the healing card readings map the inner journey, complete with trouble areas, focused solutions, and packed with heart’s wisdom. they are very relaxing as i use my healing practice, breath work & postural alignment so that client’s receive their body’s somatic response to the message of the cards. it feels comforting to see the inner path laid out in a tangible form and to feel the body’s response to your own inner truth.
life is art
live according to your heart
i feel like i can almost cross italy off my list, there are so many authentic italians here! last night at gusto creativo italian restaurant i heard them exclaim ‘alora’ all the time, a saying i’ve only heard my best friend, julia, back home say as a canadian-italian. i ate amazing free pizza, drank a fab latte and enjoyed beautiful ambiance and live reggae music. i get to travel from italy and back to costa rica this way!
i hear the most interesting mix of italish when owner of gustos, steffi, talks to me and since i’m learning spanish, i have to discern if i am getting italian or spanish from her, a fun and endearing challenge that i enjoy very much :o) steffi and her partner stefano came from italy to start up one of the most popular restaurants on the beach in samara. they inspire me with their vision!
another beautiful italian lady by the name of sabrina, also decided to call samara her home 5 years ago and came here from italy to start something small. well that turned into ahora si, a restaurant that seats 37 people and a hotel that sleeps 16. for one lady to run, that is no small enterprise! especially when she had no prior experience in running a restaurant, hotel or cafe, but it doesn’t show as the place is full of good vibes, a nice breeze running through the restaurant, vegetarian cuisine and tunes that keep me here all day. sabrina has started up live music performances, complete with dj’s and dancing and tonight she is setting up a special table for me to offer my card readings to people. i am excited to see how this will be received by the community.
i’m making a life in costa rica as best as i am able. hitting pavement and knocking on doors in the small town of samara is easy when not a single soul has turned me away and instead greet me with kind words of welcome and a willingness to help me make it work here. even though my alternative healing work is completely unconventional for this small town, i am met with great enthusiasm from the expats here who have walked this road before me with their own crazy stories on how they came to live in costa rica and locals are curious and receptive. above are my two posters that i have made for samara, as well as for the distance work that i offer via skype for all the beautiful souls back home. so this moment finds me in gratitude, staring at a coconut bonfire on the beach where i currently live listening to this song.
terremoto (it even sounds scary)
what timing! on my 5th day in samara, i was sleeping when an earthquake shook me from my bed. i ran for protection under a door frame. it was a 7.6 quake and i stood on the face of it in my cabina on the kiss of samara’s waterline. the epi-centre was somewhere in the sea directly outside and that was close, real damn close!
once noriel and i got under the doorframe, we held each other while watching as the earth did the death dance beneath our feet. a tsunami can follow 5 mins afterwards but, none came. the cabina is made of wood, with wood shutters, instead of glass windows and concrete walls so there was no damage. it was a miracle that everyone was unharmed. one man died of fright and had a heart attack. fright?! yeah, that showed itself in the panic of the people as they filled with terror and transferred it to one another faster than a hot potato. it was really interesting observing the immense reaction 30 seconds of a natural disaster brings out in people. they turn our world on its head no matter how quick they come & go and it affects everyone!
i observed what was happening with a calm head even as the adrenaline was pumping because in those 30 seconds, i figured that and the grace of god were the only things that could save me from death’s early road. after the quake, the people of samara all headed for la bomba (the gas station not the song). what does it say about a place when you know that everyone can fit and hang out at a gas station in the hills? the otherwise lonely bomba was the spot that day as it was on high ground.
once the fear had worn off, it was all quite exciting! people had stories to exchange: a girl on a bike, saw a truck pass her so she threw her bike down, jumped on the back and rode for the hills with nothing to save on her person other than her life. during the quake another lady held on to her t.v. as if it had a life to save and then ran from her house with it in her arms. i grabbed my computer and passport so i guess i’m not all that different.
life philosophies were exchanged as everyone came face to face with their mortality that day and people were saying things like life can change in an instant and noone knows how it is going to turn out so may as well be happy and appreciate the little things. cliched sentiments like these held a new light in them now.
get in-bodied in 10 mins! come into the now through the sacred vessel of our hearts & bodies…<3
step 1) pop in a piece of chocolate…girhadeli caramel milk is mine, mmm. whatever feels good & connects with one of your 5 senses is perfect…a whiff of fresh mint or the feel of a cashmere blanket on your skin, go nuts, in fact eat nuts if that is your thing..
