Hello Friends,
I hope your experience welcoming Spring has managed to find moments of levity. Lightness is especially important anytime things may feel grave. I always take some time to consider the spirit of a season;
With autumn upon us, the nights have grown colder; the days are shorter. The trees transitioning their resources creates a spectacular array of colors as this cycle’s growth gives way to make possible next years blossoms. Death, one of the more well known archetypes of the 22 in Tarot’s Major Arcana has found their season.
10/15/2023 @Germantown Friends Meetinghouse
47 West Coulter Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19144
8/29/2023
Hello Friends,
I hope summer has allowed your fruits to ripen and that you are basking in the light that remains. Now and again, I catch myself wishing the remainder of summer away. Swatting gnats and smacking mosquitos while sweating through my second pair of underwear has certainly grown tiresome; It always does around this time of year. I also bit into one of many juicy peaches last week. Now we live in a world where biting into a peach may seem unremarkable, you can get a “peach” any time of year in many parts of a wealthy country such as the US. Of course my peach wasn’t a fruit forced to grow in artificial conditions; my peach wanted to burst forth from a tree that grows in my mom and step-dad’s yard. This peach and most others had several spots that ripened faster than others; insects fought for what was left and I left with a fraction of edible fruit but immeasurable nourishment, far beyond mere sustenance. This real fruit matured in as natural an environment as can be found in an American city today; juicier and messier than any conventional produce.
April, the first full month of Spring has arrived. April, which means “to open” is where we begin our inhalation. Summer will be the peak of our inhale where we are full as the flora ripens. Eventually we will exhale and autumn will drop any remaining fruit from trees serving to remind us that life remains even when its fullness has inverted. At the depths of winter, we remain empty and available knowing Spring will return. Here we find ourselves at a new dawn.
“Couples are wholes and not wholes, what agrees disagrees, the concordant is discordant. From all things one and from one all things.”
-Heraclitus
“Everything that originated from the tree of knowledge carries in it duality”
-Zohar
February is upon us friends. The second month of the year being a good time to give recognition to the dyad.
Happy New Year Friends,
The darkest days upon us and the cold insights an impulse to shiver. Breathe deep, make movements intentional - instead of panicked responses to the sudden shock. Daylight is returning, but it will be a while before the warmth of the sun can touch us, we must not waste the body’s stored energy. Reemergence will take time but there is literal light at the end of this tunnel of winter; and on the other side…
Hello Friends,
I’m hoping this moment finds you well. It has been several months since my last correspondence with several email drafts existing on my laptop; some long abandoned, one in a constant process of edits - perpetually one paragraph away from some grand resolution. Mostly I’ve existed in solitary practice: moving my body, breathing, violin-ing, meditating, reading and the various other intentional modes I use for self development. This too is in a constant state of edits - perpetually one step away from a sense of accomplishment.
Hello Friends,
It has been a while since my last correspondence and as I "turn" 41 today it felt important to reach out. It seems as though I had to lean fully into the archetype I played for much of my 41st trip around the sun. The Hermit who lives with both feet in the world ceases to be a hermit. It has been a pleasure to connect with several of you via classes and workshops, carving out a couple hours a week to connect with a friend - one foot has remained standing among you and the other is firmly rooted in esoteric matters. For a hermit that exists in both worlds the hidden doesn’t remain hidden from those who care to stay connected. So thank you for bearing with me while I reserved some light for solitary spaces.
“Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.”
-Iain Thomas (“I Wrote This For You”)
Happy Spring Friends,
I hope you are enjoying the seasonal shift (despite the recent winter reprise), awakening to possibility as new life appears in vibrant colors each day. I am blessed to have nature all about me, my parents (whom I rent a duplex from) have a yard designated as a “backyard wildlife sanctuary” fit with vegetable gardens, beehives and plenty of indigenous plants to attract a host of wild creatures that are consistently pushed to the margins as “development” encroaches upon their formerly vast territories.
Wishing you a peaceful transition and a happy new year. Conspicuously minus the exclamation point, or any emphasis. We have endured enough anxiety to feel no loss at the elimination of directed excitement. Instead I am taking this moment to become silent. I’ve grown increasingly quiet during recent time and feel that I must take this road a bit further if I’m ever to find a path toward communion. “Communion” with its 6 definitions at dictionary .com allow enough uncertainty to make me okay with moving toward an objective nothing; in the hopes that it may contain something.
I’ve been enjoying an abundance of time outdoors, teaching often in the mornings, leaving afternoons for training, reading and writing. At this moment I am sitting on a favorite bench in Wissahickon Park (a woodsy part of Philadelphia), smiling at passersby and doing a dance with a carpenter bee who has seemed curious and confused by my presence this past week. It has been incredibly beautiful and awesomely lonely. Creating a sense of normalcy in a world that often seems in chaos hasn’t been an easy feat; my mood (as I assume many of yours) often being a mixture of blasé exasperation.
I’m turning 40 in a couple weeks; A time often ripe with action(s) that get labeled a midlife crises or perhaps a touchstone of personal achievement. Following a somewhat disorienting few years, the later tends to feel untrue; I’m consistently hopeful that actions deviating from my “norm” will be considered not as a crises, but a consistent effort to avoid tragedy, or to be less dramatic, missed opportunity. I regard myself as a “slow mover” but I tend to be moving.
“There is nothing so beautiful as to approach the Divinity and spread its rays for the human race.”
-Beethoven
There are few things one needs to make great art of any kind. Technique and talent are certainly helpful tools to this end, but we have all seen popular artists reach millions while embodying a foundation that pedagogues would denounce as beyond the pale.
I see two essentials: discipline and meaning.