Jasmine and Rattlesnake
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson, Ed.D.
www.pathwaysforhealing.net
joanne@pathwaysforhealing.net
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JASMINE AND RATTLESNAKE
Jasmine’s barking alerted me from across the mesa. Turning back to find her, I quickly scanned the land for the coyotes she was likely talking to and telling me about. No wild dogs in sight. Just Jasmine standing among the junipers and sage, her head raised toward the turquoise blue sky, barking away. I called to let her know her pack-of-two was joined up. Jasmine leaned down toward the desert soils and suddenly lurched back. That’s when I saw the coiled serpent body and heard the unmistakable sounds. Jasmine was nose to nose with a rattlesnake.
The picture of what-I-should-do instantly flashed through my mind: heroically fling my body between the snake and my dog. Truth is, I stayed a safe distance away. I wasn’t sure at the time what that said about me as a dog mama. Opting for self-preservation? Really wanting to stay unharmed and alive?
No matter what I did, I could not lure Jasmine away. So I stood nearby, curiously watching the unfolding dance. Jasmine stopped barking. Rattlesnake stopped rattling. And Jasmine sat down in the middle of the mesa, unperturbed and at ease, right where there’d just been a highly charged circumstance.
Was she communing with the snake? Was she a snake hunter? A snake charmer? Had Rattlesnake charmed her? Perhaps they were involved in a peace negotiation. Maybe they were sharing what they knew about the mesas, about life, from their particular points of view. There was something going on between the snake and the dog, something beyond what my human eyes could see.
It was quite some time before we finally all journeyed home. Rattlesnake slithered underground. Jasmine pranced along the dirt path on all fours. I walked in my hiking shoes carefully watching each step, extra-attentive to who might be crawling around.
The rattling of the rattlesnake has stayed with me for days. The sound is compelling – beautiful and delicate and uncompromising all at once. The snake’s rhythmic rattling carries a clear, unwavering message: “I’m here! This is my body! This is my space on the land!” The rattling is a claiming, a calling for mutual awareness, an embodied request to honor the snake’s birthright to be who and where she is at that particular moment in time. It’s all there in the vibration. Self-protection. Preserving aliveness. The cherishing of life.
That seems the common ground on which we all stood that day out on the mesas – rattlesnake, human and dog. Each of us, loving life. Protecting aliveness in the organic ways of our unique bodies, spirits and minds. Negotiating in diverse languages our co-existence on the land. Creating and claiming safe and sacred space.
It’s not just the rattling that has stayed with me for awhile. So too has weaving of our co-existence, the resounding peace and the quiet. Because rattlesnakes don’t rattle all the time. Most of their days are spent purposefully engaged in the other intriguing aspects of their lives. Rattling is episodic, a specifically chosen response to a potential life-and-death circumstance. What ingenious communication – the motion, sounds and vibration broadcast a message while Snake gathers up information to readily discern if further measures for self-protection are required. Once the threat has diminished, once mutual understandings of presence and space have been clarified, the rattling doesn’t keep going on and on. The snake and everybody involved freely move along their way, all lives touched by the unexpected crossing of their paths.
The artful ways of the rattlesnake have something to teach us. Because we two-leggeds have gotten trapped inside our relentless flight-or-flight mode. Worry Worry Worry. Fear Fear Fear. Anger Anger Anger. Stress Stress Stress. Fight Fight Fight. These habitual patterns are disharmonious and deafening. Drowning out the joy of our aliveness. Burying the passionate cherishing of life.
So we’ve just got to do a little digging. And find again our joy, those wild instinctive passions, that boundless creative momentum hidden away inside. And amplify the feelings until we’re filled to overflowing. Radiating aliveness. Claiming our birthright to be who we really are, right where we are, here and now. Honoring the organic rhythms and ways of every body, spirit and mind. Creating and sharing sacred space on the earth. Living in love with Life.
It’s all there in our vibration, naturally.
