An Anniversary

What are your thoughts on death?

I’d love to know.

Here is a passage from my book:

“We romanticize that wild animals enjoy an idyllic life of freedom, when really, they are fighting to survive, for food and shelter and safety and against the infringements of man. Death serves in nature. The soil is fortified by the bones; animals and birds and bugs live off the carcass. In nature, there is honor in being eaten. To me, the [dead] deer was beautiful in providing its body to the living animals that were trying to survive. And I believe this works on a human level as well, although it is somewhat taboo in our society. I believe we can learn to use death, and let the gifts of the dead help us to become stronger. Our society responds to death by mourning, and usually, mourning is the stopping place. It is not the stopping place. I believe there is nourishment and strength to be found, if only we were not so afraid of it.”

What about you?

Moth, Emerging

Last Friday was a profound day for me. Intense, and intensely profound. And each day since has been either one or the other. The lack of details is not my being coy, but because I simply cannot share everything right now for various reasons. But I can share this moth.

Last Friday evening, immediately following this bout of profundity, a crazzzzzzy windstorm blew up. One moment, all was calm; the next, the sky was solid with whipped-up dust and trees were bending sideways. And then, perhaps half an hour later, the wind was gone, and all was calm again.

I went outside, because I love to be outside just after a windstorm. And I spotted this moth, clinging to a weed near the ground, next to one of my garden patches. I knelt beside it, my head low to the ground, studying this incredible moth. Its body was huge and fat, black and gray and yellow and white, about the size of my thumb but slightly longer. Its face was awesome; it looked carnivorous, strong, and so incredibly graceful, its wings hanging behind it like a cape.

The moth swayed softly in the remaining breeze, clutching the weed, waiting for something. Unhurried, unworried, secure in itself and waiting. Then I saw the hole. And now I must back up in this story-telling for a moment: Roughly seven weeks ago, I was weeding my garden and saw an enormous caterpillar amongst my watermelons. It was a glossy bright green, larger than my thumb. Huge! I took two twigs as chopsticks and gently moved the massive ‘pillar to the dirt outside my garden plot, near a clump of weeds. And then watched in awe as the caterpillar disappeared into the earth. It started digging a hole with its nose and down into the dirt it went, disappearing completely. The next day, I had forgotten about it.

Now, I noticed the hole in the ground near this magnificent moth. A hole exactly the size of its body. A hole where the strange caterpillar had disappeared. I do believe it made its cocoon in the earth ~ or that perhaps the earth itself was the cocoon ~ and that this moth had just emerged. And was waiting to fly.

Darkness crept in and I walked Daisy & Co to the corrals, and the next morning, the moth was gone. Days passed; I wondered about the moth, wondered where it went. I spent nights sitting outside, watching the silhouette of a bat swooping between my home and the stars every night.

This morning, I saw the moth again, clutching a large rock I have on my deck. Resting again. And this makes me wonder, perhaps it is not a bat visiting me every night, but is, in fact, this moth in flight.

UPDATE: The moth is Manduca quinquemaculatus, aka Five Spotted Hawk Moth. More info HERE. I noticed this morning that the “eyes” on its shoulder are actually three-dimensional and raised! Thanks, Keitha, for the link!

UPDATE II: The moth is still sleeping (?) on the side of the big rock on my deck, but has been moving as the sun crosses the sky, to stay on the shady side of the rock!

How I Do

The question that’s currently inundating my inbox is the one I’ve received the most over the past few years, and while I’ve partially addressed it in my book and in some interviews, I am going to try to tackle it here, fully. And it is: “How did you take the leap of faith?/ How did you make such a drastic change with your life?/ How did you swing it financially?/ How did you DO it?”

This was a hard post to write. The answer is multifaceted and it’s a tricky question for me to answer because so much of it is tied up in who I am ~ my past, my self, my personality. But the bottom line, and the truth of it, is that I practiced.

I have practiced leaving and going and trusting and doing and taking risks and making things work on my own (and my own terms) for years. Decades. First on a small scale, then gradually increasing in scope and degree of commitment required. For as long as I can remember, I have pushed myself outside my comfort zone. I like to test myself. I still do this, all the time.

Meanwhile, I was learning to pay attention to my intuition and to trust it. I remember so many times when I would be given direct information in my head and I would ignore it and then life would prove that I was really, really dumb to have ignored that information.

