Tag: love

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Green Lifestyle Earth

MAEOE – Be Green, Learn Green, Live Green

The annual Maryland Association for Environmental and Outdoor Education Conference was held in Ocean City Maryland February 3rd-5th, 2023. The theme of the conference this year was Be Green, Learn Green, Live Green.

What does it mean to Be Green?

Green is a term used for being environmental friendly. It refers to keeping our earth healthy and clean. Being green means respecting our environment by keeping it clean and not leaving trash around, while using our resources in the right way, without wasting them.

MAEOE is a wonderful organization that helps schools in Maryland to be Green Schools. This is my school’s 4th year recertifying as a green school. In order to do the application for our recertification we have to collet data on how our school is green! The MAEOE conference is one way that I bring back information and ideas on ways our school can thrive in being green.

Landscape Design for Nature Educators

The first workshop I attended at the conference this year was a landscape design workshop! I was super excited about it because as an art educator, I haven’t had much learning about landscaping, planting or designing gardens. Though as the green school coordinator, who has won a few grants for our school for environmental projects, it would greatly help me plan for outdoor gardens at our school.

I learned so much from this workshop. The presenters gave us all a folder of information about native plants, which shared when to plant and where. We also learned a lot about how to work with the stakeholders at our school, because it is a team effort to keep these gardens going.

Eco-Anxiety/Grief

Another amazing workshop was about dealing with the anxiety and grief that can come from the state of our ecosystem. It is vital to grieve… to release the ideas we have of what we expect. We come at the world with a negativity bias, which helps us survive through lifetimes. But it is important to see into the present moment… using nature to help us regulate our emotions in the now. We can visit the past and the future, but we should not live there. Practicing gratitude intentionally. We created nature mandalas and did a thought experiment called Future Beings! Such a great session.

Green Conference

Environmental Team

I am excited that I get to be apart of such a wonderful team of people who love spending time with nature, and really see the value of connecting with the earth. Being the green school coordinator at my school allows me such amazing experiences and opportunities to learn more ways to remind people we are all connected. I love making connections at these events, because it allows us to create better experiences for our students while working with other passionate educators.

Categories
Existence

Yoga Love Festival 2022

  • Yoga Love
  • Image gallery image

The second annual Yoga Love Festival was held at Amethyst Retreat Center. This year was wonderfully planned to flow in and out of sound, yoga, and art experiences at a beautiful and sacred space.

Yoga Love

The first festival was held before the lockdown, and was a beautiful event, but this years topped it.

There were local artist, healers, food vendors, musicians, and dancing!

There was an amazing artist from Pennsylvania that created a performance piece! King Prolific painted this upside down and then lit it on fire to reveal the woman!

There was Yoga, and Love.

Every year I look forward to this event! If you haven’t been, you need to keep your eyes out for it next year!

Categories
Existence

We are ALL Connected

All Connected

We are ALL connected…. each of us. If no one shares their stories and teachings and thoughts and ideas with each other, then no one will grow or change. We are meant to be here for each other…. and not just for those we like.

Remember.

ALL of us are ONE.

People are here to show you all something about yourselves, like you are meant to show others about themselves…and how do we best do this… by first being grounded and centered within ourselves and our OWN connection to creator… and not letting things knock us off center emotionally but rather seeing all things as a challenge to grow and learn from. By polishing our own mirror.

I keep seeing others putting things down and breeding negativity by expressing how dissatisfied they are with things. There is a difference between moving through awareness, acknowledgement and action… and getting stuck in it.

Release.

When people just want to hold on to the old narratives, the energy tends to vibrate at a lower frequency. If we aren’t moving through the past and becoming more present, then we will never create a future we truly desire.

The mindset has to be shifted.

All Connected
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Treat others how you want to be treated. Period. Not treat others how you want to be treated, until they don’t treat you how you want to be treated.

I had this conversation last weekend about the IGGY culture, and how there is this idea that when someone presents us with something we don’t like, that we do not have to “take” it and can simply block or ignore them. Those people are VITAL to our learning about the deepest parts of ourselves. We should be examining ourselves and the things people do which trigger us so bad that we want to ignore them. Finding out where those feelings come from… where are their roots… questioning ourselves deeply, and recreating our responses rather than simply reacting.

