Taking Off

Liar's Lodge grounds, Buena Vista, Colorado

A new twist on the heart rock. :) Love comet takes off, outer-space bound, free.

Warmth

Beach driftwood, Lincoln City, Oregon

Love feels warm to me. During healing or energy work it might feel like heat in the hands or the center of the chest. And as warm-blooded creatures, life itself is warm. Life, love, warmth. Mmmm.

It's pretty cold out there in lots of places today. In Jackson, MS, where my son Michael goes to college, it's 23 degrees right now, with an expected high of 30. !!! They'll be back to normal soon... the forecast projects a high of 70 in a few days. We're looking forward to soaking up a bit of that toasty sunshine when we visit him next month.

Meanwhile, here's a little love-warmth for you on a cold day, from the inside out, a heart-hug from me to you. Snuggle up!

Beyond Suffering

Dana Point, California

Eventually there comes a point where we simply cease resonating with pain, struggle and sadness. Sure, we walk through the events of life as they come, but we can barely hold on to the density of suffering because, well, it just doesn't fit any more. We see the pain and struggle around us, and we may feel tenderly toward it. We may even have some of it ourselves for a moment, but we don't stay there for long. Because when we realize the infinite spectrum of possibility while also acknowledging the truth of who we are, we're left with a simple question: Do I want to be/experience/know this misery over here, or do I want to choose this wondrously joyful, expansive and light-hearted being that I am? I know, I know, misery tugs. It works the mind and says, "But this is real! This is what you know. Come on back. Lots of people you know are hanging out over here!" My answer? Naw, I think I'll stick with love, joy, and playfulness. But thanks. :) And the amazing thing is, as we make the truth of who we are our permanent address, the space where we hang out and live, the world around us also begins to move into this lightness and love. Imagine shifting the pain and struggle in the world by simply recognizing and aligning with the truth of who we are, moment by moment by moment. YES!

This sweet little pink agate rock called out to me last summer. Hello! Here I am! I wanted to have it, enjoy it longer, but when I went to pick it up, I was surprised to find the entire surface you see in the photo was one solid thing! So there was no having the heart. Today, when I look at it, I think, "Of course there's no having it. Only being it, because that's what we are. And when we are it completely, there is no not having it, ever." I'm in.

Heart-headed

 

Such a cute heart head on this duck. I like him. He's my role model. With the heart as the command center, 

we see clearly and live freely. Otherwise, it's all quacked up mind-fowl.   hee. sorry... couldn't resist. :)

Mind-f = being right, people-pleasing, control, ego games, need for attention, addictive patterns (including relationship), self-abasement and arrogance (two sides of the same coin), victimhood, power-poo (also two sides of the same coin) 

and all the rest of the program that isn't our beautiful, infinite and glorious selves. 

Heart-headed = free, open, spacious, divine, creative, love-powered and magnificent. The duck is on to something.

Getting to the Heart of the Matter

  

It took me a while to get there, but I did. That first shot is actually the sun. Not the moon, but the sun, mid-morning through colorless fog, of which we have had a lot.  The top three photos were taken at Minto Brown park in Salem, and they were spotted within a mile and an hour of the last one, all today, January 21st. Amazing, isn't it?  Such a spectacular, tiny pink surprise! It catches my eye every year on campus, tucked in a corner behind the back Mill Stream bridge, blooming its little heart out in the freezing cold of January. It is like a miracle each time I see it. Especially today. Thank you, moon-like sun, and chubby-fluffed bird, and lonesome berry. And thank you sweet harbinger of blossoms to come!

Through the Looking Glass

                           Chihuly glass, Bellagio Hotel lobby, Las Vegas

 Detail from giant, stained glass leaf,

Conservatory and Botanical Garden, Bellagio Hotel, Las Vegas

The journey is like cleaning out the river, clearing away everything that might impede the flow, anything that might trip up the miracle of love in motion, all of that stuff that I think is me. What is me? My voice? My mind? My body or personality or talents or thoughts or beliefs or experiences? None of that is me. Identification is like lead.

The body becomes an open vessel for the energy of creation, everything moving light lightning, like light through glass, projecting spectral, holographic images that reflect endlessly upon each other. Are you that projection? Am I? I don't think so. We are the infinite play of light.

So Much Gorgeousness, I Couldn't Wait

Roses and hearts. Must be Valentine's! Oops... a month early.

I love Valentine's Day. I guess you can imagine why. :) I've seen people get irritated that the Valentine's displays go up two days after Christmas. I just get cheerful. I love seeing all the hearts, the pink and white and red. I just do.

When I saw this one in a bouquet that my colleagues sent to Rob, I thought, "Oh! That would be a perfect post for Valentine's Day!" Then I realized it's only January 15. Hm. A month is just way too long to wait. Not only couldn't I wait, but I also couldn't decide which one I liked best to share. Why not have all three?

So here it is for you early, not to capitalize on the commercialized, Hallmark holiday, but just to smile some love your way - doesn't it look like it has a little mouth in the middle? Besides, it's orange.

LOVE YOU!!!!

It's the Little Things

 

It happens pretty regularly, the little food heart squeal. Then comes a brief pause in cooking or eating for photography. I like the little ones. Tiny bursts of love, dotting the landscape of the day.

This one was from a loaf of gluten-free bread a friend brought us with some homemade soup. Another friend recently wrote a beautiful poem, sharing some life reflections at one of these times when there just isn't very much to say about the situation at hand. Love as food. Love as kind gestures and words. Love as noticing. Love sprinkles our eating, thinking, and being, like stardust, blanketing with blessings as it drifts down.

