Growth dreams

Resiliency powerhouse

Soft lover

Open channel

Guided, Effective, Capable

Living off the fuel of my challenges

Facing the fears and being gentle with myself

Loving compassion

Showing up!

Clearing the illusions

Being present

Sharp focus

Strength & opportunity

Seeing the wisdom in the wounds

Building paths and making possibilities

Transcending my perceived limits

And working it, never giving up.

*I’m picturing myself sailing on a ship, being deeply in tune with the ocean, and yielding to the power of the storm while the storm inside me grows to match the might of that storm outside of me. I am ready to build this new way of being in the world. I am ready to see the new ways forward. I am ready to be gentle and yielding in the truth of how mighty we all are. 💖 We can overcome our difficulties. I want to be on that path! I am on that path! I will keep going. Growth dreams, to become more than I am now, I am ready.

Cheers to this full moon 🌕

Feeling authentically with chronic pain

In the beginning of the year I wrote a blog post titled the beginning of healing. In a personal sense, this was more prophetic than I knew. I sensed a deep river running through me ready to perhaps “cleanse me” and wash over me on a more subterranean level. Yet I’m not ready to define “what this is” on that deeper level, spiritual level. Maybe I sensed that quite a bit had been stirred up inside of me during the insanity of the pandemic and politics and thus readying me for more healing and feeling. Maybe I had just been through so much just having a baby and transforming into a mother.

Three months after having her, I completed most of my National Board exams before graduating.

I then finished my Master’s Program by December and the remaining National Board exam, but now have been stopped short of my goal to get licensed in my own state because of the need to sit for a 5 hour exam when I cannot due to pain and further causing injury to my spine. I put so much effort into my program and made much progress with my own health (so it seemed) only to be stopped short for a time. I can eventually take my state’s board exam, maybe, if I get well enough to. Sure I could move to a different state but we have other roots here as a family, and so I feel attached. Better to stick with the career roots my husband has built. Also, it’s home to my alma mater and I’d prefer to stay close by hoping for more opportunities that way. But not if I’m not well!!

I can barely take care of my family, and it being “just us” and literally no one else living in the same state, there’s no one to really turn to for a helping hand. We need to hire help.

Plus, my health has been the worst money pit.

Friends, I’m still in the thick of it, having some better days mixed with suffering days. However what seems to be emerging is this sense of connectedness with my closest friends, who still happen to live far. I don’t feel as lonely as I did a month or two ago, at least, not today.

I also really want to be in touch with people who have had or are experiencing chronic pain, and making the best of it. I absolutely know I am not alone. The whole reason I am walking my path is because I am authentically me. I am free to be myself, and learning every day how to show up for myself and love and bring healing to all the aspects of my consciousness. Some part of me does trust that this is a process unfolding within me, that I will get past it, and my life will move on! But for now, I’m in a really challenging & painful holding pattern.

Authentically yours,

Ka

Stabilizing

a pillar has rolled back into place.
consciousness is as steady as a beam.

The gaze is calm while looking at the rust, bright lights and dark spots fuse transforming angles of industry into cloth and folds into thin sheets.

i hear a whisper from her heart
her lips are pressed against my chest. i feel warm knowing she is one with me again. She’s curled up inside of me, ready to face what’s next.

i turn to her and thank her for her patience, for enduring what this path and journey really means: commitment.

I’ve never seen her grow like this before, joining in with faith. She clutches onto nothing. She’s honest to the brim. Shes ready for what’s next. So I lead her back inside.

The clouds have broken

The clouds have broken

And you were in my dreams

Courting me with dark wine and

Deep ocean waves, foaming

Sand everywhere—

Your music was soft and enchanting,

Filling my ears with swirls and rhythms

I even discovered I had a dress for the evening

to dance with you under the fading pale sun

Now I am wondering why the violent lightning

Gives way to such a soft sunset.

And, who could forget the hard rain?

5 min or less sketch

I erased once. You can see that.

My drawing skills are nowhere near what they used to be, or potentially where they could have been if I would have progressed with this same skill level as a teen.

But I am 1000% less judgmental about what I create. This gives me pleasure.

I don’t have the time to dive in like I long to, but sketching a little bit here and there is a very welcome slow return to what used to feel more like “who I am.”

Who I am is not me.

It’s a process; it’s looking and feeling, and living. It’s simple. What activity most feels like you? Is it writing? Maybe it could even be walking? Walking would be my second most thing-I-do that feels like me (and exploring) but I have had to forgo that for now. I’m still finding ways to enjoy the day.

speak.

When I woke my voice was brittle—

The words came out,

but were easily broken.

I then sifted through the debris and emptied the sand from my hands, made up of

messages that, when undelivered,

had turned to dust.

With my warm dry hands I gently held my

throat and let my hands speak “you may not know how to voice

but I give you time. I give you space.

Your voice matters. Never give up. Let anyone try to silence you, but you will never again do it to yourself.”

*is anyone else having trouble with the editor? I did a copy and paste of my poem and the formatting would not fill one solid block. I’m not being too picky about format right now, because it’s not convenient to be. It expresses enough on its own.

My tears are touching everything but what I need

My tears touch my cheeks

But cannot spread into my heart

Cannot touch this wound and offer it

Still there’s flowing from both heart and from tears

The path forward seems dusted over

Every prayer keeps me in it for the day

But each day I’m missing out on where my

Heart wants to be engaged, in full capacity.

Moments ease and bring hope.

But, the same thorn in my back remains

My patience has been by my side for 9 years

But the dysfunction cannot be ignored.

I am tethered to it.

Only well enough for so long or so far

The variable “x” has been my one constant.

I want to run and sweat with all the energy I have built for transformation

But I am stuck sliding back in my circled walls so slick I cannot climb

Bone deep is misaligned

No muscle release nor stretch will remove the thorn, no deep breath, no daily meditation, no daily Qi gong wills it away.

Where I want to spread hope, I’m left wanting.

My tears arriving to keep me company and hear me lose my patience.

Enough!