Tea with Luna McFeisty: Shakti Badge Program UPDATE – Getting Started
For today’s newsletter, our intrepid Shakti reporter, Luna McFeisty, is back with an updated report below about the Shakti Badge Program. Luna wanted me to tell you that she loves receiving letters from readers and is happy to track down answers to your questions. If you want to reach out to Luna, then please…
We hide what we fear – We hide our greatness.
In every heroic story there is a part of the journey which is filled with darkness. The hero is lost, scared, forsaken. During this challenging part of the story, the protagonist questions their path, doubts their abilities, and wonders if they can finish. As uncomfortable as this part of the journey is, it also is the most important, for it is in the darkness where the hero finds the buried treasure, the magical elixir, the truth.
From the earliest recorded heroic stories like…
An invitation to join the army of love. (+ Fall Schedule!)
Happy Fall Y’all! We are celebrating the new season this Friday with a Community Potluck Dinner and Equinox Celebration. The potluck starts at 5 pm, right after Makerspace, to be followed by a ritual, weather permitting, in the backyard. This event is free. All genders and ages are welcomed. I hope you can come and celebrate with us!
The new season also means a new schedule…
Automatic thoughts that do not support growth.
Thank you for the outpouring of love I received last week – I am very grateful to all who responded to the article I wrote about Maya, our dog. I am happy to report that I visited Maya last Sunday and she is thriving. She looks better and seems happier. More importantly, the behaviors which our family was struggling to manage have decreased. Seeing Maya last week reinforced the importance of a good fit for BOTH parties.
Next Friday, September 22, is the Fall Equinox which means…
The importance of “a good fit.”
As some of you know, my family adopted a six-month old puppy last May. We named her Maya. When I first met Maya, she crawled into my lap and shook for 20 minutes. She was so scared. My heart turned over in my chest and our family made the decision to adopt.
Within days of bringing her home, we soon realized that Maya was more than a scared puppy. She had behaviors that suggested prior trauma and were very erratic. We asked our veterinarian for help and were referred to an animal behaviorist. Due to a great demand, our family was put on a wait list. In June, we got an appointment for August 23. That date was circled on our calendar as a beacon of hope. We just had to hang on until late summer.
Desperate to learn how to manage Maya’s behaviors at home, we…
A Ritual for the End-of-the-Summer
I am hard at work finalizing the Shakti schedule for fall. I don’t think I have ever received this many proposals before: it is exciting! Once the details are finalized, the amazing Carolyn will create event and registration pages to showcase the talent within our community. These events and classes are in addition to the new Shakti Badge Program which is launching this fall too. Needless to say, there should be plenty of ways to engage, to learn, and to have fun. I cannot wait to share the calendar with you!
Because I need to attend to the behind-scenes work, I am offering a fun ritual as opposed to a longer article this week. As always, take what you want and leave the rest behind.
Looking forward to engaging, learning, and having fun with you this fall!
Your permission slip to go outside and be.
Last weekend Shakti in the Mountains had a tent at the Meet the Mountains Festival in Johnson City, TN. Our purple tent was situated near Boone Lake at Winged Deer Park: the perfect location to catch a breeze. We had Cleo Hankins giving free chair massages and Amanda Chapman offering a free Forest Bathing Walk. It was a pleasure reconnecting with folks I haven’t seen in a while as well as meeting new people who were interested in joining our community. I want to thank everyone who helped us set up, break down, and staff our tent. It took a village and I am very grateful to: Cleo, Amanda, Janna, Jil, Judy, Laurie, Allan and Liam – you made festival participation possible.
As part of Shakti’s participation at the festival, Amanda and I presented on The Mental Health Benefits to Being in Nature. I learned a lot of interesting facts about the current mental health status of Americans as well as reasons to spend more time in nature. For those of you who could not attend the presentation, I am sharing the information here. Consider this article a permission slip to go outside and be.
Improving Executive Function: strategies which help folks move from ability to skill.
Thank you to all the people who contacted me last week and shared their excitement about the upcoming Shakti Badge program – I am excited too! I am happy to report that the Shakti Badge Team is already writing the descriptions and the criteria for the fall badges, which will be unveiled at our Fall Equinox Celebration (September 22). Save the date, bring a dish to share for the potluck dinner, and be ready for some nerd fun!
As some of you know, licensed therapists are required to earn continuing education units (CEU’s) in order to maintain their license. In my quest to earn CEU’s, I chose to learn more about executive functioning, specifically strategies for improving attention, memory, and self-regulation. I am only a few hours into the 18-hour course, and I have already learned so much.
Because so many of us complain about feeling distracted, I wanted to share some course highlights with you…
Tea with Luna McFeisty: Shakti Badge Program
For over a year, some of us involved in the Shakti’s School of the Lost Arts have been tossing around the idea of a Shakti Badge program. You know, like the Girl Scouts or Boys Scouts, but cooler. ;) After months of thinking about it, a group of us met last week to start hashing out a program. We are in the middle of sorting out the details and building the infrastructure, however, I am happy to report that we plan to launch by this fall. Woot!
Why a Shakti Badge program, you may ask?
We all need a safe space to practice being messy.
Happy Lugnasad or Lammas! Today marks the halfway point between summer and fall: a day where we in the Northern Hemisphere acknowledge the days have less light and the first harvest is celebrated.
Our ancestors celebrated this midway point with feasts and rituals, in part, to address their underlying anxiety around getting the harvest in before the first frost. The push to harvest and preserve food before cold weather came was motivated by winters where there was not enough food to sustain families. Praying for a good crop, with the time to bring it in, was a common practice. Rituals which acknowledged the precariousness of life were opportunities for people to come together in community and feel less alone in their worries and fears.
Shakti in the Mountains recognizes these worries and fears continue albeit with a modern slant…