The second meaning of care is that in which care is the basis for a system of ethics, including nurturance as well as other “socially reproductive activities” which may not be face-to-face caring practices. There is a connection to the ethics of Yoga and compassionate care with which teachers use Yoga as a base to build caring relations with students and community members with whom they have regular contact, both inside class and at outside social activities. The authors believe “an ethics of care that is political and critical must be grounded in the concrete activities of real people in the context of webs of social relations. In turn, these webs are affected by politics and the structure of social policies” (2). Yoga in the community is a form of meeting the needs of individuals, transitioning to a future care-based economy and sustainable communities.

Mahon and Robinson cite a growth in what they term “global care chains” due to the “defamilialization” of care. There is a growing care crisis “arising from inadequate political responses to the defamilialization of care” (11), meaning less family input and cooperation and more professionalized understanding of who does care work. They cite the flow of women from poorer countries to fulfill this gap: “The flow of (mainly women) caregivers from poorer countries to wealthier countries offers a low-wage solution to the dilemma posed by the trade-off between affordability and fair wages for caregivers and the failure to get men to share care responsibilities” (11).

This leads to another question: Are we failing as communities to care for one another? If we are in agreement that the hopes of “the welfare state” are very difficult to achieve in reality, then what are our options? What does self-care have to do with this? Is there a role for communal self-care, including medical and psychosocial? And if so, what does that look like? Yoga and other complementary and alternative medicines could be one of the missing links for communities seeking to re-establish routines of care. Mahon and Robinson describe what this scenario could look like:

Rather than idealizing caring relations, a contemporary political ethics of care must address the moral and political implications of the global care crises as they are manifested both globally and locally. Ad hoc, exploitative crises as they are manifested both globally and locally, and excessively privatized solutions to the question of how we will care for each other are woefully inadequate in the current social, economic, and demographic contexts. Care ethics can serve as a lens through which to focus and organize our thinking about ways in which care is delivered at the local, national, and global levels. To do so effectively, however, it must confront head on the realities of human vulnerability and dependence, and of our embodied, fragile, interdependent selves (16).

The ultimate premise of Yoga is blatantly utopian in the sense that the possibility of peace, coexistence, and tolerance across human society is just another social proposition. But in Yoga, these values are turned upon the self first, which makes it an interesting model for how social change occurs. By empowering the individual woman, to be physically and mentally healthy, Yoga creates “pillars of caring” which can be relied upon for families and communities. In looking at the values of Yoga communities, we can not only see that the values–of nonviolence, non-possessiveness, and truth–are there, but that a core group of several thousand Yoga teachers spread throughout the culture are struggling with, and activating, these principles not only in their own lives, but in communities that form around them and with whom they form bridges to larger groups within the culture.

The way that Yoga teachers articulate their ethics against larger social systems is customized and complex, due to the depth of global problems, ignorance on certain social realities, and tending to focus on local problems. But, understood within the context of the decline of religion and social capital in the US, there is a certain robust force of strength and union rising from this community. Yoga teachers have disciplined their bodies, befriended their minds, and opened their hearts to persons and communities in need. Through the idea and field of practice, they have reprised Yoga’s values in a systematic way, slowly building a foundation for activating these principles through remembering the self/Self. Not only have individual lives changed, but this must be seen as part of a larger movement of small, living changes in society in order to bring forth a healthy, ethical ideal which helps evolve industrialized civilization.

Great speech, very solid, not too impassioned, lots of great ideas. Balanced, hard-hitting, focused, with many great plans.

I liked the Enhanced Broadcast on the whitehouse.gov website. I’d reached a pretty wound up state on my dissertation by 5 or 6pm today, so was happy to take a break.

I took notes. One nice thing is how ideas were projected far ahead out into the future, giving us all, and our young people, something to hang our hats on, as well as create a foundation for whatever party or persons may be coming into power next.

So many good programs. All very exciting.

