The Desert and My Ego

Its been an unexpected 3 months to say the least here in Palm Springs, but as a good friend said,

“Not a bad place to spend the winter.’

Simplicity in that statement.

I arrived here at the end of 2017 it is now the third  month of 2018 and I thought I’d be here around a month, I was mistaken. But I am doing exactly what I predicted before I left Washington and started this journey – I told others and myself when they asked the question about money and funding this work, what would I do?

I responded, “When I run out of money I stop where I am and work and then move on when I am able.”

Also simplicity in that statement.

I further explained that I didn’t have much of a preconceived agenda in how or where I went with The Nature Of Refuge, I would really just let the weather dictate where I went as not to get too hot or too cold in my travels and let the work itself connect the dots and set the pace.

It’s doing exactly that and this particular slice of desert is really the only spot in the US besides Florida, to spend the winter outside in any capacity and be comfortable.

So, coming to Palm Springs when I sensed I was about to run out of funds and then having that actually happen, the stress of that. Job seeking and shooting the occasional commercial gig and art modeling, having that not be enough. Getting really sick for a month, going to the ER and then going through all my reserves, having my truck break down and manifest some major repair needs before I could get back on the road, maxing out my first credit card and learning about that. Panicking about all of this and going into a tailspin for a minute – this was all a part of my grand design to begin with and all I have been doing was living up to each one of my expectations of myself.

The thing is, I also had and have an expectation of myself to simultaneously and radically alter my dependence on the pendulum sensation between abundance and scarcity as my rocket fuel. That addiction to panic in response to the building an imaginary wall of failure behind me and backing myself up to it time and time again has run its course, or my fascination with it has finally waned. I want with all of myself to let go of the identification with the survivor mind set and enter fully into the awaiting reality of continuous abundance, be that material or spiritual.

And I want that to happen now.

I am a very impatient individual.

I am also still wrestling with my ego and the need to control and forcing my agenda when force and control are completely uncalled for.

So of course all of the challenges that were happening in the last couple of months and my resulting panic spiking, was completely unwarranted and seemingly unnecessary. But there was the necessity of me truly reconnecting with the present moment and letting go of my scheming and planning for the future and the only thing that finally got my full attention was the spike of seeming disaster and my overwhelming panic response that overloaded me and shocked me into the present moment completely. Emptying me out and calling my full attention once again, to the reality that I have no control, there is no agenda even in the midst of great creative and spiritual output, and to slow the fuck down, stop.

This forced me to stop spinning my wheels in chaotic emotional response to challenges in circumstance.

For a few weeks, I took ten minutes at a time, the mantra of existing in the next ten minutes, that’s all that concerns me. It worked and I was soothed. It’s all that is real anyway.

During this time period I got a call from The Ace Hotel, a local cool kids destination boutique hotel chain with an outpost here in the desert. I had applied there on a whim when I first got into town but with no real response and no real interest on my part, I hadn’t really thought about it again. When Ace called me I had literally two dollars in my bank account and a maxed out credit card and an injured truck and psyche taking 10 minutes of my existence at a time. I had had a phone conversation with a dear friend who was helping in talking me down off the ledge so to speak and she believed that I could still devote all of myself to the project in the midst of all this upheaval, stay true to the work and have faith. Also practically not to waste my energy on looking for a service job and the added frustration of that but if something dropped in my lap, by all means take it and use it as a tool to aid my creative endeavors. Good advice and the next day Ace called me and it felt like a gift and all part of this serendipitous care-taking that the universe has wrapped me in in these last couple of years.

A punch in the jaw and an immediate hand stretched out to help me up. It’s a funny image but a true one and I am certain that magic and my faith in it are actively at work and intertwined strengthened by each other. So I keep getting up by taking that hand. This is fascinating juicy stuff.

Ah but my ego and working at The Ace Hotel!

I am serving poolside while the sun and the kickass soundtrack spilling from the speakers along with drinks and nice asses roll around the pool. I’m hustling drinks, running my own cute ass off and making mad money while the season is high. My ego does not like it one bit,

“Service industry, again?”

“Yuck!”

“I’m an Artist!” It says in self-righteousness, “What are we doing here??”

“Can it.” I respond. “We need the money honey.”

