a man who takes his time

Have you ever met a man who takes his time? A man so in tune with your energy, your mood, your expression that he knows what you need without an explanation?

A man who doesn't push you away when you're upset or frustrated. A man who knows how to stand with firmness and calm in his masculine while your feminine works it out.

He's taken time to get to know your mind and your body. He sees you, he listens to the little things, even when you don't know he's listening.

He learned how to connect with your mind and he's learned how to touch your body. He's able to slow things down and read your body's response to his touch. He doesn't rush, he's not pleasing you for his own release. It's for you with no expectation, no pressure, no manipulation, no games.

You can let go because he's created a space of absolute respect and trust. He knows when to kiss you softly, when to hold you gently or when to consume your mind and body with masculine power and intensity.

Only a man who takes his time gives a woman time to experience every level of response, layer by layer, deeper and deeper until her mind, body and soul all explode together.

Only a man who takes his time can give her a release of what lays caged beneath her surface. And only a man who takes his time will ever glimpse the heights of ecstasy a woman is capable of, her secret remains hidden to all others.

Author: Jennifer Funk

(my response to the question asked at the beginning of this essay is yes, i have met this man and i fell in love with him)

another gem from john

 

 

I can't think of

anything more

boring

than living by

the expectations

of other people

let the hens gossip

and cluck and clack

whenever you walk

into the room with your

mismatched socks and

stardust falling out

of your wild pink hair

because in a little while

when you get up to leave

to continue on with

your adventure

every single one of them

will secretly wish that

they were going with you

~ john roedel (johnroedel.com)

a bit of wisdom from john roedel

came across this man's writings on fb and after checking his page, found this gem:

I have now taken 47.5 lumbering trips around the sun to observe the human experience and here is a brief recap on a little I have learned so far:

The angriest people are usually
the ones who are the most afraid.

Empathy is a very under-taught
subject in our schools.

People who can’t laugh at themselves
make for terrible comedians.

If you mix Daiquiri Ice and Chocolate
ice cream at Baskin Robbins you’ll know
exactly what heaven tastes like.

Not enough people take the time
to jump in puddles.

We somehow normalized giving
our guns baby names and naming
our babies after guns.

The inside of our eyelids play
the same monster movies over and over.

Dandelions aren’t weeds. No, they aren’t. Stop arguing with me.

A womb is a temple of miracles where souls and bodies form the most perfectly strange communities.

By the way, hospice beds are the exact same.

Politics make for terrible eyeglasses
to see the world through.

There are not enough books written about lighthouses and way too many about vampires.

We take part in so many things that
don’t bring us joy all in the name of “tradition”.

The best naps happen during rainstorms.

Our cell phones have more plans
than our actual lives.

We fetishize butterflies a little
too much, I mean, come on.

Kissing is magic. If a kiss doesn’t
feel magical then it isn’t one. It’s just
lip chores.

We choose if the holes in our hearts
kill us or turn us into woodwind instruments.

Rivers have taught me as much about God
as Sunday School ever did.

If we stare up into the stars long enough
we will feel this little tug on the threads of
our spirit. It will be like the pull of a magnet.
We are drawn upwards. We are attracted to
the expanse. We are being called to return
where it is we came from. We come to know
that everything out there in the endless field
of celestial delights came from the same burst
of creation that eventually formed us. And those
thoughts are gently pulling on us every time we
gaze up into the night sky.

Trees make really wonderful life coaches.

Whenever we hold hands with each other
our pulses try their best to synchronize.

There should be an Olympic sport
that is all about untangling extension cords.

Eating a hamburger while sitting
on the hood of a car is something
people should go do more often.

Our memories should never have
walls to them. We should be able
to visit them without getting stuck.

We treat grief like it’s a summer storm
-as if it’s a temporary event that will
quickly pass. It won’t. Grief is a comet.
It terraforms our world.
Grief doesn’t always destroy us - but it
changes the shape of our continents.

We hide too much beautiful art in places
where we only people who don’t care
about art can afford to see it.

I think whomever created pulp-free orange juice didn’t quite understand what orange juice is.

Sex in movies makes people cringe more than
mass murder in movies and that probably makes the angels weep.

Mothers should be given 10% discounts. Everywhere.

The best name any flower has ever
been given is “Baby’s Breath”.