Happy to see the global poverty and AIDS stuff mentioned. Super vast and needs a lot of vision…

Loved loved loved the early ed and high school ideas. So much to say and do there… Was a bit confused on plan for higher ed, but happy it was on the agenda. Federal higher ed policy has always seemed a bit vague to me anyhow. In fact, I don’t think it’s ever really been properly taken on.

Missing from speech: Farming, Forestry, and Food Security.

Farm Bill needs to be overhauled most desperately. We need a coalition to overhaul this bill, and all programs associated with farming and ranching. Farms are in a terrible state, as is the state of forestry management, lumbering etc. Gotta pay attention to that. This can be a big boon to climate change. Planting trees and growing crops will help the energy plan. Nature is here for us to use, but we need a working knowledge of that to be incorporated into our science and technology outlook. If we are ever faced with our grids or power sources going down, or even some kind of weird magnetic thing with the planets (ok, sounds totally weird and Justice League of America, but, just a thought…), we might need to be able to rely on local energy sources, food sources, etc. I think this needs to be incorporated in a big way into what we do. look at the popularity of Buy Local, Foodies, Farmers Markets, Small Farms, and all those types of things right now. There is tremendous interest in this area. This food and farming thing needs a little push to support Energy Conservation and Energy Production. Making sustainable towns, cities and rural areas… what does that mean? See: Transition Handbook and Transition Movement (off oil) in the UK. Permaculture, all that. Also, what about setting aside new lands for federal protection? It needs a holistic approach. More down to the little guy, like those farms in Holland that all had windmills back in the day. I have a painting of a place that looks like that.

On gun control… it’s not enough. Culture of killing should be shamed severely. The victims are innocent people. Shame the killers.

Attract jobs. Teach skills. Hard work ~> decent living.

Very interested in last part and how we do that. Teaching hard work once again. This is important for us, as we become dependent on devices or the government. What do we mean by this? And how can this be taught? Self-Reliance (Emerson). Ben Franklin’s Virtues. Walden (Thoreau)….

In the 1960s, we tried to fix social ills and inequities with a band-aid of social programs. It seems we have come full circle to see we need something more. How can we inspire everyone to be a part of this change?

We have some downfalls with entertainment and social media… our young people need to learn how to survive and be educated. We need to keep these things in check, so virtual life doesn’t outpace the needs of the real world.

Weak applause on cybersecurity ideas. Still very new and, though critical now, the whole idea of the Internet(s?) needs a lot of thought and development. People are personally concerned about personal privacy and security, and also at the same time a little bit ignorant on how it all works, even though they may have all of these devices… iPad, phone, computer, etc. Needs to be done in conjunction with civil rights groups, industry, local govts, education etc. Individuals need to be trained on cybersecurity and lots of young people need to do this job. Needs to be made a positive thing, too. Cyberlife is tricky. This is still very new, and we need some balance and hard thinking on it. Needs to be put in perspective. Virtual world is highly misunderstood, and a lot of people going into online status is a roundabout of sorts… unproductive, misleading, kneejerk, and counterproductive in a lot of ways. The virtual world needs very deep consideration with leading thinkers, industry, and scientists. We also need coaching of people as to the prevalence of this type of communication, business, and education and where we are with it all, as it has been evolving very quickly over the past 15-20 years. As technology ramps up… chips in everything (?)… these are deep ethical questions like stem cell research, abortion, etc and need to be treated as such.

I like the radio in my kitchen. I hangs under the cabinet and it gets AM and FM. It has a clock and a light. It was made in the 1970s and it works just fine. I don’t have a TV, an iPod or an iPad though I do have an iPhone and a Mac, we have a Kindle, but it doesn’t go online (only to Amazon) and my child is not allowed to have a “gamer” (what they call DS or DSi). I played video games when I was a kid, so I don’t think they’re flat out evil, I just think tech is getting so pervasive, that it needs some real consideration. A few parents I’ve talked to have strict rules about how much their kids get to use these devices, while most just let them use them whenever they want.