2) breathe from the lower belly - trouble pulling the in-breath up from there? relax and release belly muscles. focus on the longest, most gentle out breath you can. breathe out every last drop. hold the out. the inhale will then take care of itself. repeat 6x.
2) take a moment to become really quiet & present. close your eyes.
3) feel your body….scan it from top to bottom… keep feeling..
4) click on this yummy link & watch this 4 min in-bodied video of joy
5) read this poem about wild hearts by mary oliver (how i love her!).
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting–
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
~ wild geese, mary oliver
ahhh….
a tiny glimpse of my simple but content mornings in costa rica. more of my trip will be documented in an upcoming documentary of the trip with jiggytv.
living in the mystery is challenging but i can’t remember feeling happier, more connected to nature, community or myself. making a simple living in a foreign country is a big change from the first world and the corporate environment i left over a year ago. i love meeting inspiring people who have also left the first world and have made it work in costa rica, whether that means opening a bakery, cleaning up and running a haunted hostel, making chilli sauce or opening the only organic store in town. their success stories motivate me to make one of my own!
to my pleasant surprise i welcomed aspects of myself that were awakened as a result of being forced to creatively survive, living on the fly with little to spare. in essence people who live on the fringes live out darwin’s theory of evolution. i now speak spanish, dance 5 latin dances like a local, cut hair for travelers, among other things, none of which i did before i got there.
i return to costa in september to expand a healing practice i started there last april when i went on a healing tour. it took me from salt spring island b.c. to the cloud rain forest. at rancho margot eco-retreat & wellness resort, i taught somatic yoga, meditation & sound healing to people i will be happy to now know and love for life. i also taught dance, did natural art & dream classes with children & became a wedding singer, which was so much fun!
i then followed the tropical coast to a little town of 1071 people called samara, where i worked with elders of the land getting versed in the sacred art of wildcrafting, making healing teas by using the natural herbs of the land. my healing work also took the form of hypnotherapy, intuitive movement therapy, stone massage, channeled healings & heart healing card readings. i worked with the terminally ill & recovering addicts, as well as locals & travelers looking for deep relaxation.
june unexpectedly brought me home, where i witnessed my grandfather release peacefully into the after life, before i returned to salt spring island to run wellness workshops and organize community events with live music.
my intuitive and multi-disciplinary approach toward healing, brings people face to face with their deep intuition, divine selves and inner healer. i would love my family and friends to experience my work first hand. so before august is over please come visit me at utopia’s cozy healing space on 18th & lonsdale. the next two weeks, on mondays & tuesdays, between 12-6pm will find me in the healing room working on clients needing body work, postural alignments, pain relief, & healing relaxation. i’m also stoked for sunday, aug 26th, where i lead a workshop for friends, family & community at a delicious little yoga studio in deep cove http://maayogastudio.com/. in this joyous workshop, from 2-5pm you will be led through a guided healing meditation, a sound toning & balancing of the chakras & a yoga dance massage that will leave you sweaty, opened & relaxed. it will be a blast so i hope to see some loved ones there before i leave for costa in a few weeks.
pura vida, means pure life in costa rica. the locals often say it for no other reason than to wish me well. so pura vida to you & your journey, wherever it may be taking you…may it be somewhere good!
where am i now?
sitting at beans on lonsdale and planning my right now moment. receiving intuition’s action plan for my time in vancouver that will allow me to live and love with friends and family in conscious community, while allowing me to propel myself to my next destination (wherever that may be, i have a few inklings but nothing to give voice to yet). i am tapping into conscious communities here in vancouver, places like yoga for the people, utopia the mystical sanctuary, conscious divas online community as well as others. offering my services as an empath & channeler, sharing tools for inner & energetic alignment, alleviating stress the natural way & offering workshops on the path to wholeness, are just a few points of focus (e-mail me personally if you want more detail on what i do). it is exciting, this new journey of motherhood, readying myself for the birth of a child, while birthing my most creative and inspired life everywhere and anywhere i travel to, doing whatever my heart, mind and guidance system leads me into at the time. following my heart never leads me astray and i find freedom, love, immense challenge and all the resources to deal with them in that most sacred of spaces. i am grateful for allowing myself the chance to navigate through unchartered territory with my heart as my compass, trust and faith as my lifelines, and creation as my cohort. before i sign off i want to dedicate a line to the importance of friend and family support as the journey is made that much more enjoyable and the tough bits that much more bearable by all those who join hands, as we walk each other home. joyful gratitude for the countless blessings..