It is a serious hustle out there, too much to do, too much ground to cover, too many people, too hot, but I am making mad cash everyday. My body and mind hurt at the end of each day and I soothe my ego with the reminder that this will enable me to be on the road doing The Nature Of Refuge for some months comfortably and that fact and connecting with these women is the only thing that matters and far more important than my ego. I meditate and move and release my energy that The Ace is generating that feels toxic but I am still creating an anxiety mind stream about the place and experience and already having anxiety dreams about the work one month in. My skin itches all the time, which has always been a major signifier of my stress levels, and I am sleeping restlessly.

“Its worth it,” I whisper to myself and the thing of it is, that its true.

I am still in the midst of my sacred creative center; it is with me wherever I go. I am still engaged with and observing the women around me, I will be interviewing two of my co workers this week that have that light around them that attracts me to their stories of vulnerability and connection. Each time I speak of this work, extraordinary conversation and compassionate listening and speaking occurs. It astounds me these past 5 months what these beautiful women share with me with such articulate vulnerability and emotion. Affirmation that everything is worth this project is revealed to me everyday.

Take this experience for example. Last week there was this lovely couple that were staying at the hotel for a few days and each day I was out working the pool, they were also out relaxing and enjoying themselves. They immediately made a point of connecting with me and telling me how cute and thoughtful they felt I was and we struck up a professional friendship the duration of their stay. After a few days of this, the more talkative woman of the pair started asking me questions about my life and what I thought of Palm Springs and what my interests were. I told her about The Nature Of Refuge and the fact I was slowly making my way across the country interviewing American women about their experiences with safety and vulnerability and what the concept of sanctuary meant to them. This woman was immediately quite curious and responsive, she and her wife were Canadian and on a much needed vacation and she started sharing with me a story of such grief and loss in such a graceful matter-of-fact manner that only added to the depth of her story. This woman, let’s call her Miss Fab, started talking about how my work intrigued her, the conversation of feeling unsafe as a woman because she was feeling unsafe in her body in response to the medical community due to the fact that she and her wife had just lost their newborn son. He died due to medical negligence in the hospital care of their child a few days after he was born. He had died this past December and Miss Fab and her wife were traveling to help in some way with the grief. She went on to tell me the details of the hospital’s negligence, the fact that she was still lactating and as she put it, “ her body was still looking for her child’, the fact that her wife and her were actively choosing to draw closer through this ultimate nightmare of loss instead of being torn apart, how they were considering conceiving again and the worry and fear in making that decision. Miss Fab also showed me a photo of her son, Huxley, before he died, he of course was beautiful.

So there I am, drinks tray in hand, being a witness to these women’s loss and pain and the honor of that moment was overwhelming and gave me literal shivers across my body. I told Miss Fab all this and she said the same was happening for her and I asked if I could hug her and she said yes. The pool scene buzzed around us and at some point one of my co workers had come over to tell me it was time to take my break which I ignored, this moment with this woman was everything, it was why I took that job to begin with, for that moment to reveal itself and all the other moments of true compassionate connection that will happen there in my time as an employee at The Ace. This is who I am now wherever I go, whatever environment, however I choose to spend my time in, I will be this cipher. It is an extreme honor and my calling, this is what I was made to do, be this witness and tell these stories.

Any twinge that my ego has in this point in time, is one to be ignored, ego twinges usually are best ignored or better yet, acknowledged, identified and then released. For me to revisit an environment that has always caused me great stress such as a service job, is a gorgeous opportunity to do my deep creative work in the midst of that anxiety. To learn and integrate that I am on my hero’s journey in every environment I place myself, that nothing is wasted and that failure is just is not an active reality at this point.

Fear of failure is not the rocket fuel, authentic connection is what propels me now. Over and over I am here to learn and integrate that truth, I hope I truly understand that fact and transform my emotional hardwiring before I die.

So thank you Ace Hotel for all that you are providing right now. I can’t quite let go of my agenda of more fundraising plans and how I want to guide and share and cast a wider net with this work in the coming weeks, my ego and I are a work in progress always.

This journey with The Nature Of Refuge has only begun, it is a marathon not a sprint, I am seeking stories of sanctuary and our collective relationship with autonomy and connection, safety and violation and through listening I am learning my own experience with the inner sanctum of stability. In learning the contour of the shape of my own fears, I can hold greater space in witnessing the shape of others and there we can hold one another, stronger together than alone.

This is the nature of refuge.

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