The Prelude .....

I love the word Prelude.  It speaks of such beautiful anticipation.  It lays the ground work for the masterpiece.  In music it sets the stage for the grand suite or fugue.

In the aspect of your life it offers so many options, tweaks, and creativity.  It is the juiciness of design, the excitement of the inspirations, and the core of creation.  Your aspirations shine during the prelude leading further down the path. Prelude can take many forms and speaks to your psyche as to the process that resonates with you.  

For me sometimes it is the prelude where I get stuck.  Do I approach the Prelude this way or that causing me to not allow the flow  I am not one to be uncomfortable for long, either a solution appears or one must move on. So over careful reflection, I have come to understand that Prelude is not to be rushed. There isn't a time limit to its creation and when allowed to flow guides itself. Prelude is not the incubation period. It is the creative introduction, the stage setting for the Masterpiece. Creating the Prelude is as valuable as the masterpiece itself.

As another marking of time begins what will be your Prelude?  How will you approach your masterpiece? Will you give yourself permission to flow into the anticipation.  

Is discovering your muse, your prelude without linear time important to you? Giving rise to understanding that time does not control our outcomes removes suppression of our soul song line. We are so geared to time limits in our daily life that we often rush to push our creative work out into the world too soon. Does your new healing modalities or creative offerings have a self imposed expiration date? Is the launching date driven by the world at large or the panic of missing the prospect of joining the bandwagon of others?  Are you listening closely to your Soul Song line and imbuing your Prelude with soulful creative energy allowing it to steep?

It isn't unusual to feel the push to get your creations out into the world 'just in time'. If you watch a true creative person they move differently. They listen intensely to a different drumbeat that draws their creations along. If you ask them they will do their best to explain how they create. Just remember it is how they create, their soul song line they hear and follow, not yours.

2017 is a 1 year in Numerology. A #1 year is all about new beginnings and the energies of #1 are perfect to begin your Prelude.  Astrology is another modality that speaks of cycles and spirals not linear time.  The movement of the Stars are very much a symphony.  They take center stage on cue, moving forward or retrograde back to a repeating stanza. 

Your soul doesn't do linear time.  Your soul doesn't do human.  It does soul.  It sings a song that flows and swirls.  It doubles back, surges forward, pauses, and plays. Its time rhythm is to visualize, listen, and dance.  Soul song lines have no beginning and no end. They just are truly movement. 

We live in a linear society so how do we walk in two worlds? There are many tools available to support you in straddling many worlds. Check your toolbox and see which work best.  Reach out for new tools or a refresher course. Play with your old tools in new ways,  Play and build your Prelude.

How does one connect with your soul song line? Hum a few bars, sway a bit, 2 twirls and a sigh should just about get you there .... Come play with me and I'll help you hear your soul song line.

Happy Fresh Beginnings! Come play with me any Time xxoo

Traveling on ~ The Soul Traveler

Time and Time and ..... Time Again

"Make me your friend," Time whispers.  "Don't hate me for not filling your day fuller, or so full you can't breathe. Remember I am but the limits you believe exist."

We wander through life following a clock.  We are taught to set goals for the future and remember the past.  We are not told how to live in the present.

Time is presented to us as a dictator.  We are led to believe that we must rush through our life succumbing to its will.  The sound of our mother's heartbeat from the womb is replaced by the tick ticking of an inanimate object.  Driven by a set number we rush through our life only occasionally rebelling against its chains.  We think Time requires us to be lead around in a constant circle.  

We practice meditation daily only to run off to the next appointment we managed to squeeze in to yet another day. How often do we purposely bring the non-time of meditation into our work day or weekend plans?

Each of us has our own perspective of Time.  We use it to accomplish our living, mark memories or milestones, and allow it to lead us forward.

Time does not exist.  It is our buy-in to segment our life that determines its control.  If Time doesn't exist then what does that really mean + why would we care?

Our ancestors used Time as a natural rhythm.  Sleep + waking were the determining points.  The sun came up, they rose.  Sun set, they slept.  As days lengthened hunting + planting lasted longer. Days shortened hunting became a quick sport and they relied upon what harvest came from the plantings of the longer days.  There was not a giant clock nailed to the trees, ticking away to drive their days.  They marked their lives from the seasons and rhythms of the sun + moon.  The stars portended the future.  The moon reminded them of the day just ended ~ the past.  Their present was marked by the sun as it moved across the sky.

