The waxing moon,
each night this week,
is shining a little brighter through the window 
as I get up to pee in the moonlit dark.
I am reminded of how it held me 
when I could not be with my love.

We lived painfully apart.

But when the moon was full, 
you saw it from where you were,
I saw the same full moon from miles away
And we were somehow united under it.
That helped.

As we near our 18th anniversary
There is so much tender remembering 
As we now lie in the moonlight 
Together.

Friends, our anniversary is tomorrow, Sunday, August 30. We are both so glad to be together.

Upcoming events:

Conversations with Linda and Marcia Link for more info is here.

New Meditation Course Grounding and Joy starts on Wednesday, September 9. Link is here.

When Marcia Miller and Linda Oshins tell stories about the ‘old days’ or what a lifetime of practice has given us, our listeners ask for more. Our experience represents a slice of the long history of yoga in this country and is peopled with fascinating characters. When we formed the Mid-Ohio Yoga Organization in 1998, all of the yoga teachers in Columbus could fit around one lunch table at the only vegetarian restaurant in town (5 of us plus Claudia from Mansfield who was the driving force behind the group). Just three years later, Yoga on High alone employed fourteen yoga teachers plus Marcia, Martha and Linda—an explosion of activity and professionalism. They’ve decided to offer a few on-line get-togethers during which they tell stories and answer questions. You might laugh or cry with their hilarious, wise, and sometimes heart breaking stories.

In the first session, Claudia Cummins will interview them on the practices that have been most important to them through the years, the teachers who were most influential in their lives, and what decades of practice has given them.

This first conversation will be on Sunday, September 13 (sign up info here.)

We are not entirely sure yet about the other topics, but the next two dates are October 11 and November 15. In November we’ll be interviewed by Michele Vinbury, sharing stories and memories of Yoga on High. Feel free to ask for what you want and we’ll consider your questions.

You can join us in person at Radiant Yoga in Worthington, or online. I personally hope you will come in person for as many of these that work for you and would be delighted to see you on Zoom as well.

grey treefrog on a hazelnut tree leaf

After asking the trees and plants

SO many questions

They said,

“We don’t know

What will happen,

But whatever that is

We are all in this together.”

What I know is that when I saw someone online twirling a dowel around his body, I HAD to learn how to do that. My body said yes, go get a dowel right now and learn these moves. As you probably know, I already have lots of cool embodiment and energetic practices that I love. My body did not care. I needed to learn this, now. As I learned the moves, something happened inside. I feel more grounded and powerful. I have a sense of playfulness around this because it is fun, and I also have a sense of fierceness that allows me to protect myself, if needed. I can stand in the center of my energy and be myself, just as I am, without apology, without needing anyone’s approval. When I stand with my stick I feel like a goddess and a queen and I can feel myself radiating power. It feels good, so good. I want that for me, and I want that for you.

Here is the workshop description:

Can you imagine for a moment, unfurling to your full height, your full physical and energetic space, the full truth of your sacred being? Many of us have learned to be small for lots of reasons, including gender, religion, painful life experiences, and early training. Maybe we stayed small to stay safe, or maybe we were trained that we were too loud-too much-too big, or that our needs, voices and feelings didn’t matter. Now is the time to embody your full self and all its beauty so that every part of you can breathe and shine.

This will not be a workshop of ideas; it will be a time of practicing our embodiment. Beginning with practices and movements that help fill up your inner experience of your body, we’ll expand with yoga and Qigong exercises that fill up space internally and around us physically, vocally, and energetically. The final part of this workshop will include practices using wooden dowel rods to increase our sense of space beyond the reach of our arms. We’ll do exercises using sticks that will tone and strengthen our cores and then learn a simple enough movement repertoire that gives the felt experience of being bigger and more powerful than usual. We’ll end with a potent standing practice where you’ll feel both regal and majestic, alive and joyful in your inner and outer authority.

Each in-person attendee will receive a wooden dowel; if you are attending livestream, you’ll need to purchase a ¾ inch wooden dowel (48” long) at your local hardware store (for about $4). A recording will be available for 3 months. There is only 1 in-person spot left but lots of online spots available.

Aug 15, 1:00 to 3:30p ET at Radiant Yoga and Wellness

Cost: $75

Warning, she says with a grin: in this workshop we will likely infringe on rules you have learned in your life about staying small and about having to be different than you are to be accepted. There may be moments when some parts of you feel nervous but there will be many more moments of glee and empowerment.

Upcoming

UZIT Community Convo with Roger Cole, Tuesday, August 18 7:30 to 8:30p ET Yoga for Sleep: where Science meets Rest. Roger Cole was a frequent and beloved teacher at Yoga on High. He is a long-time yoga teacher and scientist with a specialty on sleep. Free if you come live. You can watch later with a UZIT membership.

Gabriel Kram is coming to Columbus on September 25-27 with an extra day for clinicians. Here is a previous Substack post I wrote about this. Please join us—it will be helpful you and our world to do this work together.

AND save the date for a long UZIT practice on December 6 at 1:00p ET. Brenda Gertmenian and I will be offering all the practices of UZIT so you can start December rested and grounded. Sign up will start next week.

“The number one thing we can do to help the environment is to bring back a wetland that was drained hundreds of years ago.”

To hear the above words spoken by Tom Biebighauser on this podcast woke me up and gave me more hope for our world than usual on a day in Feb last year. He is so enthusiastic and at the same time totally practical, and by the end of the podcast I was ready to dedicate the rest of my life to building and supporting wetlands. In actuality, this is something that had already begun, but the knowing went so much deeper after listening to this inspiring man.

Did you know that since the late 1700s over 90% of Ohio’s wetlands were destroyed? The number may even be higher than this. We were a wet state that settlers and farmers wanted to farm, so every acre that could be drained was. The value of native wetlands was not understood then, but now we are beginning to realize how important they are, especially in these times of climate collapse.

Some benefits of wetlands planted with native plants:

· Wetlands act like giant sponges and can control flooding as the lowest cost way—either by keeping the few remaining ones we have or by restoring them.

· Ground water recharge--when water is slowed down by wetlands more of it returns to the water table.

· Wetlands clean runoff, including storm water runoff.

· Wetlands help protect and encourage rare species including amphibians, birds, plants, bats and other mammals and more

· Wetlands can provide a nursery for fish

· Wetlands are beautiful to look at—bringing wildlife and great joy to your yard and community

· They are educational, helping kids and people of all ages learn about biology in embodied ways

Did you know that wetlands can be small enough to be built in your backyard—these are called vernal pools. They can be a small as a desk and up to any size.

Kevin and I have been fortunate to live next door to a hundred acre wetland and are enjoying the incredible benefits of being able to visit regularly as we learn about the plants and other living beings. And I am so grateful for the sense of awe I experience. My heart is uplifted 100% of the times I visit. We have also designated two areas on the land right next to our barns that will be wetlands by next year. We are hoping to build them ourselves with Tom’s help!

So, when I heard Tom talk about building wetlands where they used to be, and that anyone can do it, I went to his website and found his phone number. I called him up immediately, still super-charged from hearing him talk. He answered right away and we had a fantastic conversation. He is just as entertaining on the phone as he was on the podcast. I told him about a group I am involved with, the Arc of Appalachia, and asked what it might take to host a workshop with him. He gave me details and then I called the Arc and suggested we offer a workshop with him. To get him and the details just right has taken over a year, but my dream is coming to fruition—this fall, from November 5-7, Tom and all of us who are there will build two wetlands during the workshop! Proof that we can do it ourselves is the best way to learn. Details about this program are here.

If you don’t have a large land area or even a back yard, perhaps you know a school, a church, or a local park that could benefit from a small wetland. Let’s get rid of all that grass and give the land to one of its original purposes in Ohio—wetlands.

We abuse land because we see it as a commodity belonging to us.

When we see land as a community to which we belong,

we may begin to use it with love and respect.”

-Aldo Leopold

Thanks to Thomas Biebighauser’s website for the photos here.

Other upcoming events:

The Post Retreat Meditation Course. 5:00p ET

Info and signup here. Each session may be joined individually as well. And of course, each week after that I teach Yoga Exploration starting at 5:45p ET

Take Up Your Full Space: Workshop on August 15 from 1:00 to 3:30p ET

Can you imagine for a moment, unfurling to your full height, your full physical and energetic space, the full truth of your sacred being? Many of us have learned to be small for lots of reasons, including gender, religion, painful life experiences, and early training. Maybe we stayed small to stay safe, or maybe we were trained that we were too loud-too much-too big, or that our needs, voices and feelings didn’t matter. Now is the time to embody your full self and all its beauty so that every part of you can breathe and shine. Link for more information and registration

Gabriel Kram is coming to Columbus on September 25-27 with an extra day for clinicians. Here is a previous Substack post I wrote about this. Please join us—it will be helpful you and our world to do this work together.

AND save the date for a long UZIT practice on December 6 at 1:00p ET. Brenda Gertmenian and I will be offering all the practices of UZIT so you can start December rested and grounded. Sign up will start next week.

Friends,
I had quite the birthday this year. It was mostly silent, I was mostly outdoors in one of the most beautiful places I know, with two of my dearest friends, Linda and Michele. This poem just landed on the paper after I got back to the house before our small group meditation, and the sutra at the end was the basis of a very joyful and uplifting meditation that I experienced that morning. 

And as I stepped off the stairs
for my early morning walk
there they were
three deep red, 
perfectly ripe
thimbleberries.
Happy Birthday to me
as I take this gift onto my grateful tongue.

They were not ripe yesterday.
And while I know berries
ripen every day,
I choose to take this offering 
personally,
Nature offering one of her own
a sweetness on this particular day.
Sated with wild flavor, I continue on.

I’m off to visit the elderberry that has called to me 
since I first saw it on the side of the road yesterday.
Elderberries in the Cascade mountains?  So tall? So wide?
I want to, I need to 
see them up close—like an old friend
you pass on the street and know 
you have to call them and sit across from each other over tea.
Today I keep going
and,
there she is!
My heart leaps—is it really you?
Yes, and there is a rush of recognition and 
love even. 
Like that Radiance Sutra where you steep in the joy of seeing a loved one you haven’t seen for a long time. 

my friend the elderberry

Later, I had the thought,
That sometime in the past
I might have called this yearning to see the elderberry
“attachment.”
And might have practiced “non-attachment” by staying away, 
by conquering, or denying that desire.
And I’m doubly glad 
that this morning,
I followed my heart.


