WHAT I LEARNED DURING MY BOUT WITH COVID-19 + UP-TO-DATE NUTRITIONAL GUIDELINES

WHAT I LEARNED DURING MY BOUT WITH COVID-19 + UP-TO-DATE NUTRITIONAL GUIDELINES Ellen Kettridge

At the end of summer, just as the weather was getting its real first autumn chill and cases of COVID-19 were starting to increase all over England, I had the chance to meet, up close and personal, this virus that’s brought our world to a screeching halt.
MY MAIN SYMPTOMS
The symptoms I had with COVID-19 were like nothing I’ve ever felt before, and were very different than a cold or flu.
I was symptomatic for about 14 days total, though had some longer-lasting residual effects for a couple weeks longer, mainly a feeling like I was walking around at high elevation – i.e. there was not enough oxygen getting to my cells and I was more easily fatigued.
My symptoms started as a mild fever and a headache, and the next day moved into my lungs. Climbing stairs left me fatigued. And walking too quickly made my heart pound to the point where I could hear it in my ears.
I then began to lose my sense of smell, which was one of the trippiest parts of the entire experience. I was only able to sense texture, heat and cold. Things were chewy or crunchy or soft. That was it! No more enjoyment from food than that.
Next came the digestive symptoms, though actually they overlapped with the loss of taste and smell. These lasted the longest for me. Mostly mild nausea and other mild digestive complaints, coming and going for a total of about 7 days. I also had very little appetite for a couple days.
Throughout the 14 days I felt “wonky” and definitely had more fatigue. I was mostly able to keep working from my self-quarantine at home, though had to cancel a few clients due to the fatigue.
MANAGING THE FEAR
Early on in the process I found myself waking up at night with a lot of fear. It is of course a little intimidating to feel a pathogen making its way through one’s body at a quick pace, stopping in every major organ system and causing a variety of concerning (though for me, overall mild) symptoms.
Add to that the collective fear around this particular virus, and it can be quite disconcerting to say the least!
I did the following:
– I began to practice daily centering, grounding and clearing exercises.
– I deactivated my facebook account for the entirety of the infection
– I stayed off news media, and stayed very present with my body and my experience.
– I got outside into my yard, sat in the sun, and soaked in the healing energies of nature as much as the weather allowed for.
By about day 5 I felt a huge wave of the fear that I had been navigating process through my system and clear completely, never to return. From that point forward I was able to accept this invader into the private space of my body as something that I could connect with with a level of clear-headed awareness and presence.
I simply kept doing my thing of taking the supplements I knew would keep my immune system optimally functional, while eating a very low-inflammatory, nutrient dense diet, to give my body the best chance possible of having no long term effects from my encounter with this virus.
I had been taking immune-supportive supplements for months at this point, so I just slightly increased the doses of what I was taking, and made sure to have absolutely no sugar, gluten, dairy, or processed food, as I knew that would increase the inflammation in my body.
In addition to the very clean diet I maintained throughout the active infection and beyond, and my intentional walk with acknowledging and then clearing the fear that came up for me early on in the infection, the supplement routine I followed daily was:
Vitamin D3 – 5,000iu
Liposomal Vitamin C – 2 to 3mg in divided doses
Zinc – 30mg daily
Quercetin – 400mg daily
These supplements are consistently indicated in both prevention and treatment for viral infections. But please follow the recommendations of your medical doctor or other medical professional when it comes to supplementation, as we are all different, and the specifics of supplementation for YOU always needs to be considered alongside other medications you may be taking as well as other health conditions you may have.
Luckily, about 7 weeks out from the infection now, I seem to NOT have fallen into the category of COVID-19 “Long-Haulers” which many are finding themselves in.
I am keeping my eyes peeled for studies and data that indicate the best ways to support those who are having longer-term lasting effects from their infection as that is an area of rising concern. My current thoughts for anyone who is finding themselves in that category, is to commit to eating a low-inflammatory, nutrient dense diet, as we do know that real food heals, and often more quickly and effectively than we might imagine.
UP-TO-DATE NUTRITIONAL GUIDELINES FOR COVID-19
VITAMIN D3
There is VERY exciting research (from a small study in Spain) indicating that higher dosing with Vitamin D is keeping folks out of the ICU and is indicated in lower overall morbidity rates.
Another study done in the US from blood samples from 190,000 Americans found that people with “deficient” levels of vitamin D were at 54% higher risk of having the coronavirus.
Additionally, just over 8% of those with “adequate” vitamin D levels and 6% of those with high levels had COVID-19.
If you haven’t already been taking Vitamin D at a daily maintenance dose of between 1,000 – 4,000iu which is what Dr Mark Hyman recommends, you might want to consider getting a vitamin D blood test done to see what your levels are.
Because this nutrient is proving to be so important for reducing morbidity and mortality, it’s probably the #1 supplement to consider supplementing with throughout this fall and upcoming winter.
Remember that Vitamin D is important for supporting positive moods, bone health and overall immunity in addition to it’s clear ability to prevent a worse outcome from a COVID-19 infection.
+++Folks with darker skin are at worse risk for COVID-19 morbidity, due to the higher levels of melanin in the skin, which protect from the sun’s rays, but also make one’s ability to produce adequate Vitamin D lower. So please share this recommendation to test your vitamin D levels, and consider supplementation with all your friends, family and loved ones, but especially those who have darker skin, as POC are being hit harder and having worse outcomes.+++
As we age, we also lose our natural ability to produce Vitamin D from sun exposure, so the older you are, the more likely it is your vitamin D levels are inadequate. A Vitamin D3 blood test is easy to get and any medical doctor should be able to order it for you.
VITAMIN C
For all the up-to-date info in detail on Vitamin C’s remarkable immune benefits for COVID-19, please go to Patrick Holsford’s website, where details of statistical significance and what the studies that have been done mean, are shared.
Highlights of the article include:
– 2/3 reduction in mortality with high dose IV Vitamin C for critically ill patients.
– In ICU, almost all COVID-19 patients were low in vitamin C, however those lowest did not survive, while those with much higher levels did.
CORE NUTRITION
In my research in preparation for writing this article, I am grateful to have come across some recommendations from Dr Joel Fuhrman for a simple acronym to remember what to eat to support optimal immune function, not to mention have a real leg up at preventing the major chronic health issues of our time – diabetes, heart disease, stroke and cancer.
The acroymn is GBOMBS
G = Greens
All dark leafy greens are high in a multitude of phytonutrients, and most specifically Vitamins A and C, which are both essential nutrients for maintaining a healthy immune function. Green are also high in fiber, which supports healthy detoxification and feed good gut bacteria. 80% of the immune system resides in the gut, so we must keep our gut bacteria well fed!
B = Beans
High in protein, B vitamins and antioxidants + fiber! Protein is essential for proper immune function, and many, especially the elderly, do not get enough protein. Did you know protein malnutrition is a risk factor for death from infections?
O = Onions
Very high in Quercetin, a bioflavanoid found in many fruits and vegetables that’s quickly becoming recognized as a nutritional superstar when it comes to its immune-modulating benefits. Specifically, it reduces inflammatory mediators, including cytokines, which are what seem to be doing much of the damage with COVID-19.
M = Mushrooms
Very effective in supporting healthy immune function. Plus, did you know that mushrooms are one of the very few foods that naturally make/contain Vitamin D?
B = Berries
Very rich in vitamin C, in addition to many other phytonutrients. Choose a rainbow of color in your berry selection to get the most broad-spectrum nutritional support.
S = Seeds
Great sources of protein, fiber and certain key nutrients like zinc (especially pumpkin seeds) which is another essential nutrient for supporting healthy immunity.
Given the very real risks for temporary as well as longer term health issues arising from infection with COVID-19, why not start making these foods a part of your daily diet so you don’t have to live in fear, and can take proactive steps towards supporting the health and longevity of yourself and your family!
Even with all the research into nutritional sciences these days and the clear data supporting the wisdom of adopting a whole foods diet for it’s general health benefits, I think we are still, as a whole, not turning our attention enough to the fact that our chronic health crises, including the over-active immune response with COVID-19 (which is causing the severe illness and mortality) are linked to inflammation, nutritional deficiencies, and chronic stress.
THE BAD NEWS
We eat ourselves into our disease states. ?
THE GOOD NEWS
We can eat our way back into good health! ?
It starts with adopting one habit at a time. What healthy food are you inspired to bring into your daily diet from the list I’ve shared with you today?
I would be very curious to see what committing to such a diet might do for those who are COVID-19 “Long-Haulers”.
I hope we can see some clear data on that soon, but if you have had a COVID-19 infection and are struggling with lasting side effects, consider cutting out all inflammatory foods and sugar, and adopting the dietary approach offered here, and let me know how you feel in one month’s time.
– Ellen
p.s. My formal training is in nutrition. I don’t have as much training in herbs and have very little training in homeopathy, so I haven’t shared about these treatment and prevention options. I do know that there are many wonderful options in both of these categories, and more! I also forgot to mention that I was getting acupuncture (post the 14 day isolation period) and was given some chinese herbal remedies from my acupuncturist which were targeted for post-COVID healing support, including herbs that are used for when someone is at high altitude. I know these were very helpful in my full recovery. I appreciate folks sharing what has worked for them in the comments, etc., as we are all learning together right now.
www.ellenkittredge.com