This happened enough times that I finally said, OK, I don’t understand this and can’t explain it but I know I must always pay attention to that voice. And now I confidently make major decisions by tapping into that part of myself and paying attention to the information it gives me. I hold logic in very high esteem but if intuition says “yes” or “no” and logic says the opposite, I go with intuition. And I’ve never been sorry.

I believe wholly and absolutely that everyone is capable of having a strong and trustworthy relationship with their intuition, but it’s something that’s been forgotten or ignored or dismissed by our society. It, too, takes practice to become proficient, just like any skill. And I believe it is a skill, not a gift.

So there’s A) Practice and B) Trusting my intuition. C) is Failure.

Failure is really not as bad as it’s made out to be. I have failed so many times. SO MANY TIMES. Some have been minor, some major. But I think we’ve been conditioned to believe that failing is The Most Horrible Thing Ever and in reality, it’s more akin to skinning your knee. Or even getting a compound fracture. Sure, it hurts in the moment and you have to work harder to recover, just as your body must work a bit harder repairing a skinned knee or broken bone. But then, as is true for scar tissue, you’re stronger in that spot. I happen to learn best from failing. I would rather fail than not try. And sometimes I don’t fail at all. I fly.

Somewhere in this, somehow, I need to say that I don’t do things that I think are stupid. I do things that other people think are stupid, but based on practice, intuition, what I know of myself, and what I know I’m willing to risk or sacrifice, my choices never seem stupid to me. The mother of my best friend in high school had a saying, “be wild and crazy, not stupid and dangerous.” What I’ve learned is that you are the only one who knows where the line between the two lies for you.

As for the financial aspect, for me, it, too, goes back to practice and intuition and trust. When I moved to Wyoming, I did not have very much money and I did not have a job lined up. I knew that moving here was the Right Thing (and this was full-on intuition: I had not even been to this town before. My ride across the Bighorns was two hours north of here. I rented a house sight unseen, over the internet, from New York City.) Anyway, since I knew this was Right, I knew I would make something happen, work-wise, because I had to. Because I had done it in the past. Because I believe when you are doing what is right for you, in the truest sense of the word, things conspire to help you.

That said, I am A-OK with a low standard of living. I have a $1500 truck. No car payments. I have catastrophic health insurance with a $7000 deductible. Low monthly payments and I don’t go to the doctor. When I moved here, I didn’t have internet service or long distance (and I still don’t have a cell phone). I went to the library to use the internet and in doing so, I saved a bunch of money and made friends. I know what I need and I know what I don’t need and that helps me in my decisions.

So…. where does one start? Practice! Give yourself a day and just start walking. See where you end up. Take breaks when you need to on the side of the road. In a strange cafe. See what you see or who you meet. Take water, pen and paper, trail mix and your cell phone so you can call a friend to pick you up at the end of the day. The commitment level is low but the exploration quotient is high! Who knows what might change in that one day.

As for intuition, I don’t really know how to explain practicing that skill, so if anyone out there has suggestions, please please leave your ideas in the comment section. I know it is intrinsically linked with awareness. So maybe start with making lists: What do you want? What are you willing to sacrifice? What do you refuse to give up? What are you willing to risk? What, to you, is the worst thing that can happen (know thine enemy, so to speak)? Define these things. This kind of awareness brings power. One thing I learned on my Vespa trip is that confidence keeps a woman safe. Take that a step further and you have self-awareness. You have that, you have real power.

So. This is what my path has been and continues to be. “Practice” is probably the most boring and undesired answer. But that has been my truth. And while magical serendipitous experiences or profound epiphanies are incredibly awesome and can transform one’s perspective or physical reality in a moment, I believe practice and diligence are just as important. In playing the piano, one must first learn scales. And after mastering the third movement of the Moonlight Sonata, you still practice your scales. Said another way: “Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.”

One!

Cleaning out my inbox during the hot part of the day, I was about to delete several memes (me, me’s ?) that have accumulated, but before saying “adios” to all, I decided to post one here, and do it. It asks for: seven things about myself, previously unknown to everyone else. Here goes ~

1. I love algebra. I experience a visceral thrill when an application, in life, arises that requires a moment of algebra. I absolutely delight in doing algebra. I dislike calculators (though I do like pressing the buttons) and pretty much always do all math longhand.