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Dear Diary; Flying on Land

Every morning I open the front door and step outside and go running about, along the roads, in the parks, by the side of the river…

I like running about; with no plan, no where to go or reason to be doing it.

When I was young I liked this too – in fact I liked two things a lot… I liked running as fast as I could on grass, racing along – like the wind…

Flying on land…

And I liked going a long way… Setting off on adventures, walking or running for miles, and often getting lost!

Many years years later, I still like these two things a lot… Running as fast as I can on grass, racing along – like the wind – flying on land; and I like going a long way.

I like to journey for the sake of journeying 

I like  going running for the sake of running

I like living life for the sake of living – Life an adventure

Life as an experience – no where to ‘get to’

So much of a life can be spent trying to ‘get there’… To the end of exams, and then to the end of more exams, and then to get a job and then to get a better one… Always trying to ‘get somewhere’ –  and then off again…

Now there is nothing wrong at all with stretching towards a goal, to accomplish something is wonderful.

But more wonderful and fun than trying to arrive – is to be journeying towards the goal in the moment.

Relaxed and free… One step at a time towards the goal, fully present… The Zen of achievement – a sort of oxymoron!

Being on planet earth lends itself to creating a life, sharing our existence and achieving things and creating a reality that we can enjoy.

Creating experiences…

But it is far more fun to fully experience the experiences; to be here and now in whatever we are doing…

Experiencing…

The Zen of exam revision

The Zen of art and music

The Zen of learning a new skill

The Zen of stretching to get fitter stronger

The Zen of making more money

The Zen of building a new home

The Zen of running….

The Zen of life in each moment 

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Dear Diary; Never Never Land

Barefoot on the grass, running running running… Kensington Gardens inviting, summery delight…

Anadi beside me, adventuring, exploring new lands – that we know so well…

The Albert Hall through the branches, majestic, beauty, architectural joy through leafy veil.

Running running, Peter Pan flying to Never never land beside us; his statue forever held in his childhood state; never growing up – we too with him for just that moment…

Our own never land journey in each step, running inwards to the child we were – but the cycle of our life experience has shifted us, shaken us up…

And so now we return to the place of our childhood freedom – but know it more truly; beyond Neverland.

My inner child healed and released to play once more barefoot on the grass… Freedom

Within and so without. 

Never land not never land now…

Not searching and seeking as I once did… For the end of the journey – for the ease to come, the ease in the step, one at a time.

Is here now 

Simply experiencing and playing again like the child on the lawn, in the woods, the playing fields in the village…

No where to get to then, no achievements to be had. Play the only thing… Then.

And now.

Creativity in motion, sharing it with the world; in the barefoot step – in the written and spoken word…

Playfulness, sharing, we are the world – together we make the tapestry for all to see.

Each one of us vital, our vibrant spark of light all that is required

To shine as we are, nothing to do, or get or earn

You are loved for being your self

You do not need to earn love

Stay in the step; my feet are bare.

A woman sitting on a bench called out to us as we ran past…‘What does the grass feel like…?’We stopped and went back to her…

‘It feels wonderful’ I said.

‘I want to do it’ she said’ I am barefoot all the time in my home, but I am wary to take my shoes off here… But I want to…‘Just keep your eyes open’ if you do, I laughed… ‘Keep your eyes open and on each step’…

‘I’m going to do it’ she said ‘Before I go home, I’m taking my shoes off, and I am going to walk in my bare feet just here..’

She pointed to the verdant grassy area just in front of her…

We ran on… Another lady stopped me ‘Are you okay’ she enquired concerned, pointing to my naked feet! ‘Yes yes…’ I replied ‘I’m running bare foot, because I like it’…

She was intrigued, and asked to see the bottom of my feet – we talked for a bit.

‘It’s wonderful’ she said  – ‘Have fun; enjoy your run’ she said…

‘Have fun’…

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Dear Diary; Beyond The Illusion

 Lock down has turned a key within me, that has opened a door which finds me speaking and connecting with many more people!

