My beautiful friends and teachers

So grateful for them, especially when the human world gets too heavy. Their silence and quiet acceptance of what is, the way they live in the moment, their presence - these are my refuge.

Blessings, peace and respect to all animals all around the world.

Peace 

Life is practicing you

When we feel alone and unsupported, or unseen, we can try to remember that we have support from life itself. Life supports our physical processes, so that when our bodies get sick, they want to get better again. Life supports our emotional and spiritual wellbeing by giving us signals when we're not acting in a beneficial way. It supports our relationships with each other by drawing us in certain directions.

To have life on our side is more than we can ever ask for, and life is always on our side, until the very last moment, even when we don't feel like it is. Life wants us to thrive, because we are life. Life is experiencing and experimenting through us.

Chogyam Trungpa said that we are not practicing life, life is practicing us.

We are unique singularities, each one of us, every single being on this planet, and as such, precious to life. I hope you can take some comfort, strength, or maybe some courage from that. 

Peace 

Practice

I've come across two metaphors for meditation practice that I really like, and want to share them. I think that even if you're not into meditation, they apply to anything that you want to get to know really well, anything that you'd like to become second nature to you and become intimate with, wether it be gardening, painting, telling the truth, being courageous, or whatever else you're genuinely devoting yourself to.

The first metaphor comes from Dogen, a zen monk from the 1200s, whose work I'm currently reading about in "Sit down and shut up" by Brad Warner. "Dogen likens ... practice to the way you get wet if you walk through fog. You don't notice it as it's happening. But walk through that fog long enough, and you'll get thoroughly soaked."

The other metaphor I really like, and unfortunately can't remember where it comes from, is of practice being like soaking beans. I soak a lot of beans, so I feel close to this one. When you first put the beans in water, they are small and rock hard. Over time, the water infiltrates, slowly and imperceptibly, at its own pace, until the beans are eventually all swollen and soft, and quite transformed.

I hope these metaphors can be helpful to you in some way, maybe if only as encouragement that things do happen when you make an effort, when you try, even though it may take a really long time to see any results. Sometimes the results of our actions may not even appear until our lives are over. 

So, to close with another quote from Brad Warner, which I really like, "Do what you can, and do it now".

Peace 

Robin

This poor little robin never had a chance. It broke my heart to see it. Its nest fell out of a tree and the egg broke.

How to reconcile the realities of life with our ideas and expectations? And how to reconcile what we perceive as the beauty of life with its harshness?

I guess one way is to let go of our notions and expectations and try to align ourselves as much as we can with what actually is, while keeping an open mind and open heart. Walk that edge of trying to do our best without attachment to the results. Sounds so easy but is so very hard in practice.

Peace 

Flowers on the porch

Good morning! Look how beautiful the flowers on the front porch are getting. This little spot, which I've been tending to for a couple of months now, has become my little sanctuary. I'm glad to share it with you.
Peace 

A short reading from my book

I just posted a  6 minute, YouTube video with a short reading from my poetry book.

Enjoy this beautiful day!

Peace

My book is ready, and how to get it

My poetry book, Fertile Ground: Beauty and Brokenness, was just printed. I am so excited, and grateful to everyone who encouraged and supported me. For logistics on how to get the book, read below.

I decided to donate 100% of profits to these environmental organizations:

Natural Resource Defense Council: Defending our air, water, communities, and wild places.

Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies: Marine research, rescue and education since 1976.

Marine Mammal Alliance Nantucket: Responding to stranded and injured marine mammals on Nantucket, and providing public education about the ocean.

The book costs $15, and here's how you can get it:

• At the farm: just stop by during weekly sales on Thursdays from 3 to 6 pm, or whenever it works for you.
• By mail: Mailing costs are: $4.25 for US, $6.50 for Canada and $12 for Europe. Please send me a check for $15 plus the mailing cost, and include your name and mailing address, and I will send your book as soon as I receive the check.
• Starting next week: At the Willimantic Food Coop.
• If you have any ideas or suggestions of where/how I can sell it, would you please let me know?

Please feel free to email me (mail@shundahaifarm.com) or leave a comment here with any questions or anything else.

Thank you so much again to everyone who encouraged me. I would not have done a book on my own, but now that I did, I am so glad. It feels like a sort of passage and also a sort of connection and continuation of my ancestors, since both my grandmothers in Romania wrote poetry. 

Peace 🙏

July Farm Video

My latest video, showing what's going on in the fields and orchard, and with the animals. I hope you enjoy it.

Flowers, veggies and my latest read

"Sit down and shut up" Punk Rock Commentaries on Buddha, God, Truth, Sex, Death.