The aforementioned sutra, #48 from The Radiance Sutras, by Lorin Roche, PhD 

In the great joy of seeing
A loved one after a long absence,
A flash of recognition ignites you,
Space becomes charged,
The bond between you shimmers,
And a surge of delight arises in your being.

Beloved,
Find within you the source of this surge.
Melt into that place of upwelling,
A wave rolling in a vast ocean of delight.

Upcoming Events:

Linda, Michele and I had precious meditation time last week together and individually. I have lots of great practices to share with you in my new upcoming meditation course:

The Post Retreat Meditation Course. Starts Wednesday, July 22, 5:00p ET

Info and signup here. And of course, each week after that I teach Yoga Exploration starting at 5:45p ET

UZIT Community Convos open to everyone, Tue, Jul 21, 2026 @ 7:30pm ET: Savasana, Complete Relaxation, the Sleep Alternative Richard Rosen in conversation with Rodney Yee. Link to sign up for free is here.

Take Up Your Full Space: Workshop on August 15 from 1:00 to 3:30p ET

Can you imagine for a moment, unfurling to your full height, your full physical and energetic space, the full truth of your sacred being? Many of us have learned to be small for lots of reasons, including gender, religion, painful life experiences, and early training. Maybe we stayed small to stay safe, or maybe we were trained that we were too loud-too much-too big, or that our needs, voices and feelings didn’t matter. Now is the time to embody your full self and all its beauty so that every part of you can breathe and shine. Link for more information and registration

Gabriel Kram is coming to Columbus on September 25-27 with an extra day for clinicians. Here is a previous Substack post I wrote about this. Please join us—it will be helpful you and our world to do this work together.

We mystics and healers who practice Reiki and other energy healing traditions, we who pray, who make offerings or do rituals, we artists who can envision and create something new, have much we can do. When we are touching into Life Force itself we are One with Everything and the power of that cannot be overstated. When we are full of love for all of life we radiant energy and warmth. If you know me you know I enjoy fierce resistance when necessary. I learned to say no, then NO, and love to do so. But what I love even more is to say YES with my full body, my full energetic being.

When I am saying NO to a huge data center next door, I have so many YESes. Here are a few:

· I say YES to letting the land breathe and exist without having to be paved over.

· I am saying YES to rain water trickling through the earth to end up clean and fresh into the Hellbranch Run that then flows into the Big Darby without more pollution.

· I am saying YES to birds, insects, amphibians, tiny and large mammals and other wildlife that need and deserve a place to live and flourish. (Part of me is just so aghast that I even have to write that last sentence, but since it does seem to be necessary, I’ll leave it.)

· I am saying YES to all the people in this area that want to breathe clean fresh air and we have chosen to live here in part for that.

· I’m saying YES to all the native plants that support all the native insects which do so much for all our lives.

· I’m saying YES to the children and their teachers at the school a few hundred yards away, that their air will be free of pollutants that are already making children sick in other communities.

· I’m saying YES to natural silence and YES to natural darkness.

· I’m saying YES to the whole Darby Creek area that helps to protect this gem of a river in our state and in our country.

· I’m saying YES to the 10,000 acres of Metro Park land nearby.

· I’m saying YES to the years of re-wilding we have done on the land where we live; we have learned to be good stewards and that work, and the work of so many like us will be destroyed.

· I’m saying YES to all my neighbors, human and otherwise.

· And mostly, most emphatically, I am saying YES to the interconnection of all things, all beings, and our ability to honor that with wisdom, love, and gratitude.

Kevin and a good friend looking at tadpoles in the wetland. If built, the data center would be on the upper right hand corner.

Reiki Sending: Here are a few examples of how these YESes play out in my Reiki practice. Nearly every day I send Reiki to those in need. I have a little handmade book I write names in. It is an extra blessing that these books are made by student and friend, Christy Brand, and she gives me a new one whenever I need it. I absolutely know that her Reiki hands making the books increase the blessings that go out. When I send, I send to support Life. For example, if someone has a disease, I am not sending to get rid of the disease; I’m sending so that Life can support that person in the best way for them. I’m sending so that their vitality and ease may be increased, because then bodies can help themselves, if that is what is best for someone, which is not up to me.

When I am sending to the land recently purchased by the company that wants to build the data center, I am sending to the health and vitality of the land and our human and biodiverse community as a whole. I envision wild nature, not a huge, noisy warehouse filled with computers. Then as I send I am filled with love and energy, and often creative ideas of what to do next. It’s so interesting to experience this. Sometimes I just feel hopeless and distressed by what is happening, but when I shift to sending mode, I see and feel so much beauty and a much bigger picture that holds everything as sacred. I am uplifted and vast. At least once a week, I get together with Reiki sisters Linda Oshins and Luann Jacobs and sending in our group magnifies this experience into pure bliss.

When I drive by the land the data center folks bought, I sometimes shudder with a feeling of dread and as soon as possible shift into Reiki mode. I raise a hand and feel into the love I have for butterflies and dragonflies, frogs and wild grasses, and my neighbors being able to breathe and relax in their homes.

Nearly every time I am walking the wetland next to our home, I offer Reiki symbols for the health and vitality of this precious and re-wilding land. I can feel something happening and it is good.

Helpers: This week as I was pulling into the parking lot for my acupuncture appointment I got really bad news about our area. A developer is buying up huge tracts of land and no one knows for what. I have long been concerned that the data center folks would want even more land, and some land nearby is what the developer is buying. Maybe houses or maybe not, we don’t know yet. But instead of the 125 acres we have been focused on, it is now more like 500 to 600 acres. I was totally disturbed and upset as I walked in the door. Heidi (of Pinned Acupuncture (you already know I adore her) was there with her calm and empathic demeanor. We talked briefly about what I had just learned and how I was both angry and heart-broken and knowing I was in the right place to re-settle. She listened to my pulses and put in the needles. Mostly it doesn’t hurt to get needled, but two points were excruciating with a painful shock-like electricity moving far away from the point. This happened twice—both were heart protector points. Makes sense. Eventually they calmed down and she left me alone to deeply relax. My body loves acupuncture and soon I could feel sweet energy flowing through my arms and legs with a kind of wave-like inner energetic motion rolling up and down my body.

Then in a kind of day-dreamy vision I saw the room I was in differently. There were two tables in a bigger space with a pair of sheer curtains between then. And a man with a beard was in the other room and pulled back the curtains. Then he gently laid one of his hands on my torso in what felt like the perfect spot. It felt so good and I received the offering deeply. A small part of me was confused because I knew there wasn’t a curtain and another table there, yet it felt so true and right to have that hand on my torso. Later it occurred to me that he was one of the invisible helpers that come to us sometimes during Reiki. At least that’s where my mind landed. Where my heart landed was that in a time of great need, I was given a powerful gift to be able to keep going. I remembered experientially that there are always lots of resources available to us and I was SO grateful for this support. The rest of the session felt extremely supportive as well and I left the appointment in a very different state that the one I arrived in.

Ancestors: This morning I sent my siblings a text saying that I had become my parents as I worked to protect a nearby river that I love. My dad was on the zoning board of our township once they moved to the country. He always said that zoning boards are where all the real power is. My mother became an activist in her 60s when the New Albany Company began construction on their huge community development upstream from the banks of the stream we lived on. The construction, that often did not follow EPA guidelines for protecting water ways, was killing the river. We said good bye to our beloved crawdads and other tiny critters as silt flooded the bottom of the creek. My mother got together with neighbors, scientists, people from every environmental organization she could find, and insisted the construction companies followed the law. She sent daily pictures of transgressions to the EPA so they would be encouraged to do their job. Later that day I sat up with a start—let’s ask the ancestors to help! My parents even have the right skill set! This is a practice from many cultural traditions and indigenous groups that I have been including in my life since my ancestors started coming to me during meditation and Reiki. When I meditate and send Reiki to them I honor their work in the world and ask them to bless me with skills and energy to keep going and be effective. Sometimes I light a candle or make offerings; other times I write letters to them. Sometimes I make paintings on their behalf. There are many ways to honor the ancestors and I was so happy I remembered to get back to this.

I started this blog thinking I would go through all manner of things we can do. Perhaps this is enough for one day to help you see that using our subtle, life-enhancing energy opens portals for us and our beloveds to know that we are linking into the forcefield of Life with them. We are not begging with desperation, though maybe sometimes we are and that’s Ok too. Does doing these magical practices mean we will get everything we want? No, I don’t assume that at all. Outcomes are never mine to know. What I do know is that we are entering the fullness and magic of Life itself as we connect to and become something greater than us. Love and Life pour through the world in creative and potent ways. That is enough—more than enough. What feels like yours to love, to do?

Upcoming Events:

UZIT Community Convos open to everyone, Tue, Jul 21, 2026 @ 7:30pm ET: Savasana, Complete Relaxation, the Sleep Alternative Richard Rosen in conversation with Rodney Yee. Link to sign up for free is here.

New Meditation Course starts July 22, Post-Retreat Meditation Course

I’ll be back from my silent retreat filled with inspiration and practices that felt meaningful to me. Wednesday evenings through August. Link for info and registration is here.

Take Up Your Full Space

Workshop on August 15 from 1:00 to 3:30p ET

Can you imagine for a moment, unfurling to your full height, your full physical and energetic space, the full truth of your sacred being? Many of us have learned to be small for lots of reasons, including gender, religion, painful life experiences, and early training. Maybe we stayed small to stay safe, or maybe we were trained that we were too loud-too much-too big, or that our needs, voices and feelings didn’t matter. Now is the time to embody your full self and all its beauty so that every part of you can breathe and shine. Link for more information and registration

Gabriel Kram is coming to Columbus on September 25-27 with an extra day for clinicians. Here is a previous Substack post I wrote about this. Please join us—it will be helpful you and our world to do this work together.

The Big Darby Creek, the cleanest river in Ohio and a state and national treasure

People are resisting data centers all over our state and country and we certainly have more than our share already in the Central Ohio area. And, when one of these centers is proposed in your area it gets personal. It’s personal for me.

If you have been reading my work for a while, you know I live on a farm that my husband Kevin and I have been actively re-wilding with native plants, shrubs, and lots of trees—so many trees. We have put in between 7-10 large areas of prairie (when I say we, I really mean Kevin) and have removed lots of invasive plants as well. In 2020 we purchased the 100 acre farm next to us and after much research, facilitated the construction of a wetland which just began its third year this spring. The biodiversity that is already present is honestly astounding given the fact that the land had been an industrial farm for over 100 years and was plowed and poisoned at least once a year. This past spring we had hundreds, maybe thousands, of migrating water fowl, including ducks of all kinds, many rare in this area. There were three types of sandpipers who came through. Sandpipers! There are at least 3 endangered species of birds nesting on the land with many more that are in the “almost endangered” list. Because there is water and a wide variety of native plants in the wetland, there are many amphibians, and insects galore. Interestingly, we don’t see many mosquitos as there are so many predators for them, but there are huge numbers of dragonflies, damselflies, lightening bugs and an exciting variety of butterflies and moths, along with other insects that help feed the birds, their babies, and other creatures.

