Heaven Us Earth

Letter from J'HeaLee

Reflections on my stay in Maine

Dear Dara,

I arrived here on Peaks Island on March 7, 2006. It has been a little over three weeks, but my life here is so different that I have a completely different sense of time. I feel like I have been here much longer. In some sense, I feel as if I have always been here and I belong here. This island is quiet and peaceful especially during this time of the year when it's not quite the tourist season yet. At the same time, it's only a 15-minute ferry ride away from Portland and most houses seem to be wired with a fast Internet connection. People are all very welcoming and there is a strong sense of community that I really appreciate.

I love the rocky shores here. Everyday I go for a walk along the shores making friends with the stones. There are so many stones here, I am in heaven. Some of the boulders make me wonder what it was like in the beginning of time on Earth. They look very ancient with deep knowledge and wisdom embodying the entire history of this planet. While I am standing on them looking out to the ocean, I ask them to share their knowledge and wisdom with me.

It has been a real treat to stay where nature is so accessible - not only the water surrounding the island - there are also many Native American trails to hike in the forest on this island. Last month I made one call to my friend Greg, who lives in Portland, expressing my desire to be close to nature away from New York City for a couple of weeks. This led me to people who I have never met before who opened their houses to me both on Peaks Island and in Portland. It seems that everything here is about houses and homes. Many people are working on their houses. If they are not, they are working on someone else's, and some people are working on both. In a way, it's been very healing for me to be here. Seeing people working on their houses, I ask myself what this means to me not owning any physical house for myself. Then I am reminded that I am building a larger energetic house and home for people around the world to gather.

I recognize that all three houses I have been staying in here are also in the middle of renovation--an indication of the renovation process of my inner self, I take it.

On the island I stay at Greg's brother Matthew's place while he is away, ironically, in New York City, and at Annie and O.B.'s house while Annie is away for the Veteran's and Survivors' March for Peace and Justice, and I have the entire house to myself and Molly, the cat. In Portland, I stay at Greg's friend David's house where there is a couch in every room including the bathroom and the kitchen! I am going to keep this in mind when I have a bathroom large enough to fit anything other than a mop. I hope he doesn't mind me sharing with everyone his secret to making a comfortable home. Also, my friend Greg, who is an architect and a painter, allows me to use his painting studio in Portland so that I can explore my desire to paint. You can see that I have the best of the both worlds, having places to stay on the island and in the city, and access to the studio for my artistic aspirations.

By allowing myself to be fully enveloped in the feeling of home and community, created by the love and the openness of the people here, I am healing the loneliness and uncertainties that I have felt at times on my path to building a home of my heart's desire. I feel as if everyone here and this place as a whole are patting me on the back saying, "Continue following your heart. Here, we will show you what it feels like in the place where you are heading to."

David, my new friend with many couches, shared with me his long-standing desire to bring genetic diversity to food crops. Did you know that there are such things as Endangered Foods? Apparently, due to the needs of commercial seed production to impose uniform standards in the farm and marketplace, there are many lost varieties of seeds and vegetables. He told me when he tried to work on his idea in the 80's, people did not understand it and it didn't go anywhere. I don't know about you, but in the 80's, I was busy doing my engineering class homework. I don't think I contemplated much on how to bring changes to the community then. Anyway, after pursuing his other interests for the last two decades, David is now focusing again on making his vision a reality. His approach is to work with local farmers to bring lost varieties of seeds and vegetables to the local restaurants and markets. He says that, recently, his project seems to unfold naturally as if there is a timing in all things. He is now getting positive responses and more people are interested in his project, The Cook's List, Portland Maine--working with the chefs and growers to evaluate the taste of heritage foods. To me, he is an example of a person who is steadfast and patient with his dream.

As he is in the beginning phase of a project, he is doing many things himself. He has turned one of the bedrooms in his house into a nursery to sprout these seeds--there is no sprouting in the couches, I assure you. Once the seeds sprout, he then brings them to the farmers to grow them. The closest to farming and gardening foods I ever got was to buy a basil plant and water it, if you can call that farming. So I learned something about the process of sprouting vegetable seeds just by listening and watching him.

It occurred to me that the seed of his dream had been literally to work with seeds! I realize that this is why I am here--to learn to create an energetic nursery for the seed of my own dream and to nurture this seed sprout and grow it. David's creating a nursery in his home shows me in a literal sense that to create my own nursery, I need to find home first. I now recognize that the sense of home that I feel here is providing me the safety to relax more into being who I am and to access home within my inner self.

