I’ve been working on the east coast usa for the last couple of weeks. My first time in Boston, DC, Maryland, Virginia. It’s spring and soooo beautiful. Really, truly, beautiful. The people, the place, all of it.

The work has been powerful:
- An organizational retreat with the Interaction Institute for Social Change. If you are looking for training, strategic planning, organizational development, coalition/network development on the east coast… these are your peeps.
- I’m currently at a 1Sky Campaign retreat. Add your voice to the call for action on climate change.

Days have been full so the pace of my blogging has slowed. However, I have been inspired… lovin this video.

Thanks to sweet Kai of the fab Garaj Mahal for the forward.

a big shout out to the mothers of our world. the deepest of appreciation for your care, your guidance and your nurturing. I LOVE YOU MOM!

here’s a repost from The Root…

For Mother’s Day, musician India.Arie and her mother, Simpson, sat down with The Root for an intimate mother-daughter video chat. In a series of lively, funny and honest exchanges, the two shared their cross-generational views on tradition, independence, fabulousness, and the importance of sewing, music, fearless grandmothers — and a mom who rocks bikinis and red pumps, who will still run over and do your hair in a pinch.

WATCH VIDEO

Courage is the price which life exacts for granting peace.
The soul that knows it not, knows no release.
From little things:

Knows not the livid loneliness of fear
Nor mountain heights, where bitter joy can hear
The sound of wings.

How can life grant us boon of living, compensate
For dull gray ugliness and pregnant hate
Unless we dare

The soul’s dominion? Each time we make a choice we pay
With courage to behold resistless day
And count it fair.

– Amelia Earhart

“As you press on for justice, be sure to move with dignity and discipline, using only the weapon of love. Let no man pull you so low as to hate him. Always avoid violence. If you succumb to the temptation of using violence in your struggle, unborn generations will be the recipients of a long and desolate night of bitterness, and your chief legacy to the future will be an endless reign of meaningless chaos.”

– Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Excerpted from The Most Durable Power, a sermon delivered November 6, 1956 in Montgomery, Alabama

From my heart to yours…

My hood feels like it is intensifying; the sirens are constant, the police are everywhere, and the suffering runneth over. All the while the gentrification machines are threatening our right to exist in this physical place.

The Sean Bell case; a ringing alarm to the state of systemic injustice and the very tragic and personal ways in which it manifests. I am experiencing a strong wave of rage, grief and profound sadness as the verdict feels directly connected to a plot that is centuries old. A plot we all participate in.

Food shortages, climate ruin, war…

I have been feeling a lot of anger and despair…

I’m not feeling the love and hope of the Obama experience. Long gone is the glow of the race speech.

How to reconnect to the source to provide fuel for potential transformative action?

I noticed today that I move into despair when I try to resist what I am feeling. If I can embrace the sad, mad, anger, whatever and ride it… fully step into it and honour it without judgment… I can move through it. I don’t leave it behind… but it sort of integrates and maybe strengthens. It’s in the struggle to ‘keep it together’ or ‘mature’ or ’spiritual’ when I AM NOT feeling that way where I get caught up. If I resist ‘what is’ in any way… suffering and loss of energy. If I have the courage to just be with what is there, to fully feel what is there, the feelings shed their negative attributes and power over. They transform into healthy energy. Energy that can fuel action. Actions that have the potential to create radical change in our systems and societies.

I want to act… but I’m not feeling the love. I’m not connected to any source. I’m drained. And I’m triggered. How to recenter?

Here’s what I have noticed in myself:

1) Feel my emotions deeply and with self-compassion
2) Share them in all their guts and glory with those dear and trusted
~ somewhere in that process a shift occurs and I am liberated from the despair. I can find love authentically now that I have honoured and integrated the pain and rage ~
3) Brainstorm my actions - what I am committed to doing? - what can I let go?
4) Focus and define clear action steps forward

thanks for being there breathing your breaths.

Many of my dearest are giving birth this year, the zodiac year of the Rat in Chinese astrology. I am a Rat and I couldn’t be more pleased to be shepherding in the new crew. Joanne, Lesley, Laura, Natasha, Michelle, Dionne are all growing little rats that will soon be here for us to love. Hooray!

THE RAT INFANT AND CHILD
Rat babies love to be loved and cuddled. When they are young, Rat babies tend to depend tremendously on their parents, but later in life they develop natural leadership qualities. During their baby years, Rats mature slowly, but gain momentum as they become toddlers. Eventually, they begin to exhibit active mentalities, so, in the early years, plenty of sleep is necessary. In school, the young Rats are eager to learn. It is then, too, that Rats begin collecting things, and like to fill their bedrooms with pebbles, shells and keepsakes of every kind. Generally, young Rats are smart little people who are artistic and literary students. They are well-rounded and many of them do well in sports, too. Being born in the first sign of the Chinese horoscope motivates these children to be pioneers and gives them a need to be first in line.

i love this…

On Valentine’s Day BlogHer launched a brand new Letters to My Body initiative.

Today I’m calling for members to blog a “letter to my body” and link to the post using Mr Linky. You can also blog your letter on BlogHer (select the Letter to My Body topic) and it will feed directly into the BlogHer Letter To My Body widget we’re creating.

I promise to do my bit but i need to muster up a little courage… will you too?

here’s some inspiration…

wedding photographers //www.allebachphotography.com

Photo: Beawiharta/REUTERS

Dede, 35, a man who has gnarled growths sprouting from his hands and feet, drinks tea at Hasan Sadikin hospital in Bandung.

Photo: Don Ryan/AP

A lone tree, survivor of last year’s devastating wildfires and nicknamed ‘The Magic Tree,’ stands out on Cahuenga Peak in Los Angeles.