Birding at the wetland on Mother’s Day with one of my sons

In early April, as we were joyfully adding many new species of birds to our ever growing list of what lives here or flies through, we learned that a company that builds data centers had bought land adjacent to the wetland. Our hearts sank and then sank some more as we learned what so many of you are also learning these days: that data centers add tremendous amounts of air, noise, water and light pollution to our environment. And in that location, there is a tributary of the Big Darby Creek and runoff could harm the number one river in Ohio with the greatest biodiversity—by far. That’s right, in our backyards, is the number one river for cleanliness and diversity in the entire state. One of the reasons we moved out here is because of the Big Darby and the beautiful Metro Parks along it. And our area has a great deal of land that has been conserved as natural areas for ever, including 1300 acres within one mile of the proposed data center, with about ten thousand more acres when you include the parks.

There is so much more I could say here, about greed, about our society’s lack of respect for nature, our hunger always for more more more. I have written elsewhere about the absolute beauty and awe of what can happen when we give Life a chance. One small example: Even as numbers of birds decline nationally, we have seen our overall numbers and diversity double in the last 5 years here on this land as we have added what they need. Nature is ready and willing to heal the land if given half a chance.

But there are steps to take, and I want to give you a list of actions and ways to stay informed. Do what you can and what you feel called to. And please share this far and wide.

Because this proposed data center is in the Darby Creek Accord area, and the Darby Accord was created to protect the Big Darby from over-development, we are somewhat hopeful AND not taking anything for granted. And because the Darby Accord is an agreement between multiple cities and counties, there are lots of ways to affect what happens here. As I have been trying to find the best levers to push for what I want, it has not been entirely clear despite dozens of calls and meetings with people who each have some piece of the puzzle. And the truth is, data centers started becoming a problem so recently that no one really knows much, and definitely there are not great (or many) regulations that are relevant to the huge impact they are having. I’ll offer lots of options and depending on where you live, please make calls or show up if you can.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

Did you know that action reduces anxiety and hopelessness

Come to a meeting on Thursday, June 25, 6:00 to 8:00p at the Prairie Township Community Center, 5955 W. Broad St. If you love the Darby Creek please show up and show your concern. Even if you are not from Prairie Township, we are hoping to make it clear to our township trustees that this area is of value to our entire central Ohio community and beyond. Our trustees have put in place a 6 month moratorium, but what comes next is uncertain. Also, there are ways around that moratorium which is why I have multiple things for you to do.

Call these people on Columbus City Council:

Shannon Hardin:

Jessica Clinger
Legislative Aide
(614) 645-6354
jnclinger@columbus.gov

Linda Capobianco
Legislative Assistant
(614) 645-2726
lmcapobianco@columbus.gov

Nancy Day-Achauer She is the council member in charge of the Darby Accord

Jacob Dilley
Legislative Aide
(614)-645-5292
jadilley@columbus.gov

Marwah Warsame
Legislative Analyst
(614) 724-1260
mawarsame@columbus.gov

Tiara Ross

Mercedes Wiley
Legislative Aide
(614) 645-6546
mdwiley@columbus.gov

Ciera Adams
Legislative Analyst
(614) 645-3773
csadams@columbus.gov

Melissa Green

Haley Gerken
Legislative Aide
(614) 645-0076
hegerken@columbus.gov

John Drury
Legislative Analyst
(614) 645-1319
jadrury@columbus.gov

One possible script: Tell them you vote in Columbus (if you do) and that you are concerned about the data center proposed for the Darby Accord area. You do not want that land annexed to Columbus and do not want the data center built. You are concerned about water pollution and the quality of the Hamilton Run Creek and any runoff that would go to the Big Darby. You are concerned about the wildlife that is already in this area with hundreds of acres of already conserved land with huge amounts of biodiversity. You are concerned about the air, noise, and light pollution which has been shown to have harmful effects in the communities where they have already been built. Let them know that you know that the Big Darby Creek is one of the most beautiful things about Central Ohio and that we would like them to protect it like the crown jewel that it is.

If you are not used to making calls, be brave. I was nervous at first but now find it exciting. Plan out what you want to say and start by calling when you are likely to get voice mail so you can practice. Now I like to call when I know someone is there so I can make my priorities expensive for their time and make all my points and ask where they stand. They almost never say but I like to ask anyway. The more of us who call, the more they have to do something to make it stop—remember they face us at the polls.

Oh Lordy, you are registered to vote aren’t you? If not go here: https://www.ohiosos.gov/elections/register-to-vote You must be registered 30 days before an election. DO IT NOW!

Follow The Darby Creek Association on Facebook for important news and announcements: https://www.facebook.com/darbycreekassociation

Call Prairie Township Trustees

• Cathy Schmelzer, Trustee
  614-679-9485

• Rod Pritchard, Trustee
  614-216-3386

• Doug Stormont, Trustee
  614-209-9122

Call your Ohio representative. If you don’t already have them in your contacts (I know you do, don’t you?) find them here.

https://ohiohouse.gov/

When I am calling my rep I always say I live in their district and that I am a voter.

Call your state senator. https://www.ohiosenate.gov/members/district-map When I am calling my senator I always say I live in their district and that I am a voter.

Say something similar to the script above. You can also include that you want them to pass legislation that prevents NDAs and creates protections for people in the communities where they want to build. We also want the centers that are built to be powered by solar and other renewable energies. And no more tax incentives or credits for these companies who are some of the richest in the world. Also, once these centers are built there are almost no jobs.

Call your US representative. Find them here: https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative

Call your US senators:

Bernie Moreno: 202-224-2315

Jon Husted: 202-224-3353

Again, since there are few meaningful laws ask them to pass meaningful legislation like what is outlined above.

Links to important groups in Ohio doing good work around data centers

Save Ohio Parks Much of the fracking that is currently or about to happen in our parks is to get more natural gas to fuel energy-hungry data centers. We are the only state in the country that fracks in our state parks! Their blog gives lots of important details and the website is full of important information and suggestions of ways you can help.

Ohio Environmental Council: The OEC has really stepped up to the data center issue and is working on multiple fronts to support the environmental protections we will need to survive.

Conserve Ohio This is the group collecting signatures to ban largescale data centers in Oho. I am collecting signatures—we’re now looking to be on the ballot in 2027.

Policy Matters Ohio And yet another group that has turned a lot of their attention to data centers. They have big area on the website about data centers.

Here are a few videos that give you an idea of what people are living next to, because yes, many of these are built right next to neighborhoods and schools:

The sound of a data center

This is what it is like to live 400 yards from Mark Zuckerberg’s data center:

And finally, one of the ways I am able to sleep and find joy in the midst of all this is by doing the activism I see in front of me and including beautiful walks so I steep in the awe of what the parts of the world already are. I have practices of Yoga and Reiki that connect me to everything everywhere and that helps too. I know I am not alone in this work and invite you to join. You will be glad that you are doing something to keep creating the world we want to live in. It’s not enough to know what you are against, though that is important. But the real changes come as you visualize what you want!

Blessings to you all and hope to see you on Thursday.

What I will say here is that I never expected this retreat to feel like a spiritual retreat and yet it did. Part of our learning was cognitive, mostly as a framework for the primarily experiential work we were doing. Once again my teacher Gabriel Kram (who is coming to Columbus this fall and you just have to be there—see below) talked about the same things he has been saying for years, and also said them in totally new ways that landed deeper in me than ever. And we mostly practiced: we practiced being fully human, we practiced noticing our animal bodies with our longings and our wildness, we practiced knowing ourselves to be a part of the living world (not something separate from or dominant to it), we practiced feeling into each other’s experiences (with permission) so we could support each other as we attended to whatever wanted to be expressed through our bodies. And when I say “we practiced” what I really mean to say is that we were humans being humans together on this earth interconnected with all the other beings, the plants, animals, birds, salamanders and other lifeforms—and we paid attention as we were that. The creek flowing through the property, the ancient Douglas Firs, the ferns, the birds in dialogue with us (I swear they were and I’m not the only one who knows this), the earth herself, we were all part of the same ecosystem, and it was beautiful. And what I felt clearer and clearer each day, was love for it all, love for each other—a few of whom I had only recently met, a few of whom I have known over several years, and I just loved us all so very much. This is not the “in love” kind of love, but an open-hearted “seeing us all as one” kind of love—love despite any limitations or annoyances. And that love included the land and the stream and all the rest of it—and if that kind of vast love isn’t spiritual, I don’t know what is.

our retreat classroom

I have been to this special land before and have my favorite places. Each morning when we arrived we were invited to go to a sit spot, or a standing spot, and just be for about 30 minutes on the ground with the sights, sounds and felt sense of the earth beneath us. The second day I headed up along my favorite place near the creek where I have loved lying back on soft earth among ferns, with the rhythm of the sound of water rolling over rocks…. And that day, no, I wasn’t feeling it. This was not the spot my body wanted to be. Surprised, I got up and decided to let my body tell me where to go. It was a felt experiment. At each step I felt either a clear no or a clear yes and I followed the yeses.

What I realized looking back at the retreat later, was that my body and heart were preparing for this retreat long before I got there. There were many foreshadowings of what was to come that I was not aware of beforehand. Our bodies are so very wise, our autonomic nervous systems (ANS) are so very wise, and I was being prepared without any conscious involvement.

And so, as I found my spot for the day, this way (not that way), turn here, go over this tiny creek here, move over 3 feet, exactly right here….yes this exact spot near the creek but on the other side up a hill, overlooking our outdoor classroom. I sat down, wriggling my butt as I nestled into my spot the way a duck nestles into her nest. Even as I sat in the just right spot, “this perfect place” (as is quoted in the Radiance Sutras), my mind was very active: what will happen today? What will happen the rest of this week? What will I be called to work with? Who will support me and who will I be supporting and will I be able to do it? All the unknowable questions arose and as I saw they were in fact unknowable I placed my hands on the dirt and shifted to deeply sensing and feeling the earth under me and nature around me as both physical and vibratory sensation. The pulse of life was all around me and in me. I felt how the earth, and this place were, in fact, holding me. And feeling held was such a relief from all the thinking, worrying and planning that I have ever done in my whole life, I allowed myself to be held and softened into that.