It all began when my fabulous client Josie encouraged me to hold an online Satsang… 

A ongoing dialogue has opened up from there…

Many questions are being asked; and in many different ways, this one question keeps arising…

Who am I? 

Who am I really?

From the same source; we are all born…. Of consciousness, of infinite love.

Namaste…

This is who we really are… And in the present moment we know who we truly are, when we are silent, and still – there we are, here – now.

But in the moment that we ‘react’ to anything we are immediately in the past.

The old brain, the prehistoric brain is telling us that there is ‘danger danger danger…’  It has been reminded of something way back; way back when we were little… When to survive we adapted our behaviour to keep safe within our family, within our society.

We created a self that fitted in…

So when we react, something has challenged this created self, the hurt self, the ego… 

But none the less…The self you believe yourself to be; the identity which you hold on to tightly; because…

Letting it go feels to be a death…

Oh what irony, to be living asleep, not recognising that who we are is always there, eternal.

Our freedom arises when we

Let go….

Let go of every single shred of attachment to our sense of self, and discover the self that is true…

The I beneath the I

And the we let go is through experiencing everything we feel – and living it fully

Fully feeling and cutting those stories… 

To heal we must feel.

The way to freedom is through our experiences, consciously experiencing them.

Being fully in each moment of everything in our lives, without resistance.

And then we start to shed the layers, peeling them back like an onion skin –  and journeying to the centre of the earth; to the centre of our being.

To discover that consciousness is at the centre and circumference of all things.

So within, so without.

Our outer experiences reflecting our inner state.

If we want to experience a different reality, we must travel inwards and clear all that is blocked or stuck; and recognise the patterns that are looping around; maybe so many times in this life, that eventually you start to see them; recognise their familiar ways…

It is likely that we have been doing the same thing for lifetimes…

And now you are beginning to see…

Once the veils of awareness have been parted, it takes courage to keep them drawn back… To resist any desire to close them again.

Out of fear for a new uncharted future…

And instead, see beyond the illusion – and wake up to who you truly are. 

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Dear Diary; Letting Go of Everything

As we enter the month of May again today, I am reminded of last year…

6.30am May 12th 2019… My 60th birthday, became my re birth day.

Are you ready to die? 

It seemed to me that this question was asked of me that day…. Was May 12th to become my death day too?

Are you ready to leave your body, to leave your mind, to leave everything that you have created here. Your work, your running, your friends, your family….?

Are you ready to leave this life Julia?

It can happen to any of us in in one minute, one second. That our life is done. 

We are transient beings experiencing an incarnation; here to do whatever we do.

It won’t be any other way

Our karma playing out, lifetime after lifetime, our energy creating and re creating…

And so often we forget we are born of consciousness until we remember…. A spark of light opens in our being, and we remember who we truly are, even if only for one flash

Often then we forget again – close the curtains of awareness and sink back into what we knew… With no thoughts of our eternal spirit .

I woke up at 6.30am – exactly twelve hours short of the hour of my birth, sixty years previously.

‘Something is really wrong with my body’ I said to Anadi; everything was spinning at great velocity and I felt very sick…. I wanted to get to the bathroom… Anadi helped me  weave my way there; and then I slithered to the floor.

On collapsing I left my body. My spirit flew. I was off, and fully conscious of the flight I was making. Into the vast silence. I was without mind or body, but I was aware and alive. There was complete silence.

Freedom. I had let go of everything I knew about my self on planet earth – even my body. 

But I was still aware…And I was zooming at great velocity in the expansive space towards a dot ahead of me in the distance….

I had let go of everything.

Anadi thought that I was dying. He started to prepare himself…I had breathed out in a strange way, and my body ran with more sweat that he had ever seen a body pour…

He went back into the bedroom and called for help…When he returned, he knelt beside me and called the name he calls me, over and over…

‘Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful….’