closing thought: vancouver’s awesome
to all my peeps on the west coast who are enjoying vancouver & salt spring to the north of me ;o) i miss and love the seasons flirting with one another as they change hands. one sunny day, the first really good warm spring like sunny day has such an effect on our smiles, or the first bumpin day of summer with tunes blasting from car windows as people head to the beach…ahhh these are the beloved moments of nostalgia that i like because i can feel you all shakin and bakin in a new way, way over there, experiencing these lovely moments in beautiful british columbia.
i am winding down in candle light in my hut on the beach. the full moon brought the tide right inside but she said she couldn’t stay for tea and left as quickly as she came. guess she only just had time for a quick show of face. i won’t hold it against her i know she’s got places to go and people to see, after all it isn’t every wave that gets created in the south pacific and then breaks all the way here in samara beach. amazing to think of the same waves having travelled in that same pattern all those miles without breaking only to crash here, in my pad :o) i’m happy. like really happy! with simplicity comes so much i could fill a book. and that would just be one story of someone who lived with so little and felt like they had the blessings of the whole world. and i’m also happy to know that waves travel together like a family. i see them, papa wave, mama wave, baby wave…all previously swells travelling in a pod…is that what you call a wave family?
sending you light over waves of my love!
maliha
friends sit under the coconut trees beside gustos beach and become really relaxed as i get them in touch with their breath, while giving them a scalp massage.
cutting hair is a shedding. hair holds our history much like a tree holds its age in rings. a cut unveils parts of our personality, bringing it out in full glory and lightening the load on the top of our heads. once the cut is complete, we wash the scissors and release the locks of hair into the ocean with the cleansing salt water.
it reminds me of a baptism, as the people who come are ready for something new and often are celebrating a part of themselves that they have fought very hard to know. the cut reveals a freer part of their inner self and is a celebration!
they say hair is dead, but if so then it speaks to me from beyond the grave. it moves, it dances, wishes to curl, part and lay in ways that are as unique as the people that sit in the chair.
these cuts bring out how much a person trusts the life that flows through them, as well as how much fear they hold around living it freely. the more fear they hold, the more restriction in the energy field, which affects the freedom available within the cut. the more at ease, the easier the cut flows and the more fun the cut.
after the cut, we stare at their hair in the mirror and notice how it sits on their head, framing their face differently. it is a shared moment of witnessing what their inner self has called for and the way in which the scissors answered and brought it into form. some clients say they do not even recognize themselves, others are pleased by how natural a fit it is for their face. sabrina, a beautiful friend, said ‘i had the best pizza of my life in nicaragua and now i’ve had the best hair cut of my life in samara!’
how to style my cuts -
these cuts do not need product to be styled and are best styled with eyes closed rather than looking in the mirror. i teach clients how to style their hair, using feel and their sense of touch rather than sight. with their dominant hand, they give their hair a scalp massage to feel how the hair wishes to sit on their head from the root. the key is to make the hair and scalp feel good, then i get them to look in the mirror for a quick finishing touch.
6 months ago i started cutting my own hair in the dim light of my cabina with one mirror and as i shed the length i have worn on my head for the past year. i entered a new place of surrender knowing i was taking a risk but i knew that the only way i could know how far and how fast i could go with my intuitive skill is if i went that far and that fast. this holds true whether riding a bike down a dirt road or cutting my own hair going purely by feel in a dark room with no mirror for the back of my head. see the video on my blog for my own piece of hair art.
hair, a canvas, an ever evolving art piece of inner forth coming, a dance, all happening right there on top of our heads!
