Precarious Joy

When I heard the call of my Soul three years ago, I first went to Greece for a retreat. I spent 6 weeks at an olive farm, pretty much in constant silent and stillness and in intimate conversation with a semi-wild land which opened me to a relationship with the Earth larger than anything I know. Not only physical nature – soil, rain, sun, wind, trees, animal beings – but with her soul as well. That’s when I started writing poems to process and express my experience of opening, surrender, falling in love…

This is one of the poems from that time. It felt appropriate to share here for Earth Day.

precarious joy

I stopped everything and I am waiting
listening to her rumbling, trembling, shuffling…
I am a midwife
awake through the night
listening to the whisper of the full moon
who says:
you need to surrender your fears of annihilation
and enter your own life.
sink your teeth into the divine body of love
that holds the creation together
and the consciousness
that binds us is expanding,
penetrating, dancing, weaving us
I am listening to her
as she moans, thrusts, throbs
and I stay awake with her
I love her
how I love her
in her fullness, in her wholeness
as she is shape shifting,
taking us on the wildest ride of our lives
along with her
right into the underworld
riding towards the eternal spring
gasping, breaking open, bewildered
as we gaze through the chaos window
I am sitting, waiting
looking at her deep blue waters
and I am ready to dive in
to catch the life she’s giving birth to
I can see her coming
I can hear her arriving
oh what joy!

originally posted at Magical Mystery Tour
February 2010

*Visual art called Childhood Dream by Siddhartha Saravia

When the Soul calls…

I was born on the west. on the west end of this beautiful bountiful land called Anatolia. Which means East, or more literally sunrise.

I wanted to go Eastward. But I always ended up moving further west. When I finally landed on the farthest west point of the world, I stopped. I found home in the West – the home of Mystery, shadow, dreams and visions, Soul, self-discovery, descent…

Oceans, mountains, deserts, tall trees, bigger, larger, wilder than I have known on my homeland, called me fiercely. I could feel it in my body across the ocean and landmasses. This longing to be there, the longing to wash myself free in the waves of Mystery. To call my soul back.

“I’ve been long looking for you. I am ready now.”

When the Soul calls, you obey and go. It doesn’t always call you to the other side of the world, like mine did. It could call you from any direction, you need to beware. And once you heard the calling, give up all your excuses and projections, and get ready. Once you felt that mysterious longing, you can only honor it by listening. Don’t fight, don’t resist, only listen. If it seems crazy, ridiculous, impossible, outrageous, just surrender to it. Your Soul knows the right time, the right place and the right people. All you need to do is to listen.

“Many are beginning again to hear the soul’s call and want to follow it into the unknown. But there are fears. What will happen to me? What will others think? There are few societal practices or values to support us on the journey. When the soul is heard but not engaged, we fall into a type of sorrow, a soul depression”

Bill Plotkin, Soulcraft, pg. 43

I listen to mine. That’s why I dropped everything, packed my bags, my new expensive camera and computer and flew to America last fall. Did I know what was going to happen? No, of course not. Did my Soul KNOW? Yes, my Soul KNEW.

You must know that your Soul is in ongoing conversation with the Mystery. They are partners in crime that love you dearly and constantly conspire for you to come Home. They don’t judge, they don’t punish. They are more compassionate than Buddha. More patient than Jesus. More loving than your mother. Take my word.

So, when it’s time, take that call. Don’t mind the trembling, the fear of unknown, the fear of darkness…not only the darkness is sweet and fertile but you will also find the light eventually. Your personal myth lies in you making that journey.

“Many people fill their days with a thousand and one distractions in an attempt to muffle the cry of their souls. Often these distractions become our addictions – consumerism, eating disorders, substance abuse, compulsive sex, pornography, workaholism, religious fundamentalism, obsessive thrill-seeking or gambling, and excessive TV watching – all of which contribute further to the deterioration of the world.”

Bill Plotkin, Soulcraft, pg. 43

On this new moon, say YES, say yes quickly to the voice that’s been whispering your name…you don’t only have a responsibility to yourself but to a world who longs and needs for you to fulfill your birthright of living your Soul’s purpose.

To go into the dark with a light is to know the light
To know the dark, go dark, without sight,
And find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
And is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.

Wendell Berry, To Know The Dark

*Photos by Doug Ellis

Confessions of a broke change agent

cross-posted from Brave New World:

I am going to be honest with you. Very honest and vulnerable.