I think as we figure out how to change into the future, we need to keep our technology in check. How does technology work in partnership with a nature-based model (ecosystem) that teaches us what sustainable living can be like? If everything goes technical, then we need to power those data centers, and that is a huge energy suck. Tech is a huge question mark, with lots of different categories, what do we do with all this information…. Let’s look at this question, and use it to grow good food, make clean water, exchange fun stories, educate ourselves, and help each other.

Though maybe we have gone too far already? I wonder what Steve Jobs would say.

The future? I’m sure there’s an app for that…

All the best to everyone-

Amy

–Swami Vishnudevananda (www.sivananda.org)

As a serious Yoga and meditation practitioner for twenty years, I entered into the PhD program in Performance Studies at UC Davis to research how Yoga, as a mind-body practice, inspires women to effect social change and build community. I wanted to interrogate how women integrate the lessons, skills and potentialities of their private spiritual lives into larger social and political worlds, to inquire what struggles ensued in this process, and to explore how those challenges were met.

My research project straddles three academic fields–Performance Studies, Feminist Theory and the Yoga Studies field within Religious Studies. I am attempting to move forward feminist Performance Studies discourses of embodiment, practice, purpose, and community, by demonstrating how women doing Yoga full-time enhance our understanding of these concepts in new and interesting ways. The key questions have been focused on the context of the United States and include: How has Yoga evolved today beyond what the academy has analyzed of its practice in the historical context? What does Yoga practice look like for women today? How do feminism and Yoga intersect? What is the relationship between practice and performance in daily life? What changes do women undergo when they become Yoga teachers? And–can women who do Yoga become empowered activists?

This dissertation is also a product of my personal experience as a spiritual seeker, academic and activist, and so this is where I would like to begin, by describing personal reasons for utilizing a phenomenological approach to this research. During my high school years, I began to read Eastern religious texts, and left the Christian church I was raised in, to walk a new spiritual path. I practiced chi gung, went to see many gurus and continued my spiritual studies during my college years. In the summer of 1994 after graduating college, I took my first Yoga asana class in Santa Barbara and travelled on a six-month pilgrimage to Buddhist sites in Nepal and India, taking Yoga classes and studying Tibetan Buddhism while living in nunneries and monasteries. I subsequently lived in Southern Africa for the next 18 months, and while on a Fulbright fellowship working with a women’s theatre group, I also studied Yoga with a private teacher and helped to build a Buddhist meditation center. Returning to the U.S. and living in New York City, I studied meditation with Tibetan monks and continued my Yoga practice, studying a variety of styles. In 1999, I returned to my home in the foothills of Northern California and began to study with Swami Sitaramananda at the Sivananda Ashram Yoga Farm in Grass Valley.

Looking back at the age of forty, I can see how I came increasingly to value my spiritual practice as the foundational practice of my life, even while I was doing other things, like working a job, living with friends and family, doing community work, or creating art. My progression in other areas of life perhaps suffered at times, because of the importance I placed on my spirituality. But it was the umbrella that sheltered everything else, and provided meaning for my life experience. Since going to India at the age of 22, I was actually a little bit unhappy with working, paying the bills, and being a part of “the system.” I had experienced another side of life, and I wanted to get back to it, if I could. So this project became a process for me, mid-life, to find a way to bridge the positive feelings that Yoga gave–with the other things that were equally relevant, but were more deeply troubling to me–such as social justice, equality between people, taking care of the natural world, and feminism.

In 2005, I was an aspiring academic, teaching U.S. Government and International Relations at local state and community colleges. As a political science teacher, I was struggling with teaching college students about tough political realities and wondering how the Yoga part of my life could better inform my teaching. I decided to stop teaching college, and became a Yoga teacher, training under the Sivananda tradition and receiving mantra initiation with Swami Sita. This question of how to integrate my two worlds culminated in a PhD proposal for a study on Karma Yoga, submitted to the Performance Studies program at UC Davis. Within a year, I was deeply invested in researching this project and found that many of the questions I had about my own path as an academic and activist were being answered in the workshops I was attending. At the Yoga Peace Ambassadors retreat with Elaine Valdov (former Undersecretary for Youth at the United Nations) I shared, “I’ve been consciously working on this. I spent the last year, overturning every structure in my life, enabling me to become a peace worker, to understand how Yoga can empower activists. My problem is keeping up with the pace of developments and trying not to crash and burn.” Elaine responded, “You’re on the airplane, but you need to make sure it has some gas.” This dissertation is really an explanation of that process—what it is that women who do Yoga put into that tank, how we keep our tank filled as Yoga teachers, and what does it mean for ourselves, our families, and our communities?

