The Multiple “Hats” of Art Goodtimes
Poet~Essayist~Farmer~Parent~County
Commissioner
Whole Life Network Interview
Were you in the audience at the Western Colorado Congress annual
meeting on October 9th, 2004 at
the Montrose Pavilion? In years to come a great many of us will tell
anyone that will listen that we were there when Terry Tempest Williams called
on Art Goodtimes to come up on the stage. She wanted Art to share his
poem honoring Helen Newell. Williams introduced Art thusly, “If there’s
hope in the American West, it’s that Art Goodtimes is one of our County
Commissioners. And, Art, I want you to know you’ve inspired me for
years”. It was a consummate recognition which only one
poet/environmentalist could bestow on a fellow poet/environmentalist. The
Whole Life Network is honored that this accomplished icon of our community, Art
Goodtimes, is a regular contributor to our newsletter through his monthly
column, Remembering Aztlán. We are further honored that he has
agreed to take some time away from the great variety of his duties, responsibilities,
interests, hobbies, meetings and travels to give us some insight into his
world.
WLN: For our readers that missed your first
column for Connections (March, 2003), please explain the meaning of the
title, Remembering Aztlán, and why it holds so much significance
for you.
When I began “Remembering Aztlán, I took great care to try and
locate where I was writing in a matrix of time and place. As a bioregionalist
who has long been inspired by Peter Berg of San Francisco and his Planet Drum
Foundation, trying to understand my own adopted watershed was critical for
reinhabitation – the goal of becoming native to a particular place. As Dolores
LaChapelle quotes a traditional elder in her her seminal work Sacred Land
Sacred Sex Rapture of the Deep, “The first task is to find a sacred place
to live in.” And after several decades on the Pacific Rim of my birth, I found
that place where the Colorado Plateau meets the Southern Rockies.
My little piece of it to caretake is on Wright’s Mesa near
Norwood, looking south to Lone Cone. Once, in the 1850s, this land was part of
Iron County in Brigham Young’s State of Deseret, and then in 1860 part of Utah
Territory before becoming the western half of Colorado Territory in 1861. The
Mexicans claimed it before that. And it’s been the ancestral homeland of the
Nooch “the people”, whom we call the Utes, for generations, some of whom still
live here among us or in nearby reservations. Ancestral Puebloan peoples farmed
here before that. And there are ancient Folsom habitation sites in the region
going back 8000 years or so.
So, in writing a column of culture and arts, I want to honor our
ancestors in this place. And as a descendant of Italian and Spanish settlers, I
chose to use the term Aztlán – which poet Trinidad Sánchez, Jr., has called “a
state of mind” as much as any physical place, although it has been long
associated with the Four Corners region. As a designation it is a recognition
that this country has been associated in the mind of many Chicanos with the
legendary homeland of the Aztecs, those Nahuatl-speaking folks who share a
common linguistic ancestry with the Utes. And the many Spanish names in the
area remind us that we European-Americans are but the latest in the many waves
of peoples who have moved through this great land.
Just as the Navajos are an Athapascan people who migrated down
from the north, and became native to the place, establishing their four sacred
mountains to the south of us. So, the Spanish-speaking peoples from the south
came into this land and settled much of it, before the Americans seized control
as a spoil of the Mexican War of 1846-48. So, the title of the column is meant
to honor all those who have loved this place before us.
WLN: How did you get your sense of environmental
responsibility? Was it instilled in you growing up?
My parents loved the outdoors. And they took their three boys
camping often. We spent many a weekend hiking in the redwoods of Big Basin
State Park in the Santa Cruz Mountains of central California. And one of our
vacations was spent camping up in the Sierras for two weeks.
As I grew up, I began to spend a lot of solo time up in the
woods. Big Sur’s Ventana Wilderness became a favorite haunt, especially the
Esalen homeland of Church Creek and Sykes Hot Springs. And as a Conscientious
Objector working in San Francisco for two years, I spent almost every weekend
hitchhiking north along the coast, finding obscure and not easily accessible
places to camp and hike in Marin, Sonoma, Mendocino and Humboldt counties.
That led to a strong association with the natural world. And as a
poet inspired by Gary Snyder and others, the environment became the source and
playground for my muse. I became involved in local environmental issues,
particularly the anti-nuclear movement. I remember in the Seventies attending a
Left Write Conference in San Francisco’s Noe Valley, where half the room was
made up of Marxist-Leninists focusing on class struggle and the other half of
the room was filled with personal liberationists, gays and lesbians, who felt
that human relationships were paramount and class struggle only secondary. And
then there were a few of us in the back of the room who wondered where the
natural world fit into these two revolutionary strains.