Now we live here with the aspect of Time glaring down from his mighty perch, barking out measured steps to be completed each day.  Our children's arrivals are measured in weeks, the longer calculation, instead of the vagueness of months.  There is a celebration for every passage of time.  Constantly we are shown the greatness of Time.  A languished moment is heralded with criticism and offered up as a treat.

How we got here would be another 10 pages.  How we arrived is not as important as how we release this dependency on Time.  We can all agree we are in a world running faster and faster.  We are totally enmeshed in the barbs of time.

Each of us use some form of meditation.  These practices are generally our first introduction to moving out of time. As we leave our meditations we sense the calm space, an altered space, surrounding us and it appears to be drifting away.  You experience this same sensation when you are caught up in something enjoyable and not so enjoyable.  It is the altered state of full immersion into the Present that lengths or shortens our concept of time. Time truly is an illusion.  Playing with that illusion will break down the mental and physical constraints.  

Try for 45 days a few of these games and see what transpires.  Nothing tricky or 'time-consuming' to this play.     Enjoy ~

1.) Rid yourself of all clocks. Yes turn your phone over :)

2.) Each traffic light you approach that is RED state: 'Change, change, change'.  Make note each time it changes to green.

3.) Each traffic light you approach that is GREEN state: 'Stay, stay, stay'. Make note of the times it stays green and you pass on through.

4.) Using the appointments you have during a week, pick one each day (even if the only one is getting to + from work) as you head to the appointment say, "Stretch, stretch, stretch'. Make a note when you arrive with time to spare and when you don't.

Each week during the 45 days review your results.  Mark down any feelings or reactions recording when one was easy, fun or difficult.  Note any resistance.  These simple exercises will asset you in learning how to stretch time, fold time, and break down the assertion that Time exists.

Learning to play will help shift your mind & its reality of the need for time and heighten your bodies acceptance of freedom.  Time play + shifting = a mental, physical, and spiritual understanding of what is reality.

Traveling on out of time ~

Teri ~ The Soul Traveler

Eventually You Have to Go Back and Get it ................ and other musings

At the ancient age of 6 I would wander outdoors early and not return until hunger struck me down.  There was far too many familiar faces often hidden from others for me to visit and chat with to endure the indoors and siblings.  I would build replicas of ancient cities in the sandbox chatting to the multitudes that filled the houses, creating soups and brews from the plants and feathers around me making sure to offer them to the sky above, my dog, and those living in places far, far away.  Some days I could be found squawking out a tune in my squeaky voice of lost love and home long missed, crafting necklaces of seeds, feathers, and hollowed bones, leaving a very pretty plate when my dinner bell sounded for those who would be passing through.

Occasionally my pesky brother would come to chide me it was time to give it all up.  "What you are doing, he said, is never going to work here."  Let's climb the trees I begged at least we can get closer and perhaps they will hear us.  In solidarity for his crazy sister, we climbed higher and higher into the trees.  The fun eventually turned to spying on the people in the passing cars and our other siblings sent to find us.  

My nighttime dreams were filled with places not known here and starred me as a Joan of Arc Star Faery come to help.  I would wished that Peter Pan would arrive and take me back to his Tinkerbell except there was a BIG thing wrong with her.  Star Faeries don't look like her nor do they flitter around aimlessly.  I was after all only a silly 6 year old with a vivid imagination.

Since mid June I have been experiencing a heavy dose of what I call 'the crabbies'.  You know those small irritations that surface to prick at your sanity and your peace like the driver going the speed limit after 5pm?  I am not one to dismiss any disruption to my daily nirvana.  My hip, lower back and pelvis had decided to hold a grand flair up in my honor which signaled ~ the storm is about to hit!  I hit the airwaves to search for insight.  The body needed to be heard after 40 years of carrying a long hidden pain, my mind needed a distraction to allow for the story to be told, my emotions needed expression but not during rush hour, for god sake, and really I needed to blend, meld, brew all that ancient wisdom I once relished in back up to the surface and come full circle.  Time for the full Joan of Arc Star Faery to come out to stay, not the half assed 'almost' me.