In that sweet moment, I had a familiar flashback to the shocking moment when my dear friend Martha told me that my husband had died that morning, in our house. We were sitting in the corner of our shared office, and she was gentle and brave with her words. She drove me home and in the next moment of sitting there in the woods I had the other flashback that has come so many times in my life: me standing in my second-floor hallway, with Martha, my father, and the police officer who met us there. And in that moment in the woods, something happened that has never happened since that day 20 years ago: my eyes started tearing up. There was a soft sadness, and as I kept sitting there, held in safety and beauty, eventually one tear slid down my cheek, and soon after a tear from the other eye released as well. It was somehow very powerful to feel this completely appropriate response with such softness and sorrow. Without any drama. There didn’t seem to be more that wanted to happen—no deep dive into more sadness or grief—just these few tears that day that felt right and felt enough. And sacred. I felt soft for a long time after, and grateful for each tear.

These few tears were a long time coming, especially after so many years of flashbacks which were an indication of my whole system being overwhelmed at that time. I have worked many ways with these flashback memories and the whole experience of his death by suicide, including several powerful sessions with Gabriel and our cohort at other retreats. All of that work has been useful and beautiful. And it all led to this precious moment in the woods. Do I imagine I am done with this loss, this grief? No, not at all, but tender tears feel like a new stage in this journey and I’m happy to be with it just as it is.

There is more to share, and I’ll have a part two soon.

And in the meantime, here are a few events I’m sure you’ll want to know about:

UZIT Community Conversation with Gary Strauss on Holding Space. FREE and OPEN TO EVERYONE if you come live. Link to sign up is here. Tuesday, June 16, 7:30 to 8:30p ET

Take Up Your Full Space

Workshop on August 15 from 1:00 to 3:30p ET

Can you imagine for a moment, unfurling to your full height, your full physical and energetic space, the full truth of your sacred being? Many of us have learned to be small for lots of reasons, including gender, religion, painful life experiences, and early training. Maybe we stayed small to stay safe, or maybe we were trained that we were too loud-too much-too big, or that our needs, voices and feelings didn’t matter. Now is the time to embody your full self and all its beauty so that every part of you can breathe and shine. Link for more information and registration

Gabriel Kram is coming to Columbus on September 25-27 with an extra day for clinicians. Here is a previous Substack post I wrote about this. Please join us—it will be helpful you and our world to do this work together.

Lorin Roche, one of my most fabulous teachers of meditation and living life with joy and gusto, died recently and I have been thinking about him and all I have learned from him since. These four weeks will be weeks for me, for us, to steep in his work in specific ways:

• his attitude toward what householder Westerners need vs monks (hint: they need different practices)

• how to use mantras with personal relevance and a sense of jazz rather than rote repetition

• how to trust and appreciate the ways our bodies are always nourishing and healing us, and more.

Join us for the magic that will be unfolding; of course, there will be some of his poetic sutras tossed in as well.

Dates: Wednesdays, June 3, 17, 24, July 1 ( no class on June 10)

Cost is $85 or Radiant monthly pass

5:00 to 5:30p ET (we generally stay together until 5:40 but the practices are always done by 5:30) In-person at Radiant Yoga in Worthington, OH, and livestream with recordings sent afterwards which are available for 3 months. You can sign up here.

More Thoughts about Lorin and his death

I have been thinking of him continually since then and replaying my memories of our times together. I can say for sure, he changed my life, but only to become more myself. I watched him and his equally creative wife Camille affect the lives of many around me—magic couple as they were.

I have been crying a lot since he died but mostly from a tender and unbelievable gratitude that I got to know him. I didn’t see him daily or even that often, though we did communicate regularly. But oh, how wonderful it was to be with him.

One of the things I have most thought about is how I watched him deepen and ripen these last years. He was always so fun, so cool, and so nerdy, all at the same time. He could geek out on computers, and the Vijnana Bhairava, the text he lived with for decades, slowly finding the poetic words for the way the practices affected him.

I was often with my first energy teacher, Katherine Dufrane, at the end of her life. She was the one who gave me his book! I saw in her a total completion of her life’s work in a way that left me knowing that enlightenment in this life is possible for us seemingly ordinary humans, with husbands, jobs and personality quirks as well. I believe I saw this in Lorin as well and I am doubly heartened.

Watching Lorin these last few years deepen into his life and his teaching was beyond another gift. He lived in joy and delight so much of the time and that apparently was how he died. He called us to the “flame of our beings,” to love, to authenticity, and to tenderness toward each other in these challenging times. He too become more himself, which also meant a full part of the universe, dissolving into ecstasy in life, and in death.

This poem that follows was written the day I learned of his death from Camille. She generously called me to let me know since I had been in contact with Lorin a few days earlier.

The Lorin Roche Memorial Walk

I knew it when I saw her name ringing on my phone.
Could hear it in her voice before she even spoke a full word,
He took his last breath, he is free.
His body dead, his vast loving spirit even vaster and more loving.
I assumed he had gone home from the hospital to rest and heal;
he went home to die.
We hung up, I had to sit down.

So grateful to know; so sorry to know.
I cried and I was glad for him.
I made Reiki symbols for him and laughed out loud, realizing he didn’t need them.
But I needed them and sent Reiki to whatever this new phase is for him,
And for all of us who love him still.
I cried some more and sat in meditation in his honor, letting everything
be as it was:
opening a portal to him and feeling such love.
Love and gratitude flowing through me, offered and received.
Thoughts too, no problem.
Thoughts of Camille, and how different this would be after so many years of the two of them….

Restless, so full of emotion, I answered a text,
And then decided that a memorial walk would be just right since I didn’t want to sit still and wanted to be outside where it was big enough to breathe again.
It’s freezing here today, though past mid-April, so with puffy coat and warm scarf,
I went out to walk.
A few rain drops fell, and I pulled up my hood and walked anyway, a blessing of
holy water from the clouds.

I’m in that time between cataract surgeries—one eye seeing better than ever and the other eye so blurry. I see some things and not others. I notice for the first time this spring that of the two cypress trees opposite each other on the driveway, one is fully dead and the other is leafing out in the most glorious spring green leaves,

Live and death everywhere……always

Fluffy clouds in the shapes of sea animals, perhaps keeping Lorin company on his journey to everywhere.
The birds are accompaniment to my footsteps
and I remember again the first time he came here to the farm
and carpenter bees were drilling big holes in the wood around all the porches.
Each morning he would go outside and greet them with excitement, deriving such pleasure from them.

Everything is a portal to Oneness, even a carpenter bee. Especially a carpenter bee!
EVERYTHING is a portal to Oneness
EVERYTHING IS A PORTAL TO ONENESS.
Take it in if you can, and I’m speaking to myself here as well.

Everything

is

a

portal

to

Oneness.

Remembering and just rereading his wonderful calls and texts out of nowhere,
“Marcia, let’s chat.”
And “Love to Marcia, I miss you.”
And once he sent me a guided meditation, that let me know he had been thinking of me and imagining exactly what I needed. The meditation was perfect..

Step by step I kept walking, sun low but not quite sunset; the light was stunning. Maybe it was the new lens in my eye or maybe it was the shine of the world with him in it in a new way.

Step by step—I walked by a prairie we planted 2 years ago and there it was—Golden Alexander, a stunningly bright yellow native plant that is newly blooming and food for caterpillars, butterflies and native bees. Everything is a portal to Oneness especially Golden Alexander.

Step by step, I would walk to the ocean if I could—his favorite place.

Step by step I remember the last course I took with him a year ago.
He gave us
EVERYTHING.
I wondered then if this would be the last main teaching to his experienced students, though I didn’t really want to think that way.
On a new plane of existence even then, he was not holding anything back. Drifting in and out of ecstasy with words shared from Bliss.

Step by step and then remembering the beginning—those first looks at his book, The Radiance Sutras, given to me by my other main teacher, Katherine Dufrane, her body now long gone.
I inhaled the book and then called him up inviting him to come to Yoga on High to teach. He said yes and that was the beginning of our long relationship.

And now as I type, darkness has come; I’m alone in the house and ready to meditate again. Words on paper freeing up the space to just be with him in my heart which is “as wide as a spiral galaxy.*” 
Thank you forever, dear Lorin

Also a line from The Radiance Sutras.

Have You Grieved Enough?

Oh, the shock in my body when I heard these words, 
sitting on a stump around a long wooden slab of a table
deep in the woods, 
with people who were becoming my trusted friends and allies
alongside ancient Douglas Firs.
The deep geologic trembling, the shaking,
My face erupting like a volcano
as everything reshaped itself inside me.
The instant tears of being seen…
The impossibly freeing invitation to be myself.
Not, Are you done yet? but 
Have    you    grieved    enough?

I had always felt like too much:
the tears,
the exhaustion,
the longing for something that could never be,
the hiding of my feelings so as not to bother someone else
because if they were freaked out about the deaths of my daughters,
it was harder for me.
It was too much to train unknowing (not uncaring) people 
what to say or not say.
Always trying to be DONE with grief 
To be “spiritual enough” to let go 
And get on with my life….

What if someone had asked me that question in my twenties? 
Or my thirties?
My life would have been so different.
And it’s different now—just knowing the question exists.

Deep gratitude to Ali Montgomery for sharing her experience with this question. This poem is dedicated to her and my young grieving self.

Friends,

This poem was already in play when I was asked to facilitate a day holding space for a group to grieve together. And now, this is the title of the workshop that will be offered by the Spirituality Network, downtown Columbus, on Saturday, May 30 from 9:00 to 4:30p. They are keeping the price very low for which I am glad, only $75 for the day.

Have You Grieved Enough? A Day of Grief and Love in Community

The denial of death is a powerful and destructive force in our culture. The topic is one many of us avoid or find uncomfortable. On this day in May, we will come together to break this taboo of silence. Together, in community, we will create a safe-enough container to explore important conversations and practices around death and grief. Together we will bear witness to grief, fear, shame, and guilt, and likely even relief, joy and laughter. It’s complicated. Being present to our full selves can help us to be present to the precious beauty of life.

This day will include much conversation, simple movement, with options for art, energy work and other practices needed to support our time together.

