Going out of orbit

I attended my feng shui teacher's annual workshop on the weekend, and for once, I have to say I was not impressed. This is a 'big thing', really, because I have always been impressed with her. Even if she smiles I'm impressed! you know what I mean?

So I am left with this disappointment deep within. This kind of 'end of an era' feeling,............ which on the flipside of the crap critism and guilt and feelings of loss, actually reminds me that new things are therefore coming in. So it's all ok really.....really.

My lovely teacher has been the source of so many inspirations. She emits an 'inspirational field', and I just love her for it. This year she is 'going global' as she puts it. Publishing a holistic feng shui book and distributing a detox product from a global business. Nothing upsetting me at all about any of that, but she did not put as much into this workshop and she overbooked it, so we all missed out on that small intimate connection you get with a dozen people and a teacher.

(covens, Jesus and apostles kind of thing)

The analogy that clearly came up in my mind was of a bright shining comet that we all love to gaze at and that fills us with 'big' thoughts and wonder, then it night by night fades and continues on it's orbit. It's not gone but we just won't get the benefits of watching and wondering anymore,..for a very long time anyway.

She's often been told that her spirit self is 'galactic'. More than one metaphysical interpreter has let her know she is from another star galaxy of this universe. And you know, usually I 'smile and nod' at people when they say this, not because I don't believe them, but because no-one can prove otherwise, and I'm ok with it. (be from another galaxy! see if I care!) With her though, there is just this otherness that so clashes with the human you see before you, and the warmth she has, and the flaws she has.

Ah anyway. End of an era. Bye bye, stay in touch, keep sending me inspiration from my memories. *sigh*

Integrity, and fame, 'n'stuff.....

Just read this on one of my emails this morning and thought it represented the kind of integrity that attracts me to certain people....

"[Coltrane contemporary and jazz musician] Dave Liebman expands the thought: " 'What stays with me about the Coltrane Quartet is an image of them getting up on the bandstand ... completely burning for two hours without a word to anybody, getting off the stage and sitting down like any other person. Not having an entourage around them or anything. Then doing it again, with unpretentiousness, absolute honesty and matter-of-factness. ... I still try to live up to that image: to do your work, to do it intensely, with conviction, and be honest with the music."Ashley Kahn, A Love Supreme, Penguin, 2002, pp. 66, 210.

It's very similar to the way I was amazed by Deva and Mitten and their unannounced entry to the 'stage'. I wish I would have waited back and given them both a big hug, like I would to anyone giving me a mantra session.... :)

Deva Premal in Brisbane 17.01.07

That was just so full on, and wonderful, and uplifting, and quietning, and calming, and nourishing.

Deva Premal concerts are unlike anything ever experienced before.

From the end of the first little interlude she made it clear that we "don't have to, you know, clap.....after each mantra,........because sometimes, after the mantra ends,......you want to just sit and feel the mantra,................so I am like, giving you the night off....." :)

She's lovely. So slight, and strong, and humble and with just the most lovely lovely lovely resonant voice. To begin the concert she and her husband walked on stage unannounced, very quiet, very slowly and then bowed to the audience, hands in the prayer position, receiving the blessing and sending it back out to all of us. Then they just sat down and got their instruments together, spoke quietly to one another, and then she directs us that "we will start tonight with three Ohms".

If you've ever been in a chanting circle, done a toning meditation with others, or something similar (like belonging to a Welsh choir) you will understand the power that's in a resonant chant. Times that by hundreds of people in one auditorium and you have an idea of why I nearly exploded with JOY on the first Ohm. :))

Their accompanying flautist was great too. Very cute.

The concert went over time as it's their first one of the year and they were getting themselves together and they just went with the flow. It was great. Highlight of the night was the Gayatri Mantra which everyone wished was earlier in the night when our voices were stronger. Oh but it does not matter when really, it was always going to be 'the thing' of the concert for me.

Michelle dressed up so nicely that a complete stranger gave her a compliment. She had a black floor length skirt on with a blood red velvet corset...and her hair up in little Teutonic buns, like a mini Princess Leia. :) I was in linen pants and shirt that creased easily. I looked remarkably well matched to the rest of the audience. :) It had to happen sometime.....