the final chapter of 2010 ...

2010 has been one of the best years and I stated that it would be on the new years eve.

She has called on me to take on many new adventures including expressing my love for another, my love for myself, traveling much and far, meeting many new special people in new places, giving back to worthy causes, contributing to the goals of many people surrounding me both professionally and personally, cherished time with my family and much more.  

She is not yet over. 

Three months left and she has promised to create much more with me and I am blessed.

And recently she and I have created a game for the next two ++ years that as things unfold I will be excited to write about those journeys and their journals.

Until then ... dream well my friends!

Cassándra

Cassándra

Heartbreak vs Hangover … Getting Too Old for Both

Laying on my couch feeling completely incapacitated, the thought of food or drink makes me nausea, the room is spinning in a dull way, and I have no desire to move, period. If I were to relay my symptoms over the phone to a medical professional I wonder what they would conclude. I had my own epiphany that my heartbreak was similar to a hangover. Interesting…. perhaps.

It came to me a few weeks later on my “healing” vacation, in a moment where I realized another comparison that it was getting harder to bounce back quickly from either phenomenon and that quite frankly I was just getting too old for both.

Let me start off by writing a “disclaimer” that the topic up for discussion is firstly created by ourselves. Yes, heartbreak’s and hangover’s are self inflicted acts both cast upon ourselves and result in the same maladies of emotional, mental and physical discomfort. Even I often like to “blame” an external source because relating to something outside ourselves can seem to alleviate even a little of the “pain” even if only temporarily.

My friends in Kaua’i had this beautiful painting on their wall, up high.  It caught my attention many times. One time I stopped to pay attention. I asked myself what I saw and immediately this “broken” part of me said sure that’s me standing out front of the boat, looking into the horizon with hope, believing the person I’m traveling with is guiding us along and knows that my heart is in the boat with us. What I can’t see but he can is he’s pushing us over a cliff. A-ha of course. In moments my first rendition of what this painting meant would conclude with my heart in pieces on the shore below. And then in an immediate second moment, one that skipped over the first one and replaced it, I’m present to what this picture has been wanting to share with me all along. That we’re going to glide over the edge and fly.

There’s a quote I think of often. It got me through my first “mid-life crisis” as I called it 10 years ago when I made some major changes in my entire life and that catapulted me across a huge cavern onto new ground. Recently I’ve found myself in this reflective space, knowing that it’s time to cross the unknown again though this time I’m going to fly instead. It shows up for me when all the great things in my life, both personal and professional, seemed to be pulling me in a new direction and I know I’m going to jump, yet I sit counting 1-2-3 and ….

It quote goes something like this:

When you come to edge of all of the darkness that you have known and you are about to step out into the abyss trust that one of two things will happen… a net will appear or you will learn how to fly.

Let go and Let's go and fly!

Cassándra

Swimming with my face in the water….

Three days into my island visit…. Kaua’i has had her healing hands on me.  How would one describe to anyone else what healing on an island feels like, looks like, sounds like, smells like, and even tastes like?  Are there any of the typical five senses involved in a healing process? Is healing even just a made up story? Who says one needs to heal or what to do to heal, or knows when one is healed? And healing from what?  It’s the many loved ones around me healing from life threatening illness, or health issues in their families or the loss of loved ones all together who are indeed need of something defined as “healing.” And yet there is no rating on who gets to heal or for what, I know that about the universe. And I know I’m here and I know I’m healing.

The day I arrived here so did two spots on my tongue. I’ve not looked it up online because my mind has already run wild with the worst case scenarios and since I’m not in my home country what am I to do about it anyways. Tonight I did brave looking it up online and although I’ll still seek out medical advice upon my return home guess what the first thing I found about what it was? 

What you have is called Benign migratory glossitis or geographic tongue. 
Do you suffer from stress or mental anxiety of any kind? particularly related to domestic or professional problems? Stress triggers the appearance of this malady. Eating spicy food only increases the burning sensation that occurs due to the inflammation of your taste buds. Do not smoke when you have this appearing on your tongue. Try and avoid spicy food, and use some method of relaxation, like meditation or Yoga.  You may even use a mild analgesic or anaesthetic lotion on your tongue 10 minutes before you eat. It helps to avoid the burning and irritation.

Interesting? I possibly have Geographic Tongue?

So let me share what the healing has felt like, as a starting place. This island has a way of caressing you. Lying on the beach I’m subtly aware of how the sand feels underneath my fingers each little shell is kissing each molecule of my skin, soft to the touch. Her waves crash upon the shore demanding all my attention to her and nothing else enters my thought. The wind moves her hands up my entire body like she’s wrapping me up in satin. Her touch is warm and patient. A swim is the only thing to cool me down, temporarily, though in the water she has her way with me. This island has nothing other than a complete and utter feeling of seducing me with her sensuality and love.  At least that’s what she’s giving to heal me.

