Totally Awesome To Be Alive!

Saturday was my fifth experience with Holotropic Breathwork, the fourth time in the past year, and the second time Lori and I teamed up as partners. Once again it was unlike any prior time. I fell into a very deep meditative state even before the music and breathing was supposed to start. Suddenly I found myself laying on my mat, realizing the tribal music was cranking and I needed to get breath fast and deep. I had no idea how much time had passed and I thought "Oh no! I'm missing it." This went on a few times, I thought I wasn't getting much out of it. I had very few conscious memories or experiences. I was either in the room thinking I was missing it or I was in some zone so deep I got no "story" from it.  I remember laughing out loud a few times at my thoughts that I wasn't getting anything - some part of me knew better.  A few times when the bass of the music had the floor vibrating it felt like every cell of mine was vibrating and ascending.  As I floated above into some golden dimension, I took one step forward and completely lost my balance and "landed" back on the mat, in the room, with the music cranking and people breathing and wailing around me. I laughed again.  I felt like, ah you think you are ready for this enlightenment? Think again kid!  I was considering opening my eyes with a disapointed feeling when the music stopped.  Three hours had gone by - wow. Yesterday I felt out of it, wondering what was I integrating since I didn't have much memory of things happening.  But today I woke up feeling so ALIVE, so AWESOME  that I declared it to be Totally Awesome To Be Alive Day.



Lori enjoyed her experience and looked gorgeous as she went on her ride. She was doing all sorts of cool motions with her hands, sort of a mix of sculpting and dancing at times. She sat up on a number of occasions and it took all my control not to wrap her up in a hug. Her session ended really cool as the creator of this process and a founding father of Transpersonal Psychology, 80-year-old Stan Grof laid down next to her and held her hand. She opened her eyes and looked at him like a new-born baby. She said, "The Universe is purple! Do you see it?"  Stan, replied "No, but I'm glad you do."  She went on to say, "No matter how much you give, it all comes back to you." It was beautiful to watch.

Everything Is Energy - LIVE

Still riding high after an amazing week in Boulder, CO with David and Kristin Morelli and a few hundred other fantastic people.  The Morelli’s hosted a 3-day event, Everything Is Energy LIVE, that Lori and I attended.  A couple weeks before the event I felt called to serve as a volunteer, so with my extended hours and working through meal breaks I didn’t really get to see Lori much, but we both had quite a time.  Not always good during it, but great by the end.

I ended up working on the video production side, which was pretty fun as that was my job for much of the 90’s.  It also gave me lots of behind the scenes access to the whole event, the opportunity to be part of a great team lead by Robert MacPhee and let me be close to David and Kristin as I was responsible for getting the wireless mics on them – and that Kristin can be a tough one to wrangle.  She once made it to the stage and was dancing before I could strap her in.

The volunteers were also responsible for holding the space, creating a safe place for growth and transformation while keeping the room grounded.  Now, I’ve heard the term “holding space” tossed around for a while, but this was my first experience truly feeling it and it was powerful.  The energy in that room was astounding.  It was such a cool experience to have strangers compliment my space holding and say how much they enjoyed my energy.  I made lots of great connections with attendees and my fellow coaches.

Aside from great teachings from Kristin and David the event featured guests, Dr. Alex Loyd of The Healing Codes, musician Robert Gass – who lead some of the most powerful meditations and truly had the place whipped into a frenzy with some chanting - and Gay Hendricks just making it under the wire after a missed flight.

There were many powerful meditations and exercises.  I tried to keep an eye on Lori and sometimes knew we were thinking of the same thing during some couples work even when I couldn’t be next to her.  There were lots of intense times that made the weekend feel like it was weeks long, none more so than speaking on stage about my past of depression and suicide attempts.  It was very difficult yet rewarding at the same time, and it just melted my heart to see Lori in the audience looking back at me in tears.  We’ve been through some major shit together and I’m so fortunate to have her in my life.  Once the event ended and people streamed out of the room we found each other and just stood there locked in an embrace for quite a while.

Sunday afternoon was the graduation ceremony for my yearlong energy coaching program, Enwaken. A majority of the 100+ Enwakeners from around the world were in the room and we could feel the ones who didn’t make it anyway.   We got to hear from Gay Hendricks again and we each said something about our journey on stage.  All I remember is I was bawling.  In fact, I’ve been in tears everyday since Labor Day.  This has been quite a month.  And quite a year.  And quite a life.

We had the celebration rocking the lobby as one of the coaches, Dan, is an amazing singer and piano player.  The hotel asked us to stop due to noise complaints and I realized the gym was open 24/7 so Dan grabbed his own keyboards from his car and we moved the party into the gym – even with a couple guys working out.  It was all fun and games till someone got hurt, by my hand of course which has ended many a party in the past, but Tina can take a medicine ball to the face like a trooper and we sang and danced till 12:12am on Sept 12.

Monday kicked off another three-day event, the wrap-up of the Enwaken Leadership program, a special six-month program for leading groups.  That was another wild ride with lots of breakdowns and breakthroughs.

I flew home on the red eye Wednesday night and now, Friday night, I’m at Kripalu in Lenox Ma for another round of Holotropic Breathwork tomorrow.  I was at this very event a year ago, this time Lori has joined me.  It was here last year that I first saw the burning heart image that is now tattooed on my arm.  95 people are here and we know five of them from prior breathwork, so that is really cool.  I have no idea what’s left in me to come out after such an intense time in Boulder, the great part to that is that I have no expectations. That makes breathwork all the better.

No let up in the energy after this weekend.  The Morelli’s annual 40 Days and 40 Nights program kicks off on Tuesday September 20^th.  You can still join if you feel called.  This was the program that first introduced me to David and Kristen about 2 ½ years ago.  Our journey together isn’t over as I’ve been selected to be an apprentice and work with next year’s fresh batch of Enwaken students, so I’ll be back in Boulder again in November for the kick-off to that.  And Lori will be with me once again, as she’s decided to take the Enwaken program herself.  Gonna be another wild ride of a year.