I’ve always felt that things that are the most challenging to do or begin, usually have the greatest gifts in the end.

Reemerge.

So this means we have to sit with our shadows, and really listen for and to our intuition. Meditate. Have faith that what you feel and hear is truly aligned with your highest good, and for the highest good of all.

This is the meaning of true unconditional love. This is the living example of love… and true awareness that we are all connected. Love all ways.

The Anishinaabe see respect as an awareness that we are all part of creation and so what I do to you I also do to myself… the ultimate respect is to know that others are embodiments of the great mystery and we are all connected.

Know thyself and love thy neighbor as thyself. ❤

#remember #release #reawaken #recreate #selfawareness #reemergence

Categories
Indigenous Knowledge

Orange Shirt Day

Today is a day of remembrance for those who were affected by residential indian boarding schools. A day to give love to those little children taken from their families, some lost and some wounded for what seemed like forever. But today in a sea of orange, there is hope… as we call back to mind each of those beautiful souls, those who have suffered because of their differences, we can hold them in love and light, and let them shine their beautiful light to the world through us. Through our awareness, we can acknowledge and then take action in a new direction. In the direction we desire to see in the world.

Orange Shirt Day

Orange = Self Expression

When we hold space and bring awareness to a story, we have the opportunity to change the ending… to heal the past and create a beautiful future by sending the love now.

Growing up as a native american in Maryland I felt out of place because my bone structure was different from everyone else’s. My mom always told me that it was because I was native. I didn’t like it very much. My name was also different… Raine… I got made fun of often…. “Raine Raine go away and don’t come back.” My name was very native, or hippy. I didn’t always like it.

Going back to the reservation in North Dakota and visiting my cousins… life was so different for them then it was for me. We would usually visit during the summer for a week or so before driving back to Maryland. I would run in fields of wild grass, sweet grass and sage… never realizing how sacred it was. I would see life for the people on the reservation and feel many things, as they lived differently then I did. Living on the reservation wasn’t something I desired to do.

There was always one thing that stuck with me though… the sacred spiritual knowledge that I felt in my bones, deep down within my being….calling out to me to remember. I felt it when i danced in pow-wows.

When I was 12 I was honored with a naming ceremony….See my parents, even though they believed in religious teachings, always had an underlying connection to spirit in their lives. During my naming ceremony, our medicine woman shared that it was uncommon to be given the same name in ceremony that your parents named you. And that the creator told my mom to name me Raine Dawn because that was who I am… so my Anishinaabe name is Raining in the Dawn Woman.

After that experience, I began on a deep journey into spirituality (unknown to myself at the time, but looking back that is where it started) through Baptist, and Pentecostal religions… along with a deep connection to the holy spirit and feeling called to work with the youth, I started to really align who I was with who I am. Through attending a christian college to be a youth pastor, to going to Towson University to be an Art educator…. uncovering that deep connection to spirit that I felt within.

The path is so magickal and I feel so honored to be given the opportunity to be me, and share what I know and see with the world.

And all of this beautiful life because my grandmother and her grandmother and her grandmother made choices and took actions in ways that allowed me to flourish and become who I am today. Because my mother had a vision, to love her children and give them a life she never had… I am who I am today. I am grateful for the journey… as it reminds us we are all connected. <3

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Divine I Am Intuitive Henna

Kids Yoga Love Festival

The first ever Kids Yoga Love Festival was held at Amethyst Retreat Center in July 2021. Chelsea Parcels created a wonderful event for children of all ages!

Every child is an artist, the problem is how to remain an artists once they grow up.

Pablo Picasso

Kids Festival

This was more than just a Yoga festival, it was full of experiences that allowed our inner child to play, dance, create, and explore!

The event offered Yoga inspired classes for all ages, Vendors, delicious food, ice cream, hiking, dancing, drumming, community art, beginner friendly. Kirtan, henna, forest meditation, friends, kittens for adoption, magic show, super hero martial arts class, Qigong, nature + SOooo Much More!

