Welcome to paradise- 10 days of JOY

Hi beautifuls. Really I am so excited to share with you the beautiful, joyous journey I have been on for the past ten days.  I have laughed; I have cried- sobbed for hours, tears streaming down my face, not at my own sorrows (mostly) but on the stories shared by other members of the incredible "Joy Tribe" I was part of.  I've woken up with puffy eyes, drank fresh water with lemon every morning, stayed in my pyjamas til 5pm one day; got dressed up in finery and supped champagne at 11am, another day.

These are all the external things really, right?  Putting on beautiful earrings.  Making music and DANCE!! part of the everyday.

The internal shifts of this week have been seismic.  Two or three really "hellish" things happened.  Like- rethink the life-plan things.  Which were not without tears of their own.  We mourn the loss of our ideas... of our identities...- don't we?

207 ladies were in the Joy Tribe.  We started the journey in our own corners of the world, and bravely carried it through the wild irrational spaces of our own homes.  It is these ladies, and our beautiful leader, Hannah Marcotti, founder and leader of the JoyUP, who I am so in love with and despite the inner turbulence and changes I feel, it's them who have made the reality of living in JOY worthwhile.  It's more practise than paradise.

The last piece of Soulwork assigned was to find in our environments a special stone.  A stone we could journey on with, to access it's grounding, truthful energy.  Maybe as a lucky charm, to whisper our worries to or just as a reminder we did this.  Hannah has a thing for white stones.  (I have a thing for Hannah.  girl-crush! so embarrassing!)

It has been pouring with rain all day here- in the wetly wild, can't walk outside your door way the Isle of Man gets.  But around 6pm, the clouds lifted slightly.  So I put on a blowy skirt and dangly earrings- dressing up to get my stone.  I wanted a white one, just like Hannah's.  Maybe I'd get two- and post one to her!  this thought made me race out the door and onto the beach.

"There is so much magnificence... in the ocean"-  Miten & Deva Premal

It is a fib, the paragraph above.  It had been pouring and super-windy.  But before I put on my pretty skirt I went out on the beach, for a run, and I was just going to get a stone for our soulwork.  When I saw how the beach had not been walked on all day, how hundreds of sparkling pebbles were winking as me as I jogged, I knew.  I knew I wanted 207 white pebbles, one for all of us in the joy tribe.  I came back down in my blowy skirt.  I picked up off the sand, and added to a beautiful jar I was keeping hematite crystals in- 208 white rocks (one for our beautiful founder, too!)

Just two thoughts
1. Every single rock is different.  Some were clustered on the beach together - a bit like JOY tribe members who discovered they lived in the same small east coast town this week!  Some were small and pointy.  Others were round and weighty.  Some almost transparent, some flecked with gold, or striped with caramel.  Some slipped through my fingers as I picked them up- many are called but few are chosen; I thought.  I let them be.  We, Joy tribe are Brightly shining white pebbles.  We are so may when we look!  But I only wanted 208.

2.  This jar of pebbles to me represents the fruition of a dream.  Hannah's dream.  To join 200 beings in a quest for JOY.  It may have seemed unlikely, even impossible, to her at one time.  I can imagine that others said it couldn't be done.  This jar will always stand as testament to me of the power of a loving group; a devoted, heart-centred, visionary leader; and the triumph of a life devoted to living in beauty.

Thank you Hannah!  Thank you, JOYtribe! for the ideas- creativity- stories- bravery- friendship- introductions- new dreams birthed- old broke pieces swept away.

~sparkles & butterflies a'fluttering now, always!~