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Holy Women


There is a band of women present on this earth who are carrying flaming torches for the evolution of humanity.
These women are rare, unique, highly-crafted jewels of the ancient feminine spirit.
These women possess more courage, resilience and perseverance than is fathomable.
These women have silently walked through thousands upon thousands of years to find themselves back here on earth, charged with the task of re-awakening the deep feminine soul to humanity and earth.
Emerging one by one from the etheric temples of Shakti in all Her forms, the Awakened Women plant their naked feet on the barren soil of earth.
The Awakened Women do not announce themselves as the Saviours of our Time.
They mostly get on with their immense workload with devotion, discipline and immeasurable commitment to mission.
All of these women will go through deep dives into their own accumulated emotional suffering arising from the suppression of the Goddess-Consciousness.
This karmic load of the feminine wound will inevitably reach a crisis point at some point during this lifetime, pulling them into profound self-healing and self-awakening.
When these women heal themselves,
they ignite a domino-effect of healing
and transformation for generations
of females both past and future.
Not only that,
the innate spiritual power of these women,
who have spent eons
devoting their entire Selves
to serving the High Feminine,
is so catalytic,
so immensely creative and illuminating,
so alchemizing –
when these women pour sacred intention
into bringing themselves into Wholeness,
the entire Universe
receives
a body-full of oxygenated divine-blood.
If you have been pulled
into the vibrating web
of an Awakened Woman’s energy field,
you will experience a spiritual change.
Firstly, no matter what you think,
your Soul chose to connect with her.
This woman carries deep
and significant mystic information for you;
sacred intuitive-based codes
that are vital for the evolution
of your Being.
These women all carry
pre-arranged agreements that bring them
into contact with specific people.
These women are never ‘randomly’ placed.
There is always a deep purpose
to the connections and places
that these women bring their energy to.
It is not always an easy task to carry
the sacred Torches for the feminine awakening.
You know her.
You could not have missed her.
She will not be the flashiest, loudest, attention-grabbing woman.
She will not
manipulate,
beg,
or guilt-trip you
into being around her.
She does not work at the level of the ego.
She works at the level of the Spirit.
Spirit does not need to announce Itself because
It is …..
Source
~ Sophie Bashford

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LIVES OF COLOR & BEAUTY Brooke Medicine Eagle June 30, 2020