During the research process I personally participated in approximately 75 classes, workshops and lectures and observed at least 100 women Yoga teachers engaging in their own practice as well. Throughout the course of this project, it was important to me to respect each woman’s personal choices and beliefs. My own positionality as a Yoga teacher led me to create this project, fuel it, finance it, bless it, nurture it, and find a way to make academic sense of it. For, while my life as a woman who believes in Yoga makes perfect sense to me, I needed to find a way to articulate this in a professional way, to make it acceptable to the academy—to performance specialists, religion scholars and feminists. These disciplines were additional bridges that needed connecting, across rivers that were running parallel to each other.

I did find it difficult to separate my personal belief in Yoga (it feels strange to describe it as such) from a research analysis of the leading practitioners. This was primarily because of the respect that I have for the privacy and sacredness of personal spiritual practice. I also felt, however, that a certain level of critique was important, because a majority of academic theses written by Yoga practitioners had fallen short in their ability to bring certain contentious issues to the fore.

I do not believe that it is my job as an academic to judge the validity of anyone’s personal spiritual beliefs, though I have definitely tried to find a way to build a polite commentary that attempts to extend the discussion a bit more, build on the narratives, and find some new ground. On the whole, as a Yoga teacher and supporter of women’s rights, I am supportive of the developments in this community regarding greater acceptance of women’s bodies and healing from emotional and mental trauma. On numerous occasions, when my advisors have pushed me to be “more critical” of practitioners, I have endeavored to ask deeper questions of the practice, while not pushing into personal criticism. Many women shared vulnerable stories with me or in group workshops, and with Yoga being a major part of their healing process, I did not feel compelled to justify or criticize that impact. I have tried to let them tell their own stories, and to provide some history and theoretical reflection around them, as a framing device to explore larger questions about healing, personal truth, and empowerment.

The phenomenological experience of spirituality can be difficult to articulate, and I also wanted to open up a space for that, without demanding too much from my research subjects or creating the burden of having to tell everything about any one of them, while at the same time, keeping an adequate distance that allowed me to interpret the data from a feminist and historical perspective. And so, this dissertation is more of a theoretically-based survey, founded on discursive approaches from Performance Studies, than a focused ethnography or series of case studies. From the beginning, I was sure that there were certain themes I wanted to approach—the body, practice, service, and community—from both a feminist and yogic perspective. Covering these areas while utilizing a wide variety of examples has been the challenging part, and though my advisors knowingly warned me against it, I forged on because I knew the examples were there; I just had to gather them and focus on these important themes.

I attended yoga classes, workshops, events, festivals and conferences in a variety of places, led by both availability and funding. Thus, while I primarily focus on women Yoga teachers in North America, I also studied Yoga in Canada, England, Slovenia, and Chile, and describe gurus and adepts in other places and times. This approach has helped construct a larger picture–that Yoga has become an extremely relevant, productive, and reliable means for women in many countries outside of India to achieve health, balance and self-esteem. In order to do that, I personally felt, that to make this case, the work needed a lot of different examples to highlight my four major points, concerning the body, practice, service and community.

