Looking For A Post modern Matchmaker?

 Tawkify!
 

http://tawkify.com/matchmakers/profiles/charlee/

Charlee's Tips For Tawkifiers

1. How to make Charlee's Tawkify Cocktail:

1 cup red wine

1/4 cup vodka

2 tbsp. sugar

1 whole vanilla bean stalk

1 whole cinnamon bean stalk

2. Twenty minutes before you're due to pick up the phone, make the cocktail.

3. Sit down, sip, and relax the 101 muscles of your face.

4. This is where your expression manifests, it's very emotional, and even if you're not meeting someone face-to-face your expression and posture will affect how you feel and communicate.

5. After you relax the chin muscles, the cheeks, around the mouth, around the eyes, the nose, and the forehead, then focus on a feeling inside of yourself that is like a substance of all that you love about yourself, and let that expression come into your face and animate it. This will give you a better starting-point for expressing and communicating.

6. Don't be too aloof—if you wanted to gain the attention of someone who responds to coldness, then you're fishing in a sea of sick fish. We want healthy ones, here!

7. Don't be overly giving of yourself yet, but be reasonably generous with your attention—an interested attitude—a warm radiance of attention is what attracts people.

8. It's a good space to get to know people. Be available and warm, but don't push so far in the person backs away.

9. Speak slowly and let your emotion color your speech. When I got back to New York from France one summer when I was 21, my old boyfriend came by for tea. I was so used to speaking in slow, articulated, (with a slight exaggeration in the "feeling" behind it for toning effect) English with the Parisians who couldn't suffer my hacked French, that it remained a habit for a while after I returned. "This is the best time I can remember having in YEARS!" my ex said, with a peculiarly renewed interest in me. Later I asked him why he enjoyed my company so much when all I did was offer him tea and ordinary conversation. He said I spoke so nicely--so slowly and clearly--that he was enchanted and felt the power of the exchange. I have tried to remember to slow down and enunciate since then. "It made you sound more intelligent," he said!

10. Remember people's hearts are at stake here—be honest and try to be kind.

Turning My Failures Into Honey...

 

Last Night As I Was Sleeping

Last night as I was sleeping,

I dreamt—marvelous error!—

that a spring was breaking

out in my heart.

I said: Along which secret aqueduct,

Oh water, are you coming to me,

water of a new life

that I have never drunk?

Last night as I was sleeping,

I dreamt—marvelous error!—

that I had a beehive

here inside my heart.

And the golden bees

were making white combs

and sweet honey

from my old failures.

Last night as I was sleeping,

I dreamt—marvelous error!—

that a fiery sun was giving

light inside my heart.

It was fiery because I felt

warmth as from a hearth,

and sun because it gave light

and brought tears to my eyes.

Last night as I slept,

I dreamt—marvelous error!—

that it was God I had

here inside my heart.

Antonio Machado

Astrological Notes From Barbara Taylor

 

Barbara Taylor & Chiron Associates

This article is in response to a number of questions and inquiries I have had recently about the rapidly-approaching Winter Solstice which occurs on December 21, 2012. The current concerns are based on the widely publicized ending of the 5,125-year Maya Long-Count Calendar cycle which is more popularly known as Doomsday 2012, or the end of the world (as we know it).

Much has been made of the concurrence of these dates. Many prognostications and predictions have been made that unfortunately are contributing greatly to the existential fear that accompanies living in a world where human-mediated tragedies and natural disasters are all too common.

The winter solstice which simply means the Sun is astrologically moving to 0° Capricorn, occurs at 6:12 AM EST, while in England it happens at 11:12 AM GMT or UT (universal time). It seems that some people are pointing to the repetition of 1s and 2s and somehow concluding that this is another ominous sign related to this date. In addition, there is a great deal of importance attached to the Sun being 'exactly' in the center of the Milky Way Galaxy at the moment of the solstice and the supposed end of the Maya calendar

The Sun will be approximately visually conjunct the Galactic Center on 12/21/12, but in fact it has been there for several years already and will be there for many years to come. The winter solstice point alignment with the galactic equatorial plane actually occurred during 1983 (plus or minus 5 years) and represents a 36-year passage because of the sun's Precessional movement is 1° per 72 years. From our perspective, many authorities think the winter solstice sun will be closest to the Galactic Center in 2019, although others think this actually occurred in 1988. The visual disc of the Sun actually occupies 1-degree of space, so it is virtually in contact with the presumed center of the Milky Way galaxy from 1°initial contact through 1°leaving contact. This translates into a 36-year passage of the Sun over the galactic center. Measuring a projected exact location of an object that occupies 1°of space over a 25,950-year cycle is pretty tricky from a visual perspective like the Maya used. Interestingly, this phenomenon of the winter solstice Sun is only visible at its Zenith between the Equator and 15° North Latitude, which happens to be the location of Izapa, the postulated birthplace of the

Maya Calendar.

