Back to the keyboard!

Hello dear readers… it’s been ages since I’ve been here, I know… so, for those of you who’ve come back: thank you for giving me time to sort myself out and for having enough trust and faith in me to know that I’d come back with a good thing! And for those of you who’ve just now joined me, welcome to this funky corner of my head and I hope you enjoy it! I hope you all find it very very worth it – you’re in for a very personal journey into my head and soul (if it wasn’t already so!) and I want all of us to make the best experience out if it.

Firstly, I won’t go all deep and personal into every single thing all in one go. No, my intention is to make shorter entries out of all of these important issues that have been swimming all around us for the last couple of years (or decades, is it? Or perhaps I mean centuries…? It could easily be millennia, considering how time-wimey humanity has become ever since the concepts of money, social rank, gender superiority, race superiority and religious superiority became a thing in our heads). No, I’m not going to try to solve them all single-handedly, nor do I even suggest that I’m the only one doing it! See, the reason for my disappearance was that all of a sudden the voice in my head was overpowered by many other voices, most of them from the past and not any of them friendly, all talking at the same time about fracking, social and political borders, race equality, what breasts mean, what a healthy body (and facial!) image mean, religious division, religious degradation, religious confusion, religious freedom, the bees, many other animals that deserve even more attention than the bees, gender degradation, gender division, gender confusion, gender freedom, basic human decency or the lack of thereof, the importance of knowing what sexuality really is (biologically, spiritually and regarding choice), the importance of knowing about forest management for both political and religious uses, the need for students to stop using the word “bullying” so matter-of-factly, the need for humanity in general to stop using the word “haters” as if it was so simple and stupid, the mysterious disappearance of God in many of the big “God-says” movements over the last few decades (or was it centuries… perhaps it may be better to not get into this again), and perhaps, if we’ve got time, I might try to dig really deeply to reach the true meaning and importance of the number 42.

Now, luckily we’ve got plenty of people blogging today – some with more experience and professionalism than others, some with more heart and passion put into sharing their personal experiences, some a nice mix of both, which is why we all need to develop a style that will add into this wonderful mix instead of trying to complete with each other. This is my intention for the following period of my life, and I will come back every Friday to post something new (for Freya and Venus, remember? The day of beauty, love, compassion and fertility). Yet, I deserve the right to write an entry out of the blue in the middle of the week or to skip a Friday if necessary. I will tackle all of the subjects above and any other that pops into my head and my life. I have no idea what order they will come in, though, and make no promises about it. I will also add to that list all the literary and cinematic subjects that I’ve been constantly been wanting to comment about, but have no idea when they will swish out of my fingers and into the page.

Another thing I will do is to keep my promise of cleaning up old blog entries. To that effect, I will re-post all my writings for Inkwells and Daydreams and Clarity Found, all updated and categorised – but I make no apologies about having no definite schedule for that. See, I’ve got my novel going on, I’ve been married for a little over a year and am enjoying the amazing change in my life… Also, I’m happy and busy developing my acting career and that has taken time and focus, too! I’m also still struggling with the aftermaths of the stress of having to deal with the barbaric visa conditions imposed on us (which I will talk more about when I tackle one of the subjects above!), and I’m also craving to re-address the importance of love, self-worth, cultural codes imposed over both of those issues, and the freedom we lack as a race to really be happy with either…

Sigh, this is why I couldn’t write – it was too much information and I couldn’t even sort it out in my head enough to make a list of it! Now, regarding repetition of issues, perhaps sometimes what we need is to repeat until it’s made itself at home in our brains and souls… with no intention of imposing my beliefs on others, but rather to give people the option to choose for themselves. If you go back to my old posts now, please excuse the childish use of language (I literally had no experience in blogging back then and was in such an excited rush to get it all out that I just went for it as if flowed), that’s one of the reasons I want to clean them up. The other one is that there are a few ideas there with which I don’t agree anymore since I have learned one or two things if not more about them.

And one more thing before I go… I will give you fair warning: I will freely use extremely bad and offensive words such as sex, sexual, sexual pleasure, sexual organs, penis, vagina, breasts as a thing of beauty, breasts as a sexual organ, fertility, sex as a fun thing and sexual freedom as a positive thing… When did that happen? When did any of these words become offensive? Please note that is for all intents and purposes a rhetorical question. If when you read this bit your first thought was “How is that offensive?” or, “I hadn’t thought she was such as prude”, then we’re on the right track.

And so, please visit me on either Clarity Found or Sandra Tena on Facebook (I’m not two people, I just want to keep my author/actress profile as a separate thing for professional reasons), and my Amazon author page to read any (or all) of my books), and I bid you farewell and welcome!

No, let me try that again… once again welcome back to my homely and healing corner, and I bid you farewell and blessings!

Sandra Cole ≈ Writer, healer, seeker, lover

My author page on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sandra-Tena/e/B00NWBFY6E/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Clarity Found:

https://www.facebook.com/clarityfound/

My author page on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/Sandra-Tena-1607745812817176/

A new perspective on facing the old ghosts

We all know how frustrating it is to have to go back to an issue that we thought we’d already healed, especially when it’s taken us a long time to work it out, or when our circumstances have changed a lot for the better, or when we have seen so much progress on that account that we’d already reached a point of being proud of ourselves…  Yes, we’ve all been there, and we all dread being there again, and we constantly prepare so that it doesn’t happen – yet we’re all probably going to be there again anyhow!  So, what’s to be done about this?  If it’s unavoidable, why do we keep on trying to make things better for ourselves?  If we’re going to have to deal with the same issue over and over again, why do we even bother healing?  Well, the answer is simple enough: because we all deserve to live a life in which we are healed and whole and satisfied.

Why does this happen, then?  If we all deserve to feel good with what we’ve done with ourselves, why do we have to keep looking at certain issues over and over again?  The way most people think about this is that they haven’t quite learned what they needed to learn, and that’s why they have to be in the same situation again – that could be true in the case of people that find themselves over and over in similar situations: jobs that give them the same kind of challenges, relationships that fail for the same reasons, or social, financial or health issues akin to previous ones.  In that case, a full reassessment of their attitude and response to those problems has to be done, but what if it is that we only have to look at the circumstances again without having to undergo the actual situation?  In that case, there might be good news ahead!  Heraclitus said: “No man steps into the same river twice, for it is not the same river and he is not the same man”, and in a very deep, spiritual way, it’s the same with the problems: they are not the same problems that they were to begin with; and even more to the point, you are not the same person that you were back then, because you’ve already undergone a huge learning and, hopefully, evolving process.

