Wild Mustang: Lover of Soul and Inviter to the Dance

The Butterfly How do we discover joy in this very serious life?   Or perhaps, I should say in my very serious life, always focused, always trying to work on what is next.   Do we ever discover joy or does joy always discover us? When I think of the joyful moments of my life, I never found joy.   Joy found me when I was present and open to what was before me. In November 2018, I attended a Quest with Animas Valley Institute. It was suggested we spend some time before the quest being present in nature.   Choose some place as wild as possible, some place not domesticated or where you will meet other human beings.             I chose to go to Bonham State Park, a park I had not been to before, though it is only thirty minutes from our house. The instructions were to get off trail as much as possible.   Go where you are led.   Don’t simply follow the worn trail that is before you.   Look. Listen. Spend the whole day. Respond to that which is tugging at you.             I went on

Lover of Soul(s) and Inviter to the Dance             This Summer I was at Camp Gilmont for a week of camp as the theme enabler/bible leader.   It was my second summer and I really enjoy it.   I got to spend time with some wonderful kids, fantastic counselors and staff and just chilled.   My total teaching time was a couple of hours a day, so I spent the rest of my time reading, eating, napping, and walking in the woods.   I highly recommend the experience.             Every afternoon, I would take a 2-3 hour hike on the trails at Camp Gilmont, always trying to go somewhere I had not been before.   Most of the time I tried simply to be present in the woods, looking, listening, paying attention to what is before me and around me.   I tried not to have an agenda.   Just walk and explore, look and see.             One day a question kept popping in my head.   “What am I supposed to be doing in my life?”   This is the question I have been living with the last four years, especial

Wild Mustangs In June 2015 I left the church I had served for over five years to begin a mystical path, one I did not know where it would take me. As part of my discernment process, I went to Ghost Ranch that summer to spend a week with J. Philip Newell.   A few weeks before I left, I met with dear friends Suzi Hales and Patti Gilmore.   Patti had stage 4 metastasized breast cancer.   She had seven months to live.   Since she had faced the coming of her own death, she became a deep spiritual presence in this life. I listened carefully to what she said. When Patti learned I was going to Ghost Ranch, she told me I needed to go to the White Place and the Black Place, places near Ghost Ranch that Georgia O’Keefe painted. Patti arranged for a dear friend Matthew to be my guide. Matthew and his dog Mika met me at Ghost Ranch. The Black Place is a two-hour drive west of Ghost Ranch.               After we arrived at the Black Place, Matthew, Mika and I climbed up on top of the bla

Grief Part 2             After my experience of grief in “remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return,” (see last week’s blog) I thought, “good, I’ve got that grief stuff over with.   Now I can move onto something else.” That was not meant to be. Deeper grief work awaited me.               Three days into my Seminary of the Wild experience at Ghost Ranch, we were sent out onto the land again.   We were given a much longer time and I chose the land behind my tent.   Honestly, I should say it chose me.   As I began to move out onto the land, I came upon a short ravine.   I step down into it and sat for a while.   I knew this was my threshold for that day’s journey.   Thresholds often are found at the beginning of the journey, inviting us to see that we are stepping out of the ordinary into something new.   I sat in my threshold, down in the depth of the ravine because I knew this was a journey that would break me open.             After a few minutes in the ravine,