Manaole U Manaole,
from my heart to the heart of mother earth to your heart,
JoAnne Dodgson
MAKING WAVES
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson, Ed.D.
www.pathwaysforhealing.net
joanne@pathwaysforhealing.net
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MAKING WAVES
During my childhood, many summer days were spent at my grandpa’s farm. Running around the fields chasing grasshoppers. Tentatively feeding horses handfuls of plucked weeds. Jumping into the swimming pool to find relief from the stifling humidity and soon shivering, teeth-chattering, from the water barely warmed by the sun. My brothers, sister and I loved to make waves in the swimming pool. Gripping the sides or sitting on the steps, we wiggled, splashed and kicked with unbridled passion to fill the waters with wild rippling waves.
Making waves. Looking back on these memories, I see now how we generated the waves with our intent, with the movement of our bodies, with our enchantment with the magic of creating change. We purposefully filled the pool with something of our own making – all the motion and diverse patterns rippling out from our bodies, the unexpected surprises in the ways the water moved, the playing together, the feeling of family, the peels of our laughter dancing around with the waters we were immersed in.
Making waves. Not just a childhood memory. We are all actually doing this every moment of our lives. Every thought we think, every word we say, every action we take sends waves into the world. The energies of these waves touch everything within us and ripple out, touching everything all around.
Very different things happen inside us when we feel or speak in anger than when we feel or speak with acceptance and the desire to learn and understand. Feelings of peace and delight, thoughts of competition and fear, send very different energies rippling out into the world, affecting everyone they touch nearby and far beyond. Like generating waves in the swimming pool, we live immersed in the world of our own making.
So is there something you want to change? In your life? Home? Community? World?
Make some waves. With purposeful intent. With unbridled passion. With your body, spirit and mind. With your actions and words and thoughts and emotions. Without a doubt about your power to create change.
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OnLine Courses with JoAnne Dodgson
Offered by Wise Woman University
SHAMAN’S CIRCLE • MANIFESTING WITH THE MOON
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Dream A New Dream
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson, Ed.D.
www.pathwaysforhealing.net • joanne@pathwaysforhealing.net
DREAM A NEW DREAM
This weekend, on Sunday, the earth, moon and sun will join up in creating a total solar eclipse. When we look at a photograph or even glance toward the sky, our minds tend to interpret what we see in two-dimensional forms – a flat sky, a flat round moon passing in front of a flat circular sun. This narrowed perspective makes things simple, perhaps, but so much remains hidden from our view.
We miss out on the incredible depths of space we’re gazing into. We don’t quite let ourselves feel the mystery and magic so alive in the relationships among our earth and moon and sun. We forget we’re living on an immense spherical planet spinning on her own axis while spiraling through space. The earth is steadily encircled by a moon who energetically touches all the waters, influencing the ebb and flow of life. And then there’s our sun, a fiery star so extraordinary who brings light and warmth to the earth from millions and millions of miles away. And somehow in the midst of the ceaseless cosmic movements of these interwoven orbits in the endless oceans of space, our earth and moon and sun align in a particular way at a specific moment in time to create a solar eclipse. Wrapping our minds and hearts around all this is something we’ve spent centuries upon centuries trying to achieve – and it’s just a part of the story of our planet and the galaxy and universe we call home.
When we open ourselves up to experience life in it’s fullness and see beyond that flat two-dimensional perspective, we discover we’re not sitting somewhere outside looking in. We’re in it. We’re of it. We are Life. So connected. Co-creators of this grand celestial dance.
And therein lies the power of our dreams.
Our dreams, visions and intentions provide the blueprint, the very seed, for everything that comes alive in our everyday world. Without new dreams, nothing new will grow.
The solar eclipse brings darkness during the daytime and occurs during the new moon/dark moon phase, the time in the lunar cycle when the moon isn’t visible in the night sky. The nourishing stillness of the deep darkness, amplified by the mystical energies of the eclipse, offers a potent invitation to enter the dreamtime. To intentionally reach for new visions. To picture creative change. To think, feel and explore beyond all the judgments and expectations which have limited our experience and narrowed our view. The interwoven energies of the earth and moon and sun are calling us to passionately give voice to new dreams.
What do you really want?
How do you want to experience life, moment to moment, day to day?
What do you want for your relationships? Health? Home? Friends and family?
What about the spending and sharing of money and time?
How would you really like the world to be?
What changes would nourish and sustain Life on our planet?
Dream a new dream.
In full color.
In all dimensions.