~ DES VIES DE COULEUR ET DE BEAUTÉ
Even through all the pain that is surfacing in this time of BLACK LIVES MATTER, there is a deep part of me celebrating the awakening of the general public and the caring that is being shown. May it continue and deepen in order to address and heal an issue that has been buried for so long, right in front of us.
AND, I call for attention to the others who have been oppressed as well, whether the “reason” has been color, gender, or any other thing. For sure, it’s time to face the painful truth of what has happened to brown people, native people, indigenous people, tribal people, original people of this land. It’s not just the surface trauma that we see – brutality, women disappearing and found dead, poverty, alcoholism, and all of that horror – but the DEEPER ISSUES that have led to those things and more.
Put yourself in the shoes of a people who had invaders take everything they had (including by the way, ALL THIER CHILDREN), and it makes 911 look like a Sunday picnic in comparison. Imagine being a sleepy people, running for their lives, who were hit by machine guns – aimed low to hit them sleeping exhausted in their ragged tipis. Imagine your family, if cavalry men rode by and ran a saber through your pregnant wife. And then imagine, being rounded up and confined, given crap for food, and spat upon. I’m sorry to be so graphic, but it’s just the truth ~ the sickening, painful truth ~ and we must open our hearts to the grief of these things that underly what is happening now for native peoples, if we are to begin the profound healing that is required.
So thank you for not closing your hearts down in the middle of this truly challenging time. NOW IS THE TIME WE CAN HEAL, and move forward into the beauty of unity that is so possible for us as humans. Don’t let color, or money, or politics, or meanness, or the hurt and anger of distressed minorities, stop you from doing what you know is right ~ DO THE NEXT RIGHT THING, whether it be large or small.
Even if you don’t know what to do, be brave enough to follow you heart. LOVE IS THE ANSWER, and Great Mother made you of that! Shine the LIGHT of your Awareness ~ a gift from Father Spirit ~ onto these troubled waters and continue to paddle. WE CAN DO THIS, and we must do it for the sake of all the children of Earth ~ human and All Our Relations. Otherwise, as our elders tell us, we humans will disappear from this sweet Earth, and we can’t let that happen. This Mother Gaia home is too precious.
Bless you in your walk of Honor and Unity. May your back be strong and straight, and your heart soft and open. I’m crying with both the pain of what has been, and the profound joy of what I’m clear that we can now create. Love, Brooke

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It’s time for Asian Americans to unite in solidarity with black Americans

and the co-host of the podcast “They Call Us Bruce.” He co-wrote Jackie Chan’s best-selling autobiography, “I Am Jackie Chan,” and is the editor of three graphic novels: “Secret Identities,” “Shattered” and the forthcoming “New Frontiers.” The opinions expressed in this commentary are his. Read more opinion on CNN.

(CNN)There’s a quote from Cathy Park Hong’s provocative and brilliant essay collection “Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning” that’s one of the most jarringly apt summaries of the insidious nature of silence I’ve ever read.

“The problem with silence is that it can’t speak up and say why it’s silent,” writes Hong. “And so silence collects, becomes amplified, takes on a life outside our intentions, in that silence can get misread as indifference or avoidance…and eventually this silence passes over into forgetting.”

Jeff Yang
Silence is the scar that forms over the small, persistent wounds of our lives as Asian Americans. Silence is what our immigrant forebears learned when they first arrived in this country, to hide the awkwardness of their second-language speech, to swallow the bitterness of petty slights, to bite their tongues so as not to escalate major ones. Silence is what they taught to us, their children and grandchildren, through adages like “The nail that sticks up gets hammered down” — the categorical opposite of American sayings like “The squeaky wheel gets the grease.”
But the silence that might protect us in small ways in the short term leads to a moral callus over the soul in the long term that can, as Hong says, be mistaken for disdain, or become indifference in truth.
In the horrific viral video of George Floyd’s killing, Derek Chauvin kneeled on Floyd’s neck until Floyd lost consciousness and life. Tou Thao, Chauvin’s Asian American fellow officer on the scene, stood by, hands in his pockets, even as onlookers pointed out that Floyd wasn’t moving, and didn’t seem to be breathing.
“Check his pulse!” they shouted. Thao remained impassive. Indifferent. Avoidant. Thao’s lawyer pointed out in court that long after the fact, Thao provided a statement to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and turned himself in when an arrest warrant was issued. But at the scene of Floyd’s death, his behavior was an apt demonstration of how apathy is an action; how staying silent is a statement. Thao may not have been the only police officer there who failed to step in, but as Chauvin’s partner, he was arguably someone who could’ve made a difference had he chosen to intervene. His inaction was painful to witness — and a stark symbol of why, now more than ever, Asian Americans cannot afford to be voiceless watchers of this moment.
George Floyd's family showed America the grace that he deserved but didn't get
George Floyd’s family showed America the grace that he deserved but didn’t get
Just a few months ago, we were preoccupied by the impact of Covid-19 xenophobia and bigotry on our own Asian communities. Yes, Asian Americans face bias and discrimination. It is also true that — in comparison with black Americans — we have privilege. Those in our communities who have joined with their voices and their bodies in the ongoing protests know this to be true, and they are speaking out.
History shows us that this nation’s anti-Asian bias spikes in times of internal or external economic or military crisis and fades when these pressures abate. But it also gives us ample evidence that anti-blackness is steady, unrelenting, and continuous — an undercurrent in American society that some privileged Americans may try to avoid seeing, but never goes away.
Asian Americans’ privilege is an uncomfortable thing for us to consider, given the very hard journey our immigrant parents, grandparents or great-grandparents may have taken to carve out a place for us here, and the microaggressions (along with more explicit forms of racism) we still experience in our own lives.
But our families first came to this country seeking shelter from war and catastrophe, escape from tyranny, or access to educational and professional opportunity. They were not dragged here in chains. They did not experience two-and-a-half centuries of serving as chattel, and a century after that of institutional degradation and constant terrorist threat, and a half-century after that of a nation trying very hard to pretend those 350 years never happened at all.
Mr. President, you don't speak for Asian Americans
Mr. President, you don’t speak for Asian Americans
And let’s be very honest: This studious negation of history is what enables the harassment, assault and murder of black people today. When we refuse to address the bigotry woven into American society, when we submerge black lives beneath “all lives,” when we talk obliquely about love and fellowship without acknowledging racism and segregation, when we who are not black stay silent, we allow the names of countless casualties of state violence and systemic racism in policing to fade into mere litany, a blurry montage that rolls before the latest victim is unveiled.
Eric Garner. Michael Brown. Akai Gurley. Tamir Rice. Sandra Bland. Philando Castile. Botham Jean. After each incident there was outrage, then indifference, avoidance and a passing over into forgetting.
Now, as protests fill the streets, it feels like the horrific deaths of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd, coming so close together in a time of pandemic lockdown, when most of us have had nothing to do but stare at our screens, have brought our culture to a turning point. Those who are marching and demanding justice aren’t just black, aren’t just young, aren’t just doing so in major cities. The crowds cut across lines of race and ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation, age and class.

