Tallahassee Journal by Margaret E. McColley

Diane Booth Gilliam is an extraordinary human, one whom I am grateful to have met and someone I will continue to seek out for guidance and creative inspiration. She is the creator of  Yogastrology ®, a practice that marries the lessons of ancient yogic and ayurverdic practices with knowledge rooted in Vedic and Western astrology.   To learn all about her offerings, visit: https://yogastrology.com/ . As a student and teacher of yoga, I was looking for something deep that went far beyond learning about the physical shapes the body takes in yoga. What I found was a supportive, intuitive, listening voice with whom to engage on the most gorgeous topics through which yogic practices allow us to explore and expand. Diane's curriculum is utterly unique, and allowed me to find a Home within while learning about interactions between the cosmos, the natural world, and an enhanced path to being. Here is our interview in 3 core questions:  1. How did your travels to India imp...

                                                       Sometimes when I brush my teeth at night, I look down and inspect the sink in the bedroom where my toothbrush and paste are located. And unless I've just scrubbed it down until sparkling, I have an unheimlich feeling of horror while looking. It's almost never clean enough for my ablutions, and I hear myself questioning my self worth: what have you accomplished today, anyway? Your sink is dirty. You can do better. This is when I know that I stayed up too late and my tired voice is talking to me.... At this point I try to make a b-line to bed, surrendering to the sandman, hoping that my horror will stay at the sink and the sandman will caress me gently with kinder words. It didn't occur to me until today, while talking to a new student, that maybe perfectionism was the culprit. But this isn't wha...

 Recently I was out to lunch with a dear friend when she told me to" Stop It". I had been speaking in a self-deprecating manner without realizing it. I took her words as an admonishment. I got reactive. "It's not your job to fix me,"  I returned. "I'm not trying to fix you--it just hurts me to hear you talk about yourself that way."  We got a little heated trying to flesh it out all the way. But ultimately it was a tune-up for our communications. It had been building up for a long time... years? Prior to this lunch date I had already been reflecting on the Art of Misunderstanding.  It seems to me that so much of life is filled with misunderstandings that there should be a play-book for how to make them turn into a growth moment.  But the fact is, life moves so quickly at times, and we have so many communications within a day (and this is ofcourse variable, depending on one's circumstances), that they aren't that easy to track and revise in-...

   Limoges tea cup: Anne Bewley Artwork: Lancelot Gambis A Cup of See (for the phone-shy) In memory of dad,a conversationalist This poem is an exploration of the intimacy that comes through in-person vs. over-the-telephone conversation. I had started to notice a greater impetus to use video when calling friends and family, and wondering what it is about the phone...And yet: some of my most intimate conversations have been over the telephone. The voice alone can convey so much , and without the seeing part involved, we may listen more deeply to the warmth and musicality of the human voice.To be explored later...once I phone the ones to whom I owe calls, those who prefer the phone overall.  I realized while composing this that there is a whole philosophy of seeing that I want to consider, since seeing goes so far beyond the visual, since we do not all see through the eyes*All of my writings are subject to tweaking so check back from time to time to time (the beat of the h...

 Hunkering down with the Ferals, and what They are teaching me. fe·ral /ˈferəl,ˈfirəl/ adjective (especially of an animal) in a wild state, especially after escape from captivity or domestication. "a feral cat" I provide some food and shelter for a family of feral kitties living in the cul-de-sac.  This is what I'm observing, and learning: 1. They take turns being sentinals for eachother (protection, sharing). 2. They eat their food delicately, even when they are very hungry (non-dominance, non-greed). 3. They keep eachother warm (sharing heat). 4. They greet eachother by bumping into one another with purpose, shoulder-to-hip, in a side-swipe (recognition, hospitality). 5. The pack is a matriarchy, and she eats first (respect for the mother, for elders). 6. They are more comfortable when I hunker down at their level (equality, meeting them at their level). 7. They have sensitive hearing (vigilance, awareness of surroundings). 8. They like sleeping on leaves (naturally-lea...

  This is where they walked, swam hunted danced and sang, Take a picture here; Take a souvenir. Cuyahoga, R.E.M.   Sometimes words swim around in our minds, sinking into the inner layers until they embed, planting new life in our neurological bedrock.  ~~~S y l a c a u g a~~~ A few days ago, my swimming word was a name-place: a small, hilly town in Alabama, where once tread the Shawnee, until they were forced to move west of the Mississippi through the Indian Removal Act. Sylacauga looped around like a river otter in my ear.  Chalakagay was a Shawnee settlement prior to the expelling of native Americans both more and less itinerant (the Creek were established in this area before the arrival of the Shawnee, who were refugees). The lay of the land is gentle here; one can see why it made such a compelling place to rest, with its hills, forests, and lakes coming together, forging ecosystems. See: https://digitalalabama.com/alabama-cities/sylacauga-alabama/2543...

September 16, 2022  If I had to create a symbol for the last few years, it would be a circle. So many circles have come to mind. At the same time, I've missed circles: the kind created when several people come together, and sit around a fire, for example. A fire circle. The circle I have been thinking a lot about is one created by narrative. We have these family Zooms, you see, and after more than two years listening to people speaking, I have started to recognize circularity. Coming back to a story that has been told before. The way that the brain changes as we age and becomes more circuitous. What if: We were re-telling stories we have already told in order to seal them into others' memories, and our own? What if repetition of the same story were considered a golden gift and never judged as less? Circularity. The embedding of stories.