It’s about money. Despite my intelligence, vision, hard work and unique gifts, I struggled financially most of my adult life. Especially so ever since I walked out of organizations – corporate or non-profit – which in my experience were limiting, creativity-and-spirit-killing, ineffective containers of human misery. 6 years ago I said enough, walked away and never looked back. (Here I am referring to my own experience and would like to acknowledge that not all organizations are soul-crashing and there are definitely those more aligned with human-soul, pace and scale and life-affirming out there. Our organizations will transform as we transform)

I moved on to creating what I believed in. I tried to live in alignment with my ideals and calling in life which is to help us transition to a new story, to a new culture and way of being in the world: life-affirming, wholesome, sustainable, joyful, celebratory.

Over the years I planted many seeds in Turkey; I initiated, co-created and co-hosted many wonderful community building, re-skilling and learning events from permaculture workshops, to film festivals to leadership trainings in the past 10 years. More than half of my work has been gift economy, meaning I offered it from my heart for the wellbeing of my community (myself included) and the world, without expecting any financial return. And there was none. Because I did what I did more or less in an invisible capacity of a networker, connector, weaver, visionary, often my role and the outcome of my work has gone unnoticed.

Those who know me, know me and appreciate me. That’s taken care of. However when it comes to sustaining one’s self economically, when your work is gone unnoticed, it’s not a good sign. And of course, I investigated into my self-limiting beliefs around money and yes I have a hell of a negative projections around it and I desperately looked for clues for how I bring this onto myself, how I manifest the scarcity within etc etc.

This goes on and on. It did occasionally occur to me that I was not cut out for this ‘system’. I always felt alienated and outside of a mechanism where growth and profit possibly could be the only desired outcome.

Being exposed to Charles Eisenstein‘s work lately, surfaced the sobering realization of “this dominant economic system is certainly more flawed than I am” and because we are between two worlds, most of the visionary work that’s been out there has not only been not recognized as service, but it is seen at times as a threat and is resisted against.

Charles says:

“You have to actually need each other. People desire to enact their gifts, and if they were free from money, they would do it. But money is so often a barrier. You know, people think “Oh, I would love to do this, but can I afford to do it? Is it practical?” Money stops..”What beautiful thing would I do? What am I called to do?” Would it be to set up big gardens for homeless people to take care of, and reconnect them to nature? Would it be to clean up a toxic waste site? What would you do? What beautiful thing would you do? And why isn’t it practical to do these things? Why isn’t there money in those things? An economy that embodies the principles of the gift is an economy that is simply grounded in the truth. The task before us is to align money with the true expression of our gifts. It requires a very different mechanism for the creation of money and the circulation of money.”

Money hasn’t stopped me from doing what I am called to do. However it exhausted me and drained my energy and made me worried that takes away some of my creative juju which can be much better used. It also prevented me from taking care of myself as much as I would like to.

It’s fair to acknowledge that Brave New World journey was only made possible through crowdfunding and the money my community raised, supported me for 4 months. 6 months later I am back to where I started, financially speaking. Although crowdfunding is a great idea, it is not a long-term, sustainable solution.

And just for clarity, I am not whining of complaining here (I already did that a lot on my own). I am seriously curious and intrigued by this conversation.

So I ask you: whose responsibility is to support those of us who commit their lives to this transition and new story in various non-commercial capacities? whose work is less visible than others (the mighty social entrepreneurs for example)?

Sobonfu Some says ”In a context where your gifts are valued, where what you bring is exactly what your community needs, you don’t need to make a living. All you need to do is to be yourself and to live your purpose”.

Based on this wisdom, I might still need to fine tune my gifts so they are exactly what my community needs. Meanwhile I hope there will be soon more seeing, more support and more funding for the kind of ‘less visible’ work that some of us do…

Toward the heart of the world

It’s 4:27 am in the morning and I am wide awake. with a big, piercing headache. jetlag. I will be miserable the rest of the day but I think I am going to skip sleep tonight…

I crossed the ocean one more time yesterday, this time backward, towards Turkey. How many coming and goings in a nomad’s life? Does it ever become normal, I wonder. My gypsy soul, when will you belong?

I recently met someone who speaks the language of my soul. He writes:

“There is a great longing within each of us.
We long to discover the secrets and mysteries of our individual lives, to find our unique way of belonging to this world to recover the never-before-seen treasure we were born to bring to our communities. To carry this treasure to others is half of our spiritual longing. The other half is to experience our oneness with the universe, with all of creation. While embracing and integrating both halves os the spiritual, Soulcraft focuses on the first: our yearning for individual personal meaning and a way to contribute to life, a yearning that pulls us toward the heart of the world – down, that is, into wild nature and into the dark earth of our deepest desires.