When I moved to San Miguel County in 1979, I soon learned of a
nascent group called Earth First! through a magazine out of New Mexico called Dry
Country News. These enviros were taking some outrageous tongue-in-cheek
actions, using humor as much as confrontation, and I loved the koan of their
name. So I got involved and soon became the poetry editor for the Earth
First! Journal – a position that I held for ten years (1981-1991). After
that, I followed Dave Foreman to Wild Earth where I served as poetry
co-editor for almost another decade.
It was through my association with Earth First! that I met
Dolores LaChapelle and learned about deep ecology. Dolores, a world-class
climber, skier and author, became my mentor and close personal friend. I
believe her idea of reciprocal appropriation sums up the core essence of the
way back to a healthy relationship to the natural world. And I’ve considered
myself a deep ecologist ever since.
WLN: What do you consider to be the greatest
challenge to our “4 corners” environment at this time?
Of course, there are lots of specific challenges in the way of
population growth, developmental sprawl, oil & gas production, uranium
mining, industrial tourism, road fragmentation, water and air quality issues.
But I think the deeper problem has to be our relationship to the natural world.
The film Koyaniskatsi perhaps said it best.
A Norwegian philosopher has called our world globalist culture,
Industrial Growth Society. It’s an apt phrase. Classical economics seems to
treat natural resources – water, timber, precious metals -- like freebies to be
mined, refined, and transformed into usable products (and immense wastes) on a
first-come, first served basis. It’s a crazy system. Way out of balance. And
the result is that we are rapidly using up finite resources like there was no
tomorrow, and poisoning ourselves in the process.
That has to end. And it will. Following the biological model that
all life tracks, we as a species must either adapt to a healthier relationship
with the nature world, or we may become architects of our own genocide. Dolores
LaChapelle has given us some basic tools on how to reconnect with the natural
world on an individual and community level. Drumming. Chanting. Dancing. Bardic
poetry. The pathways to reconnect us are available. Now we must exercise our
wills to employ them and turn the Titantic around before the next tsunami
iceberg global warming disaster takes us all down.
Once we re-establish a healthy relationship with spaceship earth,
we’ll figure out how to deal with some of the pressing social problems like
population explosion, equitable distribution of wealth, pollution, renewable
energy sources, etc., because our communities will have morphed into a
lifestyle that is sustainabile and nurturing for all living things.
WLN: What do you like to do in your free time?
Okay, every interviewee has a trick question. Here’s yours. Free
time? Yikes, I have so many projects and interests and responsibilities and
activities in my life that free time has all but disappeared. In some ways, I’m
hoping that as a grow into being an elder, more of it will become available.
I have three biological children with three different co-parents.
And my current partner (we met at the Rainbow Gathering in Oregon in 1997) and
I have two children at our home at Cloud Acre. Having a family and being a
father to children and stepchildren and a partner to a most amazing Dakini is a
primary focus, although I probably could put a lot more time into those
relationships.
But I’m also a performance poet, member of a performance ensemble
called EAR (along with Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer of Placerville and Elle
Metrick of Norwood), and founder/facilitator of the Talking Gourds poetry
circles. I’m poet-in-residence for the Telluride Mushroom Festival and the
Headwaters gathering at Western State in Gunnison. I’ve written a number of
chapbooks, been widely published in Colorado, and perform throughout the Four
Corners region. I’m a member of the Vincent St. John local of the Union of
Streets and a fellow of the Cloud House Poetry Center in San Francisco.
Journalism was a second career, after I spent ten years as a
child care specialist in San Francisco (I have a lifetime California teaching
credential). Having been a reporter and editor, I continue to do occasional
freelance pieces, and have written a weekly personal opinion column for various
Telluride newspapers for over 20 years (as well as several weekly columns, on
and off, for regional publications, like Connections).
Politics has become a third career. Always active politically, I
won office as a county commissioner in San Miguel County in 1996 as a Democrat.
I switched to the Green Party in 1998 (when Colorado Greens won ballot access
as a minor party) and have won re-election twice in 2000 and 2004. As well as
running county government and making local zoning decisions, I belong to a
dozen or so boards and commissions, including Club 20, the BLM’s Southwest
Resource Advisory Committee, and the Mountain Studies Institute. In addition,
I’m one of two San Miguel Greens reps to the state Green Party’s Coordinating
Council. I do a lot of work by email, and process on average 100 email messages
a day – mostly relating to various projects and programs I’m involved in.
