Chapter 7, Consulting with the Guides; 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women

There are women who make things better... simply by showing up. There are women who make things happen. There are women who make their way. There are women who make a difference. And women who make us smile. There are women of wit and wisdom who -- through strength and courage -- make it through. There are women who change the world every day...women like you. ~~ashley rice

Mentors, guides, ancestors, family….. got me thinking this week.

My father made bologna palatable by frying it and hot dogs taste good by dunking them in soy sauce, raw in a coffee cup – hey us kids loved it! He pushed snowballs down my back, and took my brother and I Snipe hunting. (If you don’t know what that is, it’s a complete farce as there is no such thing as a Snipe and you walk around with a paper bag and a flash light calling Snipe, Snipe… in the dark, in the woods, there is also a build up for years that you have to be the right age before you get to go Snipe hunting.) He made me laugh and feel safe. He also tried his hand at Children stories – he was good, he read them to me at night when he tucked me in.
Dad used to say I was supposed to go into the ad business because of all the posters I would make, taping ripped up paper bags into banners for birthdays, anniversaries, welcome home’s….

My mom, a bit of a tortured soul, read to me giving me my love of literature and tried to teach this tomboy to sit still and sew, but I was a lost cause, poor Mom, she got the daughter she wanted in my sister. I’m glad for both of them. My mother read everything I wrote and even submitted my first piece of poetry to “Barbie Magazine,” which was actually published and a darn good poem for a seven year old. Mom took up oil painting when she was 36, somewhere in 1973. She was even in a show. We were all very proud of her. Dad was clever when he made her frame for the big painting. He pounded the hell out of it with a huge, heavy mace that was part of our living room décor before staining it. Except for her pork chops, mom was a good cook (I swear in the 60’s and 70’s those pork chops had to cooked within an inch of there life and tasted like the cardboard on the back of a legal pad.) Though her sweet basil on fried eggs in bacon grease, though horrifying to a nutritionist now a-a-days were great. Her pasty recipe passed down from my great, great, great gram is still a family tradition –though mom put a new twist on it (it’s a secret). So I was peeling potatoes by the time I was eight and cooking a decent meal by 12 &–still enjoy cooking. My family dubbed me the queen of making something out of nothing. Currently my homemade salsa, fresh ingredients from the garden should be canned.

I’ve nurtured and raised 5 other boys, and girl that didn’t get it in their own home and my two beautiful sons. I offer a circle of yoga, with my yoga instructor at my home without charge and give out complimentary Reiki treatments at my grams nursing home. Those people are my mentors as in their strength I find my own.

But, though I’ve often wanted the traditional mentor, none seem to present themselves in the form of a human. My mentors are in movies, literature, poetry, nature and animals.

My dad was a projectionist in Milwaukee and we were able to see movies for free back then (shhh no one was supposed to know.) I was raised on films and learned to decipher plot, character, and the deep layers of the human psyche. (I have a secret dream of receiving an Oscar for an original screenplay) Movies –good ones always seem to teach me more about the human condition and ways to understand others more than anything else. Can I just add Bette Davis, Joan Crawford & Anne Bancroft.

Joseph Campbell, Clarrisa Pinkola Estes, Jung, Marianne Williamson, Krishnamurti have had the biggest non-fiction influence. Shirley Maclaine, Toni Morrison, Charolette Kasl, Kay Jamison Redfield & Angeles Arrien also. Great fiction as had the same effects on me as movies. It’s the best, the worst and the ideal of who we are in our true hearts.

Oddly enough, I think of myself as my own mentor; that my contributions and willingness to take chances, even scared or worried…to self my talk myself out of bad places and notice and be grateful for others. I put a second picture of myself on my blog. At first I was very satisfied with it but then I thought others would think that narcissist. In the end, I realized that this is how my husband sees me, and if he can love me that much, I can try to see myself through those same loving eyes.

Holding a tree till I can feel its roots and match my breath to it's essence, floating in the sea, feeling the life forms surround me, waiting till I disappear and there is nothing separating me from water, earth and air. Brushing down my horse, Ambrosia; she lets me know when I’m stressed and teaches me awareness. These have guided my body –

The teachings A Course in Miracles and Krishnamurti support my daily faith, reminding me that I’m not alone, that something else is always there to guide me. The Holy Spirit – the Gift of Grace.