For me, Yoga has become a frame for life, creativity, and research practice. With Yoga as my philosophical base, and feminist research as my main theoretical mode of inquiry, my positionality is that of a woman interested in women’s bodies and lives. Critical engagement with Yoga practice, and extending theoretical discussions of feminism into practical lives are, to me, much more productive, theoretically and socially, than attempting to impose a scientific, or even a social science method, onto what I see as the very personal and experiential field of Yoga. Most of the more scientific work I have seen in this area does not fully articulate the embodied experience of Yoga. While that work has its own place of critique and historical contribution, as someone who moves through life with and via Yoga, I cannot really go back to a point twenty years ago, where I do not think, move, and speak from this practice. Performance Studies has several vocabularies for speaking about the phenomenology of experience, and I will draw on these during this dissertation. Having established my standpoint, I am at the same time very interested in the many ways that critical theories of both society and Yoga–in ethics, philosophy, and practice–can speak with and influence each other.

Archangel with Lion in Plaza Italia

Viva la Vida is a restaurant,

Near Neruda’s re-made home in Barrio Bella Vista.

Here there is Spanish music,

A big kitchen with a Public Enemy poster,

A giant bag of lemons, and families enjoying el menu del dia.

Here I can sit for hours,

Watching lovers in the square,

Wondering why the cultural center in the red building is always closed,

Seeing the Chileans pass in their winter coats.

There is so much creativity in this city,

So much love,

So much life–

I feel as if I could stay here forever.

I could pretend that this book of Neruda’s memoirs never ends,

That I don’t have another chapter to write,

Or a country that needs so much from us.

Such a young, brash country the USA is,

But from here I can see centuries of history in the land,

In the people,

In the stories.

Here under the palm tree at Viva la Vida,

I want to remember,

I want to dance,

To make great poems,

To travel farther and longer,

Hitchhiking to the Atacama.

But learning takes time,

And time is something that this world has forgotten.

Time, history, poems, great loves–

These are the food from which we make our bodies, lives, and children.

But where are these things now?

Hiding behind café curtains,

Waiting for people to go searching.

But, you cannot search too much on a journey.

Too much longing is dangerous for both love and travel.

I wanted to go far away in my last five days,

Like the tourists–to islands, deserts, and mountains–

To see new and big things,

But Santiago is making me stay.

The city is asking me

To the cathedral

To find my mother,

To the market

To taste her fish,

To the cafés

Where life and time

Still have a chance

In this brave new world.

It’s the poet’s only dream

To get lost in these places.

The people at home long for something too.

If only they could let time and love be what they are.

Life and love are here every day,

But I have seen that they are abused.

I have seen people in this world

Think that they can win

With weapons that poets put their bodies underneath.

I have seen the unspeakable brutality

Of abusing life’s beauty,

People engulfed

By their own programs,

Those who turn their back on life

While trying to save it.