Relying on proven traditional awakening techniques I struggled to make the meld permanent.  I made headway for sure and saw the twinkling of long hidden knowledge but it would not come up, stay, and pour forth.  I knew there was an issue that I needed support in clearing.  It was an issue that wasn't responding to my usual support network.  Feeling the 'need' to go home I knew this was a quantum leap coming to the surface.  No longer satisfied with my usual tools, I found myself pushing to make that long overdue sacred connection.

Reaching out to my divine star connection, tears filling my sacred eyes, I asked to be gifted the tool that would take me back to the treasure trove of my sacred ancient wisdom.  The wisdom held securely by a small delicate 6-year old girl who knew that anything crossing her path was sacred, loving, and in need of their own remembering, the wisdom that may not free this planet completely but it would offer care, nourishment, and a recognition of the elegance of the human heart.  And not just a little bit of that ancient knowledge but the whole treasure chest ~ because why go after just a spoonful of nourishment?

Last evening I participated with 4 other magnificent women in a northern shamanic vision quest led by a wonderful Vitki.  This isn't just a coincidence that through the ancient north traditions my vision has been cleared.  My ancestral roots like most western europeans comes from the celtic + viking traditions.  It wasn't just a luck of the draw that I spent 2 weeks in Ireland and England last May.  It was the call of the delicate, optimistic, pain-in-the-ass 6 year old sprite come to claim her star birth rite.

There are so many ways back to finding our true self.  The one that brings you joy even in the midsts of your human trials is your key.  I know my home is in the stars and that I live here now.  Finally claiming the ancient traditions of the stars brings a passion long since subdued back into my daily life.  My ancestral knowledge helps me to meld it all together.  It supports the creation of knowledge, play, love, and nourishment that is a kaleidoscope of all wisdom ~ ancient, current, earth, + star.

Take the road you are most afraid to walk.  It is on that road your truth lies waiting.  Who you are is for you to discover and claim.  Loving every aspect whether it be called light or dark is what it is all about this time around.  Close your ears to the world screaming out the latest and greatest.  Open your heart to the murmurings of those not seen ~ they remember you, your naked you, your sacred, playful, wise you.  

Let's take that step and see where it takes us.  Let's brew that cup of nourishment and drink it down.  Every last drop! 

I'll be seeing you around the next star - The Soul Traveler xoxoxoo

The Stillness that is the Harvest

Sometimes, when we really pay complete attention, we are gifted with a communion that takes us out of our daily existence and into the 'real' experience of life.  

Four summers ago I visited the Devoto Memorial Cedar Grove on Lolo Pass. This grove from the first moment I heard of it has been calling and gifting me deeply.  Each summer since hearing the first call, I have returned and included one good friend to travel the grove with me.  Each friend has experienced and brought to the Cedars' a much-needed piece.

My personal blend of sacred herbs & plants includes the cedar from this grove, my clearing tools include a large piece of bark from the Grandmother Tree magically shaped like a cedar feather fan.  Every trip has been blessed with a special harvest of needles and bark, wisdom and words, strength & courage leaving behind gifts of my love and respect.  These visits have been magic-filled.

In 2012 I was told not to go further than the first 10 feet which of course I gently challenged.  Here was my first opportunity to step into a forest filled with ancient ancestors only to be asked to leave. 

In 2013 hearing I needed to come and  harvest cedar for a special blend I was to make, we arrived and heard repeatedly 'NO not here’.  Finding nothing had fallen to the ground to gather we decided to head home.   Winding back over the pass I heard a loud "Pull off Here" command and found myself face to face with 3 large cedar trees standing with branches loaded and offering their needles for sacred use.  

Last summer brought me to the Grandmother Cedar.  She had fallen across the trail blocking access to the area where I usually make my offerings and sit to drum.  She beckoned me to lie upon her and be with her.  Feeling the life still beating within her and hearing her song as I lay there took me to a deeper understanding of the magic between trees and me, actually all of this planet and me.  I have always loved the place we call Earth.  I have ached for her and cheered with her, shed tears for her and rallied for her, knowing that she will always forgive and continue to offer love to us.  She has protected me and drawn me closer to my medicine ways.  She has taken me home through her night sky and brought me back with the waking sun.  Yet the visit last year laid me open.  It carved the path for me to really grasp what was to be shown in the months ahead.