I met my friend, Greg, in 1998 when he was painting and staying in New York City on an artist grant. He was among many struggling artists then. I am happy to see how now he has balanced both his architecture practice and painting, and that he has also created a loving home with his wife Nicola for their twin boys, Keegan and Cooper. It's interesting to notice the reversal of our situations in some sense. When we met, I had a steady job and an apartment. I was pursuing my professional career life and he was facing challenges as a free spirited artist. Now he is more grounded and balanced in both his profession and his art. And here I am I with the challenges of making a living as I follow where my heart has been leading me for the last six years. Seeing how he has found balance in his life, I am inspired as I am learning to find a balanced path of my own.

Since last year, I have been wanting to paint for some reason. Because I have many interests but have been impatient in the past, I've never fully disciplined myself in learning to become proficient in any particular art form. Because of this, I have always felt that I didn't have a way to express my inner art. When I first met Greg and became friends, I was excited to be around him and to see him working on his paintings. In a way, I envied him that he had a medium to express himself. Now that I am here and have access to his studio, I have started exploring my desire to paint. Greg shared with me his unique technique of using gesso for his paintings. To my surprise, gradually I have discovered my own way of applying his technique to what I want to do. Previously whenever I tried to create any art works, I was always frustrated that I didn't quite have the techniques to do what I wanted. But this time, I have been feeling calm and patient. Working in his studio surrounded by Greg's large paintings, I feel as though my body has been absorbing the knowledge and talent emanating from his paintings.

I shouldn't forget to tell you one of life's little surprises. The first day when Greg took me to his studio, I was introduced to Christopher, an architect, who owns the building where Greg's studio is. Christopher and I knew each other in New Haven, Connecticut over 10 years ago. We used to play Ultimate Frisbee together in a group mostly of architects, and we also went on the same group ski/snowboard trips together. Finding an old friend here, and having all those old memories flooding over us, felt like life was winking at me. Ten years later, he still has the same youthful look. It must be Maine.

Do you think there is some kind of connection between my stay here being all about home and my two friends here, Greg and Christopher, both being architects?

At the end of my second day in Greg's studio, working with my hands all day and finally figuring out a way to apply the new technique to my work, I felt a similar feeling to that of finger painting or paper art making in kindergarten. I didn't even realize that eight hours had gone by. Feeling happy as I was cleaning up and getting ready to take the last ferry back to the island, the iTunes on my computer started playing the song, "So this is love" from the Disney animation movie, Cinderella. (Don't ask me why I have this song on my computer.) It was then that I realized that the true feeling of love is when we find a way to express ourselves--sometimes this is through other people we love, but whenever we are truly expressing who we are (whether in personal relationships, work, or art), we feel the genuine sense of love.

Do you know the song? The lyrics go,
"So this is love
So this is love
So this is what makes life divine
I'm all aglow
And now I know
The key to all heaven is mine
My heart has wings
And I can fly
I'll touch ev'ry star in the sky
So this is the miracle that I've been dreaming of
So this is love"

At first, it seemed like an impossible desire that I paint because I never painted before. But somehow I have found a way to do it with the help from Greg and his paintings surrounding me.

I have always known this--that the home I seek and the love I desire are already within me, that making home within myself and falling in love with my heart are what I am learning, and that when I am fully centered in my heart without looking outside--only then can my dream of building a home for many unfold itself. However, to feel this knowingness fully through my body and my entire being has brought deep healing to my heart. My stay on Peaks Island and in Portland, with the help and love from the people here, has helped me to feel--feel what I have always known in my heart.

Rebecca, who I met through Matthew, has not only connected me to Annie, but also introduced me to Betsy, who has built a lovely meditation studio on this island. I am very grateful to her for allowing me to use this studio for our upcoming gathering next Tuesday. I have just found the perfect music for this gathering and I wish you could be here physically with me. But I know that you are anchoring your love and presence where you are, in San Francisco, helping to expand the roof of Heaven Us Earth.

I would love to stay here longer. But something deep inside me tells me after our gathering next week, it will be time to return to New York City to share what I have experienced and received here. I came here having only one friend, but now I have many. Instead of thinking that I leave, I would like to feel that I bring. I bring all of them with me wherever I go and I share from my heart what I see as their essence with whomever I encounter in my life.

I am sending you a photo of a flower (a fuchsia) that opened up during my stay at Annie and O.B.'s house. My friend Piet, from NYC, describes the feeling of this photo perfectly: "The flower really seems to come forth to greet the onlooker...while the folds of the leaves [petals] of the flower look like those of a royal dress, like that of fairy tale princess."

How appropriate to watch this flower unfolding its petals while I was learning the theme of our upcoming HUE gathering--Bursting Into Our Flower!

Love Love Love

March 30, 2006
Peaks Island, Maine