Workshop link

I rarely use the word “should.” But when I use it take note. I have been studying with Gabriel Kram for about 4 years. He has evolved a model of the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) that is the clearest and most complete that I have ever seen. It is way beyond what I learned 50 years ago as a beginning yoga teacher and way beyond what rocked my world when I started studying Polyvagal Theory. And, it is beyond what many people learn in medical school, and other advanced degrees. Cutting edge. Yet, this information, these practices that support our deepest sense of safety and connection, should be taught to everyone! He is the author of many books, the most relevant for this weekend workshop is called The Neurobiology of Connection. This is what I wrote for a cover blurb for this book:

“The Neurobiology of Connection is a book we all need—a user’s manual for our nervous systems. Brilliantly insightful and practical, we can learn to understand why we are the way we are moment-to-moment, meet our needs in ways that heal old traumas, and enhance deep connection with other humans and the world around us. Gabriel brings together material from indigenous cultures, neuroscience, neurochemistry, mindfulness, somatically informed trauma work, Polyvagal Theory, and literature, combined with attention to his inner world, in order to create an updated model of the Autonomic Nervous System. I have made so many changes to the way I teach, and my students are loving it!”

This is all still true and as I keep working with him, I have learned so much about how to free myself from old conditioning that no longer serves me, even though it served my survival at earlier ages. And as I have experienced this, I have become freer to be myself in my fullness. There is more space in me and around me. I have more choices of how to show up in the world as certain patterns are noticed and re-wired. And these options give me even more safety as I move through this complicated and often dangerous, (and beautiful) world.

I have also learned to track what is going on in my students and clients in new ways. I believe I am much more useful to them now than ever. I have a much better sense of what is happening in their ANS and what they might need to support what is going on. Also, I have met some really smart and interesting people from all kinds of backgrounds in his workshops.

Here is the full description and information about this workshop coming up September 25-27, 2026

Living the Neurobiology of Connection

Our work is about coming home to yourself through the autonomic nervous system, which is the deepest layer of your nervous system, with the strongest shaping force over your lived-moment-to-moment experience of wellbeing. We will spend one evening and two days exploring the experiential practice of deepening our embodied experience of safety and opening the neurological doors to connection in and through the body. Our bodies have an innate and aboriginal language that most of us do not speak at all. In this two-day training, Gabriel will work to acquaint (re-acquaint) you with this deepest primal animal and embodied aspect of being. We will learn to communicate with our own nervous systems, and that of others through the embodied language of sensation, and begin to learn to read to map of our own (and other people’s) autonomic selves.

This is a layer of self beneath language, and far beneath thinking, and it is spoken by animals in the forest as well as humans. Our goal is to help acquaint you with, and deepen into an experience of the vitality of this autonomic self.

In this two-day in-person training in Columbus, Ohio we’ll deep-dive into the neurobiology of connection, focusing on autonomic fluency, and the five doorways to enduring wellbeing. Safety is the doorway to connection, connection is the doorway to interoception (feeling into yourself), interoception is the doorway to intuition, intuition is the doorway to relatedness, relatedness is the doorway to enduring wellbeing. This training is capped at forty (40) participants. Participants will receive a complimentary copy of Restorative Practices of Wellbeing.

For whom is this training appropriate?

• Yogis

• Meditation practitioners

• Anyone with an interoceptive or somatics or movement practice, including coaches and wellness professionals

• Therapists

• Interested individuals of all kinds wishing to apply the principles of autonomics to wellbeing.

For whom would it not be appropriate? People taking psychotropic medications, people with active substance abuse issues, people with complex chronic illness (what I’m teaching about autonomic intervention won’t work the same way for you), people with Axis 2 disorders (personality disorders), people in extreme distress, or mental health crisis.

In order to benefit from this training you should be in a relatively balanced place– somewhat subjective given the dumpster fire of modernity, we realize– but you need a base of some stability in the body and mind to integrate this material in ways that are useful.

ABOUT YOUR INSTRUCTOR:

Natureza Gabriel is an ancestral neuroscience pioneer, the Developer of Autonomics, the architect of The Autonomic Compass self-healing software, and the Founder of Hearth Science. He is the author
of The Neurobiology of Connection and other books, developed the Autonomics poster series, and teaches the art and science of connection around the world. He has been asked
to teach Autonomics to the faculty of medical schools, world leading executive
coaching firms, global social movements, and Indigenous tribal leaders.

Sign up here. Cost is $400 for the weekend.

Friday evening 4:00 t0 7:00p ET

Saturday & Sunday 9:00a to 4:00p

Location: Columbus, OH
Our present plan is to host the Friday and Saturday portion at Radiant Yoga & Wellness in Worthington.
And Sunday we’ll be in Battelle-Darby Park where we’ve rented a building for a mostly nature-themed day.

Also, A Day for Clinicians

September 28, 2026

This class is by invitation. Fill out the Expression of Interest for the Columbus training September 25-27. Indicate your interest there. That training is pre-requisite to this training..

Join Gabriel for a day focused on the clinical application of Autonomics.

This is a small group (12 participants plus instructors) deep-dive into the clinical side of applying autonomics in your work with clients. We try to make this kind of small-group work sensitive to the particular needs of participants, and their particular clinical and nervous system interests, and we tend to work emergently. Yet we are likely to address:

•precise neuro-anatomy of the autonomic systems

•differentiating between generalized and localized shutdowns in the body

•differentiating evoked neurology from pervading neurochemistry

•autonomic tracking of continuous load pathways to exit allostatic loads

•working at the perimeter of shutdown responses

•at least some of the 32 facets of expressed autonomic nervous system state that Hearth Science teaches people to track

...It would be unlikely that we won’t do some demonstration sessions. We will probably practice some of this in small groups. For those who might be wondering about the price discrepancy between this daylong versus the weekend, the price for the weekend is lower than we usually price offerings, and the group will be more than forty people. This group is capped at 12 participants by invitation. This will be a deep-dive. We will go as deep as capacity in the room desires.

For whom is this training appropriate? Coaches and wellness professionals interested in experiencing the clinical application of autonomics. This is a daylong training appended to the end of the prior September 25-27 training.

We will make use:
The Neurobiology of Connection (digital version here). Check out our original research here.

Cost is $300. Apply here and specifically mention this day. You must attend the weekend to be included in this day.

Here is what this felt like: all day my heart felt huge and vibrant. It felt tender and also powerful. There was room for everything here—all the love and also this knowing that the pain of the world could be here too without destroying me. My face felt alive with a glowy feeling in my skin and smiling came easily. If you have been trained in Reiki you may know that feeling of the palms of the hands “turning on.” My palms felt tingling and alive with energy. My belly and breath felt liquidy and responsive to whatever was needed. I was grounded. I felt light and buoyant. I could rest or I could act. It was really cool to have this feeling sustained for most of a day.

Living a day filled with love, did not change any of the external challenges of my life, but it did change the way I experienced those challenges and what power they had over me, or not. Linda, Luann and I raged against certain things going on in the world before moving to love and Reiki. And, as you have heard me say before, the rage we felt was also born of love and was welcome. There is still a proposal to build a data center adjacent to the wetland we have lovingly restored and tended over the past 6 years. This is still a huge problem, possibly existential for all the work we have done, and from the vantage point of love, I was able to do what I needed to do that day without adding streams of stress hormones into my body. It was if I was being held by love, by connection to my friends, to nature and All That Is, and that overrode everything else. I will absolutely fight that data center with everything in me, and I saw I can do it in a way that doesn’t destroy me along the way. I experienced that clearly the other day.

Is this always my experience? Ha, for sure not, and as I attend to these moments of Connection, these occasional days of Connection, there is a path being made in my nervous system, and in my heart: neural connections and memories and something more are deepening, making it more likely I can traverse this way again. This is part of a dual path I am walking now: part that allows me to recognize and internalize Connection, and the integrating and unloading of what we call allostatic load from the past—past traumas that have not yet been integrated that weigh on us and give us less options in our lives. Those also are well-trod paths. I like to think that I am clearing out what is not needed (like invasive plants?) so the native plants can thrive. Spring cleaning perhaps?

And a few days later I was feeling myself as an all-powerful Warrior Goddess, a story for another time—stay tuned😊Speaking of staying tuned—as we allow our nervous systems to be fully tuned, flexible and responsive, all possibilities for us are present. When pure love is needed, there it is; when warrior goddess energy is needed (it’s totally needed these days you all!) it can be here. If you need to run, stay and fight, or disappear into a cave to stay alive in the midst of intolerable trauma, these are all available.

Speaking of the nervous system my teacher, Gabriel Kram, is coming to town! He’ll be offering a workshop here in Columbus the weekend of September 25-27 with a just added clinical day (limited to 12) on the Monday following. The link for more information is here. If you are considering this, let us know soon as Gabriel will be away much of the summer.

Have You Grieved Enough? A Day of Grief and Love in Community on Saturday, May 30 from 9:00a to 4:30p ET. Thanks to the Spirituality Network for inviting me to facilitate a day of Grief-tending. Link and more information is here.

Next week, Thursday, May 7, one of my favorite Kirtan artists, Girish, is coming to Radiant. We used to host him at Yoga on High regularly. Link is here.

And, another wonderful event coming up that has my heart rejoicing—a weekend (or an evening) of Ecstatic Poetry in Logan, OH with fantastic poets Rosemerry Trommer and Kim Rosen. I’ll be there both nights and am honored and nervous to be invited to offer a poem on Saturday evening. Link is here.

It’s still dark
And the first few birds tentatively call out
"Is anyone up? Are you up, are you up?"
With no response, they hit pause the alarm, 
For 10 more minutes of silence.

In my bed, I’m half-awake
And already pouring love through my body and hands
Offering out to those I love, those in need—
Often the same people,
The entire world…..

And out of the shadowy quiet comes the rolling trills of the robins
Calling all at once: “I’m up, fully up, are you up, if not, why not?
Get up, it will be morning soon. I’m up and ready to go!”

In that liminal space between sleep and waking
I delight and marvel at their conversations—so intimate and cheerful,
Now punctuated by the calls from the cardinals
“Phew! phew! Phew!” Like bright knives cutting through air
And now Towhees chime in so assertive and clear—some unseen conductor
waving them into the mix.

I flow love to our children, my husband, just because,
more purposeful as the chorus swells and I am fully awake,
hand on heart, hand on belly
I include myself, 
also, 
finally, 
as a dear beloved.
And I think of my friend, her tumor regrown in just over three months,
another surgery ahead, benign they say,
but it keeps coming back—"It could kill you” they say.

And now the cardinals are striking their sounds, louder, more strident—
“Chew! Chew! Chew! Chew!”
Their sharp staccato beat filling the sky, 
other birds singing backup.

