soul Friend,

Some good personal news against the backdrop of some auspicious heavenly events: my second shoulder replacement surgery is happening in 2 weeks, on August 26. As you may remember, I got my left shoulder replaced in October of 2025. Now, with the right one going to be done, I will have the matching set the surgeon promised! The earlier surgery was very complex, she said, but I’m very grateful to report that it was successful. More than 95% of the pain is gone from that side! If the right side has that kind of success I will be walking into the new year of 2027 a new (-ish) woman! Earlier this year I had two (non-complex and very boring) cataract surgeries. And considering that at my birthday at the end of September I will turn 70, I will celebrate all of this as a hopeful new chapter of my life.

If you are a praying kind of person, please remember me in your prayer. Light a candle, send good energy, chant a blessing, or hold a ritual. I am open to all forms of positive intention, love, and hopes for less pain. My dear body manages several chronic conditions, and I carry lots of pain, every day. Any ease of that is so truly welcome.

Today is the New Moon in August, with all the energy of newness and beginnings and starting new projects. The surgery will happen just at the Full Moon, where I hope that all of my inner and outer preparation for a successful surgery comes to fruition.

As well, today there is a total solar eclipse where the moon aligns itself directly in front of the sun. For a few minutes, it will grow dark, the air will cool, and the animals act as if it’s sunset. Unfortunately for us in North America, we will not be able to see it. You would have needed to get tickets to Spain, France, or the UK to witness this one. Nevertheless, I witnessed one in 2024 from my own front porch. It was eerie, to tell the truth. Something big and important felt very “off” — anything could happen, it seemed. When the sun kept moving, out of the alignment with the moon, it felt to me as though the universe was saying “Gotcha! You only THOUGHT it was the end of the world! Everything is still okay.”

(my first completed project in biomorphic artistry, July 2026)

Meanwhile, in another part of the forest of life, I started a new learning project: Biomorphic Design in Islamic Art. Biomorphic art, from the words “life” and “shape” or “design”, is the arabesque style of decorations filled with curling branches and exquisite small flowers. There are also leaf shapes and other designs that swirl around borders or within larger geometric designs. Biomorphic art also reminds me of the illustrations created by the Christian monks as they illuminated manuscripts in the middle ages. To me, it’s the curvy, sinuous counterpart to the straight, measured geometry of the designs I’ve been learning in the past few years.

I signed up for a year, alongside my other learning project of Islamic Geometric Design. The two courses are run out of the same organization, GCIA: the Global Center for Islamic Art (https://www.gcislamicart.com/). I’ve followed that organization since its founding four or five years ago, and cannot say enough positive things about it. The two women who are the co-founders are such positive, energetic, and skilled artists and teachers, and they have managed to engage some of the best masters in the world in these arts. Their express purpose is “to make the transformation of Islamic art accessible to everyone around the globe.”

Each course (Geometric Patterns and Biomorphic Designs) meets twice a month on zoom. One meeting is to learn and practice the design, the second is to paint the design. Interspersed in every class is the historical background of the design and photos of where it is found “in the wild” — whether on the walls of a mosque or in the pages of an ancient book.

It has become my practice to include photos of my own work in these arts to accompany almost all of my Substack articles. They are not only interesting to look at (though I am very far from achieving mastery), but are a reminder that each of us has a variety of interests and avocations that make up the wholeness of who we are. Not only do I write, but I also invest hours into creating this kind of beauty, hours that have become my form of meditation.

(The design from Samira Mian’s July 2026 class.)

As the writer Flannery O’Connor reminds us: “The artist prays by creating.”

I’ve been asked the question “But, why? Why are you spending so many hours of your life absorbed in artistic traditions that are not your own? Are you thinking of becoming a Muslim???”

The short answer is “No.” I’m quite at peace now in my inter-spiritual stance in life. In my younger years, I have been thoroughly marinated in my own ancestral tradition of Roman Catholicism. My first degree is in Theology; I was a member of 2 different religious communities for a number of years (yes, as a Franciscan nun); I spent 4 years studying Theology in the graduate program at St. Michael’s College in the Toronto School of Theology.

Through those years I experienced the best in the heart of this tradition. I loved the sense of community I found, the shared service, the depth of prayer and the sacramental life. I learned so much from the mystics in how to develop a relationship with that which is deepest within us, and is the ultimate Greater beyond; i.e., the Great Mystery.

With that, of course, I also experienced some of the worst: misogyny, abuse of power, archaic systems of hierarchy, the passion for control, stunted sexual maturity, violence, colonialism, and Empire. Welcome to the world of very imperfect human beings.

Having experienced some of this abuse personally, processing and healing from all of that prompted me to leave the institutional church. However, I still am who I am, a wonderer and wanderer of the Mysteries of life, a lover of symbols and metaphors, exploring how this aspect of life can transform us to bring out the best of human beings.

As I transitioned out of my work with survivors of sexual violence into education, I began to offer small groups, “Story Circles” in my home. Over the course of 7 - 12 weeks, or monthly over a year, I facilitated “d & r” (deep and real) conversations about self, values, how we want to be in the world, change both internally and politically. Through book studies, poetry sharings, and simple art practices, I taught critical thinking along with (non-denominational, non-religious) spiritual companionship.

In my own explorations, I’ve always loved labyrinths and mandalas. I collected all kinds of ways to express our connections with life and wonder, especially with non-figurative art. One thing led to another, and I became fascinated with the patterns in Islamic art. As I learned more, I found GCIA, as well as the online Patreon teacher Samira Mian, and, well, the rest is history!

(A biomorphic design reminiscent of a mandala. July 2026)

While the founders and teachers of GCIA are Muslim, there is a welcome and desire there to share the tradition of Islamic art with anyone who is interested. All the classes are taught in English, with a choice of several languages for the subtitles. I have always felt welcomed, and frankly, I LOVE being in zoom rooms with people from literally around the world. It feels like a small, yet real, step towards the mutual respect that is a foundation of world peace. As we begin to know each other and bond over shared interests, there is no “other.” There is only more of “us.”

At the same time, I can recognize that the origins of these arts are immersed in the Sacred, in reverence and devotion, and committed to reflecting the beauty of the divine within and around us. Yes, there are Christian and non-religious arts based in the same values. Yet when I have explored my Christian heritage of art, what I discovered was all bound up with the shadow side, and I did not want to be around depictions of so-called “divine hierarchy” or the colonialism and racism of saints preaching to the “savages.”

Now I am well aware that Islam, like any human institution, has its own shadow side and abuses. But because it isn’t my own ancestral baggage, I am easily able to see the Islamic arts in their best intentions, as depictions of the unity of the Divine expressed in the infinite forms of the universe. I suspect, too, that much of the art was created by Sufis, those devotees who follow the mystical aspects of Islam, a deep and beautiful world tradition of inner wisdom. I have found that drawing, designing, and painting these patterns to be very satisfying on both a personal and spiritual level. There is always more to learn, and more complexity to discover along with greater skills to develop to render it.

The most remarkable thing for me, though, is that I find that the concentration and surrender of designing, drawing and painting to be so good for my brain, mind, spirit, and body. I’ve been a meditator and “pray-er” since I was a young person. Creating Islamic art allows me to access that meditative state more easily, reliably, and quickly than the sitting meditation that I used to do. Simply, it makes me feel better. And when I feel better, my choice to be a good person is more easily enacted. Good for me, and good for those around me.

( mix of a geometric pattern — same design as the previous image in this article, and some biomorphic motifs. July 2026)

Well, my friend, I hope that you have your own forms of exploration, discovery, and pleasure that can support the rest of your life. It is always of value to create beauty wherever you can. And when my perfectionist, “be productive” introjects are yelling that I’m not working hard enough against suffering, injustice, and the “-isms”, that I’m wasting my time in “playing” with paints, I tell them that at least when I’m painting, I’m not making the world a more hateful or uglier place to be!