The day began with an opening ceremony with Chelsea Parcels & Emily Turin who performed of her very special song, “Send Out A Smile.”

Photo taken by Emily Zebel
Photo taken by Emily Zebel

Nicky Yesser lead us all in dance time.

I truly felt my inner child filled with joy as I danced along with the kids! You can feel her heart as she leads the kids to express themselves through dance!

There were many yoga classes held, Jennifer Lynn Teens Yoga Class, Kids Yoga Class with Erika Malorzo, Holly Keich, Kids Yoga with Suzi Zappile, Nat Aiello Yoga for Toddlers, Jennifer Lynn, Erika America Family Yoga Nidra, and Amy Necci Tween & Kids Yoga.

Photo taken by Emily Zebel

Rickie with Reiki by Rickie lead workshops for kids. It was so wonderful seeing Rickie work with kids and teach them about Reiki! So powerful to see children taking time to slow down and listen and feel the energy around them.

Dani & Shelley Herlihy played Kids Kirtan for us. Their music is beautiful and all the kids enjoyed sharing in song with them!

Julie Niblett read her book “The Talking Stick,” based on a true story of a boy who was bullied, and utilized the native American traditional talking stick to communicate and overcome obstacles.

Photo taken by Emily Zebel
Photo taken by Emily Zebel
kids
Photo taken by Emily Zebel
Photo taken by Emily Zebel

Participants were able to make their very own talking stick, followed by a traditional circle discussion about effective communication. This was such a powerful experience for kids to have! We need more of this.

Photo taken by Emily Zebel

There was a Magic Show with River Barry, who has been immersed in the entertainment world for over twenty years. One of the most original and in-demand acts out there, River’s style of entertainment emphasizes moving beyond the present moment to help find an equal balance between self and nature, allowing the individual’s movement to be inspired by the moment. A magician, bubble artist, and rock balancing artist, River is committed to sharing the expression of the four foundational pillars of physical, mental, spiritual and financial.

Emily Turin, read her book “Herbert likes Sherbert.”

About the book: It seems at first to be a story about a child’s reluctance to try new things. As the story progresses, he learns that while cherishing memories is beautiful, sometimes holding onto something for too long can hold us back! Share in Herbert’s discovery as he braves the outcome of making new choices.

William Autore shared, ”Finding Your Future”

Photo taken by Emily Zebel

About the book: Finding Your Future written by author/artist William Autore, featuring his son on the books’ cover, is a comprehensive guide to self awareness and discovery of one’s purpose. Debuting in 2017, Finding Your Future is currently in talks of becoming a school based curriculum in New Jersey and an independent short film.

Kathy Conners Bucher lead everyone in Super Hero Training where they practiced their special powers and talk about what makes these super humans special. They finish the class learning what special powers they possess and how to bring them forth to help humanity. Experiences like this set the stage for a more self aware child!

Photo taken by Emily Zebel

Tammy & Jack Bray Yoga “Sacred Silliness” is always a favorite of mine. We did group giggles as we stretched, moved, and got our joy on playing in Laughter Yoga. So amazing… to show kids its ok to be silly and be you!

Photo taken by Emily Zebel

For the weekend I offered Intuitive Henna, and sold prints of my artwork.

I also hosted a Flower of Life workshop for the kids, allowing them to co-create in completing flower of life murals. This taught them the importance of our choices, and being tolerant of others choices. Also it was a nice lesson in the idea that sometimes things don’t always go the way we expect them to… the universe sometimes throws new things in the mix.

There was also William G Pagan Live Performance with his Didgeridoo, which were out of this world! Qiqong with Kathy Conners Bucher, Chad Brown live music, Forest Meditation with Erica Jo Shaffer, and a community fire with music, and s’mores!

Thank you Emily Zebel for capturing the day so beautifully!

Chelsea did an amazing job bringing together people from different backgrounds to create a safe and magickal environment of creation, exploration, experimentation, questioning, expressing and reflecting.

Her next event is the 2nd Annual Yoga Love Festival. (this one is for adults.) The first Yoga Love Festival was an amazing success! I am so grateful and honored to call her friend and be apart of these amazing experiences!

