Finding Tara

       

 I was never a, “If you can’t see it, it isn’t there,” kind of person, but I wasn’t a dandelions-in-my-hair, tie-dyed spirit guide either. As previously mentioned in other blogs, I became jaded in regard to anything metaphysical after my husband of seven years dumped me for a fantasy - a pretty, blonde self-proclaimed medium who sold crystal skulls, bought married men element pendants, and met them for lunches at quaint New England bistros.

Granted, no resemblance, still one of my girls 

After my divorce, I worked my ass off and rarely slept in order to regain my independence. In two years I became self-sufficient, living in my own apartment, working two successful teaching jobs, and maintaining a healthy relationship. Still, something was amiss. Confidence, peace of mind, and healing were things that eluded me thanks to years of feeling inadequate and expandable. Then during my divorce party in the Spring of 2013, I reunited with a grad school classmate, and things wistfully started to change. 

Upon my request via random and desperate text, Mind Key creator Danielle Rose introduced me to Brian Froud’s Faeries’ Oracle among other resources on faerie, goddesses, crystals, herbs, moon cycles, yoga, etc. To this day I remember sitting in her home office, filling a canvas bag with almost every book she owned. I was hooked. 

Everything I read or researched made sense to me. At this point, I am not ashamed to say that I never received the same enlightenment from church. My parents, who are very born-again Christian, tried to steer me towards the Baptist church. Despite disapproval from the ones who put me on this Earth, I took a different road, and I have been on the down-low ever since, at least with my family. Nevertheless, I continue my journey. When I think I couldn’t be anymore moved by this spirituality, something else leaves me breathless. 

I found a little metaphysical shoppe called Soul Journey while taking a different route home from work one day. It was there I discovered Laurie Sue Brockway’s The Goddess Pages, Patricia Monaghan’s The Goddess Path, the many works of Doreen Virtue, and so many other writers, poets, artists, healers, and spirits whose words continue to resonate with me - a secure but wavering being who needs to believe there is something more to existence than what I can see or touch.  

Brockway's wonderful book 

Then I discovered Tara - the Hindu goddess of protection and compassion - and in doing so, I continued building a stronger connection to self. Sure, I was ecstatic to learn there was a strong, feminine deity with my name. But more importantly, Tara became a companion and symbol for my continuous soul journey - a journey that will hopefully lead me to the key to understanding my own mind, where my mind needs to be, and how my mind needs to protect my body. 

According to Laurie Sue Brockway,“Om Tare tu Tare ture soha…essentially translates to: “Hail Tara…Her enlightenment and compassion protects me and liberates me from external fears and internal delusion…May I honor this in myself!” 

And that, in essence, is Mind Key - finding that key that unlocks your mind to your truth. Follow the Green Tara Chronicles to learn more about this tumbled-rock covered road to self.  

Becoming Whole: Making peace with the light and the dark

At Mind Key we believe are all whole and perfect, exactly the way we are. The only way to accept and make peace with this truth is by exploring the shadow side of ourselves and bringing it to light.

In our anthology, Yin and Yang: The Duality of Balance our healers, artists and writers share their insights and journeys into achieving wholeness via both the yin and yang sides of themselves and the world around them.

Let them inspire you on your own path of healing and happiness in the following reviews of their contributions to this beautiful, full color work of art:

Award-winning author, inspirational speaker and radiant life coach, Barbara Steingas, helps people find the pieces they need to solve their personal health puzzle through coaching services, talks, workshops, and her writing. Barbara's passion is helping others optimize their health and vitality.

accompanying image by Alma Carel

In her piece, Everything in Moderation, Barbara tells how she seesawed between healthy and unhealthy eating habits. This bouncing from one extreme to another became a determining factor in why she eventually developed Cohn's Disease, which affects the body's ability to digest and eliminate food. Her story speaks not only to women, but also to men who struggle with striking that balance between what is right for their bodies, and their emotional health. Without this crucial balance, everything suffers.

Poet, artist, and clothing designer, Ava M. Hu studied poetry and sculpture at St. Lawrence College. To Ava, there is a fine line between art and poetry, one a written metaphor, the other visual.

accompanying photo by JoAnna Schillaci

Ava's word choice is exquisite, and her poems elicit raw, and often nostalgic emotion from a few short lines of descriptive language—whether describing the relationship nature and god, and how it reveals itself in the "Secret Mantra" of love, or representing in ten very short lines how one can achieve all they desire through observing the space, time, and poetry between the stars, between molecules of water.

"Ava appreciates short concise thoughts and questions that inflame your brain," Yin and Yang editor and contributor, Charla Dury writes.

art by Elisabeth Ladwig

Elisabeth Ladwig, an award-winning conceptional photographer, believes "that life’s mysteries fall within the parameters of scientific explanation, that science abides by the Laws of Nature, and that nature is magical."

