Monsters

One of my favorite old pastimes was watching psychological thrillers, serial killers documentaries and local hauntings. Teaching small children, I have been slowly integrating psychology into my every day life and theirs. Watching them grow from tiny, angry psychopaths into beautiful, regulated children is an amazing reward of my job. When I was at WKU, I studied child psychology many times in different classes and it really just taught me more about myself. It's interesting when you focus outward, sometime you also tend to heal your inward. However, when we focus on the good, we mustn't forget the bad, the evil, the subhuman.

I've been delving into the Monster series on Netflix. It started with Dahmer a few months back; I've watched the Ed Gein story and currently watching the Lyle and Erik Menendez story. It's wild to see that monsters are not always born, that they can be created by neglect, abuse, war or a mix of all of the above. They are created by a series of unfortunate, traumatic events that can be chronic. At times, it's one thing that is the catapult to murder, but then sometimes it's continuous, ominous happenings that change your DNA and make you into someone bad, someone who uses their magic for evil.

We all have magic. We can use it for good or for evil. Money can be used for good or evil, so can weapons, and so can words. We create our reality, our lives and we put our boundaries up to feel safe. We use magic every day- whether we are manipulating an outcome or whether we are using intentional kindness and radical honesty is up to us. So if we are magic, we are medicine, we are intuitive, we are pure animals and we are still children. So I ask today, are you using your magic for good...or for evil? Are you intentionally lying and deceiving yourself, your partner, your people.. or are you using your words to create, to learn, to grow? Are you leaning more towards the psychosis of your life or the magic that you have within you that is weird, strange and wonderful?

How much of society are you making into the standard human response? Are you listening to yourself and making your kinks feel subhuman? Are you depending on social norms to tell you who you are and what you like? I, myself, am not a huge fan of the word "social norms" because who is to say what's normal? Normal is a setting on a dryer, not a human being. There are things that we all do like bleed, sexual desires and triggers and have flesh and meat suits but we are inherently all same, but different. How much of our differences really truly matter? I am full of questions lately as I am stepping into new territory by stepping into my feminine. It's awkward, it feels unsafe, I feel strange, loud and obnoxious all while I feel peaceful and like I am coming home. Weird. It's all strange. The Cheshire Cat said it best.

Spirituality v. Grief

Hey everyone,

My grandmother passed away on 8/17. My sister's father in law passed on 8/19. You can't make this up. My families lost two generations of grandparents in two days- a great-grandma and a grandfather. I AM NOT OKAY!! We buried my grandmother on Wednesday 8/20, and Niko on Friday 8/22. On Saturday, I attended my sweet friend Marcy's offering; a grief retreat that I had registered for weeks before specifically for my neighbor. Never dreamed I would be in terrible need of it. I couldn't be more grateful that Spirit had put it on my path and very grateful for Marcy for holding such a safe container that I could scream, cry, grieve and release all the stuck energy that I have been harboring for years.

After I got home on Friday from the funeral and sitting shiva essentially all week, I spoke with a dear friend of mine who reads past lives. We had already started discussing my past lives last year, but really decided to hone in on how many I have lived. She mentioned that a previous life of mine on this land was in the 1400's and that I was one of the Mound people at Etowah village, which is now in Cartersville, GA about 271 miles away. So after I got out of the retreat on Saturday and got home at 2:30pm, I packed, got a babysitter for the farm and left on the road at 4:20pm. There were numerous things that happened on the trip down that made me feel safe and pointed out I was on the right path. Once I got there, I checked into a hotel and signs continued to happen. The energy of the place felt amazing- I felt as if I was home. 

On Sunday, 7 days since my grandmother had passed- I woke up early, had coffee in the hotel room, meditated and watched the beautiful scenery outside of my window. I got dressed and headed to Etowah Indian Mounds Historic Site. Once I got there, I asked for the guide that I  trauma vomited all over on the phone. Once Lucy came to the front, I started crying. I thanked her for being so kind and patient on the phone with me. She informed me that people often come to Etowah for healing and I told her a little of why I was there. We exchanged hugs and I headed to the mounds. I took pictures of everything at the center without reading it, and then stepped onto the land. I walked tops of Mounds A, B, C and the river bank barefoot. I was met by a butterfly at the beginning and the end of the journey through my Native land. I saw many more signs on the way back home that confirmed I was divinely protected and that she was still here, in the wind.

I recommend visiting Native lands, national and state parks while they are still funded and taken care of. Suffice to say, I found Spirit out there. 

First home

Look, I was never known for having small feelings. Everything I've ever felt has always felt immense and loud which means that the feelings that are already loud and achy were extra that and anything good felt amazing. This is wonderful to have until something bad happens; then it's torturous. And life be lifing a whole lot lately! I grew up not being able to express myself fully, and often being shushed or shut down when I showed emotions or expressed feelings, so when I became a teenager I often acted out in order to let the suffocated into silence energy out of me. I was also in a foreign land trying to assimilate and unspoken hormones were directing my actions. I started hanging out with all the people my mother didn't want me around. I wanted to do everything opposite of what my stepfather said. I was noticing holes in my most important pillars, and I needed a way out.

