Letting Life Live Me!

Change is the only constant!  An absolute Truth I can depend on, even when I crave a change it still feels shocking and I'm slightly apprehensive.

Our family is going to go through a huge change and I'm simply letting go and letting be! 

JJ has worked so hard to get us back to the west and back to the mountains, his hard work has paid off.  He got offered a job flying airplanes for the patients of Lander, Wyoming.   He has been flying private charter and is looking forward to a SET schedule and more family time!  We will be nestled in the foothills of the Wind River Mountains and in a small town of well, about 7,000 people!  Quite the change from the bustling traffic filled Nashville we have become accustomed to. 

As I prepare our family for a move across the country I can't help but reflect on the life we have been living.  We are all excited for the move, including lil Amazing, however, I find myself working through attachments I didn't realize I had.  Moving to Nashville has brought some of the biggest life changes and growth I have ever, been through thus far in life.  After four years of life here I have created a small community, realizing that a big city offers more distance from people and more loneliness than I had expected, yet the handful of relationships I have made here are so rich and contain so much depth that they will last this entire lifetime!  We gave birth to our daughter at The Farm in Summertown, Tn in a cabin in the woods, we then brought her home to the same house my husband was born in, at the Big Valley!  I learned and connected to the land, she gave us several years of abundant produce. I kept chickens and learned the personality of these silly birds and I grew and harvested many many of my own medicinal herbs.  I learned to be efficient with nature, how to be domestic, adaptive and full of surrender!  I lost my greatest partner, Sekoya and gained an incredible connection and bond with my daughter.  

I have struggled with all the colors of my soul and have been transformed into new perspectives and beliefs of Love, especially, love for Self and Nature, as these offer the strongest insight for spiritual growth and connection.  As I go about my last few days in this place I find myself I immediately go to all the positive things I'll miss a out my life here, the humidity, yes, I LOVE humidity as much as I love the dry desert.  It's like being in a detoxing sauna with an open sky and trees.  I don't even care that my clothes are always wet. I will miss the songs of the summer nights, an orchestra of insects, frogs, bats and soft winds!  I've never experienced thunderstorms like the southern storms, with rains that pour off the roof like a waterfall, ice storms that freeze each pine needle individually, deer, coyotes, turkeys flocking on the Big Valley land every early morning and evening. I will miss the live music every evening on every corner as all the music enthusiast strive for a record deal.  The made rush of healthy eating establishments and juice bars which I've grown so accustomed to being able to eat on the go at a juice bar! Oh and did I mention Trader Joes and my CSA.  I will truly miss these conveniences. 

This rich land which has graced our family with abundant organic produce and never ending medicinal herbs, often growing into winter.  Berries growing wild all over the property and numerous amounts of helpful weeds that have filled my over cluttered cabinet space. 

Letting life live me as taken my mind from trying to flee from this place to seeing so much greatness from this experience and the riches of a very healthy humid environment. I have created new beliefs from this experience and my perspective is one of understanding and gratitude.

 I am so thankful I took this step to change my world four years ago and leave my homeland.  To create a child and start a family in a new unfamiliar environment that pushed me to know ME deeper.  To stand by my man when I felt most disconnected and confused.  I am the woman I am because of this life I've lived in Nashville, Tn. The mother I am because of the availability to be present and attentive due to my hard workin man and the opportunities he was offered here.  The friend that I am because of the rich and special friendships that allowed me to truly be myself in whatever emotion I was feeling and they still cared and listened to me.  We became mothers together! Thank you girls, you know who you are and the place you hold in my heart!

I see so much Love for Nashville, as I prepare to leave this place, and I block out the constant traffic and chigger bites and wasp stings and mosquitoes and mildew and $30 parking and chigger bites and huge brown recluse spiders all over the house and bugs in the shower every morning and traffic and chigger bites!  

Letting life live me and surrendering to its magic and mystery has given me more gifts then what I could have ever given myself by planning it on my own. Surrendering myself has taken me to such deep waters and here the water is still even when the surface has so much turbulence.  