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

And what are YOU doing on this Full Moon in July?

Dear Soul Friend,

Both online and in person, so many of my friends and acquaintances are just simply overwhelmed, exhausted, and don’t know what to do next about the state of the world or the state of their lives.

I’d like to share with you a Depth Dimension practice that I use to try to pull myself out of ruminating on things that I can’t seem to do anything about. This past Sunday I shared this practice with several women online in an open group called “Sunday Gathering,” a monthly event organized by Katharina Brandl (https://www.facebook.com/katharina.brandl.102). Every other month I facilitate a simple writing/art process that helps us think deeply about our lives and live more intentionally, that is, I facilitate a Depth Dimension Practice.

Many years ago I read the children’s book The Magician’s Elephant by Kate DiCamillo. Though I forget the story, I do remember it was filled with fantastical and unlikely positive events. There were two or three phrases repeated in the book that have stayed with me. Because I don’t have the book, I can’t check my accuracy, but I remember them as “I wonder. . .,” “What if. . . ?” and “Why not?”

When I find myself ruminating on situations that just increase suffering, my rational mind knows that there is often little that I can practically do to solve or even influence the situation. This leads me to try to think about something else, something that I CAN do or influence, because the feeling of being impotent is even more uncomfortable than knowing about the suffering. I understand why many people would rather blame somebody, whether world leaders or even the victims, for the problems; anger and rage are energizing, and it feels good to direct all that energy outside of us, to other people. Yet, of course, all this emotional churning doesn’t do anything to actually help the situation. (Okay, sometimes it does provides an impetus to contact our representatives or to organize a group — but actions based solely on anger aren’t likely to make a world we all want to live in.)

I have found it helpful to remember that the future is, by definition, not yet here, and therefore, we cannot know for sure what will happen. When I can interrupt my doom thinking by opening this door to the possibility of something new or different, I then use the three phrases to nudge that door of possibility open even further. One of our greatest gifts as humans is imagination, and this way of thinking invites imagination into my life. I wonder . . . . What if . . . . Why not?

The more senses we can involve in our imagination, the more powerful and wide-ranging it can be, and so I suggest the following practice to create the possibility for new thoughts and new ideas. Minimally, you’ll get 20 or 30 minutes of creativity and play with paper, glue, and colors.

You need a few sheets of paper, glue or a glue-stick, a pen, and some colors. Those can be watercolors, colored pencils, or a set of colored markers.

Designate one paper as your base. It can be a little heavier, such as card stock or the side of a cereal box. But plain copier paper works, too. Or a page in your journal.

On another piece of paper, I want you to think about whatever it is that you’re trying not to think about, or whatever you’re most worried about, or whatever breaks your heart the most. Set your phone’s timer for 10 minutes (or 7 minutes, or 15 minutes) and now pour your heart out on the paper. Write on only one side of the paper; you can use more than one sheet if needed. It can be a rant to a world leader, or a rant to God for allowing such shit to exist. It can be in the form of a letter to your sister or mother, someone who would listen to you and care about how you feel. It can be a bullet list of all the things that are wrong that have contributed to the perfect storm of today.

When the timer goes off, stop writing. Below is a portion of one of my rants. It doesn’t have to be pretty or make any sense.

If you want to, you can set the timer again and write more, but only if the words seem to want to come tumbling out.

Now take a few deep breaths, and lay your hands on your writing. Do what you do to calm yourself, whether it’s to light a candle or say a prayer. Then I want you to consider the following words. Maybe even write them out on an index card or on a different page in your journal:

No need to write out any responses to these words. Just let them mix in with the energy of the words that you have already written down.

Now I want you to tear the paper you wrote on into little pieces, each about the size of a quarter. As you’re tearing, think of how much you want things to be different, for the problems to go away, for the world to be transformed. Let your yearning be an intention, a prayer. Most of the problems we worry about do not have easy solutions, so don’t spend your energy trying to figure out what to do. Just acknowledge the need for transformation with as much openness as you can muster to something unexpectedly new and positive.

When you have finished tearing up your paper, you’ve symbolically rejected the status quo. It’s now time to build something new. If possible, to build something beautiful.

Take each small torn paper, apply some glue to the side that that has your writing on it, and stick it onto the background page. If there’s not enough room to include all your scraps in a single layer, then overlap them and layer them. As you do this, reinforce your intention that your concerns be transformed into something better.

When you’ve included all your scraps and the glue is dry, take your colors and create something new. It doesn’t have to be beautiful or “good”. See some of the following possibilities of coloring each of the scraps a different color (to create a stained glass window?), or overlapping colored circles, or painting the entire page one color (like creating a new canvas for something new), or creating an image on a newly painted page.

As you are playing with the paper and the colors, you may feel inspired to write some words, as I did in the next sample. Here I had written about my frustration with the leg pain that I have at night, which awakens me every 1 1/2 to 2 hours all night every night, with there being nothing I can find to alleviate this pain. As you can imagine, this impacts my days as well as my nights, as I never know how I’m going to feel after such interrupted nights. It’s hard to make commitments; it’s hard to get stuff done.

As I wrote the words that came to mind, I added curvy shapes around the angled shapes covering the scraps of the previous writing. It somehow seemed to be a change to the image, or a way to state that I wanted a change.

After you finish your piece, take another few deep breaths, drink a glass of water (as a symbol of cleansing the old and bringing nourishment, life to your intention), and go on with your day. You have witnessed your own pain and worry, and you have declared that you are open to imagining new, unexpected ways to live as positively and as helpfully as possible.

When we do these Depth Dimension activities, I do believe that they make a difference in our psyches and spirits (“Psyche” actually means “spirit”.) As the days unfold, we begin to notice new ideas and can support creative ways to live with peace and a commitment to Life.

And as I often remind myself, at least while I’m doing these activities, I’m not engaged in hurting anyone else or destroying anything! At least for those few minutes, I am doing no harm.

I hope that this is helpful to you, and that you find your own ways to go deep inside, process what is so difficult, and pour out your goodness into the world.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

Hello dear Soul Friend,

There were tears, there was laughter. On June 24, we had our last night of Owl Poetry monthly Open Mic in this incarnation. Eight years ago, my friend Teri Petz (also here on Substack with Poetic Encouragement) asked me what I thought of an open mic for poetry. She’d spent the year in my monthly Poetry Circle I facilitated in my home studio, and had rekindled her deep love of poetry. And the rest is, literally, history.

(photo credit: Teri Petz)

I created the above banner for the Open Mic’s first anniversary. I painted the tree on six pieces of poster board duct taped together on the back (so that I could fold it up and transport it from home to restaurant). Then I cut out about 200 leaf shapes from leftover cardboard I’d painted green, and invited each of the participants to write on a leaf what poetry meant to them.

I repeated the activity on the 5th anniversary, and then on the 8th anniversary, our final event, I gifted each one there a copy of every comment shared on each leaf. Here are just a few of those comments:

“Poetry is You. It’s the pure reflection of your soul.”

“My quest to understand emotions, people, life, and the silence between.”

“Dear poets, thank you for sharing the part of you deep and real and all.”

“Here people write like they don’t know how not to. Let that be you, too. Let it bound out of you in leaps. Go to the sun!”

“Poetry night at the Owl is like a sweetgrass serenade singing up serotonin.”

“Owl Poetry is love and community, a place to share your heart and voice.”

“Owl Poetry with an honoring audience is a blessing.”

“Listening to the Owl poetry night is like hearing the soul of the city.”

(All comments are included below.)

Within the first year, our event was being recorded by Rogers TV for community programming, and it was broadcast across Alberta. Over 70 programs are archived; most can be watched on youtube at Tell It Like It Is Poets (https://www.youtube.com/@tellitlikeitispoets1352).