Since 2008, I have been researching the Maya, their culture and their calendars, and presenting programs on this topic. It is distressing that so many people have turned the ancient Maya's amazing timekeeping methods into such a huge opportunity to promote fear and terror. One has to wonder if the motivation of many of the self-proclaimed prophets translates into profits as huge numbers of books have been sold and many expensive tours promoted to historic ruins of the Maya. Ironically, many people are disappointed to hear that this entire doomsday hoopla is nothing more than a flimsy cover for the tremendous amount of fear and unrest that permeates our world today. It seems if we can find some way to identify the threat as someone or something 'out there,' outside of ourselves, then we can avoid facing our inner shadows and taking responsibility for our lives in very important ways.

This mass projection of an approaching doomsday scenario is actually building upon our individual intrinsic fears. Escalating unfounded fear of this magnitude truly is tragic and we are seeing the heartbreaking results in escalating numbers. Unfortunately, we are physically unable to differentiate between a realistic fear, such as escaping a burning building, and an irrational fear, such as the looming end of the world in just a few days. Initially fear stimulates evasive action, in this instance running the gamut from survivalists stockpiling food and weapons to children and teenagers committing suicide in order to avoid being here at the end of the world. The final result of fear is paralysis and it seems that a significant number of people are so stuck in their many misguided beliefs of coming annihilation that they are unable to logically seek and assess the facts.

The holidays provide a time to gather with friends and family, a time to reflect on the past and to plan for the future. This holiday, we would be wise to examine our own fears and run a reality check on what we find. Perhaps we should also listen carefully for irrational fears that are expressed by others, especially impressionable children who are not yet able to separate fact from fantasy.

Beliefs trump logic. Our lives and our worldview are accurate expressions of our most deeply held beliefs. It matters not if our beliefs are not based on solid research or unflappable principles of reality. We act them out in our lives every day, often with positive results but often enough with resulting disasters. The hallmark of psychosis is living and acting out a faulty belief system that is disconnected from reality and has no concrete basis to support its delusional foundation. Essentially, we are seeing many threads in the unraveling tapestry of those who are living out their fantasies devoid of reality-based linear thinking and logic. Individually, we can create a different reality if we can change the way we see the world and how we create our deepest beliefs about life and the world that we all share.

As a bit of balance for the colossal sources promoting this mass hysteria and its polar opposite, massive hope for a miraculous shift of consciousness into enlightenment and ecstasy, we are wise to do our own research and logically sift the few facts from the many fantasies. Here are some online resources to help in our search for accurate information on which to base our beliefs. Please share these resources with those who are fearful about what might transpire this Friday. A change in perspective can change everything!

Ask an Astrobiologist has received more than 5000 questions about Doomsday 2012, with more than 400 answers posted. Read a summary of the answers that have already been posted, view a videoo n these topics, and submit your own questions.

http://astrobiology2.arc.nasa.gov/ask-an-astrobiologist/intro/nibiru-and-doomsday-2012-questions-and-answers

NASA has several resources to provide astronomical information relevant to this topic.

2012: Beginning of the End or Why the World Won't End?http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/2012.html

2012hoax http://2012hoax.org

The Truth about 2012 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LG2B9YZjr7w

Best wishes for peace and harmony during this sacred season! Barbara C. Taylor

Martha Beck's Holiday Notes

 

Immeasurable gratitude and the process of rebirth...

First of all I want to express my immeasurable gratitude to all the amazing people who have given me help, presents (or presence), kind wishes, and loving energy over the past few weeks. I’ve never had such an emotional and beautiful birthday, and at this point that’s saying a lot, for I am old.

Right now birth—and rebirth—are very much on my mind. Having finally reached the new home I’ve been yammering about for months, I’m in the process of being reborn as a Californian who lives on a ranch, something I never in a million years thought I would say.