And in this moment, Asian Americans have a particular role to play as allies: We need to be loud. Because in the past, our silence has led to our being used as an example of a “good minority” that doesn’t protest, a hardworking population that presents a counterfactual to the notion that America is racist, a magic eraser for 400 years of anti-blackness on this continent.
There are ample reasons why: Because of the debt we owe to black Americans for paving the way for the civil rights we take for granted today. Because we can’t expect others to call out injustices against us if we don’t do the same for them. Because Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. called out bigotry against Asians and denounced the Vietnam War, and because Reverend Jesse Jackson played a critical role in bringing attention to the racist murder of Vincent Chin in 1982.
And because the very beginning of Asian America, the origin story for our pan-Asian identity, is intertwined with black history; the term “Asian American” was coined by students seeking to march in solidarity with black activists, protesting the incarceration of Black Panther founder Huey P. Newton.
But most of all, because for Asian Americans, “belonging is always promised and just out of reach so that we behave,” to quote Park once more. “If the Asian American consciousness must be emancipated, we must free ourselves from our conditional existence.”
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Through silence, we allow others to control whether we belong and where we belong. Are we unassimilable aliens, or intrinsically American? Do we seek adjacency to whiteness, or coalitions of color? By speaking out now, we answer these questions for ourselves.

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Have you heard of Transformative Justice? Who are the Black and Brown thought leaders and practitioners of this new way forward.


written by Rowen White
I spent the weekend in quiet reflection, listening and reading, in journaling and talking with my family about the ways we can really do the work that is being asked of us in this time. This morning as I was weeding ( one of the best ways I comb out the tangles of my thoughts!) I was thinking more into these conversations around Transformative Justice, and the Black and Brown voices that are leading that edge of the movement. The threads of learning that I am most committed to in the current moment is immersing myself in the practice of Transformative Justice.
What does justice look like without revenge? Without the continuation of endless cycles of violence, harm and trauma? The goals of Transformative Justice are:
Ensure Safety, healing, and agency for survivors,
Accountability and transformation for people who harm,
Community action, healing, and accountability,
Transformation of the social conditions that perpetuate violence – systems of oppression and exploitation, domination, and state violence
Transformative Justice is grounded in inquiry such as:


How do we build our personal and collective capacity to respond to trauma and support accountability in a transformative way?
How do we shift power towards collective liberation?
How do we build effective and sustainable movements that are grounded in resilience and life-affirming power?
Transformative justice is a way of addressing an individual act of harm that relies on community members instead of the police, the law, or the government (also known as the state). It is a response to the racism and gender-based oppression that shape life for many people of color. Though models differ, all reject the involvement of the criminal-justice system, choosing instead to rely on community support networks and mediators.
As a daughter of parents who pledged their life’s work to indigenous sovereignty work through the US judicial system, I see that there are fundamental flaws in trying to reform a system that is fundamentally designed to oppress and harm Black and Indigenous people.
We need radical changes and defunding police helps us to reckon with the failures of the punitive justice system and the roots of that oppressive system. But for the real change to happen, we must look more holistically at the roots of where the harm begins and build a practice towards reparations and reconciliation and community healing. This is transformative justice. This is a long game approach, but from my vantage point, the only way we will be able to really address the syndrome and not just the symptoms of an unjust society.
As Audre Lord said: “ “For the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us temporarily to beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change.”
How do we reclaim our stolen tools? Our forgotten tools? How to we uplift and center a new ancient future where ancestral, indigenous and culturally aligned ways of community health and wellbeing, safety and accountability are blended with the new ideas of this coming generation of BIPOC leaders who know there is a world where transformation is possible. What are the ways we can disrupt harm and violence and also cultivate new frameworks for community wellbeing and accountability?
Transformative justice ripples out into beyond the first stages of healing and accountability. Its being in a practice of ensuring a vibrant quality of life for all, so that when basic and foundational needs are met and joy and pleasure is possible, then we see that reflected in society and community wellbeing. Growing food to end food apartheid and scarcity, engaging in initiatives that ensure culturally appropriate regenerative economic opportunities are available, ensuring the education that is offered in communities is culturally relative and support the growth and wellbeing of all community members in their quest for a good life. These are all foundational contributions to the overall community practice of transformative justice.