And I do a lot of double-tasking. For 30 years I’ve been a
basketweaver, and one of the attractions of politics were the endless meetings,
where I’ve been able to weave coiled hemp twine baskets my first two terms,
while listening and participating. But since getting a county laptop, I find
myself working on the computer during meetings to catch up on my continuing
backlog of email.
My main “hobby”, to balance all the intellectual and people work
that I do, is to grow non-chemical heirloom seed potatoes – some 39 varieties
currently. I’ve been doing Cloud Acre Spuds for about ten years, improving the
soil’s tilth and increasing the varieties I grow.
And recently I’ve been participating in weekly drum circles and
trying to take a regular bicycle ride with my kids, as well as hiking and
camping trips.
Some day I hope to have free time to rock in my rocker and merely
watch the clouds play tag over Lone Cone.
WLN: Can you name the point in time when you
realized that you had a unique ability to create poetry?
As a young man I went off to boarding school at 14 years of age
(actually a Roman Catholic seminary), and I started writing home to my mom a
couple times a week. Quickly tired of the usual tales of boarding school life,
I began to dabble in rhymes and word play. Studies in Latin and Greek, both language
and literature, helped expose me to the wider world of poetry. And then one
summer I found Gerard Manley Hopkins, and became completely enamored of his
wild poetics. I started reading more poetry, and moving from doggerel to real
verse. My first real poem was in my third year of high school, where I compared
life to a river and took it from its headwaters to the ocean.
Leaving the seminary and working as a Vista volunteer on the Crow
Indian Reservation in Montana, I met John Schaetzl, a Harvard student who was
volunteering for a summer on the Rez. He opened my eyes to the Rimbaudian idea
of a poet as a person who experiences life to its fullest.
When I went back to San Francisco, I finished college at San
Francisco State in English, with a focus on creative writing. And I became a
fellow at the Cloud House Poetry Center and a member of the Union of Street
Poets. I spent two years in the Seventies traveling all over the country as a
kind of troubadour bard, meeting poets and searching out poetry communities.
Poetry has been my heart’s desire and my essential practice ever since. I often
teach a course for events like the annual Sparrows Performance Poetry Festival
called “Poetry as a Spiritual Practice”. And I’ve been poet-in-residence for
the Telluride Mushroom Festival for going on 25 years.
WLN: Do you credit any teacher, writer, or mentor
with developing the passion in yourself that is so obvious in your endeavors?
Oh yes, many. From my mother I gained a great love of books and
literature. From my dad, a life-long union man, I learned a strong sense of
social justice. A younger brother’s death at 14, when I was 16, catapulted me
into a transformative reflection on life and a deeper sense of purpose.
I had a professor in the seminary, Fr. Terence Loughran, who
helped develop my love of poetry, and turned me on to Hopkins with his
brilliant verbal fireworks and his concepts of instress and inscape. Gary
Snyder has long been an inspiration and an elder brother of bardic poetry,
since I read his first book, Rip Rap, back in the Sixties. S.S. Kush of
Cloud House was instrumental in teaching me the practice of performance poetry,
and Jack Mueller sprouted the idea of the Union of Street Poets that
invigorated the poetry scene in San Francisco thoughout the Seventies.
A brother writer, Steve Clark, has been a hiking buddy and a
crucial literary colleague ever since those heady days amidst the intellectual
and social ferment of the Bay Area. And Peter Berg’s Planet Drum Foundation was
instrumental in connecting my writing to the natural world through his emphasis
on bioregionalism and reinhabitation.
Moving to Colorado, I met Pamela Zoline, who has been a great
friend, patron of the arts, a fine writer and painter in her own right, and a
convener of salons and soirees that have made Telluride less a cultural
backwater and more of a cultural window on the world.
But my greatest teacher and mentor has been Dolores LaChapelle,
whose ideas and analyses have inspired my own work in poetry, community and
politics and have permanently shaped my enduring passion for deep ecology.
WLN: Following your election to a 3rd term as County Commissioner, you have
achieved a lofty status in the Green Party. Are you harboring any
thoughts of seeking higher political office?
Ah, lofty is far too gracious a word. I am the only partisan
elected Green official in Colorado, and one of only a handful of Green county
commissioners in the country. But I was elected with only about 2000 votes, so
that’s not a huge constituency. I seem to be able to provide a balanced
political agenda in a mostly liberal county, but I doubt if that local skill
could translate into higher political office in mostly conservative Western
Colorado.
Of course, if opportunity were to present itself, I might
consider something else. But more likely, I’m looking forward to spending my
golden years playing with my kids, performing poetry, assembling my papers, and
writing up my experiences. At least I hope so.