Conscious Mothering In A Unconscious World

When I found out I was going to be a Mother I was filled with excitement and anticipation.  I knew what kind of Mother I was going to be.  I saw it clearly.  What I didn't see is the challenges that would lie ahead when my sweet lil baby grew into a toddler and started to think for herself.  I encouraged this, excited to see this little person develop into her own being. What I didn't realize is how soon this would happen. 
Already she has her own opinions, her own desires but she lacks the full ability to get her message across.  Her tantrums and emotional outbursts are simply a release of an emotion she doesn't understand or a frustration from a lack of being able to communicate what she is needing from me, therefore leaving me confused and internally irritated!!

I have always known that this is a sensitive time for all children and usually they are placed in a catagory from their parents of "terrible twos!" Oh, how this pulls on my heart strings.  No child going through their toddler stage is terrible, they don't even want to be terrible in my opinion, I believe they want to be understood and they so strongly want to understand and explore their boundaries.  This results in repeating their behaviors good or bad over and over and over again.  What looks to parents like a child purposefully disobeying is just exploration and discovery of their boundaries.  Often, acting out and releasing emotions that we have passed and projected onto them.

Reading book after book seeking some guidance on how to delicately approach this stage with sternness as well as patience I came across "The Conscious Parent" by Shefali Tsabary, PhD (yes, a doctor...I added that because well, humanity seems to only think something is worthwhile if it was said by a doctor....rubbish!)

This book simply states that is is in transforming ourselves as parents that we begin to empower our children.  Taking the responsibility that our children are a reflection of ourselves. They reflect our inner most turmoil and can teach us as parents how to behave more consciously and how to stay present with life healing ourselves and quit putting our inner inheritance of psychological pain and emotional shallowness onto our children.

Both parents undergo a large transformation in their identity while raising children.  For a mother the journey is especially emotional and very spiritual because we hold this growing child within our body for the first nine months and this mother-child bond is particularly unique in its intensity, leading to the complex relationship that is highly symbiotic and profoundly personal.

Often we see our children react and throw these so called "fits" and we don't even see that we are projecting our own emotions onto our children and watching them release them for us! Pain is passed from generation to generation and is such an important aspect of conscious parenting.

 I believe that no matter who you are and what your life story is, what it is you see in others, especially those closest to you, are your own emotions and issues being projected onto them, therefore it is a huge responsibility to all those practicing living in consciousness, to be aware of this and work on yourself.  NO ONE is to blame for whats happened in your life, never was it happening TO you, but FOR you to learn and grow from.....Remember that!!!  We as individuals, especially parents in todays age of conscious awareness, are to change the old patterns of which we have evolved from.  Creating new thought patterns and new conditions from which we react or better yet don't react from! Our perspective must be transformed to free our children from the emotional pain and fears we face.  Emotions must flow freely and fears are meant to dive into and come out the other side transformed to courage! None of this is your essential being!  Few of us have been raised by parents who are in touch with their inner joy.  Those children who are so blessed to have parents whom understand this grow up with a lightness of spirit and an intuitive trust that life is good and wise. These children grow up not fearing life and its experiences but see their inner light and freely express this in the physical knowing that it transcends the physical.  Never once feeling they aren't doing it right, or aren't good enough.  They know they are exactly as they are suppose to be, authentic and uniquely filled with light and inner knowing, they trust themselves because their parents trust themselves!

Adults today are filled with constant activity, consistently preoccupied.  Many of us fill our every moment with some activity, me included! The foundation of our self-esteem rest on the amount we do, how much we earn, how good we look, and how socially connected we are.  Children don't function in this manic state unless we teach them to do so.   Children need to be allowed to live in the moment and celebrate the organic nature of their existence.  If children are caught up in a buzz of constant activity from morning to night even before they reach age five, they don't get the opportunity to connect with their True Self.  All our "doing" is an attempt to distance ourselves from our sense of incompleteness. 

Its a difficult road to travel but one very worth the investment of our children's self awareness.  When we as conscious humans decide to walk the path of parenthood, especially mothers, we absolutely must see our children as perfect in who they innately are and cherish that in them, not imprinting our silly expectations of worth onto them.  

As I watch Amazing Grace come into her own being I am proud to see how she is raising me, she is raising my vibration and I am forever Transformed!!

Weaning!