Our last night: Teri Petz, Jolene Draper, Cat Charissage (photo credit: Jolene Draper)

One day on the coldest day in winter a couple of years ago, I was struggling to enter the hospital doors to attend my physio appointment. A woman pushing a man in a wheelchair was walking toward me and she suddenly shouts, “I know you! You’re on TV all the time!” She sure didn’t look happy, though, and I wondered if she hated the poetry program. Yet, she must have watched it enough to recognize me all bundled up on a snowy day at the hospital!

At almost every event, there were more than enough poets to fill our 2 hours. About 18-24 poets read their own creations each month.

Teri and I talked a lot about the atmosphere we wanted to create, and the reason we wanted the event to exist at all: We wanted it to be welcoming to newbies as well as experienced poets. Anything was acceptable (the swear words were bleeped out for the TV programs!) No hate speech tolerated. But the primary reason we wanted this was to encourage people to articulate their thoughts and have a space where who they are and what they had to say was accepted and received. You know, free speech. Self-expression. Art. And hundreds have been able to find their voice.

The woman on the left is Shelley Kay, who will be hosting a new incarnation of Open Mic poetry in Lethbridge. (photo credit: Jolene Draper)

Owl Poetry has run its course, but in September, another wild woman, Shelley, has decided to shepherd a new poetry open mic: Word of Mouth Lethbridge Poetry (https://www.facebook.com/people/Word-of-Mouth-Lethbridge-Poetry/61591362002366/).

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

Here’s a copy of the text of the Legacy Document given out on June 24, 2026:

“What do you love about Poetry? What do you love about Owl Poetry?”

The Origin and Legacy of Owl Poetry 2018 - 2026

In the summer of 2018, we had just finished the year of the small Poetry Circle that I, Cat Charissage, facilitated in my home studio. A couple of weeks later I received a phone call from the newbie of the group, Teri Petz: “Being in this Circle brought poetry back alive for me!” she said. “ I don’t think I can go all summer without it. What do you think about my organizing an Open Mic Poetry night for the community?”

“Sounds like a great idea to me.” I pictured Teri reserving a room at the library, having a one-off night of poetry. I thought the members of our Poetry Circle would attend, along with spouses and a few friends, and we’d have a great evening letting our friends know why we loved our Poetry Circle so much.

But I didn’t know Teri very well in those days, nor her skills in making stuff happen!

Within a few days, she called me to tell me that she’d made arrangements for the last Wednesday of July at the Owl Acoustic Lounge — only the most happening place in Lethbridge! As the date approached, I was a little nervous — would anyone other than 6 or 7 people show up? We asked that people read their own poetry that they had written themselves —- would there be enough poets here to make it an event?

Well, people came! Before the end of the night, Steve, the manager, asked us if we wanted a regular monthly gig! So Teri and I met together to figure out how we were going to pull this off. Teri knew Ryan Cradduck, a producer at Shaw Community TV (now Rogers). He offered to put the Open Mic on local television — and there are more than 67 sessions of Owl Poetry that he recorded, edited and posted online. Now, roughly 96 months later, we’ve created eight years of a community open mic for original poetry here in Lethbridge.

Teri and I thought a lot about the atmosphere we wanted to create. No hierarchy, first come first served. Open and inclusive to all who came. A space where newbies and experienced poets both were welcomed. Freedom of expression, anything goes — anything goes, that is, except for hate speech or intolerance. Two women, no organizational sponsorship, no fanfare, no funding. Over the years friends have helped with advertising and with sponsorships to pay for the posters.

And the poets came, and shared their hearts, minds, and words. Newbies found confidence, and so many poets have found their voice, and their audience.

On our One Year Anniversary we packed the Owl (at its old location)! It was literally standing room only. Steve, the manager then, served up a cake, free pieces for everyone!

I, Cat, had decided that we needed some kind of logo or banner to put up at the Open Mics.

The challenge was to create something that could easily be put up and taken down, and dismantled small enough so I could bring it home between the Open Mics. I finally had the idea to duct-tape together a number of poster boards to make a large banner, and because of how I taped it on the back, it could simply be folded up and carried in a portfolio bag. So I painted a tree and cut out a couple of hundred green leaves. That night I put a few leaves and a Sharpie on each table, and asked the participants to write on a leaf “What do you love about Owl Poetry? What do you love about Poetry?” I glued the leaves onto the poster board’s background tree, and that became the Poetree that has been the backdrop now for 7 years.

On Owl Poetry’s Five Year Anniversary in 2023, I brought more leaves and invited everyone to answer the same questions of what you love about Poetry.

Because so few people come up to read the responses, I decided to compile the list of comments as a Legacy Project here at the completion of our eight years as Owl Poetry.

Here’s what you all told us:

What Poets and Friends Wrote on the Poetree Leaves:

(each leaf contains one of these quotes)

“It’s important to tell the truth about our lives.”

“Write or die. Choose life!”

“Poetry is You. It’s the pure reflection of your soul.”

“Phenomenal cosmic power.”

“A poem is a song of the silent.”

“Poetry gives me hope for the world.”

“You are more than trauma. Trauma makes great poetry.”

“Romantic expression of my depression.”

“Poetry makes me reflect on meaning.”

“Poetry is passion.”

“My quest to understand emotions, people, life, and the silence between.”

“Speak those words, baby! They are magic!”

“Vision is the seeing of what’s invisible to others.”

“Poetry helped me heal.”

“Poetry is a gift from me to you, and you to me. Thank you.”

“#Poetry lovers.”

“Speak up, slow down, what you have to say is worth hearing.”

“Poetry lets me communicate with people I’ve never yet met.”

“Poetry is therapy for myself.”

“Dear poets, thank you for sharing the part of you deep and real and all.”

“All you in pieces, stanza after stanza.”

“Keep learning, keep loving. Stay dedicated to your art. Stay dedicated to yourself. Never believe you are not enough.”

“Here people write like they don’t know how not to. Let that be you, too. Let it bound out of you in leaps. Go to the sun!”

“Poetry soothes the soul and the savage beast.”

“On the prowl, found the Owl.”

“Beautiful words, beautiful souls.”

“Poetry should make it new.”

“Music, therapy, love, life, release, peace, hope.”

“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race, and the human race is filled with passion, find medicine, business, engineering, that are noble pursuits and are necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, love, these are what life means.”

“Poetry night at the Owl is like a sweetgrass serenade singing up serotonin.”

“Poems love poets love reading my inspirations or heartaches — a love affair.”

“Poetry is the breath of life.”

“Thank you for providing me with this metaphysical wonderland.”

“Thanks for sharing your words, your gladness, your joy, or sharing your heart.”

“Poetry is the language of the heart.”

“Poetry is the wind blowing on leaves, dewdrops, on flowers and stars in the sky. It just speaks to me.”

“Poetry is a reminder of our humanity.”

“Say the things without saying the things.”

“So many original artists.”

“Currently getting comfortable with being uncomfortable.”

“Poetry tells life.”

“Owl Poetry is love and community, a place to share your heart and voice.”

“Artists are those who express themselves not with words, but in ways that are abstract to the mind but vividly clear to the soul.”

“Authentic.”

“Owl Poetry night: celebration in words, good food, good folks, fun.”

“Thank you for sharing your beautiful words.”

“Be scared. Do it anyway!”

“Poetry means life.”

“Forever my heart, forever my soul, the Owl hoots, always yearning for more.”

“Enables one to meet interesting people.”

“Poetry equals passion.”

“Thank you for opening your hearts to the world.”

“Poetry lets me say what I can’t say.”

“Poetry feels like vulnerability. It’s so courageous and authentic.”

“Owl Poetry: an evening’s delight. Good food and entertainment, too! Five years!”

“It’s a thunderbolt in prose form.”

“Owl Poetry is love and support.”

“Poetry is the words I cannot speak.”

“Writing poetry helps me refine and release, esp. Joy, hurt or confusion.”

“Owl Poetry with an honoring audience is a blessing.”

