gatekeeping and gategiving

are you gatekeeping from us around you, gathered?

fearful that your well-woven wounds might cheapen in the hands and mouths of shallow artifice?

thrown around flippantly like a freebie?

aghast! the hungry ghosts clog the psychopomps

greed enters the field.

the wave scatters into particle

resonance collapses

greed sniffs out what’s been dug up by somebody else

“it’s my turn, damnit!”

greed, scarcity and incompetence’s consort,

forgets that nothing vibrates without, first, a ferment

fixated with safety,

greed glances left and right, looking to grab onto anything

generosity enters the field.

particles recompensate into waves

parts no longer seen in their small form

formlessness precedes everything!

greed scowls in unrighteous indignation

generosity laughs with too much love, “how adorable!”

still stuck in dyadic gatekeeping

gratitude enters gallantly

gifting a current that with levity, lessens gravity

when witnessed in plentiful approval

recognized

both become right-sized, fervent in their creativity

next arrive 4, from 7 generations back

from the formless, an arc, a gateway is formed

content turns essence

love and life flow through

a six-sided star, sextiling

people, parts, and waves trine, serving simply

the chaos agent signals

great mother stabilizes

the line collapses surrendering to what’s cyclical

do you want to try again?

“Do you want to try again?”

A question that hums without a “you versus me.”

A prayer that the dyadic impasse between us has collapsed.

There is a tune of “time and space have worked their magic.”

You’re stronger and you’re assuming that I am too. Thank you!

You might even be saying I didn’t irrevocably fuck it up?

You’re confident enough to take a risk to try and love me again?

You still consider me, my impact on you?

There’s no “are you ready to pay penance for the error of your ways?”

More of a “have the errors of our way settled?”

A “I found all of those parts in me, too.”

I’m not a total terror-inducing doom and gloom boogey man?

Try what again?

Something generative, something life-giving?

You want more of me?

Wow.

Too bad I’m too stunned to speak now.

I love to love you baby

People love to humble heroines instead of doing the humbling repetitions of integrity required to heroine correctly.

Repetitions of taking responsibility, of not blaming everyone and everything.

Repetitions of doing it not for adulation but for self-respect.

Repetitions of realizing that it’s not about you but the quality of your presence in the lives of others.

Repetitions of friendliness from a commitment to self-warmth and not repressed lust or performance.

Repetitions of staying in dignity whilst being dismissed for basic ornamentality.

Repetitions of not taking the come-drown-with-me bait when cursed in projective contempt.

Repetitions of putting yourself last, not from shame but from ongoing gratitude resourcing.

Repetitions of creating the interdependent glow of illuminating others’ strength.

Repetitions of emanating a bath-worthy solar generosity, a field of tolerance and mercy.

Repetitions of doing it for the regenerative joy of photosynthesis.

very serious instructions for how to attend constellations

for tending to your anxiously-styled parts:

Take your piece, place, and peace…and run!

But first, show up a little bit late!

Flip your hair a little flagrantly!

Get all that you need in one fell swoop!

Selfishly!

Make no friends!

Be distant and discreet!

Hide in the bathroom on the breaks!

Say “thanks everybody!” in the middle of running out with your shoes barely on your feet!

for tending to your avoidantly-styled parts:

Show up early!

Ask if you can help move the furniture!

Maybe a little myofascial release for the host and facilitator, even!

Whatever serves everybody!

Hope to represent everyone’s very mean and bad mom and dad…an unresourced ancestor even!

At break time, make everyone a cup of mint-infused tea and make sure they get a couple cookies each!

Say “I’m just happy to be here with you people, not here for anything in particular, really!”

Practice completing courageously in front of everyone by repping the dead again and again.

Coordinate the Avoidant Collective’s giving flowers to failure praxis!

Ask who wants to go to dinner after and say that you’ll coordinate the appetizers, with pleasure!

How my Grandma Martha holds me

My Grandma Martha holds onto me from right behind.

Her arms wrapped around me.

Me. Me just as I am. Just as I am.

She follows me. As I dance around.

First she just sways right there right there behind me

And then she dances with me.

She dances with me. From right behind me.

She’s been trying to get in there for some time right behind me.

“I want to hold you with nourishment and nurturance, my sweet wild Mattie dear!”

It’s the holding I’ve been missing! I do declare!

She doesn’t leave me when it matters.

When does it matter?

It matters when I’m doing well.