My voice mattered then, and it matters now. Of course, when I was a teenager, I wasn't aware of that so the agreement that I adopted then was that I was "too loud, too much, too emotional, too aware, too outspoken, too everything but at the same time not enough." I often hid myself and did what individual friends or groups wanted me to do. I was smoking cigarettes at 7, I tried weed and alcohol at 13, I was sexually active at 15. I tried to fit in. It worked until it didn't- my body is intuitive. Your body is intuitive- it knows what you need. It recognizes people, places and patterns of behavior so it gives you butterflies and chills when you're around someone you're attracted to but also a sense of cold sweat or pain when it's warning you about something or someone. All you have to do is be quiet and pay attention. I wish I knew that then because I would have saved myself lots of heartaches.

Fast forward to today, and I am learning daily to listen to my body. It's my first home regardless of the country it was born in or the parents it was granted to. My first and only true home that will reflect how I take care of her daily is my precious body. Recently, I received information from my doctor that my body already was privy to. At 27, I was gifted this gentle pause of degenerative disc dis-ease mainly in my cervical spine and some arthritis in my lumbar and hips. Now at 39, I have arthritis in my entire spine, degenerating discs in both lumbar and cervical plus new degeneration of my SI joints. My body was yelling this since 2025 started. She howled every time I sat in the car for longer than a few hours. She shouted every time I binged watched a season or 5 of some serial killer show. She bawled every time I didn't take care of myself that day. She is screaming now and I have to listen. 

I am terrified. I am staying off Google because I am not about to psych myself out. I am going to focus on PT, and a re-test in 3 months for some of the other things that showed on my lab work. My 5 year plan is not going to include a motorized scooter or wheelchair. Neither will my 10 to 40 year plan. FUCK THAT! Like a friend of mine says "God's going to have to catch me." 

Chronic baddies

Have you ever seen one of those signs that asks you how do you feel physically on a sliding scale 1-10 with 1 being mild pain and 10 being severe?- I would add 10 being even excruciating. Here is a breakdown of the scale- 1-3 mild pain, 4-6 moderate pain, and 7-10 being severe. Leaves much room for questioning, methinks.

I have not been at level 0 since I was in my teens. That's my truth. I have been at levels 3-8 the last 4 months. Call it getting older, call it degenerative disc disease, arthritis, stress, call it whatever makes you sleep better at night but for me it feels like "today, I am able to live or not live." At pain levels 8, people are shut down in a hospital while all I am getting is doctors telling me I'm overweight and to move. I AM MOVING- I am a fucking yoga teacher! It feels like pins and needles in my back when I walk, and it feels an elephant is sitting on my hips when I sit down, but oh when I lay? It feels wonderful, for a whole 5 minutes and then I sink in and start throbbing. It's great. Every day. 

A yoga sister of mine and I were chatting about pain sucking the life out of you and how wonderful it is to have people who you can vent to and talk to about important things such as trauma, physical, mental or spiritual! One of the many things we talked about, we were discussing how people ask questions as if the person they're asking hasn't thought of every question, solution, problem and googled naturalist medicine on how to solve it. I do appreciate people asking, but the questions get tiring. We are wasting time questioning things and not moving into action- sooner! If you know someone who is in pain, chronic, severe, excruciating pain and they are functioning?- Ask how you can help! We are handling the entire world that you are as well, but we are also physically worn out, burned out, torn down. Be kind. Offer help. Care. Hug them- it's been PROVEN to lessen pain!

Health care system as a whole is not equipped to TAKE CARE of people. It is set up as a business to keep people unhealthy- unless you do your research as well. You have to participate in your own life- get out of your own way! Our physical self is only one part of us but it's a big part in this energy field we call Earth! The medical business industry in the US is based on patching bullet wounds with Band-Aids, and that's been my experience since the very first doctor and the very first big ache! There is not a doctor that looks at you holistically to heal all parts of you- physical, mental, spiritual. So then you have to venture out and start your own research. Get into the western medicine in different states, and then turn to your woo woo friend and ask what they can do. Do whatever you need to in order to feel better because your life depends on it. So does a few people's.

Being without employment, there is a lot of work to do in order to keep my mind and body on some sort of schedule even though I just want to curl up and watch TV. I try to get out of the house once a day. Right now the only thing that keeps lessening my pain is movement- any activity to warm up my muscles and joints, plant medicine, somatic therapy, dancing, eating foods that make my body feel good and being around the people that keep my body/mind/soul safe. Also crying!!- I cry a lot lately!

Toodles!