“Poetry speaks to my spirit.”

“I love everything about this place at the Owl.”

“Comforting.”

“Each night we wear our hearts on our sleeves for all the world to see, or at least this bar full of poets.”

“Thank you for all your enthusiasm.”

“Write what you don’t know you know.”

“Poetry makes me finally feel heard. I can relate to victims and others’ stories without judgement.”

“Supportive community.”

“They open and close two lips on stage. See and Hear your heart in many others.”

“The word is all.”

“Life is inspiration.”

“The blunt, quick, spicy way to start a fire.”

“In a world where you can be anything, be kind.”

“A poem is one moment in time that can last forever.”

“Freedom of Expression.”

“The Owl is my safe space. Poetry is my outlet of self-expression, and my way of letting the feeling and words that aren’t typically heard and to heal within.”

“What I like about Owl Poetry is it allows people to express themselves in creative ways as well as have an outlet to heal past pains.”

“Spotlights mental health.”

“An interesting way to express oneself.”

“Poetry is self-expression and healing, the words that don’t get out.”

“P = poetry. T = thrills. S = syllables. P equals T divided by S.” “Maximize P, please. . . “

“The words.”

“The vibes.”

“I like poems. My husband writes them for me.”

“Listening to the Owl poetry night is like hearing the soul of the city.”

“Experiences.”

“Swords by T. Rex.”

“Express emotion. Dream and get your art on!”

“Poetry provides structure for the chaos of the mind.”

“Emotions!”

“Concentrated distillation of emotion and thought.”

“Inclusivity.”

“Lyrics.”

“Authenticity and vulnerability.”

“Poetry sanctifies the mundane.”

“The potential layers of meaning.”

“Poetry moves my soul and spirit.”

“The language of the heart.”

“If you haven’t left them crying or speechless, you haven’t done your job.”

“To wield wild words softly, strongly, poetry is a wonderful way to fight for passion, sorrow, sans swords or perfidy.”

“Self-expression, mental health therapy.”

“Writers gonna write. Poetry brings the light.”

“Birth of ideas.”

“Owl Poetry is a safe space to share deep, hard truths.”

To all of you:

Thank you for all that you have brought to us during these past eight years. Together, we have created something beautiful and deeply meaningful. May this legacy live on through our lives!

With much love from Teri Petz and Cat Charissage

June 2026

Hello my dear Soul friend!

Happy Canada Day to you, just a day and a bit after the full moon. Today I want to tell you about one of those life events that reinforced my belief that another world IS possible. It’s so simple and mundane, it almost isn’t worth mentioning, but perhaps that is the precise reason to do so. Changing the world is only sometimes about the big events: war, regime change, economic depressions (and personal depressions, too.) Most of the time, change comes so slowly we recognize it only when we remember how things used to be. It’s also worth reminding ourselves that yes, we can choose activities and attitudes that help create the better world, rather than hinder it.

In 2023 I had decided that I needed a website. Without the funds to hire a designer, and seduced into thinking that a simple website would be easy for me to do by myself. I jumped in! And seriously failed. A friend offered to help, and then what I thought would be a simple couple of hours turned into weeks of ongoing effort.

You know where I’m going with this: my friend had problems with the website. Dozens of back and forth messages between us, then dozens with the website host, still didn’t solve our problems. My friend finally turned to her husband, a computer genius, designer, inventor. I didn’t know him very well; I knew he was in the middle of an important project; I hadn’t wanted to take his time.

My simple project had become a monster. The expert even had challenges figuring it out. Then getting the provider to address those issues became yet another adventure.

But after all that, with a little help from my friends, I eventually got a beautiful website — even though now, 3 1/2 years later, I need to revise it again!

The biggest learning I took away from that time-sucking “adventure” was that it would never have come to completion without the generous help of friends who gained nothing from their hours upon hours of work. Well, except for my undying gratitude, of course!

I also created a painting for them in thanks. I’m sure I photographed it before giving it to them, but I just can’t find that photo anywhere! (Which is why this letter is coming today rather than the day before yesterday!)

So let me describe it for you: It’s an Islamic Geometric Pattern, but instead of it being completely symmetrical, sedate, orderly, and elegant, some of the shapes in the pattern have moved away from the original plan. Shapes on the edge of the design have moved away from the central design. Some are on their own, other shapes have joined together to create new patterns, with space for new shapes to enter. When you first look at the painting, it looks “wrong,” yet upon further observation it reflects life the way so many of us actually live it.

The metaphor of an Islamic Geometric Pattern is that it reflects the unity, beauty and order of creation. The pattern is a representation of the ideal. Yet of course we live life given to us in much less than the ideal.

I wanted to communicate to my friends that while I had intended to create my project, the website, in an independent, orderly, and beautiful way, things kind of got away from me. Just so, the shapes in the painting got away from the original plan. Some shapes didn’t go anywhere, just stranded, yet others started to create new patterns (projects) and their own beauty.

We might have grand plans, yet reality is complex. In the midst of that, though, a mistake is not necessarily a disaster. Yes, there is confusion and misdirection at times, but new alliances can create new patterns (projects). The end result, our world, may not look all neat and tidy, but it can still be beautiful and creative —- when we work together.

(An outside visitor to my study perhaps wanting to jump in on my project?)

I also wrote a poem to go with the painting, included below. I especially wanted to play with the idea of kinship versus hierarchy, so used the word “Kindom” rather than “Kingdom.”

Striving to live with curiosity, resilience, and “with”-ness, we created a kindom of care and got something beautiful done.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

p.s. I’m now inspired to create another painting on this topic —- and this time, remember to photograph it!

Chosen Kin Creating Kindoms of Care
                 ---Cat Charissage

We haven’t been buddies from birth,
haven’t made memories in childhood or teens.
So many stories we haven’t yet shared
So much that we do not know.

Yet we don’t have to know all the details
to help each other out, to care, 
to choose each other by offering listening ear;
making possible the other’s way of life now.

Scaffold of ordinary life, 
We stumble along life’s paths.
We circle around the inchoate hope 
That love is our center, 
That love is possible,
And that we can somehow be a part of it.

Sharing struggles and ideas and joys and hopes
we are creating a kindom of love
with our imperfect selves.
And it is good.

I wouldn’t be who I am without you.

You, my friends, are my chosen kin.
Living alongside each other
we create the kindom of care
as we muddle along in ordinary lives.

Thank you my friends, thank you
We are together.
Friends: chosen kin
creating kindoms of care.

Hello, my dear Soul Friend,

I recently came across an article in The Guardian from June 4: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/jun/04/world-inequality-lab-equality-academics-planetary-survival?utm_source=Live+Audience&utm_campaign=e8b6af7dc9-nature-briefing-anthropocene-20260612&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-33f35e09ea-50282300

The title: ‘An equal and habitable world is possible’: academics set out sweeping vision for planetary survival

The subtitle: Global report provides an alternative to climate breakdown, political extremism and economic tensions.

I recommend you read it, because it’s a piece of hope in the midst of news that takes a tranquilizer or a stiff drink to read, much less live through one of its current themes.

The authors are not Pollyanna-ish old hippies, nor uninformed dreamers. They really do know how bad it all is. Yet they not only come up with an alternative to the way things are, they show the path to get there. Of course there can be endless debates as to the likelihood of widespread acceptance of their recommendations — one of my friend’s responses was “This sounds great and the rich will fight it until the day they die” — but low likelihood of acceptance is not the same as impossible.

This document is the first that I’ve read that tackles climate breakdown, political extremism, and economic inequality as systems that work together and that need integrated responses. Their recommendations include large wealth taxes on the richest of the rich, a change in diets (from increased meat-eating to a largely plant-based diet), and a shift from investments in materially intense sectors such as industry and mining to education and health.