Ask yourself this: what if you have to see that life you left behind because you have to show to yourself right here, right now, how much progress you’ve made?  What if the challenge this time is to show yourself how much better you are at this moment, how much you’ve evolved, how much you have now to feel proud of yourself about?  Plenty of people feel afraid of this moment, because they find it hard to believe that they might have had so much progress, and they might even feel undeserving to have achieved something or to have the respect of others for how brilliantly they’ve done in their path, so could it be then that this bend of the labyrinth consists of a test from yourself to yourself?  We all have to undergo it sometime, because we also need to respect ourselves and be self-aware of our achievements, only some people find it more difficult than others!  And some people let it go to their heads, I know, but they have their own set of challenges to work with…  Still, maybe this change of perspective is one many of us need in order to remain strong and keep going, and I want to share with you how I came to that conclusion.

I’ve spoken many times on this blog about my ongoing process of having to look at the same situation from different angles, about acquiring a new perspective on an old issue, and about finding myself face to face with old ghosts and shadows.  Today I am living a similar process to that, except that it is kind of reversed: it’s not about the being there “again”, but about having read an entry from two years ago which I could have easily written a couple of months ago instead!  Save a few changes that is – two years ago I was single and frankly very scared that I would remain that way, whereas today I am happily married to an incredible man; two years ago I was moving out of London and back to Mexico as a frustrated jobless Graduate, whereas today I have moved out of Durango and into England as a resident and a freelance writer… so a few major changes that is!  Still, the entry that I cleaned up a few days ago made me think how similar those months after arriving from London were to those months of waiting from my residency to come through: both times I had to confront my issues as a misfit, both times I had to face my fears of not being able to succeed, and even both times I had to fight my inner demons regarding my confidence in myself, physically, emotionally and intellectually…  It took me a few weeks to realise that it was not about having to learn something new, or having to undergo the process again because I hadn’t done a good enough job the first couple of times around, but because I had to see how much progress I’d made!  It seems like a very basic thing to mention, but sometimes we need a reminder of the most basic things in order to keep going.  Sometimes we need to be told that we have the tools we need, and sometimes we need to have a go at something again so that we can show how better we can handle it this time around.

So, my dear readers, I hope this has been a pleasurable and helpful read for you, and I hope you have a wonderful month ahead of you!

Many blessings and much light!

Sandra Cole ≈ Writer, healer, seeker, lover

To read more of my healing techniques, you’re welcome to visit me at:

http://clarityfound.today/

To read my literary works, please visit me at:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sandra-Tena/e/B00NWBFY6E/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

and:

http://inkwellsanddaydreams.com/

The Mysterious Lady of Glastonbury revealed

Written on Monday September 15, 2014…  That date means a lot: in Mexico, my native country, it's the Independence Day celebrations... for me here in the UK, my adopted country, it was the day of my rebirth (or regeneration if I must)... as a writer, as a healer... my first visit to the Isle of Avalon...

I went to Glastonbury for the first time this weekend, and I worked harder than I have possibly ever worked in my life! Before you jump into any sort of wacky conclusions (especially because this was particularly intended to be posted on the Friday after the YouTube upload of The Glastonbury Mystery, it does not mean that our Renaissance-Man Director Mani Navasothy overworked us… well, yes, he did, a little bit, but that is not the point… hehehe).  Kidding, so before you jump into any sort of conclusion then, let me tell you this:  I have talked about my path, about my process of healing and creativity, in many previous posts, and by this time I should have my Healer blog all pretty and set up, so in this post I’m going to go no-boundaries and delve deep into the four pillars that constitute me: I am firstly and foremost a creator, and even after the disappointment of knowing certain dark truths about one of my favourite authors from my teens, I still have a poignant love for everything that revolves around Morgaine and the Mists of Avalon. Certainly, everything related to King Arthur, Excalibur and the Round Table will always mean a great inspiration source for my own Lady Rhiannon and Sir Orlando… You will have to wait until Tuath, the second book in my Pentacle series to read about that ;) although I am giving many hints constantly!

So, that’s the first “Me” pillar: the Writer.  And I must say, it has struggled to stay up for quite a while now.  It’s difficult, more than even those people that tell me to “think realistically” imagine.  Everyone tends to think that just because I am a dreamer it means that I don’t know the real price of things, but it’s the other way around… See, I have decided to become a full-time optimist because it’s the only way that I don't want to die every single day I feel I’m a living failure…  Now, most people would want to jump in and reassure me here, but I’m not saying this to look for pity, I’m saying this because it is the truth: I found my best medicine against depression ever, and it turns out that I had it with me all along, I just hadn’t really been using it until I had to leave England last January… that was the only thing I could cling to, my optimism!  And I haven’t let go since, because it is the only thing that helped me realise that things have been moving all along, even though I was too blind to see it before; also that there was something very real to learn from every single one of my failures, not just the “love yourself” type of thing that everyone kept hitting me with because they couldn’t see that that was never the problem… When I found *that* out, believe you all me, my life changed so amazingly that I was not even prepared to receive the amount of choices I was going to be delivered.  And now I can safely say that no one can wipe the smile from my face that easily…  What does any of this have to do with my writing? Everything!  Because, like I’ve said before, Pentacle came to be because of my need to hide from the real world because of my social failure.  So, now that my life has finally started to settle, I can finally also sort that one out, and magic is ensuing from my fingers by itself, because of the amazing power of optimism.  I will say this: it’s not a matter of not wanting to see reality, it’s a matter of choice.  Yeah, you don’t like what you see? What are you going to do about it?  Are you going to get angry and stressed?  Or are you going to take the best things from it to make your present moment a bit better and use everything around you to keep going in the direction you actually want to go?  Ahh, you’re going with the second choice?  There you go, you’re an optimist!  See?  It wasn’t so hard!

(Editing note from January 2016: I am at that bend in the labyrinth when I needed to learn that lesson once more!  I was temporarily caught by my fears and my optimism faltered, but I was able to look back on my life and the blockages faded as I recognized the old patterns).

