-22.22222222222222222222

Dear friends and family,
After 14 months on my continuing eat,pray, love journey, I had a great urge to sit in the wilderness in silence....(yes for all those who know me personally... silence).
A friend of mine suggested a 4 day silent meditation retreat in Montana. So within a week .....I was off to Montana after Bridgewatch.
Now I just need to get this straight... I dont even know where Montana is... but what I do know is its cold.

After having completed a 10 day silent retreat with Vipassna in the Blue Mountains...I said to myself...4 days... in the mountains... piece of cake...

So on a cold chilly morning at 6am I departed San Francisco Airport for Billings, Montana.- where ever that is.We soon landed at midday.. in the snow...(yea) and 10 beautiful women boarded the Fidel Ranch Bus and headed for the retreat...We soon arrived and got settled...

It was a real American Ranch with cows, goats and chickens... and snow... lots of it.
Day one I set my intention... worthiness. to meditate on... so we were up at 5.30am.
We were given our words of wisdom to meditate on for the day.... mine read...
"What lies behind me and what lies in front of me, pales in comparision to what lies inside of me"".... great the universe is playing in my sandbox again....

So let me give your the picture... 10 women... now allowed to connect with each other or talk for the next 4 days.... mmmmmmmmmm.
As the group started to wander in....... in what appeared to be Artic Expedition attire.... I knew immediately I was underdressed. I managed to borrow a pair of ski pants before I left Boston, and buy what looked like a dead racoon hat which took me straight out of a Dr Sharvargo movie.

We all lined up our reclining deckchairs on the outside deck (yes outside)..... climbed into our sleeping bags and began to meditate. I have a duck down jacket, two pairs of socks, 5 jumpers, a balaclava, my dead racoon on my head, two sleeping bags and two blankets. And I am still freezing....

Meditation has begun... and we are waiting for the sun to rise.
me: shut up and be silent
my mind: wonder how the people are going back home
me: shhhhhhhhhh
my mind: its bloody cold here and I dont think I can feel my toes
me: will you stop being dramatic
my mind: I wonder if I have frost bite and my toes are going to fall off....
me: shhhhhhhhhhhhh
my mind: If my toes fell off I wonder if could still ski or hike...in fact I wonder if there is any sport I can do without my toes...
I love my toes... thank you god for my toes.
My teeth is chattering... is that cheating...??

People are getting adjusted and making noise, moving around and getting comfortable.
My mind: Cant they see that I am meditating, cant they be quiet.
me: shhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
I am still waiting for the sun to rise. The next thing I open my eyes and I think I have falled asleep.Oh no I have missed the sunrise. Lucky I still have tomorrow.

Now the benefit about meditating is.. if you close your eyes and fall asleep... noone knows...they think you are meditating.... but if you do it in the Montana... when you wake up you may find that its so cold... that your eyelashes are frozen and stuck together (yepp you betcha).

My nose is cold, I cant feel my toes, my fake racoon is snap frozen and my eyelashes are falling out.... and I have to go to the bathroom...Why do I always have to go to the bathroom when I meditate?
I can leave now... but I will become one of those noisy people who bothered me at the beginning... or I can hang on and wonder if my bladder will explode.
Then the chime goes off ... I am out of there....

You may ask why would I subject myself to this?....... I am glad you asked...... After two days I managed to get the left side of my brain to finally stop chattering and open the right side of my brain.. It is there where I find a place of absolute peace, serenity,love and creativity. A place that has no concept of time. It is when I come out of that place where I managed to create the structure of my book in which I have been trying to write for the past 14 months.

Whats with the -22.22222222222222222............. well thats what the temperature was one morning when we were waiting for the sun to rise.(thats -8 for the USA people).

Where to next... South America to thaw out my toes

Chow...
Katrina

Christmas 2010...............

Hi friends and family...

Well its official... I have finally ticked off No 5 off my list.... I finally had my white christmas....
This year I am proud to announce that Marcy, Alex and I celebrated Christmas at Lake Tahoe...
It was a few firsts for me...
First white Christmas
First night Skiing
First Black diamond run in Tahoe
First official whipeout by a chairlift
First car spin out in a blizzard... hitting a guard rail.....
coooool... my life is so enriched....

In San Francisco....I managed to catch up with Lisa and Dianna.. my girlfriends whom I stayed with when my journey began. We spent a fun but cold evening on a San Francisco trolly...... singing Christmas carrols..... wearing Santa hats... spreading Christmas cheer and sightseeing the Christmas lights on the beautiful Victorian archtecture.