Kindness is elemental.

A slow drive down a dirt road with the exact right song playing can be a baptism.

I’m hopeful that we have finally
reached the saturation point
of reality tv shows involving
angry neighbors and retired judges.

Although, I can’t quite prove it yet, I think every gust of wind is a ghost trying to win a race.

Our hearts are sponges. What we put in is what squeezes out.

When we fall in love we don’t actually fall. We float. We become weightless.

We have turned the expectations of other people into anchors that we wear our our necks. We are curving our spines by trying to fit in.

Airplanes look they shouldn’t work but somehow they do and we just get over it ~and that is the kind of shoulder shrugging we should do for people who live their lives in ways that we don’t understand.

Listening to new music is an easy way to turn our minds into gates instead of bank vaults.

People are good - some of them just forget it.

We put way too many people in prisons, boxes, their places, in timeout and in hell.

If the universe can still be expanding after all this time then I should willing to do the same. Every morning we become a newborn galaxy. Every breath we take is a baby sun. Every word of kindness we speak can build a new Earth in someone else’s heart.

Nobody can tell you how to heal.

There should be more cupcakes. I know
there are already a bunch of cupcakes, I
just think there should be more.

~ john roedel (johnroedel.com)

the "too much" woman

 “There she is. . . the “too much” woman. The one who loves too hard, feels too deeply, asks too often, desires too much.

There she is taking up too much space, with her laughter, her curves, her honesty, her sexuality. Her presence is as tall as a tree, as wide as a mountain. Her energy occupies every crevice of the room. Too much space she takes.

She is dangerous.

And there she goes, that “too much” woman, making people think too much, feel too much, swoon too much. She with her authentic prose and a self-assuredness in the way she carries herself. She with her belly laughs and her insatiable appetite and her proneness to fiery passion. All eyes on her, thinking she’s hot shit.

Oh, that “too much” woman. . . too loud, too vibrant, too honest, too emotional, too smart, too intense, too pretty, too difficult, too sensitive, too wild, too intimidating, too successful, too fat, too strong, too political, too joyous, too needy—too much.

She should simmer down a bit, be taken down a couple notches. Someone should put her back in a more respectable place. Someone should tell her.

Here I am. . . a Too Much Woman, with my too-tender heart and my too-much emotions.

A hedonist, feminist, pleasure seeker, empath. I want a lot—justice, sincerity, spaciousness, ease, intimacy, actualization, respect, to be seen, to be understood, your undivided attention, and all of your promises to be kept.

I’ve been called high maintenance because I want what I want, and intimidating because of the space I occupy. I’ve been called selfish because I am self-loving. I’ve been called a witch because I know how to heal myself.

And still. . . I rise. Still, I want and feel and ask and risk and take up space.

I must.

Us Too Much Women have been facing extermination for centuries—we are so afraid of her, terrified of her big presence, of the way she commands respect and wields the truth of her feelings. We’ve been trying to stifle the Too Much Woman for eons—in our sisters, in our wives, in our daughters. And even now, even today, we shame the Too Much Woman for her bigness, for her wanting, for her passionate nature.

And still. . . she thrives.

In my own world and before my very eyes, I am witnessing the reclamation and rising up of the Too Much Woman. That Too Much Woman is also known to some as Wild Woman or the Divine Feminine. In any case, she is me, she is you, and she is loving that she’s finally, finally getting some airtime.

If you’ve ever been called “too much,” or “overly emotional,” or “bitchy,” or “stuck up,” you are likely a Too Much Woman.
And if you are. . . I implore you to embrace all that you are—all of your depth, all of your vastness; to not hold yourself in, and to never abandon yourself, your bigness, your radiance.

Forget everything you’ve heard—your too much-ness is a gift; oh yes, one that can heal, incite, liberate, and cut straight to the heart of things.

Do not be afraid of this gift, and let no one shy you away from it. Your too much-ness is magic, is medicine. It can change the world.

So please, Too Much Woman: Ask. Seek. Desire. Expand. Move. Feel. Be.

Make your waves, fan your flames, give us chills"... 