Tag them below so we can support their efforts. Yes, we must dismantle and disrupt the current corrupt system, but we also must sow seeds of what the healing, revitalization and new future will sprout from. Thank you to all of the ones tending the seeds of possibility for transformation and community wellbeing for Black and Brown folks. We see you, support you, and act in solidarity with you. #transformativejustice #blacklivesmatter

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Brooke Medicine Eagle Message May 26, 2020 CHOOSING LOVE


CHOOSING LOVE: Well folks, the news of rioting and hateful behavior from friends in the southern USA is sobering and shocking, and yet it’s good to have a sense of what is actually happening. I receive beautiful stories of caring and sharing too. MY HOPE IS THAT FOR ALL OF US, IT GALVANIZES A WILLINGNESS TO DO EVERYTHING WE CAN ON THE POSITIVE SIDE. And, of course, CHOOSING LOVE over fear and anger IS THE PRIMARY WORK.
It’s quite strange, to say the least, to be living the experience that our wise elders and prophecies have predicted for generations – a time when great shaking must take place to loosen the hold on the old ways and open to the new. I’ve always wondered what it would look like, and this certainly seems to be at least part of it. Those power-hungry and greedy find chaos and disciplined shut-down, perhaps even of democratic process in a vital election year, to be beneficial to their causes.
Crisis, crucial moments, always imply a cross-roads where we get to actively choose our path into the future. Prophecy says this is a time when a new level of Love will blossom, and regeneration of all Life burgeon from there. Yet, even the most conscious and willing of us may not find ourselves at that higher level. So what we are called upon to do, from what I can see, is find the highest and clearest Love we can generate in ourselves (through bringing those radiant memories into our bodies so fully that we literally feel them) and making a practice of sending that vibration into our world – whether the person walking 6 feet across from us on our street, angry people rioting in the streets, hungry children in refugee camps across the world, or polar bears starving on melting ice. Don’t forget the animals and trees and plants and water. Add some GRATEFULNESS into the mix, and you have a winning combination.
Step up. Take care of and be there for everyone you can in any way. Love opens us to offer our best; Love transforms and regenerates; Love is the finest medicine.

Remember, it’s a PRACTICE and Life depends upon it. It’s not too tough an assignment, since having Love vibrant in your body and pouring forth is one of the most wonderful feelings in the human form. I think the Great Mother planned it that way.
I tell my students: there are only a few reasons NOT to do this practice ~
1. ignorance of Love’s transformative power,
2. thinking that you aren’t enlightened enough to do it,
3. and just plain old laziness.
a. You aren’t ignorant (although I usually spend two days in class illustrating the magic potential of Love for humans and all Life).
b. If you have ever had a moment of feeling Love – giving or getting it – you are qualified.
c. And it’s time to get your butt up off the inner couch and do the work we came to do. This is not some light game that is playing out here. Everyone counts and it’s a participatory sport….

For me, here in the quietness of our garden home, it means being incredibly grateful; getting my hands in the rich soil; giving ground to seeds doing their amazing thing of becoming food plants; spreading Love across the countryside on bike rides; writing and sharing as much goodness as I can through modern technologies; and remembering that LOVE CREATED EVERYONE AND LIVES IN EACH OF US, we just need to FIND AND USE IT.
I’ll soon be announcing my POWER & BEAUTY Wisdom Series, which I think has some wonderful answers and practices of wholeness and holiness vital for this time.

Wishing you very well on a day of sweet and soaking rain. It’s that natural lesson in how our constant, gentle soaking of the world with Love, will produce an irresistible flowering. Be wise and well, Brooke

Above I left out a couple important things that need to be shared, as well.
Love is FIERCENESS too. FIERCENESS is not aggression or meanness, it’s about behavior correction and boundaries. A mother dog, when bitten on the ear by the tiny, sharp teeth of her playful pup, gives an intense snarl and “glare”. It’s a big NO without physical harm, and she means it; the message is clear!!! A couple experiences of this, and the baby gets the lesson, the boundary of good behavior. Bless us all, B

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The Medicine of Coronavirus Rupa Marya, MD