Now we can move on to my second “Me” pillar, the Healer… I have to admit that there was a point in my life when I could not bring myself to believe my abilities in this profession, mostly because I felt I was so behind everyone else, and my own healing most of all, that there was no way I could even think I could manage… And then magic started!  I decided to heal because there was no way I could carry on with my life if I didn’t!  There were many things holding me back, mostly that I constantly found myself unable to say that I am a writer because I had nothing to prove that I was, you know what I mean?  And ironically, now that I’ve become the Doctor it’s the same story.  Many of my friends kept telling me that I had to *believe* it when I told people, that I had to own it and then people would stop going “Yeah… ok, change of subject…”, but both things are one and the same: what did I have that I could use to prove it?  To others, I am mostly a girl in funky cosplay trying to be funny in London and Glastonbury with Tennant’s Sonic Screwdriver in my hand.  It kept running through my mind that had it been Joe there instead of me, then the reaction of people to the two Doctors would have been totally different, because nothing would have been funnier than two boys quipping about who was “Who” and so on and so forth, but a girl?  There is a lot more than “owning it” to that part, and possibly someone with an acting career (OR a published book or two!) would have pulled it off tremendously, but not when the story repeats itself on itself and folds over twice more...  That’s when it hit me, up at the Tor:  I had always known how I felt about this, I was just using the wrong words to explain it… My whole life has been about the challenge of proving WHO I am (pun partially intended); I thought it was about justifying myself to people, but it is more than that, it’s about letting them *know*, and making sure they never forget!  So that’s why I kept running into walls!  They don’t have to understand me, they just have to know I’m there, and for that my presence and my actions are what count… and that was my goal of healing right then and there… That’s not to say that I was not healing everything else as well, because, phew, I have to say, that whole naked-under-the-blanket-in-the-middle-of-the-street thing?  Doesn’t get any more healing than that!

(Editing note on January 2016: the original storyline included another Doctor, Joe Teulon, but he had to drop out due to personal reasons, leaving Stephen Cole and me to lead the series, that’s why there are a few mentions of another male Doctor on this and other entries of those weeks).

Yeah, I’m probably disclosing secret production details here, but the peak of it all is, once you’re able to heal yourself you’re then able to heal others, so it was a pretty brilliant graduation for me…  which brings me to my third “Me” pillar…  The Beauty “Me”.  Not that I believe I am better than anyone else, please stop calling me arrogant and whatnot, we already talked about this months ago!  As a result of strange happenings and dishappenings during my childhood and early teens, my whole belief in myself in a physical sphere had flopped and just dragged me down for ages…  truly ages… thing is, people tend to tell me I’m beautiful as if they couldn’t understand why I am single (variations of this depending on gender, age, marital status, gender preference, family/friendship relation to me, and also city, country and world that it is being said in…  but that’s the common gist of it), and I didn’t understand either.  Somewhere back in my past, people also spoke about my beauty in a “look at yourself and love yourself” kind of way.  Today sometimes they speak of it in a stop-being-so-arrogant sort of way, so I guess I took the first advice too far? Haha.  I do admit that I am the Queen of Vanity, what with being so in love with myself and all, but I think that by now we all agree that it was Mani Navasothy’s doing, right?  If he hadn’t dragged me into this project the world would not be in so much danger of a paradox… hehehe.  Aside from that, I had to do that bit of healing: I had to look at myself as a woman for the first time, feel that fear, like it or hate it, accept it and take charge…  It had to be done.  It had to mean something; otherwise, what’d be the point of going through such great lengths with the healing, the arts, the creativity and the traveling miles?  It’s not every day that an opportunity such as that arrives, and I really wanted the next guy that I approached to have sex with not to yell at me “Are you crazy?” (God and the Goddess, I hope I am in a committed, sweet, mature relationship by now, eek?  Will that be too much asking? Hm, I’ll make a side-note here to make a side-note and tell whether I’m still single or not in this bit…) (Side note here, on January 2016: I am actually married!  Huzza!).  After we shot the regeneration scene, Stephen came up to show his admiration, and say that he hadn’t thought I would be brave enough to do the blanket thing… yeah, well him and everyone else! It’s the story of my life: no one ever believes that I am brave enough to do anything.  Some people say that I’m brave for trying my luck in London, but that’s about it…  This time it was about more than just showing everyone that I could be brave at something, because probably only the people reading this entry will know the truth about that scene, and probably *most* of those people already know I’m somewhat brave, so it’s not about impressing the world, but about showing *myself* that I could brave the actual recognition of myself as a lovable woman without any fear…  All right, I was afraid to be arrested for indecent exposure, but everybody did a fine job with the blanket handling, so I was covered on that part (ha! See what I did there?). (Editing note in January 2016: The Glastonbury Mystery aired on YouTube in Autumn 2015, followed by Spears of Destiny and Ceremony of Souls, the storyline becoming  three-parter.)

That pillar was all about the acceptance issue, which goes hand in hand with the fourth pillar, my Intelligent “Me”…  I have sort of left this one behind a bit…  half on purpose, half because I was hurrying forward other things I thought were more important…  but I have always been a brainy child, and there is no reason to pull away from that, especially because I had the most annoying reason anyone can ever have!  I did it for the men, all right? I’d stopped being “serious” for a while, since I’d noticed that the more I seemed to know, the more men would turn away from me and go for the bimbos…  it kept happening in Durango and it kept happening in Newcastle…  the moment it started happening in London I said to my brain that it should take a little vacation… so it went ahead of me for a little while, learned a whole bunch of new things and then came back some time ago and asked me if I wanted to bring it back to London with me, because it likes the city so, so much, you know?  So I said yes, what’s the harm it could do?  And now I am as opinionated as I’ve ever been, only with more determination, and some of the most gorgeous men I’ve met here have disliked it greatly, and some others (gorgeous or not) have absolutely loved it and fallen for me because according to them it adds to my beauty, so that’s cool…  (Side note on January 2016: and the most gorgeous of them all has become my husband two months ago, so I win!). But the important thing I’ve learned here is that I simply don’t care how people judge me anymore, and I think it is because when I sent it to its vacation, some of the things that my brain learned was to bring empathy back, both for people who have different opinions from mine, and for those that have not been as lucky as I have to find the path of optimism…  Which means, I have to apologize for swearing a bit in front of my friends when I lost it for a few minutes on account of someone complaining about something that to me was way too simple back in Glastonbury…  I think there is nothing wrong with swearing, but when it’s done with a touch of acidity toward someone, even if for a short moment, is a kind of hurtfulness that I don’t want to repeat, no matter how low-intensity or short the moment could have been or was…  Yep, so my brain went searching for the place where I’d left my empathy a few years back, brilliant, no?  I mean, a woman cannot live on beauty alone, so I have to use my mind, right? Make my own decisions and use my own power; this I’m saying because I was literally told the other morning that I was insanely hot but that he could not find me attractive because I was not willing to be overpowered by a man… this after he spent a great deal of the night texting me what I can only assume were bits and pieces of Fifty Shades of Gray, and I *kindly* told him he was way off the mark…  Where do I even find these guys? I’ve got use the rest of my Glastonbury water to clear that up, because there is no way I’m willing to spend any time around that lunacy!  I told him, “Hey to each their own and who am I to judge, but me no more!”  That’s the bit I was saying I was worried about months ago, remember?  Dating today seems to be more about the sex than it is about actually connecting, and forgive me for repeating myself, but every time I find someone fabulous, they already have someone fabulous by their side!  Heck, all my friends are fabulous (and I don’t go to any lengths whatsoever to hide the fact that I think so, you amazing boys!), and often they are all very lucky to have fabulous girls by their side! It’s only been those few times, a handful maybe, that I’ve thought that I’m going to be one of the fabulous girls by their side and they go Nah… (Side note on January 2016: Stephen Cole proved me wrong!  Our story in short is that we already fancied each other by our online conversations, and once we met in person over the glorious weekend I’m editing about we knew we had to be together always... It’s brilliant to be able to look back on our story this way, because I am learning so much of my own path as I edit, and because he has been the most amazing partner ever, and it’s beautiful to look back at both processes and how they intertwined until one became part of the other).