Grandmother Cedar gifted me with memories and bark from her fallen trunk.  I took several pieces but stopped before she told me.  I stopped because I did not want to be a glutton.  This May as I prepared for my trip to Ireland & Glastonbury I gathered satchels of my sacred blend digging into my stash of cedar.  It became evident in my preparations that I would soon be out of cedar needles and would need to ask to come harvest in the grove.  As I visited Ireland I left offerings to the land and was gifted small pieces of the Irish landscape for the sacred grove here.  Glastonbury welcomed my offerings of cedar and at Og & Magog I received a piece to bring back to Grandmother.  

Shortly after my return I heard Grandmother call asking me to come and see her.  I was asked to bring a friend and was given that friends name.  This wonderful friend has a gift of healing and as soon as the invitation was offered she connected with the grove and prepared for our visit.  And now in 2015 we came to assist with the matrix as a support to a new paradigm needed for the cedars to survive.

Upon our arrival we were asked to reverse my normal routine.  First we were to go to my special sacred spot, drum, and make our offerings.  The Grove whispered its hello and delight in our visit.  Grandmother Cedar chastised me for my reluctance to take more my last visit.  Why was I so stubborn to take what had been offered?  What was this 'belief' in my excuse of gluttony?  Who was I to determine when a gift was enough?  WoW!  She was right.  Who did I think I was to 'know' what was the right amount for a gift?  Why would I put a governor on the outpouring of sacredness?

Traversing through the grove we finally came to Grandmother Cedar.  She had been cut into several pieces so the trail could be cleared.  Her heart still beat as she lay there, holding the interim Grandmother and the matrix of the grove in a supporting love.  She knew as the Grove did that the old ways of holding space upon Earth needed to change.  It could no longer fall upon one.  There was a call now for several groupings of trees to bind together and then each group would hold the next until the matrix became a honeycomb shape and support system.  We were asked to help in setting the matrix and flow.  We were also asked to partake so we could understand the need for this paradigm shift.  

Coming face to face with her once again, I was transported back to last year and my special time with her.  Knowing I was to stay open to her guidance and blessings of the gift of her bark and needles, I pulled my bag out and listened.  Gently taking her bark, needles from the branches that had begun to grow from her fallen trunk, tears flowed as I realized that soon she would be out in the world blessing homes, ceremonial fires, and altars.  I continued until I heard her tell me "Take one piece just for you, my daughter, to remember me by for I won't be here next time you come".  I gently laid the piece of offering I brought from Ireland and Glastonbury, stepping back I turned, my heart saddened yet full, knowing she would be gone when I returned.

Continuing our work it became apparent that each group of three old cedars had around them groups of three much younger trees creating a matrix of 12 that connected to the next 12.  As we worked diligently, several groups of visitors would walk along the trails in the grove, stopping occasionally to chat with us.  The entire time we worked there were no groups of 2 or 5 only the combo of 3, 9, and 12 ~ trees and humans.  Finally we found ourselves back at the opening to the grove facing  a line of male cedars guarding the grove from the highway.  We were instructed to leave them as they were ~ connected to each other but not the grove.  These cedars are the Guardians of the Grove.  This place holds so much for all who visit.  What a blessing to be asked to help.
  

Often times we think we are being respectful by our humility yet there are times when it is only our ego that declares the reasons for our humility.  When I stopped taking the gifts Grandmother Cedar offered last year out of my need to 'not take too much and be disrespectful'  I wasn't able to gift fully to others.  I had to be careful with what I used in my sacred blend and in sharing with others.  Being concerned about 'running out' brought lack to others and myself.  Had I continued to gather more of Grandmother Cedar would be out in the world today.

It is so important to listen closely and not 'read into' or let our ego interfere in our sacred work.  Whether it is in our gathering of sacred offerings, building our connections, or learning + listening from Spirit and our Soul, don't quit when You think it is time.  Stop when all goes quiet and the stillness of the sacred moment assures you that completion has happened.  