The Medicine of Coronavirus
Rupa Marya, MD

Apr 23 · 5 min read

Coronavirus is here. An invisible entity that is changing the rhythm of life as we know it. Many have died. Many more than we know at this point. And many more will get sick and pass. The virus has spread along travel routes that trace the flow of global capital, routes that were established in a time of colonialism when greedy men carved up the world to exert their own will. The traces of this greed have left scars on our relationships to each other and to the ecosystems around us. For a moment, we are seeing what we have been missing.
Stay at Home. Take Care.
The best protection we have at this moment is to avoid its spread, which means to starve the virus. By staying home in the company of those we share life with, we stop it from hopping from person to person and replicating. In the Bay Area, we are flattening that curve. Our collective action in keeping distance and staying home has demonstrated that we can take care of one another in a powerful way. We can radically change the rhythm of our lives in order to look out for one another. This is good medicine to witness.
Stay at Home. Take Care.
For those who cannot stay home because they do not have a home, we are seeing community members speak up and agitate for the first time to get those unhoused sheltered. For those who are incarcerated, we are seeing full-throated calls for freeing them. Even if the awareness was out of self-interest, for the first time, we hear voices unanimously demanding humane solutions. Not a tool shed. Not a warehouse. But private spaces which should be held as permanent housing is found. We are watching the compassion of our people awaken. This is also good medicine to witness.
Stay at Home. Take Care.
What has been fascinating to notice is starving the virus also starves the engine that is destroying the earth. People staying at home has driven the airline industry to the brink of collapse. People staying at home means the fossil fuel industry doesn’t have as many people to buy their poisons. The cost of oil has dropped below $0. This means they have to pay us to take it. But we don’t want it. The air pollution from the cars and airplanes and trucks driving through Oakland drives chronic inflammation in our chests, in our lungs and around our hearts. We want another way. We want more bicycle friendly and human scale transportation. We want accessible electrification of our transportation, so that electric vehicles are available to folks at every level of income. We want poisoning industries to be shut down permanently. And we can shut them down, collectively. But refusing to buy what they are selling. And refusing to continue our lives as we have. We can do things differently. This is powerful medicine to witness.
Stay at Home. Take Care.
And it is isn’t simply the fossil fuel industry, it is those pushing for the economy to reopen when we have not been cleared safely. A death cult that has mistaken money for life energy pushes to move people into harms way, those who are the most vulnerable. It is the healthcare systems that neglect the health and safety of their labor force, the doctors, nurses, cafeteria workers, unit clerks, security workers, janitors and more. We are being told those of us who are sick are getting the virus outside the hospital. Make no mistake — if you work in a hospital, coronavirus is an occupational hazard. We have been told we would be fired for wearing masks. Then told we cannot wear the masks we know we need to. We have been threatened with loss of our jobs for speaking out against these measures. And we have been denied workman’s compensation when we get sick on the job. We are all facing pay cuts now, instead of hazard pay or forgiveness of our crippling student debt. I heard one white physician in her 50s say “I understand how the people of Flint feel now. I feel life my life doesn’t matter.” This is the sickness of our system exposed.
Stay at Home. Take Care.
But we have seen what happens when we collectively stop working for this economy. The stock market collapses. Our federal government pumps trillions of dollars into saving it. I have never seen such expenditure to save the lives of people dying needlessly from lack of healthcare insurance. I have never seen such expenditure to house people sleeping on the streets. Or the cleaning of our ocean waters. But this system cannot hold if we collectively refuse to work for it. We must consider the power of a general strike now, to force the changes we need. Healthcare for everyone. Housing for everyone. Healthy safe food for everyone. A Red New Deal, with indigenous wisdom leading how we care for each other and our relationships to the natural world that supports our very life.
Stay at Home. Take Care.
It is time to put into larger scale practice those economies we have been experimenting with in our life projects over the past several decades. The radical acts of growing our own foods, working with our medicines, reimagining the primacy of food and medicine together. Staying at home doesn’t mean doing nothing. It means doing the all the things that will shore up your community in times of suffering. Because more suffering will come. Coronavirus is the first of a series of global climate shocks that are coming. The people suffering the hardest are the ones whose suffering was built into the architecture of colonialism. Climate collapse is the end-stage of the colonial project. A system that is built upon exploitation and degredation cannot hold. We must dismantle those structures now. Staying at home means mobilizing what gifts you have to share with the people in your midst who don’t have enough. It means imagining economies that matter. Imagining economies where care is centered.
Stay at Home. Take Care.
This coronavirus is humbling. It is showing us things we didn’t know we had the power to do. It is showing us how we can come together by staying apart. It is showing us how by taking up less room, everything else has a chance to recover. Mother Earth is remarkable in her capacity to heal. We just have to give her space to do it. The environmental movement doesn’t need us to do more. It needs us to do less. To pause. To stop running around so much. To stop building so much. To start turning inward to deepen our practice of care. Care for one another. Care for the animals who share this world with us. Care for the air and water who sustain us. Care for the soil that feeds us. It is time for a global culture of care to emerge as a stronger force that any global culture we have seen. It cannot be dictated from any government. It must come from the will of the people all around the world. And it starts in our homes.
Stay at Home. Take Care.

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“Letter to a Young Activist During Troubled Times: Do Not Lose Heart, We Were Made for These Times” is ©2020 by Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Ph.D., all rights reserved

Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés, a mestiza Latina and longtime activist now in her mid-seventies, continues to testify before federal and state legislatures for social justice causes of disenfranchised persons. She is a poet, an author whose books — including Women Who Run With the Wolves — are published in 42 languages, and a post-trauma recovery specialist, serving 9/11 survivor families and students, teachers and community after the Columbine High School massacre. She is a senior diplomate Jungian psychoanalyst in practice for fifty years, the former chair of the Colorado State Grievance Board, and the first recipient of the Joseph Campbell “Keeper of the Lore” award.

April 4, 2020
Dear Brave Souls: This was printed a few days ago in our alternative newspaper that is read by many young persons. Many many readers came to read…
Please share this blessing letter with those you wish… including your local newspaper {if editorial needs to, we can be contacted projectscreener@aol.com }
My foreign and domestic agents are working to forward this blessing letter to our forty-two publishers from South Africa to Mexico, Canada, Central and South America, Australia, New Zealand, most nations of Europe and Eastern Europe, goodly amounts of parts of the Middle East, island nations, UK and the north countries
I can’t convey how I feel thrown to my knees in prayer when I know, for reasons beyond my hard work, for reasons beyond working to bring ‘the work’ for a lifetime, that somehow I have been given such — I don’t know what is quite the right word– but /and to make offerings to/for many…
Our UK publishers and our Italian publishers have already seen the blessing letter last week, and they are tearful and uplifted to have it so they can distribute far and wide. I hope you will keep all in your prayers; they are under great duress of many kinds, as we all are. Yet, we will rise. We will. It has already been decided by the innate design of the human psyche and soul.
It there is one thing humans have inborn, it is the deep instinct to rebuild… to scrape the ruin and build again. And again And again. I think of all the disaster sites Ive served at where everything has been lost including family members and animals, let alone dwelling place, forests, gardens, family treasures of many kinds to the heart and soul.
Even whilst still in the midst of the wounding, the rebuild instinct kicks in more and more, and is given a home in one’s heart of seeking, heart of actions, and is not spurned nor scorned.
Im adding the cover letter was sent last week to select some persons, and that will be sent to my publishers who will see if their newspapers will also carry these words…
This comes with love and I am covering you in prayer daily. Dont forget. We are. Together.
dr.e