Now you see why it’s been so important for me to do this healing?  All of it, for years and years, not just Glastonbury… it may be that at some point I will not be writing this blog anymore because the need for catharsis is over and then I focus only on the serious blogs; but in the meantime, if this catharsis helps others as much as it’s helped me, I’m glad I’m doing it. (Side note on January 2016: I stopped for a few months, but only to realise that it is always healing to look back and that every catharsis means a serious blog, because every catharsis means healing for the writer and for the reader, so I shall carry on).

So, that’s my account, and it only could have been done this way: write it down today and post it in a few months time, when it is all done and shown… I loved Glastonbury for all it was, all it is, and all it will always be: a doorway for all to reach higher grounds of spirituality…  I was the luckiest woman in the world to have gone with such an amazing group of people, and to do such an amazing project as well!  From the streets and The Cat and the Cauldron, to the handmade Mexican butterfly that you can spot now inside my TARDIS; to the Chalice Well and the White Spring to the Tor, everything was magical and beneficial… not to mention all my little late-generation jokes (or foreignerisms, however you wish to call them…) about having jelly babies with Stephen, or how when you go to the doctor they often prescribe you to have a jelly baby, or how I felt like a changed man, or how the Doctors spooned for the very first time in history – across the table at the George and Pilgrim – and so on and so forth, up to the point of walking up to Lesley and asking her “Are you my mummy?” (oh, how we laughed at that one)… Some people did laugh a lot, some rolled their eyes; at one point Mani and Stephen looked at me and I could just see the little dialogue globes pop up from their heads and read “She’s funny and sweet and I don’t want to hurt her feelings, but can’t she see that we’re trying to concentrate here??”…  Learning reassessed: there is always someone who’s going be new at something, hehehe. So, in short and after five pages of non-stop joyful writing, I loved every bit and every minute of Glastonbury, best experience ever to combine my four pretty pillars, yay!

Here finishes the original blog – along with my editorial notes!

Have a wonderful week everyone, keep enjoying the Doctor Who London episodes (Imaginarium Fan Productions), keep enjoying my entries every first of the month, and do check out my short story collection and novels at Amazon Kindle :)

Love and blessings!

Sandra Cole ≈ Writer, dreamer, healer, lover

To find my Amazon novels and short stories, please visit:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sandra-Tena/e/B00NWBFY6E/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

To read my writer’s blog, please visit:

http://inkwellsanddaydreams.com/

To access my healer website, please visit:

http://clarityfound.today/

And to watch our Doctor Who London (Imaginarium Fan Productions), please visit:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrE0gfV1XnzZ5Zfn3Pns25A

The things I learned last year

I thought it’d be nice to start off this blog again with something of the “Things I’ve learned” series.  This past year has been most influential in my learning process, indeed!  So full of blessings and travels and stress… so full of surprises and longing and joy…  Yes, they can all coexist.  I already knew some of the issues on this list, but what I gained from finding new angles to look at them from was a better understanding of them, and more appropriate ways of expressing them.

1.      I learned that trying to come up with “new” material is not always the way to go when you’re on the healing path (for yourself or for others).  The thing is, I’d stopped writing briefly because I felt that everything that I had to say, I’d already said; I thought I was being repetitive, but in fact I was doing my own inner Labyrinth, where I have to keep walking for a while because I’ve yet to reach the exit and start again.  That’s what we’re doing all our lives, whether we realise it or not: we enter the path, we spiral and keep looking at the same situations but from different angles, then we reach our centre, we get our balance, take a deep breath and begin the journey out again, this time wiser and even able to teach others from our experience if we wish… Then in we go again and start afresh, because the human being is always growing, always evolving whether they intend it or not.  So, while I’m doing the promised re-editing of the entries I’ve already got here, I might revisit some of the subjects under different lights, and see what happens ;)

2.      I realised that letting go of the blogs in order to focus on my novel was definitely not the way to go!  Of course, for those who don’t know (or rather for out-right bragging purposes), I just got married!  After such a long period of aching dryness, I met the love of my life and my whole world changed within a year… Yet for the past few months all my writing energy was put into the planning of the wedding, and I do have to wonder: if I’d been carrying on with either of my blogs, would it have made a big difference on how much more of my novel I’d finished?  This is of course an “I will never know” kind of situation, but one thing is for sure: in the half a year I didn’t follow-up on my blogs, I only finished part 1 of Iar, so I think this year I will carry on with two blogs and balance out the novel… and I’ll let you know what happens!

3.      I realised that no matter how different you are from your family, how strange you seem to them and how much that sets you apart outwardly, the genetic memories and paradigms that run as blockages in your family are still deeply ingrained in you, and sometimes even worse, because you feel so different that you never see the blockages coming until they start acting up!  So, those are the ones to watch out for, precisely because you’d never thought they were a part of you.

4.      I learned that the world needs more people talking about, understanding and yearning for natural beauty than I had given it credit for…  This issue about magazine beauty being “what attracts attention” really has to stop – when we say magazine looks are fake, it simply means that people who look more natural are actually more beautiful, because we can see the real shapes and shades of bodies and faces, instead of plaster, gloss or glitter...  Think very deeply about this, because it’s time that realising that every shape and every shade has its own beauty becomes the thing to live by (not the trend to follow, but the thing to believe and feel happy and at peace with!).

