Reaching for the Rainbow Road

"We need to keep breaking down the myths about what women can't do. It hasn't been that long since women were first allowed to run the marathon in the Olympics. It's important to keep expressing ourselves physically."

Ann Bancroft, first woman to reach the North Pole


The many colored veils which make up the Rainbow people of our circle, our group, and the medicine people who stretch back into the cycles of time are empowered by the strength and beauty of feminine energy. Chaos/beauty, strength/vulnerability, endurance and attention to the moment are all the inconclusive paradoxes we carry. There is nothing a woman, who is in possession of her Self, can't undertake in her quest to unfold her nature.

I have a day to address things other than work today, then later, a chance to catch a run in the low light of early evening, if I want. A chance to catch up to myself, to run into my own shadows and light cast upon the long ribbon of roads that wind around the wide sky of my dreams.

...from Beliefnet

"Change Demons Are a Healthy Part of Change

Change Demons are disempowering feelings that arise during any change. These emotions--fear, doubt, impatience, shame, blame, and guilt--can wreak havoc with your self-esteem and destroy hope. But they also remind you how you don't want to feel during change so you can return to how you do want to feel.

When Change Demons visit, remember: 1) they are temporary; 2) they encourage you to make a choice--you can choose to feel better or worse than the emotion you are currently experiencing; and 3) they can be replaced with better, brighter emotions that will help you move through change with ease and grace. Faith, patience, endurance, and honesty are some positive emotions that can replace Change Demons."

I choose to empower my feet, heart, hands, and the voice that carries my intent into the world with faith in a Big Picture. I dreamt last night of tiles, something the size of dominoes...each one a miniature piece of art, figurative in black and white, reminiscent of my early work, very Matisse-ish. Somehow the message was, not only can one be 'chosen' at any time, being completely unique, but they also stood in for both people and the potentialities of people, as well as my own perceptions and imaginations. They were beautiful, and endless. Within each small rectangle, a perfect composition of elements created the figure.

May mornings...the most beautiful of weather, heat and breezes, a long 8+ miles....easy and fluid....

The Practice of Steps

As we practice steps to keep our energy flowing freely and without obstruction, we shine our light brightly, illuminating our own paths and making the world around us glow as well.

-from Daily Om

Smoke and mirrors

Despite sleeplessness, brought on by the upset of negative crap shot at me from clients at work, and again from a more unexpected and personal corner, I was determined to get out this morning to run it through. The client who has it in his mind to use me as his excuse to vent his resentments and anger for lack of positive outcomes, and the failed attempt in a relationship along similar lines is a hard hard hit. People are tricky creatures, alright. It is all perceptions, projections, misaligned and reinvented, permutated along a thousand potential pathways until we are in a big, tangled mess of energy going.....?

I point myself in a direction, hugging the side of the road and my feet are able to take me where I need to go. I am so grateful for this rock solid reality. I am full of love for my heart when it melts into the sky, and the drum-beat rhythm takes hold, flowing up and into my lungs with every set of breaths, in and out, in and out. I adore the light as it caresses my face and the drops of sweat swinging off my lip. And as I tire, I embrace the light/leaden feeling of release that comes with putting every ounce of effort into the pace before I slow it down....

The earth will not abandon me, not as long as I stay with Her. My run is my love-affair with all She offers me. Those in my life who are rock solid are like Her, they do not blow off with the seasons, though they change. They do not look away when I stumble, fall or cry in frustration. They carry me through every which way I go.
For all of you, and you know who you are, my love, always, goes with you.

Night and Day

In the bright white light of midday, I ran 10-12 miles up A1A in Boca Sunday. The last time I was on that route was for the 30K in October, run in what seemed the middle of the night in windy, cold conditions. Yesterday, I took the challenge of the heat, which permeated up from the asphalt, and the distance, as long as I could stand it, with some pride, as I tipped my total for the week to nearly 50 miles. Of course I pay for it now. David works on the whole picture. I feel places deep within the tissue scream under his touch. There are years and traumas under those places, pent up like silent bombs, like torch-flames which want to consume me in their constant, edgy discomfort. I don't want to acknowledge them; I want to run through them. I don't like feeling their tired, fierce weight- I just want to forget I have them.

The night was long, but not long enough to hide in my dreams. The book I was making in one of them, related to work, was ready for it's next chapter, called "Synopsis". If this is a 'summary' or abstract, as its defined, then what am I summarizing??
What do I need to recap in order to move forward with new material? Is what exists under these hot spots the verses of my love, hardship won through loss, heartache felt from feeling the rift of time and distance and desire?

I can't wait to be out again tomorrow. It was a nightmare day at work. The faces of frustration, blame and hatred were at me, and I had little defense. The need to run is the need to control something....to give myself over to a rhythm inside of me that belongs strictly to me, to me and the earth I run upon, the sky I run into, the wide sun who carries me into the day.

"You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage -- pleasantly, smilingly, non-apologetically -- to say 'no' to other things. And the way you do that is by having a bigger 'yes' burning inside. The enemy of the 'best' is often the 'good.'" -- Stephen Covey

Focus, balance and yes, love&light

May Day brings a glorious crisp morning full of bright sun, the air warm around the edges strewn with chaffs of breezes pushing off the ocean. The whole atmosphere swirls around me as I start out this morning, taking the long loop over the interstate and back around west. Coming up to 46th, a pair of puppies, loose from their owner, come crashing into me; they are a matching pair of black and white, except for their faces, happy to run with me, slobber all over me and jump into my way with big happy kisses and tongues lolling out. Their owner finally comes round the corner for them, and I'm back to the rhythm. But for a minute it was nice to be reminded of Life's play, and the energy of the animal/natural world.

Between Jesse the chiropractor and David the master/healer (I know he cringes when I say that...LOL), there are spaces in the structure of things inside I haven't felt before. What was tight and contracted, pulled up in pain, feels loose and fluid. The aches and soreness seem more muscle related, but once in awhile I feel the old familiar weaknesses, the vulnerable spots not yet as strong as they can be. With any luck, I'll put away about 40 miles this week by Sunday. This is a good base to sustain until mid-summer, when I would like to begin long runs of at least 15-20. If I decide to do Marine Corp marathon in Oct., it will be time to prepare....

Keeping focus and balance in the love and light of Universal Oneness is the key. As work continues to drift into system's chaos, and more clients revert to old behaviors and emotional patterns to cope, the demands on me as an 'interventionist' grow. I am vulnerable to the stress, as usual, feeling the imprint of their pain. The shield of light is not so much to protect me as it is to be a channel for influence; to permeate the connections of patterns they navigate, and I seek to augment with my 'push', my purpose. The form of healing is never known....it is hard going before it gets any better, as the toxic and destructive forces are released. This I know. But as the light pushes us all to wholeness, I am reminded by those who love me that we continue to choose our place, not just with each other, but with the One Love of our Togetherness in the place of peace.