I have seen the one who lives and loves crucified,

And a civilization in crumbles

From ignorance about life.

~~~~

July 28, 2012

Happy Birthday Mom!

I’m looking forward to keeping up more online, as I come close to finishing my journey with grad school. If you have feedback or ideas about what you would like to see here, please post your comment below. You can subscribe to the blog (with your email address) over on the right side of this page ~~>> Thanks so much and see you online soon!

What is a soul,

If not a chance to just fly free?

Oh dear graceful butterfly, please come and land on me.

You have rode on the wind, far above terrible things below.

You have made beauty from chaos, inside a smile so quiet.

As still as the pond on D’Agostini Drive with its familiar blue herons,

My soon-to-be-friend, you are

On a journey, kind sir,

And you have found twelve million birdlike companions.

Life, treacherous Life, became sweet joy for you.

Inside your subtle smile, only to be free,

Where we could hide and live forever—

As kindred souls should be.

February 20, 2012

The lady at the reception has nerve damage from drug use. At first I thought maybe I was being harsh, until I saw her skinny friend with tattoos speeding like crazy. And yet, it’s clean and nice and cheap and perfectly fine. There is a pool right in the middle of the hotel, or is it a motel? And the kids play there all day. There are guys drinking forties right on the corner, calling me Chiquita. I just throw them the deuces and it’s all good.

I haven’t turned on the TV once. Since I don’t have one at home, I usually watch TV in hotels, but I can’t afford that luxury right now. And I feel better getting away.

I love doing yoga and meditation on the beach. It’s pretty much the best thing ever.

I should have booked my favorite place on the water, but I didn’t even think about it. I also like Adobe on Green A LOT but it’s seriously expensive for four nights. Staying in a dumpy hotel makes me feel like I’m supposed to be writing. There is no nice lobby or cool people to look at. It’s not even that dumpy.

I actually ate Cup of Noodles for dinner. “That won’t give you enough protein,” the Smoking Man at the desk said. “I have nuts,” I told him. After all these years, it may just be time to figure out how to write a book. Food is just another form of distraction at this point.

I am working on an application for a postdoc at Stanford tonight. Doing it and sending it.

And — after 17 emails, set up a meeting with my dissertation advisor. They want me to finish. Major.

I am behind. I am smart, but I have procrastinated on figuring out how to get my research together. I felt guilty as a mom, had too much outside work, was exhausted, had a bunch of emotional garbage that I could not deal with quickly so it took forever to get over it, had a spiritual awakening, did a bunch of activist projects, moved to a new town, and did not ultimately have the total willpower to believe in my intellectual work. Major. It’s boring, quiet, and nobody really wants to hear about it anymore. It’s doubly difficult being in an arts PhD program. Most of my friends struggle with wanting to make art and figuring out how to write their dissertation.

But that’s all done now. Henry Miller would say you can’t think about all the other books you want to write. You have to write the one you’re writing right now.

The fact of the matter is–you have to go into Lockdown Mode.

Nobody move, nobody get hurt. And do some damage on pages. It’s the only way.

The next 8 weeks = hyper critical production mode. I don’t even know what I am capable of, but I have the feeling I am about to find out.

I think I finally found a way to just get into the zone. There’s this sea of data, information and experience…. even from many years ago. You open up and wait and stay present and START TYPING and DON’T STOP and TAKE BREAKS and COME BACK and DO IT AGAIN. Sometimes I have to go (CITE LATER, FIND XX BOOK) because I can’t remember where it is. There’s a lot and it’s hard to remember where it all is. The joy in this is that I have climbed out of the box of what it should be, and I may have finally arrived at the place where my real knowledge and wisdom can be expressed fully in an uncompromised way, but also with some intellectual weight.

I’ve made some progress on this book chapter here, and it’s due in a couple of days, so basically I have to be pretty much brilliant tomorrow.

The other place I have had a lot of luck writing in the past is at Cam’s cabin on the Russian River, so I am going to go back there really, really soon. There’s no cell phone reception or Internet there, which is amazing. The only people that have the house phone number are my aunt and uncle and they buy me dinner, so I usually pick up the phone when they call.

I read about Aldous Huxley a couple of days ago, and how he used LSD on his deathbed. I didn’t realize he was so prolific as a writer. I think he’s been very underestimated as a social thinker, and I really want to read Island, which was the utopian alternative to Brave New World.

I got some foodie stuff–good honey, sea palm, etc. I buy food and kitchen souvenirs on my trips. I collect dishes and candleholders. I love estate sales. I make my own chai. I cook big meals and eat the leftovers for days. I lay on the floor and listen to music. My dream is to write books. I am learning how.

