This Mama’s Dharma

I’ve just begun a 10-month online course called Awakening Joy with Buddhist meditation teacher James Baraz and a whole host of guest teachers. As the name would indicate, it’s about cultivating happiness, wellbeing, peace, serenity, whatever you call it, in your daily life. I continue to be amazed and humbled by technology because it really [...]

This blog reminds me more than anything of the principle of impermanence.
I went through the grief of the last few posts and came out the other side. Nothing lasts forever.
Tonight, I think about how much joy I feel. Connection with my son has never been sweeter. In the last five weeks, since getting clean, I [...]

It has been a very interesting few weeks.
Interesting is putting it mildly. It started when I got some completely unexpected and very upsetting health news - basically it was yet another cancer scare, and the good news is that it is benign and things are more or less back on track. But something has happened [...]

I have been neglecting this poor blog all summer, but I’d like to think that I have a bit of a good excuse.
I was busy recording a spoken word album, working with a professional producer here in DC. This is how my life goes; when I take on a new project, something else gets neglected. [...]

On August 2, I turned 34, and soon after, had a mini breakdown. It could have just been really bad PMS, but it felt like more than that.
I am perfecting the art of the mini-breakdown. It involves a few days of intense crying jags, not feeling real, barely being able to work, calling all my [...]

This is a very special time of year for me when New Age Mama comes out in full force.  It is the Aries New Moon - the astrological new year, so to speak.  A ritual that I began for the first time last year was to make what is called a “treasure map” - a [...]

I believe that in this world all matter is interconnected - what influences the inner influences the outer, and vice-versa.  My new tattoo is a perfect example of this principle.
I feel as if I have undergone an initiation of sorts.  I am marked for life.  So many experiences have marked me for life in the [...]

The metamorphosis.  It’s happening.  I feel as if I am going through some kind of awakening, down to my DNA.  Old, long-buried loves are being resurrected in my heart, and it feels extraordinary.  Recently, I’ve gotten obsessed with GarageBand, which I’ve just discovered on my new Mac (no, I swear I don’t work for Apple). [...]

I’m on a compassion jag and I can’t stop it.
I have been gathering up Sami’s baby gear to donate to a local thrift store, but then as I was looking at those two bags of stuff sitting there in the front hallway this evening, it hit me that I know someone who can really use [...]

First of all, I must announce that I am offically full of shit. 
Despite recent meanderings  that hinted to the contrary, I am not going to stop trying to meet someone (never mind if wisdom indicates that it would probably be a good thing for me to intentionally be on my own for a while).  In fact, [...]