I don't feel time is truly linear at all, but that we process and experience it that way...  timelines for me, describe the energetic "slices" of our reality which can be grouped into periods of linear time.  It makes me think of that last scene in Interstellar when he is in the 5th dimension and all the moments of time are stacked upon each other, happening stimultaneously. Without getting too crazy, I really do feel that past timelines are still in existence, except they are no longer "energised" or perceived by our consciousness... so they retreat to the subconscious where we occasionally catch glimpses in dreams and memories. I think that the same can be said for the future, but that's for another day! I believe we change timelines when we experience an energetic shift. Sometimes, this is marked by a physical change like moving house or changing jobs... but it can be much more subtle like just feeling "different", one day. It is energetic above all.

I have had my first car sitting in the car-port gathering dust for 4 years... not being willing, or ready, to let it go. I got that Holden Astra when I was 17 and I will never forget sitting in it alone for the first time and driving it around the block playing Heavier Things and feeling this incredible sense of freedom and possibility about life...the irony was that little car broke down on me so many times. There were constant issues and in turn I put it through all sorts of run-ins of varying severity with my absent-minded driving. I really loved that car but it became so unreliable that it was a relief to stop driving it. That was 2017. So much was changing within me and It was a lonely and dark time that became very beautiful for me in the end. I feel in my bones that was the end of a timeline and the beginning of another which started properly in 2018, carrying through until now. My dreams have been bringing me back there and I feel those times echo what I am experiencing in my life now.

After washing all the dust off my car the other day, I opened it up and sat inside it for a long time. It has a very specific smell that brought so many memories and feelings to the surface. I sat there and cried, remembering so many things I had forgotten. I felt in those moments it would simply be too painful to let this car go. But after a while, that familiar and nostalgic smell became rather hard to bear. It's a chemical-smell that made me feel dizzy and headachey. I opened the doors and breathed in the fresh air. It is time to let go.

Reaching the end of a timeline feels like a tunnel, where for a while you can't see the light at the end and have little idea that it's anything more than an endless void. Eventually the light grows bigger and bigger until it is blinding - obliterating what was and leaving you blinking on the other side. But in the void, it is certainly frightening. We cannot know what we do not know. The mind returns to the past and clings to the present searching for ways to prolong what is, even if it isn't what is in resonance anymore, because it doesn't know anything else. 
 This timeline I have been on has been so light, so light. I have loved it truly. I made a deep vow and commitment to my career and in so many ways and forms have found myself a student. With the most incredible teachers. At times I have felt incredibly frustrated creatively and confronted by shame but this too has been perfect and I can see that now. But this time I will not be holding onto the past.  When things go awry, or plans fall through, people leave, or cars stop running - there is a deeper intelligence of life: the living and dying of it all. With a deep breath, what is ready to change will, it is out of my hands. There have been timelines and people I never wanted to let go of, and I still miss them terribly. But I did it and I learned that on the other side of that is even deeper love and closeness with the pulse of life and the core of the things we hold the dearest. They never leave, not really. The heart can hold it all.

Goodbye little car. Goodbye Timeline. I love you. Thank you.

.“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream.”
― Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill House

If there's one "truth" I can return to, over and over,  it is that I know really nothing at all. I know that for some, this might be the doorway to existential dread that is best left well alone, but truly I have found it so peaceful because my mind cannot argue with such a truth. It can try, but I have been to far too many strange and upside down places to believe that any claims on reality, or sense-making could keep the endless mystery at bay and I would rather be devoured by it than resist it. I would rather live by my own truths - the ones that feel beautiful to my soul, than try to find what is real in some outside sense and follow that. This is not to be mistaken for a kind of denying or ignoring... sad is beautiful too. Difficult, incomprehensible, overwhelming...all beautiful, part of the divinity of being human. But the other way feels like putting a wild animal in a cage, the soul inside the bounds of the intellect will fury and fight and then eventually exhausted, it will whither. Losing the strength of it's instincts, unused. Not in this lifetime will I live like this. I would rather be considered mad than be caged in by my own mind. And I would rather dream, madly, than be taken seriously by the minds of others.

I think we may just be dressing up and playing pretend for a little while...that this is all a sometimes lovely and sometimes heartbreaking dream, but a beautiful dream nonetheless. Being human is so very strange and difficult for me to comprehend at times...but when I find myself in places so dark and confused, nature arrives soothing and gentle. Not in the realm of thought but all around me in a feeling. And in remembering myself not as a mind inside of a body but as the dreamer inside of this beautiful dream I can feel as weightless and as joyous as a bird at dusk.