The letter before the letter:
Everything is going to be alright. Stay in good fettle. DON’T listen to the endless loops of ‘the news’— they are like a bench grinder to the spirit.
I’ve ridden out 8 recessions as a self-employed person for 53 years, and ridden the tsunamis from all manner of persons/cohorts intent on slaying myself or what I love and seek to shelter.
Not despite, but because of travails: We can do this. I’m old as dirt. I know this time too shall pass. It will. We’ll rebuild. We will.
Rx: STAY WELL, STAY IN.
Learn something valuable
Stand in the sunshine
Take a meditation walk by yourself
Talk to friends
Rest
Drink water
Eat decently
Create something beautiful/ useful
Pray and bless everything
and everyone you can.
No lack of love, ever,
Dr. E.
THE BLESSING LETTER:
****************
Do Not Lose Heart,
We Were Made for These Times
Mis Estimados Queridos, My Esteemed Ones:
Do not lose heart. We were made for these times.
I have heard from so many recently who are deeply and properly bewildered. They are concerned about the state of affairs in our world right now. It is true, one has to have strong cojones and ovarios to withstand much of what passes for “good” in our culture today. Abject disregard of what the soul finds most precious and irreplaceable and the corruption of principled ideals have become, in some large societal arenas, “the new normal,” the grotesquerie of the week.
It is hard to say which one of the current egregious matters has rocked people’s worlds and beliefs more. Ours is a time of almost daily jaw-dropping astonishment and often righteous rage over the latest degradations of what matters most to civilized, visionary people.
You are right in your assessments. The lustre and hubris some have aspired to while endorsing acts so heinous against children, elders, everyday people, the poor, the unguarded, the helpless, is breathtaking.
Yet…I urge you, ask you, gentle you, to please not spend your spirit dry by bewailing these difficult times. Especially, do not lose hope. The fact is, we were made for these times.
Yes. For years, we have been learning, practicing, been in training for and just waiting to meet on this exact plain of engagement. I cannot tell you often enough that we are definitely the leaders we have been waiting for, and that we have been raised, since childhood, for this time precisely.
I grew up on the Great Lakes and recognize a seaworthy vessel when I see one. Regarding awakened souls, there have never been more able crafts in the waters than there are right now across the world. And they are fully provisioned and able to signal one another as never before in the history of humankind.
I would like to take your hands for a moment and assure you that you are built well for these times. Despite your stints of doubt, your frustrations in arighting all that needs change right now, or even feeling you have lost the map entirely, you are not without resource. You are not alone.
Look out over the prow; there are millions of boats of righteous souls on the waters with you. In your deepest bones, you have always known this is so.
Even though your veneers may shiver from every wave in this stormy roil, I assure you that the long timbers composing your prow and rudder come from a forest greater. That long-grained lumber is known to withstand storms, to hold together, to hold its own and to advance, regardless.
We have been in training for a dark time such as this, since the day we assented to come to Earth. For many decades, worldwide, souls just like us have been felled and left for dead in so many ways, over and over —
brought down by naiveté, by lack of love, by suddenly realizing one deadly thing or another, by not realizing something else soon enough, by being ambushed and assaulted by various cultural and personal shocks in the extreme.
We all have a heritage and history of being gutted, and yet remember this especially…we have also, of necessity, perfected the knack of resurrection.
Over and over again, we have been the living proof that that which has been exiled, lost or foundered can be restored to life again. This is as true and sturdy a prognosis for the destroyed worlds around us as it was for our own once mortally wounded selves.
Though we are not invulnerable, our risibility supports us to laugh in the face of cynics who say “fat chance” and “management before mercy,” and other evidences of complete absence of soul sense. This, and our having been “to Hell and back” on at least one momentous occasion, makes us seasoned vessels for certain. Even if you do not feel that you are, you are.
Even if your puny little ego wants to contest the enormity of your soul, the smaller self can never for long subordinate the larger Self. In matters of death and rebirth, you have surpassed the benchmarks many times.
Believe the evidence of any one of your past testings and trials. Here it is: Are you still standing? The answer is, Yes! (And no adverbs like “barely” are allowed here.) If you are still standing, ragged flags or no, you are able. Thus, you have passed the bar. And even raised it. You are seaworthy.
In any dark time, there is a tendency to veer toward fainting over how much is wrong or unmended in the world. Do not focus on that. Do not make yourself ill with overwhelm. There is a tendency, too, to fall into being weakened by perseverating on what is outside your reach, by what cannot yet be. Do not focus there. That is spending the wind without raising the sails.
We are needed, that is all we can know. And though we meet resistance, we more so will meet great souls who will hail us, love us and guide us, and we will know them when they appear.
Didn’t you say you were a believer? Didn’t you say you pledged to listen to a voice greater? Didn’t you ask for grace? Don’t you remember that to be in grace means to submit to the Voice greater? You have all the resource you need to ride any wave, to surface from any trough.
In the language of aviators and sailors, ours is to sail forward now, all balls out. Understand the paradox: If you study the physics of a waterspout, you will see that the outer vortex whirls far more rapidly than the inner one.
To calm the storm means to quiet the outer layer, to cause it, by whatever countervailing means, to swirl much less, to more evenly match the velocity of the inner, far less volatile core — till whatever has been lifted into such a vicious funnel falls back to Earth, lays down, is peaceable again.
One of the most important steps you can take to help calm the storm is to not allow yourself to be taken in a flurry of overwrought emotion or despair, thereby accidentally contributing to the swale and the swirl. Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach.
Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul, to assist some portion of this poor suffering world, will help immensely.
It is not given to us to know which acts or by whom will cause the critical mass to tip toward an enduring good. What is needed for dramatic change is an accumulation of acts: adding, adding to, adding more, continuing. We know that it does not take “everyone on Earth” to bring justice and peace, but only a small, determined group who will not give up during the first, second or hundredth gale.
One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times.
The light of the soul throws sparks, sends up flares, builds signal fires…causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these, to be fierce and to show mercy toward others — both are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity. Struggling souls catch light from other souls who are fully lit and willing to show it. If you would help to calm the tumult, this is one of the strongest things you can do.
There will always be times in the midst of “success right around the corner, but as yet still unseen” when you feel discouraged. I, too, have felt despair many times in my life, but I do not keep a chair for it; I will not entertain it. It is not allowed to eat from my plate.
The reason is this: In my uttermost bones, I know something, as do you. It is that there can be no despair when you remember why you came to Earth, who you serve, and who sent you here. The good words we say and the good deeds we do are not ours: They are the words and deeds of the One who brought us here.
In that spirit, I hope you will write this on your wall: When a great ship is in harbor and moored, it is safe, there can be no doubt. But…that is not what great ships are built for.
This comes with much love and prayer that you remember who you came from, and why you came to this beautiful, needful Earth.
*****************************
“Letter to a Young Activist During Troubled Times: Do Not Lose Heart, We Were Made for These Times” is ©2020 by Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Ph.D., all rights reserved. Creative Commons License by which author and publishers grant permission to copy, distribute and transmit this particular letter under the conditions that use be non-commercial, that the letter be used in its entirety word for word, and not altered nor added to, not subtracted from, and that it carry author’s full name and this copyright notice in full. Other permissions via facebook message: dr. clarissa pinkola estés.
***********************
Brief Bio
Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés, a mestiza Latina and longtime activist now in her mid-seventies, continues to testify before federal and state legislatures for social justice causes of disenfranchised persons. She is a poet, an author whose books — including Women Who Run With the Wolves — are published in 42 languages, and a post-trauma recovery specialist, serving 9/11 survivor families and students, teachers and community after the Columbine High School massacre. She is a senior diplomate Jungian psychoanalyst in practice for fifty years, the former chair of the Colorado State Grievance Board, and the first recipient of the Joseph Campbell “Keeper of the Lore” award.