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Unlocking the Gifted
Student in Your ADD/ADHD Indigo
by Laurel Ann Browne
If someone showed you an easy method (that didn’t involve drugs)
to unlock the gifted child that you know is inside your child, you’d want to
hear more about it, wouldn’t you? You want the absolute best for your child or
student, but you worry about him/her because he/she doesn’t easily glide
through school and has a tough time with things like following directions and
sitting still. Would you feel better if you knew a way you could coach
hyperactive kids; that they can not only survive but thrive, and I’m
here to tell you that your child CAN succeed. It starts with this one universal
truth; every single child with ADHD has hidden talents and skills he isn’t
using nearly as powerfully as he could.
These high energy kids are wired differently, but they have a lot to
give, if we will only listen. Your
child’s teachers are trained to deliver information to students who will sit still and listen…and then
they’re put in front of classrooms with children WHO WON’T SIT STILL AND
LISTEN! Do we really think that sitting
still inside a classroom for six hours per day is an easy or natural thing for
any child to do-not to mention highly energized kids with ADHD. How do we determine if these children are,
yes, from another planet after all? Are
there new or better approaches to our teaching skills and listening skills in
order to “reach” them? There are new
proven breakthrough techniques that have turned around countless classrooms
around the globe. It works even better at home because you don’t have 30 other
kids clamoring for your attention. One
book I want to recommend interested parents and teachers is: “The ADHD
Solution for Teachers: How to Turn Any Disruptive Child into Your Best
Student,” written by Tom Daly, an ADHD child himself/Indigo, and a
professional teacher and professor for many years.This book is so helpful that
it has been sold in all 50 states, as well as 15 different countries around the
world. Our new Support Group for THE
NEW CHILDREN will be an ongoing course beginning April 13th and
every 2nd Wed Evening monthly, for parents, teachers, supportive
adults working or interested in children. Learn new techniques to redirect
behavior for conscious parenting or just for your own information. We will include both ADHD issues and Indigo
issues. For more information on “The
Indigo Child”, please contact me. Our
new EXCEPTIONAL TEEN AND STUDENT SUPPORT GROUP beginning April 27th and every 4th Wed
evening will be located at: 137 N. Mesa Avenue, Montrose. This group is for young people looking for
answers; seeking identity; personal solutions; response-ability; preparation
for the future. How can you tell if you
are an Indigo/ADHD or? A good way to “test” yourself is to answer the
following: Are you always searching for
your greater purpose in life but feel like the world isn’t set up for your
kind? Do you sometimes feel wise beyond
your years? Do you have trouble conforming to the ways of society? Do you feel
out of place in today’s world? Do you have strong intuition that others don’t
perceive? Do you often feel misunderstood when you try to talk to people about
what’s real to you? Are you a truth seeker? Do you feel like you were born to
accomplish a special mission in life? Do you feel isolated and alone in your
beliefs? Misunderstood by family? Do you perceive the world differently than
most people around you? Do you feel anti-social unless you are with people of
like mind? Are you emotionally sensitive? Did or do you have a difficult
childhood? Do you often feel disempowered
by too much authority? If you
can answer yes to these questions, then come to our Support Group, and get some
answers.
Visionary Counseling – Laurel Ann Browne
970-249-1345
laurelann@bresnan.net
Rev. Aryln Macdonald
Community for Spiritual Awareness
970-252-0908
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Remembering Aztlán
a column of poetry, culture & spirit
by Art Goodtimes
BLESS ME ULTIMA … The controversy over the Norwood School
pulling Rudolfo Anaya’s award-winning novel Bless Me Ultima from a high school
freshman English class curriculum at the insistence of one family made regional
and even national news. But that wasn’t the full story. Just the flashy one …
The follow-up to that action, once the Norwood Post broke the story, was a
student sit-in by a sizeable portion of the Norwood high school students. They
skipped classes, sat in the gym, read the book aloud, and demonstrated their
upset at the administration’s action and their willingness to risk a range of
penalties, in order to correct a social injustice … And the wonderful news from
Norwood is that Superintendent Bob Conder recognized the reasonableness of
their concerns, apologized for an inappropriate action, and set up a committee
(including student representatives) to review curriculum choices, without
punishing anyone … That Norwood was a book-burning backwater was the story that
went out over the wire services, but the real story, which too few media
followed up on, is one of student activism that worked and a school
administration that was willing to respond to its own students and be sensitive
to community review of its actions.