This journey we are traversing is filled with opportunities to lengthen and strengthen our connection to our Higher Soul Self and Source.  We are here to learn and grown.  Don't think because you have 'arrived' and completed course after course that you are done learning.  Oh no ~ Beware of that ego trap!  HA, Baba Yaga loves those times.

So keep on keeping on!  Learn, Laugh, and Leap!

The journey continues ~

The Soul Traveler xoxox

Fireside Chat with Crones ~ February

Having decided to change the format of these wonderful chats to the Equinox & Solstice, I found myself missing my monthly creativity.  Today I sat down, communed with spirit and compiled a short video expressing the wisdom, serenity and love of our Elders in Nature.  Enjoy!

~ The Soul Traveler

And so .....

As the months of 2014 ebb and flow to us, I realize that I have been on a 7 month journey of unemployment insurance that has drawn to an end.  

I know without a shadow of doubt that I am not the same woman who looked out into the world on November 27, 2013.  I cannot even remember who she was.  There is a tad bit of a memory of how she felt and an understanding of her story.  There is a deeper understanding of how the story dissolved, the realization of a stronger essence of her, and a willingness to feel into the moment and hold no expectation, no opinion of what is to be. 

Oh the journey was complete with wildness, back-ups, and delight.  It carried me to a place I had desired to hold deeply.  It carried me out into a jungle replete with tangles, rushing water, and mystery.  The adventure did not disappoint.  It has no ending.

I am truly blessed with the opportunity to focus solely on my path.  And these last 7 months allowed a deeper involvement into uncovering this path.  It enabled me to bring into my daily life a realization of how my path, even the search of it, was individualized from others. 

Through this time a stronger concise understanding of who I was, coupled with a releasing of old patterns and beliefs, balanced by acceptance of the value of illusion moved me into an empathy of self and my community.  The freedom to lay about, wander the mountain top, grovel in the frustrations, and epitomize standardization pushed me to turn and deny the existence of self; to die to myself as I had never imagined.

There has been a shamans death experience, a mystics evaporation, and yet what I was being asked for did not contain another level of these prerequisites to soul evolution.  I have experienced a burning to the ground, the severing of the leash, but I had not experienced the dying to myself.  The dying took place sudden with the realization of the ask, moved into flowing with the demands of daily life, and ended in an ancient ritual that almost seemed uneventful.  It was the forward motion after the dying that emphasized the Divine's request.  

Every time I looked to draw a frame of reference the screen was blank.  It wasn't just the screen of Future but the screen of Past that lay black and empty.  Only the place of Here and Now held any form or design.  Anything presenting itself to me was met with nothing but what I knew to be true for me.  Trying to decipher anything has been unsettling.

The unsettling is not in being unable to fit in or know the direction.  The unsettling is learning to walk completely within the present.  It is learning that where I once related in life with others is non-existent and non-essential.  It is non-identifying.  It cannot relate to me as much as I cannot relate to it.  In the midst of all of it, there is laughter, joy, tears, love, and a completeness.  A focus of all is finished within itself bringing with it a solid sense of self without identity.  

Spirit has said others have experienced this and many will join in the dying to themselves.  Everyone will be offered, not all will accept, and all will continue along their path.

Having words to express this past 9 months has been very difficult.  Having words to express this newest endeavor has been even more difficult.  It has not mattered that there are no words.  It does not matter if I ever climb the mountain top, it no longer matters what I hold dear, where I wander, who I meet or don't meet, how I show up to the world is all that matters.  Do I come with my heart open, my mind quiet, my eyes bright, my ears listening, and my tongue gentle? Do I come willing to share everything including the unacceptable?  Do I come each day willing to make it a good day to die?  Do I come prepared to return to the primordial juices?  Am I willing to live outside the perceived existence of all that matters?  Am I willing to be the ancient?  Am I willing to hold past, present, future completely within me?

These questions may seem to be those we all ask ourselves daily.  This time there is a very large difference in asking them.  We all know being who we truly are means living with hearts open, mind quiet, listening, no opinions, etc., and yet this is different.  