Categories
Divine I Am Earth Spirituality

Earth Love 2021

Earth Love is gathering created by Nicole Sharkey, of Nicole Naturally, to celebrate the love vibrations of the earth. Everything is energy and vibration! Through the foods we eat, the sounds we hear, and the sights we see…. our bodies and minds can become healthier and feel more uplifted.

The Earth Love weekend was built to deeply connect us to our senses; to clearly remind us of the beauty all around, and to open us up to the unique beauty inside. This is the 3rd annual event.

This weekend was a wonderful experience. Grounding to mother earth, and tuning into the divine through sound and art at Amethyst Retreat Center.

It all started on Friday night with Sarah Fiore with The Big Sky Quartet, previously known as Indian Summer Jars. The sound of her voice and the lyrics to her songs feel like beautiful earth. <3

Earth Love Festival
Earth Love

Sarah Fiore is the founder and songwriter for Central PA’s original folk/roots quartet Big Sky (previously known as Indian Summer Jars). With songs that evoke the mystery and deep joy for life, she aims to inspire people to remember their dreams and follow their hearts in walking their own life’s paths. Big Sky has many great accomplishments, including their recognition and award by Central Pennsylvania’s Music Hall of Fame as ‘Best Trio’ 2020. The band has become well known for their beautiful three-part harmonies and the energy they create together on stage. Sarah’s solo work invites you to an intimate view of these long standing folk blues anthems and stories. Her new album, ‘Back to the Heart’ was recently released.

Earth Love Vibrations

We started the days activities on Saturday with a vocal toning circle lead by Lana Ryder. Lana has been sharing the healing power of sound, voice and music for 50 years.

We used our individual and group vocal sounds to create a portal to journey within, to connect with earth and with one another through simple toning sounds used by shamans, indigenous healers and sound medicine practitioners throughout antiquity. Now more than ever we need to use our voices for transmuting negative energy into healing, peace and love. We chanted, hummed and sang our own songs together. The cicadas added another level of vibration to our song as well!

After the toning circle, we shared a delicious lunch before I presented on sacred geometry. My talk felt so good, it was fantastic how it all fit with what Lana had mentioned about sound and creation. How our voices are one of a kind and the world needs us to use them! We are meant to create in this world and when we do not create … the world is missing out.

Everyone helped create our flower of life community mural, while they worked on their own mandalas to focus their energy on the desire they wish fulfilled.

After artmaking John Protopapas played the sitar, taking us into a journey through music.

Immersed in the study of yoga and Indian music for over 35 years, John will share and offering of classical Indian music on the Sitar. This music takes you to a deep contemplative space beyond words and ideas. In most ancient traditions, music is approached as a sacred path, leading the listeners and musicians to deeper states of being and nourishing our hearts and minds.

Nicole created an amazing event, with a delicious menu of music and food! Breakfast on Saturday was crafted yogurt, a spring fruit selection, hearty home made granola. Lunch featured the finest spring vegetables in a healing broth accented by locally made baguette and home made dessert. Breakfast on Sunday was delicious sour dough bread, local eggs, veggies and a lil something sweet.

Amethyst Retreat Center

This land is such a beautiful and magickal sacred space. So grateful for its presence in my life. <3 Thank you everyone who made this weekend so magickal!

An inspiring environment dedicated to discovering innovative and meaningful ways of living, learning and healing.

They are dedicated to offering information, experiences, and programs that inspire innovative approaches to wellness and living in ways that are nourishing and sustainable.

Amethyst offers wellness retreats, educational workshops, classes, nature programs and camps for children, gatherings for women, for men, for the public and weddings for 100 guests or less. Their weekend gatherings typically feature music, art, movement, hands-on workshops, incredibly good food, time in nature, and optional camping.

Categories
Astrological Insights Divine I Am Earth Existence Spirituality

Dagwaagiin Equinox

Today is the Autumn Equinox. The point where the sun is directly aligned with the equator of the earth, making night and day of approximately equal length all over the earth. Dagwaagiin means Autumn in Annishinabe.

This equinox feels extra important. It feels like a tipping point… hurling us into a new future. Leaving behind all that no longer serves us… on such a micro and macro level.

