Healing Meditations

Healing Ourselves
Sit or lie down, breathe, and relax deeply. Starting with your toes, feet, legs, pelvis and so on, put your attention on each part of your body in turn and tell it to relax and let go of any tension. Feel all tension dissolving and draining away.

If you wish to, do the meditation on opening the energy centers in order to get your energy really flowing.

Now imagine golden, healing light energy all around your body....... feel it.......sense it....enjoy it.

If there is a particular part of your body that has been ill or in pain, ask that part of you whether it has a message for you. Ask whether there is something you need to understand or to do, right at this moment or in your life in general.

If you get an answer, do your best to understand and follow it. If you don't get an answer, just continue with the process.

Now send special loving, healing energy to that part of you, and any part of you that needs it, and see or feel it being healed. You may want to have your guide, or any master or healer, there to help you do the healing.

Picture the problem dissolving and flowing energy away, or whatever iage works for you.

Now imagine yourself in perfect, radiant, natural good health. Think of yourself in different situations feeling good, active and healthy. See yourself as divinely, radiantly beautiful.

Affirmations:

I have now transcended all patterns of illness. I'm free and healthy!

I am now full of radiant health and energy.

I love and accept my body completely.

I am good to my body, and my body is good to me.

I am energetic and full of vitality.

My body is balanced, in perfect harmony with the univverse.

I give thanks for ever increasing health, beauty, and vitality.

I am a radiant expression of God. My mind and body now manifest divine perfection.

Sambodromo

Blocos

Relating

It is one thing hosting a complete stranger in your home, and it is completely another to be a guest. It is a vulnerable experience for both, where so many things have to be given up if it is even going to happen. Is my house too messy? What do I do to make my host happy? It was a myriad of emotions for me, but not really until the rollercoaster of stay & go happened.

My original host changed his plans 2 days before arrival, so Katia had jumped in to save me, but only until the 4th. After a couple days at her house, she said I could stay as long as I wanted. Then, on the morning of the 3rd, she said her gramma was coming home and it would be too difficult for 3 guests to stay, so I would have to leave as planned, on the 4th. I was certain I had done something wrong, and immediately went into a childlike state of hurt, and resentment. I knew what was going on inside me, and used my skills to be mature, and gentle about the process. It was painful, but I made the day as best as I could, and had found another host had sent me a message to stay at his house already. But it didn't take away the deep feeling of guilt and that there was something wrong with me.

I started packing my things on the afternoon of the 4th; we had stayed up until 5 am that morning at the Carnival Ball, and I didn't wake up until 2 pm. Katia then said her grandmother was not going to come out of hospital until after carnaval, and I could stay. My pride, and 'doing the right thing' was strong, and I said Bernardo was expecting me after 11 am and I should stay to the plan, but really I was just still hurt about having to go. Then we all sat down for some wine and a nice dinner and I thought can i give this attitude up? Can I see this as a great opportunity to ignore my own selfish thoughts, and change? I asked her "were you serious about me staying?" She said "Do you want to stay?" I said, "yes!".

The pains in my body seemed to melt away, and the negative self-loathing thoughts were gone. I went on to have a connected evening out at carnaval, being chatty and comfortable. All from this release of guilt and self-punishment.

Edward Whitmont describes the phenomenon of “shadow projection”, as it is known in analytical psychology, very aptly in his book The Symbolic Quest:

This type of situation is so classical that one could almost play a parlour game with it if one wished to court social ruin. Ask someone to give a description of the personality type which he finds most impossible to get along with, and he will produce a description of his own repressed characteristics – a self-description which is utterly unconscious and which therefore always and everywhere tortures him as he receives its effect from the other person.

Unfortunately, although this shadowy side of the personality is usually “utterly” unconscious in the individual, it is not so hidden from everyone else, and the more repressed and unconscious it is, the more obvious it will become to others. Often we may hear a man declare, “I simply hate dictatorial people, they make everybody’s lives miserable,” and then, on another occasion, the wife or friend ssays, “Well, he really behaves like a tyrant sometimes, but whenever I try to tell him this he flies into a rage and I can’t make myself understood at all.”

When we find ourselves the victim of an emotional reaction that is out of proportion to the situation, or where we have such a reaction in regard to some situation that is not really within the range of our concern but is strictly someone else’s business, we should suspect that we are reacting to something of our own that we have not recognised as ours.

– Relating: An Astrological Guide to Living with Others on a Small Planet” – Liz Greene

Carnaval

Cidade Maravilhosa

I took Helen on the bike over to Copacabana (passing over a 12 km bridge from Niteroi), up to Corcovado (the Christ the Redeemer statue) and finally down to Lapa where I bought some crazy electric hair and pink hat for the night. Twice this day we experienced a miracle : Marco and Andre from the amazon boat were up at the statue at the exact cloudy time we were there, and Katia, who had brought Daniel down, was found in a kiosk area amongst thousands - exactly where I would have told her to meet. Home at 5 am and up at 2 pm.

Maids

Cleaned up some areas and hung up some Carnaval decorations Katia had from a previous year. At the end of the Carnaval, the participants take off all of their amazing glittery gear and form a massive pile. Whoever gets there first can have their pick. Usually the poor people are there, and sell pieces for $10R.

