mull

i am on the isle of mull, one of the inner hebrides off the west coast of scotland. it is beautiful and i've been incredibly lucky with the weather. where i'm staying is the ferry port for ferries to iona. spent a day there a few days ago and had a great time. walked a fair bit round the island (it's small) and then meditated in the nunnery which unlike the more famous nearby abbey is a ruin. the abbey has been restored and maintained through the centuries while the nunnery has been allowed to fall to ruin. why doesn't that surprise me?

i've been on a couple of wildlife tours -- on on a boat rount the isles and another inland. seen sea eagles - one a mother feeding her chick in the nest, a golden eagle, puffins by the score (they are just finished hatching so saw them on the water and on land, deer, otters, seals and a load more things. no whales out that day,nor dolphins but a wee porpoise.

february sorry speech

i have mentioned a couple of times that i was deeply moved in australia to witness the "sorry" speech made by kevin rudd in february. i have been meaning to post a link to some articles about it and haven't done so. so, here it is. click on the header to go to a page from the sydney morning herald. the first video link (the day we said sorry) is a 4 minute report and really captures the spirit of the day. it was an historic occasion and i was so so happy to be there in the street sharing the moment with hundreds of people -- first nation people as well as others. there is also a link which gives you the speech in full. that's half an hour. so do have a look, i think it was an amazing day, i know it was a couple of months ago but...
better late than never.

more about transition culture

for anyone interested in my last post, take a look at the closing speech by rob hopkins of the transition town initiative. click on the header of this post to take you to the speech. i was especially interested in his references to santideva's bodhicaryavatara

transition towns

last weekend i met some people involved in the "transition town" initiatives -- sometimes known as energy descent initiative- in totness, bath and bristol. i had heard the term before and knew it had something to do with peak oil but i hadn't heard much about it nor met anyone involved in one of these transition towns. i think i had put it in a box in my mind which goes : "could be interesting but has something to do with permaculture so not my bag"!!!!

anyway meeting these folks i thought it was really interesting and bought a copy of
The Transition Handbook: from oil dependency to local resilience by Rob Hopkins

which seems to be the bible. i am just starting to read it. also been having a web trawl and seen various interesting sites. turns out portobello in embra (that would be edinburgh in case it isn't obvious) has a transition town initiative going. click the title of this post to get to their web site. this has links to the main wiki site for transition towns in general and information about the whole idea. in scotland the other transition towns are in biggar and dunbar, which seems pretty amazing somehow. hard to explain why! and there are around 60 in the uk apparently as well as others world wide.

forgive me if this is old hat but i found it inspiring, fascinating, rather challenging. i thought maybe some of us can be thinking about transition glasgow????? or something. long term? i don't know, i'm just throwing it out. what interests me is the idea of urban initiatives. i feel very strongly that i do want to move back to glasgow - don't know how or when - but i do know i don't want to live on my own in a wee flat. i want community and this seems to me to speak to something of that.

back in the north

i wrote this last week for shabda (the order reporting in monthly) and just thought i could post it here too.

i am back in the northern hemisphere. i almost said the frozen north but actually spring is just starting to show. there are daffodils in the garden here at taraloka and in the lanes around here and a few brave buds are trying to push through. i came back from australia on friday last week and have had a few days catching up here at taraloka. i have felt bereft and sad at times but no jet lag which is good. this afternoon i am off to birmingham for the last few days of the college meeting.

i don't know what to write about my time away. it is too big a journey to lightly describe. the journey was geographical and spiritual. i completely fell in love with the land in australia, especially when subhavyuha and i spent some days at uluru, the aboriginal sacred site in the desert which used to be known as ayers rock. what a stunning place. i think that was a peak experience of my life. i had been feeling drawn to questions about home even before visiting there and there was something stunning about being on land where an unbroken line of people have lived for probably more than 65,000 years. and the desert was fantastic. i feel i need to explore something of my own roots and groundedness. i am not very grounded. in elemental terms i am more fire and air than earth or water and i feel a need to change that. i feel i slowed down on this trip, particularly in uluru and i want to find a way to honour that.

one thing that happened during my time in aotearoa/ new zealand was that i got in touch again with sexual abuse memories. that carried on and i must say it did make for a challenge especially leading these big retreats with over thirty people on them. i would be having physical flashbacks, re-experiencing events of a truly horrible traumatic nature but i am incredibly grateful to vikasini who continued to give me cranial osteopathy which i think has really helped me to move through something. i do believe that these memories are held on a cellular level and it feels like i have been experiencing shifts on that level. it has been horrendous, painful (both physically and emotionally), disgusting and yet liberating. i do not want to die with this stuff still present. i know it is vipakka but i am also aware of deep patterns of behaviour that cause karma formations which come from these memories and traumas. i want to leave no traces. i want to break that circle where i act defensively or even offensively because of vulnerabilities and deep rooted insecurities.