Alongside our greatest longing lives an equally great terror of finding the very thing we seek. Somehow we know that doing so will irreversibly shake up our lives, our sense of security, change our relationships to everything we hold as familiar and dear. But we also suspect that saying no to our deepest desires will mean self-imprisonment in a life too small. And a far-off voice within insists that the never-before-seen treasure is well worth any sacrifices and difficulty in recovering it.

And so we search…”

Bill Plotkin, Soulcraft, pg. 9-10

6 months ago I set on a journey to the West, the home of Mystery and Unknown, feeling exactly pulled by that Mystery. Say it’s fate, say it’s God, say it’s me, say it’s the community who funded me, it happened as a small scale miracle and I landed on San Francisco October 12, 2011, only in less than three months after the conception of Brave New World.

What started as an mysterious adventure to the other side of the world turned into a soul-journey. not as unexpected.

I surely lived my dream of dipping into some of the most progressive Western culture, meeting and interviewing visionaries, artists, activists and teachers extraordinaire of our times, participating in Occupy Movement and marching on streets of Oakland and Santa Fe with thousands of people, and really, really seeing and feeling and experiencing what Brave New World is/will be/can be. My own narrative – based on years of witnessing the world, observing patterns, connecting dots, conversations, intuition – of a new story emerging was affirmed again and again by many others I met along the way, for which I am grateful.

I know this was an attempt to find this great treasure – my unique gift to the world – I seek in the depths of my soul; a yearning that pulls me toward the heart of the world – down, that is, into wild nature and into the dark earth of my deepest desires. and a deep deep longing to belong: to belong to the world, to belong to life, to belong to my Self. I feel the terror of coming so close to it and I also feel the terror of not ever finding it. Doubts come and go but all other times I know I am dancing at the edge of my destiny and I am committed to finding that treasure.

Brave New World journey will continue. Because it’s a story in making. Work in progress. Just like my life. Just like you and I.
Because the humanity is dancing at the edge of its promised treasure too.

“The gift you carry for others is not an attempt to save the world but to fully belong to it. It’s not possible to save the world by trying to save it. You need to find what is genuinely yours to offer the world before you can make it a better place. Discovering your unique gift to bring to your community is your greatest opportunity and challenge. The offering of that gift – your true self – is the most you can do to love and serve the world. And it is all the world needs.”

Bill Plotkin, Soulcraft, pg. 13

It’s 6:27 am now. Birds started singing outside my window. It’s time to go and have that Turkish breakfast I’ve been dreaming of…

* The painting is called “Gilded Roses” by Slyvia Ji.

onward and downward

over Atlantic Ocean

I am traveling east-bound. literally, I am crossing an ocean in darkness towards sunrise right now. metaphor of my life. metaphor of our lives.

Returning from yet another journey to my alluring yet intimidating homeland.

Have I found my treasure?
Not yet.

I kind of noticed a while back that I seem to be hanging out on the thresholds a lot. I used to joke that my whole life looks like a transition; I don’t make that joke anymore.

Because on one hand I know that is true for anyone living at this time. Both the Earth and humanity are going through their intimately intertwined transitions right this moment. Thankfully more and more people are seeing, acknowledging, honoring this fact so that I don’t need to feel like a crazy fool anymore…

On the other hand there is the deep longing of my Soul to belong and find and offer its gifts to the World at this significant time. This soul of mine who I am still trying to get to know take me on these journeys – outward and inward – to find the meaning, deeper and deeper, under layers and layers of uncommitted truth, false ambitions, flesh and bone. And my impatient ego that quickly wants to be something great and special keeps attempting to slay the tender blossoms of my life by comparison, harsh criticism, or dismay.

Sometimes I give in.
Sometimes I hear the faintest melody in the wind and I remember I am on my path.
Nothing extra, nothing missing. Just the way it is.

I used to think that the journey with the unknown will be over someday. Surely someday I will find all the answers I’ve been seeking, I will create a perfectly idyllic life where I will have arrived my destination and hence will stop ‘living in the unknown’. In a similar fashion, there was a romantic sense of arriving at my ideal self at some point in my life and living there happily ever after.

Now I am coming to terms that unknown is forever! Life is the unknown. and now that I am scratching the surface of my soul, as well as being reminded by wise elders, self-work is ongoing. In fact, this is why we’re here. Even death is not a destination but a significant rite of passage, crossing a major threshold into the unknown.

When there’s nowhere to arrive, nothing to attend, then there is this delicious slowing down that takes place which for me is key for the authentic embodiment of my soul.