5.      Yet the other kind of natural beauty must not be forgotten, either!  No “new learning” here for me, I just wanted to point out how important it is for our health and spirit to get back to the enjoyment of nature, be it mountains, lakes, sea or desert, and anything in-between...

6.      I learned that the world needs more people talking about, understanding and yearning for being in love than I had given it credit for, too…

7.      I learned to cook a whole bunch of different yummy dishes which I hope I don’t forget before I get back home!

8.      I realised that no matter how emotionally independent you already are, there will always be someone telling you how to deal with a difficult situation (i.e., being away from your new husband for political/economic reasons during Christmas break, or how to act around your new husband so that he remains in love with you)…  And more often than not they won’t let you have your say…

9.      Referring to that, there will always be the “I have to tell you something but don’t say anything back” person in your life.  You know the one I mean, “I have some advice to give you, and it’s up to you whether you take it or leave it, just don’t say anything about it, because even though I’m not living your life or have any idea what you’re going through, if you try to explain to me things I don’t understand about your situation, it’ll just mean that you’re someone who doesn’t want to change, lacks the force of will to do anything about your situation and/or are just bellicose, self-justifying and argumentative.”  Sound familiar?  Yes, because they’re always there and they’ll always be there…  But the thing is that it’s their problem, not yours!  It can be someone who loves you more deeply, even your own mum or grandmother (all right, it’s usually those people!), but that’s because they come from a paradigm where if you say your feelings it’s because you’re being quarrelsome with them and also most probably from a generation in which it was believed that women had to be sitting down, smiling quietly and giggling and laughing only harmonically in order to be perceived as lovely and attracting men to them – if a woman was sarcastic or showed feelings of dislike towards something, or felt a painful stab at something their family members said and came back with an answer, then they were rude and unlovable all of a sudden.  No…? Doesn’t ring a bell?  Was that just Latin America, then…?  I don’t know, but anybody reading this from anywhere in the world and feels related to it, feel free to take the advice of remembering that it’s their problem, not yours!

10.   I learned how important it is for the world to understand that men also have it socially hard regarding similar issues ladies do…  This seems like a very basic thing not to have learned by the age of 33, but when you’ve spent your life either single or with really bad experiences of men, it’s hard to learn even the basic things, especially when all my male friends are so laid back that I often thought that because they deal with it differently than us it was somehow easier for them…  But it’s not about how easy or hard it is, because that actually applies to every single human being on the face of the earth: everyone feels differently, so something that might be easy for one might be difficult for the other, and that doesn’t make the one stronger than the other or vice versa!  The fact is that the new wave of feminism is in dire need of balance…  There are some activists out there, like the by-now-loved-by-all Emma Watson who seem to be doing things right, but we still need more people to hop on board and make sure that this is a win-win situation for both genders…

11.   I learned how to handle babies!!  More or less…

12.   I learned that people won’t appreciate what you’re saying about your health, emotional situation, or job/marital/living status until you show them a good article on such a subject.  All right, I was being sarcastic with the “I learned” bit, I’ve always known that, but I momentarily forgot and it came back to bite me in the bum…

Thank you for being here with me in this re-launch of my blog…  I hope you enjoyed yourselves, and that you enjoy your first weekend of the year ;)

Cheers and blessings and happy 2016!!

Sandra Cole ≈ Writer, dreamer, healer, lover

 

Read more about my healing activities at: http://clarityfound.today/

and https://www.facebook.com/clarityfound/

And about my literary works at: https://www.facebook.com/clarityfound/

http://inkwellsanddaydreams.com/

and https://www.facebook.com/Sandra-Tena-1607745812817176/

 

 

Glastonbury Tales, pt. 6

Hello kind readers!  Excuse my absence once again and let me begin with a brief announcement: because I’m really getting into writing my next novel, Iar, I will blog only once a month from now on, although the date for that has yet to be decided…  However, I might come up with surprise entries every now and then, if the need for such arises in my fingertips.

So, it’s been weeks since we talked, it seems, and I have to admit that I regret not publishing this entry on the Friday after the last entry, because that’s when Stephen and I were actually celebrating our six months and a “Glastonbury, pt. 6” might have been sweetly meaningful…  On the other hand, I get to tell you what happened on that weekend and on the few weeks after, and that shall be a thrill for me!  Firstly, on Friday the 20^th, the day of the Solar Eclipse, we were on our way to London, so we got to see the eclipse from the coach and we even got to see Stonehenge right as the eclipse was coming to an end!  Needless to say, we had our own little healing ritual right there on the coach, but instead of talking about what we did (which indeed is quite personal), I’ll redirect you to my friend and mentor Mani Navasothy’s book, Eclipse Magic (http://www.maninavasothy.com/html/eclipse_magic.html ), on which you can find a great deal of ideas to do your own kinds of rituals, healing or otherwise.  I prefer to always do healing, because anything you ask from the outside has to always be processed within the self first.  In order to get good things from the world, we have to be clean and ready to obtain them; yet others might differ, so you’re welcome to explore what best suits you…

We were on the coach, then, Stephen’s head on my shoulder as we gazed at the Eclipse through the clouds – the clouds being thick enough so that we were able to watch for a great deal of time before and after it reached its totality; then we saw Stonehenge pop up from the ground, the way it does when you’re looking for it from the road, and it was just a very blissful moment indeed!  It made me realise many things, but especially that my choice to document my healing path is a never-ending story in itself, because like it’s been stated over and over again, once you start healing, you can never truly stop!  Never!  Dun dun dun!  (Hehe, un-helpable, hehehe)  In all seriousness, though, once you realise the roots of your issues and how to fix them, you just keep finding things to work on and heal more and more things within you, dark corners and sharp edges and all of that.  Sure, it gets dangerous if you become fanatical about it: if you can’t stop because if you stop you go mad, but that’s true with any health practice!  Like a person who wants to lose weight and looses the sense of proportion instead, becoming too thin and thus unhealthy again; or vice-versa, for those need to gain weight and become uber-muscular, to the point of losing elasticity.  Yes, I’m drawing on the body issues again because I’m tired of this body-shaming battle going on the media over the past months… If you’re too fat, you’re unhealthy, if you’re too thin, you’re unhealthy, if you’re uber-muscular, you’re unhealthy!  And here the word “too” refers to what is an unhealthy weight in relation to height, body-type and age…  It’s not about aesthetics anymore, it’s about health!  Granted, if a person can’t lose weight because of health issues, such as thyroids, medicine intake (such as in my case), or other weight-gaining illnesses or issues, they have to treat that first, not the weight problem!  And doctors going “Oh, you have to lose weight to fix this or that problem” (such as knee or back pain) are not helping either, because they only make the person feel worse about themselves and even more impotent than before…  However, there have been some really good blog entries on this subject, so keep reading on about it and make your own mind.  Now, body image, that’s another story!  I stick to my belief that we’re all pretty and that we’re all seen as pretty by some and not by others, and we have to be at peace with that, especially because, a) we don’t all have the same taste, and b) not because you’re not seen as pretty by a person or a particular group does it mean that you’re less pretty, it just means they don’t think you’re pretty!  But why do “they” matter so much?  What truly matters is who you are, not how you think “society” wants you to be… although no one actually ever says who “society” really is – it could be the rich folk, it could be Hollywood, it could be Religion (seen as how many people blame “Religion” for everything nowadays), it could be the people in charge of social media, it could be aliens, Big Brother, the Master, or the gods playing games with us, who knows?

