Restarting and Revision

Hello all! My you have been patient. To get responses STILL after such a long hiatus, I am honored.

And I am ready.

Suffice it to say, I was - busy. Healing. Putting straight my life and eliminating the chaos.

I can't talk too much about that. And this blog isn't about THAT stuff, anymore anyway.

But I do have a vision, and now that the proverbial chains have finally been lifted, and my energy can now go back into my LIFE and LIVING it, not surviving it again, I can turn my attention back here. The direction I have been hinting at moving this blog can finally come to pass. And oh the fun we shall have :)

Sharing knowledge. Giving to others what others gave to me to heal, it my focus here now. Soon, along the sidebar, you will start to see listing of my writings. Some from school, some from my own private collection.

Some will be reports from my schooldays relevant to today.
Some will be poetry.
Some will be meditations, both written and recorded for you to use immediately.
Some will be songs I have written for children, or spirit.
Some will be meditative chants I have learned to reach a affirmative meditative state.

All will have a little "donate" button, or suggested "donate" button.

For now, as always: Music! A repeat I believe, but SO appropriate for my life the last 2 years:



In hope, and joy, and gratitude.
Jenna

Healing Medicine

If you can't get a smile in your heart from watching this....you have NO soul....



OH my oh my oh my!
Jenna

Re-emerging ...slowly

I am touched at the number of people wondering about the status of this blog. I haven't abandoned this project/blog. I have just been in the state of deeeeeep adjustments. Fundamental life stuff, like the beams and posts of a building needing replacement. I am almost there. Almost there.

A beautiful new home, one I hope to stay in for a long long long time. I finally finally feel like I found my home in Seattle. Like someone plugged me back in. I've traded the quiet forests of the Cascades for the semi-city life of the waterfront. I love both. But this is the best of all worlds and I am charging up.

But still in adjustments. A lot of big fundamental changes. I will leave it at that.

I am also pondering the direction of this blog. I have batted around ideas. It's origins were to inform friends and family. But it is going way beyond that.

I have had requests for writings, books, etc for the past year, and wasn't in a position to write. But in this new place I have a desk, that peaks at the Puget Sound, Vashon Island, and the ferry going back and forth. The light is streaming in 100 year old windows, taller than me,

in every room. I miss the light of Arizona, this comes in a close second, making me wish I was a cat, that could curl up in the light on a rug and be done for the day.

But this space, the light, the new beginning is allowing room again for creative energy and my creative center, shut down too long, is starting to churn.

So this blog, I think, will be a catchall. It isn't going to be all about cancer, because my life is not all about cancer. My life is about who I am...and cancer is just this part of the journey.

I had the honor of being interviewed for a book recently. And she asked me what is it I want to say, while I have a platform to say anything, that could help someone going through a challenge in their life. And it all came back to what I was doing BEFORE I was diagnosed with the damndable little "c".

So that is what this blog is going to be about. Creating a toolbox for life's challenges so when the winds of change come, your center will ALWAYS be there. The core of WHO you are is unchanging. And life challenges, like cancer, try hard to make us forget and go into slumbers until the ache and discomfort of living out of alignment with ourselves calls us back to do the work. To unearth the "why did I come here to planet earth? What is my purpose?" starts to nag at us.

That was my work before my period of disorientation occured. I am not WHO I was before in so many ways. How I view the world has fundamentally changed. YET....WHO I am has not. What awakens my curiousity, challenges me to grow and expand, reconnects me to feeling a part of something greater than just ME....that has not changed.

And this blog will become my journey to remember that part of myself and in turn, to share what I have learned through my life.

This is the ONE thing I kept wanting to share during that interview...doing the work of knowing WHO you are at your core BEFORE life throws you for a loop, will help you recover, learn, and intergrate much more quickly. During these times of challenge, you can either adapt, learn and grow, or cave in, give up, and die before your dead. If your reading this blog, you are probably in the former group. Wanting to learn, challenge yourself, grow.

You will hear some of my cancer journey here. I will indeed post helpful links and what I have learned. I will also post writings, research papers from my Health Psychology school days, and things that inspire and interest the creative hearts.

Because, I am not cancer. It is a huge influence, challenge, and personal growth instigator in my life. I am not ignoring it. But it is time to share all over myself. Not just part. How I am "doing" updates are easy to get if you call, or write. If you don't know me personally, you will have to just know I am well enough to be writing, if I am, and that is all that matters.

I am going to get back to that paintbrush and yoga mat aspect of this blog now. ;)

Thanks for sticking with me during the break!
Jenna

Transitions

Press Play first. Then read.