Dying to yourself means you cannot do anything else but show up as an unidentifiable person.  You cannot be You.  You can only Be.

The Soul Traveler

Shifting .... time

One wonderful gift I have, is shifting time.  Unaware of what I was doing for most of my youth, I would be amazed at the ability to move through a difficult time very quickly, stretch out in a marvelous moment, and change traffic signals.  It was the ability to change traffic signals that woke me up to my little gift.  Yes, those too long lingering stop lights especially when one is late to an event!  My first realization became a game very quickly.  Counting to 5 as I said out loud, "Change now" to watching the series of lights ahead in downtown Denver change with each planned blink of my eye as I never altered my speed developed a realization of the illusion I lived.  This playfulness became a salve to my road weary heart.  It taught me a wisdom I did not realize I had.  Time became my secret.  Time was my best friend.  Time allowed me to shape shift and led me to my soul path.  Well, actually, time is my path.  

It was in realizing the essence of time and the illusion we had created around it that I began to fulfill my desire to be who I truly was.  

In the moments that I believed I needed to fulfill the dreams of family, friends, society, I disconnected to my ability to shift time, my connection to my soul, and my heart became weary.  When I bought into the demands of those living within our perceived time constraints the only way to remove myself was to play with Time.  It was those moments caught in abusive turmoil that time became my ally.  I did not leave my body or disassociate from self when I remembered to shift into a time filled with the end.  I know this explanation borders on "psychological dissociation" but it is not.  I know when I created means by which to cope with the abuse.  I am referring to using time to alter the illusion and repair the wound.

A shaman using an altered state travels to the time and space of soul loss.  It is by shifting time that a shaman retrieves the lost soul piece and returns it to the client.  

So even in times of abuse or trauma, never having completely separated from any of my soul gifts especially the gift of shifting time, I was able to lessen the soul loss around these events.  I did not realize what I was capable of doing in the moment, it wasn't until later that this abilities deeper essence was revealed.

Because we are not broken and do not need to be fixed, we have always used our gifts to move through our life and experience those events and moments that will bring us back home to ourselves and the Divine.  It is when we use time that we can reflect upon our abilities to remember who we truly are.  Every one of us takes time to look "back" upon our lives to learn.  We may not do this consciously as in "Hey I want to see why I experienced this loss, abuse, trauma, reward, etc." but we do reflect every moment of every day.  As we are moving through traffic we are reflecting upon where we came from, we are looking to where we are going, and maintain a strong awareness of where we are.  We have to do this to drive our cars.

Do you honestly think you don't do this with everything in your life?  Come now be honest.  As your discussion with your partner escalates up or down are you not reviewing what got you here and how fast you can get to the other side?  

Guess what?  You just used Time to shift the moment at hand.  Now lets do it with a sense of deliberate outcome.  

As a shaman, I listen to your story, looking for the exact place in time where the soul loss that is impacting you now needs resolution.  That moment or time is suspended in a dimensional latitude that spins timelessly waiting for the impactful moment to collide and bring it forward to move your soul further along your path.  In an altered state or a time shift I journey to the moment moving through dimensions and time to retrieve and bring it to you.  Time is fluid.  As in a stream or ocean it moves continually upon itself creating and recreating.  It never begins nor ends.  It shifts us, itself, and eternity continually.  Collapsing upon itself it is giving birth to a never ending beginning.  Remembering, as we know it, allows time to lead us deeper into all that we are.  Grasping this concept even fleetingly without over thinking brings awareness.  The altered dimensional moment uses time to refocus and create.  It splinters the outcome across many realities shifting past, present, future, parallel lives and experiences simultaneously.

A simple game of change the traffic light becomes a catalyst for shifting realities.

What time game is waiting for you?

The journey continues ~

The Soul Traveler

The Lady of the River

I am a water baby at heart.  A Pisces that has been land-locked most of her life must take the time to really refuel with water.  Lately I have been craving a float in the fueling waters of this planet.  Just to sit and hear the movement, feel the caress, and absorb the nourishment for my soul.  Daily I walk upon the crust of Gaia grateful for the opportunity to commune with her and her creatures.  I love smelling the scents of the trees and grasses, glimpsing the wildlife and soaring with the bird tribe, and yet my soul is drawn to the water.

