I don’t know how things work for you but sometimes I get an answer right away from the universe. Like BAM! I had just decided to step away from doing theatre and really focus on commercial and film and the universe said YES. Within days of this, I got confirmations of web-series and short films I’ll be doing in the next few months and got cast in a new team forming at Finest City Improv. We’re called “Mutiny” for now, our first show is January 4th, come see us on Sunday nights. I can tell you this makes me feel all kinds of awesome to get to play Sundays with some impressive improvisors.
Category: universe
Mahalo
We’ll start at the end of the journey: the last sunrise at the Point, where we would all practice qigong and then walk back to the Hale and practice together for the last time on this journey. The tears flowed at the end of this practice, it would be saying farewell for now to some old and some new friends. But it would also be saying goodbye to this place, this very special place.
Kalani is on the eastern shore of the Big Island of Hawaii. From the Point, the horses would be grazing in the grass, fruit trees and flowers lining the path on our way back to our temporary homes. The first day, I remember thinking ‘oh I could never live here, this isn’t home’. By the last day, it was a tearful good bye. The road to Kalani, winds along lava rock shores, sometimes enveloped with trees and hanging vines. 
It’s an interesting feeling to be on land that that once was a town, or was once under water less than 30 years ago. It’s like you’re seeing something out of a sci-fi movie, but it’s your planet. It’s also the realization that it can all be gone in an instant, mother nature always wins.
There were moments of intensity. My body resisted practicing, my joints hurt, the mind would not commit at all. It was like I was detached from everything, and yet, showing up still. My teacher Arturo talked about this, when you go in with expectations and you show up and it’s not like it was before or fun or relaxing or whatever your adjective is for your expectation. The point is to stay with it, it’s not always passion fruit and peace.
And we did show up to do yoga….
I just don’t think we were supposed to do it inside the Thurston Lava 
tube, but I wasn’t alone in my ridiculousness.
We practiced together, ate together and went on shopping trips to the middle of lava fields together. Yes, we did. We laughed a lot, at our orientation we were warned of the wild pigs at Kalani. The destructive creatures would root up plants and destroy habitat, got the nickname of ‘delicious criminals’. We found secret thermal pools and plunged into scary ocean currents at times, well, some of us (me) plunged right back out. We shared food, and our thoughts. We discovered the surface was a false advertisement to riches of coral and sea life in tidal pools. And sometimes, ‘disappointment’ turned into beautiful experiences.
The last night, I went to the pool and saw one of the singing frogs in my path, perfectly still, frozen in fear. As I lay in the pool, looking up at the glory of the stars and the milky way, clearly visible in this land without lights, contemplating the vastness of the universe, and how we can’t all be just here.
The first day, a beautiful retreat center, an open airy room, a symphony of frogs, insects and birds to sing me to sleep.
Expectancy, met with obstacles, internal and external. The body not willing, the mind, barely there. But who is on the altar but Ganesha….
By the last day my heart opened.
It would take a big push. It would take a big one.
Later on the path back from the pool, another frog, still. Not moving. Staring off. Got my attention, as would a few other things.
When I got back, I looked up frogs and their symbolic meanings:
- Cleansing
- Renewal, rebirth
- Fertility, abundance
- Transformation, metamorphosis
- Life mysteries and ancient wisdom
There’s not a bone in my body that doesn’t know this to be true for my life right now.
Letting Go
Big day is coming and this week has been a flurry of planned and unplanned tasks. I felt really heavy and burdened by a number of things and then the unplanned and unexpected happened. Yesterday came some perspective. Not necessarily the “see the bigger picture” but more like, “connect with the reason why all of this is happening.” In this space, I reconnected to that love that I feel and ultimately why we’re here. By reconnecting with the love, I feel now excited about what’s happening, rather than burdened. I feel more alive, this is a good thing, this is a celebration.
I also connected with the fact that I do not need to do or respond to everything that comes my way. I delegated some things and others I simply didn’t respond to. Will something not get done? Yes, probably. Will it not getting done lead to more difficulty later? Probably. One of the key elements I have found is by letting go I am allowing myself to live with the consequences of that action. Good or bad. Indifferent or not. I don’t have to figure out the end. So much of time and space gets taken up with planning for what is going to be, rather than what is. Yes, plans need to be made. But how much time and space and agony is taken up when those plans don’t fall into place? By letting go of the outcome, I allow space for the ever-fluctuating, pulsating and changing nature of the universe. I allow for others to have their own experiences. I put the responsibility of those decisions back in the laps of the deciders, not taking on things that aren’t mine. And ultimately, what do I trust? The idea of failure or the idea of reasons, seasons, change and unexpected surprises.
Poetry
Many times in a yoga class I have either read poetry or quotes or had poetry read to me. I went on Friday to an amazing slam poet Buddy Wakefield whose work really touches my soul.
The past few days, that experience included, has really brought me into a new frame of consciousness. I’m shifting paradigms here don’t get crazy about the twenty-cent words, it’s just a new shift and the last time I shifted and felt this sense of awe and wonder and excitement the world smashed and it was a little bloody and broken. And I don’t think it was that I was in line for the punishment and the karma but the universe had something bigger in mind and I was settling for the great un-great. If you’ve ever settled for some great un-great, mediocrity doesn’t describe it but good enough with bandaids stuck to it and some toothpicks holding it together with the smiles and nods you’re getting from someone who you want to love you sounds familiar then you know what I’m talking about in this long sentence. So the rubble which was my house upon the sand became the pathway to the place I stand today. With the universe saying here’s some new shoes and a key chain and a light, the rest is golden, enjoy the new ride.
There is a universal song that is being sung in various notes and to various keys. And I think we’re listening in. I think we’re tuning in because it plays the chords on the strings that are found in the fibers of our very being and so we know the song to be true. Laugh, breathe, believe…..
Jennie Olson Six 
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