DRIVING ‘EM CRAZY … My dad turned 85 recently. And it was
time to go get his license renewed. He’s still alert and all, although his
physical body is hardly spry, and he’s limited in his mobility. So, he was a
little worried as he got ready to take his driver’s test. Making sure to study
up on the state’s regulations … But as it turned out, he needn’t have worried …
When the gal behind the counter asked him how long he’d been driving, he
proudly noted, “Seventy-five years, without a ticket and not one accident.” …
And it’s true, back in 1932 he’d started driving. A year later, at age 13, with
an older brother’s borrowed license, he chauffeured his entire family (mom and
4 kids) to L.A. to visit a Hollywood uncle in their Model T Ford … En route,
the old car broke down going up a hill. Although he didn’t know much about
cars, he took out some tools and got the gear shift apart, substituted the
reverse gear for the broken one, and made it to L.A. without backing up … The
family found lodging in some cheap bungalows. When the Model T broke down this
time, he had to rebuild the entire engine, after school and on weekends,
outside in the motor court parking lot, and then put it all back together. And
when he’d finished, it worked. And he safely drove the family back to San
Francisco … Of course, my two brothers and I grew up with that story -- of my
father’s amazing vehicular exploits as a youngster. So it came as no surprise
when the license examiner waived him through at the examining window. “You
don’t need a test,” she told Grandpa Vince, and could have added, “You, sir,
deserve an award” … And truly, imagine the accomplishment -- driving in
California for 75 years, amidst freeways and precipitous coastal highways and
daunting industrial traffic, with no tickets, and not responsible for one
accident … Urrá Bontempi!
WEEKLY QUOTA …
"If the earth's 4.5 billion year history could be compressed into 30 days,
life in the form of simple bacteria appeared on the tenth day whilst the first
vertebrates crawled onto the land around the twenty fifth. Homo sapiens
(peoplekind) appeared at about 1 minute to midnight on the thirtieth. The
industrial revolution would have happened within the last fraction of a second
of that minute." - www.gburnett.unisonplus.net/Perma/indexp2.htm
DON’T WORRY BE HOPI … A well-respected and popular
professor at the University of California in Berkeley has been fired after
publishing a scientific paper regarding the uncontrolled contamination of
irreplaceable native Mexican corn varieties by genetically engineered corn …
Dr. Ignacio Chapela, whose corn contamination article was published in the
science journal Nature, was denied his tenure due to pressure from the biotech
company Monsanto on the University (the UC Berkeley tenure review panel had
actually voted almost unanimously to approve his tenure) … Sign a petition to
demand a review of Dr. Chapela's tenure denial… www.organicconsumers.org/uc.htm
DAKINI DANCE … Tara Stapleton, a Tibetan Buddhist tantric
teacher of the Yeshe Tsogyal lineage, held a daka class for men up in
Telluride’s Mountain Village a while back. I was glad that I got to join in …
I’ve always hated guided meditations. Knees folded. Sitting still. Someone
telling you to see things and feel things. It never worked for me. Maybe I
remember too many forced morning sessions in the seminary of my youth -- being
told, before breakfast, the sun not yet up, to focus on various cloyingly
religious texts, inert in my chapel pew or hunched over the green leather
kneeler … But Tara’s imagining flames being stoked in various of my chakras
worked for me because hers is a tradition of sacred dance. And on my feet,
moving to the meditation, I was able – in my own kinetic way – to make sense of
visualizations. Translating her words into my own idiosyncratic motions …
Further, attuned to the Western mind, Tara encourages each person to co-create
the energy fields she helps us access, each in their own way. A feminine way.
Where diversity and individual vision are honored. Instead of being funneled,
in the Eastern way, into set forms. Strict observances. An implacable tradition
… Dakini can be translated as “sky dancer” and a daka is the male counterpart,
accessing the celestial realms via dance. It is a very powerful practice. And
it certainly felt empowering for me … For more info, contact Tara in Santa Fe
at onewisdomflower@aol.com.
© 2004 Art Goodtimes
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Dea's Kitchen: How About a Dream Date?
by Dea Jacobson
Spring is here, with all its unpredictability - from snow to sun
every few minutes, and plenty of wind to stir up your allergies, as it gives
the cranes a lift in migrating to their nesting grounds up north. It is the
time of birth and rebirth, and with that, we also experience vulnerability.
Perhaps that's what Spring Fever is all about. We can become susceptible to a
dreamy state of falling in love, or distracted by the beauty around us, letting
the spring winds blow our lists of things to do away (credit to that line goes
to Greg Brown). As we lose our focus, playful chaos wreaks a bit of havoc...
unless we go with the flow, relax and enjoy the ride. So, if all this chaos
makes you crazy, find a ritual or routine to ground you each day, and allow
some new creation to take shape. Mine is cooking something from scratch.