-Ev'yan Whitney

there is light inside me

 there is light inside me

i have the words tattooed on my body as a reminder 

because sometimes i need reminded 

of who i am, that i am good 

and that i can trust myself and the people i love

and that even when i'm by myself

i'm not really alone.

letter to my love - seeking clarity, context & contentment

in my sadness over your leaving i have to question why our parting always causes me such sorrow when i know we'll be together again.  but the truth is, i don't KNOW this.  so obviously some of my sadness is fear based.  a lot can change in a short time and that scares me.  i've had hard lessons in this.  this is just some of why our parting is so sorrowful for me.

looking over the situation and my feelings, here is what i think...

when we are together i feel genuinely happy.  not just because of the attention and company, but for a short time i feel purposeful and alive.  when we are together i am able to do what i do best, that being to love and care for you.  when together i matter, you matter and we matter as a couple.  when we part ways i am forced to look at what is missing in my life and how it feels unfulfilled much of the time without the presence of my companion.   i love hard and sometimes that can suck.

what i want is to be that woman who doesn't need much of anything from anyone or who doesn't need another person to fulfill her, but you can't run from the truth of who you are.  and does that woman actually even exist?  i'm not so sure.  

love is the greatest gift you can give or receive. it truly is what life is all about.  this i KNOW.  loving IS living and without it we are only existing as a cog in the wheel of life, going round and round.  

it's hard letting go every time we part.  i want it to be easier but the only way i see it being easy is if i didn't love you.  so maybe it's just something we both have to live with and perhaps i should stop being so hard on myself. 

i am learning or in the least i'm trying to adapt to something different with you, the man i love and whose love i am deeply grateful for.  i am trying to live for the moments, not so much for the future and not just in regard to our relationship.  please have patience with me.  

 

notes to a born self

 from kamal ravikant, an excerpt from "Notes to a Born Self" ~

- You are worthy. The sooner you accept that, the sooner life will zing.

- Break rules. The rewards greatly outnumber the punishments.

- Everything is an experience. In the now, that’s it.

- Good and bad are labels. Be with the experience, not the label.

- You are special. Treat yourself well.

- I repeat: you are fucking special. Don’t accept less from anyone.

- Love requires risk. It’s worth it.

- The more you close your heart, the more it gets broken. Funny how that works.

- Your mind is not far removed from a monkey. Don’t trust it.

- Your inner self, the quiet and deep part within, trust that.

- Every day, spend time in gratitude.

- Every day, create something.

- Love yourself. It works wonders.

I am a later version of you. Before I know it, there will be a later version of me. And before he knows it, no more. Poof, a wisp of stardust, gone. Leave behind a life that mattered. I love you.

lucky me

i'm lucky enough to have fallen in love with someone who wants to know all the little things about me, like my favorite color and how i take my coffee, who loves to see me smile and hear my laughter, who makes me question why i thought i could live without love and who would never do anything to intentionally hurt me or anyone.  i'm lucky enough to have fallen in love with someone who sees my flaws and still thinks i'm perfect just the way i am.  

i'm lucky enough to love someone whom, when we make love, makes me feel as if i'm being rewarded simply for being me.

love love love

sitting here on this sunday night in the stillness.  i am thinking about life, mine in particular.  i know i've thought this, felt this and probably said it a thousand times, but when it boils right down to it, te only thing that matters, is of any real spiritual or soulful value in life is love.  

i belong to facebook group called "the three blessings".  members usually post daily at least three things they are grateful for or feel blessed by.  sometimes i struggle with three things.  most of the time i can make a list much longer.  tonight i kept it simple.  my three blessings were:

love

love 

love

it's so simple and covers everything.  it's not just the love i receive.  it's that, too, but it's more.  there is so much love in the world but so often what we seem to focus on are the ills of society.  (guilty!)  however, i bet if we just stop and consider all the love that exists in the world, we couldn't even fathom it. 

i feel blessed by love.  the love between my kids and i, the love between siblings, the love i've shared with coop and mark, the love shared with my animal companions.  

but tonight...tonight i am feeling especially blessed by the love of the man in my life.  and sometimes the love in me is so big i don't quite know what to do with it.  i never used to love so hard, but life and loss in particular have taught me to give in, embrace and experience it completely.  

is it scary?  yeah, it is for me because life has shown me what incredible loss feels like, so there is always the element of fear.  but i also know that it's worth the risk.  if we've never truly loved we've never truly lived.   

tonight i go to bed with a grateful heart for all the love in my life and in the world.  

demons

DEMONS

 i like to think i live alone, but i don't.  they are always with me.

sometimes they rest, but i know it's just a temporary reprieve. 

all it takes is one small thing and they swoop in and before you know it i become mistrusting, indecisive, needy, unworthy...all the things that make me hate myself.

i like to think i'm strong enough to conquer them and the thoughts they feed me.  i wish i believed i was.

obviously i'm not.

with thoughts of jason

"And so you see, I have come to doubt All that I once held as true; I stand alone without beliefs. The only truth I know is you."

i am not old

I am not old… she said

I am rare.