Amazing Grace is 2 1/2 years old.  She lives up to her name in everyway!  She has impressed me over and over again and confused me too! We have had a very strong bond, one that allowed her to depend on me for her every comfort and release.  Mazi has been sleeping in my bed since birth and about three months ago we moved her to her own bed, right next to our bed, where she still wakes up and asks me to hold her hand.  Everymorning Mazi and I would snuggle and she would nurse and both of us were very at ease and relaxed, needless to say I really dreaded the time when I was going to have to wean her.

Amazing has a sensitive personality and she gets uncomfortable easy when around chaos or when life is too busy, forever she was using my magical milk of oxytocin and digestive goodness to ease her every discomfort.  I was always there for her.  She has proven to be very self aware, potty trained at 19 months, speaking all kinds of words, telling stories and using her imagination very very well by 2 1/2.  I knew she would never choose to wean on her own, its too great!  Who doesn't have an addiction they don't want to give up? Especially, when this one helps her health, tremendously, emotionally, physically, and spiritually!!!  Its the best thing we will have to give up to grow up!

Now I didn't know how to go about this so I asked, I read, I meditated deeply and this is my weaning story!

Knowing that I needed to wean my child for my sake, because I need more time to myself without the pull of dependency from Mazi, she didn't want her milk to get too far away, she hated to be away from me.  To this day we haven't been apart for more than 5 hours! When I did have to leave, the moment she saw me walk in the door, ALL she wanted was milk, milk, milk!!!  With a whine attached to it!

For her sake, because she needs to feel that she is in control of her self and to know that Mama is separate from her on the physical level, and she needed to practice self-soothing! Even though it still happens in my arms.

I talked with her about it each day for about two weeks, I got out a calendar and drew a fancy picture of some ta-tas with a big squiggly circle around them in bright red and explained to her that this was the day my milk would be all gone.
We discussed babies and big kids and why they are different, we showed her how she has teeth to eat, legs to walk and run, she is strong, she talks, she plays and she no longer needs her Mamas milk.  We pointed out children at the park and helpless babies whenever we came in contact with them.  Mazi loves attention and comforting so I always explained that we can still always cuddle, I will always hold her and give her attention, she will still get all of Mommy but we kept telling her how big she is and that she is drinking Mama's milk all gone.  She can speak so well that she repeated this over and over to her Daddy and I.  We both knew she was understanding it and approving it.  She would ask me everyday, "Is it all gone?" When I said "not yet" she would light up.  I would remind her on the calendar of when it will be gone.  Finally, we told her that big girls get to do great things like take care of a kitty all by themselves...she really wants a kitty, and when we run into a kitten we will get one for her!

My anticipation for the upcoming day was intense.  I was nervous.  We never let Mazi cry herself to sleep or ignore her cries for any reason and knowing this was her favorite thing on the planet so far, I didn't know what to expect!! Oh, and Amazing Grace is perfectly emotional, she feels all her emotions very well and she's incredible empathetic.

The last day we will ever share the moment of her taking in my milk was positive and full of fun!  We spent the day together as a family bringing up often that this is the last day for Mama's milk and that she is growing up.  We went to the park, we got her a toy, we had lunch together, we snuggled, lit candles and played fun games til night.  JJ put her to bed and the next morning was a new day!

Shocking to me, Amazing didn't want to snuggle.  Immediately, she wanted to get out of bed and get distracted.  She wasn't too whiney, she just didn't want much to do with me.  That day was harder for me than her.  It broke my heart to see her avoid snuggling with me, I totally understood and was even proud that she knew she just had to stay away from it or this will be real hard, it was will power in its prime.  I wore high collared shirts and sweaters to help.  I also, wore cabbage leaves and oils in my bra so when she did want to look at them she would say, "Mama, you got leaves on you!" I explained they were my magic leaves, as all of plant life is magic in my eyes.
I kept snacks and yummy beverages around all day, everyday, smoothies, juices, and almond butter milk shakes...yum!
 It was about 3 days where she didn't want to snuggle much.  When I picked her up she tried to get away...she never does that to me!  Finally, after day three I noticed that she became almost a different kid, instantly matured!
She talks about how she is taking care of her babies and she's a big girl.  She wants to walk more and hold my hand, sometimes she asks to not hold my hand but to just stay by me.  It kills me to see this maturity at the same time that it excites me to see her develop into her own person with her own ideas!  She wants to dress herself now, and pick her shoes, she tells me what she wants to eat, even if I only offer what I planned earlier.  She is her own Amazing Grace!