This belief is conveyed through her digitally composed photography, each piece with elements of nature and with an anonymous subject, offering a variety of metaphors for the miracles all around us, and for humankind’s relationship with the Earth and with the Cosmos.

“Anonymity allows the viewer to take part in writing the story,” Elisabeth says, “and that story is going to be different for everyone.”

photo by Charla Dury

Journalist, editor, columnist, poet and musician, Gene Myers, believes the connection between art and life is everything, so why separate music from poetry? Creating is his way of relating to his surroundings, and to others, more deeply. It's about communicating and sharing the real-life miracle of art.

"I only write when I think I have found something that is a worthy find, something to share with others. For me, that is the point, otherwise, why bother?"

Charla writes, "Gene makes you think. He brings every-day human interaction to the ethereal, describing succinctly the mood and emotion of the moment using poetry. In A God Who Is Still Making Up His Mind, Gene’s God sounds a lot like a father who is world weary or an overworked mother hoping for a 'me night'.”

Perhaps he is also speaking to the god-like-ness of parenthood, in which parents have the both grueling and fulfilling task of allowing their children free will while imposing upon them the rules of the universe.

Dr. Kevin Hall approaches both health and life from the understanding that there is “an accessible greater intelligence that we can tap into and draw from.”

photo by Danielle Rose

This intelligence offers a place to still our minds and hearts, Kevin said, so we can view our thoughts and emotions from a distance, creating a new perspective for how we feel and think. He shares this perspective with others through his words as well as his practice.

In Using Light by Night, Kevin talks about his struggle with life's curveballs. In his medical practice he encompasses a wide variety of modalities for health to create a wide-angle vision of what’s happening. So, this wide-angle applies in his essay as well.

“There are people that looked up at the starts and just saw stars, then there are those that looked up and saw constellations,” Kevin said. “I’m a constellation seer.”

art by Dana Bree

As an artist, Dana Bree believes that a connection to, and an opportunity to discover new things with like minded individuals, is essential to her health, happiness, and creative progress.

“This has also allowed me to move forward into metaphysical realms with healing and helping others as well as myself,” Dana said.

Dana's art has been inspired not only by her dreams, but by the inspiring life she has led

In The Master Juggler, Dana brings together bright and contrasting colors to create a feeling of expansiveness—as is seen through the cosmos peeking out the juggler's window—as well as perspective as he looks upon the Earth as it juggles between the cracked egg and the 8-ball. The combination of the three in suspension represent the fragile nature of our existence in the universe.

photo by Heather Taylor

Heather Taylor is a mom first, but she refuses to let motherhood define her solely, and is continually creating, whether photography, art, crafts or food.

In Heather's photo, Glisten Dichotomically, editor and Yin and Yang contributor Tamara Rokicki appreciates the yellow selection of the leaves, and writes that yellow expresses energy, joy and happiness, stressing the importance of positive vigor and contentment even throughout the coldest phases of our lives. Tamara is particularly struck by this message as we revel through autumn to prepare ourselves mentally and spiritually for winter by taking courage and inspiration from Mother Nature.


This photo is also Heather's son's graduation portrait, and it reflects Heather's passion for her family, who have inspire her to show the world the amazing gifts a family can bring and the legacy it can leave.

Other artists and writers to contribute to this beautiful work of art include

art by Jason Tirendi

• art by our digital editor, Jason Tirendi,
• photography by Stan Cohen,
• meditations by healer, Kathleen Santora,
• stories by psychic, Sarah Loukos,
• storyteller Rebecca Godina,
• writer Tamara Rokicki
• mixed media and poetry by artist and jeweler, Rachel Bertoni,
• writing and photography by editors Charla Dury and Danielle Rose
• Plus many more!

Read and view more by pre-ordering your copy of Yin and Yang: The Duality of Balance (CLICK HERE) today, and guarantee it in-hand with plenty of time for the holidays.


Or read the full reviews below:

The juggler of the world (Dana Bree)

How do you glisten? (Heather Taylor)

Using Light by Night (Kevin Hall)

Everything in Moderation (Barbara Steingas)

The power of simple words, images and art (Ava Hu)

What if God Were Still Making Up His Mind? (Gene Myers)

Behind the scenes: The Making of Yin and Yang (video)

Why Mind Key Is My Second Home - Tamara Rokicki

When you’re a writer, it’s very difficult to find that homey, comfortable feeling.  The world, as we see it, is this monotonous and rule-enforced place in which we spend a timeline called life.  It’s beautiful and enjoyable, don’t get me wrong, but when you have a story to tell, the real world just doesn’t cut it.  There are words to be found, immortalized, and written to craft stories that have yet to be told.  It’s both a heavy and exhilarating burden because the struggle to produce such stories, and then share them with the world, requires a huge leap into the unknown—and it requires faith. 