It matters when I am succeeding.

It matters to me to be held when I am doing well.

She knows success intimately.

So she isn’t intimidated by my success.

She birthed six children, you see!

She created a garden, home and big family.

She was taking care of all of her kids, husband and mother at the same time!

May the embodiment of her success flow down to us all more freely!

Especially to her great-great grand daughters!

She’s right there with me, holding me in all of my and life’s complexity.

all the complexity.

Success is the face of my father’s mother.

I’m looking forward to our reconciliation.

I’m not sure when it’s going to happen but I know it’s going to happen.

Probably right here on the crust but if not, in the mycelial or the ethers for sure.

And I’m grinning ear to ear just thinking about it right here and right now.

The mere notion let my belly digest something right here and right now.

You see, I never stopped holding you dear.

I can’t help it. It’s what my emergently-abled brother taught me! I die if I don’t use what he gave me.

I have enough to include those who gave me much to set me free from chunks of empiric fuckery.

Those who saw more of me before I did.

Those who accompanied me just one step towards living more in the real awful wonder of it all.

Oh, I so look forward to it with much grace and gratitude.

I miss your beauty. And your brilliance. And your raw instinctual intelligence.

I’m curious but what I imagine is that we’ll both say,

“It’s good to see you.”

We’ll likely pretty quickly move into self-mockery and mutual musery, lifting out from some of the goop, ick and misery.

I feel my jaw dropping down now with all that you’ve learned in my absence, through the wins and the losses. Through the successes and failures. Through the empowerments and humblings. Through the sun and the lightning.

I can’t wait till I can say, “it wasn’t till you left that I realized how you were always right most everything…!”

I can’t wait till I can playfully say right to your big gorgeous face, “You’re welcome, I’m glad you realize I watered you in that!”

You’re so worldly now, putting yourself right out there right now!

Tears well with appreciation.

And then

And then things must get sober.

A feeling felt of the hurt

and the pain

and the loss

and the potential squandered.

A frown appears from both our trembling lips.

We think for a minute maybe it could’ve been different.

Then, we, with a big simultaneously surrendered sigh let out one of those, “It is what it is.”

At least now

At least now we can bring one another forward with us a bit more, even from a great parallel distance. And center even just 1% more that which we got and a teeny bit less that which what we lost.

And as we reseed what we sowed before with a scattering instead of a planting, a juicier compost allows a wider wellspring of loving remembrance…

…to take fold.

intelligence is relative

In Family and Systemic Constellations workshops, we employ the field of our collective intelligence. We each bring our own type of intelligence. As we are held in this field together, we become present to what is elementally true for us. We see a 3D representation of the images we hold inside. We give gentle loving awareness and curiosity to what feels stuck or confusing.

We might feel unsure about a relationship or our work. We might not know where to go next with a project or a decision. We might need to acknowledge our resources as we venture into the scary unknown. Maybe our connection to love and life got interrupted somewhere and we need others to bear witness with us to what happened. Maybe we’re wanting to build our capacity to hold steady.

We give the parts of complex systems space to breathe and loosen. We slow down with spacious stillness to acknowledge what is and more fully grieve what and who is gone.

And then, we find some movement and integration.

When our new movements gain some momentum, the microcosmic spirals of reconciliation grow into new modes of being and relating. These create a field of emergence where we can step into more truth, authenticity and agency.

The Knowing Field

I am seven years old. It’s just before I move houses for the first time. I am sitting cross-legged in the brown grass, at the edge of the forest, admiring the dainty snowdrops sprouting. My hands are getting dirty as I collect sticks and leaves to make a geometric pattern on the ground. I keep an eye on my brother. We’re at good distance for accompaniment, doing our own thing together. He’s concentrating carefully while tying nautical knots on the swing-set. I am listening to the birds polish the air with their chirps. Out here we’re free to follow our instincts, our natural movements. I hear the howl of winter’s wind traveling far unencumbered by summer’s leaves. I take my hat off and ponytail out to feel the cold air in my hair. I pull my bangs back to feel better the sun on my face. My pants are getting wet from the moist earth beneath me. Mom told me to wear snow pants but I was relieved when she let me not listen. I start to hum in resonance with all that I am witnessing. I am within myself and attuned to what’s without at once. My body rocks gently to praise to the breeze. I drop my head, mimicking the closest snowdrop, and smile smelling the earthy odor that tells me spring is coming.