And so, it is winter again. It's been another sleepless night - but I feel like I just woke up. Everything looks and feel vivid and real. I'm not sure how many days it's been but, but lately everything has been dreamlike and noisy. Noisy, in the sense that all the details merge and blend together and there is little room left to tell the difference between real and imagined.
It's exhausting.
But this morning is beautiful. I've missed the early morning. It rained all through the night and now the creek is gushing and the air is fresh and cold and smells like life and... I have words to write. Lately I have tried to sit down and say something with my pen and nothing has come or flowed. My urge for expression has had to find other avenues. I've been dancing and playing my guitar and running, alot. Running so far until I slow myself down because my body is aching and I remember I don't want to give myself shin splints again.

In truth, and full transparency, I think I haven't wanted to write because I've been dealing with aspects of shame... it has risen because I'm ready to see it. I haven't wanted to be seen. I haven't felt like my words are good enough, or even that I am worthy enough to write about myself. This is hard to admit to myself. They are only aspects of me, ofcourse. I thankfully don't live with crippling shame or self doubt... like I once might have. However our lessons will return when another layer is ready to reveal itself and be healed...and this has been a cycle of working through the density with equal awareness and equal entanglement in the grips of self neglect.
I have spiralled in and out of thinking that has me looking at myself through the third person perspective. This has led to me feeling out of my body. Out of tune with the resonance with my soul. Trying to affect change from the outside, in. And I know by now this never works. I have known for a long time. But I am learning what it means to crystallise the truth of love. Sometimes that means going back in time in a sense. Being ok with not being ok. Being triggered, again. And finding, that you are in fact... not in that place any more. And actually, now you have the power to work your way out with full consciousness.
This is how you clear your deepest fears that hold you back from living. You show yourself that you can always return to love. You show yourself that no matter the places you find yourself in, that you hold the ability within you to transform your holographic reality with the power of your heart and mind...and what you decide to take away, what you decide to keep.

This journey is not perfect. I'm so glad it isn't.
It's winter again. I feel the myself returning to myself. More than ever before... thats the thing about an always expanding universe. You never go backwards. Actually you always go forward.

We,
Unravelling poems
winding from the ink of a vision -- continuous.
Delicate tapestries of creation,
born, so...soft.
Bridges of vulnerable truth and profound intention.
Sweet breeze and dirty earth,
a hummingbird
a snake.
We, caught in loops of a collective story
fables and old wives tales
a wooden spoon
a spirit stick
a telegraph line
a totem pole.
Somewhere within the pages, we are found
weaving
and being woven
writing
and being written
And though we forget, we are not forgotten
and
perhaps
somewhere along the way -
a song
a death
a lover
a dream
a moment
We remember,
or rather, glimpse.
The undeniable nature of it all
how way leads on to way
And always will,
like the words of a poet
never finished.

I’ve been purging these weeks past… this moon phase has brought resolution to a part of my life that feels finally and cleanly finished. I am so thankful, but I am exhausted. Turning over the soil in my psyche, writing down my dreams and delving into the space of my feelings has revealed a clarity, and ‘seeing’ of what has felt murky for the longest time. I see the moments of last year and the year before stacked like dominoes…encounters, people, circumstances. I can see the motivations and momentum that led to certain decisions, the entrapment I felt and the ways I ignored my intuition. Hindsight is a powerful guide. I am trying not to judge my experience. Although I struggled, I feel almost as though the dominoes had to complete their run in order for me to deeply learn these lessons.
For that, I can only be thankful.

I spiralled into the darkness and experienced my blockages with ferocity. A lack of self conviction led me towards circumstances of imbalanced power. In doubt of my resiliency, my dreams and my worth, I handed my security to somebody else. Created an invitation for dominant and coercive energies. Fell into cycles of obligation and attachment. It feels good to speak the truth, no matter how unsavoury. It feels important.

What I can understand now is that I felt the loss of community very much in my life, more than I realised. I was dealing with and probably denying the feelings of confusion and isolation. In the transition between worlds; the ending of one and the beginning of another there is a void, a question mark, an unknowing. I was swallowed by this. I was missing confidence in my intuition to see the forest for the trees and could hardly see for a very long time that I was seeking sustenance and respite in the wrong places. That, although I had felt like I had left an old pattern of obligation and dependency, it led me straight into the chokehold of another. It’s funny how it works that way sometimes.
But what I’m sure of, is that self doubt, confusion an questioning is normal on this journey of learning ourselves. It is okay. I cannot blame myself for this, nor carry on expecting that I should always have total belief and confidence in what I’m doing. But what is not okay, is for that place of uncertainty, naivety even, to be taken advantage of. Manipulation can be subtle, it can be energetic, and it can be as obvious as it is undetectable to you when you are experiencing a situation and not ready to accept that it is poisoning you.

It really feels like no coincidence, what is playing out in the world right now as the feminine rises up to reclaim her sacred space. So much of what is coming up within me is related. I feel strengthened by the conversation, the rising sentiment “enough is enough”.
I am healing after far too long of a time allowing my sacred space, time and energy to be utilised in unhealthy and domineering ways. I have come to accept that I am not easily able to see this on a surface level with a person or situation which is why it is so important to heed the feelings of intuition, the physical sensations in the body. Feelings do not lie and mine were certainly warning me time and time again… I rationalised them each time. Every panic attack, feeling of overwhelm and fear, the flood of emotions and vulnerability… the visceral feeling of being attached. I subject all these sensations to analysis, scanned myself for discrepancies, asked myself what was wrong with me.

