THE YEAR OF LIVING DARINGLY: Week Two

When I started this adventure of living for nine months at Prairie Pond Woods...feeling a little like Thoreau (and a little guilty)...I said I was ready to be "inconvenienced by the things I love."  As mentioned in the Week One post, sometimes we can put parts of ourselves on hold or let them die altogether because we allow other things in life take over. 

For me, this meant finally putting all my loves in one basket and seeing where they take me...FOCUSING on the "businistry" of Heart by Nature, spending time outdoors, raising my own food (chickens!), getting a dog (after being dogless for 7 years), writing, reading and helping women connect with their own heart's desires through nature.  

Could I have done this in my life up North?  Maybe, if I was a different person.  But the advantage of years is that we learn who we truly are and accept it. I am not a highly disciplined person...and I am definitely not a multi-tasker.  I am motivated by passion, not productivity...and I do well focusing on a few things at a time with lots of time for reflection. It is who I am. In a book I read recently, The Artist's Rule, I recognized myself in the author's description of an "artist-monk," a person who is drawn to and more fruitful within a contemplative and creative lifestyle.  So when I finally realized I was being inconvenienced more by things I didn't love...it was time to make a change.

So, the change has begun...sort of.  Week Two was less about contemplation and nature immersion and more about business marketing.  For the upcoming retreat, Birdwatching as Meditation, I learned (was inconvenienced by, actually) a new Email Marketing program through Vertical Response.  Hopefully, you received a copy of my labors in your email Inbox or through Facebook.  And when I wasn't staring down cross-eyed at my computer...I watched snow flurries and resident birds out the window.

The other task...as boring to me as it is to you...was the sorting of paperwork into piles, then purging, then putting those piles somewhere that makes sense.  Piles for retreat ideas and hand-outs, piles of natural history resources, piles for writing piles of journals, piles of my life...all sorted and condensed.  And a pile of books, brought to finally read...  

I'll share my non-exhaustive Book List, which might be a bit less boring to you.  These are books I've read since I've been here, books I'm reading (or listening to) now, books I plan to re-read and new books waiting on the shelf.  Do they all look a bit similar?  They are...I call it focused.

The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd
One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp
The Secret Message of Jesus by Brian McLaren (and others not yet purchased)
Writing Down your Soul by Janet Conner
Listening to the Heartbeat of God: A Celtic Spirituality by J. Phillip Newell
Prayers from Iona by J. Phillip Newell
Nature as Spiritual Practice by Steven Chase
A Field Guide to Nature as Spiritual Practice by Steven Chase
The Artist's Rule by Christine Valter-Paintner
Anne of Green Gables by J.M. Montgomery (never read it as a child)
An Obsession with Butterflies by Sharman Apt Russell
On the Unseriousness of Human Affairs by James A. Schall
Spiritual Ecology by Rudolf Steiner
Holy Silence by J. Brent Bill
Newcomb's Wildflower Guide
Peterson Field Guide of Eastern Birds
Peterson Field Guide to Eastern Birds' Nests
Moth Field Guides, Insect Field Guides, Butterfly Field Guides, Etc.
AND...if I can get my hands on it anywhere:
Phytogeography of Unglaciated Eastern US and its Interpretation by E. Lucy Braun.