You know they say don't judge a book by its cover; well, I judged this one by its title and bought it. I think punk rock and zen make a lovely combination. I'm only 50 pages into it, but so far I do like it.

Only

Only love 

Through you

Not from you

Not for you 

Through you 

Be the instrument

Only love 

Even when it breaks you

Only love 

Peace 

Control, going with the flow, and the ground in between

How much to control? How much to let go and just go with the flow? And how to tread the ground in between?

One of the more difficult lessons we repeatedly have to learn in life is how to hold intention without becoming too controlling or too attached to the way it manifests. We all have situations where we'd like to see a certain outcome, whether it be in our personal lives, our families, jobs, communities, etc. In the great majority of cases, the outcome doesn't depend on us alone. And it's a fine act, one that requires self knowledge, sensitivity, life experience and some luck, to know how much to control and how much to let go of a situation.

Letting things be determined by circumstance alone doesn't feel right to me, but neither does pushing too hard for a specific outcome.

Personally, I feel that what I need to do is learn how to hold intention in a firm but gentle way. It's really tough and I don't have an answer yet. I think that a lot of is has to do with knowing yourself and trusting your instincts, and also learning to discern whim from something more solid.

It's also important to learn to be aware of when you are being swept away by circumstance versus acting intentionally.

We make mistakes, but rather than beating ourselves up over them, I think it's more useful to realize that learning this kind of fine balance is not a one time lesson. We must do it over and over, and our experience, our own lives and the lives of those we know are our teachers.

Nobody can tell anyone else how to tread the ground between being too controlling and letting themselves be at the mercy of circumstance. We are all naturally drawn to a certain point on this spectrum and we must all find our way to a good balance. Hopefully, we can have some support and understanding from others as we do this.

I share this from my own experience and I hope that it can be useful to someone, if only to know that you're not alone.

Peace and keep trying.

Go

"Go–not knowing where; bring–not knowing what; the path is long, the way unknown; the hero knows not how to arrive there by himself (or herself).” —Russian Fairytale, quoted in Search edited by Jean Sulzberger (as posted by Creative Soulful Woman on FB).

Just go. Knowing you'll get lost along the way. Knowing nobody can save you. Knowing that for you, right now, there's no other way. And also knowing that you're no hero, certainly not a hero, but that's okay.

Peace

My book going to final printing

Today I'm bringing my poetry book to the printer for the final printing. I am both excited and scared. Scared because many times I feel like my poems are crappy and pathetic and way too personal to put out there like that. Excited because I'm doing it anyway.

Peace 

Quote from Fear by Thich Nhat Hanh

I am acutely aware of how true this is. I have been both victim and perpetrator. 

"...blaming and arguing never help us and only create a wider gap between us. Only understanding, trust, and love can help us change and grow."

So let's be generous and open, and let's forgive ourselves and those who have hurt us. Let's trust ourselves that we can do better, and let's trust them too.

Let's live with an open heart knowing we'll be hurt again, and doing our very best not to hurt others. There is no place in this for blame. Just being willing to learn, to feel it all, to contribute and give the best of ourselves always. What else is there to do?

Peace 

Sunday morning

First, the milking.

Then, breakfast on the porch: my sister's home made bread, my own home made cheese and strawberry jam, and not home made but delicious coffee with milk from Jasmine. And current reading. 

Enjoy your day. It sure feels a lot better out there now that the humidity came down.

Peace 

These summer days

Quiet mornings with a book and a cat. Some of my own favorite memories from when I was a child are of reading a good book in a comfortable place.
Blackberry abundance is here 
Nasturtiums and geraniums 
Planning out the work for the day. My feet are never clean at this time of year because I'm always barefoot.
Whatever you are doing, wherever you are, may you also find beauty in your life and may you be healed by it.

Peace 

A little beauty

Just wanted to share this sweet little spot at my sister's house.
Nasturtiums and butterfly 

A simple lunch 

Life gets tangled and untangled

In its own time 

In its own way 

Have faith and learn from that.

4th of July

Me, I'm harvesting cilantro and milking my cow. Still, I'm grateful to be here and grateful for all the places I'm from. 


I hope that people are remembering those separated from their children today. I can't imagine the pain and anxiety.

Peace 

Girls

Quiet summer morning on the farm.
Girls just wanna have fun. Still true for good friends like these. Heading to the beach, with grandpa driving.

Peace 

Things I've been up to

Ed and I went to a protest in Willimantic last Saturday, to stop family separation at the border. Thank you to everyone who came out here and all over the country.
Cheese making

Trellissing and pruning tomatoes. They're loving this heat, and growing fast. Me, not such an extreme heat lover, but I deal with it.

Cucumbers coming right along too. Look at all those flowers. Abundance is here!
Peace