And I’m learning how to play with her too.

As I’m snorkeling it takes all my concentration to enjoy and relax what I’m being exposed too. The majestic world of the coral has sights and colours rarely seen. Even though I’ve snorkeled before I’m finding the procedure of shifting my natural breathing patterns from in and out the nose, to in and out of the mouth has an unsettling edge to it.  And then as I glide over the coral and the schools of fish looking back at me I remind myself deep, long breaths as I’m currently at a rhythm much like I’m hyperventilating.

I realize the root of what is having all these necessary functions be the most unsettling is swimming with my  face in the water.  A few times I catch myself pulling my head out to look ahead at where I’m going… innocent enough. Yet, it’s exactly this type of action that often has me misguided by what is right there in front of me. Looking ahead at what’s coming, another wave knocks me off my balance and I swallow salt water. Looking ahead at where I’m going I can only see that which sits above the water and it cannot guide me through into the deep caverns of the coral. So putting my face back in the water the waves no longer knock me over, the path is clear; I start breathing with the rhythm of the ocean and notice the fish rolling around in the sand like puppy dogs. Sliding my hands back along my side I float along and before long it feels natural to swim with my face in the water.

Love, Cassándra 

Flying by the seat of my pants….

Flying by the seat of my pants….

Upon reflection this current adventure of mine has pretty much started out on a whim. Though I travel a lot and can be quite spontaneous, recent circumstances pulled me into “getting away” in a fashion faster than I could recount if asked.  If you told me on August 10^th that a month later I’d be on my way to Hawaii, I would have squinted my eyes and said “Whatcha talking about Willis?”  Especially because at the time I had other plans.

So first, I booked my flight not in typical fashion for me, and for what I will now refer to as “flying by the seat of my pants”

Then usually, because I do travel often, I’m usually somewhat methodical, organized and handling details in an orderly fashion.  Not this time.  I barely spoke about my trip, barely thought about, and barely packed in time.  Therefore it didn’t occur to me until hours before I’m about to leave, versus the day before, to check into my flight online.  I always pre-book my window seats and because the flight was only a few hours away I thought I’d peruse what other seats still might be available.  Another window seat was available and with no one booked to sit next to them, unlike the current seat I was arranged in.  I took a chance and well, it paid off. 

So second, booking online by the “seat of my pants” and I got two seats all to myself.  Mahalo.

One of my best friends Gillian dropped me off at the airport which was also by the seat of both our pants.  She was borrowing a friends car and texted me the night before to offer me a ride. Extremely thoughtful as she always is…. and a send off from someone you love is the best way to arrive or depart any airport so of course I said yes!  Usually logistical challenges happen on my end, by which I mean I’m the one usually running late, however this time lovely Gilly was juggling to arrive in a timely fashion to get me to airport.  I knew, just knew it would be okay. I’m meant to be going to Kaua’i and went with the flow. I wasn’t even flustered when at the check-in counter the woman said to me, “Wow you just made it, like just made it, like JUST!”  Uh-ha, I got it.  I was grateful, to the universe and to her, kissed my ticket and headed through security.  Now, just to note… “just making it” was apparently hitting the 60 minute cut off before my flight, because I arrived an hour before it was to depart.  I still have flashbacks of running every step of the way to make a plane to Miami years ago in Toronto when I arrive at the check-in counter at the same time as they were boarding the plane?  I digress.

So third, arriving at the departures check-in counter at exactly 60 minutes before a USA flight from Canada is JUST “flying by the seat of my pants”

I whizzed through the rest of the check-in procedures and had lots of time for some sushi and wonton soup while I starred at the Information Boards on arrivals and departures. Hhhhmm, that plane just departed to Minneapolis.  I ate another piece of raw fish.  Then, it was off the board … where’s my flight again?  Calmly I sat and sipped my soup and at about 3:05pm I figured I better walk over to my gate for my 3:20pm flight.  Seconds later as I approached closer I heard them page my name with the following… “This is our final boarding call, all bags will be removed from the plane if you do not take your seats for our final boarding call”   Wow, I am flying by the seat of my pants.  Calmly, and a little apologetically, I boarded the plane.  Whew!  Let me digress again for a minute and just state for the record, and most of you who know me will agree, IF my bags were ever to be “removed” from a plane I’ll tell you it’s going to be for a much better story than I sat starring at the check-in board sipping soup. 

So fourth, arriving at final boarding call as they “threatened” to remove my luggage, also falls into the category of “flying by the seat of my pants”

As I write these detailed accounts of my journey to arriving in Hawaii I’m present to only one feeling.  A deep, routed feeling of trust.  I can tell I’m learning to trust myself and the universe again J

Oh shit!   Gotta go FINAL CALL for my plane from Honolulu to Kaua’i.