If the title of this article grabbed you, and you've gotten this
far, read on to learn a little about dates. Technically, dates are berries, and
grow in semi-arid climates on date palm trees. Can you imagine a string of
camels at rest in an oasis of palm trees, a colorful tent rustling in the
breeze, while its occupants, resting on sumptious cushions, munch on dates in
the heat of the desert afternoon? Indeed, dates are considered to be cooling,
sweet and nourishing, and are used in ayurvedic medicine to treat weakness,
symptoms of aging, low semen and impotence, and hence are considered as an
aphrodisiac. They are a good source of potassium, niacin and iron, and
strengthening to the liver. An ancient food plant of the Middle East, and sub
tropical Africa, they are also now grown in the desert valleys of California.
As a date dries on the tree, its fructose turns to sucrose and, the drier the date,
the sweeter it becomes. The chief nutritive value of the date is this high
natural sugar content. Ayurvedically speaking, dates will reduce pitta and
vata, while kapha should consume them in moderation, perhaps with a pinch of
ginger to aid in digestion.
Enjoyed as a snack, incorporated into baked goods or blended into
a khir, or Indian pudding, dates invite your creativity. I found alot of
information on the many types of dates in Rebecca Wood's New Whole Foods
Encyclopedia, and lots of fun recipes in Dr. Vasant Lad's Ayurvedic
Cooking for Self Healing and Amadea Morningstar's Ayurvedic Cookbook,
which is where this perfect recipe for your date comes from.
Date Dream Balls
1 cup whole dried pitted dates (about 1/2 lb. chopped finely)
2 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons brown rice syrup
1/4 cup blanched almonds, chopped
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon tangerine or orange peel
1/4 cup (or less) date sugar
Mix dates, water, rice syrup, vanilla, and grated peel in a small
heavy skillet and cook over low heat for 10-15 minutes until the water is
evaporated and the dates are a thick mass. The thicker it is the easier it is
to work. Stir in the almond and let cool. Then form into 1 inch balls ( you can
butter your hands, but this is a sticky business!) and roll in the date sugar
to get them dry enough to serve. Amadea's comment is that these were considered
an aphrodisiac of sorts in ancient India, and are sumptuously delicious. So,
indulge and enjoy!
Dea Jacobson, RYT, directs Blue Heron Yoga and teaches classes
in Grand Junction, Delta and Cedaredge. She is a member of Yoga Alliance at the
RYT 500 level, a Religious Science Practitioner and a graduate of Naturally
Grand Cooking School. She can be reached at www.blueheronyoga.com, by calling
970 856 4905, or at Box 95, Cedaredge, CO 81413.
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Calling All Women
by Jill Burkey
In the last month I've come across several different sources
proclaiming the same idea: women should rule the world. I know it sounds a little extreme, but as I
was reading Parade's annual, "The World's 10 Worst Dictators"
article, it occurred to me that none of the top ten are women, and one of the
reasons most of the men are on the list is because of their treatment of
women. I think Elayne Boosler was on to
something when she said, "When women are depressed they either eat or go
shopping. Men invade another
country. It's a whole different way of
thinking." I'm not saying men are
single-handedly responsible for all the problems in the world, I'm just
wondering what things would be like if more women were in power. I bet, for instance, that if a woman
presided over Pakistan, laws wouldn't be such that a rapist can walk free
unless the woman who was raped can produce four Muslim men who witnessed the
attack.
We've never had a woman president, and obviously we have an
amazing country, but I wonder how things would be different if a woman had been
president somewhere along the line.
Even equal representation in our state and federal government would be
nice, but if we're going to have that, more women need to get involved. I know this is easy for me to say. We didn't even get the vote until 1920, and
it's been a hard road since, but that's no reason to stop now. Garrison Keillor said on his February 26
broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion, "...we need women to take
over the job of running the world...
We've been hearing for forty years about women assuming leadership and
they've assumed some but not enough...I was brought up by women in a world that
was dappled and golden." Let's
make our world more "dappled and golden." Let's ask, "Why not?" instead of "Why?" Let's ask what's possible in our local and
world communities.
In 1940, Eleanor Roosevelt wrote about the possibilities she saw
in women. "It will always take all
kinds of women to make up a world, and only now and then will they unite their
interests. When they do, I think it's
safe to say, something historical will happen." Decades later, women in South Africa proved her right. Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who received the
Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for his pacifist crusade for the end of apartheid in
South Africa, said in an interview for the February issue of O Magazine,
"I realized...that we would not have gotten freedom without the
women. I want to suggest that women
start a revolution."