It also depends on ordinary people waking up to the truth that what most people want is a better quality of life, not necessarily just more wealth. Most everyone who wants more money wants it in order to buy a better quality of life, that is, health care, housing, food security, transportation, and access to natural spaces. The recommendations of this report seek to provide these for the world’s current population.

I’m reminded of the quote from Mahatma Gandhi “The world has enough for everyone’s need, but not for everyone’s greed.”

The reason I’m telling you about this article is to share concrete hope that what so many of us want and work toward is actually (theoretically) possible. But there needs to be widespread support for the kinds of political and policy changes that could bring this about. That’s where each of us have good and important work to do.

We’re all allowed to have our moments of understandable despair. But staying in that despair leads tragically either to suicide or cynicism, neither of which brings the world toward justice. It has been said that cynic is usually a disappointed idealist. I’m calling for the disappointed, the hopeless and the cynics to find justifiable hope that planetary survival and greater justice is possible, and then to support visions that may actually implement those ideals.

[these 3 images are the same Islamic Geometric pattern that I painted this month from my classes with the Global Center for Islamic Art. All three are acceptable, but I certainly think that one or two are better than the others. Just as, in our search for useful policies and practices to move the world into more justice and sustainability, we may find similar but different iterations of ideas. Let’s keep working on those ideas to find the best as well as the “good enough for now.” And, to find completely different patterns for hope.]

I know that so much of my own time and energy in my life has gone into either hopelessness or impotent anger, and I’m done with that. I don’t want to live that way. I assume you don’t, either. Please, think deeply about these issues and make a commitment to supporting, in voting but also in casual conversations, visions toward sustainability and justice. People’s minds are opened, and changed, in conversations with people they know and trust. Each of us could be that person who helps make support for measures that will make a positive difference to become better known and attain wider acceptance.

And everywhere, support creativity and out of the box thinking. Where else do new visions come from?

For the past year or so, when performing at our monthly Open Mic Poetry event, I’ve encouraged the participants to keep writing, keep visioning, keep taking care of each other. My mantra has become “another world is possible.”

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

Here’s the poem I wrote with that name:

Another World is Possible

Another world is possible
though it’s really hard to see in your news feed.
We’re in hard times, the disappearances and the intimidation are real,
and we must see reality as it is, the truth that frightens us.
Reality doesn’t stay static, though,
and facing reality also means facing the possibilities
that tomorrow might bring.

Another world is possible, and we need you,
you poets and artists, to imagine that other world.
Who benefits when we’re all terrified, hiding in our homes,
Silent except in the echo chambers of FB friends, Tiktok content, and Instagram reels?
Power mongers and mega billionaires benefit, that’s who.
The status quo feeds off of despair, and fear,
and neutralizes our anger into more contention, more division, 
and more fear and more war.

But another world is possible, friends, I can see it.
Artists, show us your visions of alternative futures.
Poets, tell us the stories to spark my heart hope.
They say we shouldn’t waste time on art when genocide is happening.
But if you can’t actively stop the hate and the killing right now,
Show us the possibility of another way, another world.
While you still have your pens and paints
give us the visions to work toward.

Another world is possible
Poets and artists, we need you to show us that.
Another world is possible.

(misty, overlapping layers in this Islamic Geometric Pattern I painted last year)

Hello my dear Soul Friend,

I’ve been thinking today about Soulwork, contemplative living, seeing things from different viewpoints, and the stereotypical differences between Left-Brain Thinking and Right-Brain Thinking. And about layers —- about how seeing behind, beneath, and within, that is, the layers within most phenomena, is like seeing something from a variety of viewpoints. And about holding all these “views” of something, or someone, or some situation, is challenging in this hurry-up, make a decision, have an opinion right now world. And yet how this willingness to be uncertain, complex and multivalent is so desperately needed in our interactions with each other, and also in how we view (judge?) ourselves.

I’ve been trying to read Iain McGilchrist’s massive tome The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World. I emphasize the “trying to,” not because it is difficult to understand, but just because it is such a big piece of work: 2 volumes, EACH about 800 pages long. (I’ve read a few summaries of his work, though, so until I get through all of it, I think I already understand the major points of his work.)

McGilchrist is a psychiatrist, neuroscience researcher, philosopher and literary scholar at Oxford. Also the author of The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World, he is not only an expert on how our divided brain actually works, but also what that means in our world and how we experience reality. To over simplify almost to the point of sound bites, his thesis is that our brains have two ways of experiencing the world that when working in balance reveal a rich and complex reality. In the last 500 years, though, western culture has favored left-brain specialties of breaking down what’s in front of us to its smallest parts, analysis, rationality, and “just the facts, ma’am, just the facts.” Our culture, over time, has ignored and then denigrated the more integrated modes of seeing the whole picture, noticing how things work together, of placing importance on feelings and even what we may experience as mystery. Left brain = trees; right brain = forest.

While emphasizing left-brain modes of understanding has brought scientific discoveries and sophisticated economic systems, our world and especially Western Culture has de-emphasized a clear half of what humans are capable of. We are oh so clever but probably not nearly wise enough.

Personally, I have always been good at school and encouraged by parents and teachers to pursue academics and systematic excellence. At the same time, though, and often to my confusion and frustration, I am drawn to music, art, spirituality, theology, literature, mysticism, philosophy, sacred geometry, finding the nuances in discussions, symbols, examining situations from a myriad of perspectives, and slowly allowing my mind/body/heart/spirit/soul to reflect and allow, to integrate and synthesize. (All things that aren’t very good ways to make a lot of money in this world of ours! Coincidence? I think not.)

As a young adult, lots of what I was drawn to found expression in my Catholic faith, where I entered a Franciscan convent of sisters in order to live a more contemplative life. There I received a crash course not in mysticism, but in becoming an obedient servant to whatever my superiors demanded. I left for a different community after a year, then spent another few years in the company of smart, prayerful women with a mission —- you know, the kind of nuns who could build a hospital with a quarter, a book of matches, 2 rubber bands, and a rolodex. I returned to college and graduated with a degree in theology, then moved to Toronto in Canada to study theology at the graduate level. Serious academia.

All that study of theology and church history taught me just how human the church hierarchy was (and is.) And then it had me questioning how a good God can allow so much unmerited suffering to occur. I mean, if I were God, I’d be doing everything to alleviate all suffering of any creature. (Of course, I’m not God, as more than one friend has pointed out!)

I decided that I would NEVER have a priest for a boss again (at least a male roman catholic one). I left theology, I left the church, and I more or less left anything like a traditional faith.

But my orientation to all things soulful still was (and is) the central concern of my life. After many adventures with all things “spiritual” and “spiritual but not religious,” I believe that spirituality is not something “out there” away from daily life, but is how humans can live deeply and richly with intention, meaning, connection, and compassion. I am interested in all the ways we can access those things; hence, my devotion to all kinds of Depth Dimension Practices. Which just happens to be the subject of my book Wildflower Seeds: the Beauties of a Reflective Life.

Our society has no time for Depth Dimension Practices, for reflection, for art, for silence. In my book, though, I still advocate for every one of us deciding to devote 20 minutes a day to this aspect of life, and then offer almost 100 ideas of what to do in those 20 minutes to help build what I now see are the Right Hemisphere ways of experiencing the world. I myself devote much more than 20 minutes a day to these kinds of activities, and have never been happier.

I have discovered that many of the ways that I make art reflect this way of looking at the world, of looking back (reflecting), looking within, around, and within. In the photo above, I try to make visible how we create things, in this case, an Islamic Geometric Pattern, in layers. One thing on top of another both covers up, but also reinterprets what is underneath it, allowing something new to emerge that was not there before.

Before I became interested in the art of Islamic Geometric Patterns, an art directly developed with prayer (the Right Hemisphere) and the examination of our relationship with Ultimate Unity and the thousands of things (forms), I was fascinated by Mandalas. The word mandala is from the Sanskrit word for circle. That’s the basic attribute of a mandala: an image depicted in a circle or in a circular form.

