The ones you long to know.

Soulmates aren't the people 

that make you the happiest, no.

They're instead the ones

who make you feel the most,

burning like a star on the edge of the world

as one night ends and another begins.

Radiation and reactions.

Scientific poetry,

poetic science.

Around and around in an endless circle.

They're pure elation, 

danger, and ecstasy.

They're the ones

that can destroy you.

They're the only ones

you long to know.

The burn of lightning.

Remember to only remain on flights with storms you can tolerate swallowing. The burn of lighting is merely fiery fuel when flying toward skies that suit you.

illustration source: Christian Schloe

Content to be consumed.

Let's not travel to tick things off lists
or collect half hearted semi treasures
to be placed in dusty drawers in empty rooms. 
Rather, we'll travel to find grounds and rooftops
and tiny hidden parks, 
where we'll sit and dismiss the passing time,
spun in the city's web 'til we've surrendered,
content to be spent and consumed.
I need to feel a place while I'm in it.

photo by Alicia Savage photography

Real connections live forever.

When connections are real, they simply never die. They can be buried, or ignored or walked away from, but never broken. If you've deeply resonated with another person or place, the connection remains despite any distance, time, situation, lack of presence, or circumstance. If you're doubtful then just try it- go and revisit a person or place and see if there's any sense at all of the space between now and then.

If it was truly real, you'll be instantly swept back into the moment it was before it left- during the same year and place with the same wonder and hope, comfort and heartbeat. Real connections live on forever.

When you're certain.

I often think of the energy behind Paulo Coelho's words while gathering passion and certainty over a longterm plan:

"And when you want something, all the universe conspires to help you achieve it."

Ask yourself if you're certain- do you really want it? When you're certain, desire will transform you into a racehorse, explosive at the gate. When you're certain, details and obstacles will noticeably shrink, and crumble away. Excuses will die, ecstatic determination will strengthen your drive, and the sheer power of intent will rattle your lands and skies. Are you truly certain? Then call it out. Claim it as yours. Do what you need to do each and every day, to let it know you're ready, you can see it, and that you're on your way. Now is the time. Your dream patiently awaits.

Suspended in a moment.

Somewhere close yet far enough,

there's a place where time cannot reach.

A place suspended in a moment,

where the earth stops turning

and where you know I'll be waiting.

I'll be the wings

that keep your heart in the clouds

and you'll be the anchor 

that keeps my feet on the ground.

(photo by me)

Step off the treadmill.

Perfectionism is merely an endless treadmill of self-destruction that'll only build momentum until you're running at unsustainable speeds. Rather than remaining a slave to the illusions you perceive as safe, step off the treadmill and live as the piece of art you are: messy, colorful, fluid, and adoptable to change, mistakes, shifts, surprises, pain, and of 

course, immeasurable moments of beauty.

It is there, outside the enclosed grey walls of perfect self-imprisonment that you shall 

touch the meaning of freedom.

photo source

Burns like fire.

The fiery force is the life force. The beat within the song, the perfection in the chaos, the core desire within the need. Without the fire and drive we walk around numb and numb isn't really living.

Numb is nothing.

Rise up rooted.

We are not separate from the pulse and wisdom of the natural world as our bodies are always in direct connection with the energies of this planet. Every one of us mimics the earth with our daily and seasonal cycles, and we’re comprised of the very same elements.

Place your hands into soil to feel grounded. Wade in water to feel emotionally healed. Fill your lungs with fresh air to feel mentally clear. Raise your face to the heat of the sun to reconnect with your fire and own immensity.

Let your body love what it loves, and what it loves are gentle yet powerful things, same as the way you must care for it. Subtle habits. Small daily rituals. Roots. Solitude. Connection. Resonance. Home. Surrender.

Ignites the flame.

If on this Monday morning you've woken to find yourself less than satisfied with one or many parts of your life, then let it be the drive that keeps you awake, pulsing, and pushing. The hunger for something better always ignites the flame. May we all step up and show up for ourselves.

photo source: here

Rust and stardust.

"The night will give you a horizon 

further than you can see.

You must learn one thing:

the world was made to be free in.

Give up all other worlds

except the one to which you belong.