(Speaking of which, I’m making a list called “S**T I never in a million years thought I would say.” For example, “Honey, could you get me the chainsaw?” “If you could just move the carcass over there it would help.” “Did the turkey hurt you, honey?”)

Even after all these years of coaching, I forgot what the process of rebirth actually feels like. It’s not as if I had no clues—have you ever seen a baby being born? They are slimy, disgusting creatures, and they scream constantly. Of course, there is nothing more precious than a newborn, but being one is not something you want to repeat too often. During the last week I drove several thousand miles, sustained approximately a thousand bruises, and stabbed myself in the eye brutally with a wire hanger. I look like the child I would have had after sleeping with Sasquatch.

Let’s just say that you, like me, are newly born in some way. Maybe you have just emerged from a terrible relationship, or you are starting a new business, or you have just had an actual baby, making you a newborn parent. Here are some reminders that have helped me cope with my own recent experiences:

Do not be ashamed if you find yourself screaming! Halfway through our long trip my GPS navigator gave out, telling me it had unsubscribed me and insisting that I give it a password that I forgot during the Reagan Administration (you kids don’t even remember President Reagan, and trust me he doesn’t remember you either). I thought I was hiding my distress from my son, who was in the car with me. I didn’t think he was watching when I physically assaulted the gas station pump simply because it was the nearest physical object. When I got back in the car Adam looked a little pale. Thinking he might have seen something, I said, “Honey, I’m sorry, I am not mad at you.” He said, and I quote: “It’s OK mom, you just scream too much.” I didn’t bother to explain that I am a new baby, and screaming is what new babies do best.

Let other people hold you up. I don’t mean as in mugging. I mean as in swaddling, feeding, and comforting you. Even if all you have to carry is a heart full of grief at the loss of your former life, you cannot carry it alone. Tell people when you are tired. Tell them when something is too hard. Tell them when there really is something they could do to help. More than any other animal, we are born needing one another. In our individualistic culture we can pretend much of the time that we need only ourselves. Times of rebirth will teach you just how ridiculous that is. Rely on your loved ones. If you have no loved ones, ask for help from strangers. Despite all the terrible things humans do, rebirth will teach you that our species' capacity for kindness far outstrips our cruelty. Rebirth will teach you this simple truth: most people are good.

Finally, I want to update you on a Square 3 tool you all learned in your training. I have revised the concept of Turtle Steps. I am now taking BABY Turtle Steps. My to-do list includes tasks like “plug in computer.” Sometimes that’s all I can take before I have to lie down. That’s OK. Babies lie down a lot. When they first start moving, they don’t gallop around like the deer I watch out my window as I write this newsletter. They creep, they thrash, and they frequently give up and go back to screaming.

I have a friend whose new grandbaby can travel only by rolling. It is quite an experience to see her trying to navigate around a room: ten pounds of ambitious human, with virtually no motor control, using every ounce of energy she possesses to move about half an inch and hour. I so identify.

So now I am going to go thrash around my new life for another BABY Turtle Step. My goals for the day are simple; the only really solid one is to avoid stabbing myself in the other eye. You may only roll one tiny fraction of an inch toward your goals today. You may have to ask for help from someone you’ve never even met. You may do some screaming. If all these things and more happen today, give yourself a high five. You are right on track for a wonderful new life.

~Martha

Thank you!

(Get your tissues out!)

Martha's Book Nook...

This month I want to recommend a classic: The four novel series by T.H. White The Once and Future King. We have a big-ass round table here at the ranch, and a visiting Shaman told me I must reread The Arthurian Legends. Start with the wonderful novel The Sword and The Stone. In that book, White describes the childhood of the future King Arthur, especially his education by the wizard Merlyn, who teaches him morals and ethics partly by turning him into a wide variety of animals. Anyone on the Team (that means you!) will identify with Arthur and spend some wonderful hours being educated by Merlyn. On second thought, most of you ARE Merlyn, so go right ahead and identify with him!

Whether you are re-birthing or just experiencing the crazy chaos of the holiday season... I wish you much love, safe travels, love that surrounds you (you are always held and supported), and the most delicious December.

Cheers to 2012 and I'll see YOU, YOU, YOU in 2013!

xo

Thanks To Luisa

http://www.madinamerica.com/

Thank You Ali! I Feel Honored!

http://ilenehartconsulting.blogspot.com - a counsellor and life coach, an old friend, and most important a truly wise human being with a big heart. Ali Armstrong

Post Atomic Hillbilly

Hamburger Bob Hamilton & Old Crow Studios & The Undertakin' Daddies...

