“When we get out of the glass bottles of our ego, and when we escape like squirrels turning in the cages of our personality and get into the forests again, we shall shiver with cold and fright but things will happen to us so that we don’t know ourselves. Cool, unlying life will rush in, and passion will make our bodies taut with power, we shall stamp our feet with new power and old things will fall down, we shall laugh, and institutions will curl up like burnt paper.” ~D.H. Lawrence
Artist Unknown
Source: ShamanTube
“When I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.” ~Audre Lorde
Art by Susan Seddon Boulet
“The greatest crimes in the world are not committed by people breaking the rules but by people following the rules. It’s people who follow orders that drop bombs and massacre villages.” ~ Banksy
Street Art by Banksy
“Healing is not pouring your energy into another, but activating the widening field of possibility around yourself, so the other may glimpse their own majesty forming on the horizon.” ~Dreamwork with Toko-pa
Artwork by Balbusso Anna and Elena
“I have no right to call myself one who knows. I was one who seeks, and I still am, but I no longer seek in the stars or in books; I’m beginning to hear the teachings of my blood pulsing within me. My story isn’t pleasant, it’s not sweet and harmonious like the invented stories; it tastes of folly and bewilderment, of madness and dream, like the life of all people who no longer want to lie to themselves.” ~Hermann Hesse
Art by Carrie Hilgert
A beautiful experiment that demonstrates the power of words and intention~
“Words can make you sick. Or healed. Heavy or light. Here’s an experiment that might prove it. ‘I’ve got an idea,’ I said to my Kid.
‘Let’s talk smack to apples and see what happens.’
And thus began the Good Apple / Bad Apple (approximately) 25 Day (because we lost count) Experiment in our kitchen. I’m a fan of Dr. Masaru Emoto’s research on water and resonance. Apples would prove resonance theory. Sure enough….
Each half of the same apple sat in its own sealed jar on our windowsill. Throughout the day, we’d walk by and say to The Apple of Positivity, You are so awesome! You’re a winner! You are perfect, gorgeous, useful. We love you apple! Apple! You rock! We’d touch the jars, whisper, yell, laugh. Good apple!
As for The Apple of Negativity, well… I had a hard time being nasty to the bad apple, actually. My truly kind-hearted boy had a field day with it, though. Apple! You super suck! You no good, ugly, stinking piece of usefulness fruit.
Since I was having difficulty channeling my inner jerk face, I chose to use my words to program the apple to rot. I kept telling it what I wanted to happen: You’re rotting. You’re not worth my attention because you’re gonna rot. And you know what? I kind of hope you rot. You’re so rotten.
And look what happened. The Apple of Positivity that we loved up is well preserved and smiling. The Apple of Negativity that we verbally abused took an immediate, downward spiral into rotsville.
— In the pic below: Left facing apple got glowing, positive input. Right facing apple got all smack talk.
Words can make you sick. And heavy. And dark.
Words can make you light. And radiant. And energized.
Words infuse.
Words refuse.
Words bless.
Words protect.
Words energize.
Words heal.
Words create worlds because the universe is always listening.
… and so are your cells, your psyche, and your children, your team, and the apples.”
~Danielle LaPorte
(Read it on her site here: http://bit.ly/1DSxlSy)
“To speak our own truth the first time feels fraught with danger. It becomes easier each time. In the bones of our collective experience as women we know there are risks. Somewhere in our souls, we remember the burning time, when women were persecuted and burned alive as witches. This went on for three hundred years of the Inquisition. In what has been referred to in contemporary times as “the women’s holocaust,” more women were burned at the stake than were killed in the Nazi gas ovens during the Holocaust in World War II. First the midwives were burned for easing the pains of childbirth (which went against the biblical injunction that women were supposed to suffer), then the healers who knew the medicinal uses of herbs, women who celebrated the seasons, eccentric women, women with possessions someone coveted, outspoken women, bright women, women without protection. This collective memory has an effect much as any personal repressed trauma does; it makes women anxious when we discover our own sacred experiences and find words for them. We need courage to bring forth what we know. Somewhere in our souls, women remember a time when divinity was called Goddess and Mother.” ~ Jean Shinoda Bolen, “Crossing to Avalon”
Art by Joyce Huntington
“Step closer to the story that scares you~ the one that has you gasping for air in the night, searching for ground. This one wants to take you past the lip of the void to the birthplace of stars, where all stories dissolve into the blessing of original song. Turn your wild horses out into the fields in the morning, when first light purples the hills. They are hungry for this earth under hoof, this thunder of full gallop. They may trample all the places you have so carefully tended. They may leave you in a cloud of dust. And yet, this is the only way they will return to you truly, without a fence to keep them in. Leap into the love that terrifies— you know just what it will do. It will un-hinge every door in your house. It will blow in like a hurricane and re-arrange your furniture. It will howl like a banshee through your bones and leave you delightfully hollow. Without this love you are only playing at this life– and you are so tired of that! Let the current lift you out of the churning eddy. There is only one place where this river flows— through slot canyons and the eyes of midnight, through singing valleys and greening glens. These holy waters will have their way with you. They are dreaming you into a body of light. Why fight what you most long for?” ~ Laura Weaver
Art by Andrew Ferez
Thanks to Dreamwork with Toko-pa for the quote.
“What must I give more death to today, in order to generate more life? What do I know should die, but am hesitant to allow to do so? What must die in me in order for me to love? What not-beauty do I fear? Of what use is the power of the not-beautiful to me today? What should die today? What should live? What life am I afraid to give birth to? If not now, when?” ~Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes
Art by Salvador Dali
Source: Dreamwork with Toko-pa
Under The Blue Door 