The Leap of Faith

Among the vulnerability, chaos and uncertainty of putting yourself out there, as a writer you need to first find a place where you can truly connect.  When I say Mind Key is my second home, I refer to what I seek during my writing journey.  Sure, writers who are serious about their work want to be published, but there’s so much more.  There’s an intrinsic desire to fulfill through the written word. To do that means to fulfill others.   

When I was a little girl, I overheard my mother talking to a friend and something she said has stuck with me through the years.   There’s a pot for every lid, she said.  It implied that there’s a soul mate for everyone out there, the ‘right one’ that will come along when fate so decides.  I don’t think it’s that much different for writers.  For every piece of work, every written creation and every path we choose to take, there are readers who can be touched by our work.  They are the lids to our pot, the one we stir madly, adding the mismatched ingredients of fictional madness, long sleepless nights, outlines, rough drafts and characters so vividly living in our minds that we feel them coursing through our veins.  

Connection

It’s about connection.  If you fail to connect, to truly reach out and expect someone reaching back, then are our words really inspiring, immortalized, and meaningful?

It is here, at Mind Key, that I find that connection.  As a contributing writer, I’ve realized how essential creative connectedness has become.  Mind Key focuses on emotional, physical and spiritual awareness, understanding how creativity—whether it is found in a photo, a painting, blogging or a novel—can enrich us on so many levels.   Healing, spiritual awareness, and inner strength are part of a world with which we can connect and in which we can thrive.  At Mind Key we’re all given a key to this world, along with the encouragement to find out more about ourselves and the world around us.   

Have you connected yet and are you ready to unlock your potential?

Check out an excerpt from my current work-in-progress, Aiken’s Wings

Tamara Rokicki on Minute Novel - Writing as inspiration

by Tamara Rokicki

There’s a spiritual connection that comes from writing and it harbors a strong inner enlightenment.

I began writing at a very early age.  I wrote about everything—stories of fairies, fashion tips, recipes,

Tamara Rokicki

manga, personal journals and eventually what turned out to be the beginning of novels.  Thinking back to the early years of my life, I see that writing wasn’t just something I learned to enjoy over time.  There wasn’t a particularly enlightening class in elementary school that prompted me to love the art of writing.  It was something emblazoned deep inside my core even before I could steadily hold a pen in my hand.  It was my life connection to something higher.  

I often see myself as lost inside a venue of veins traveling inside of me.  The power of writing motions me through the inner nooks and spaces that make up who I am.  It brings to light just what I stand for, what I believe in, what troubles me, and who I want to be.

That’s where NaNoWriMo comes in.  It provides me with the tools I need to simply let go and search for myself in a jungle of words and metaphors.  My first introduction to NaNoWriMo was about four years ago thanks to my cousin, Danielle.  A writer herself she explained how NaNoWriMo helps unleash the artist within.  Her enthusiasm pushed me to try it and I was immediately hooked.  Not only it provided me with a community of fellow writers, but also shed the truth on what really matters: relax, take a breath, ignore the rules and WRITE.  No guidelines, no doubts, no second-guesses.  Just write.

My NaNoWriMo exploration gave me the opportunity to interview one of my favorite authors, Marissa Meyer.  Starring on my blog as a guest, she answered questions about her writing journey; a journey that made her successful thanks to NaNoWriMo (Find my blog interview here).

But it didn’t end there.  My inspiration pushed me to reach out to the community and host a NaNoWriMo workshop at my local library.  I was able to share the benefits of this amazing challenge with local amateur writers, many of them hiding in the shadows, afraid to take their writing to the next level.  For weeks I was flooded by emails from attendees, thanking me for opportunity to find NaNoWriMo.  One of them, thanks to this workshop, recently self published a book (to read about my hosted workshop experience, see here)

The Mind Key Minute Novel is another tool.  It brought me closer to other writers who like me believe there’s more than a page with words.  There’s a spiritual connection that bonds us through the expression of writing; because at the end we all seem to transform the meaning of a ‘writer’.  

A writer believes that there’s an unseen power that only words can unleash.  

“No, no,” was all Antha could say as she shook her head.   It couldn’t be.  This girl staring at her from inside the cottage, whose mouth had just tore into someone’s flesh and gruesomely killed an innocent person, was a monster—not a girl.  Not her sister.  

Charla on writing Minute Novel: Click here
Danielle on writing Minute Novel: Click here

Click below to read what else Tamara and the other members of the Mind Key cabin are writing this month.  Don't forget to vote for your favorite!

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Posted by Mind Key on Friday, April 17, 2015