That’s all she wrote.

xoxo Gaia

P.S.

As feminism became entrenched in the academy, the focus turned more towards definitions of gender and sexuality. The question of how feminism—and woman’s condition in general—is advancing in society as a whole has taken a back seat. The popular academic feminists of today are increasingly more focused on gender norms and behavior which are analyzed in a theoretical and philosophical bubble; they do not actually address the concerns of the average, working American woman, who is dealing with the realities of patriarchy, domestic violence, and inequality in the culture.

Within the historical trajectory of patriarchy and capitalism, women’s liberation has become equated with buying into the accepted, dominant system of competition and affluence. Women’s skill sets have therefore narrowed to compromise with the economic demands of capital. In my own research, I have tried to explore the ways in which women’s art and spiritual practices provide alternative spaces, where women’s knowledge flourishes and allows for expression of non-essentialized and unconventional social models.

I found that in Yoga communities nationwide, women were dealing with feminist issues in therapeutic, truly embodied, activist-leaning ways. While feminism has become a dirty word in the public sphere, empowering women as spiritual and community leaders is rather popular in Yoga circles, bucking the nationwide trend to the contrary.

While not all women practice Yoga, it makes me wonder about what there is to learn from my study about the evolution of feminism in general. Within the diversity of feminisms that we have come to know, we still have the same basic common problems–grappling with: control of the body, redefining gender, equality (civic, legal and educational), as well as issues of sexuality and human rights for women across the globe. Within this diversity, what are the ways in which women might perhaps have held onto feminism in their own way? In the title of my dissertation, I call it “the hidden story” of women and Yoga, because it isn’t “nice” to say in public that women are dealing with issues of violence and trauma on their Yoga mats. Could there be parallel situations in other communities?

Along with the 9/11 terrorist attacks, came a growing conservatism during the Bush years (increase in staying close to home, more marriages, and clamping down on rights through the Patriot Act). We are just now beginning to lean away from that trend, through the Occupy movement, and surviving and trying to sustain the political will of the Left through another presidential campaign. How can feminism be sustained in a future that is rife with dehumanizing technology? Is there any hope for ecofeminism that, despite its drop in popularity as a term, may in more practical terms provide the actual way forward for a sustainable tomorrow?

We have to answer these questions, in order to think seriously, as feminists, about the future of our daughters and granddaughters. These are the kinds of questions I would like to address and interrogate with my peers as a postdoctoral fellow.

How have the last 35 days been? Yikes. I know my muse book and journal are next to my Yoga mat, but I’ve gotten distracted there in the mornings by the DT Suzuki book. I can’t see that far back, so let’s just think about ~right now~.

Last night I wrote a proposal for a talk in Chile without thinking about how to get there. Tonight I was a bit of a drag thinking about the travel costs and worrying, but when I wrote it, I realized it was the missing link for Chapter 3, so all my chapters are sort-of started. You were there for me, and it all flowed together perfectly. After a while of not thinking analytically (holidays), this was a good exercise in trust. My muse is there.

I got home from taking my daughter to school this morning and sat right down in the big white chair and wrote a few sentences with a Sharpie on a bunch of Post It notes. This building out of the Stanford application, which muse only knows why I am trying again there. Knowing exactly what you want has its benefits. Even in one-year increments. Anyway, it blew up the proposal into a creative space. Thank You.

I hung up another thing in my bedroom, which has been the barest place in the house. Put my vision board up yesterday, along with a Bread and Puppet poster. I need to keep the big vision open. That’s what Bread and Puppet is to me–the bigger dance of creativity that expands out of the immediate situation and daily projects and current set up.

I picked up my guitar today and made a song. I think my music is probably even better and freer than my poetry. Not in terms of technique (lord no!) but mostly because I don’t record or write anything down anymore. I just sing it out and then forget about it instantly. And nobody hears it except the neighbors. Sacred!

Tonight I wrestled with the Cambridge Journals online system. This online submission of everything has got to be the greatest bane of the contemporary academic’s existence. I was looking and looking, and finally saw it — there it was right in front of me. Did it twice and never got confirmation. This is annoying, dear muse.