With rich detail.
Co-creating.
In connection with all life.
New beginnings begin with new dreams.
Manaole U Manaole,
from my heart to the heart of mother earth to your heart,
JoAnne Dodgson
For the Love of Water
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson, Ed.D.
www.pathwaysforhealing.net • joanne@pathwaysforhealing.net
FOR THE LOVE OF WATER
“It was the prairie dogs,” she smiled, looking over her lush vegetable garden. During the hot desert summer, Sofia had been concerned her plants wouldn’t survive. She didn’t own rights to the fresh water streaming by in the acequia, the irrigation ditch leading from the river to her neighbors’ fields. Looking around the land, still trying to piece together her story, I silently wrestled with the idea that somebody owned the water. And what had the prairie dogs done?
A chattering flock of chickens and two woolly sheep watched attentively as Sofia and I gingerly walked through the garden. We admired the leafy greens, the diverse shapes, colors and stages of the growth of the vegetables. Sofia told me how feeding her baby these homegrown foods was so important to her. “It was the prairie dogs who brought the water, ” she said with delight.
Not everybody smiles when they talk about prairie dogs. There are those who go to great lengths and use quite horrific means to get prairie dogs off their lands. Because prairie dogs like to live in large extended family groups. And prairie dogs love to dig. They are gifted architects of underground tunnels, instinctively building extensive networks of burrows for their homes. Many people don’t want these wild animals disturbing their gardens or manicured lawns.
Last summer, here in the desert valley, the acequia gate was opened as usual and the river water flowed into the irrigation ditch which by-passed Sofia’s land. Unexpectedly, because of the prairie dogs, the water had a new underground network of pathways to follow. Water seeped into these hidden tunnels and found it’s way to the very roots of the plants in Sofia’s garden – inviting the garden to flourish and provide abundant food for her family, not to mention delectable treats for the chickens, deer and rabbits too.
Prairie dogs live deeply connected with the soils of the earth. Water passionately flows, touching and nourishing life along it’s way. Precious resources, unexpected gifts and creative collaborations come alive when we’re not warring against “the bad guys,” even the little furry ones.
Cherishing the mother earth.
Loving the water.
Trusting the natural flow.
How beautiful life can be.
Manaole U Manaole,
from my heart to the heart of the mother earth to your heart,
JoAnne Dodgson
Summer Solstice
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson, Ed.D.
www.pathwaysforhealing.net • joanne@pathwaysforhealing.net
Dear Friends:
We live in a universe of cycles within cycles within cycles. As we move into the passage of the Summer Solstice here in the northern hemisphere, the southern hemisphere of the earth is settling into the heart of wintertime. The changing of the earth’s seasons is just one of the countless cycles unfolding moment by moment, within us and around us, in the vast and richly diverse web of life.
In many ancient traditions, the earth’s seasonal transitions are honored with celebrations and sacred ceremony. The Summer Solstice is the longest day of the year as measured by the hours and minutes passing between sunrise and sunset. Summer Solstice ceremonies involve the honoring of our sun, of the essential natural light, heat and energies which nourish life on our planet.
In the Peruvian tradition Ka Ta See, sacred ceremonies involve calling in the Four Directions for assistance, guidance and support. Each direction has a kinship with a particular season. In the ancient Peruvian ways, the South is associated with Summer.
The gifts of the South are about knowing who we really are, feeling and living our truths, freely expressing what the elders poetically referred to as our “Song.” Summer, with the radiant shining of light, illustrates and symbolizes this full and free expression – no hiding, no diminishing of our love, creativity, beauty, passions or joy. Connecting with the gifts of the South and medicines of Summer, we are invited to let our light shine, to know, express, feel and be our unique individual Song – no holding back, no toning it down.
In celebration of the Summer Solstice, I’d like to share an excerpt from a prayer offering I’ve written to honor and call in the Gifts of the Four Directions. Below is the section for welcoming the Gifts of the South.
In the spirit of Summer Solstice, may your life be filled with freedom, with the passionate and joy-filled expression of your Song.