I managed to skip the fireworks on New Years Eve and had an early night.... in preparation for the Bridge Watch programme. A friend of mind Brando Jessie created a programme called Bridge watch. The purpose of the programme is awareness and prevention of Suicides off the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. He is a truely wonderful and inspiring person..So we spent 10 hours .... walking 10 miles back and forth across the Goldengate bridge ....connecting with people... and watching out for people wanting to jump.... It was cold, windy and raining... but at the same time rewarding....The walk was a great place to start the new year, reflecting on
the completion of 2010 and its blessings, and choosing to celebrate life itself.
There have been over 2000 people who have jumped... but none on 1 January 2011 this year...
www.247woc.com/bridgewatch.htm

And December 2010 also bought us the passing of our Grandy back in Australia.
My heart and love goes out to Mam, the English and Boyle Family.

Take care and god bless..

Katrina

Where is Kat now??????

Hi family, friends and blogspotters,
It has been a while since I last wrote to you all.
Sorry, but I have been busy.....you may say... busy doing what when you are not working and travelling the world...?????
Well ... here is what I have been upto since last time we connected...

The last time we spoke... I had just finished volunteering at the Autism Treatment Centre. I met a wonderful grandmother of a beautiful austistic boy, her name is Mukee. She is Australian and now living in Phoenix. She was such a beautiful soft organic woman who reminded me of the fairy godmother. She offered her house in Phoenix to me and as I was thinking about it.. she handed me her business card...
There it was "Mukee Okan"....... "your orgasm's best friend, sexuality coaching and education"
....tantra... erotic intelligence....www.spiritfireproductions.com... so what could I do... but book the next flight out of town to Phoenix. Now every woman (whether flashpacking or not) can use a fairy godmother to teach you a little bit of erotic intelligence.... So I was soon off to Phoenix to spend the week with Mukee.

As I entered (excuse the pun) her house the most beautiful Native American erotic paintings decorated her walls. She had painted them herself..She had hundreds of books on sexuality and sensuality filling her bookshelf. I asked her if I were here for a week what should I read.. she handed me a book... and there it was "tantric Orgasm for Women" by Diana Richardson. Over the next week my speed reading skills came into good use.... as I devoured 4 books. I found myself each morning meditating to her famous Orgasm poster .....and absorbed every morsel of information that she was willing to share with me. ...I finished the week with my first traditional pipe smoking sweatlodge ceremony and some new found skills. (yes she does run courses in Australia).

I found myself back in New York staying at Miss Tess' place in Brooklyn.(thank you so much for accomodating me) and after escaping Guatelmalas earthquakes, volcano eruptions, sinkhole and mudslide....earlier this year.... I managed to find myself
in my first tornado....the wind blew so hard I thought it was going to shatter the
windows .... and I have never seen the rain fall so hard and in circles. That night Tess and I took a walk in the area... trees uprooted and fallen on cars, traffic lights torn out of the ground.... I had just survived my first tornado... cool... and it wansnt even on my list.

In October I went to my first David Deida course... a speaker who I have been following his work for several years...who teaches feminine and masculine energy and polarity. He has not been working for the last year so I was excited to be able to see him... those in the Anthony Robbins world are familar with him.
The practical part of the workshop was interesting.... yes we had our clothes on.

Talking about the Anthony Robbins world.. I managed to crew an Unleash the Power Within event with Anthony Robbins in New Jersey. Its funny it doesnt matter where you are in the world.... you can crew one of those events and its like walking into family again... it was fun to lead a firwalk lane again ...but this time in the rain. I am looking forward to crewing UPW in Italy this year... I have attached a crew photo...

In November 2010 I found myself celebrating my first traditional American Halloween and I am proud to admit that I managed to carve my way through my first pumpkin after being guided by two great kids.... We spent the night with a set of 3 year old twins door knocking for candy....it was so cute when the 3 year old girl greeted each candy giver with the words "does your chocolate have nuts... I cant eat nuts."

I managed to find a new friend DR Barry Taylor... natropath, sharman and healer...
I have been very fortunate with volunteering in his practice in Boston for the last 2 months. Learning, growing and getting my health into great shape..
We managed to do some great volunteer work with the Gourmet Guys. We had about 40 men come in with delicious home made dishes raising money for a battered womens shelter. We came equipped with our famous Curry Carrot soup.... (guaranteed to extend your eye sight by another 40 years).

Thanksgiving bought us to feeding the homeless at a Mens shelter near Boston...It was so rewarding to spend the morning feeding these beautiful lost souls....Barrys two sons were there to complete Team Taylor..

so where am I now.............. Boston......

love and hugs
Katrina