Eventually I  heard him calling and I came back into my body.

‘I’ve been somewhere’ I said… ‘Wouldn’t it have been symmetrical to die on my birthday’!

But I didn’t die on my 60th birthday

Instead I was re born. 

I lay on the bathroom floor, at the beginning of my new life.

I couldn’t move… After two hours on the floor, Michael and Emily the ambulance team were able to stretcher me out to a waiting ambulance.

No one knows what happened that day. Why my body fell to the floor… Vertigo and a virus perhaps in medical terms?

But my spirit took the chance to fly free. To show me the way

To demonstrate what I knew all along; had been working with all my life…

That we are not who we perceive ourselves to be; we are not our mind or our body.

We are infinite awareness, consciousness…

We are spiritual beings on a human journey

Born of infinite love

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Dear Diary; The Cycles of Life

The cycles of life – round and round they go…Children playing, exploring investigating.

Being instructed to ‘stop that right now’…

Reprimanded – controlled, told off… But the child does it anyway… ‘You bad boy’!

‘Give me a child until he is seven – and I will show you the man’.

Unless…

The man wakes up – and investigates the patterns from his childhood – and clears the hurts; the stuck energy…

And then life opens to ‘three thousand possibilities’ in every moment.

Then we are never bored; by the cycles that we are stuck within…

We are never bored by life… The inner reflected outside; never the circumstances always our inner landscape creating our reality….

‘Look…. There’s someone in the river’, I said…

Anadi and I leaned over Battersea bridge watching a man leisurely swimming about below us.

We had enjoyed a late sunny Sunday afternoon walk along the South bank, still bathed in its warmth, and were now making our way back…

A police van drew up beside us, one of the police offers leapt out and shouted to the man…‘Yes, yes – I’m coming in’, he responded.

We watched him navigate his way – against the current now; his bare bottom revealed by flashes of light glinting on the water…Three police officers now, awaited him on the steps… Two more soon joined and a conversation full of gesticulations from all parties ensued…

Our theatre in the moment unfolding.

Quite soon the party broke up… And with some shorts on now – he sauntered off.

I turned to Anadi  – ‘I want to Congratulate him’

We ran after him…‘Well done’ – I said, he turned and smiled; tall, piercing blue eyes, late forties perhaps…

‘Why thank you’ he replied – an educated voice – you might guess him to be a lawyer, a professional man…

‘The police didn’t think so’….‘Well at least you weren’t arrested’ – Anadi laughed… ‘It was a close thing’, he said, ‘I gave as good as I got’

‘Is it illegal to swim in the Thames’? I asked.

‘Yes’ – he replied‘…You could have said you didn’t know’…

‘That not a defence in law’ – he smiled at me… We talked a bit more about swimming; riptides and watery adventures! 

And then as way of explanation for his swimming fun – he said

‘I’m so bored… of all this….’

And so… maybe as he has always done?

He created his fun, in the sun.

He took the ‘naughty path’…

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Dear Diary; To Be Human

A light bright Saturday afternoon, and Anadi and I set off for a walk up the Kings road – the promise of a Pret coffee treat at the half way point!

Crossing the road out of the chilly shade, into the sunny warm on the other side of the street, we saw a man lying on the pavement… He was stretched out on his side the whole way across; a young woman beside him – hesitating, hovering  – unsure what to do.

We all bent over him… ’Do you need help’? I asked, he vaguely waved a hand at me…

‘Shall we call an ambulance’? Anadi asked… Fumes of alcohol  –  swirled around.

He waved his hand – gave us a thumbs up… ‘I just want to lie in the sun for bit’…

And so we three continued on our way, and left him to rest in the sun…

’I think he’s had a drink’ I proffered; ‘Anadi laughed ‘I think he’s had a few’…

At Pret we chose our mini picnic with coffees – then found a space under a tree; on a grassy patch in front of the elegant cream houses, stretching upwards, tall – the doors all painted a different colour… Police in their van nearby, enjoying the restful afternoon of sun, their door open – lounging and and chatting together…

‘We used to have brunch, and spend £50’ I mused…’Hard to do now’!