And my heart is back to a student whose sister just died this week…

And a tender conversation with a colleague about how very hard she is trying to keep her teenage son alive—her heart simultaneously broken and filled by this brilliant, complicated young man, who isn’t sure he’ll ever find his place in this world. May they feel wrapped in this loving embrace of support.

Sky slowly brightening, shapes starting to show themselves in the misty light
as earth turns toward the not yet visible sun.
A loud and bossy house sparrow comes to the porch railing right outside our open bedroom door. 
The soloist now, he is loud and insistent. 
Not beautiful exactly, but powerful in his confidence.

And I send Reiki to a dear teacher, hospitalized and now resting at home.
My heart is so full of love and gratitude for all I have learned from him—with a side of worry that he didn’t respond to my text yesterday. 
I’ll text his wife later.

Sky lightening faster now as more and more birds join the chorus.
“Drink-your-teeeeeaaaaa,” says the Towhee, once again rising above the chorus.

A rolling tide of energy and love inside me
Gathering, flowing, filling,
The way light slowly pervades the sky is the way love pervades every part of me.
Hands are warm, now holding the little handmade book where all the names are written,
Birdsong traveling alongside the love to each person listed inside.

The red-winged blackbirds, with their trills and high-pitched peeps are late to the party, but joyously join in along with the tufted titmouse with its tin-whistle-y “Peter, Peter, Peter.”

Life is so complicated for so many:
My friend, whose trans daughter is struggling, has her own health and career challenges,
The terrorized immigrants who thought this country would be their salvation,
All the genocide……so much genocide
At her request, I send to my friend’s mother, the one who abused her—the daughter still wanting her mom to be OK.  Easier for me than for her, and I’m glad to do it.
And sending to every woman who heard about the rape academy websites this week where men go to learn how to drug and rape the ones they sleep next to: their dates, their girlfriends, their wives…..I send to all the women
And sending to the men who are sick with a deep illness that has not yet been diagnosed, and for which there is yet no cure.

Sky lighter and lighter, though the sun is still not visible.
The morning chorus quieting now as
Two mallards fly in, honking lustily as they slide into the pond.

And now finally the sun shines through the mist, 
Heart is full, 
Birdsong holding it all, 
Reiki holding it all
And eventually 
nothing 
        holding 
                  anything…..
                
               just Love

Dear friends, the teacher I was referring to in this poem is Lorin Roche. I did text his wife, Camille, and she called me to say he left his body over the weekend. If you know Camille, at her request, please allow her privacy at this time. I am grieving and I am celebrating his magnificent life. No doubt I will offer a personal tribute later and a time of singing the Maha Mrityunjaya Mantra on his behalf. Stay tuned.

Video taken this past Dec in FL with my sister. It went on for over 30 mins.

I recently listened to the podcast, Hark the Holobiont (look up the word and the podcast—both are wonderful!) with David James Duncan as the guest. He read from the end of his book, one of my favorite books of all times, Sun House, where he quotes his friend, Barry Lopez, a much loved environmental and fiction writer. I’m quoting this completely because it so affected me and pulled together important experiences in my life these past few days and spurred a creative and deeply satisfying meditation experiment.

“Murmurations of Humans:

My estimable friend, Barry Lopez, came to believe late in life that if humans are to survive, we must learn to operate like starlings once they’ve gathered in flocks of tens of thousands to migrate in the fall. Winding through the skies in dense formations called murmurations, their reflexive attention to the four or five birds adjacent to them is so super that they never collide despite their sharply veering flight patterns. There are gigantic murmurations in the farm valleys of California that peregrine falcons attack, screaming through flocks of thousands at 180 miles an hour. But the starlings veer away so preternaturally fast that the bewildered falcons often give up and find a vole or field mouse for supper.

Barry’s description of how the skill could address what threatens humanity was this: ‘The flock is carving open space up into the most complex geometrical volumes, and you have to ask yourself, How do they do that? The answer is, No one’s giving anyone else instructions. You look to the four or five birds immediately around you. You coordinate with them… One of the birds you’re using as a guide for your maneuverings, is itself watching the birds around it to coordinate its movements... It’s an aggregate of birds in which there’s no leader, no hero, no driver. That to me is the way around the dilemma of scale [we humans face]: a much greater level of coordination and reference toward others. You must rid yourself of the idea that only one person knows and understand that genius might be manifested in one man or woman in a particular moment, but that the quality of genius that characterizes humanity is actually possessed by the community.’

And I’d like to add Tom Crawford’s opening of a poem because it’s the same idea expressed very differently. The poem is titled “The Eucharist”:

When the light is just right
if you squint, you can make out
The wiring to the one bird they all are.
           thousands
of swarming black starlings
going suddenly vertical, stalling,
doubling back on themselves.
In China it’s called ‘running hand, ‘
this brush stroke that flows
over the paper, nobody in charge.”

And though there is enough goodness here to be its own post, there is more. I want to share what listening to this did to me and for me, helping me make sense and metaphors of what had been happening the past few days.

Over the weekend I had lunch with two dear friends and colleagues, Aimee Pruitt and Stella Cornett. I think I started part of the conversation by saying I had been considering quitting teaching yoga, something nearly unthinkable even a week earlier. I’ve had so much rage lately, rage that is important to me, showing me clearly what to resist with all my being in order to protect what I love. It’s making me more of an activist than I have even been. Sometimes I think my deep ability to calm down through the yoga practices I have cultivated for decades is a super power, and lately it seems completely inappropriate for these times. I’m deeply exploring what it is to be present to everything that arises within me with respect and a sense of agency. Because I have unwittingly used relaxation as a way to avoid taking action in the past, I want to be very careful here, in these moments, that I am not doing that. I am definitely not practicing yoga right now to make myself believe that if I just calm down, and all my students calm down, everything will be all right. I also understand that living in anger is not a healthy or effective way to live long term—at a certain point, too much anger limits our options.

Then Aimee spoke of her anger. As a nurse she was particularly outraged at the way fellow nurse Alex Pretti was murdered and then described as a terrorist. She spoke of that day, how she went home after a long day of work, and sat on the floor in her room between a chest and her closet and raged. Closed her door and fully raged. This is a woman with a lot to do. She has a full-time job, and owns Radiant Yoga, and when she comes home there are often 3 generations of people in her house. As she fully felt her fury (Epic Fury?) she eventually noticed her young granddaughters in the other room singing a favorite Billy Eilish song at the top of their little lungs. Her rage paused for the moment, and she went out to find them, totally naked, jumping on the couch as they sang their song with the pure power of uninhibited joy. “Of course,” she felt viscerally, “This is the love that births my rage; my anger is born from love. This rage is saying to me ‘don’t sit down, Protect. Protect what you love. Channel your rage into action.’” Living in rage feels chaotic and scary to her And, she said, when she can sit with it, acknowledge it, not push it away but honor it, it becomes clear what it wants. It wants her to protect what’s important.

Then Stella shared her experiences. She has been practicing meditation lately in a way that respects all the feelings present, and for her too, anger is often with her. And she knew that while she did not want to diminish her anger, she did want to find a way to carry it that was not harmful to her. Her anger has been a deeply felt presence lately in her solar plexus—intense, powerful and challenging. She discovered that when she uses Poorna Mudra (a mudra is a yogic hand energy template) that she learned from Linda Oshins, she could stay with the rage as if she had help in holding it; it was in her belly but also in her hands.

And though I see these beloveds every week, I had not known that all three of us were on this same journey. Now we are no longer on it separately, we are on it together. To be connected in learning to live with anger in a true and empowering way, is its own murmuration.

And speaking again of murmurations, I shared the story from the podcast with several other beloveds that I meet with twice a month to practice a form of meditation called contemplation. You can read about that practice here—it’s one of Linda’s and my most foundational practices over decades. Generally, before we get into the practice we chat about our new or ongoing questions and last night we were sharing inspirational stories, including the quote about murmurations. We went on to decide what questions we were each going to contemplate, had seemingly made up our minds, when out of the blue Linda said, “You know, I think I want to consider what it feels like to be part of a murmuration.” Immediately we were all on board for that, our other wonderful questions temporarily abandoned.

As we moved into the contemplation, my mind offered so many powerful words about what it must be like/feel like to be part of a murmuration:

• There must be an aspect of not-knowing since you could never know in advance when the group would be turning or twisting

• Thus, there would have to be the ability to respond spontaneously, to listen, to respect the individuals around you and the entire group.

• A felt trust of the process, synchronous, without thinking or deciding, just moving, present, attentive. All these words and phrases came as I tried on the experience of flying in a group this way. These words represent a powerful embodied sensing of how it might be.

• I felt what it might be like to be an individual starling—no doubt there are differences from one to another, and I also felt into what it could be to be part of the whole—the “one bird” as Tom Crawford described. Both felt true and knowable.

In the next part of the meditation, as I dropped the question into my heart, I felt the upwelling of gratitude for this particular group of humans and for being part of this group all moving and flying together. My heart was so happy and pulsing with life. I felt the joy of being part of something of such awe and beauty. My heart shone with delight and we stayed there for some time. I remembered what it was like to be with Stella and Aimee recently, and again felt our little flying group of enraged and loving yogis.

The third part of the meditation is the dropping of the question into whatever feels like the deepest part of us—for me these days the center of my belly. My belly felt tremendously warm and grounded even as I had the feeling of flying in our murmuration together. There was some dissolving into something larger and less personal, yet I also noticed and named for myself a sensation that had been with me since the beginning of the meditation—the tingling of my upper arms as if I was feeling the next “starling” a few inches away from me—the way you just know in your skin when someone’s hand is hovering a few inches away. This sensation guided me to know how to move in the embodiment of the murmuration. It was a powerful reminder that I was not alone and how it felt on my skin to be awake and attentive enough to follow the lead of someone next to me, or to move without hesitation when it was my turn to lead. Swoop left, swoop right, go up, circle around……this felt like collective freedom to me, each of us remaining inches apart.

For some in our country, freedom means you can do whatever you want, without consideration of consequences for others. But this is not the kind of freedom that I felt in the murmuration or that Barry Lopez was talking about in his writing. We are both speaking of the collective freedom of everyone being accountable to each other, responsive, collaborative—loving even. And the awareness and sensitivity needed to fly together was profound—for those few minutes I was present enough to attend to those around me moment to moment, to turn on a dime—it was exhilarating to even imagine it.