As I studied more, I became fascinated with how mandalas seemed to change, or at least become more complex, as I looked at them from different angles. I began to imagine them as prisms of life, where a seemingly clear rock can make visible what we cannot see, as the prism reveals the colors of the rainbow when held to the light at the right angle. As Carl Jung used creating a daily mandala in order to make visible his underlying, invisible aspects of his consciousness, these mandalas can help us not only see the invisible, but see what we can see in multivalent ways. As Walt Whitman reminds each of us, “I am large; I contain multitudes.”

Mandalas can be created intentionally, as all art can, and can be an exploration into something we want to understand better. We can start with a question, then let color and shape, symmetry and form, do their wordless magic. After we have completed the mandala, we experience the image alongside the words of the question or intention we started with. Often we can sense more about the question than we could when we started; oftentimes we understand our issue and our world just a little better, by creating and then reflecting on an intention from different directions.

We begin to explore what is True, not needing to fossilize whatever we discover into Truth.

And, now just imagine a three dimensional mandala!

All of this has to do with the presentation I will be giving next week at our “Sunday Gatherings,” the last Sunday of May, May 31, at noon Mountain Daylight time, 11 a.m. Pacific time, 2 p.m. Eastern time. It is in my series of Depth Dimension Practices, where I offer a short time of teaching about an activity that can help us access our depths and instruction in how to go about the activity, and then facilitate a sharing as to what we did and the insights we may have gained.

This month we will be exploring Mandalas: Looking at the Truth from Various Directions. I will give a very short history of Mandala making and offer two very simple ways to create your own. We will talk about how holding an intention as we create can help us to examine different aspects of an issue in our lives as we metaphorically travel around that issue. I’ll talk about the traditional 4 directions and their meanings, and I will also introduce how Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes (with whom I’ve studied in person for over a decade) has expanded this and teaches the Eight Directions. Then, of course, we’ll be invited to try creating our own Mandala in only a few minutes.The gatherings are about 90 minutes long, on zoom, and anyone interested in attending is very welcome to join us. There are usually about 5 to 8 of us, it’s very low-key and relaxed, and you’re welcome to also just watch and witness rather than participate if that’s what’s best for you. Bring your journal or other paper, pen or pencil, and your colors: watercolor paints, markers, pastels, or even simply crayons! No artistic ability expected.

If you’re interested, please RSVP to my friend Katharina Brandl who organizes the gatherings, and she will send you the zoom link on the Sunday morning. Send your email to sundaygatherings@posteo.net. For more info: https://www.facebook.com/katharina.brandl.102

With much love and many Blessings,

Cat

Dear Soul Friend,

It’s been awhile! Life happens when you’re busy making other plans. . . except I’d already made the plans and life hasn’t cooperated. That’s what I mean by life getting life-y. I’ll tell you some more details (I always love to hear when other people are having the same challenges as I am, not to enjoy their chaos, but to remind myself I’m only human, too), but first I want to share some thoughts on how to live soulfully in the midst of it all.

This is a background grid I made that gave me the lines I needed to create (at least) 4 different patterns. This grid is created one line at a time with only a compass and a straight-edge, no measuring or tracing. It takes a lot of concentration (I followed my teacher Samira Mian as she taught it online in her April 2026 Patreon course). There is more than one line I had to carefully erase to then connect the actual points I needed to find!

Drawing and painting Islamic Geometric Designs is definitely one of the ways that I consciously immerse myself in Soul Life. When drawing the patterns, I need to be extremely focused and as exact and accurate as possible. There’s something about drawing lines with simple tools that then transform into beauty that allows my whirling brain to center and to feel as though I’m definitely part of the Creativity of creation. It’s what I want to do with my life: create some kind of beauty out of the sometimes seemingly meaningless acts that make up my life. I love the complexity of it. Daily life is pretty complex, isn’t it? I love that each small piece is repeated in a large pattern is almost always one of about eight foundational shapes used in this art. My life is primarily made up of a few actions that I repeat in almost infinite combinations: make a meal, clean up the kitchen, write in my journal, catch up with my family, hang out with friends, make end chapter of life decisions, declutter, organize, rest, make art.

One of the patterns made from outlining certain lines in the large grid. This octagonal pattern can be tessellated, that is, repeated across the page, to make a much larger design. Octagons do not tessellate unless you include some squares between the octagons, though, but those squares then offer another surface on which to create patterns.

I belong to two different monthly courses that teach Islamic Geometric Patterns. Samira Mian, from the U.K., offers 2 online zooms to complete one pattern each month. One zoom shows us how to construct the pattern, the second one offers suggestions on painting the pattern. Each one is 1 1/2 to 2 hours long.

The other course is from the Global Center for Islamic Art. Similar kinds of teaching, but GCIA is more “formal”: there is a designed progression in difficulty as well as an attempt to familiarize students with the different “families” of patterns, such as six-sided, four-sided, and five sided. There are different artists offering tips and suggestions in painting the patterns and designing complete works of art. There are perhaps hundreds of subscribers. One of the things I love is seeing people from literally all over the world on our zoom classes. (Okay, nobody has signed in from Antarctica — yet.)

Because life has been life-y for months, I’m very behind in these classes, and so badly want to catch up on the recordings. But 2 hour blocks of time are scarce these days. And when I do have some time to myself, dear body lets me know that I’ve been pushing too hard. It’s hard to do concentrated work when in pain.

Most of us are finding ourselves with so many, too many demands on our time and attention these days. We end up thinking that this is just how life is. But not even machines — or AI — can continue on without needing maintenance, cooling off, or tons and tons of water (looking at you, AI). How can we create these moments of calm, of mindfulness, of Soul in the middle of the maelstrom?

One tried and true way is through our hobbies. And no, scrolling the internet is most definitely NOT a hobby! Most people don’t think of their hobbies as Soulful, yet in so many ways, many of them are, especially the ones we do individually, often in the quiet or listening to a particular favorite kind of music. They can become Depth Dimension Practices.

A second pattern that will tessellate perfectly. I drew lines on each side of the pattern lines, erased the pattern lines, then starting at one corner, weaved the “ribbons” over and under, over and over again. I love this weaving, often called braiding.

All kinds of handwork hobbies, such as knitting or crochet have two aspects. So do building things with wood, nail, and screws, in all their varieties. One is the focused, concentrating part of learning the design or pattern. The second is the more repetitive execution of the pattern. During the focused parts, we pull ourselves into a world away from the daily rushing and worrying, allowing our brains and spirits to disengage from the wearying pattern of go, go, go. The more repetitive parts allow us to relax, to let the mind and heart go into a light trance, where dreamlike thoughts and feelings arise from the depths. (Of course, just like night dreams, sometimes this time of lack of distractions allow all kinds of unresolved memories to come up. If being quiet is difficult or scary for you, go slowly, like maybe 10 or even 5 minutes at a time of the quiet, and please find a loving someone in your life with whom you can be witnessed in the hard stuff.)

Assuming that we’re not in a crisis state, the quiet allows us to rest and renew ourselves in a way that scrolling the news never will. You can imagine sitting with someone you deeply love; many people imagine sitting in the “lap of God”, or the Great Mother. I often imagine that I’m floating in the infinite creativity of the Great Mystery.

A third pattern “found” within the grid.

When we’re in that restoring quiet, I believe it’s what generations of our ancestors have called prayer. Any thoughts that arise in that quiet are often messages from deep within offering an insight, an image that is symbolic and nourishing, or a reminder to attend to someone or something that isn’t in the forefront of our everyday thinking. These are the gifts of silence.

So when life is particularly “life-y,” how do we find time and space for these moments? Practically speaking, even just three deep breaths, especially if you can close your eyes when taking these breaths, can offer renewal, relaxation, and a moment to remember your intention.