I am the standing ovation

At the end of the play.

I am the retrospective

Of my life as art

I am the hours

Connected like dots

Into good sense

I am the fullness

Of existing.

You think I am waiting to die…

But I am waiting to be found

I am a treasure.

I am a map.

And these wrinkles are

Imprints of my journey

Ask me

anything.

Author: Samantha Reynolds

tarnished glory

 

every once in awhile...

 ...we need a little alan watts reminder...

she was brave

 

she was beautiful

SHE WAS BEAUTIFUL....

.... but she didn't know what that meant.

When she was a little girl

they told her she was beautiful

but it had no meaning

in her world of bicycles

and pigtails

and adventures in make-believe.

Later, she hoped she was beautiful

as boys started taking notice

of her friends

and phones rang for

Saturday night dates.

She felt beautiful on her wedding day,

hopeful with her

new life partner by her side

but, later,

when her children called

her beautiful,

she was often exhausted,

her hair messily tied back,

no make up,

wide in the waist

where it used to be narrow;

she just couldn't take it in.

Over the years, as she tried,

in fits and starts,

to look beautiful,

she found other things

to take priority,

like bills

and meals,

as she and her life partner

worked hard

to make a family,

to make ends meet,

to make children into adults,

to make a life.

Now,

she sat.

Alone.

Her children grown,

her partner flown,

and she couldn't remember

the last time

she was called beautiful.

But she was.

It was in every line on her face,

in the strength of her arthritic hands,

the ampleness that had

a million hugs imprinted

on its very skin,

and in the jiggly thighs and

thickened ankles

that had run her race for her.

She had lived her life with a loving

and generous heart,

had wrapped her arms

around so many to

to give them comfort and peace.

Her ears had

heard both terrible news

and lovely songs,

and her eyes

had brimmed with,

oh, so many tears,

they were now bright

even as they dimmed.

She had lived and she was.

And because she was,

she was made beautiful.

~ Suzanne Reynolds, © 2019

Photo credit: Nina Djerff

Model: Marit Rannveig Haslestad

your new life ...

 

the answer

do you know why i am soft and submissive with you?

do you understand that i haven't been this way with others?

it is because you have given me permission to be comfortable in my own skin

and shown me that through your eyes, your words, your touch, that i am a beautiful being.

you have loved my body as a temple, accepting all of the flaws as if they were perfection.

in doing so you have taken away so much of the shame and insecurity i've felt and opened me up to my goddess self.

you have helped to vanquish my fear of emotional and physical nakedness...and rejection.

you have allowed me to reveal myself and flourish in my true feminine sexual nature, allowing me to be a tiger or a kitten.

in your love and adoration you have made a safe place for me.

you have created trust.

and that is the real answer.  

hope

tonight i watched the memorial for the victims of covid 19, listened to the words spoken and witnessed the lighting of the lincoln memorial reflecting pool.  as i watched i thought about all that has transpired in the past year; the pandemic and lives lost to it, the hatred that has risen and shown its ugly face and the lives lost to that.  i thought about all the people who have died alone without the comfort of loved ones near.  i thought about all those who are grieving and those yet to grieve.  as i did, the tears began to flow and a prayer rose up in me for all of us, not just those in this nation but those across the globe.  i prayed for an end to this pandemic, for an end to the hatred and the grief.  i prayed for a cure, for humanity to become more compassionate, for unity, for all those grieving to find some comfort and for all of us to hold love and hope in our hearts.

i want to be filled with hope, but it's hard when the news keeps getting worse.  it's hard after we've seen the nation's capitol under siege by our very own citizens.  yet what else is there but to cling to that thread of hope no matter how small?  