Cassándra

Today is the last day that I’m using words

In the words of Madonna (artist video below - two versions) 

Today is the last day that I’m using words 

They’ve gone out, lost their meaning

Don’t function any more

Let’s get unconscious, honey

Let’s get unconscious, honey

Today is the last day that I’m using words 

They’ve gone out, lost their meaning

Don’t function any more

Traveling, leaving logic and reason

Traveling to the arms of unconsciousness

Traveling, leaving logic and reason

Traveling to the arms of unconsciousness

Let’s get unconscious, honey

Let’s get unconscious

Let’s get unconscious, honey

Let’s get unconscious

Words are useless, especially sentences

They don’t stand for anything

How cold they explain how I feel

Traveling, traveling, I’m traveling

Traveling, leaving logic and reason

Traveling, Traveling, I’m gonna relax

Traveling, Traveling in the arms of unconsciousness

Let’s get unconscious, honey

Let’s get unconscious

Let’s get unconscious, honey

Let’s get unconscious

And inside we’re all still wet

Longing and yearning

How can I explain how I feel?

Let’s get unconscious, honey

Let’s get unconscious

Let’s get unconscious, honey

Let’s get unconscious

Traveling, traveling, traveling, traveling

Traveling, traveling, traveling, traveling

In the arms of unconsciousness

And all that you’ve ever learned, try to forget

I’ll never explain again

Madonna - Bedtime Story Reinvented

Madonna - Bedtime Story (Video)

Schizophrenia and Harmony....

 I was at my best friend Maria's home the other night and she had a set of Tarot cards. I love delving into signs and rituals along my path. So I picked up a card and showed it to her and she asks me what I pulled the card for...  I paused for a moment thinking, is this like telling someone what you wished for and then it doesn't come true?  For love I said.  She promptly, perhaps a little too promptly upon reflection say “No, that's not your card pull another one.”  How rude I think but before I can utter the words right back at her I’m trustingly pulling another card. She does know me very well, you know. This one looks much like a painting I created, hanging at the foot of my bed, after my blue moon New Years Eve at Whistler this year. Two mountains, two peaks, separated or brought together by a blue moon depending on the perspective.

My painting, you like J?

  

Now this Tarot Card has a little added dimension of a person being stretched across the two peaks which, upon reflection, accurately depicts how I’ve been feeling since new year eve… like I’m trying to pull these two peaks together. I solo woman trying to pull two mountains together and is now hanging over the abyss, stuck. Perhaps this is my card after all. I read what it says and it resonates, more than I’d like to admit.

Days have past and the cards have been showing up in different areas of my life. I meet up with Maria tonight and request to see the cards again, to revisit their messages to me. And as “insulted” as I was about her claiming the first card to not be mine I confess I can’t remember what it was. I remember the second one, or at least I remembered what I wanted to about it.

In her apartment I find the card and place it beside me. I open the book to read it’s wise words again. I say to her out loud, oh yes… “Commentary.” Her unaware that what I was referring to was the title of the card, says “Ah yes, Schizophrenia.” Jilted again by my best friends blunt, innocent honesty I look down and realize the Tarot Card I pulled for Love is named Schizophrenia? What, Schizophrenia? Are you shitting me? Oh yes, I’m paying attention now Universe.

And here’s what it said.

Schizophrenia

Commentary (not the name of the card, the actual commentary – ha,ha jokes on me)

The person on this card brings a new twist to the old idea of ‘getting stuck between a rock and a hard place’! But we are in precisely this sort of situation when we get stuck in the indecisive and dualistic aspect of the mind.  Should I let my arms go and fall head-first, or let my legs go and fall feet-first? Should I go here or there? Should I say yes or no? And whatever decision we make, we will always wonder if we should have decided the other way.  The only way out of this dilemma is, unfortunately, to let go of both at once. You can’t work your way out of this one by solving it, making lists of pros and cons, or in any way working it out with your mind.  Better to follow your heart, if you can find it. If you can’t find it, just jump – your heart will start beating so fast there will be no mistake about where it is!

It goes on further to say, which I didn’t read the first time, and now I’m assuming if I carry on there will be a meditation or affirmation to well, make it all better or find my heart, IF I CAN FIND IT… what does that mean? If I can find it.

MAN IS SPLIT.  Schizophrenia is a normal condition of man – at least now. It may not have been so in the primitive world, but centuries of conditioning, civilization, culture and religion have made man a crowd – divided, split, contradictory… But because this split is against his nature, deep down somewhere hidden the unity still survives. Because the soul of man is one, all the conditions at the most destroy the periphery of the man. But the center remains untouched – that’s how man continues to live.  But his life has become a hell.

The whole effort of Zen is how to drop this schizophrenia, how to drop this split personality, how to drop the divided mind of man, how to become undivided, integrated, centered, crystallized.

