Mulan With the Preschoolers!
Yesterday I was sitting in the middle of my studio, and I was the eye of the storm. The storm was all of the mistakes that I had ever made in this entire life, and I sat there facing them, honoring the beating heart inside of myself. I was facing myself. I have not always had the wealth of health and community and peace. I have been on a path of reconnection and making amends as best as I can spiritually and tangibly. Perhaps these two ways are not so separate after all.
I have a painting titled Joan of Arc. She has a light in her eyes that means a lot to me. I have never seen a painting of mine have as much God (whatever you want to call HIM/HER - I have been calling God the infinite lately). She has been broken open clearly I still see that in her face, as I have in this life, and this has exposed her to the divine.
Do you want to hear something funny? Today a vision of Mulan came to mind, a movie that I watch with my little preschoolers often (oh those special little ones!) The song “I’ll make a man out of you” is on, and Shane is training all of the soldiers including Mulan. They are having a difficult time keeping up. Finally when everyone goes to bed, Mulan with determination in her eyes climbs the tall wooden post to retrieve the arrow at its peak. The viewer can see her determination. When Shane walks out of his tent come sunrise, Mulan sits victoriously at the top of the post and sends the arrow to his feet.
Mulan is a master piece if you ask me as a film. Top ten favorite movies!
I have been doing a lot of spiritual work for the past three years especially, and I feel the most stable and also heightened/ liberated that I have perhaps ever felt in this life. I recognize that there is more progress to be made (a beautiful infinity of progress!), but I feel good and free and happy in many ways. I recently heard a talk about Alms, and one thing that I want to bring in is more service to my community. I do some volunteering, but I just feel this nudge of intuition that service is the secret!
I have been thinking about the currency of community a lot lately, and this, this this is also a secret ingredient/ an antidote. Healthy, loving, supportive, strong hearted, goodwill (oh the power of goodwill!) community is precious and what is supposed to be I have been finding. Don’t you find that so many secrets to a good life are right in front of our eyes!?
Well that is all for this blog of musings, reflections and devotions.
I will leave this post with a poem I wrote yesterday (November 10th, 2025)
Title:
One Thousand Suns, All Expressions of the One Sun— Light on Water
My heart,
Innocent and bright- eyed, became wounded.
This glowing heart dimmed in her grief,
And in her self-victimization.
She hid so that no one could find her,
And thereby no one could wound her.
Alone in a dark room,
The flaming arrows couldn’t reach her anymore,
But neither could the beauty of friendship, the beauty of laughter, nor any of life’s simple joys.
This lonely heart stumbled across a Teacher one day.
He taught her about the Christ Light that we all have, waiting to be embodied
He healed her fear, melting it away like ice.
This was not all at once, but bit by bit, by the Grace of something/ someone/
The One who is everything Light- Infinity! Bliss! The source of all justice! Truth and Grace!
The journey has a starting point, but there is no end, my beloved!
For we too are infinite in our ending ascent.
We too are infinite on our climbing up the never- ending staircase!
This heart of mine, protected by the Saint, and guided began to come out of hiding.
And instead of falling victim to disharmonious energies, she began to hold her light strongly
To shift the disharmony into harmony (in situations that she was strong enough for- and this too increased) and she fell in love with God- and felt God’s eternal, Infinitely profound love for her— the Divine Mother, The Divine Father, the Blissful Infinite One!
This heart still is coming into her own, still facing trial, and her Teachers are still smiling down at her and laughing joyously with her (sometimes too putting a hand on her shoulder when she cries in sadness, often about some of the cruelty of the world, and sometimes about her own limitations and mistakes too)
She walks along the Mississippi River and Wayzata Beach today and admires the one thousand suns refracting off of the water - all expressions of the One Sun.