as i was browsing my facebook memories i came across these words i shared 11 years ago by orison swett marden, "There is no medicine like hope , no incentive so great , and no tonic so powerful as expectation of something better tomorrow."

coincidence? maybe. what is coincidence but a word we use to define a synchronicity we don't understand? all i know is this, we must have hope lest we give up and giving up is not an option in these dark times. call it hope or faith, we must believe that at some point light will permeate the darkness and that even when we can't see it, it is.

i am not a christian nor do i adhere to organized religion because i don't believe we need religion to have faith in something better or to be better, yet i offer this quote from hebrews 11:1, "now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen".  

i believe we need only to retain hope and to be that light.  i believe we are the prayer and the answer.  

What The World Needs Now

"Go home. We love you. You're very special" These are the words of Donald Trump after his cult like supporters rioted, stormed and looted the US Capitol yesterday.

Recently, i cannot help but think of Jim Jones when i think of DT. You remember him? If you don't, he was a cult leader back in the 60s-70s who orchestrated a mass murder/suicide of 918 people, (304 of them were children), which took place in Nov. 1978 in Guyana. That's where the saying, "they drank the Kool-aid" came from. Most of them died from consuming cyanide laced Flavor-aid.

I guess the reason i compare DT to Jim Jones is, he obviously holds that same kind of power over some people. For instance, like those who stormed the Capitol. They followed his urging like sheep to the slaughter.

When an evil person gains power, there are always those ready and willing to follow. Look at what Hitler's army was able to do. We can compare DT to Hitler or any number of egotistical, mentally unstable and insecure parasites who play on people's fears and get others to do their dirty work.

I guess I'm just thinking out loud in a sense, wondering what makes people so unable to think or act rationally and to be so easily taken in, unable see that they're being manipulated. None of these so called "leaders" gave a damn about the people who bowed down to them. All any of them cared about was maintaining control and power. Their journey in life has been governed by greed, narcissism and ego stemming from their own fear and insecurity. The same holds true for Trump. And like history has shown, if he goes down he will take as many with him as he can and those who have been smart enough to wake up from their Trump induced coma will aid his demise.

I've always been a believer that light will find its way into the darkness and expose people and things as to who or what they actually are. Yesterday the light shone bright into the darkness of DT and his minions. If you couldn't see it, then you would literally have to be blind, deaf and dumb to any form of rationality.

I think one of the lessons we can take from this is to encourage others (especially our children) to think rationally and independently, to question everything, to look deeper, to not accept any so called "truth" until it's been examined without bias, whether it be political, religious or otherwise. It's not necessarily wise to take what your politicians, your church, the news or even your parents tell you at face value without looking at it from every side with an OPEN mind. Now more than ever the world seems to be in dire need of more critical thinkers.

s. cooper

i will love you more

(for jason)

i will always love you more 

than you're used to being loved.

it's because i have been in the dark

that i have learned to appreciate

everything that shines.

so i will love you more

for who you are 

and for the beauty you bring to my life

than you might understand

because i know too well

the absence of such light.

there was a time

i used lay on the cool green grass in summer and allow my body to connect with the earth.  i would relax and envision my body sinking into her until i was a part of her, totally connected.  sometimes i would create a circle of quartz crystals beforehand and lay in the center of them.  

i used to build crystal grids and use reiki to create an energy vortex to send healing out to an individual, a troubling situation or the environment.

at times i would place water in a jug with specific stones, then set it outside at the time of the full moon, surrounded by crystals.  as with the grids, i would activate it through reiki, prayer and intention, then use this water to make my aromatherapy blends.  one time i did this, then afterwards froze the water for later use.  when i got the water from the freezer to thaw and use, i was thrilled to see that in its frozen state a vortex had formed in the water.  it looked like a tornado had frozen in the center of the jug of water.  

i used to write spiritual poetry about mother earth, about love and goodness and choices and the human condition.

there was a time when i practiced reiki, helping others to find some comfort and relief from physical or emotional pain or stress.  i was good at it, feeling the energy of it flow through me making my hands tingly and hot, knowing intuitively where to focus the energy.  

i used to meditate daily.

then everything changed.  my husband died suddenly, i relocated and faced new challenges and as a result i lost my enthusiasm, my passion, and my connection.  this year i hope to reclaim and reawaken that connection.