Manaole U Manaole,
from my heart to the heart of mother earth to your heart,
JoAnne Dodgson
To the Spirits of the South -
Thank you for the Gifts of Song
For the invitation to remember and reclaim all of who I am
To thrive in the vibration of uninhibited aliveness
To live freely and fully in my own skin
Wild as the Full Moon
Radiant as the mid-day Sun
Passionate as the blossomings of Summer.
Whole Again
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson, Ed.D.
www.pathwaysforhealing.net • joanne@pathwaysforhealing.net
YOU CAN BE WHOLE AGAIN
healing from trauma, life changes and loss
Saturday, June 19 • Abiquiu, NM
Being Whole Again Is Within Your Reach. Experience ancient sacred ceremony to reclaim ‘missing pieces’ of your spirit from past trauma, illness, relationship changes, accidents, death of loved ones, unexpected and challenging life transitions. Learn self-empowering tools to continue your healing process independently.
Click here for flier: wholeagain
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Butterfly Medicine
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson. Ed.D.
www.pathwaysforhealing.net • joanne@pathwaysforhealing.net
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SUMMER GATHERINGS
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LIVING IN BALANCE RETREAT • July 8-11 in New Mexico
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SHAMAN’S CIRCLE and MANIFESTING WITH THE MOON – Ongoing enrollment in JoAnne Dodgson’s online classes with Wise Woman University
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FOOD AS SACRED MEDICINE
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BUTTERFLY MEDICINE • JoAnne Dodgson
Inside the stillness of the morning sun, the woman heard the soft pattering of wings. A delicate shadow fluttered by, dancing across the ground, brushing over her shoulders. The woman traced the path of the dancing shadow, curious who it belonged to. She spotted an brilliant butterfly touching down on a yellow wildflower. Taking flight again, the swallowtail butterfly beckoned the woman to follow.
Landing in cluster of red blossoms, the swallowtail butterfly crept inside a flower to drink in the nourishing nectar. He walked along a broad green leaf, reaching around with his antennae, sensing with every step. “There’s magic happening here,” Swallowtail whispered. “Come see.”
The woman leaned in toward the blossoming plant and noticed a small pod dangling beneath the leaf. The glistening shell of the pod split open. Delicate spindly legs reached out from the inside. Slowly and steadily, a purple-winged butterfly began emerging from the chrysalis.
“There’s something unstoppable calling her out,” said Swallowtail. “The seasons of the earth. The purpose of her being. The passions of her life. Can you feel it?”
The woman’s amazement soon turned into worry as her mind cluttered with fears. The poor little butterfly seemed to be struggling. It was too much, all the changes. It was too hard, coming into the world on her own. The woman reached toward the chrysalis, compelled by the impulse to help make things better. Swallowtail fluttered wildly around the woman’s face, intentionally distracting her.
The purple-winged butterfly kept moving in her own unique rhythm and pace, finally freeing herself from the chrysalis. She rested in the warmth of the sun, opening and closing her wings until they fully took shape. Then suddenly, as if she’d flown millions of miles before, the purple butterfly gracefully took flight. “Now it’s your turn,” the woman heard the butterfly say.
Center of the Circle
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson. Ed.D.
www.pathwaysforhealing.net
Dear Friends:
In the ancient Peruvian tradition, Ka Ta See, the tribal culture was understood to be a circle in which women are the center. There are no hierarchies in this way of life. In a community shaped by equity, there is enduring respect for women, their bodies, spirits and minds. Women are deeply honored for their gifts of giving birth, for weaving the web of life. To hold the center of family and community, women are responsible to live authentically, to naturally radiate who they really are, to openly share their happiness, love, vast knowing and aliveness.
In the ancient ways, the honoring of women goes hand-in-hand with the honoring of the feminine energies in everyone and everything on our planet earth. Feminine energy is receptive, flowing, and rooted in relationship. Feminine energy is visionary, filled with the capacity to dream new dreams and see beyond what is. The feminine holds the vision, the blueprint, for what may be and nourishes the continuance of life.
In our modern-day world, honoring women as the center of the circle opens up the potential to give birth to a new (and ancient) way of life. We can unlearn what we’ve learned about judging ourselves and others. We can untangle from the beliefs that keep us stuck inside harmful hierarchies – all the habitual ways we place ourselves and everyone else in categories of better than and less than, good or bad, worthy or not.