Check them out on itunes!

Hamburger Bob Hamilton & Old Crow Studio Whitehorse Yukon

Check this band out on itunes!
 

The Breakmen Break Rules of Traditional Bluegrass

Yukon News

Ben Rogalsky, centre, and Matt Lawson of the Breakmen rehearse with the rest of the band at Old Crow Recording studio. They are playing at the Old Fire Hall on Saturday.

An auspicious meeting with Yukon musician Bob Hamilton five years ago has pulled roots group the Breakmen up to Whitehorse.

Archie Pateman, lead vocalist for the quartet, travelled to Atlin a few years ago to play the summer music festival with an earlier band of his, the Boot Screefers.

Pateman had long been a fan of Hamilton, admiring his work in the Undertaking Daddies. But he’d never actually met him.

Then, just as Pateman and his band took to the stage in Atlin, he saw Hamilton pull up on his Harley.

“Archie was preparing to sing a song called Isabel and he saw Bob and refused to do it because Bob was in the audience,” said Matthew Lawson, who plays upright bass for the Breakmen.

After the show, Pateman ended up meeting Hamilton.

“Bob was really gracious and said, ‘On your way back to town, why don’t you stop by,’” said Lawson.

And Pateman did, kicking off a friendship that has lasted since then.

The rest of the Breakmen eventually hooked up with Hamilton during a yearly bluegrass festival in Sorrento, BC. Hamilton was teaching a workshop.

“We’ve always clicked well with Bob and had fun, going back to the (festival) bus, having a whiskey and shooting the shit,” said Lawson.

“And we’ve always aspired to his style of music and professionalism.”

Now, Hamilton has invited them back into his home.

Last week members of the Breakmen arrived in Whitehorse to start recording at Hamilton’s Old Crow Recording studio.

It’s the first time the band has travelled to the Yukon together.

The four musicians are working on their third album since they started playing together in 2005.

Their first two albums, When You Leave Town and The Breakmen, feature rolling banjo picking, booming upright bass, mandolin and harmonized vocals that stray from traditional bluegrass songs.

The energy and enthusiasm of their shows has led people to compare them to bluegrass giants, Old Crow Medicine Show.

“I think it’s the younger energy and the string band thing we have going,” said Lawson explaining that musically, the band doesn’t mirror the sound of Old Crow Medicine Show.

For their third album, the band is trying to move even farther away from traditional bluegrass and roots and cross their music with other genres.

It will have more of an edge because of the new elements we’re adding, said Lawson.

That includes adding drumbeats to each of their songs, when with their earlier work, drums were only an afterthought.

“The result is a sound that’s really up front, rhythmic and driving,” said Lawson comparing the recent recording to “roots soup.”

The band is hoping the extra blend of music on this record will make the Breakmen more appealing to a general audience.

Not that Canada’s bluegrass scene is struggling to attract listeners, it’s actually bigger than it’s ever been, said Lawson.

The motivation to make its sound more accessible is more about the band wanting to branch out creatively than thinking the bluegrass genre is dying off, he said.

“When you’re not restricting your songwriting and song structure to a traditional (bluegrass sound) you can do so much more with it.”

The geographical distance between band members has also forced the musicians to be more creative.

A year and a half ago members of the band scattered from Vancouver to different towns in Canada and the US with Lawson living as far away as Ontario.

But the distance hasn’t been an issue for them, said Lawson.

“It creates an interesting dynamic,” he said.

Good musicians should be practising on their own anyhow, he said. So when one of the members of the band has an idea, they write the music for it, throw down some bass, guitar and vocals and send it to other people in the band and ask what they think.

“That’s the power of e-mail and modern technology,” he said.

When the band showed up in Whitehorse last week, the musicians had a sense of what they were going to play but didn’t have their record completely mapped out.

“It’s been an experimental process and it’s been pretty exciting like that,” said Lawson.

“When you record that way something happens that isn’t rehearsed and it’s, well, magic.”

The Breakmen play the Old Fire Hall Saturday night at 7:30 p.m.

12/12/12

12/12/12 @ 12:12 love to you!

