quits

It’s been a long few weeks, friends. While feeling depleted and defeated I retreated back to what I know and do best, hermiting. I wanted to remove myself from my friends, the land and yes this blog (responsibilities). It is something that comes very naturally to me and it feels that it is not only a service to myself (who cannot handle the weight of the feeling that I am feeling) but also to others, having me around feels like a heavy burden, a vibe killer, and I am helping everyone if I simply, stay away.

Even though this is my go-to instinct, Hawaii is infusing my most personal and intimate spaces with her wild and wise nature. I have brought her questions about everything. White people, colonization, love, friendship, hippies, my future, future of the planet. She’s held them all and patiently watched me run myself into the ground with worries. I can feel the tree standing in neutral solace as they watch me spiral. I get angry. I cry so hard I stomp my feet and ask them why? Why does it have to be so painful? Why does this turmoil follow me wherever I go?

They watch, providing very little answers and wait for me to through my temper tantrum. I always look at them with so much confusion. Why do you have answers for me when I’m hardly looking for them yet when I need you most you are the most silent?

I felt more alone than ever, not only do i feel so lost and confused and sad I can’t even run to the trees for comfort. I’m truly in this alone. This is how far gone I was feeling. Not able to recognize I was turning my back on beliefs I vowed I would never forget. I was so close to packing it up and shutting down this stupid island fantasy. Everything is inherently bad when you look closely enough. People are greedy and ultimately selfish. Beautiful places just hurt even more when you start to see all the cracks in the pristine picture.

Ce la vie as Meredith Marks would say. If you don’t know who Meredith Marks is please don’t look her up and continue thinking she is a dead poet or activist or something.

All of those things are true. I can’t say I was completely wrong. There are some really dark realities here on the island that most tourists probably don’t get the chance to fully take in. I know what you’re thinking, thank god we have this super depressing blog to tune into and report on all the horrible things happening! But this has been my world for the past few weeks I’ve been battling… myself. And it wouldn’t be an honest report of my time here if I didn’t fully disclose some of the fucked upness here. Money, image, greed, playing roles, and energy vampires are very much alive here. Culture is stolen from native people and theres a disconnect to the land because of it.

The trees were in fact giving me the answer. The answer is totally blank. I too, like the trees, need to bare witness to these things and not fight, scream and frantically look up flights. Rather, accept them, as they were accepting me in my childish manor. They aren’t going to tell me I’m wrong, they aren’t going to give me some earth shattering revelation that will make it all better. They just were there with me saying “yeah…” and after a while, I too was able to look at everything and say… yeah…

The beauty of totally losing it is that you are left with few choices. You are forced to dial into the few things that you know for sure about yourself. Your beliefs your values your reasons for getting up and trying (see bees harvest note). I had no choice but to try to care for myself, I had to get myself into anything other than my thoughts. I found myself face to face with my belief system and the make or break moment of realizing hey I actually really do believe in all this stuff I talk about – it really resonated as truth when I could see any other shit, surrounded by my self imposed darkness. The trees didn’t have answers for me, the island was showing me things I didn’t want to look at, my role on the farm had been totally washed away from working with the plants and replaced with childcare and cleaning. With my back against the wall I didn’t turn to TV, tears or THC. The loops inside my head were too strong for any of that over-the-counter bullshit. I was brought to my knees in prayer to the river and when I couldn’t hear her I began to dance (and cry a bit). Not in a nice way, but an honest one. I tried to move all the nasty energy inside me with stomping and jumping and fist throwing. I closed my eyes and felt all the tension I wanted released. After an hour or two of chaotic but free movement I felt slightly better. I wasn’t in loops anymore but I couldn’t lie and say I felt good about where I was and what I was doing. I still had questions and I still wanted to be alone.

Timing was an important element by letting it be. It wasn’t the timing I wanted but when you allow time to take you places, I’ve found it takes you to the most magical, creative places you’d never ever think of yourself. It’s an opening, allowing and trusting. I opened and allowed and I had to trust that timing would lead me to something. Please God anywhere besides stagnant waiting, but waiting is required if you want to catch the right train. It can’t be something controlled and directed otherwise you’ll just end up with more you and I needed anything but that.

Later that day I was prompted to go to a concert by a woman very highly regarded in the hippie circles of Kaua’i. I hesitated, in my very cynical and bitter mindset I professed that everyone there would be a phony spiritual person who loves to vampire off ‘high vibrations’ and ‘love frequencies’. Still I attended trying to wear my flowyst hippie friendly clothes so I could blend in

What I experienced that night was the most real and powerful medicine I had ever witnessed. I ate my fucking words and regretted so much the judgemental narrow mindedness i chose to stand in. So so close I was to closing myself off to one of the most magical musical experiences because I wanted to feel superior. I was close to closing myself off to these hard lessons from the island I didn’t want to learn.

Marya Stark is a woman weaving the wounds of femininity with beauty, depth and soul. I’ve never seen anyone perform in such a way. Such an open raw deep and playful presence that reached out to every single one of us sitting on the church, on the floor, taking in her mighty energy. She sang out to us and told us stories that inspired her poetry, she danced with us and we sang. We all sang together. She acknowledged all the pain I had been feeling, all the pain we’re exposed to right now on the earth. She sang to it. It was incredible. So powerful and quite literally medicine.

Its not a problem to see and feel the evil that is present. It is real and it is deserving of being noted. Allowing it to shut you out of the other also mighty forces is not. The mindset of everything is wrong. I must do something. That is pretty much the exact same game of the rat race I attempted to escape. I’ve realized it’s something within me I was trying to get away from. Doing nothing and accepting all the forms of life around you is actually pretty revolutionary. And loving.