Jill Burkey is a freelance writer and stay-at-home mother of 2
young children She has a B.S. in
English, Business, and Secondary Education from Nebraska Wesleyan University
and provides professional writing services through Word Wise, Ink. She can be reached at 255-7348 or at
burkey@frontier.net.
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Peaceful Contributions for the Soul
by Kathy Gates
Spring, glorious spring, the seeds that were frozen in the earth
during the winter are bursting forth with new life, after dying for a season.
This is true for all of us as well. It feels good to step out and feel the
light. Our days are filled with more light, the colors of life are radiating
all around us. Grasses are green, fresh
new leaves are filling the empty branches of winter. The days become warmer, our eyes take it all in with excitement.
A restless energy is moving through all life, a new season is presenting
itself, holding back nothing, being alive, being awakened with enthusiasm with
beauty and grace. Coming forth and creating itself for our experience of it!!
We can all be inspired and energized with the knowledge and
wisdom this wonderful season of Spring is providing each of us as individuals.
Here are a few questions we can focus our attention on briefly.
As you ask yourself the questions, what comes to mind?
• Do I feel a sense of new energy within me?
• What unique gifts do I have to bring forth for the good of all?
• Am I holding back?
• Am I believing in myself with enthusiasm, ready to burst forth
with new ideas?
• Am I noticing the beauty in all life?
• Can I give of myself to others without a reward?
As the season of Spring gives to us abundantly, let us give back
by noticing it's beauty. By smiling and acknowledging its being. Feeling abundant with all this new life
around us as we take in the beauty of Spring. As each little flower pokes its
head out of the soil, taking its first glimpse of its own reality, let us smile
and welcome them, with gratitude, the gifts they bring without reward are many.
Be aware of the preciousness of your own life, and appreciating
the moments to enjoy the experience of being alive. We are all sacred expressions
of the Divine.
Kathy Gates: Women's Spirit Retreat: wsretreat@aol.com or
970-234-2454.
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Spirulina
© Anne Calzada Herbalist
Spirulina (Spirulina pratensis) is a one-celled form of
blue-green algae that grow in alkaline fresh water ponds. The name Spirulina
comes from the Latin derivative for "spiral" noting it's physical
presence as it forms. It has been used and respected in different cultures for
many years for it's rich source of nutrition. It is composed of approximately
70% protein, making it one of the richest plant sources of protein known.
It therefore contains all of the essential amino acids. Actually
one acre of spirulina yields more than twenty times the protein than one acre
of soybeans. It is easier to digest than other protein sources such as meats.
It contains high levels of gammalinolenic acid also known as GLA. GLA is an
essential fatty acid in the omega 6 family that are primarily found in plant
sources. GLA is important for normal growth and development, brain functioning,
skin and hair growth, metabolic and reproductive process and immunity.
Spirulina is an excellent source of beta-carotene and
chlorophyll. It contains vitamin B12, which is mostly found in animal sources.
One teaspoon of spirulina contains 21/2 times the RDA for B12. It also contains
other vitamins such as B1, B2, B6, biotin, folic acid, inositol, niacin,
pantothenic acid, vitamin E, calcium, iron, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus,
selenium, and zinc. Spirulina contains more beta-carotene than raw carrots, and
is a rich source of carotenes such as lutein. It retains its blue green pigment
from a photosynthetic compound called phycocyanin. Phycocyanin has been shown
to be helpful in preventing unwanted colonies of bacteria from forming. It also
enhances neurotransmission, therefore increasing mental alertness.
Additionally, spirulina's cell walls are made entirely of
mucopolysacharides or (MPs) which make the nutrients contained within
completely digestible. Other plants have cell walls that are made of indigestible
cellulose, limiting bioavailability. MPs provide anti-inflammatory action as
well as reducing blood fat and inhibiting arterial deterioration. They are also
helpful in strengthening connective tissue, by promoting resilience and
elasticity. Spirulina helps to balance Immunoglobulin E (IgE) in the blood.
Boosting immunity and allergic response. Spirulina has been clinically shown to
slow the loss of white blood cells, being important during times of stress,
sickness, chemotherapy and radiation, making this great plant medicine for
those with cancer, HIV/AIDS and other imbalances.
Spirulina is salty in flavor and has a cooling energy. It
cleanses the blood, arteries, liver and kidneys. It builds the body, intestinal
flora and discourages growths such as fungus, yeast and bacteria. It helps to
balance anemia, eye problems, such as cataracts and glaucoma, hypoglycemia,
diabetes, G.I. disturbances and chronic skin problems.