As we set off – the sound of someone sobbing and crying out filled the air…

‘Please help me’…’Please help me’

He was sitting on the road, his leg looked infected and sore… ‘I haven’t got anywhere to live’.

He was crying loudly…‘Please help me’.

I went to the cash point – and took out the £50 I didn’t spend on Brunch – he stopped crying…

Further on there was a loud hooting of horns – a line of cars backing up… 

A small vehicle, with a couple inside it, had broken down at the traffic lights… Some folk had already gone to help… 

A group were pushing the car out of the way…

To engage – to help, to be human – two meters apart was impossible… At every turn on this Saturday afternoon of bright sunny light.

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Dear Diary; Going With Flow

I didn’t really plan to start my ‘Conversations with a Bodhisattva’ Group, it sort of planned me…

I didn’t really plan to run across Spain without any shoes on, my feet seemed to decide this for me!

It appeared that I just found myself shedding all I owned and setting off on a nomadic journey with Anadi…

And I didn’t really plan to spend the whole of my life working as a healer and teacher in the lives of others

My life path seemed to steer me…

And so it has always been.

All the adventures of my existence, unfolding it feels, without me having had much say…

But the truth is that deep inside my inner compass has planned them all

My deeper knowing senses when a path opens that must be trod…

In the same way that deep inside I have always known when I am going in the direction that is against the flow of the river…

When I have been swimming upstream…

But also at the time couldn’t stop this; some karma to be worked out, some lesson to be learned

‘I knew I shouldn’t have done that..’

A huge mistake – but I learned and I grew, and so it needed be…

And again followed my inner compass, where there is always a flow, I go with it; the river tumbling and sparkling and playing downstream; sometimes seeming to go too fast , and flowing over dangerous rocks and swirling in eddies, but always flowing freely from its source…

And returning to the source from which it first begun

When we connect to our own source, to the self beneath any self that we might have created; remove any mask that we wear so that we might be accepted, acceptable –  and decide instead to take it off, and to stop following the path of conventional wisdom…

When we stop in our tracks, along the well trodden path that we know but feel isn’t fully true;

We can begin again to listen to the whisper of our self.

The silence of our self

The self that will lead us to the experiences that resonate with our truth.

And then we  experience that…

Everything comes from the silence within

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Dear Diary; Bare soul

I set off up the road without my shoes, the feel of the road beneath my feet…

Weaving my way once again, between the small stones, jumping over the cracks in the wide grey paving slabs…

Padding up the stony steps to Albert bridge…A smooth pathway underfoot to the other side of the river…

Into Battersea Park

Two laps round the circumference, appreciating the sensation of the ground under my soles…

Remembering why I took my shoes off… And have never really put them back on…

This English winter, my first in seven years, persuaded me into vivo barefoot by day and skinners socks and vibram fivefingers to run about in…

Warm feet, cosy winter feet

But they now cry out to be naked again… To tap tap tap along, strong feet.

Feet free

People look – always – some aghast, some intrigued, some in admiration…

The police circling slowly on motor bikes, took no notice of me – not one bit.

My inner voice lead me to shed my shoes once more, nearly four years ago – on Famara beach…

And, during this UK winter, it whispered to me to keep them warm.