Life Transitions - Thanks again to Martha Beck

 

Life changes... Insight from Martha

So here I sit amidst my remaining possessions, all of which have to fit into a house on my new property that is about a third the size of the house I live in now. I’m moving soon, headed to a less arid climate and a lifestyle with which I’m totally unfamiliar. I learn new startling things about this lifestyle every day. For example, gophers are evil. Who knew? Turns out they chew the roots out from under young trees and create holes that are exactly the right size to swallow a horse's foot and break its leg. There are literally thousands of new gophers on my new property. This ranch is to gophers what Manhattan is to Americans. I plan to address this with diplomacy, but I have been warned that St. Francis himself would have taken up arms if there had been gophers living in Assisi.

But the anti-gopher offensive has not yet been launched. Because right now I’m in the process of ending my old life, not yet beginning my new one. My coaches will recognize this as Square 1, a time of death and rebirth. We train to deal with many clients in this state of change, because it scrambles the average person's brain like an egg. I’m used to it, and was expecting it, which always helps. Nevertheless, every death, from the death of the smallest hope to the death of the physical body, throws most people into the cycle of grieving: denial, bargaining, anger, depression, acceptance. This is not a clean, linear process. It’s more like taking all those emotions, adding a huge dollop of fear, and blending the entire mixture like a green smoothie of psychological anguish.

When people ask me “What would you do if you only had one year to live?” I never come up with the exciting bucket list they expect. I would spend that entire year trying frantically to take care of everyone I would be leaving behind. This, believe me, is a bad choice. So I have reframed my current minor death as weaning.

Weaning is indeed the death of one situation—nursing—and the birth of a new way of life for both nurser and nursee. Far from being a catastrophic separation, it sets mother and baby free to embark on separate adventures, so that between them there will be a far more interesting assortment of experiences. Baby gets to develop self-sufficiency and empowerment. Hooray! Mother gets to sleep and shower without interruptions. Hooray, Hooray! So it’s all good—but it has to be done right.

There are two steps to successfully weaning yourself off any situation. The first is to step it down. Not to gross out those of you who have never given birth, but if you have ever fed a baby in nature’s way, you know exactly why cows make that horrible sound when someone forgets to milk them. You can’t go cold turkey in a relationship in which much nourishment has been exchanged at any point. It’s painful. It hurts the mother, and it starves the baby. A better way to proceed is to subtract one of your daily nursing sessions, and hold the new level for four days. Then subtract another nursing session, repeat for four days. Etc. (Why four days? I wrote a whole freakin’ book about it. Just take my word for it, it works.)

As you step down the amount of nourishment being given and received, you move on to the second step: substitutes. You must obviously find something else to feed the baby. Trying to be a martyr, to get along with less, is a noble but unworkable enterprise. If you are losing a situation that nourishes you, finding other nourishment should be at the top of your priority list. (By the way, if you are in relationships that don’t nourish you, something is wrong, but that’s another column.) For example, I am accustomed to receiving weekly energy treatments from a magical healer named John Parker. Sure, I can survive without this—but to do so would probably affect my overall health. But I can’t just substitute any old massage therapist for John Parker; he’s one of a kind. (Plus, if I ever had a massage therapist come to my new property he or she would immediately be eaten by gophers.) So I have to get creative. I have to come up with something so physically, emotionally, and spiritually renewing that it will create the same net effect of a John Parker treatment. At the moment, I’m thinking this may involve Quaaludes and a very clever monkey. I’ll keep you posted.

I can tell you some additions I’ve made to my life that are beginning to make up for this loss, and they may not be what you’d expect. (They never are.) One of my substitutes is downloading entire seasons of TV series I’ve never seen and watching them on my computer. I’m also into visiting sites online where I can find tutorials on drawing the human body in extreme perspective. Another is cooking with my friends who will be living on my property. I’ve never cooked before, but for some reason being several miles away from the nearest Starbucks has inspired me. Also, I’ve stumbled upon a new system for memorizing piano music. What does any of this have to do with energy healing? Not a damn thing. That’s the point of weaning. You are going to a whole new source of nourishment, not just moving from boob to boob. I mean seriously, how is milk like grass? It isn’t! Eat it anyway!

So as your life changes—because everyone’s life is changing—use step-downs and substitutes to wean yourself off whatever you are losing. You’ll never find things going back to the way they were—but you will find yourself forced into discovering delicious new things you may have never even imagined. For example, gopher hunting.

~Martha