I recommend thinking about what you can do in a twenty minute time slot, and getting yourself set up beforehand if at all possible. (And it almost always is possible, if you give yourself a couple of days to assemble what you need.) Gather your supplies, whether knitting needles and yarn, or simple art supplies with some paper, and keep them out so that you see them and are reminded to rest with them every day. They can be in a tote or in a box. The box can serve as a lap desk, too. I have the luxury of being able to leave my patterns out on a table ready for me whenever I can steal away. (It takes a lot of training, and the maturity of many years before children can leave “making supplies” undisturbed, though! For all you mothers of small children: the time will come, someday!)

The more regular you can be about when you take your twenty minute Depth Dimension Practice, as I call it, the more easily you can build a daily practice of this. Your body begins to anticipate these moments, and you will be able to drop into the zone more quickly. Your family or roommates will get used to it — sometimes it helps to set a timer, put it out where they can see it, and teach them that you will be back when the timer rings.

So this is how I’m navigating my own “life-y” season here: three deep breaths, and twenty minute Depth Dimension Practices. I will — eventually — get back into my two hour zoom classes. But until then, I’m both surviving and thriving. You, too, I hope!

The fourth pattern, here in process of my beginning to weave the pattern. Hard to do this without a lot of smudging of the pencil lead!

I promised to tell you why it’s such a busy season right now. My spouse and I decided to purchase a very small condo just a couple of blocks from our house, to use as dear spouse’s office and to help us downsize as we prepare (long-term) to eventually sell this house and move to an apartment or condo. It has been a whirlwind of talking, planning, deciding, looking at the property, asking questions, talking with realtors, talking with banks, talking with lawyers, and then more meetings with banks and lawyers, signing dozens of papers, etc.

Dear body is aching and my shoulder, the one waiting to be replaced, is very very painful. I’m also possessed with a very rare desire to declutter and purge some of my possessions, and to organize the rest. There is almost no end of that, as you can imagine if you’ve ever seen my books and art supplies.

Then Liberty (my adult son) went to the U.K., came back with a virus that he gave to dear spouse and myself — and there went more than a week with almost nothing done!

And then there’s the rest of the world, and the big behemoth just to the south of the country I live in (I live in Canada, if you didn’t know.) No woman is an island, and all that. . .

So there’s been a lot more running around than in my usual rhythms. I’m not sure when it will calm back down again. I will try to be more regular with posting here on Substack.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

* I first heard the term “when life gets life-y” from Dawn Madsen on her YouTube channel, The Minimal Mom.

Dear Soul Friend,

It’s a rainy, grey day on so many levels. I’ve been waylaid by some virus that has sucked out any energy I still had; there are so few signs of spring here in my neck of the woods; real people just like us across the world (and maybe even we ourselves) are suffering while billionaires make more money. And for what? Oh yeah, I forgot for a minute: for more power and control, of course! [uh, that’s sarcasm, you know!]

And also, according to the Roman Christian calendar, it’s Good Friday, the day that Jesus’ public ministry officially came to an end with his execution. I can just imagine some of the thoughts of his followers: “Well, it was a good time while it lasted. . . ,” “But you promised!!!” “So whadda we do now?” “Where do I go now? I’ve already burned bridges with my family because of you!” “There was such hope, such promise. . . what went wrong??” “You get us all excited, and now you just abandon us. . . “

The whole narrative of Christianity, though, is that the story didn’t end on Good Friday. And that’s what I want to talk about now, whether or not you consider yourself a Christian or have a Good Friday sort of religious outlook.

The larger narratives of history are too often told by the victors, but each of us can observe human nature around us. Some days we see constant drama; other days excruciating boredom. For every joy one can point to a multitude of sorrows.

Yet we all know people who somehow keep getting up after they’re mowed down — just like those rubber duckies that bob back up to the surface after you push them under the water. They keep moving forward, keep making the meals and loving the children, telling stories of the good things that can happen when you keep persevering. Some people are making more beauty.

And then sometimes those people get cancer and die, leaving three little kids and a devastated community.

Even though I endeavor, choice by choice, to be positive and life affirming, I’m not interested in sweet stories that jump over the suffering to some happily ever after. There’s been too much spiritual bypassing, too much false hope, too many (dare I say it?) redemption narratives.

No, “good” Friday sucks. And nobody knew what would happen next.

And THAT’S the basis for hope: nobody knows what will happen next. But it’s also true that how we carry on, what we do, where we place our attention, is all part of what helps create the “what happens next.”

Good Friday isn’t the end of the Christian story. And today, nor any day, isn’t the end of our own story. As my dear spouse tells me, “There’s always the unexpected, and the odds are that at least half the time it’s gonna be good! ”

Now, today, I rest. And grieve. Maybe you, too? Today I will care for dear body. Tomorrow I will face what I see, and choose where to place my precious attention and limited energy. Maybe influence those odds in a positive direction. You, too!

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

Hello my dear Soul Friend,

Greetings to you on this Equinox weekend, where in the northern hemisphere the earth’s tilt moves toward the sun, bringing us into Springtime and the glorious profusion of abundant, extravagant LIFE! To my friends in the southern hemisphere, you have full cosmic permission to fold things up, prepare your hidey-holes, and get ready for fall and winter’s rest and incubation.

I have been in a time of frustration and floundering. The weather has matched it: one day so warm that you’re just sure that spring is here; the next bringing a snowstorm! I haven’t written because I felt I had nothing to give you. Besides being in the tumble of the weird weather, I was “doctoring”: I had my second cataract surgery and every week had several health care consultations. The cataract surgeries left me with seemingly endless weekly check-ups, blurry eyesight and unreliable depth perception (add icy and uneven streets outside, and I become terrified of falling!) My eyes are now in very good shape, yet I’m still doing physiotherapy for the shoulder that was replaced, and preparing for the shoulder that still needs replacement. I got the CAT scan done early due to a cancellation (originally scheduled for June), and recently consulted with the surgeon. I’m on the “just less than absolutely totally catastrophic shoulder damage” list, where there are a few “absolutely totally catastrophic shoulders” ahead of me. But the art, it seems, in a system that doesn’t fund enough operating rooms to match the need, is to get to the shoulders before the damage is so pronounced that the surgeon cannot reconstruct it at all.

And in the meantime, I’ve been so frustrated by the piles of S T U F F that surround me in almost every room of my house (and garage). My guys (spouse and adult son) have much more capacity to live in chaos than I and I have not had the energy or strength to put away, throw away, and organize the S T U F F as I have at other times in our lives. But a (small) wave of energy has enabled me to declutter and organize my study! It took a very long series of “15 minute at a time” sessions, but I have dealt with most of the piles and found room to put all of my books where I can see their spines on shelves! The room feels more spacious, and best of all, I know what I have and know where it is.

I want to tell you, today, about one category of the S T U F F, and how dealing with it has become a reflection on time, mortality, possibilities, intentions, spiritual practice, choice, and commitment. I’m sure you have your own parallel category of S T U F F, and perhaps you will find some ideas and motivation in my own meditation on this.

You see, it’s the category (i.e., the almost metre high pile) of “articles I badly want to read.” Although they are now in one pile, they have been strewn around several rooms in shallow boxes that have been accumulating for more than 10 years — maybe longer. They were birthed from so many posts, pdf’s, theses, and articles that I’ve come across on the internet, but absolutely did not have time to read when I discovered them. I’m embarrassed to say that in addition to the computer files where I’ve stored many of them, I also printed out far too many (a 3 foot high pile, remember!). How much paper have I gone through!? And for what?!

While decluttering and organizing, I just collected all the random paper that was witness to my good intentions, my ideas for new projects, my spiritual aspirations and curiosities. I’m now going through the (3 foot high!) pile, deciding which ones I need to just pitch (recycle), and which ones I can still deceive myself that I actually will read someday. At least I’m NOT just taking inventory: the pile IS going down.