I follow where my inner compass leads – often along the road less travelled; and so each journey is new, uncharted; no road map…

It is a chimera to think that we know the road; that we can plan it out and follow it where we want to go…

Each moment is new… Each moment vibrating with limitless possibility

Each moment never ever lived before

How can we possibly know the way…There is no road map for our lives

But there is an inner compass

We all have one

To start to listen to it, means that we must first stop and hear all the other voices…

The beliefs, the ideas, the stories, the rules of our conditioning – that we have allowed to drown out the gentle subtle movement of the compass within…

It guides always, sensitive always to the truth… It goes on whispering its suggestions – ever more quietly as the years go by – even when the voices of conventional wisdom still lead the way…

But if we stop

And feel

Listen to our heart

Hear its whisper

Very soon, its beat can start to soar and the compass becomes our constant guide

Life truly begins

Bare Sole to

Bare soul

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Dear Diary; The Path is Always Inwards

A few days ago a memory showed up on Facebook… As they do!

It was of a video of me running along a road in Spain, without my shoes on… I was twenty six days in the fifty two day journey from the North to the South of Spain barefoot…

A film of my life

That now  – never happened…

Our past is gone, like the wake of a boat.

Trying to hold on to the past, keeps us from living

Now…

Watching the film is fun, but it is like watching any film…  A scene on a stage… An illusion flickering and dancing, creating an image…

That fades away and never was.

All made up.

We are not the same as we were yesterday… The stories of our life are just stories – and they are great fun; to re visit; sometimes…

We love a good story!

It’s like reading a book that we really enjoyed, that we lived – the characters our friends for awhile… Remembering our life is like dipping back into the parts of the book that affected us the most – had the most impact…

But when we get stuck there, in a past that never happened, then we can never fully live.

When we get stuck in the past, wishing to be there – ‘Those where the best days of my life’ – Or wishing to change them – full of regret – ‘If only I’d known what I now now…’

Then we cannot live now – and we fear for a future that doesn’t exist…

And so we never fully live.

We simply act on the stage of life, with its ever changing scenes and actors playing different parts but the same story – over and over…

Until we die having never fully lived…

Now is here

Now is now

This is our life… We are creating the story of our life in each moment… We are making the path by walking each step in whichever direction we choose

In the moment.

And the path is inwards… Always inwards…

There is never a stop sign, or a no entry sign on this pathway.

The road is open…

Limitless

The road to the infinite 

Love

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Dear Dairy: We Do Not Know What Lies Ahead….

On Friday, I spoke with my niece Jess, the Chinese Dragon niece of the highest metal order, who I have mentioned in my writing before…

She is a courageous dragon, currently living in Japan, with no idea of what lies ahead…

She was meant to have flown to New Zealand weeks ago, but they closed their borders and so all plans were gone – just like that…. 

She is living each day as it unfolds.

A week ago, a baby Alpaca was born on the land where she is living, and she is watching him grow. 

He also has no idea of what lies ahead

None of us do

We just pretend we do

Well, we used to…

There are bells that ring, playing a tune, twice each day on this small holding, which is her home – for now. One of the tunes is Edelweiss…. 

I told her the story of when I was eight years old…

I wanted to sing a solo in the school nativity play… I found it difficult ( and still do) to sing in tune, or in time!

The school where very encouraging, They said that I must practise with Miss Nichols, the singing teacher each day – and then they would decide… 

For weeks I practised until one day she gave me one note – and I continued, to sing Edelweiss unaccompanied…

I did it!

In tune…

Miss Nichols swung round on her piano school, arms spread ‘there, she exclaimed…!

Jess and I sang Edelweiss together…

6000 miles apart…

But – none of us are ever actually apart… 

Technology is simply energy, demonstrating the truth we can connect with one another whenever we want…

That we are all connected

Always 

We are all one…

And thank goodness I had Jess to sing with…!

 I have forgotten again how to sing in tune, or keep time…

I haven’t practised enough…!

I was, however, shown at the age of eight that even with things we aren’t naturally good at – that with lots of practise and encouragement and kindness, we can become much better at that we would have ever known…

The key is not having a self concept of ‘I’m useless  at this’ or ‘I should to be good at this’.

Both can limit in debilitating ways…

Just turning up every day and practising whatever it is we would like to develop, whilst being always encouraging and kind to ourselves ….

Allows the space for us to realise things we never would have thought possible before…