She is a ceramics artist, and spent over 7 years in Boston and Alabama attaining her Masters. Now she's a mom to 4 year old Katerina and Gabriela helps look after this massive house on the hill - more than 5 bedrooms, swimming pool, ceramics studio, patio and lots of beautiful exotic trees. The Jabuticaba - with fruits growing right off the trunk - eluded me for 6 months and found it. Mom had seen one in a picture and asked me to find it. I do what my mother wants. Always.

We go to a couch surfing event tonight and katia thinks I would do well to drive up on the motorbike. She thinks it's quite an accomplishment, and the ambassador appreciates motorbikes, so could be an ice breaker. Still very tired, but better. The normal waking up 3 or 5 times or more in the night checking my money belt and wondering whether the bike has been stolen. Naps are a must.

Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before... He is full of murderous resentment of people who are ignorant without having come by their ignorance the hard way.
Kurt Vonnegut, "Cat's Cradle"

“When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.”
Mark Twain

Understanding

I've worked so hard to understand and calculate life but it just doesn't work. Being a stubborn SOB I've pushed myself to the brink trying to. It's driven quite a few people away from me over the years, screaming my problems and uncertainty. They don't have the answers either, so it's no wonder they don't like it.

The next 10 days I will be the ambassador of fun, presence and generosity.

Burning

My first carnival experience of this journey was actually the Burning Man festival. Many refer to people's intensity as 'burning'. For example, if a person parties all night, goes hard all day, that means they are burning fast. This can lead to burn OUT. The wise ones burn well, managing their days, getting much needed rest, and pacing. Full of discipline, calm and peaceful intention, I burned quietly and slowly.

I am seriously sleep deprived. Wired and tired from the intensity of driving over 3000 km in a foreign country on a motorcycle. Despite the road in excellent condition I was determined to get to my destination, performing suicide passes to get past hundreds of big semi trucks with loads.

have fun vs. guilty
biggest snow since 74
don't use ink
bloco
finding her house

Wheee-oooo!!!

I have reached the summit. Massive city with 446 birthdays..........

On the road the night before, I drove through a wildfire. Couldn't hack it at midnight and stopped to curl my big head down for 15 but the ground looked so inviting so I laid down right there with my full helmet on right on the side of the road. Long but satisfying day to Rio even with a one hour mistaken diversion.

Expo 86

Cousin Jimmy sent this to me - what a sweet guy! A flashback to a time when I was more worried about my first pimple than whether Id be bike jacked in brazil.

What Song?

I drove all night, or Enter Sandman? over 24,000 kilometers driven, and about 900 to go before I reach the summit of my journey: Rio de Janeiro. Of course, climbing Mt. Everest is always that much sweeter when you can make it back home. I will do that. But first, I will enjoy life guilt free worry free for the next 10 days. My brand new battery is dead; something electrical is killing it possibly my headlights. I have suspicions of why and where but I wont say until Im sure.

I have a saviour in Rio! Her name is Katia, and I can stay at her home from the 1st to the 4th. Ironically I would have sent her the request first, but I thought her profile was so great she would already have someone on her couch. Instead, I picked someone who pulled out at the last minute - well lets call him the pullout couch. but now i feel strongly nothing will stop me, even me.

So much happens on the road everyday im lucky to catch 10 percent of it. I dont worry too much about names and places. that i can read in a book or on tv. the parts that interest me are the sudden realizations about life. For instance, the guilt I feel for not constantly working like a wasp. lazy, unambitious, dreamer, etc. I wonder how many people really thinking I am just fucking around on this trip? Trying to find myself? Vacation? Doesnt matter.

I had liquids coming out of me from both ends within the last 24 hours. My health was shaky at best when I got off the boat, but it hit a point when I stayed in the hotel in Salvador. I ordered a feel good omelette, but it was cooked like a pancake so it had some flour in it. Hit the eject button. Then I soiled the bed in the night. Never happened before in my life. I guess a preview of old age. So, staying away from any suspicious foods and meats, and things are solidifying.

Stayed in a weird Motel Sex last night, with all the sound, tv, air controls right on the headboard. It was on the side of the highway, then like a fort knox compound, a big yellow steel door, and an intercom with a box. A voice comes over the speaker, then insert your ID into the box. Bye bye passport. Drive around inside the wall until you get to your garage, pull down the blind, and enter the suite. First two channels were free porn. Despite the mood, I couldnt even seduce myself this night. Hardly slept having the same someone is stealing my bike dreams. You dont see any staff the whole time breakfast is served through a secret door, and all conversations are through the phone. The cafe de manha was the best Ive had.

Haven't talked much about the rain but I'm getting it now, and hard. Peering over my fogged up glasses and windshield soaked to the bones.

Just so many people yelling at me, giving me high fives in the air, smiling, thumbs up, honking...... its been that way for 6 months but its really coming on now. People know Im close to the goal and are acknowledging the accomplishment. No time to believe the hype.

So despite the battery problems, the only thing that will stop me will be a sign that says ~free assrubs~with a picture of perogies and salt and vinegar chips on the side. Oh boy i~m getting my grocery list ready for my return!