Passage

Open Space

"All loss creates the open space out of which birth arises." - James Finley, Christian Meditation

Rob is home from the hospital. Amazing! He was supposed to go to ICU last night but was doing so well (thanks to super-support, love and prayers from all of you and a very healthy and strong body from him) that he went to a regular room and was able to come home today. He was in surgery for five hours, and while there were no complications, there was much more cancer than they thought, extending deep into his chest cavity in addition to the mass in his neck and thyroid. Hopefully it is all gone - we won't know for some weeks/months down the line. His voice is soft and husky, and there is a distinct possibility that it will remain that way. We don't know that either.

I am increasingly aware that everything is changeable, everything is possible, and the tapes that loop in our heads are not even the beginning of the real story. So we are in this "cancer" scenario, but what it really looks like to me is divine perfection. It looks like grace and beauty and peace. And not because he is home, or because it is gone (or not) or because he might not have his voice (or might). It is that way because we are here choosing the experiences we have because our souls want them. This is my experience, and I have no need for it to be anyone else's. I only know that when I see through this wide open lens, I know it isn't about Christine and Rob and doctors and friends and diseases and wellness. It is, very simply, about being. It is about loving, and knowing the love of God in every second of every moment of every day. That is the truth for me.

Who knows what is through that little hole in the leaf? Who knows what something means or brings? We all assign meaning to the "story," but it is just that, our opinions, which we all know are not truth. I know that being is what feels true to me - not my idea about it, or what it means, or how it turns out. Just being and loving. And that, my dear, sweet, amazing friends, is what we're doing here with you. And I'm so glad.

Choffy Love

A cup of my morning Choffy

I do love this drink, and it keeps showing up in the most playful and fun ways in my day. Choffy is brewed chocolate - 100% cacao roasted and ground, steeped in a french press. It's sooooo yummy and also really good for you, and I have so much fun both drinking and sharing it. Today's Cosmic Chocolate Love Heart really cheered me up, so I thought I'd stream it your way, too. And here are a couple of other Choffy love photos. Just because.

in a sweet heart mug from a student

 

yeah, I think that's me, in my light body, dreaming of Choffy.

more info at:

www.drinkchoffy.com/christineelder

 

Grateful

Cape Disappointment State Park, Washington

This sweet heart light in the midst of luscious pink and green (two of my favorite colors!) is brought to you in 

grateful appreciation that each of you are exactly who you are. You are amazing, and I love you. And - it is a 

heart-warming reminder of more colorful seasons in the midst of this crazy winter cold and gray!

Sun-burst-of-color hugs to you.

Asking for Love and Support

Hello my beautiful friends. Today I'm writing to ask for love and support. My sweet husband Rob is having surgery for an aggressive, unusual thyroid cancer this Friday the 10th. It's an intricate procedure, averaging 4-5 hours but sometimes taking as long as 10. There are three tumors spotted thus far in his neck, and the largest wraps around his main laryngeal nerve. Like me, he is a singer, and has been a speaker for his career (retired now), so apart from living a healthy life we are also hoping he is able to continue using his voice. Singing is one of his main joys right now, and he would love to continue having that in his life.

I would greatly appreciate your love and support for both of us through the next week or two as we move up to, through, and beyond the surgery.  We are in the emotional rapids right now, as these things go, feeling pretty much everything, and keeping our eyes open for all that encourages us and reminds us of the truth way beyond what we see. Thank you so much! Love from my heart to yours, in every direction, in no direction, and way beyond. 

Tune Your Heart

Back of flower from a shop's garden bed, Vail, Colorado

This thing we call "reality," this crazy place filled with struggle and pain and discord and mind-****, is only a tiny slice of vibrational bandwidth on an infinitely broad range of being. And that infinitely broad range of being is YOU! We are so much more than meets the eye, and while "reality" (also affectionately known as an illusion) is a part of us and our experience, it is only a tiny little boxed-in, mixed up, fixed-in-place part! Just beyond the boundaries of our mind boxes are infinite possibilities and freedom. But "reality" is such a bully! It's why tuning in full-heartedly to this love hum, this truth that we are infinite, magnificent, divinely powerful and loving beings is so crazy! Surely we'd have to be crazy (by "reality's" standards) to believe that we are more than the sum of our physical and mental experiences. After all, those things are so, well, real. But you know what, my friends? I'm crazy, and when we're this kind of crazy, we're blazing brilliant in Truth. If we are just willing to consider the possibility of so much more than what the zoo tells us is real. After all, we already know what it's like in this particular box, this corner of the zoo - pretty hellish, if you ask me! Why not step on out into the open spaces of infinite love? Come on. Let's go.

Hearts of Home

 

Some love notes of home: Sweet potato peeling, loose threads on an afghan knitted by a friend, nearly empty coconut oil jar on a table runner from step-daughter Celia's wedding, and late-autumn dinner plate dahlia blossoms from the yard.
And a little kombucha love.

Love you, love me, love us, love this world, love the way love shows up every second of every day. Love love in the face of everything that would have us believe otherwise. It's soft, this love-voice. But it's sweet. And it's true.

The Lightness of Love

 

On a wisp of gossamer wings, my open and hopeful heart shares feather-light, sweet, infinite love with 

your beautiful hearts. Relaxing, allowing, opening moment by moment by moment, we let the infinite light 

of love open our awareness to the magnificent truth of our beings. We are everything. Everything is us. 

Are you willing to be this beautiful, this powerful, this divine? Surprise! You already are.  :)