The middle way, the space in between… finding balance.

The seven gifts of the grandfathers help us to find balance in this world, as we journey through life.

Wisdom, Love, Respect, Bravery, Honesty, Humility, and Truth.

To cherish knowledge is to know Wisdom.

To know Love is to know peace.

To honor all of the Creation is to have Respect.

Bravery is to face the foe with integrity.

Honesty in facing a situation is to be brave.

Humility is to know yourself as a sacred part of the Creation.

Truth is to know all of these things.

Take a moment today to show gratitude for all that life has given you… For every moment is a gift. Cherish knowledge, love, honor all creations, have integrity, be brave, know you are sacred, and you will know truth. <3

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Divine I Am Earth Existence Green Lifestyle Most Popular Spirituality Video

Stinging Nettle

Stinging nettle has been used for hundreds of years to treat painful muscles and joints, eczema, arthritis, gout, and anemia. Nettle is a superb nourishing food and has beneficial actions on many parts of the body including the urinary tract, liver, digestive tract, reproductive system, and respiratory system. Known as an overall nourisher and strengthener, stinging nettle leaf is full of vitamins and minerals most notably magnesium, calcium, iron, and protein.

Harvesting stinging nettle at Burns Valley Herbals and Retreat was such a learning experience.  I used gloves to hold the nettles while I cut them, however I still got stung.

I learned when brushed by the nettle, its best to leave the area alone so it will sting less. If you touch the area a lot, it rubs the sting into your skin more and lasts longer! I got a few welts and a rash from where the nettle touched me above the gloves! It went completely away within 12 hours. 

Nettle’s sting, however, reminds us to value our gifts just as we must honor and protect our work if we are to remain healthy. With her sting, she asks us to recognize and honor the worth of what she gives; if you’re willing to brave the sting to gain her treasure, you’re more likely to value what you have taken.

Enjoy the video, please comment, like and subscribe!!

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Art Divine I Am Earth Existence Most Popular Spirituality Video

Quarantine Art Series: Deer Medicine

The universe speaks and gifts us in many different ways, we have to be open to receiving.

Finding a deer skull was a perfect synchronicity for the energy of the current time.

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This entire experience is teaching us on so many levels. One thing I’ve noticed we are all learning, is how to have compassion for those that might offend us. Deer medicine helps us to remember to have grace through all of life’s challenges. One way to do that is to develop the ability to adapt quickly to any situation, towards love and compassion.

We have had to adjust a lot in a short amount of time. Our world has flipped into a state that none of us ever believed could or would happen. When we are grounded and centered, we can hear our intuition reminding us to be gentle with ourselves and each other.

Deer medicine helps us walk the path of love with full consciousness and awareness, to know that love sometimes requires caring and protection, not only in how we love others, but also in how we love ourselves.

Let’s remember to be gentle, to touch the hearts and minds of wounded beings who are in our lives. Don’t push people to change, rather gently nudge them in right direction, as a doe nudges her fawn.

Love and accept people as they are.
The balance of true power lays in love and compassion.

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Art Divine I Am Earth Existence Intuitive Henna Most Popular Revealing Treasures in your Own Backyard

Central PA Yoga Love Festival

The first ever Central PA Yoga Love Festival was hosted at Amethyst Retreat Center in Dillsburg PA.  Chelsea Balance envisioned and created an amazing yoga event for all.

There were so many amazing vendors, musicians, and yoga instructors! This was the first year for this event, and I look forward to the next one!

There was a buddhist meditation lead by Bhante Soma from the Blue Lotus Temple in Carlisle, Pa.  After the morning meditation, attendees were able to visit vendors in between multiple yoga sessions!

There was a powerful bonfire on Saturday night, that lead to a lot of releasing and healing energy for all who participated. Amethyst was vibrating with so much energy!

The next day there was coffee and breakfast along with morning yoga and a meditation.

I was a vendor at the event, and also the artist for the event materials!

Thank you Chelsea for following your heart, bringing your vision to life and inviting me to join you in this event! Check out this youtube video from the event!

 

Watch out for a Kids Yoga festival coming this year!

Migwetch