While attending a workshop with Malidoma Patrice Some, he told us, "The Spirit makes some people unfit to be socially productive so they can be made shamans." That statement had a profound impact on me. For most of my life, I felt different and disconnected from the human race. I struggled with suicidal depression from childhood, and developed asthma around 9 years old. As I labored to breathe at 4am each morning, I remember the thought that crossed my mind most often was, "I don't want to live in a world where there is no magic."

My father subscribed to FATE magazine back in the 50's and 60's, and I would steal his copy and read it under the covers. I was obsessed with mystery - at times my whole being would yearn to understand and be part of all knowledge. This hunger for mystery drove my life, and from a shamanic perspective, I now realize that it was part of the gift I received from my ancestors. Each of us is given a gift when we come to this world. That gift itches and twitches and prods us and pokes us, until it is recognized and allowed to fulfill its purpose. In Malidoma's perspective, it is NOT the job of the person to reveal their gift, it is instead the job of the community to recognize the gift in each child and create a safe environment to express that gift.

Many  of us struggle throughout our lives searching for our purpose, and often using up the energy of our gift in survival. As we come closer to the collapse of artificial systems and values, the need for our gift to be expressed becomes more critical.

I have a particularly loud and nagging gift. It has saved me from making decisions that would drain my life force, and pushed me into taking actions that had me shaking in terror. When I was 18, and looking for a job, I went to apply at the phone company. As I began to write my name on the paper, I fainted. The woman taking the applications helped me outside and gave me water. After a few minutes, when I felt better, she said, "would you like to come back tomorrow?"

"No, thank you" I said, "I believe my body is telling me this is not the job for me!" My body often used weakness and fainting as a way to show me I was going in a direction that was not in my highest good. I was steered in various directions, ending up at an advertising photography studio in the late 70's, working for exceptional people and learning all about the power of image and story.

In 1981 I quit my job and went freelance, moving from the world of photography to the world of filmmaking. It was like coming home, a world where creativity, innovation and professionalism were the standards by which we were measured.

I stumbled along the way, forgetting what my purpose was and becoming immersed in the flash and dazzle of the industry. Yet at all times, my gift and my ancestors nagged and prodded and kept me up nights demanding that I return to my path. In the decade of the 90's, I found and studied with anyone who was teaching something that interested me. (For that is one way my gift speaks to me - to grab my attention with something mysterious and interesting. I have learned that is a signal for me to take action. Too bad if I don't have the money or time, do it anyway!) I trained with amazing teachers and shamans, collecting wisdom and experience, and writing it all down. I became fascinated with emotion - its’ purpose, its’ process and its’ evolution. During the late 90's I began teaching workshops and holding retreats. Each event added to my understanding of the mysterious nature of emotion.

In 1999, after teaching a retreat in Mexico, I came home and sank into a suicidal depression. I was unable to do the simplest chore; but I kept my journal by the bed and wrote and wrote and wrote. As the depression came to a close, I had my ah-hah moment - that I was on a hamster wheel. As long as I had my condo and cabin, I had to stay in the city and work in a field that was no longer fun or meaningful. If I moved to my cabin, I would be isolated and unable to implement my gift. I was overweight, exhausted, angry, hopeless and frankly, impossible to be around. I could not see how to get out of my hamster wheel until that moment - when my gift whispered in my ear, "why don't you sell everything and go live in Mexico?"

So, I sold my house, paid off my debts and moved to Mexico. For 5 years I lived simply, with only what I could carry in my tiny car, and restored my health and my heart. I took all I had learned from my various teachers for 10 years and developed a system of wholeness, with an emphasis on emotion. I wrote the first draft of my book. Mexico showed me what living in community was like, and welcomed me into its world. I learned that home was wherever I was, and that even a thatched roof hut could be turned into a temple. That five years gave me a breathing space and allowed my heart to shed its armor.

I returned to MN in 2004, determined to launch my gift in a structured and accessible format. That process has been equally bumpy, painful and rewarding as the previous part of my life. Just when I think I have it all together, the boulder comes rolling down the hill and knocks me over. I have had to learn resilience above all else, and to surrender to my gift and my purpose.

I am a translator. I have been given the means to travel into the subconscious, where I encounter the collective emotions of the human race. As feelings themselves have no language, it can be very difficult to talk about them. My gift taught me the language of metaphor, or, as Paulo Cohelo calls it, “The language of the world.”  I learned to interpret and translate the messages from Earth, Air, Fire and Water.  This gives me a  huge boost in knowing how to understand the emotional signals I receive from the environment, and being able to separate my own feelings from the collective.  This is critically important for us today, as the earth can no longer hold our emotional trauma. As that trauma makes its way through the collective, looking for healing, we can be overwhelmed by feelings that are not necessarily our own, but that we can mistake for our own.  Teen suicide is an indication of how big this problem has become.

If there is only one thing I would wish for the world, it would be to teach others how to evolve their emotions through sacred expression.  There is no greater power we hold to make swift and dramatic change than sacred emotional expression. It is clear we are not going to solve the world’s problems within the framework they occupy - while marching, donating and signing petitions are all honorable ways to make change, they are slow and contained within the very structures that keep them impotent.  It’s time to take the fight to a new arena.  This is part of the return of the feminine - the ability to change reality by emotion.  I love watching people’s lives transform when they realize how much power they really have to create their lives.

The future we yearn for is within our reach.  Emotional revolution is one way to get there.  I hope you’ll join me in creating a world that is beautiful, verdant, interesting, passionate, breathtaking and honors all life.