The way you are, you cannot say that you are. You don’t have a being. You are a marketplace – many voices.  If you want to say ‘yes’, immediately the ‘no’ is there. You cannot even utter a simple word ‘yes’ with totality… In this way happiness is not possible; unhappiness is a natural consequence of a split personality.

Uh ha, now what…

I know, what was my first card? Now it’s calling me. Maria and I agree on this one. I sort through the deck and then I see it. Two beautiful dolphins dancing over my head. Now, come on… how was this not my card of love the first time?

Harmony

Commentary

The experience of resting in the heart in meditation is not something that can be grasped or forced. It comes naturally, as we grow more and more in tune with the rhythms of our own inner silences. The figure on this card reflects the sweetness and delicacy of this experience. The dolphins that emerge from the heart and make an arc towards the third eye reflect the playfulness and intelligence that comes when we are able to connect with the heart and move into the world from there. Let yourself be softer and more receptive now, because an inexpressible joy is waiting for you just around the corner. Nobody else can point it out to you, and when you find it you won’t be able to find the words to express it to others. But it’s there, deep within your heart, ripe and ready to be discovered.

LISTEN TO YOUR HEART, move according to your heart, whatsoever the stake:  A condition of complete simplicity costing not less than everything….

To be simple is arduous, because to be simple costs everything that you have. You have to lose all to be simple.

That’s why people have chosen to be complex and they have forgotten how to be simple.

But only a simple hearts throbs with God, hand in hand. Only a simple heart sings with God in deep harmony. To reach to that point you will have to find your heart, your own throb, your own beat.

Thank you. I’m listening now. I’m stilling my mind to hear my beating heart.

Cassándra 

Kaua'i Adventures Begin....

I found myself lying in bed a few weeks ago wrestling with a part of myself struggling to emerge while another smothered it with one of my extra pillows. The struggle was around that part of myself that has been harboring Love!  I had made a recent choice that paradoxically had me take a stand for loving myself beyond loving someone else because that lack of true, grounded, complete, unwavering love for myself was sabotaging the love I wanted to express.  It was indeed that love had gotten so twisted up inside of me that it was now wrapped around my neck strangling me and I had felt like I was drowning, I was in over my head and couldn't breathe. And I had some quite literal experiences of that.  I don't know how many other people can relate to the thing you want most and the way in which you have subtle ways of sabotaging it. Okay, some of my ways are not very subtle and likely quite obvious too.  And so I took a stand for me to stop struggling and surrender.  The thing about that is I was not on land yet... I was now floating in the water, without a life raft and though I knew intuitively I was safe I still felt like I was drowning, or if I moved I would drown. And yet what I was floating in was love.  Hhhmmm, what's a girl to do?  Swim to shore, dive down deeper, lye still for a while, a long long while hoping I become one with it or let the sharks at me.  I chose to go to Kaua'i.

It was calling me... I explored many regions, at the farthest reach I could in my mind to take me away from this all.  To heal, once and for all, I told myself.  Every thought as appealing as it was camping alone in Oregon, being around the innocent love of my niece and nephew in Calgary, a cooking tour in Tuscany, oh what about the unspeakable trip to Vegas I have yet to take, all of them were a firm "Nope."  Friends around the world flashed in my mind and then I thought of a loving couple who own the house next to mine on the Sunshine Coast and their new abode in Princeville, the north shore on Kaua'i, the most northern island of Hawaii.  And the voice said, "YES!"  So there it was.  An email, some browsing on flight costs and paths and another facebook message to another friend whose healing energy called me to Maui and it was complete.    Thank you to Monica and John's wide open arms to their home and Kirstie creating a rendezvous as we cross paths (she's coming to BC the exact dates I'm flying to Hawaii so I extended my dates so we'd have two days of adventures in Maui before I fly home!) 

 

Yesterday I found out a little magical mystery about Kaua'i.   Guess what "Indian legend tells us that there are four places in the world designated as "power spots" and that these four are broken into two plus two--two positive and two negative, or two "light" and two "dark."  It is believed that the two positive places in the world are Kauai, an island in Hawaii and Sedona, both red-rock country. Sedona and Kauai, the Indians say, are vortexes of energy in which the Great Spirit gives birth to rainbows"

So browsing on the world wide web I found out some pretty cool things about the land I'm about to explore September 10 - 20, 2010 

So let the adventures begin....  and if I float a little long in the waters off Kaua'i I think that may be just what this girl needs.

Sacred Kaua'i Tours

Visit some of the most powerful sacred sites on earth.

Let the spirit of Aloha and profound healing energies of Kaua'i nurture your Being and carry you gracefully back to the truth of your oneness.

Enjoy the gifts of this mystical paradise as the goddess of Kaua'i supports your journey toward realizing your full spiritual nature and remembering your True Self.

• Energy Vortex Sites
• Gorgeous Beaches and Waterfalls
• Profound Spiritual Healing