Sometimes, it takes darkness and the 

sweet confinement of your aloneness

to learn

anything or anyone

that does not bring you alive

is too small for you."

-David Whyte

I adore this song...

Sweet dreams :)

Perfect in our chaos.

I've never known a person who tries to control anyone or everything to be happy or content. Micro-managing, labeling, perfectionism, and strict expectations should be sent away in the tiny boxes they place and trap people in when overcome by them.

We arrive into this world as energy, same as stars, wildlife, wind and ocean. Messy, raw, and continuously perfect in our chaos. Release the need to control, and instead surrender to your own natural rhythm, as expansive, accepting and open to new circumstances and situations as air itself. That is how you'll thrive.

Takes me away.

This morning, this song completely stole my heart as I was driving through hill country and I proceeded to spend the rest of the day wondering how I would find it and who it was. After 30 min of attempting to google the few lyrics I'd remembered, I am now SO GRATEFUL for radio station online archives, and that the mystery song now has a name and band behind it.

I love songs that are "tristful" yet still impossibly fun and upbeat.

I'd like to drive for hours in the southwest with the windows rolled down and miles and miles of land stretched out before me, romantically, deeply melancholy. 

 

"Would it be much better if I knew....

 nothing about you?"

Show me how to be brave.

Here is my latest piece on my favorite online magazine on earth,  Rebelle Society.

The brave ones are beautiful.

The way they walk like they do, with open hands and hearts into places promising unknown conditions. A wide, dark field of maybe this will be okay or maybe not so much. What if the sun never comes?

I’d like them to show me how they do it. I’d like to know how to let go of those we once loved that live in places not so hidden, and still show up in dreams a bit too vivid. The ones we aren’t so ready to let go of yet… but should.

I’d like them to teach me how to risk what is safe, or how to set boundaries with the wrongs, or how to say “no” when it’s not a wholehearted “yes.”

How to wake up at dawn to do what I should do, to break through the barriers, tear down the walls, be brave enough to face demons with a fistful of self worth, idealisms, clearer views.

How to fiercely love my aging skin, same as my hands that cook and caress or shoulders that still hold strong and defined, despite the weight of raw stress and steel grit, time after time, after time.

Show me how to be brave. How to be made of still and steady ground instead of waves, or rocks instead of fire, and flickering, dying flame. How to walk in the storm and not be swallowed by wind, or how to breathe when your throat feels as though it’s rapidly tightening, and closing in.

Help me speak the truth. How to pass along words that may be hard to swallow, how to not ignore all things that must be noticed, how to heed the call in your body, and follow.

Guide me on how to be wrong. How to knock on a door and apologize, how to listen hard to feedback, how to nod and agree when I should simply go along.

Help me unlearn what I’ve learned, unravel what shouldn’t stay tied, and walk away, even when it will never feel comfortable, gentle, or right.

Teach me how to have faith. How to talk to someone who may not make it, how to stand, strong as gravity itself, beside a bed whispering the bravest of goodbyes. How to hold still while sweeping back our weeping cries; how to assure them it’s okay to leave us; how to tell of a place that awaits pain-free and bright; that their person will be standing there, on the other side.

Teach me how to be brave when you stare straight into my eyes, and I must fight the urge to turn away, to look left, down, right.

Tell me how to believe. How to believe in constellations, in seasons, in you, in the future, and mostly, in me.

Show me how to be brave when I can’t make a decision, when clarity refuses to sit by to my side. Show me how to be brave when I’ve lost my wildness, my spirit, and my primitive, piercing “why’s.”

Do you see my heart? It’s the same hot heart that’s been shattered hundreds or maybe thousands of times, its pieces sewn together loosely enough to be lost, likely for good, with the next saddening find. How to bleed out my lessons so that others can take note; it’s relation and vulnerability that helps us stay afloat.

I have lived long enough now to know that bravery isn’t always easy,

and courage is something we cannot always contain.

Yet…

Even when you don’t feel brave, I know you are.

Even when I don’t feel brave, I know I am.

Show me, teach me, and relearn alongside me.

And I’ll do the same for you.

Together, we’ll falter and fall and begin yet again,

and remember what it means to be brave.