Spirulina is available in tablet form or in powder. If you
purchase the tablets, the general recommendation is 6 tablets a day. If you
purchase the powder, 1 to 2 teaspoons is suggested. Try adding a teaspoon to
your smoothie or shake. Try sprinkling some on a salad, soup or guacamole.
These are just some of the reasons that you may want to add spirulina into your
diet. Here's to the abundance of the plant world!
Anne Calzada is a Certified Herbalist and founder of Healing
Heart Herbs. Her products can be found at Food For Thought in Ridgway and at
other fine natural health outlets. For
consultations or classes she may be reached at 626-5663 or by email
annecalzada@aol.com).
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Already Alive!
by Dr. Jerry Overton
“Don’t ask yourself
what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go and
do that. For what the world needs is people who have come alive.” — Harold
Whitman.
I’ve often wondered who first coined the phrase “make a living”.
Whoever it was, he or she surely did humanity a huge injustice. Let me explain.
First of all, I suspect that all of us have used that term from
time to time in reference to doing what we think we must do in order to put
food on the table, a roof over our heads, and all those other related things
needed to survive. The problem is that in seeing ourselves as having to “make a
living” we’ve forgotten a basic and foundational truth—and that is that we are
already alive! There is nothing that we have to do in order make that so. And
yet, as long as we think we have to “make a living”, then we will find
ourselves doing things that we wouldn’t otherwise do—all because we think we
have to.
I can’t tell you how many people I’ve counseled over the years
who were doing all sorts of undesirable things in order to “make a living”—and
yet, I can tell you with certainty that for most of them, what they were doing
didn’t make them feel very alive. So why were they doing what they were doing?
Because they thought they had to in order to “make a living!”
With that in mind, what would happen if we decided to totally
expunge that phrase from our vocabulary—and from our minds? And then what would
happen if we decided to go the next step and totally acknowledge and accept the
fact that we are already alive, and that our only task is then to do only that
which makes us truly feel our aliveness?
No doubt that for many, if not most, of us our experience of life
would be totally different. No longer would we be doing things because we
thought we had to in order to make a living—things that didn’t fit for us.
Rather, with our keen awareness of our innate aliveness, we’d be expressing it
in all kinds of lively ways —ways that would insure that our waking hours were
filled with much more joy and happiness and peace—not to mention much more
positive energy!
So, how is it with you? Are you content to do what you think you
must in order to “make a living?” Or are you now willing to reconsider the fact
that if you are still breathing you are already alive? And to go the next step
and consider just what makes you feel your aliveness—and then go and do that?
For the world is waiting—it’s waiting on you to make a new
decision about yourself—and to show up in all your aliveness—and to express it
with joy and exhilaration. The time is now—and your new decision will make all
the difference!
For the fact of the matter is that you, and all of us who share
this world with you, deserve nothing less! So Godspeed.
Copyright 2005 Dr. Jerry D. Overton
Jerry is a marriage and family therapist, a Master Certified
Coach, and director of The Center for Personal and Spiritual Growth, 600 S.
Park. He can be reached at 970-252-9311, and he welcomes your call!
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Business Member Profile: Stone Clan Education Center
Whole Life Network Release
Greetings of Peace, Love and Prosperity from the faculty and
staff of Stone Clan Education Center!
We are excited to be a new member of the Whole Life Network and are
looking forward to sharing not only our facility, but the wealth of knowledge
and experience in bodywork with any and all that are open to receiving.
Stone Clan Education Center was founded in 2002 to train existing
therapists in the art of LaPolar/LaStone therapy. It arose from the collaboration of Rick and Dawn Bresett and
Patricia Warne to produce marble cold stones to use in conjunction with basalt hot
stones. To introduce this new modality,
Rick and Dawn opened the Stone Clan Education Center for post-graduate classes.
In order to complete the circle, they have expanded the school to include the
650-hour state approved undergraduate massage program.
Our faculty is comprised of some of the finest bodywork
professionals in the industry. Dr. Ken
Edgar, DC is the Director; Holly Padilla-Thompson, CMT is the Assistant
Director; Instructors: Gay Leachman,
CMT; Jennifer Halbach, BA, CMT; Tina Mayfield, CMT; Beej Chorak, CMT; Rick
Bresett, LST, Owner, Instructor, and the onsite Inspirational
Speaker/Motivator.
In addition to the school, Stone Clan Education Center has an
open day spa (The Spa at Stone Clan), which proudly employs graduates from our
650-hour massage therapy program.
Stone Clan Education Center is currently the only
authorized facility in Colorado offering LaStone certification courses. For more information on any of our programs,
please contact us at 970-252-8385 or refer to our website
www.stoneclanedcenter.com.
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