So, let’s return to Glastonbury, then!  (Yes, we came back from London to Glastonbury, so that line fits in very prettily).  Well, do I ever really talk about Glastonbury?  Not sure… That was half rhetorical and half I-truly-don’t-know, btw…  Anyhow, we had our first long-ish visit a few days ago: my friend Nancy, from Durango; one of those people that you just know you feel comfortable with and who, no matter how much time passes, the good relationship seems natural as soon as you get in touch again.  I must say, aside from all the fun we had and how lovely it was to show someone around the town I love and know as home (and all the magic in entails!) (and how cool it was to see her pictures on Facebook, images of all those places that I see every day or very often, shown to the world through someone else’s eyes!!), the best bit was the sharing of pure laughter and joy between three people who are happy with themselves, contented and achieved and fulfilled (although some of us still have a bit of path to thread to get there on the professional level…  But hard work will pay off here as well, as it has done on my personal trek!).  Nancy has had a healing path of her own, and I’m sure glad I’ve converged with her during different stages of it, and even more now when I can see all her commitment paying off…  I wish to be able to see everyone I care about just like that: having succeeded or on a very positive path towards that, each on the issue they have been working on…  And even those I don’t care about!  Wait, that came out funny… I mean, I wish to see everyone achieving that level of being happy with themselves, regardless of the other things they might still have to fix in their lives.  I believe that as long as we get to that point of being truly and openly happy with whom we are, then the other issues will begin to get fixed almost automatically – not that we won’t have to work on them anymore!  However, because we’ve already established our wishes time and time again, as the Universe sees that you’re working hard for them, it’ll grant them to you.

Oh, I hate how pink and fluffy that sounds… but it’s exactly what I believe, and I don’t mean to change a word of it unless I’m proven wrong.  Tonight there is another eclipse: some will see it and some shall be asleep, depending on what part of the world one is, but it’s still a very nice time to soak in the meaningful idea of change, release, protection, visibility or openness that we spiritually give it (or any other that you might need for your own purposes); and we’re so privileged to be able to enjoy the experience!  I’m off to eat something now, but I hope I’ve left you with some inspiration about whatever you need to today…

Oh, in case you were wondering, I wasn’t intending to expand on my 6-month celebratory weekend in London with Stephen, but I did change the subject quite abruptly there, didn’t I?  Well, we had dinner and theatre (we saw The Commitments – funny, thought-provoking and extremely enjoyable, with absolutely fantastic music!  Recommendable to all who love musicals and/or soul music), and we had Spring rituals at Richmond Park both on Saturday and Sunday… oh, and breakfast at one of the first pubs we had a meal together six months before! Very meaningful…  Yet, I’m only saying this partly to brag and partly to make sure that you don’t think that I’m being secretive about something just because I changed the subject out of the blue…  Having said that, off I go for food!

Have a lovely weekend!

Sandra Tena ~ Writer, dreamer, healer, lover

Glastonbury Tales, pt.5

It was six months ago today that I met Stephen Cole in person for the first time, here in Glastonbury; at a café a couple of minutes walk from our house, as a matter of fact.  It’s been a very impressive half a year, I must say, even though anybody following this blog can ascertain that for themselves and no one might even need me to say it to notice it!  It’s no secret that Stephen gave me a push forward in my healing even weeks before we met, which is why today I’m marking it as a special date.  Even if calendars are just numbers and time as we know it is just a way for humans to keep track of what they’re doing with their lives, I have to admit that this moment of “First half” is very significant indeed!  It was a mix of elements that could have only been achieved by all the other decisions I made before in my life, which include: Changing my BA from Graphic Design to International Relations (I knew it would come in handy some day); waiting to begin my MA to have a family instead (failed); coming to Europe to do some workshops instead of my MA (getting on the right track); deciding to apply to Newcastle, and consequently to Leazes Terrace for accommodation and furthermore to the Santander Latin America Scholarship (definitely the right track!); making friends with Cata Largacha so that when we went to London for a scholarship reception we decided to do a “Secret and Unbelievable London” type of tour, instead of a traditional one, because we’d both been there enough times to know most things by heart (except Westminster, Stephen would say, given that *that’s* where I got us lost the day we got together… I still can’t understand how I could have been expected to focus on where we were walking if they’d left me alone with him!), we’d rather do the quirky and mysterious bits of London that most people don’t know about (ding ding ding ding ding!); going with her to The School of Life and buying the book Londoners, by Craig Taylor, where I read about Christina Oakley Harrington and Treadwells (best choice of book ever made!); moving to London after my MA, instead of staying in Newcastle (bingo!); going to Treadwells to hear a talk by Mani Navasothy there (wham, bam, life changed irrevocably now!); casually mentioning  Doctor Who to him, even though I was positively amateurish then, and nervously accepting his invitation to join his fan production team as none other than the very Doctor him(HER)self (happy nervous floppy Christmas dance); going to a couple of healing workshops in Mexico when I couldn’t get a job in England (just a little pause here, getting energized people!); deciding to come to England for the summer and try to get my novel from the MA published (poking my head in to see if things might go my way…); applying for a business workshop in Newcastle instead, but opting to do a full cleanup of Wideawake anyways (ding ding ding ding ding!); deciding not to come to Glastonbury on a particular weekend while I was somewhere nearby but waiting instead till Mani said we’d come for filming (Stephen and I both know that it wasn’t yet the right time to have met…  yep, this intuition thing seems to be paying off); and finally, coming to Glastonbury on the last weekend I would have been here before I got the acceptance from Newcastle…