This feeling, this knowing of our place in the collective is our birthright—something we humans have experienced since the beginning of humanity but have been cut off from for the last 10-12,000 years. For 99.9% of the human era, our ancestors worked together, in small bands, each individual with special skills and talents, and each one a necessary and undeniable part of the community. They sat around a campfire, caring for each other, literally having each other’s backs. The feeling I had in meditation with my friends gave me a deeper felt sense of guidance toward what might save us.

What are the murmurations you are already a part of? What murmurations might be needed?

If you have thoughts or feelings about this post would you post them here publicly? Let’s get more of us murmurating together!

And last night I just started a new meditation course called Meditation and the Autonomic Nervous System. You can still join and if you do you’ll receive the first week’s practice of what it feels like to be part of a murmuration! More info and sign up here.

Much of what I’ll be sharing in the course above comes from the study I have done with Gabriel Kram. He’ll be offering a workshop here in Columbus the weekend of September 25-27 with a just added clinical day (limited to 12) on the Monday following. The link for more information is here.

Have You Grieved Enough? A Day of Grief and Love in Community on Saturday, May 30 from 9:00a to 4:30p ET. Thanks to the Spirituality Network for inviting me to facilitate a day of Grief-tending. Link and more information is here.

For over 40 years I taught beginners every week. I love teaching yoga to beginners—it’s like the most interesting puzzle of how to share the essential yoga teachings (often not the physical aspects of yoga) in a context that is accessible for them as they are learning poses that help them feel good. I love seeing the light brighten in someone’s eyes as they realize they have a body and that it can feel good. So many people only experience their body as pain and lack of pain is a complete surprising miracle for them. Most beginners come because of pain or something that feels lacking in their lives and over the years I discovered that about 40-50% of them came with back pain. I almost said they came because of back pain but that was not usually the reason they started. Most of those with back pain were so fused with the certainty that they would be living with that pain forever that they didn’t even mention it on the health history form they filled out. Take that in for a minute—they had back pain, even some had had back surgery, but they didn’t include it on the form because it felt like such a permanent part of themselves that they couldn’t even imagine yoga could help. Eventually I caught on because within about 4 weeks people would tell me in amazement that their back had stopped hurting.

You shared with me how hopeless you were about your pain, and also that the type of yoga I was teaching, though generally not directly focused on helping back pain, helped. As I kept studying and you kept telling me what helped you the most, I got better and better at fine-tuning my classes for who was in the room.

I learned something I still say frequently in class—that everything is connected. Someone with extremely tight legs (that is a lot of people in our country) can have tight muscles pulling on their pelvis in a way that misaligns the spine. Misalignment is not necessarily a problem—we are designed to be flexible and make do with all kinds of issues. But when misalignment becomes more permanent and is no longer optional, then the pain starts to creep in and over time solidifies. In this case, back pain is not really about the back but about the legs. As the legs get looser, the back pain resolves. Or someone sits at a computer all day without ever changing position (even when not at the computer) and it’s nearly guaranteed that they will have neck and shoulder pain over time. Most physical pain happens not in yoga class but can be helped by yoga class! And once someone is finding some relief from their pain, they can begin to notice when they are doing something that brings it back. They have more awareness and hence more options. Also, we can teach them the yoga of daily life so they are less likely to create painful shapes.

I remember a man who came to my early classes at Jeffrey Mansion in Bexley where I taught for over 20 years. He was not my normal yoga student, who in those days were generally pretty fit. He was a long-haul truck driver, who was desperate for help since he could barely sit in his truck and drive anymore. He was heavy and tight and clearly uncomfortable coming to class, AND he felt better at the end of each class. It was like a miracle for him. This happened for a few weeks in a row and then he took me aside and told me that he felt great every evening after class but was in agony again once he got back in his truck. This led me to believe that there was something he was doing posturally that was causing his problem. I followed him out to his truck and asked him to climb up and show me how he sat while he drove. Once he showed me it was obvious—he completely rounded his back and hunched over the wheel. A friend of his, meaning well no doubt, had told him that this shape (in yoga we call it the cat pose) would help stretch his back muscles. I suggested that this was a good shape to move through occasionally but was not a good shape to stay in, especially sitting in a truck. When I showed him how to sit up straighter with his spine in its natural alignment, his pain stopped and never came back. Yoga helped him get out of pain enough so that we could figure out what was causing it. And that was that. He was the first student I followed out to his vehicle and not the last!

In the workshop this weekend, I’ll be sharing the essentials of what I have learned about back pain in my years of teaching. It’s about poses and alignment, about people and their personalities and stresses, about anatomy, about using our bodies in daily life, about us as teachers watching and listening, about experiments, about the nervous system (you just know I have to weave that in), and so much more.

And one idea we’ll be holding together is this: people are helped by lots of things in Yoga, lots of different practices. If you read all the books you’ll see that teachers do not agree on what causes the pain and what the solutions are. Luckily, this gives us a lot of freedom to explore. And this important question: How can we teach our students to pay attention so we can help them figure out what is best for them?

Teacher Training: Teaching Students with Back Pain

Taught by Marcia Miller, IAYT Certified Yoga Therapist, ERYT-500 Yoga Teacher

Studies show that over 80% of Americans will suffer significant back pain in their lives. And people with back pain say Yoga helps them more than any other single modality, including surgery and other medical care. In this workshop you will learn

• relevant anatomy of the spine and hips

• principles and techniques of yoga therapy that help your students with back pain

• a basic series of poses that are great for beginners with (or without) back pain

• several bonus poses to offer anytime someone is in back pain

• sitting, standing, and walking to support the health of your students and minimize back pain

• several relaxation setups to help students be comfortable in savasana, since relaxation is so critical to back pain relief

This class will be a mixture of lecture, discussion, and practice (including supporting each other), and you will leave with practical knowledge you can utilize right away. This training assumes you are already at least a 200-hour trained yoga teacher.

Saturday, April 11, from 9:00a to 5:00p ET (with 1 hour break for lunch)

Sunday, April 12 from 10:00a to 1:00p ET

Price: $349, some scholarships available, also, money, pricing and race

This workshop is available in person as well as livestream. Video recordings will be available for 3 months. 10 hours of CEs available through Yoga Alliance.

Sign up here.

Other Upcoming Events: Weekly classes on Wednesdays at Radiant Yoga and Wellness, both in-person and online. How to see you there! And next week, April 15, we start a new course: Meditation and the Autonomic Nervous System. This course will help you get to know and fine-tune your nervous system and keep finding your way back to a sense of connection.

And specking of the nervous system, my teacher of the Autonomic Nervous System, Gabriel Kram, is coming to Columbus the weekend of September 25-27. The link for more information is here. I’ll post more about this soon but in the meantime, read up save the date. FYI, because of his extensive travels this year, we need to know that this workshop is a go by the end of May. This means that instead of waiting until the week before, you need to plan and sign up soon. It’s OK, you’ll be fine.

Have You Grieved Enough? A Day of Grief and Love in Community on Saturday, May 30 from 9:00a to 4:30p ET. Thanks to the Spirituality Network for inviting me to facilitate a day of Grief-tending. Link and more information is here.

This is from a newsletter written by a friend of mine, Alan Cohen, who has been bringing world-class authors to S. Ohio for decades. How he gets them to agree to come includes I’m sure their love and appreciation for him and the beauty of the Hocking Hills in Spring where he lives and hosts them. Every year is wonderful but this one will likely be spectacular—especially if you are there too. Please join us—you will be so glad!

From Alan:

It has long been my dream to host a program of ecstatic poetry- poetry that literally takes you out of your habitual way of experiencing the world. Such poetry has a long tradition – Rumi, Hafez, Mary Oliver, Gregory Orr.

“Poetry is the language of the soul. From below the surface of your life, the truth of who you are calls to you through the poems you love. Even if you have been touched by only one poem, or just a single line heard at a crucial moment and remembered, those words are an invitation from within. To take them deeply into your life and speak them aloud brings every level of who you are—your thoughts, your words, your feelings, and even your physical energies—into alignment with what matters most to you. You are receiving and giving voice not only to the poem but also to your own soul.”

~Kim Rosen

See our website: https://www.ravensunpoetry.com/about

This year’s event features poets Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer and Kim Rosen, who will be sharing poems of their own as well as those of poets through the ages. They will be accompanied by master hand drummer Glen Velez and amazing cellist Noah Hoffeld.

Each night’s program will begin at 7 PM with classical piano music with Evie Adelman and Gary Kennedy. Perennial favorite Wellspring of Imagination students will present their recent work.

Please share this information with friends, We are again asking for donations to supplement our grants. Donations are tax deductible. There is no charge for admission. You can donate on the website or send checks made to :

Ravensun

26488 Starr Rt.

Logan OH 43138

This is my favorite poem of Ted Kooser’s. Ted is a real mensch and a terrific poet. We came to Power of Poetry after being named the U.S. Poet Laureate. His use of simple language and precision of words set his poetry apart. At first I thought he may be making this moth up, but Professor Google showed me that it really exists.

Lobocraspis griseifusa

This is the tiny moth who lives on tears,

who drinks like a deer at the gleaming pool

at the edge of the sleeper’s eye, the touch

of its mouth as light as a cloud’s reflection.

In your dreams, a moonlit figure appears

at your bedside and touches your face.

He asks if he might share the poor bread

of your sorrow. You show him the table.

The two of you talk long into the night,

but by morning the words are forgotten.

You awaken serene, in a sunny room,

rubbing the dust of his wings from your eyes.

-Ted Kooser

I love this picture of Lilias in her later years. We probably remember her in her leotards with a long braid, but she was a yogi her whole life.

Many of you probably know that Lilias Folan died several weeks ago at the age of 90. Perhaps you first saw her on television as I did, watching her with my mother. We didn’t really do yoga poses with her, but it was fun watching her move in unusual shapes (i.e. yoga asana) and she was friendly in a way that made her feel like family. Though Lilias always seemed like such a warm and put-together woman, like so many of us, she turned to yoga in a time of personal difficulties. She was deeply depressed after the births of her children, and though she seemingly had everything one could want, she was very unhappy. Yoga was the practice that brought her back to life. I’m guessing many of you can relate to yoga having this effect on us—it was and remains true for me.

Eventually I started practicing yoga and became a certified yoga teacher in 1976 at a time when there were few yoga teachers in the country. By then Lilias was living and teaching in Cincinnati and my husband and I joined the Cincinnati Yoga Teachers Association, founded just two years earlier with a small but inspired and energetic group of yogis. We made the trip to Cincinnati several times a year for community, to learn what other teachers were up to and occasionally took workshops from people we brought to town. The first time we went there as new teachers we met Lilias, who was warm, friendly and extremely welcoming. We tried to be cool but were not; it was wonderful for us to meet her and to feel at least a bit collegial with her.

