NOTE TO READERS

i'm changing blog sites. eventually i will just get my own domain and stop moving around so much, but for now i've found one that suits my needs. so if you're familiar or new, please check out

www.granolapath.tumblr.com

much love,
britta


2.25.2009

breath is so much more important

inhale. exhale. since i started practicing yoga i've learned (or maybe just relearned) that breathing is everything.

lately i've been battling a cold. a lot of congestion built up right in the most important place...

we breathe so that our organs and vital systems can function, so that we can live. we breathe to maintain necessary homeostatic rhythms, so that our heart can beat. we breathe differently in satisfaction than disappointment, in pleasure than in deep sorrow. we breathe, always, even if we try not to. it seems like life is simply tenacious enough to keep breathing...

currently i am in training to become a better breather, in hopes that all that smooth flowing delicious enriching oxygen will permeate my entire being and help me to be, better.


mmm

2.23.2009

lemons in life


making limoncello is much more difficult than i would have imagined. lemon juice is too sour, you see, for the type of sweet, soft , sensual delight that is limoncello. its a crazy infusion of lemon rind soaked in vodka and mixed with a gentle sweet syrup, served cold with a burst of bright yellow zesty refreshment. i was convinced i could make it in an hour. turns out 10-14 days is the minimum you need to get the proper consistency and potency. hmmm

so i'm finding the same principles resonate throughout my life. like good friendships. you can't simply squeeze all that juice out and mix it with a bunch of other stuff and expect it to taste good or be long lasting at all. you have to let things soak, you have to slowly add the sugar, the substance, the color slowly slowly begins to glow....

just thinking about all the lemons i have. some of them are still on trees, waiting to fall off from the weight of their ripeness. some are getting a little soft sitting in my kitchen waiting to be used, squeezed, peeled. some are at that perfect plumpity, simply waiting to be rolled around and made into the best, most delicious lemonade or dressing you'll ever taste...

2.19.2009

the music leads us


the sounds and images and words you surround yourself with will, without fail, infect every part of you. lately i've had a cd stuck in my car that over the last 2 weeks has played nonstop, echoing sweet songs of true, raw worship. today my ipod repeated this song at least 5 times, filling me with a warmth and joy uncontainable...reminding me of who it is who knows me so well, who loves me so well, who feeds me and leads me....

"my heart beats today with a faster pace than blood can flow, with a fever my veins can't hold
oh hosanna, hosanna

my mind circles today with thoughts much to big to think, pictures and colors to bright to keep this old piece of clay that you've shaped for so many years, is about to burst as you're drawing near

hosanna, hosanna

come close my king who bears all my sorrows, who's crushed for me, who hears my praise, come close my king by your wounds i am saved.

hosanna, hosanna"

---on the uphill---

2.05.2009

nothing like a rainy day

there's a river of thoughts rushing through my head lately...especially today. it was one of those days that i woke up and everything was somehow off...my body was sick, my mind was running, my spirit was dry, my energy was very inward, closed.

and somehow in the midst of the puzzles and traps i can conjure for myself in my brain, whether i'm fussing about my schedule and how much reading i'm NOT going to get done before class or if i'm focusing on the deep longing in my heart to create art, music, poetry that will in some beautiful manner make tangible or bring to life my swirling emotions and yet not even being able to even comprehend or organize what those emotions are...somehow i make it through the day. somehow i make the time to sit and pray, to nourish my body slowly and thankfully, somehow it works out that i understand what i was supposed to understand for class and still have time to have meaningful conversations and fellowship with close friends...

i'm not sure how all these concepts, musings, questions or thoughts will take shape or when or even if they will at all...but i do know that the afternoon promised rain, and rain it did deliver. rain in the most cleansing, dimension increasing, rich, soothing, loosening and freeing way. i went for a walk, allowing the wetness to soak through the cold skin on my feet, let it drip of the tip of my warm lips, let it drench me in whatever magical, divine, blissful elixer it could... somehow the day ended up being pretty 'on'...

there's nothing like a rainy day to do me good, to bring clarity to all this haze...

till the next storm...b