… sigh…  Serendipity, they call it…  I followed my intuition in my decision-making, and though I’ve said and done some pretty stupid things, because either I’ve been too headstrong and not wanted to listen to myself, or I’ve just been blinded by fool’s gold (which ultimately heals us, too, btw, the stone), I could not be any more grateful for those mistakes!  And this is not a new way of thinking for me, incidentally, because just this morning I was surprised by a song in my computer… well, not surprised by the song itself, because I’ve had it in there for fifteen years or so, but by what it meant fifteen years ago: Graziemille, by 883, a song that I used to thank my parents with when they gave me the opportunity to do a year abroad in Italy.  I don’t know how much I’ve talked about those times, so I’ll make a brief recount of it, starting with what 883 meant for me in high school – not the band but the actual number: I had a friend who fancied the same guy that I did, but she was a couple years below us and I only spent time with her on recesses and afternoons; the guy we both fancied was my best friend back then, and she’d say that I didn’t deserve him because I spent so much time with him doing homework or watching basketball but never did anything romantic, so that others should have a chance with him instead (as if it was me who was holding him back from it… and he was *still* not the first reason for my being so incompetent with men, yikes!).  Anyway, she had a friend in her class and they called each other “8” (I was never sure why), and they’d say that I was “3”, because I was only with them half the time, so we were the “883”…

So, when I got to Italy, and I heard that song by 883, I was captivated – For every day, every instant, every little moment, that I’m living today, thank you so very much!  Those lyrics, even though the rest of the song did not apply to me, got to the very core of my heart.  Remember, this is Italy, where I was still friendless, socially awkward, struggling with not one but two new languages, living with a family that had horrible problems with me because I wanted to shower every day (and because I opted not to learn German because of how painful the grammar was becoming for me), and pegged as dangerously depressed –enough to be sent back to my parents before the program was over.  This is also the time when I was shunned by not only one but three school groups – all those that I took different classes with, because I managed to get into a couple more Art classes and a Religion course instead of Maths, Physics and Chemistry, given that I’d already graduated from high school…  Granted, I did keep a bit of correspondence with some of the few friends I made, but things grew a bit cold between all of us after some years…  And what's more, this is also the year when I fell in love for the first time and got burnt quite badly (the first “mature” love, I suppose, because even I know that whatever I felt at age 12 was pretty different, or anything else I’d  felt for friends before, for that matter).  Why would a person in that situation wish to be thankful for ongi giorno, ogni instante, ongi attimo, che sto vivendo?  Every little moment?  Really?  Well, the answer to that is: Yes, really.

Yes, yes yes yes!  I know it deep in my heart that back then I was feeling the gratitude with the same strength as I’ve manifested over the past few months.  See, in my life I’ve been told so many times that “I have to be grateful for the good things I already have”, and I never quite understood why people never saw that I already was!  I think that’s why over the past few months I went into full emotional disclosure, and that’s perhaps why I believe that this might help someone as well…  Some people might need to be listened at closer to hear the thanks they’re giving…

 Anyway, I need to go back to serendipity: I had a moment the other night where I saw myself as someone completely different from who I am now; not worse, not better, just different… The me that managed to get a job in London the first time around, that lived in Angel (not so much because of Angel Islington anymore, but rather because that’s where the young people are living “the life”); I was the one dating a suit and drinking wine over dinner with a neck covered in pearls and dainty roses and a deep and loud laughter because she’s bored and needs to seem as if she wasn’t – wait, I made it sound worse than I intended to… I mean, I specifically said “not worse, not better, just different” because I really mean no disrespect to anybody who actually lives that way!)…  To everyone their own, I always say, and truth be told, I probably wouldn’t even notice that I was unhappy unless I’d seen anything of what conforms my life now, and something stirred inside of me to let me know that I’d strayed…  No matter, I guess if people are happy living that way then there is nothing wrong with that!  Yet, forgetting about Angel Islington because too many people rejected them for being nerds, that’s where life gets sad, because that’s when the person lets go of their essence.  I cannot imagine my life any different than what it is now, especially when two years after my first encounter with Angel Islington I come to find him with Peter Capaldi’s face on my very own living room in the flat I share with Stephen in Glastonbury!

I’m sorry, but too many people are going on and on online about how to do your makeup this way or that, or how to create a perfect hair thing, or about exercise or how to be cool and whatnot…  And there is nothing wrong with wanting to look better or with wanting to know about the things that most people say are cool, but when we lose ourselves into that “in” crowd instead of letting our true selves shine through, that’s where it gets sad (again)…  But let’s not all become nerdy now, okay?  That’s not what I’m saying…  Now that being nerdy is cool, so many people want in just because that’s what everybody is doing, yet one thing is being accepting of everyone and another is trying to become like everyone!  Although, kudos for those closeted geeks that are finally coming out!  And also, one thing is to want to learn about those things that everybody is talking about to see if we like them (and if things are likable, then go for them), but another is to try to seem like you like something even though you don’t just so you feel accepted…  Another sigh…  I’ve done both, the second one is very energy-consuming, indeed…

I will go now, before I start myself in yet another subject…  See you next week and keep on the lookout for my literary news as well – that “Sliding Doors” type of mental-episode thing is becoming its own story as well!

Cheers!

Sandra Tena ≈ Writer, dreamer, seeker, lover

Glastonbury Tales, pt. 4

It’s been a time of intense reflection, a whirlwind of activities keeping me from typing away as I’d wish…  Typing away, I say, yet thankfully not unable to write in general!  After a long meditation/inner debate about which of the original ideas actually work (presently, in my grown-up form), and which are obvious childhood hiding-holes, I’ve finally settled on a core story for Pentacle, huzza!  This has been quite a lot of work, especially since it has involved touching plenty of memories that I’d thought I’d never have to think about again.  I went down the rabbit hole, but for the first time it was an unpleasant experience because of the things that I had to recall, so Wonderland turned into the Burton version; the only reason I came back safe and sound was because Stephen held my hand during the whole time…  I guess this might mean that we may both have a story to tell, huh?

Frankly, I’m fully aware that this exploration of my different realities wouldn’t have been possible if I hadn’t blurted it all out before within this blog.  Once again, writing has saved my life, figuratively and literally at the same time!  I know I’d already said that I was going to refocus this blog and edit many of those fully-open entries because I felt like my energy was leaking from them, yet I haven’t been able to find the time to do it, and you know what? I learned something new!  Yay!  I learned that as soon as I addressed the situation, “My energy is leaking, let me see what I can do about it without hurting the essence of my writing”, the leak was fixed!  I think it had to do with my being honest about it, in the same way that I’ve been about the experiences that needed healing.  The thing is, as long as we let the Universe know what the issue is and what we want to do to fix it, the Universe will answer with support and tools; you still have to do the work, but you’ll have a higher chance of success because you’ve already established it in your mind and sent the right energies into the world.