My emotions are all over the place, though, as I go through them. Several months ago when I went through some of my archives from when I used to do trainings on Responding to Sexual Assault Disclosures and Healing Sexual Assault Trauma, I found it to be a nostalgic time full of gratitude. “Wow!” I thought, “I was tremendously busy, but I still did a pretty good job!”

Going through my actual projects and accomplishments I felt gratified that I had given those projects my best efforts. I felt satisfied that I had been of genuine help to many of the people who attended those trainings, and I hope I made a positive difference to the women who would come to those attendees in the future for help and support. It made me feel very grateful, both proud of and humbled by my work in that season of my life.

Seeing all these unread articles, though, leaves me with all the “could’ve been,” maybe “should’ve been,” and “what if?” feelings of dissatisfaction and incompleteness. Just looking at the titles of the articles remind me of my struggles about whether to take my work online first OR write my book first, whether to try to take my work online at all, the passionate desire I had to get my book into the world and wondering whether going with a traditional publisher or distributing it through Amazon without the middleman were better. How hard those decisions were — and I had to make them without being fully informed. If I had been more informed I wouldn’t have all of these apropos unread articles looking at me today!

But this is the way life always is, isn’t it? Even if we work towards something with all the time we can possibly devote, we can never be fully informed of all the what if’s, of all the possibilities. At some point in time you just have to jump in to make something happen, otherwise you could spend your life looking at yet another possibility or waiting until you feel completely confident that you’re doing the best, the right, the “perfect” thing.

For instance, during the Covid lockdowns, I felt strongly that my book (Wildflower Seeds: the Beauties of a Reflective Life available on Amazon worldwide) could be the most helpful for readers in that time of confusion and reinvention. So I jumped. I devoted myself to finishing it and getting it out into the world as soon as I could. While the book is evergreen, applicable to anyone who is interested in developing a deeper life at any stage of life, I think it was a timely response to that particular time of upheaval.

But then there are all the other paths I started down: learning about conscious marketing; examining what other healers, coaches, counselors, “helpers” were offering in their own programs; doing a deep dive into spiritual bypassing and how to not get sucked into the relative ease of that as opposed to dealing with the very unruly, unjust, chaotic world of internalized oppression as well as actual oppression, colonization, and war. (Would you like ICE with your drink???) And not to forget some constant interests and research topics: expressive intuitive art, art history, poetry, the mystics, non-religious spiritual practice, consciousness and the mind, consciousness and physics.

One thing I’ve definitely noticed is that as my interests grow and multiply, and the resources for investigating these interests are ever expanding, the actual hours of my day are growing fewer and fewer. My sleep is disrupted by pain, often stealing hours from night. Yet I still need to get enough sleep so that the pain can remain (mostly) manageable. It takes time to get to all the health appointments, much less the time in actual surgeries and recovery. And let’s not talk about physiotherapy. I seem to have less and less time to read, write, and make art.

And though these are my personal circumstances, I know that I am certainly not alone. Most of you who are reading this have your own challenges and frustrations. Then again, maybe you have reached a more mature way to manage the frustration of so many books (projects, art pieces, Substack posts, friends), so little time. If so, please share!!

painting by Cat Charissage, acrylic on canvas

I know just how wonderful it is to awaken each morning, to be able to move, and to have enjoyable and meaningful things to do. As I face the world as it is, I endlessly wonder what I can do to help, with the limited resources I still have. There are many ways open to each of us — for me the challenge is to discern the “good enough” choices of what to do with my precious time. I’ve given up perfection, thankfully. But I’d still like to do my best.

What about you? Are you surrounded with too much S T U F F? How are you handling it, or not? How much does the stress and worry about what happens to all that S T U F F after you die cost you? I could write much more about organizing and decluttering, and its relationship to living in a world where many do not have even enough to live, whether stability, food, peace, or S T U F F. I’m interested in how we spend — no, invest — our time towards the common good while also recognizing that any of us should not sacrifice too much of what we want, of what delights us, while keeping in mind others’ needs. How do we live with integrity and leave a legacy? To even be able to ask ourselves these questions means that we are living a blessed life. And I am grateful.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

P.S. Next Sunday, March 29, 2026, at noon Mountain Daylight time, I will be offering a presentation on “The Cave of the Heart: Finding your Inner Sanctuary” where we will discuss how we keep in our best, strongest self in order to meet these difficult times with actions and attitudes in alignment with our deepest values. We will practice a rest/meditation with hands and hearts on how to regulate our nervous systems in order to then decide what we might do. We will paint, simply and abstractly, our cave of the heart with ourselves within it. Bring your watercolors, colored pencils, or even crayons. There is no cost, but to receive the Zoom link, please register with your email address at sundaygatherings@posteo.net

Dear Soul Friend,

I’ve been waiting to write until I felt I had something “important” or “worth it” to share with you. Instead of inspiration, though, my days have been filled with quiet overwhelm, a cluttered house (and most importantly, a cluttered study that I spend most of my day in), and eyes that don’t quite work right yet. So this is instead sim…

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Dear Soul Friend,

In these harrowing times, those of us in North America, especially, are watching the rise of tyranny and just plain cruelty in the U.S. Many people I know are walking around in shock, almost unable to believe that there really are masked (poorly trained, ill-informed, ideologically motivated, unaccountable, and angry) gunmen in the str…

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Hope’s Letter to Me ——Cat Charissage

Dear Cat,

Thank you for searching for me.
I feel so forgotten, so forlorn.
So many people want me to be there with them
but when I don’t look like what they want,,
they curse me.
It makes me want to hide away.
Is there no place for me in this world?

I’ve always been small.
I look more like a spark than …

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When people are gathered and your name comes up, how would you like someone to complete this sentence: “Oh, yeah, she’s the one who . . . “?

How that sentence is completed is mostly under our control. Who are you and how do you live your life? What do people see of what you love, what you value, what you love to do, how you spend (invest) your time?

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“Finding Light in the Middle of the Darkness” © Cat Charissage, 2024, from traditional Islamic Geometric Design, watercolor on paper.

Dear Soul Friend,

Hello again, after a more than a 2 month hiatus in my writing here. Not only did I have a complete shoulder replacement (left side) on October 15, but last Monday I had cataract surgery on my left eye. …

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Write to sundaygatherings@posteo.net for the Zoom link Organized by Katharina Brandl

(Quick update: I’m healing well from the surgery. Little pain, yet still not much movement in my left arm. Lots of rehab to do! I’m getting back into my daily routines, and will post more here soon. Thank you for all your notes and good wishes.)

𝐏𝐫𝐚𝐲𝐞𝐫 𝐁𝐞𝐚…

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Hello Dear Soul Friend,

Tomorrow morning it will be two weeks since my shoulder replacement surgery (Oct. 15, 2025). Today is the first day that I’ve begun to feel like myself.

The surgery was successful, though the surgeon told me it was one of the top five most difficult (i.e., complex) shoulder replacements she’d ever done. “And I’ve done a lot!” she…

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Hello dear Soul Friend,

First, an announcement: the first surgery to repair my shoulders is scheduled for Wednesday, October 15. They will do a complete shoulder replacement of my left arm. I’m hoping that some of the significant pain I live with will be alleviated. But of course, it will be worse before it gets better. Thank you for your prayers, good w…

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Hello Dear Soul Friend,

Greetings on this New Moon AND the Autumnal Equinox here in the northern hemisphere.

This morning was the Poetry Reading from the World in a Room Gallery in Berlin, Germany, featuring the three poets, Annie Jones, Oyah!, and myself, moderated by my friend Katharina Brandl. It was such a joyful, heart filled time. For those of y…

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Announcements:

For those of you in southern Alberta, on Tuesday night, September 9, I will be at the Local Authors’ Night at the Fort Macleod Library, 6-9 p.m. Refreshments provided. Come for some creative inspiration —- ask questions of real authors!

As most of you know, I’ve been on the waiting list for 2 complete shoulder replacements. The first on…

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