She is even working so well with other kids, she's passive and observant but if a kid respects her, she opens up and tries to communicate with them.  I've seen her be compassionate and very giving with her play, that makes me feel so proud.  She doesn't have aggression but I've seen her give little reminders to some kids to give her space, if she is playing with a toy and some kid is moving in with the eyes to "take it" from her she holds out her hand and pushes lightly like she's moving them out of her way.  Its fun to watch her interact with others.  If they do take it they often regret it with her squeal of disbelief that they would do such a thing to her!

All in all I was soooooo impressed with the outcome, it was totally the right move to make.  We have both evolved nicely and I can feel the success of our family's growth.  I'm falling more and more in Love with who she is becoming!

For myself, the weaning wasn't bad.  I had no engorgement as I prepared myself days in advance.  I drank "no more milk tea" with peppermint, sage, and parsley.  I also ate these raw.  Often JJ caught me in the kitchen with a slab of raw cheddar cheese and a sage leaf being stuffed in my mouth.  It was good and it helped tons!
I kept cabbage leaves on my breast for about four days.  I did have some left over placenta tincture from Amazing's birth and I took that the first week to help balance out my hormonal changes that I knew I would go through.  It wasn't too bad, I got sad a few times simply because I knew it would be the last of our nursing experience together and holding her next to my body in full surrender everyday while she drank from me and I smelled her in, touched her body, stroked her hair, and kissed her hands was going to be really really missed!  I enjoyed the moments of stopping and connecting.  I try often to cuddle her and stop and hug and connect but she still doesn't just surrender into me and rub my chest for 20 minutes, like she did when she nursed.  She's a kid on the go now!

Our last time sharing this moment of nursing together!!

So, we are all growing together and this was a great step we've taken.

Amazing Grace truly is my best friend, she's my buddy, we go everywhere together, even my yoga classes.  I'm so grateful for this opportunity to help raise her into a magnificent and aware human being!

and...

I loved breastfeeding my sweet little Amazing Grace Peek!

To our next chapter....

Presence!!!

I knew it would happen, I just knew it! I would set an intention for blogging daily about what I was most grateful for each day of November. I made it a few days into the month and then the present moments sucked me in!

 I found myself thinking "oh, I love this today, I need to write to the world about my passion" but, then, I got sucked into the moment of life, mostly mazi and her addicting personality.

  I never made it to the blog post that day.  Mazi is the queen of presence and keeps me from wandering about in my head. 

This month has been different for us. Jj got a new job with a corporate charter company and he is away from the home days and nights at a time, sometimes as far as Mexico.  The goodies are fun, and the moment he arrives home is anxious excitement while also feeling the anticipation that at any moment he could be called off again, for days at a time...it sort of leaves me focused on the present moment and giving that my full attention.  I miss him soo much when he's gone, I get a little lonely. 

Mazi is so curious about the world and making sure she gets it all right...child there is no such thing as right...it's just what it is!

She keeps me close and she stays curious!  I'm thankful for that too, I love our close relationship! 

For the last two weeks I have been most thankful for the ability to be present! Present to hear my breath. Present to know my daughter deeply!

 Present to hear the wind and rain...it's presently raining...and just present in life right now.  I'm searching for constant practice of samtosa (contentment).  I'm not often content.

 This practice I must be very aware of. If I focus on mazi, my body, and our small journey I can touch and taste it and I'm suddenly at ease with what IS for if I never feel content here and now in a place where I'm completely out of my element then I've really failed at learning what true presence really is! It is a cakewalk to be present when I'm on a sunny, clean, private perfect beach or even better on the top of a snowy pure white ridgetop with thin, clean, crisp air.  Warm from the climb and a touch of the suns rays on my winter skin....inhale...exhale! Ya, that's easy to be present to! 

Oh boy, I just flopped that moment of being content in the rainy south, stuck in my car at a grocery store while my child sleeps in the backseat and I write a blog post!!!!! Oops!