The feelings in the body are always enough evidence. Nothing more is needed.

All of this understanding has come on with a suddenness and lucidity which has completely shifted me out of where I was. Although it has been extremely revealing, it has strangely not shocked me. The stitches have come undone and there is such freedom in speaking, writing and dancing with these truths now that they have come out from the shadows.

Reflecting like this is catharsis. When I think about it truthfully, saying ‘no’, choosing my needs and wants, going against the grain of expectation and rejecting advances towards any part of me…feels dangerous. It feels essentially risky, physically and spiritually. It makes me feel like a child, or a puppet…and obligation is the puppeteer.
Compassion I am positive, is my antidote. And a fierce resolve to self care in more loving, discerning and protective ways.

And with that I am choosing to release these feelings that stifled me. I have dragged them out of the darkness, looked them dead in the eyes and honestly felt ready to annihilate everything that stands in my way. But I am tired. I am not made for war.  To be on the defense does not feel natural. And yet to be soft to the point of permitting trespass is not right approach.  Clarissa Pinkola Estes says, "the wild, because of it's energy and beauty, is always in the eyes of somebody or other, some group or other, for trophy purposes or as a thing to be reduced, altered, ruled on, murdered, redesigned or controlled. The wild always needs a guardian at the gate, or it will be misused." The sacred feminine space is the wild. We must protect ourselves, just as we work to protect our sacred earth.

So let us be sure to leave a guardian at the gate, and be liberated to keep our spirits and hearts open and receptive to love in the right places, and the unbridled experience of life.

Tulum is a beautiful place. It is upmarket and the spirituality here feels a little gimmicky or ungrounded or something... but there is definitely something surreal about this place. I have never swam in an ocean so blue. I feel the landscape sigh around me as I reach the end of this little adventure... everything has fallen quiet and I am spending this time in solitude. I have been in a space of such connection with other people this whole time it feels strange but also like the most natural thing in the world to retreat and find my breath and thoughts as I reflect.

It feels like everything has happened in such perfect timing, and truly like there is a sense of finality to this trip. I am not sad or sentimental I feel  blessed and slightly overwhelmed by the scope of what I have been experiencing and learning. There is so much to digest. I have hardly brushed the surface with these blog posts, but I guess what has wanted to be spoken about has been the inner journey above anything... small snippets of realisations and understandings and felt experiences that may be of some value to someone who might read them going through similar spirals of themselves.

Sometimes I read my words and they feel so vague or repetitive even... but it is truly my experience of the world right now, and I need to honour that. I am still very much in a state of inward reflection. Of looking at my life from these brand new angles and being like what tha fuck. My mind bends and so does my world regularly and I am still trying to keep up with what I am observing. There will come a time for linearity and stories that make sense I'm sure. And maybe there won't. Who can say!
I believe we all have stories worth telling. And these are mine, at least right now.

Expansion. Contraction. I am both. Probably always. One seems to follow the other in quick succession, but these days I know it is not something to fear but something to expect and embrace. My heart opens, and my mind recoils. Afraid of what it means, of being hurt. My world opens and my experience folds in on itself. I find myself in a strange but mystical city with no money, learning how to reach out... and trust strangers. In reality, the "contraction" is only a reaction, the expansion is the truth. I feel on so many levels like the light has pierced through the clouds and touched something new. I drank in my surroundings today with an attunement to the moment I've felt only a couple of times in my life. I feel so "here". I realised, my blessings are innumerable. That pushed to my limits I only want to open more. In this particular moment, sat on the steps of the yellow church in San Cristobal, I had felt the weight of everything I have been carry this year culminate and press upon me. It was an instance of feeling so alone, so fragile and raw, so questioning of myself and every moment leading to this one...the weight of all that fear and darkness and doubt called for me to close down. To believe it. But I remembered the most profound moment in my life to date, and what I had done... and I opened. I stretched my heart wider and bigger. I embraced every feeling with a trust so real I suddenly felt this intense light come flooding through every cell and over every part of my life. I cried for the blessings I had. For that exact moment. Every experience. The square became vivid with colour and depth. A young boy chasing a flock of pigeons. A woman weaving. The sun. The mountains. Infinity stretching and rippling out around me.

The rivers and the fires
the oceans and the mountains,
of my life, I bow
Here at the centre of all directions
I am a vessel
charged to walk these timelines
to open arms
to hold close
to release.
This mind is a master of painting visions in rose
But time, honours the soul
And time,
turns the wheel
drains the well.
Piece by piece, it comes together
it falls apart
And I, mind racing and heart beating
Human in every way
will watch it all unfold
in joy.