i know i am writing of my inner landscape and experience and i am sorry not to share more of the wonderful exterior experiences i also had. i was impressed by the sangha in the different places i visited and was delighted to get to know so many people. i have definitely left a bit of my heart there and can't wait to visit again. i might well do so in 09 after or before the convention in india. on that subject i am delighted that an international convention will take place in india. the only fly in the ointment (and it is a big one) is the air miles involved but then if we are going to have an international convention at all airmiles will be involved somehow. and this way it will be a more truly international event even if fewer europeans attend than usual. i think it will be great for our indian brothers and sisters to have that experience and, of course, much more viable for the antipodeans that a trip to england would be.

yesterday i was driving to whitchurch - the town near taraloka. i was wending my way through windy country lanes and had such a strange experience. last time i was behind the wheel of a car was driving in a straight line through red desert. what a contrast. what a wonderful world as the song says. how much i love the world. how much i love diversity. i want to do all i can to serve in the healing of our world - and of course right now, i feel a need to work on the healing of myself. not seperate of course. and i thought how privileged i am that i have seen so much of the world. and me from the glasgwegian working classes!

uluru / kata tjuta

still in the land of oz. haven't been in the mood for writing - or when i have been i haven't had time. main thing i want to mention now is the trip i took to uluru and kata tjuta national park in mid australia. click on the title to link to the govt official web page. i took few photos there. it was truly awesome in the real sense of the word.i just wanted to experience it.
imagine desert, red earth, intense blue skies, 37 degrees in the shade but there isn't any and that still goes nowhere to describing the experience. i think it was one of the most intense experiences of my life. i felt energised walking on the land there, wanted to weep at the scale and wonder of both uluru and kata tjuta, felt humbled in their shadow. and felt stunned by the changing shape and colour of both.
we spent more time at uluru as that is nearer to the resort which is the only place you can stay near there. as we approached it looked different in different lights, its size and shape changed as well as its colour. i really felt i was in a timeless place, especially in the few snatches of time when we weren't surrounded by tourists clicking cameras. great thing was that at sunrise or sunset the viewing spots would be pretty packed, especially at uluru. then literally ten minutes after the sun had risen or departed the great majority would be in their buses and off they would go leaving subhavyuha and i and perhaps a few others to watch the sky's wonderful display of changing colour. and the rock changing dramatically - from dull brown to glowing orange to deep red. extraordinary.

and driving through the desert was pretty great as well. i'd love to come back and do a longer trip of that. straight road through blood red earth, few scrubs and trees by the side and sand dunes in the distance. mythic. and fighting the desire to speed. 100k seems little when theres miles of nothing in front or behind you and no other cars on the road. but there are signs everywhere reminding you that kangaroos and other animals might suddenly hop in front of you. so i stayed in the limit!
was sorry not to see kangaroos but one night driving back in the twilight after seeing kata tjuta at sunset, 4 camels crossed the road in front of us. shubhavyuha was driving and stopped in good time. we got out and just watched them cross the road, watched their outline against the sunset sky and then they faded like magic into the night.

talking of the night - the night skies were spectacular. one night we went to the observatory for a lecture and explanation of the southern sky. funny to see familiar constellations upside down - something that had disoriented me right from arriving in new zealand. we also learned how to find due south from the southern cross but seemed complicated, think a compass is a better idea. had a great look through the telescopes at the observatory. at the lesser magellan cloud and also at some new stars. i love looking through telescopes.

so the sense of spaciousness from earth and sky was magnificent and just what the doctor ordered. i felt myself slow down and the pace of my breath changing. i would love to keep that sense. i have been experiencing big changes in myself anyway while on this trip though i couldn't articulate quite what those changes are. uluru feels part of that. also i have been so happy to learn from the sense of aboriginal culture here. shubhavyuha and i did a dot painting workshop at uluru which i loved.

on the topic of aboriginal culture i was delighted to be in sydney for the sorry speech that the new prime minister made in february. but that deserves an entry all to itself.

down under

well of course it's only down under if you are up there, so to speak.
am in auckland just now where it is, of course, high summer which is very nice indeed. i have just finished leading a retreat for the australasian dharmacharinis on the lojong training. the 7 point mind training to be precise.there were 30 of us and it went really well.
before that i led a week called healing self, healing world which is a sort of applied bodhisattva ideal retreat drawing on some of Joanna Macy's work that reconnects (see my entry on the retreat at dhanakosa for a bit more about the work.
there were 16 of us on that and it went brilliantly. it was over new year so we incorporated that as well with an evening of entertainment and then a ritual and puja up at the stupa which was stunning.
course it is a bit strange (for me) doing a new year ritual in summer.