My sister stopped by and we had poppyseed muffins, and did cards and horoscopes. I’m reading another horoscope for the year which i chose randomly out of a hat. I’m still skeptical that it won’t work (doh!), but I’m rolling with it!!!

I wrote a new poem today. We worked on yesterday’s poem this evening and it really changed, didn’t it? My favorite line–

Her road cuts across the rise through the fog,

And winds around and slips down into the belly of her lovely charms.

Not great, but I like the winding around and slipping down part. I am starting to keep my poems in separate documents and work on them periodically. I’m not very much one for editing, so this is good practice.

I made a greeting card today. Whoah, squeezed that in too, along with grading papers? My muse is bombtastic!

Today I set up dates and times to start teaching yoga at the elementary school after the weather clears up in a few weeks. I want to honor what my sister said yesterday about creativity. It’s true that we don’t realize how creative everything we do is, already. And I’m constantly thinking, ‘I wish I had a more creative life.’ Complete abhorrence. Geez. My muse keeps me in the flow, and it rocks.

We helped an artist friend who is trying to make a video– http://www.microgiving.com/profile/gaianaiad I immediately released on the fact that nobody “liked” it, because I’d rather leave those types of things up to my Higher Power. I do my job. You do yours. Bam!

I wished there were more hours today at a certain point, and started to get bummed. You gotta be kidding me. I wrote another 3-page thing remembering the past five years.  It was a busy time, dear muse, and I want you to know how much I appreciate your guidance.

You walked home across the park,

Down into the Underground,

Up from the catacombs.

You walked out under the arches,

When it was so crowded

The crowd barely moved

Until the mounties waved them along.

I didn’t even realize how creative I was until I sat down just now and thought about it. Good grief.

I made a creative drink today–grape juice, apple cider vinegar and lime juice. A tonic.

I did some reading on the Documentary Hypothesis. Ancient Biblical historiography.

My sister came over a second time and brought us a hot dinner, so I didn’t cook tonight.

Can’t wait to lock myself in a hotel this weekend with a big giant spa tub and write about 10 million pages. OF SOLID PROSE!

I know you’ll be there for me. Thank you muse.

Whew! Good night.

xxGaia

Fiddlers Jam 2011.

Golden eyed shotglass drinking up my soul,
Down where love viruses multiply their evil schemes;
Unraveling every cell into the osmotic emptiness of his heart,
Synapses fill prescriptions at the edge of the universe.
That face… this place…
My vision of everything
With him inside of it--
Is probably just a moment,
Could be any moment,
Feels like every moment.
When love bugs come, they travel in armies.
When they carve the frame of reality,
They make everything fit just right, and
We become their slaves.
I am listening to your tongue move, secure and strong,
Anchoring your legs, climbing into galaxies of thought lands.
I am nowhere near turning back, because
I will have to pass by your house on the highway,
You will be here forever,
And you know I will never leave.
Our future is just a void,
Answering the voice of ten thousand choirs--
Calling us to their moments…
Doing the best that they can.
January 22, 2012

It will be so obvious when you can finally see it.

Just wait.

Don’t come or go or leave or look.

Airplane to India, 1951. From collection of Centre of South Asian Studies, University of Cambridge.

It’s coming, all at once, one day,

On a wave of faith and devotion–

Your dreams are riding in to meet you.

Don’t worry for a second.

Don’t even try.

Maybe I should go back and take a look.

Maybe I should think about this a second time.

So I looked and watched and looked some more,

And my eyes got the best of me.

I only had to go and be myself and love him.

It was so easy.

I couldn’t even bear to look at him.

Not for a second.

January 18, 2012

xxG.

**P.S. Academic Lockdown was a bit slow this week, although I did work at my desk on all kinds of responsible stuff requiring my attention. I need to be a bit more draconian with writing hours, and lock everything else out.

(A whole posse of feral cats that live in the old butcher shop out back, who my neighbor ditched after feeding for 7 years, and now the realtor is chasing neighbor #2 out of his yard, so she needs to hijack my alley access to feed them. They get 12 cups of food per day. That’s how many there are. Important Stuff like that.)

I have a book article due in 12 days. Yikes! It looks like Cambridge UP will pick this book up, so I am working hard. Well.. it’s outlined Luckily, it’s just the first round, and we’ll have another month to re-work things. I’m trying hard to do my daily writing, but need to set up stronger boundaries while working at home. Tea. Yoga. Meditate. Write. How hard can it be? Right?

Thankfully, it’s pouring buckets of rain tonight, so tomorrow should be extremely productive We’ve had a very dry winter. I never thought I’d beg for rain, but this is how it was. I better go take down the flag before I forget.