Retrieving My Soul In Nicaragua Through The Sacred

We flew to Nicaragua to bury Grandma's and my cousin Omy's ashes. It ended up being a last minute trip for me as I was sure I wouldn't be able to take time off work. However, I DESIRED to go and right now the universe is delivering on my deepest desires. Something has energetically shifted for me and I've finally taken ownership of the power that I (we all) possess to co-create my reality. And it all starts with desire.

I needed this trip. I've been in an exciting expansion in my life for the past six months. My business is growing. I'm becoming the woman I was always meant to be. And that takes work. By work I mean a lot of things: mindset, commitment to habits, taking time to rest and receive, etc. It's truly a balancing act. I have to have strong masculine energy in order to make things happen (as someone who works primarily for herself ) AND I have to have strong feminine energy in order to flow, to receive, to create. The sacred union of masculine and feminine energies is key in this dance. 

I needed this trip because our identity is reflected back to us in the eyes of our people. After a decade of navigating my darkness I am now living in my light, but I am still on the journey of recovering parts of myself. This trip to Nicaragua was a soul retrieval. 

I needed this trip because ritual and ceremony are very basic human needs, and without them our lives lack intention and meaning. When Grandma passed away a year and a half ago we didn't get to have ritual and ceremony with her/our people. 

I needed this trip because I have been living in a city away from my family for 10 years now and I fucking miss them. I got to spend time with my brother and felt like a teen again, like the old days. I slept next to my mother for a week (there's nothing like a mother's love). I connected with my aunts who fill me with joy and laughter. I connected with friends I hadn't seen in decades. I danced, I ate, I was...as in BE. I felt like a human BEing. I am so deeply grateful for humans. For community. For family.

On this trip I didn't want to go anywhere fancy. I didn't want to get all dressed up. I wanted to be fully present in the simplest things, like walking the streets of my hometown, Jinotepe. One of my favorite moments was in my Tia Onosma's finca (rustic land). I inflated an air mattress, laid it out on the porch, dropped into deep presence and felt the aliveness in the wind. I became receptive to my environment and took it in, eventually falling into a peaceful sleep. 

We've (our family has) shared so many moments on that porch. I have many treasured memories of us on rocking chairs, chatting away, sharing meals, celebrating life. My grandmother is alive there for me. My whole family is. And these are the type of moments that after her passing I have learned to cherish more deeply. It's the small things that matter. Like sitting next to each other on a porch and rocking away on rocking chairs while the wind blows and the birds sing and life goes on around us. The key thing is, can you bring a quality of presence to those moments so that you fully take them in? That's what my life is about now: deepening the quality of my presence so that I take life in as deeply as I can; so that I can look back in my old years and feel that I lived a full life. And what I'm learning is that a full life is lived in the simplest moments. Mindfulness meditation has given me the gift of purifying my awareness and deepening my presence. How lucky am I to have the gift of Dhamma on my path in this lifetime!

I want to describe with my words what Nicaragua means to me, but I've yet to accomplish that. What I can say is that I lived there from the age of about 4-6 and 13-16. When we are young our mind is filled with less chatter and less habitual ways of thinking. In other words, we are naturally more mindful and curious and less judgemental. Some of the most mindful moments, in which I experienced pure, non-judgemental conscious awareness, took place in Nicaragua for me. I see it clearly now. And it was just life going on as usual that provided these moments for me. Nicaragua is a country that is not over developed. The land is fertile and ALIVE. Life is constantly happening all around you: strong smells, the sound of church bells and street sellers, people greeting you with delight, and that which takes place when humans aren't so confined to what I'll call "the rhythm" of  the Western world and modern cities. 

I've been trying to figure out what exactly it is that gives this magical feeling I feel in Nicaragua. I've narrowed it down to 2 things:

1- Relaxed nervous systems. 

2-Abundant native trees and nature.

People spend time with people. You go places and see humans of all ages: the children aren't dropped off at a daycare and the old aren't exiled from life. Most people in town have lived there for generations and so the community knows each other well. There is more of a sense of synchrony as you are seeing each other regularly and literally growing old with each other. Life is much less fragmented than in the modern world. Now, this is slowly changing. The internet is creating a monoculture of our species in my opinion. I saw more people working under artificial lights than ever and buildings closed off to natural sunlight and fresh air. It "looks" "nicer", more modern, but it costs people their health. However, it's still on a small enough scale where people's nervous systems are relaxed for the most part. And as human beings we attune to each other's nervous systems, so there is an overall feeling of ease living there.

The above is greatly supported and created by the fact that Nicaragua is abundant with native plants, lakes, volcanoes, and undeveloped land. Trees are beings. They are alive, constantly communicating. To me, cutting down a tree is akin to killing someone. Now this may sound extreme to you, but I've spent time opening myself up to the communication coming from nature and from the trees and if you know, you know. The abundance of native trees creates a feeling of magic in the air. I could cry right now just remembering the feeling. To think, this is how it was everywhere prior to us destroying forests to create concrete jungles. As we destroy nature we are slowly destroying our very selves - we ARE nature.

For the past couple of years I've had visions of myself leading ceremonies on the sacred volcanoes in Nicaragua. I've had a deep desire to teach yoga and meditation in the central park of my town. On this trip I spontaneously guided a friend in a yoga nidra and taught it in spanish - I'd never taught in spanish before! It cemented for me that I desire to bring these teachings to Nicaragua and as I said, desire leads the way. I am feeling a strong call to connect with the land in a deeper way and with my ancestors. To reclaim my identity. This feels so dear to my heart. We aren't who these corporations want us to be; we aren't a monoculture. I urge you to connect with your ancestors and to learn about their ways. It will unlock a whole lot energetically. Thank you to my soul brother Dakota for activating this desire more deeply within me. 

We offered a catholic mass and meal to the community in the name of my grandmother Maria De Los Angeles Mena Campos, and my cousin Onosma Cabrini Molieiri Mena. Grandmother's extended family joined us, some people I'd never met before, and I saw myself in them. I now know why I look the way I do. I saw mine and grandma's face in theirs. We honored these women's lives and passing together. We are meant to do life together. To love, to celebrate, to grieve, to mourn, to cry, to dance, to eat...TOGETHER. As a tribe. Life feels like a constant offering when we live in this way. Nicaragua still has this magical quality to it, but I wonder how much longer until it changes. 

We must do our spiritual work to reconnect with the Earth, with The Great Spirit and spend time in community so that our cells can remember the times when our survival depended on our belonging to a tribe. It still does, even if the system tries to convince you otherwise. We need each other and it is up to us to find our ways back to communal living - with a modern twist! When we expect someone else out there to solve things for us we give up our power, whether it's the government, religious figures, your boss, etc. It starts with each one of us doing our inner-work first, then finding ways to bring ritual + community + ceremony back into our lives and sharing it with our families, and then having trust in the ripple effect. 

The genuine delight expressed by the Nicaraguan people when they see someone they know is something I treasure deep in my heart. The way they express affection by bringing you something, usually fruit or a dish they made, and make it feel like a sacred offering is something I treasure deep in my heart. I've learned that the sacred is naturally present in less modern cities. My God, it is the way we are designed to live and somehow the modern world has lost its way. I'm starting to believe that the way back is through our ancestors. 

Thank you Nicaragua. Thank you Abuela, my guide, my angel, my heart. Thank you Omy for your light and beautiful smile. Thank you mother, for the woman that you are. Thank you family for showing up. I honor you, I honor the sacred. 

"Nicaraguense por gracia de Dios"