The ancient ways offer us a pathway for remembering how to create balance and thrive – living and relating as part of a circle, honoring the feminine, filling ourselves and the world with equity and unconditional love.
Manaole U Manaole, from my heart to the heart of mother earth to your heart,
JoAnne Dodgson
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SPECIAL EVENTS
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• LIVING IN BALANCE RETREAT • July 8-11 in New Mexico
• MATRIARCH GATHERING * June 24-27 in Colorado
• SHAMAN’S CIRCLE and MANIFESTING WITH THE MOON – Ongoing enrollment in JoAnne Dodgson’s online classes offered with Wise Woman University
Magic
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson
www.pathwaysforhealing.net
Dear Friends,
We are nearing the time of Beltane, the midpoint between spring equinox and summer solstice. In diverse cultures, Beltane is regarded with much mystery and magic – the time ‘betwixt and between’ – when the veil between worlds is thin.
Beltane is a celebration of the fertility of life, honoring all that is growing and blossoming in the momentum toward summer. In the coming days, the full moon unfolds very closely with the passage of Beltane. Full Moon glows with beauty and mystery, inviting full and free expression of the light.
We can intentionally join up with the dynamic energies of our earth and moon during this transformational time. Feeling the passion of our aliveness. Celebrating the mysteries of life and remembering the magic, within us and all around. Holding awareness in the physical while reaching beyond to connect with the realms of the spirit. Utilizing the creative gifts of our own fertility to live our potentials and manifest our dreams.
Manaole U Manaole,
from my heart to the heart of mother earth to your heart,
JoAnne Dodgson
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SUMMER 
GATHERINGS
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LIVING IN BALANCE RETREAT • July 8-11 in New Mexico
MATRIARCH GATHERING * June 24-27 in Colorado
SHAMAN’S CIRCLE and MANIFESTING WITH THE MOON – Ongoing enrollment in JoAnne Dodgson’s online classes offered with Wise Woman University
Dance with Coyote
LIVING IN BALANCE FROM THE HEART
with JoAnne Dodgson
www.pathwaysforhealing.net • joanne@pathwaysforhealing.net
Dear Friends:
Spring is unfolding here in the lands of New Mexico. Tiny green plants are beginning to sprout up through the sandy soil. Diverse birds are coming through on their migrations north, brightly singing out from the branches of the juniper trees. Returning from their winter homes, turkey vultures circled over the house and mesas on a recent warm afternoon. In an ancient Egyptian tradition, the vulture is highly revered as a sacred symbol and teacher about unconditional love. Whenever I watch vultures soaring in the skies, I feel them showering the earth with unconditional love flowing from their outstretched wings.
Coyotes, too, are celebrating the arrival of spring. They’re howling in the night and running along the lands. The young ones will soon be venturing out from their dens. In the spirit of Spring awakenings, here is a story from an unexpected encounter with Coyote a couple years ago.
Wishing you a beautiful spring.
Manaole U Manaole – from my heart to the heart of the mother earth to your heart,
JoAnne Dodgson
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DANCE WITH COYOTE
One evening I climbed up a ravine and came face-to-face with a coyote watching over from the top of the ridge. There we stood, nose-to-nose, just a few feet from one another, both silent and still, curious and sensing. I’m not certain what the coyote experienced, but I was thrilled by the unexpected crossing of our paths.
In the timeless expanse of those few precious moments spent gazing into the eyes of a wild dog, I reached out to share a respectful connection, a joining of our worlds shaped by love. I wanted to weave of a web of connection that would untangle us both from the well-entrenched legacies of wariness and fear – because the shared history between us two-leggeds and coyotes includes generations of concerted human efforts to eliminate them.
Nevertheless these spirited dogs of the wild keep growing in number and expanding their territory, thriving in all kinds of climates and terrains. Clearly unwilling to give up or give in or get caged by others’ agendas and fears, the wild dogs of the desert are ingenious. Some consider coyotes to be tricksters. I consider Coyote to be a great teacher about tenacity — the unyielding pursuits of potentials and possibilities; the passionate reaching beyond survival to fully flourish and freely thrive, even against all odds.
Coyotes have an exquisite love affair with life. I hear them calling me to join in the dance.