Hello all of you patient readers. If you still check back to this blog, I am grateful for your persistence. I believe the cycles of life ebb and flow, from external, to internal and back again. My recent year has become a very internal journey, and I consciously chose to pull back and tend to my life with a quieter, more contemplative personal time. Many choices, and transitions have been occurring and I believe when something truly valuable to you is in the "birthing" process, holding it close is called for while you make your decisions, take some baby steps, and then adjust.

I have plans to change the scope and content of this blog in very fundamental ways. It started as a way to keep many friends connected to the in's and out's of my personal stats. Chemo, no chemo. Test results, things people can do. But it has evolved beyond that now and so I am deliberating on what the next incarnation of this blog will be.

For now. The holidays. The spiral to the center of the year, and the time of a tiny flicker of light held within the darkest times. I can so relate.

Recently, I "ran into" the biography of the the life of someone I deeply identify with, and it only took diving back almost millennium to do it. I came across this 900 year old mystic nun, by "accident", when my body was breaking down from fatigue, and I took a day to be quiet, and recoup. And by "accident" learned about the life of Hildegarde of Bingen. She was a nun from Germany around 1100 AD.

This piece, which she composed, I can feel in my bones. One of my favorite things is music in the woods and singing in chant style. So I LOVE this version of Hildegarde. Our lives parallel in many ways, and I had never, ever heard of her before. She was a nun, mystic, scientists, artist, composer, a bit of a rebel, etc. She came close to death, after years of repressing her inner calling, and came out of it with visionary work. (May I follow her footsteps!!). I always joked I should've been some sort of Buddhist nun or monk if I hadn't followed the motherhood path. But maybe it is my Catholic Italian side that is calling me.

Eitherway, you didn't come here to get schooled on 900 year old rebel nuns. :)

Enjoy this beautiful piece, may it bring a moment of stillness in the hectic pace of the holidays.

See you next year!

(Added Feb 2011 - I've had the lovely opportunity to talk to Marisa herself. She is as lovely as these songs. She isn't coming to the US anytime soon, but I promised I would make sure a link to her site was up. If you find this music calls to you, go here www.marisa-music.com. It is available on CD or digital. For US readers, the digital is cheaper because of shipping, and kinder to the environment.)

Many Blessings,
Jenna

What does Harmony Hill have to do with Mojo?

What a fun enigmatic start to a post, eh? But seriously, I found my center, got a chance to find myself again, and got re-inspired all in 3 days at Harmony Hill.

I posted about this retreat center awhile back. And just this past week, attended the 3 day breast cancer retreat. It is just too much to post about here. But I can tell you this. After 2 years of slowly changing, adapting, and getting lost in the woods, this was the trail of crumbs leading back out and back into the world.

So I am going to post just this for now, if you or a loved one are experiencing any issues surrounding cancer it is worth every second of your time to check this place out. Retreats for cancer are offered FREE of charge. Even if you are from out of town (and there were several people in that category), this place is worth the plane ticket and then some. If you are local to it, all the better.

I have yet to experience a place in this cancer journey where I felt 110% completely supported, understood, nurtured, quietly looked after with such a respect, NO patronization, no pity, no fear. If you are on this journey, or have completed it, this is a place to truly heal.

They do more than cancer retreats, (the rest of the programs are for a fee to help support the cancer retreats) so it is worth a look for anyone reading this. But if you feel inclined to give this holiday season, please consider supporthing this amazing program/place.

I feel peaceful and rejuvenated and hopeful that I can handle this journey once more. The resources, faculty, participants and the all that went on there feels cleared away the cluttered collecting in my mind/psyche/energy/heart and reminded me what quiet strength is all about.

My take home lesson, vulnerable and powerful are not opposing forces, but required attributes that happen simultaneously. I have learned to be more gentle with myself, and others, and in doing so, my power stores are restored.

Thank you to all the participants who might read this one day.

Please consider supporting this organization to make this program accessible to ALL people. Medical debt runs high in the cancer world, making this program out of reach if it were to be a fee program. By donating, you will allow cancer survivors (and that is ANYONE touched by cancer), a chance to do healing on a deep level. Thank you.



Jenna

The Shortest Update - Guarenteed

Chemo - fine
side-effects - not so bad
daughter - 7, securely in 1st grade
weather - windy
inner cheerleader - slightly annoying with the jump kicks, but helpful
big girl britches - securely fastened

Cancer - 0 Life - 1

Jenna

Hereafter - Trailer (HD)

Wow. Thank you Clint Eastwood. Thank you.

Jenna
(who is living life, not writing about it at the moment)