Today I gave in.

I loaded my pack with offerings.  I pulled one container of moon ceremony waters that raised its hand, gently securing it deep within my pack next to my favorite Hobbs.  Hobbs travels everywhere with me.  He is my tool of comfort for those who cannot find it.  Today Hobbs is joining me at the river.  Hobbs will bring the water medicine home for future use.

My first stop proved to be uninterested in fulfilling my request.  No worries.  Knowing this place would fill it for others I turned around to travel further down the road.  Spying a turnoff I made a sudden decision and turned left across the highway.  For 10 minutes I journeyed east towards the river and Poker Joe's fishing access.  Discovering only one car in the lot I pulled in placing my car squarely in the shade.  It was still early.  The sun travels slowly west this time of year leaving shade available for most of my planned time.

I followed the trail stepping around mud puddles moving further into the brush.  It was a well worn trail even indicating a quad-wheel had recently been through leaving scars in the deep grass.  It was quiet as I removed my sunglasses to see clearer.  Finally I came out into a clearing.  It was obviously the river had come this far in this spring.  Large trees littered the sandy rock filled ground before me.  The river still lay 500 feet further east.  Spotting the fisherman I turned away heading left picking my way toward the bank.  

Finding the edge where I wanted to settle I asked the river permission to join her for the day.  Quietly she meandered by beckoning me to sit for a conversation.  The breeze was strong enough to take the heat from the rocks, blowing away any chance of a candle or smudge, still leaving me refreshed and cleared.   

The remnants of moon-bathed chocolate cake came out to be sprinkled across her ripples in offering to the water sprites that danced.  Chuckling to myself I wondered if my activity would draw the trout away from the fisherman as I continued with my offerings of cedar, salt, and lavender.  Sensing something behind me I glanced up as a large blue heron graced the stark blue sky melding into the rhythm of the breeze.  Distracted in my thoughts to grab my phone, turning I ignored the request and watched her elegant flight.  Stillness settled as I felt drawn back to the river and her rhythm.  

With a sigh I released all my worries, aspirations, and plans to her as I called my guides and star family to this moment.  My body refreshed itself in the sounds of her lapping the shore carrying everything away. Trout jumped at the dragonflies skipping across enticing them in play.  I watched as an osprey soared carrying my dreams home.  

Closing my eyes the Spirit of the Bitterroot River glided across towards me.  She offered her wisdom.  Her deeper understanding of the part we each hold was gifted as I quietly poured my water offering into her depths.  Tears spilled sending ripples into her.  Slowly I stepped out into her allowing the washing and anointing.  My soul sang with each step.   As I returned to my spot a dark little frog hopped across my path a perfect gift to seal the moment.

Finally the river released me.  Packing to head home I heard the request to bring my drum next week so she could teach me a new song.  Be sure to bring lunch she said your body will need the nourishment.  Delighted I turned to leave.

Heading back across unfamiliar ground I made the choice to follow the call.  Soon I found myself watching the blue heron fishing.  As she elegantly stood in silence she stole a glance of me.  I swore she winked as I tiptoed closer.  This time I knew a photo was appropriate.  Clicking away I watched as she fished mesmerized by her beauty and presence.

Knowing it was time to return I found myself startled each time I startled the bird tribes hidden on the trail.  Laughing I heard the chatter of the black chipmunk above me as he warned those ahead.  I tried, unsuccessfully, to capture him.  He blended in the dark burnt bark of the trees.

Blessings abound for me.  I am constantly in awe at how Source gifts, loves, and teaches us.  Holding yourself in humility and love offers opportunities for simple affirmations of the grandeur of life.  I cherish this land and feel its calls deeply.  It is the waters that fill me with ancient memories.  They are very sacred to me.  Pouring my moon water back into her filled me with gratitude.  Humbly I realized how small I was compared to her, the Bitterroot River, and all the waters she represented.  I hold sacred my calling to care for these waters.  My part is small, this I know.  Yet each day I offer in prayer for the care of our waters supports the larger picture.

She wanders long and deep carrying our earliest memories and the truth of who we truly are.  One day she will bring us all home.

The Soul Traveler