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Suzanne Lewis sharing Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes Rough Prayer

DR ESTES
Dear Brave Souls: Symmetry and Balance in all that is made by hand, including human life….
Please do not read if you might be offended by what I call, ‘Rough Prayer.’
This prayer contains cussing [“Cabron” is used as a fiery direct cuss word in Spanish]
Because I’ve heard some version of “old people should just be left to die now” at least 100 times in the last many days, I wrote the following prayer as Ive heard SO many people online and in media callously speculate about persons in my age group [Im in 75th year on earth–. but ‘old’, I think, can be any age to those who are cruel] as being expendable re resources of food, medicine, shelter and more.
Also, Teresacita, one of our sister-commenters here wrote these words here earlier
“…I was shocked today by comment that we should just accept all our elders will die and stop accommodating preventive measures when it is mainly for that one, expendable group. Finally, I am awake. I am that expendable group….”
I tell you in all peace, that this ‘elders ought be kicked to the side’ is not the first time in my lifetime some political persons have hinted at the elders’ “duty to die, ” — the last being in the midst of the billion dollar health insurance industry wrangling with the government about “managed care” a crude euphemism meaning not wanting to allow elders reasoned treatments.
¡Ya Basta x 10!
We all have our own ways of staying strong in peace, and during duress. I tend toward devotional prayer, but regarding this ‘death chisme’ death-gossip flooding the internet, the fire woke me in the middle of the night and would not leave until I penned these words for whomsoever might find them useful, those who are vulnerable in any way, healthwise, agewise, mind, heart, soul, spirit wise, all wise.
I offer in all gentleness but also with fire: May all remain well and May ALL receive care to the best that can be
Not to tempt fate, but with humility, that is Creator at center, to slam home utter Faith: here is what I call “Rough Prayer.”
Para La Vida por Las Viejas y Los Viejos, the Old Ones, the Vulnerable of Any Age: Prayer About the Reality of the Length of Precious Life!
I am an elder ,
in my 75th year on earth
And you suddenly say
As some greed hounds have done before,
‘Let us leave the old behind.
Who are they?
Rocking chair fodder.
Muddled and doddering.’
¿You know who else said that Cabron?
Adolph Hitler and his flying monkeys!
Hitler called the souls of human beings,
“life not worthy of life”
because of age or affliction
or religious affiliation
I rise Cabron. We rise.
We frontliners rise.
We rise to speak for those
who have not yet heard
of your vile ‘plans.’
Now from the bloody echos
of an egregious 1940s history
of “Never again!!”
You dare to say I
And my brothers and sisters
in Their 70/ 80/90s,
the vulnerable, the ones in need,
Should die
Should be left aside
kept to the sidelines
Kept From helps
Refused interventions, medicines
You dare to try to cut the cloth
from the Weaver’s loom
Before the weaving is fully done!
¡NO Cabron!
I say ¡Cabron!
I am speaking to you,
Your lowness
Let me set you derecho
You have no say so over our lives.
We live and we will live
and love to the last breath
decided not by you,
but by Greater.
For we were born
at the appointment of
El Dio y La Diosa…
And the time
of our leave-taking from Earth
Was decided before we were born¡
¡Cabron!
I said ¡cabron!
We are divinely inspired
to be on planet Earth until
we walk onward
deigned ONLY by Greater…
¡Cabron!
You’re on noticia:
I have news for you Cabron–
And I speak for many mis comadres,
los todos compadres, los todos
viejas y viejos,
all our sister-mother-daughters,
all our son-fathers–brothers,
ALL our elders…
¡Be informed Cabron!
for this has ALWAYS been true,
despite your many cheap imaginings.
Will ALWAYS be true!
::: ¡Even BULLETS
CANNOT kill me
If it’s NOT
my time
To die! :::
May this be understood by many
May it remain so
May it be enacted in good ways
as each person sees fit
according to their ways of Life.
Aymen
Aymen
Aymen
[and a little woman]

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Wild As YOU Want Women’s Weekend Immersion in Nature September 12-13, 2020 May Creek Farm Bloomington, IN USA

Sara Steffey McQueen
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Just beginning the process of making this event come to life! Plenty of time still, but here is my wordpress blog
Wild As YOU Want Women’s Weekend Immersion in Nature September 12-13, 2020 May Creek Farm Bloomington, IN USA

Posted in Global Grandmothers' Network 2020, RAINBOW WARRIORS 2020 Calendar | Leave a comment