Soon after meeting her, she called us up and invited us to her house. She said she was hosting her teacher, a very well-known, world-renowned spiritual teacher at the time, Swami Chidananda, the leader of the Divine Life Society (DLS). DLS was founded by his teacher, Master Sivananda, one of the great teachers in India, whose students eventually traveled all over the world to teach and popularize yoga. Master Sivananda was also one of the first to teach women. Another one of Master Sivananda’s students was Swami Satchidananda, my husband’s and my first teacher and the person we certified with. In effect, Lilias’ teacher and our teacher were brother monks and she recognized that. Since we were officially in the same lineage, she thought it might be wonderful for us to meet Swami Chidananda at her house. We were completely surprised and thrilled by her generosity and of course said yes. Can I just say what totally baby yogis and teachers we were? We hadn’t even been teaching for a year and here she was giving us the opportunity to be in the same room as this deeply practiced and dedicated yogi.

We drove to her house and were among a very small group of about 5 people invited for this evening. Lilias was gracious as always and we were so grateful and a bit overwhelmed. I’m sure there was a protocol of how we should have acted but we didn’t really know what that was and just followed along as best we could. We knew the honor she was bestowing on us. We spent the whole evening with them and mostly listened to him and her discussing spiritual aspects of yoga with nary a sun salutation or headstand in sight. Swami Chidananda’s teachings for householders (those with families and careers) emphasized that spiritual life could happen right in the midst of daily life, through service, love, dedication and realization of one’s True Nature. That evening, Lilias’ den was filled with the kind of inclusive, wise, generous and spacious holiness that first attracted us to our teacher; we felt steeped in Grace. I have never forgotten that evening.

Years later we invited Lilias to teach at Yoga on High and she agreed to come. She had her own unique way of teaching that was enjoyed by all who attended the weekend, many of whom we had never met before—they came only for her. Though the usual protocol for being in a room together in those days was to lay mats side by side, she often found reasons to bring us face to face in circles and did much to create community. With her, we were not individual yogis doing practices separately in the same room, we were creating something special together. And she was the one who introduced us to the song that has long been a part of our community, The Cell Song. Some of you I’m sure remember the words:

Every little cell in my body is happy
Every little cell in my body is well (repeat first two lines)
I’m so glad
Every little cell
In my body is happy and well. (repeat last three lines)

If you are not familiar with the melody, this one is pretty close to the one she sang. We have had so much fun with this song over the years…Gail Spirit Sky, I’m thinking of you as I write this.

When she came for the weekend, she stayed in the comfortable house of Linda Oshins and her husband Joe. Joe made a beautiful vegetarian dinner for us on Saturday night since we had been in class all day. He added pork chops on the side for himself, and Lilias was thrilled to share those with him. I remember being surprised that she was not a pure vegetarian but quickly got over it. I had been hoping for an evening of more yoga conversation and stories from her, but she was also aware that Joe would not be interested in that at all. We enjoyed a wide-ranging conversation that included Joe until dinner was over and then to our amazement she departed to the basement with him to play pool before heading to bed. As I recall, Linda and I cleaned up and also went to bed to be ready for her second day of teaching.

She was generous and gracious in her teaching as she was in every area of her life. Her classes assumed that not everyone could achieve every pose and she taught with that in mind. And while the teaching she did on her PBS television show, left out all of the spiritual elements of yoga, she brought all of yoga to her in person workshops. And what she didn’t teach exuded from her pores in a transmission of loving energy—you always knew this was a woman on the path to enlightenment.

Later, when I was really struggling in my life, I remember speaking to her. I think we were making plans for another visit to Yoga on High, but as we checked in with each other about our personal lives, she listened to me and gave me wise advice. As she shared about her own life, she talked about getting older and recognizing that she would be dying in the near future. That knowledge gave her a powerful focus on her spiritual practices—she would do her best to wake up fully in this lifetime if possible. I remember the power and energetic force of those words. This was a woman who knew what she wanted and was putting her attention right there. It was also a reminder to me of the power of that desire for True Freedom. It lit that fire for me too, just hearing her speak those words.

Thank you dear Lilias for all you offered the world during your life. Somehow you lived the life of a true spiritual seeker in the experience of a householder, something that is familiar to so many of your students. We are ever grateful for your example and are sending you love and blessings.

Friends, my teacher of the Autonomic Nervous System, Gabriel Kram, is coming to Columbus the weekend of September 25-27, and I hope you will join us. The link for more information is here. I’ll post more about this soon but in the meantime, read up save the date. FYI, because of his extensive travels this year, we need to know that this workshop is a go by the end of May. This means that instead of waiting until the week before, you need to plan and sign up soon. It’s OK, you’ll be fine.

Other exciting things coming up include a very practical workshop for yoga teachers to help your students with back pain. I have taught this several times before and promise it is a good one. (I try not to be too braggy, but it’s true.) Yoga Teacher Training: Teaching Students with Back Pain. April 11 & 12 10 hours of CEs from YA are available. Full description and link to sign up is here.

And I’m back in town teaching my weekly classes on Wednesdays at Radiant Yoga and Wellness, both in-person and online. How to see you there!

Asked a colleague of mine? 
Can you tell?
So I asked a young pawpaw
if I could touch her 
and after her yes
I wrapped my body around her, hands
cradling the trunk.
“Is your sap rising?” I asked her and did my best to feel for it,
my hands pretty sensitive after all.
I could feel the vibrantly circling Life Force in her
And my body caught the resonance,
And we made music together.
I could feel her deep rootedness and it pulled me to earth.
I hope she felt my love for her.
I put my ear up to her bark
Can I hear the sap rising?
As I pulsed with her, I could hear the dozens of red winged black birds
Joyfully trilling the spring 
even though it’s only 20 degrees this morning.

“Is your sap rising?” I asked the ancient
Swamp White Oak that has lived here longer than we have been a nation.
Huge and welcoming she invited me to lean into her.
Another burst of deeper, more powerfully vibrant Life Force—a different tone altogether from the sweet young pawpaw.
My tree grandmother enfolded me in her expansive pulsing energy field, 
pulsing through her body, 
my hands, 
my belly,
my chest,
my legs enlivened from below, 
her roots deep and wide in the earth.
With ear to bark there was a sound.
But was it the low hum of faraway traffic or me hearing hymns of her long history?
I do not know.

And finally for today, the young shagbark hickory,
with its bark already coming off in strips,
had a different feel. 
As I touched her bark, I felt shaking and
quivering inside, as if she was nervous, surprised.
Eventually the longer shape of a circular flow
And I too, was fully alive.

Can I tell if the sap of a tree is flowing up or down?
No, not yet.
But I am making friends and maybe the question is just too intimate for a
first date.

Friends, my teacher of the Autonomic Nervous System, Gabriel Kram, is coming to Columbus the weekend of September 25-27, and I hope you will join us. The link for more information is here. I’ll post more about this soon but in the meantime, read up save the date. FYI, because of his extensive travels this year, we need to know that this workshop is a go by the end of May. This means that instead of waiting until the week before, you need to plan and sign up soon. It’s OK, you’ll be fine.

Other exciting things coming up include a very practical workshop for yoga teacher to help your students with back pain. I have taught this several times before and promise it is a good one. (I try not to be too braggy, but it’s true.) Yoga Teacher Training: Teaching Students with Back Pain. April 11 & 12 10 hours of CEs from YA are available. Full description and link to sign up is here.

And I’m back in town teaching my weekly classes on Wednesdays at Radiant Yoga and Wellness, both in-person and online. See you at the NO KINGs Marches today. They are all over the country with many in the Columbus area. Find one for you here.

I had the extreme pleasure to spend the day at the Lee Metcalf National Wildlife Refuge. The young man at the Enterprise Rental Car pick-up suggested I go there and I’m thanking him here. When I let him know I was going to be visiting for a week and was there anything I should be sure to see while here, he said the following, “Well, I’m a birder” (be still my heart—those words gave me such pleasure) “and you won’t believe how many birds and migrating ducks there are at the Lee Metcalf Refuge. It’s beautiful down there—not too far out of Missoula.” So I waited for what looked like the best day and went today. If you could have created the ideal circumstances for me, this place was it. I adore being out in huge natural areas, I love wetlands and birds, without many people, and this was my domain for the day. This refuge is over 2800 acres of protected land in the Bitterroot Valley, with the steep, tall Bitterroot Mountains just beyond.

I hiked, I meandered, I paused, I was quiet, I watched birds and tiny mammals and I could feel it all in my body as joy. January is not the beginning of anything, but spring is the beginning of everything. Likely you are paying attention to how you know it is spring; here are a few ways I knew today:

Migrating ducks, swans, geese (including Snow Geese—a big deal) and more…though you can’t easily see all the ducks from this picture, they are there.

The Northern Flickers (a type of large woodpecker) are doing their mating rituals. We have these birds in Ohio, but I have never seen the quantity that I saw today. Probably hundreds of them, the males chasing the females all over the trees. As soon as a female would land on a branch, there came the male. Then she would leap to another branch and he would follow. This back and forth would go on for a long time. Later in the afternoon, I saw a courtship dance that was amazing to watch. Apparently, this male was attractive enough to get the female to pause for a few minutes and let him strut his stuff for her. They were on the ground, under several huge Ponderosa Pines and the male was lifting up his beak up to the sky, and stretching his neck and torso to the max. Was he showing her how tall he was, or exhibiting his gorgeous throat markings? I’m not sure, but even where I was standing breathlessly waiting to see what would happen next, I could tell he was giving it his all and he really wanted to impress her. He was being as cocky and confident as possible with everything on the line. And, after a couple of minutes, the female decided that whatever he had was not what she wanted and she turned away and eventually flew off. Was it my imagination or did I see the male deflate a bit?

Plants greening up—I love the way the native grasses still have last year’s growth and yet the spring green is just about to cover it up with new life.

Wildflowers!!!!

Butterflies!!! There is probably nothing that says spring or makes my heart sing with joy to see the first butterflies of the season. And, the ones that come later also go right to my heart.

This picture is not as focused as I would like. I didn’t have my glasses with me and was very lucky to get this one at the end of my hike after seeing quite a few dash by.

Buds opening

Moss brightening—often we think of moss as only being green but this gorgeous moss likely just brightened up very recently.

Even as the weather jackknives back and forth, the light is higher and brighter, earlier and later. Your body also knows that it’s spring. How can you tell??