Anyway, these reflections come from a state of acceptation of myself and my story which I’ve been in during the past few weeks, and which could not have been achieved without all my previous purging.  That’s what gave me full access into my characters: a few weeks ago I said that I was ready to take control of their lives and develop the series with a balanced mind and heart, so I went deeper into the things I had to fix and this is the result, so you can imagine how happy and grateful I am.  Still, clearing those issues also meant letting go of things, places and even people that I’d always deemed important to the story, because they’d marked me for better or worse, so Cassandra had to deal with them as well, didn’t she?  Given that she’s mirroring my life in fiction, doesn’t she have to go through all of the psychological and emotional ordeals that I went through in order to get her power?  That is how good writers work, giving their characters all of their rises and falls, right?  Wrong!  I would have liked to post this entry on Friday 6^th, because it was the first anniversary of Gabriel García Márquez to be celebrated after his death last April, so talking about A Hundred Years of Solitude would have been perfect!  Everyone who knows him knows that Gabo, as he is also known by friends and fans, based plenty of his fiction on his own life and family saga, A Hundred Years of Solitude included, yet he always made it so that things were sequentially or characteristically different enough so that he could call it fiction instead of bio, delivering at the same time an amazing taste of Magic Realism in which his characters (real or not) displayed all the depth and strength of presence necessary so that the readers didn’t have to even care whether they were based on reality or not…  I admit that such is my biggest wish!  I mean, those who know me will know which real names in (close enough) real events I’m using in my novels and short stories, just as which names in fake events and what real events with fake names there are…  Yet what’s the point of pointing them out? If an author catharsizes something within their writing, it’s likely that they’re not assuming that everyone will realise that it is true and point it out, and whether they choose to disclose it themselves or not (for healing, literary or commercial reasons, that’s another story!), that’s something else entirely.  Regarding disclosure, one thing I have to say in regarding how great Stephen has been during this whole process, is that he admitted from the very beginning that he felt he knew me very deeply because of how much of myself I’d been pouring into this blog; so, for him, half the things that I worked on during these past few weeks and that I needed his support to pull through, were already known to him, and the other half weren’t even a surprise!  Oh, but I wouldn’t advise this approach with any starting couples, okay?  I mean, if things come up that weren’t expected, then be empathic and honest and deal with it from a supportive position, but it’s not a very good idea to sit down together over the first few dates and say: “Yo, this is all I need to heal, will you still like me?”.  It’s probably even a good idea to stop saying Yo altogether, at least after you’ve gone into your twenties; but that’s just a personal suggestion.  Unless you can really pull it off.  I tried and it really, really doesn’t work for me.  Apparently I’m too white and nerdy to use it even as a joke, who knew?  Anyway, don’t go telling people you fancy all the things that you need to heal, unless you’ve proven to each other that there is empathy and trust!  If you’ve got neither of those things (and they have to go together), you might get burnt even worse and considered weak or needy, even if you’re neither or even if there is nothing wrong in being either!  See, in our case (Stephen and me) this works because he already knew so much about me from what he read here, and showed me empathy about it all even before we met in person, and so we’ve been honest all the time about everything from the very beginning…  And, hey, I went through six and a half years before I found trust and empathy in a man I fancied, so I’m pretty sure I know what I’m talking about.  So, in the case of new couples, if things that need healing pop up and give surprises, the best suggestion, seems to me, will always be to keep it honest and to advance through it with empathy.

It’s almost midnight now, so I’ll try and close up, but before I go I’d like to share another couple of great things that marked my Friday 6^th: Stephen and I paid a little tribute to Leonard Nimoy by playing The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins at Folk Club (my first time singing in front of a live audience, btw – did not go well… but you know what they say: if you don’t get it the first time, try and try again!  And we will!!  I’ll have to keep you posted on that one, wink wink!).  And I was also kissed for the first time ever under the mistletoe…

…Erm, yes, I know it’s March.  March the 9^th, in fact.  Who’s to say that using a little mistletoe brooch doesn’t count for these matters?  After all, Stephen didn’t know that such an event was a first for me, but it’s really really hard not to kiss him when he goes all history and legends and literature on me, what was I suppose to do?  Wait for real mistletoe?  Okay, I sense that this is the part where I should stop my rambling and explain the context: remember how I’ve been on and on about how I felt like I didn’t belong anywhere until I met him?  That whole “Not even in London, what am I suppose to do now?” thing?  Yes, of course you do, I probably overtalked about that subject, so I won’t blame you if you’re sitting there rolling your eyes at the screen right now, but I have to mention it because it so happened that we were talking about Stephen’s Cornish ancestry and I said yet again how nice it would be to have that sense of belonging, to be able to jump up and down in joy and point to your roots or blood or whatever, just like I say to everyone (my family included!) who mentions their roots with the passion and fervour that Stephen was talking with about Cornwall.  Long story short, he said I was mistletoe!  He said that there is nothing wrong with flying about until one is able to find a nice tree where to grow and develop oneself, and that roots do not necessarily have to grow on the ground (which finally explains why it has always been so hard for me to ground myself), but that becoming part of the chosen environment has as much merit as everything else in life…  Now, before you go all “But it’s a hemiparasite!” on me, remember that it has been recognized as a keystone species because of its role on ecological cycles…  It doesn’t just “live off its host”, but its role in the roosting, nesting and feeding of many birds make it important for the continuity of biodiversity.  Moreover, if it’s seen within the areas of spirituality and healing, it’s one of the oldest holy plants known in Druidism and myths and legends in other ancient religions.  Nowadays, Druids and many other Pagans give it its place during the winter rituals: they position a white cloth under the oaks when collecting mistletoe, so that it never touches the ground and thus keeps its holy properties.  As for the oaks, it’s an honour to be chosen by the mistletoe, because that’s what makes them holy… So, either way I look at it, I love to understand myself as mistletoe now, and to have chosen Stephen as my tree as well…

Anyway, before this starts becoming all “Dear Diary” again, I’ll leave you all with my best wishes for the week, and I’ll return on Friday with the next entry…   Now to sleep!

Love and blessings!

Sandra Tena ≈ Writer, dreamer, seeker, lover